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Today's Poll!Missouri marijuana legalization petition filed
Thursday, July 7, 2011
COLUMBIA, Mo. (AP) — Missouri marijuana advocates want to ask voters next year to legalize the drug and regulate its medical use.
A group called Show-Me Cannabis filed its initiative request with the Missouri Secretary of State on Wednesday.
If the state approves the ballot language for the proposed Missouri constitutional amendment, supporters would need to collect enough signatures from registered voters by next May to get the question on the November ballot.
The measure would decriminalize pot use, possession and small-scale cultivation by Missourians age 21 and older. It would also require the state to issue retail licenses to sell the drug and oversee a medical marijuana program.
Sixteen states have medical marijuana programs. Activists are targeting several other states next year.
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Comments
asb 1 year, 10 months ago
It's high time this is being done :)
tonto 1 year, 10 months ago
Is it 4:20 yet?
jcmom69 1 year, 10 months ago
ok.. throw stones if you will at my opinion here... While I am not a marijuana smoker, there are numerous people mainly teens actually dying at the hands of the synthetic stuff sold at the smoke shops. While I do not uphold it as a general rule, I do see advantages of legalizing it. I have not read or seen on the news people dying from smoking real marijuana. You can see where I am going with this, so I will end my opinion here.
tonto 1 year, 10 months ago
Yup, it's just a quick downhill slide. Smoke a little marijuana and next thing you know, you're over at Cirilla's buying lotions and trinkets and furry handcuffs. After that you have to become gay and wear a purple mesh vest and spiky jello-colored hair.
jeffcitygirl 1 year, 10 months ago
And it's not corruption now that breeds drug dealers? You think people are ever going to stop smoking it just because it's "illegal" and YOU deem it "depraved?" It's a weed that grows in the ground. Bet you're just fine with prescription pharmaceuticals, chemicals that get you entirely more baked out of your gourd than this plant does. Alcohol makes you more "corrupt and depraved" than a little weed. Eye roll Graceful, you are "full" of something, and it's not grace, it's yourself.
bluenurse 1 year, 10 months ago
Prohibition didn't work, Graceful.
jcmom69 1 year, 10 months ago
tee hee hee.. ;-) couldn't help but giggle
JCLifer 1 year, 10 months ago
I would rather legalize pot and make alcohol illegal.
wcywing 1 year, 10 months ago
During prohibition, it was like that. Canibus should not be a felony
tonto 1 year, 10 months ago
Been eating those ALice B. Toklas cookies again?
jcmom69 1 year, 10 months ago
I agree JCLifer... a decline in alcohol related accidents would most likely occur.. I am not sure I am aware of any DWH driving while high fatalities;-).. Hmm.. makes ya wonder..
asb 1 year, 10 months ago
That is medically untrue. Pot causes far less impairment, lower variations of technical, speed, distance and timing judgement. Most of all, Booze impairs inhibitions while pot amplifies them.
tonto 1 year, 10 months ago
Your source is noted but suspect. That is a white paper - not a research paper. More recent research makes the issue murky but many people still believe the gateway drug theory.
JMO 1 year, 10 months ago
I have no problem with the idea that pot causes driving impairment. But it's unimportant to the issue of legalization. Drinking too much cough syrup, taking Nyquil or popping several antihistimines would impair you as well and you could be convicted under DWI laws. Just make sure pot is still classed as a drug - just not a controlled substance.
JMO 1 year, 10 months ago
Again you miss the point of my statements. DWI is DWI and it totally doesn't matter whether it is a legal or illegal substance.
JMO 1 year, 10 months ago
Yes Graceful, that's exactly what I think. There's a huge nyquil problem in this country. People everywhere are driving with clear sinuses, but sleepy brains. Thank God they took the pseudoephedrine out - we're all much safer now. Could you possibly be more obtuse?
asb 1 year, 10 months ago
You are wrong Grace. First of all, use patterns and effects are different. But when apple/orange differences are worked in, marijuana is less imparing than alchohol. Yes, you can smoke yourself into a stumbling stupor, trust me. But, it is not as imparing of reflexes or technical judgement. Drinking AND smoking pot can be very impairing . . . it's hard to drive and barf at the same time though, so still . . .any cop would rather deal the a stone than a drunk.
jcmom69 1 year, 10 months ago
I am aware that there are accidents involving drugs other than alcohol, however Grace, how often do you hear about or read about marijuana being the factor of a fatal accident? At least once a week on a norm, you will see or read about a drunk driver, usually a repeat offender being involved in an accident and more often than not the outcome is not a good one. You may not agree to legalize it and that is perfectly fine, but at least be honest about majority of contributing factors in accidents involving the two.
jcmom69 1 year, 10 months ago
I highly doubt that MANY as you say are both drunk and high...Fact is statically that fatalities involving DWI drivers are far greater than that of DUI drivers..
mmhh 1 year, 10 months ago
The comment that legalizing it would make cost go down and use go up is not all true. The cost would go down but we could tax it...highly. Use may go up for marijuana but use of other drugs that dealers push on their clients would go down. Pot is a gateway drug, not because of it's chemical make-up but because of the junk that dealers mix in it to spread their stash and to entice users into getting hooked on other drugs.
asb 1 year, 10 months ago
It's a gateway drug mostly in that it introduces users to criminals, corrupt police, and others willing to break the law to enjoy the medically proven least harmful of all the fun drugs.
JMO 1 year, 10 months ago
I do think use would go up. Maybe not regular use, but occasional, recreational use? Sure...if it's available for that at least. I know a lot of folks that don't smoke it simply because it's illegal - myself included - and I'm not going to lie to my doctor to get a prescription either. So, if it's only available medically, I doubt anyone who doesn't do it now, because it's illegal, will do it then. Does that make any sense?
I don't think cost would go down. When did government regulation of any legal substance decrease the cost of it?
asb 1 year, 10 months ago
An illegal drug trade, of any drug, is always more destructive to a free society than a legal drug trade. When a trade is unregulated, hidden, untaxed, and lucrative, it doesn't diminish use, it only corrupts the users and the enforcers of the illegality. People in China and Iran are killed for selling or even having drugs, but those are not free societies. In America, there is too much money in fun drugs to avoid corruption of law enforcement and laundering of profits through otherwise legitimate but now corrupt businesses. There may or may not be moral, ethical or medical reasons to not use a drug, and there are certainly all those reasons not to abuse drugs; but in America, their use cannot be prevented, so use must be regulated to control corruption, and resources now wasted on our corrupt war on drugs could be used to educate about, treat, and mitigate abuse.
soxfan 1 year, 10 months ago
i agree with all of the answers and to add to this it smells bad-like garbage and if you smoke it you smell bad too don l chicago
muleman 1 year, 10 months ago
Ok, how about the medicinal use of it? People with cancer on chemo have no appetite, pot has been proven to make these people eat and reduce depression. It also works as a pain reliever. There is an eye disease that pot has been proven to help too. Montell swears it helps his MS symptoms. Pot has many uses besides getting stoned.
readmore 1 year, 10 months ago
IT IS NOT A GATEWAY DRUG. Grace, you watched Reefer Madness too many times. Pot smells good. Medicinal and homegrown smell the best. Legalizing will not increase usage. Google: statistics of marijuana use in amsterdam. Or look up scientific studies. There are lots of them showing use actually DECLINED in countries where it's legal. Legalizing MJ would solve most of our deficit ceiling woes. If pot was legal, the court systems wouldn't be clogged up with non violent offenders, we could let all the prisoners go that only had pot charges (of course not the ones who had hard drugs and committed violent crimes, who just happened to have a little bud on them). Why is Columbia the only place in MO that has decriminalized pot? Because they're smarter and more progressive. Because they aren't a city of rednecks. Pot is rarely "laced" with anything and users can tell if it is. Some smokers like their weed laced. They're in the minority.
readmore 1 year, 10 months ago
I'm full of desire to smoke weed, Grace. I hadn't even thought of it until I read this article and posts. People on hard drugs give pot an undeservedly bad reputation. I never smoke after drinking alcohol. They don't interact well in my body. I've never been sick from weed, but I've been sick every time I tried alcohol. Just lay around the shanty, mama and get a good buzz on. That's from the seventies. And i'm just one toke over the line. Wiz K is rollin up and Snoop is smokin endo, sippin on gin and juice. With my mind on my $$ and $$ on my mind. Kid Cudi next on the jukebox.
3bunnies 1 year, 10 months ago
Where do I Sign.
asb 1 year, 10 months ago
The supply is adequate. There is nobody more than two phone calls from any amount of pot they want. Billions of tax dollars are being lost to Gangster growers/distributors, crooked cops and money launderers, all working to keep the supply higher than the customers. Supply is not an issue, the supply chain is what's shredding Mexico and degrading our law enforcers.
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