Michigan opponents: Don’t fall for medical marijuana

Don’t fall for medical marijuana | Freep.com | Detroit Free Press
The state of Michigan is currently under attack by the pro-drug lobby in its attempts to legalize marijuana as a so-called medicine (“In Our Opinion: Yes on Prop 1: Allow seriously ill people the relief marijuana may offer,” Oct. 2).

The “pro-drug” lobby?  Nobody on our side makes the argument that we’re “pro” drugs, we argue that drugs are neither “good” nor “evil”, but that the policies we have concerning drugs are causing a great deal of harm.  It’s not my position that anyone should smoke pot; I’m saying nobody should be harassed for it.

As for “so-called” medicine, I guess “so” is shorthand for the American Academy of Family Physicians, the American Medical Student Association, the American Nurses Association, the American Society of Addiction Medicine, the British Medical Association, the French Ministry of Health, Health Canada, National Academy of Sciences Institute Of Medicine (IOM), New England Journal of Medicine, and the state Nurses Associations in Alaska, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, Mississippi, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Rhode Island, Virginia, and Wisconsin.

“Medical” marijuana is a Trojan horse for legalizing the drug itself and for making it available without regard to medical science. The real issue is public safety and the staggering effect this initiative could have on children and families residing in Michigan.

I love the “Trojan Horse” argument.  This line of reasoning says that those of us who smoke pot are “using” cancer and AIDS patients so we can legalize weed for everybody.  First of all, no cancer or AIDS patient I’ve met has ever complained about us fighting for their right to use medical marijuana.  Second, if I believe healthy people should be allowed to smoke pot, how could I not support its use by sick people?  And finally, the “Trojan Horse” argument says that we have to oppose helping cancer and AIDS patients because some healthy people might get high.  It’s like saying we can’t sell spray paint anymore because some people use it for graffiti.

As parents struggle to keep their children drug-free, it is important that they arm themselves with the facts. This dangerous initiative is loaded with unintended negative consequences.

According to the Office of Applied Studies report titled “State Estimates of Substance Use from the 1999-2006 National Surveys on Drug Use and Health,” the states that have legalized marijuana as a so-called medicine continuously rank in the top 10 for the highest recorded marijuana use for adolescents in the 12-17 age category. Do not condemn the youths of Michigan to the same statistics.

Nothing entertains me more than the selective use of statistics.  First, could it be that the states that have medical marijuana were already states where there is more marijuana use and acceptance, else those medical marijuana laws never would have passed?

Our good friend Dr. Mitch Earleywine studied this very phenomenon and found that “In every state for which there’s data, teen marijuana use has gone down since the medical marijuana law was passed, often a much larger decline than nationally.”  Use of marijuana by ninth graders in California decreased 47% in the ten years following passage of Prop 215.  Overall, declines in teen marijuana use in the 11 medical marijuana states for which data are available have slightly exceeded the national trends.

The passage of Proposal 1 would also have other direct and significant unintended consequences to the citizens of Michigan. The amount of marijuana this proposal would allow individuals to possess would create disastrous public safety issues, such as an increase in drugged driving, marijuana in the workplace, and the creation of neighborhood pot clubs.

There’s no evidence at all of increases in the twelve medical marijuana states of incidents of cannabis-imparied driving or “marijuana in the workplace”, whatever that means (are there people bringing their stash to work and lighting up on break, or does the writer refer to people who use marijuana being employed in the workplace, or is it simply “more failed pee tests”?)

In Oregon, workplace fatalities and lost-workdays from injury have declined since medical marijuana‘s advent in 1998, and DUI incidents and fatalities have dropped, too.

If passed, this proposal would allow a so-called caregiver to supply up to five “patients” at any given time, allowing them to possess 60 plants and 12.5 ounces of usable marijuana. An environment that has this amount of marijuana available is known as a grow house or pot dispensary. Dispensaries and grow houses have led to increased crime and violence in communities.

It’s intentionally misleading to say “dispensary” in the Michigan case, since their proposition gives nobody the right to sell marijuana like the California dispensaries.  A grow house is a bit of a stretch, too, as the writer is trying to tie this 60-plant medical marijuana grow site to the horror stories of tens of thousands of plants in a commercial black-market grow house.

Plus, you just have to love the use of scare quotes around the word “patient”, as if the five people with AIDS, cancer, hepatitis, MS, and glaucoma who would benefit from the crop are somehow opportunistic fakers.

Marijuana is an illegal drug, and, admittedly, it makes some people “feel good.” That is what drugs do — make you feel good. That does not make legitimate medicine.

If Michigan makes an exception for those who claim smoked marijuana is medicine, it will open the door to widespread marijuana use and fraudulent claims of illness for all drug users.

This is the kind of thinking you get from someone who believes drugs themselves are evil.  I would argue that a drug you take that makes you feel good with no harmful lasting side effects is a medicine.  What is it you want medicine to do, make you feel worse?

This is where the prohibitionist will rant, “Well, I feel good when I drink whiskey, let’s make Wild Turkey a medicine!  Smoking crack feels good, it’s a medicine, too!”  Hmm, well, are you shooting whiskey and smoking crack to treat an ailment?  Shyness and depression, perhaps?  And afterward, do you feel a lasting negative side effect?  Now, do you want to compare that to marijuana, or shall I?  Not only can I show you more benefit and less harm from social pot use than alcohol or cocaine, I can show you more benefit and less harm from medical marijuana use than synthetic Marinol or conventional opioids.

Michiganders, don’t fall for the hype against medical marijuana.  None of the twelve current medical marijuana states want to repeal it and some have had these laws in place over a decade.