This picture is a like a caricature of satire for poking fun at prohibitionists, complete with the think of the children meme in forefront with the falling toddler. I love it.
Generically (not always true) red states have that for gun stuff (decriminalized unregistered / federally illegal NFA items) and blue states have that for pot and maybe even something else. It's hard for me to imagine the government will eventually catch up to freedom-leaning on either side, but I agree improvements at the state level is far better than nothing.
Spending a tiny fraction of your life intoxicated allows you to make rational decisions despite occasional enjoying altered consciousness. There may be some level of brain damage but depending on the substance and how often it's used I question whether it's necessarily going to be the limiting factor in the aging body.
These drugs have been illegal for a lifetime. It's hard to get people to accept even overwhelmingly beneficial technology into the main fold of society. I'm not optimistic anything beyond weed is gonna get legalized federally in our lifetime.
I think we're better off with a rich, mixed, and multicultural society but it may actually be true that a more homogenous society that tosses fringe races into the shredder or whatever is actually a safer place for the "right" people. Maybe they were protectors in their own racist way.
This kind of hazard that helps legitimize criminality of risky health decisions (like drug consumption) is one of the major reasons why I am against taxpayer funded healthcare.
Freedom means having the ability to fuck up your own life. Having a kid means I end up with piss and shit on me and wear out my body faster yet society seems to think that's fine. I realize that's entirely different but I'm not really interested in being in the business of how you want to harm your own health.
They are not legal profits. And what they are doing in getting creative is pretty much vanilla money laundering. But to enforce the law would just invite the more violent cartels to do it instead.
The whole system of a patchwork of half-measures is really insanity in the face of the simplicity of just de-scheduling cannabis.
Controlled substance act is not a gray area anywhere in the US as far as I know. There is nothing gray at all about federal LEO raiding a dispensary on private non-federal land. These dispensaries are basically depending on the kindness of federal agencies to look the other way. As soon as they become political enemies with someone they are cooked.
But federal land is definitely the worst. I had a federal agent obtain a search warrant to strip search me and drag me to a hospital and 'internally search' my GI tract because they claimed there were drugs up my ass.
Normally I'd say you'd be right, but I was homeless on the Seattle-Norcal circuit area, with Oregon pretty squarely in the heart of that. They're a different breed.
Sweet, rather than doing it at home exclusively with people you trust, some fucking stranger in a facility can watch you at your vulnerable moments and you get to pray they don't take advantage of it.