Funny Quote

“[Marijuana] is not a drug. It’s a leaf.”

- California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger

so it made me happy, but it does bring up an interesting point, marijuana is simply an herb, one with not so devastating consequences that is obviously under review in California because as this blog points out its medical benefits are enormous!

Implications of the Marijuana Problem

If the decision to legalize marijuana is not resolved people are still going to use it. Some will use it for medical reasons while others, like they do now will use it for the high. If the situation is resolved in favor of legalization people who need marijuana and who will benefit by it will get there benefits, but people who are against marijuana will not be happy. Either way the decision is made people will not be happy. Somebodies feelings are going to get hurt. Though some people think that there is no question whether or not legalization in a good thing, this is an issue that needs to be re-examined now that some of the benefits of marijuana for medical purposes are known.

Some links that I find helpful

My side:These are some websites that I have used that helped me come to my conclusion that legalizing marijuana for medicine is a good thing.This website norml.org/ is really good for finding out about some of the legal issues that have come up throughout the fight for legalizing marijuana. This website shows some of the ways that marijuana can help people that have illnesses deal with both the illness and its side effects. www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/factsheet/Support/
This is another good website dealing with some of the uses for medical marijuana.
www.projinf.org/fs/marijuana.html
This website talks about what got me interested in this subject, the way that marijuana helps people who have Alzheimer's.
www.webmd.com/alzheimers/news/20061006/marijuana-may-slow-alzheimers
This is a list of the medical benefits marijuana has.
www.cnn.com/HEALTH/9702/weed.wars/facts/medicinal.users/index.html
Other side: These websites do not support the legalization of medical marijuana, instead they are against it.
This website is a website for teens and young adults warning them about the dangers of marijuana, some of the things they are saying directly contradicts the other research that I have done.
www.kidsgrowth.com/resources/articledetail.cfm?id=377
This website is against legalization but some of the things on there are crazy. It says that drugs and violence go hand in hand with pictures of terrorists, it seems to me that the site is implying that if one uses marijuana one will become a terrorist.
www.usdoj.gov/dea/demand/speakout/index.html
This website simply argues against legalization with some facts that while they appear to be scientific contradict a lot of the other things I have read.
findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1282/is_n12_v42/ai_9119707
For and against: This is a really good website that includes both reasons for and against the legalization of marijuana.
www.balancedpolitics.org/marijuana_legalization.htm#no
Facts: This is a website that provides you with facts and figures although it is from the government that is against legalization so you have to wonder if they are leaving out what could be there for legalization.
www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov/drugfact/marijuana/index.html

Theory

Theory...everyone has one and unfortunately I am going to subject you, the reader, to mine. I think that marijuana should be made into a drug, like morphine, one that you need a prescription to get. I realize that it will still be used illegally but the people who need it will have access to it without having to fear the law. Legalization became such a huge debate when research was done to show all that marijuana could do to help people who were suffering. Until that time there had been no question that once marijuana was illegal, it simply was. In order to close the debate concessions need to be made by both sides. The side against needs to realize that marijuana is not all bad but the side for needs to realize that there are some pitfalls to marijuana. I think that this is an issue that can be resolved in a way that will make both sides happy.

Alzheimer's

Alzheimer's is an illness that is one of the most devastating in the world today. It is a terminal illness of the brain. An interesting fact that many people don't know is that marijuana can slow the effects of Alzheimer's. It can actually prevent some of the inflammation in the brain which causes the forgetfulness associated with Alzheimer's. Marijuana can also give the munchies which causes people to eat. People who have Alzheimer's do not want to eat so buy smoking they would want to eat and increase there longevity.

Cancer

Though some people say that smoking marijuana causes cancer (although many other studies say that it does not), many other studies show that it actually can stop the spread of cancer as well as help with some of the effects of chemotherapy that can be harmful to the health of the patient. Marijuana had been proven to help fight brain and lung cancer. With all of the conflicting studies out there about how marijuana effects cancer patients it is obvious more research needs to be done but it appears that cancer is yet one more thing marijuana can help with.

AIDS

In the last post I talked about a lot of different things that marijuana can help with. I would really like to go through one by one and talk about how, so today I am going to focus on AIDS. AIDS as we all know is caused by HIV and is incurable. The people who are infected lead medication filled lives and are generally weak, frail, and in pain. Many studies have shown that marijuana can help ease the pain that is associated with AIDS. The people who have AIDS are in pain all the time and pain killers do not always help. Scientists have discovered that where pain killers sometimes don't work, marijuana will. Many people also believe that smoking marijuana will help AIDS patients maintain a healthy weight. Unfortunately the government is stepping in and preventing research into this matter in many cases. If proper research were allowed to be done I believe that we would find how useful marijuana could be in the prevention of the pain and sickness associated with AIDS. This is a really good sheet with FAQ's about marijuana and AIDS.

Why You should take intrest...

For those of us who don't smoke marijuana the legalization probably isn't a big deal and there are more important things however legalizing marijuana could be beneficial to all and directly impact our lives. If you search for marijuana on your search engine you are likely to come up with sites like this. Most people upon seeing that kind of a website would assume that all marijuana is for is getting high. This is just one of the many myths about marijuana. If one does more research it is plain to see that this is simply not the case. Marijuana use is higher than might be expected among middle school and high school students according to ONCDP. It is not the young that I want to focus on though, it is the benefits to the sick and the elderly. There are many arguments for the legalization of marijuana such as economic gain,keeping people out of prison, and according to some people would be fulfilling our rights as Americans. Just as there are many arguments for the legalization there are many arguments against like health, the fact that marijuana is considered to be a gateway drug, and more people would be smoking. Although some people argue against marijuana for health reasons, I am for marijuana legalization because it does have health benefits. The drug in marijuana was found to counter the inflammation of the brain in Alzheimer's patients, for example. By doing this it allows there brains to stay active longer. “The active principle in marijuana, Delta(9)-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), has been shown to have wide therapeutic application for a number of important medical conditions, including pain, anxiety, glaucoma, nausea, emesis, muscle spasms, and wasting diseases." This quote was taken from a report from a study on the effects of marijuana on sick people. Not only can marijuana help slow the effects of Alzheimer's it can also be used as an effective treatment for the effects of cancer. It can reduce the vomiting and pain that chemotherapy causes as well as giving the patient an appetite. There is even some new evidence that marijuana can cure cancer. Another fatal disease that marijuana helps with is AIDS. Some cases suggest that smoking marijuana can help get rid of the drug induced dementia in AIDS patients. It can also help them keep weight on which can be one of the major problems associated with AIDS. Marijuana does this through its main ingredient, which is specific to marijuana. If you still don't think that marijuana has benefits to outweigh its cons, here is a good website that describes in detail both the pros and the cons. As you can see there are more pros than the ones I previously mentioned. Medical marijuana is not a theory made by a bunch of hippies, in fact there are many scientific studies proving that marijuana does in fact help as well as many first hand accounts. According to this website 60 of the chemicals in marijuana help with a range of diseases. I can't find very many reasons not to legalize marijuana. I am hoping that this blog might help convince you logically why it is a good idea to have marijuana legalized.

So What?

Another question, kind of short- If marijuana is legalized how many more people will smoke than already do now? It seems to be that marijuana is pretty easy to obtain so legalizing in will actually not do any harm in that it is already obtainable so more members of society will not be effected than already are. The government reports that marijuana is the most used illegal drug although not as common as one might think. 37.7% of high school students reported smoking at least once a month. If that is high school imagine the amount of college students that smoke, those who have just gotten there freedom! In fact according to some, while illegal, marijuana use seems to be increasing. Is it really going to change anything to legalize it? Once again-thoughts?

Eating

So I have never smoked pot, as previously mentioned but I have heard that it gives you the "munchies." Basically after ingesting marijuana people have the urge to eat. Some doctors have heard this to and they got to thinking that giving marijuana to people with Alzheimer's was a good idea. Ludicrous as this sounds at first it could actually be a good idea. People with Alzheimer's are forgetful, which means they could forget to eat. If given marijuana they would eat thereby slowing down the rate at which they got sick and allowing caretakers to have one less thing to worry about. Although one would start to wonder if the patient would need less or more care while under the influence of marijuana...Any thoughts? Here are some sights that you can go to to that show some of the studies done on marijuana and Alzheimer's.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,148518,00.html
www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2005/02/050224111638.htm
www.livescience.com/health/061005_alzheimers_marijuana.html
www.webmd.com/alzheimers/news/20061006/marijuana-may-slow-alzheimers

Why?

The question of the day is why legalize marijuana? What are the benefits and are there any negatives? There are of course pros and cons to every issue but in this case the pros seem to outweigh the cons. Through the course of this blog I hope to find out conclusively, at least in my opinion, why or why not the legalization of marijuana is a good thing. Going into my research I am a proponent of legalization so it may surprise you to know that I have never used marijuana so legalizing it will not help me directly. I think that legalizing marijuana will have health and economic benefits. And honestly it really won't change the number of users that much. Marijuana seems to be easy enough to find based on the number of people I know that are habitual users or that have just tried it. According to the national survey on drug users and health over 40% of the population age 12 and over have used marijuana at least once. That's 97.5 million people! (http://www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov/drugfact/marijuana/index.html) With numbers like these it seems like legalizing marijuana wouldn't do much to the current amount of users. Also with that amount of people if marijuana was legalized a tax could be imposed that could boost the economy, provide for welfare, and start paying off the enormous amount of debt accumulated. Along with the economic benefits there are also very present health benefits. For example marijuana can slow down the effects of Alzheimer's and help cancer patients deal with the pain of chemotherapy. It also causes the "munchies" which will make people with these diseases want to eat. So these are my thoughts going into the matter. Hopefully during my research I can find out if legalization will cause any dire consequences or if it will help the economy and health without any negative consequences. So any thoughts on the matter, what do you think, do the pros outweigh the cons?