Debunking ‘No on I-502′ Video

Yeah…you know something has gone wrong with NORML when they kick those two out.

Thanks for confirming that if you are not showing evidence of impaired driving and evidence of impairment, you won’t have a problem. Or did the Fourth Amendment get repealed when I wasn’t looking?

As for the law being “unscientific,” wrong. Unnecessary? The feds think it is necessary to have zero tolerance per se laws for active thc and metabolites. The legislature at any time could pass a per se ng limit by simply amending the current DUI law. Defining the per se limit at 5 ng active combined with the necessity to have probable cause and evidence of impairment precludes a legislative fiat.

Everything you say is utterly and completely without factual merit.

Impairment is a fundamental part of any DUI stop & arrest. There is just no way for it ever to be “no longer required to get convictions”. Its the PC for the stop, the field test, the breathalyzer, and the blood draw.

In the absence of provable impairment, a DUI case falls apart. Unless cops start violating the law, nothing changes post 502.

“A per se drugged driving law is one in which a specified level of a drug in the body of a driver is defined as an offense.”

“In concept it is not necessary to prove driver impairment to convict an offender under a per se law.”

I-502 DUI is FEDERAL POLICY, written by a former federal prosecutor!

This is why the ONDCP has not campaigned against I-502 beyond the few early false debates set up by Alison Holcomb.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/ondcp/issues-content/drugged-driving/nida_dd_paper.pdf

I know. I felt the same way when I read that document. What a scam per se laws are!

Tell that to Mr. McKay. He said he wrote it at the first Seattle-King County LWV debate.

Thanks for providing the cite, D42

Not true. That is EXACTLY what “per se” means. Look it up.

You’re arguing like an idiot.

The “per se” means, whether or not this limit impairs you (as in, three days after you smoke a joint – or even a single day, for that matter – you exhibit this level), you will be legally treated as though you were impaired as much as someone who is trailing clouds of pot smoke down the highway.

People are not opposed to the DUI aspect: they’re opposed to being treated like they just chugged six martinis ten seconds ago when they actually only had a Zima two days ago.

You’re wrong. We won. Deal with it.

If that was what I said, you might have an argument there. Look at the laws and the science and you will see I am right. NORML has campaigned against a 5 nanogram per se standard and only this year decided it was best for cannabis patients to “take one for the movement” and ignore the flaw in the law. Laugh it up and keep the reefer madness quotes coming, Mr Umm.

Ummm… You are an ass-hat who is unable to form an argument and can only mock others while completely missing the point.

LOL…your prices will go UP under I-502! Read the tax plan. Black market thrives under I-502.

Please show me the links to where “every economist whose ever lived” has said that about I-502.

They obviously didn’t read the tax structure LOL

Rational choice theory is garbage.

I’ve really been enjoying your comments, Jillian, and respect your thought process, but I think you may have overlooked something on the cost issue.

First, let me say I agree with most of what you say: especially the DUID has the potential to become a creeping HORROR. The PRESUMPTIVE limit means you’re considered guilty based strictly on the limit and not impairment, thus *responsible as though you were impaired*, irrespective of any actual level of impairment, and can be tested for this at basically the absolute discretion of any cop. How about this scenario: you’re peripherally involved in a vehicular accident where someone loses their life, three days after smoking a joint at home, but the person that actually *caused* the accident points to the DUID results from the post-accident testing and suddenly YOU’RE the *presumptive cause* of the whole thing. Congratulations, you’re the top target in a vehicular homicide witch hunt by prosecutors hungry for public examples to beat low-information voters over the head with to drive legalization back to the Stone Age (no pun intended). We *badly* need some objective scientific test for IMPAIRMENT… accepting the 5ng/ml limit — particularly since you personally have absolutely no way to test yourself, so you *can’t even know when you’re violating it* — is a HORRIBLE bargain with an unknown devil. We need to address that first thing.

But as to the economics: I think you’re shortcutting past something. You’re assuming an initial state where the market has already set the price free of other forces: but actually, the two big reasons people spend hundreds of dollars per ounce rather than smoke free by growing it are: a) expertise and b) criminal risk.

You can get the expertise, but only by assuming the criminal risk. Virtually every cent you pay a dealer is, in effect, payment to keep the most serious criminal risks off your own premises, totally unrelated to the actual costs necessary to produce, process & distribute what is after all a hardy plant, not a scarce resource. Right now the price reflects “What do you have to pay everyone in the chain to risk jail to get this to you,” not its real cost. Now, it will probably be iffy for the first few legal providers, but once agribusiness gets into it, with all the political behind the scenes winks and handshakes, there will be huge scale production WITHOUT the criminal risk, which by some estimates is 99% of the price (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/07/legalizing-marijuana-washington-colorado_n_2088375.html) NORML (quoted at HuffPost) projects it to actually cost more like $3/oz to produce, in the absence of criminal risk!! Figuring at a simplistic level, tax that at 25% three different times and it’s still under seven bucks an ounce. (At one point even says, “Marijuana could cost as little as 20 cents per pound to produce, according to Slate.”) (But I have the feeling “dollars per ounce” is rapidly going to become an anachronistic, or at least deprecated, measure of value. Quick, without looking, How many ounces in the pack of cigarettes you just bought, and what was the per-ounce price? Ok, now how about in that six-pack?)

This would follow the model of alcohol, which was so much more expensive under prohibition than before or after. (Although quality moonshine still draws a premium price, as a hard-to-find rarity. Boutique outlaw trade will not go away, but bulk supply will no longer be in the outlaw wheelhouse. The big scandal is going to be the first time a huge legally-grown Washington shipment ends up in Oregon or elsewhere. Easier to smuggle into Oregon from Washington or from Mexico, hm?)

So, I just think we don’t *know* on price yet, and it will be a multi-stage “settling” process where once again the pioneers will get the arrows and the settlers will get the land.

But keep up the reasoned comments in the face of knee-jerk glee. And try not to call the monkeys names, it only obscures the reason of your points and makes them hoot louder.

You say: “State police will be absolutely powerless to bust you for possession of cannabis.”

But the sentence is not complete. It should say State police will be absolutely powerless to bust you for possession of cannabis, unless you are under 21, have more than one ounce, share with your friends, buy it from a dealer, grow it, consume it in public, display it in public, or drive the next morning.

What I have a hard time understanding is exactly when it is legal under 502… because it seems to me it is only legal if you are 21, buy less than one ounce at a state store, smoke it alone at home with the shades drawn and avoid driving for a week or so while you drink detox tea so you can be certain not to fail the invasive and unscientific DUID tests.

Police don’t generally bust down doors because a neighbor smells weed. We already have laws on the books in Seattle that make it a low priority for law enforcement, and since SOOOOO many people have made the effort to get off their couch and go see a doctor to get an authorization, police are even less likely to “bust down your door” knowing you could be a patient. Because you are healthy… or too lazy to see a doctor, you want to punish patients who are working within a GOOD SYSTEM so that casual stoners can have the illusion of protection? Really? My Dog!!! You are not the sharpest crayon in the box.

Yes. I worked in a dispensary, and can’t help thinking about the grandmother who would bring her 17 year old grandson who had Parkinson’s disease and was blind in for his medication. Granted, his condition was so severe that he could not drive, but we had other patients who were under 21 who had leukemia, severe seizures, genetic conditions and so on. These patients did not get their prescriptions from MMJ clinics. They got them from physicians at real hospitals who know that it provides effective relief with few side effects. I met one 19 year old patient who was going through chemo and could not eat until she got her prescription. She had lost so much weight it was endangering her health and lowering her blood cell counts. She had to drive to get there, but under 502s zero tolerance policy for minors, she will no longer be able to access her medicine. But what do you care about her? You just want to get high and play video games or whatever.

Even if you don’t consider that people under 21 get sick and injured, you have to consider that sometimes, kids just experiment. You did. I did… most of us here did…. Why should we burden our children with a DUID because they smoked a little at a party last week then got pulled over and tested because of the way they dress or the stickers on their car or whatever?

Kids will get a hold of it regardless, and doing so should not ruin their lives…. especially considering that youth in low income neighborhoods and young people of color will be more vulnerable to such prosecution, just as they have under drug war policies for years.

I am in my mid thirties, but I was a teenager once, and, amazingly enough, I still consider them human beings and believe they should be allowed to make their own mistakes and learn from them. If they are clearly impaired and driving, they should be arrested… but zero tolerance means they would have to wait up to a month after smoking to safely drive without fear of arrest. I also think that young people should be shown compassion when they become very sick or are severely injured.

I am trying to protect patients and young people from life-changing arrests, and you are trying to protect people who smoke alone at home to enhance their favorite TV show. You said you got the impression I am a teenager when in fact I have two degrees that make me much more qualified to understand this law than you seem to be. My impression of you is this: You are a very lonely person who has nobody to share his stash with (as that would be a felony under 502), lives in an apartment, and is so hated by his neighbors he fears they might report the smell of pot being emitted form his darkened den. You don’t make much money, so would never buy more than an ounce anyway, and have never suffered enough to understand the pain that many MMJ patients are in. You just want to get high and watch sci-fi movies because you prefer to live in a fantasy world where everything is how you wish it were rather than how it is. 502 IS a bad law… and you ARE an idiot.

You are wrong. The zero tolerance DUID policy for minors does not include an exemption for patients. It is also illegal to grow under 502, so patients who can not afford to pay double for their meds with all the additional state taxes will not be able to access their medication legally. Growers will also be more vulnerable to arrest… so where are you going to get your “legal” ounce to smoke alone in your apartment with the shades drawn? 502 will also put legitimate dispensaries out of business. You are willing to call these people profiteers for earning a living by putting themselves at risk (because as you stated, even MMJ laws don’t override federal laws) to provide safe legal access to legitimate patients…. and yet you don’t see how not allowing people to grow their own creates a state monopoly on “legal” pot and creates an environment where the patients who are growing now will be at greater risk and the only “people” who can safely grow within this system are Corporate Persons like Marlborro… who has already purchased land in the emerald triangle in the event that national legalization takes place. How do you not get it?

That’s only a partially true statement. It doesn’t have to change the laws to effect it. You can’t say the DUI doesn’t effect patients. And you also do not know how collective gardens will be regulated after this either. The truth is, we won’t know until we know.

Nice try, but it is still illegal even on the state level. This is decriminalization, meaning you might have an exemption to the crime. That’s a far cry from being “legal”. The only way it will be “legal” at the state level is when we finally have the balls to take it completely out of the state’s controlled substances list.

LOL…I know it is frustrating for you to have facts thrown in your face when you want to pretend that I-502 is “legalization”. Unlike the others here promoting this sham, I have posted links to back up my comments.

“I also seriously suspect that you are a black-market drug dealer.”

I seriously suspect that you have nothing of value to add, so resort to insults and ridicule.

I think you’re absolutely right. The reason cannabis has been illegal for so long is because there are a lot of people who profit from prohibition. That’s EXACTLY what we’re seeing in all of these anti 502 comments. They don’t want cannabis to be legalized because their selfish profit margins will shrink.

This post doesn’t make any sense…

Do you know ANYTHING about 502?

Here.

Nothing changes for under 21′s. This is not a reason to support or oppose 502.

DUID provisions are vital to attracting mainstream support. Voters don’t care that you smoke too much to drive legally. Just like they don’t care about alcoholics who drink too much to drive legally. Or people who take too many narcotic painkillers to drive legally. The exemption you seem to think patients deserve is not an appropriate issue for the initiative process.

We don’t allow public display of alcohol. We don’t really even allow smoking in public. Prohibiting public display of cannabis is common sense.

The state is not involved in production, processing, or sale. The Liquor Control Board will issue permits to PRIVATE businesses – that’s it.

I don’t care what you suspect. I am not going to let you slander me because my valid points about a dangerous piece of legislation that threatens civil liberties are not in keeping with what you want to believe. Black market dealers will benefit from 502 and I am arguing against it. Maybe you are a dealer who wants to profit from the increased price structure that will be created by state taxes. They’ll be able to raise prices and still under cut state stores. They will also increase from the additional demand from people who are emboldened by the belief that it is actually legal when in fact it will not be legal at all under 502.

Can you explain how this will happen? Because my graduate level work in economics tells me that when the demand for something goes up (as it will under 502), and the supply goes down (which it will because growers will not want to give their names to the feds to provide for state stores), prices go up. Add taxes to those inflated prices and the cost goes up even further. Now…. At some point, the cost to purchase at a state store will outweigh the benefit of getting high for the casual user. No worries… because they know a guy who knows a guy. Sure he’s charging a little more than market value pre-502, but it’s still cheaper than buying it at the state stores… and at least you know they won’t use the tax revenue to fund more DUID patrols. The friend of a friend is happy because not only are more people buying, but he can charge more.

How does your scenario work? I’d love to hear it, because rationally it makes no sense whatsoever that adding demand and taxes to something will make it cost less, or keep criminals from rising up to meet the demand that will not be sufficiently supplied by state stores. http://ingrimayne.com/econ/DemandSupply/SupEtDemand.html

There are actually motions on a federal level 2 reclassify marijuana, and that is another step in the absolutely right direction!

It is about changing the political climate. Legalization will follow.

So politicians lie. Any other revelation’s you would care to share?

Fix it in the next round. Get some momentum up first.

So naturally, you solution is to…wait four years?

These initiatives need presidential election years to work. If 502 fails we will be waiting for 4 years.

Politicians lie, and so do initiatives. 502 Lies by calling itself legalization. Pull the wool out from over your eyes people! They are banking on stoners to live up to the stereotypes that we are all stupid to pass a bill that does the opposite of what it says in it’s title. Please learn to read before your ignorance costs real people their liberty.

If Alcohol and tobacco are legal – then 502 is legalization.

States have already experimented with taking cannabis off the CS list.

IT DOESN’T DO ANYTHING. The only thing the CS list does is create the need for “dispensaries”, since pharmacies can’t sell schedule 1 drugs – that’s it. It has nothing to do with “laws on the books”, or whether we can decriminalize an oz, or let people grow and sell cannabis. The two issues are mutually exclusive.

You want legalization – you need to do it by STATUTE!

Oregon & Iowa.

Both states reclassified cannabis, and removed it from schedule I.

It accomplished nothing, Look it up.

hey mr knowitall get bent go to the useless arguments section