Phelps BONG hit

whether you can actually see the weed is irrelevant, it's obvious he's getting high. I dont believe weed should be illegal. it's completely harmless. and you're completely right, how many people run from the cops drunk or beat their wife drunk and how many do those things high? high people just sit around and giggle and eat and weed is less destructive on your body. however, here in the states weed is illegal and will probably remain that way for decades to come. The government has spent too much money fighting weed and spent too much time telling us it's wrong to turn around and start growing and selling it tomorrow. So even though i dont think smoking it is a big deal, it is still illegal. and while i dont have a problem with him doing it, it was poor judgment on his part. not everyone comes out better off for getting busted. look at Vick, he got busted for dog fighting and lost over 100 million in endorsements and contracts. i see your point but that doesn't change the fact that its illegal, whether it should be or not.

 

His poor judgement seems to be on the part of him having poor friends for reporting him. I mean I am Canadian and we have had our fair share of olympic disasters, but seriously the guy trained forever to win his 8 gold medals and now he has 4 more years before he has to do it again. Why not take a little breath of fresh air and relax. Sure it is illegal....I don't do it, but I do speed occasionally and also enjoy walking across the street wherever I want. Just my 2 cents.

Oh and I just can't wait for 2012 when they have a picture of Phelps with 8 more medals around his neck and this picture in the background.

 

I applaud you tigerfan for living your life on the right side of the law! However my beef is with said law. Yes I smoke weed, every day in fact. I don't consider myself a stoner, however I know many. I really wish we could at the least decriminalize it so that people who use and need this for medicine can have good safe access to quality medication. And all the people who don't want to try it because it is illegal even though it may help them tremendously. In both our countries we spend millions if not billions of dollars on pharmaceutical drugs. Lots of them with serious side effects treated by more pharmaceutical's. Marijuana no matter what government says has medical benefits, its been used for 1000's of years in other cultures, and it is criminal to disallow people safe access to this medicine. My other beef is hemp, the original US constitution was printed on hemp paper. The US was a major producer of industrial hemp until prohibition. Hemp has so many uses is crazy that were not growing the stuff. Especially with the "green" movement, and also think of how many jobs could be created with production and development of hemp products.

I first heard of this picture on local news, they reported that a British newspaper was running the story. Now what are the odds that this picture was taken by a "friend" and posted on facebook or some similar site amongst friends, and it just so happens that some reporter from across the pond saw the pic and made a story out of it?

In a way its good, it shows that marijuana isn't as bad as our governments would like us to believe, and the more people see and talk about it, the better for ending this ridiculous war on drugs! I believe this is a fight worth fighting, and I believe its a fight that can be won!

 

I think you and i see eye to eye on most of this stuff. I take ambien and valium and lunesta for sleep problems (obviously not at the same time, i try to rotate so i dont get use to any of them too fast). But all of them have some pretty negative side effects (memory loss, sleep walking, extremely bizarre dreams etc...) but weed can put me to sleep naturally and i sleep well and wake up feeling fine instead of drowsy. i'd love to be able to get weed legally for a sleep aid and be able to trash all my pills. But i dont see that happening for a long long time.

here's what bothers me. i understand the need for a "war on drugs". drugs like heroine, coke, ex, stuff like that. But weed is completely harmless. yet the government spends millions every year investigating, busting, and prosecuting weed smokers/dealers, who are partaking in a substance that is less harmful than booze. if weed were legalized, the government could step in and regulate it, like they do with tobacco. This would dew a few things. (1) it would free up millions of dollars that are being spent on fighting weed. so, the government immediately starts saving money. (2) the government can now grow and distribute and guess what....TAX weed. hell, make it a decent size tax like tobacco and booze and make some money off of it, i dont care. Give it a legal age like booze, make it so you have to be 21 to smoke it. once again, i dont care. i have no problem with regulating it but making it illegal is stupid. Either way, the government has already begun saving money by not fighting weed, now they can MAKE money by growing it, selling it, and taxing it. (3) here is another profitable crop for farmers to make money off of. Here is another product for advertising firms to make money off of. here is something else for the American public to buy (stimulating the economy). another product for retailers to stock and sell. (4) legalization would also take a large number of dealers off the street. sure, there will still be dealers for the hard stuff but now you have a few less shady customers to have to watch out for. (5) the fast food business, snack cake business, and chip business would thrive! Either way, legalization would be beneficial to the government, the economy and the general population. you can chose not to smoke just like you can chose not to drink. but keeping it illegal and putting so much effort and money into demonizing it and its users doesn't make sense on any level... especially the fiscal level.

Why are we not doing this? The government has spent the better part of the last century telling everyone that weed is evil. smoking weed makes you stupid. it makes you run over little girls on bikes with your car. it makes you play with guns and accidentally shoot your best friend. buying weed supports al quida (seriously, wtf!). even if it was true that buying it supports terrorism, if it were legal, buying would mean supporting America since the government would get their cut of the profits). They have spent so much time and money on making it the most evil substance in the world, they cant just turn around and say "you know what? we were thinking about it and weed really isn't that bad after all. so go ahead and buy it from us now". i dont think we'll see legal weed in America (at least nationwide) in the next 20 years.

and keep in mind i have never been a big toker, so this rant is not coming from a seasoned pot head that just wants to see his vice legalized. For the record i would never pay for a prostitute but i think it should also be legalized.... but thats a whole other discussion.

 

its an herb, most herbs have positive affects. it is a painkiller and helps with sleep. i'm sure there is other stuff but i have never researched it a great deal.

 

In my case, it turns an asshole into a pretty nice guy.

 

My Father-in-Law smoked marijuana while cancer ate him alive. It helped keep his appetite up and also eliminated some of the nausea that was associated with the chemo treatments. He actually preferred pot over oxycontin and liquid morphine that he had prescriptions for. He was 46 years old when he died.

 

i have a medical card for my muscle spasms. im legal to smoke here in CA. others get it for cancer, sport injuries, anxiety, and heres a list of more from a site

Diseases / Conditions AIDS (HIV) & AIDS Wasting Alzheimer's Disease Appetite / Nausea Arthritis Asthma / Breathing Disorders Chemotherapy Crohn's / Gastrointestinal Disorders Epilepsy / Seizures Glaucoma Hepatitis C Migraines Multiple Sclerosis / Muscle Spasms Pain / Analgesia Psychological Conditions Tourette's Syndrome Terminally Ill

 

christ, there's a lot worse things to do than smoke weed. if anything, it would have a slightly negative effect on one's athletiscm

 

New studies are finding THC to actually help fight lung cancer, people with chronic pain, arthritis, glaucoma, eating disorders, chemo and cancer patients all can benefit from marijuana. People should at least be given the option to chose a natural medicine over prescription drugs. If this plant were found today deep in the rainforest, it would be a miracle plant. You can already buy synthetic THC capsules, obviously the big pharmaceutical companies think there is good in it. They just don't want you to be able to grow your own medicine. Obama has said before he got into office that he is in favor of decriminalization, the end could be nearer then you think. I am hopeful that marijuana will be an election issue in BC in our provincial election coming in May.

Nd, I agree with you for the most part, however I do disagree with you take on hard drugs. I do think the government should regulate and "sell" hard drugs. Now I'm not going to say there good quite the contrary, I have witnessed first hand the depths an addict will go to get there fix. But I do think that we need to stop thinking of addicts as criminals and think of them as human beings with a medical condition. These people will do crazy stupid things to get there drug, but thats the drug forcing them, they are quite literally powerless against it. Withdrawal from a heroin addiction can be lethal without proper care. We need to treat and help these people with medical treatment. That means legal needle exchange, safe injection sites where the quality and quantity of drug, as well as the patient can be monitored by health care professionals. If we legalize and tax marijuana, cut back on DEA budgets, and put that money towards helping the addicts, we win 2 fold. 1 we take the drugs away from the gangs and organized crime, and 2 we reduce poverty, thus reducing a lot of the crime associated with addicts. I know this won't happen overnight, but drugs are going to find there way onto the street one way or another, no matter how much money we throw away trying to stop it. The War on drugs was never meant to be won.

 

see i have an issue with that. i dont see addiction as a medical condition. i see it as someone being stupid and not my problem. if these programs were instituted then they would be payed for by taxpayers money, and i dont want my money going to needles for junkies. i've been addicted to substances before. i thought i was becoming addicted to booze and took the steps to ensure that i wouldn't be. I agree the war on drugs will never be won, but i'd rather not give my money to the addicts. When i worked at the mental hospital we dealt with the mentally ill and addicts. the addicts were impossible to deal with and they were there by their own doing. sorry, but i have no sympathy for someone who digs their own grave and i dont want my money to pay for the shovel

 

i am enjoying the two sided debate in this topic and all the strong points being made from each side so i figured i would throw my two cents in.

The War on Drugs will never work out because everybody is trying to fix the problem from the wrong end. IMO there are two different types of people out there... addicts(medically proven) and users (non addictive traits). I know both types of people first hand and it's easy to tell which is which because addicts cannot control their behavior when it comes to getting their fix but users can just get over the fact that their out of their drug of choice with some will power and move on.
I believe that the government could get a program started that would work out for the addicts/ users in this country without costing the taxpayers a shitload of money if they would just promote information up front about drugs and fight it from a beginning stand point, kind of similar to what Holland does. Most of the money spent in Holland on drugs is not for prevention but for education as to what addicts are and how drugs work so that everyone knows the risks involved and can make an educated decision. Here, the only things I have learned about drugs have been experimental due to the fact that all through school all we ever heard was "don't do it " because it's bad or taboo but that usally just makes younger people more curious, Like Phelps here.
I guess the point i'm trying to make is that if people want to do drugs, they're going to do drugs but at least they need to know the dangers of addiction and how to overcome it from what they might have learned in school or a program.

and who cares if Phelps smoked or not... he sure won't swim any damn faster!!

 

I was just watching CNN, This pic was taken in South Carliona and the cops/DA are talking about pressing charges on Phelps! NOW thats a gawd dam joke!!!!



Good reading in these posts BTW

 

Visa backs Olympic star Phelps after apology for marijuana pic


http://www.google.com/hostednews/canadianpress/article/ALeqM5g_sbd_-4VcQInzqqm2PQuioEN6hg

 

Great thread guys. Keep em coming!

Nd, I get that you don't want your tax money buying needles. But the thing is your tax money is already buying the needles. Welfare, hospital bills, Law enforcement... The money is already being spent. Take East Hastings street in Vancouver, its estimated that it costs the tax payer $40,000 a year per homeless person. It might not be as high in your particular area. However the US average is probably pretty high.

Drug addiction for the most part doesn't happen the first time someone try's a drug. I agree with what Gonzo said, users are totally different then addicts. Its the addicts that need our help. For the most part users can still eat, and have a place to live. If people were more educated of the dangers they could make a better decision. However there are people now that are past the point of education. There body's are physically addicted to the drug. Without help its unlikely they can ever totally kick it. Some addicts are created over time through years of mental and physical abuse. They turn to the drug to escape something, or someone. We need to understand these people and how they became addicts to fix the problem.

Going back to decriminalizing marijuana, if police forces didn't need to be concerned with arresting people for marijuana related offenses, they could spend more time and money stopping the harder drugs. Meth is a drug that should be relatively easy to eradicate in that one of its main ingredients is purchased at pharmacies.

http://www.drugsense.org/wodclock.htm this is an interesting site that tracks how much the war on drugs costs.

 

You know if he was hitting a beer bong no one would care.