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Comment by zajd | Hacker News Reader

(I live in Colorado)

>I don't like the attitudes of pro-legalization people in the US. They wont accept that there are negative sides to drug use and seem to think there should be no restrictions.

Who's saying that? For example, I don't think anyone is advocating selling to minors.

>It is as if there is never any middle ground in the US. Either you got the moralists who spell doom or you got people who think you should be free to do however dam you please. Where are the pragmatic people who accept it is a bad thing to do drugs but that a strict regulation is a better solution than a war on drugs.

Why do pragmatic people accept "it is a bad thing to do drugs"? Do they drink coffee? Avoid OTC painkillers?

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I love the strawman stance that aspirin, coffee, and weed are all equal, and that the single constraint of simply not selling to children is plenty of restrictions.

He said "no restrictions" and "it is a bad thing to do drugs" feel free to put forth another argument.

That was hyperbolic. Obviously even potheads in the US want some restrictions. But the guiding principle seems to be that grown adults should be free to smoke pot as they please and in whatever way they please. That is not my perspective on legalization at all. I view it as a necessary evil. Something to do because the alternative is much worse. So I want the legalization to be as strict as possible while still being more attractive than the criminal alternative. Perhaps though in a transition period it can make sense to be more liberal to drive out the dealers completely and tighten it more later.

Here are are more of my specifics. I favor an absolute ban on any form of advertisement. Limits on the size and number of shops and their placement. I would also like the dispensaries to be non profit, or alternatively a government monopoly. One does not want anybody to have a profit motive to sell drugs.

I think a dispensary should be place that you can both buy drugs but also get information about health hazards and informations about available treatment. Edibles should be banned and government should set max rates for potency of the drugs.

But apart from that I of course wish that there is an end to the federal rules against this. People operating dispenseries should not have to fear being imprisoned by FBI and banks should be allowed to have them as customers.

> But the guiding principle seems to be that grown adults should be free to smoke pot as they please and in whatever way they please. That is not my perspective on legalization at all.

I don't think "in whatever way they please" is the goal. Nobody is advocating legalizing driving while high, for example.

> One does not want anybody to have a profit motive to sell drugs.

Why? What is so bad about selling recreational drugs?

> Edibles should be banned

Why?

Pot has more restrictions than alcohol and it'd be hard to argue that marijuana has the more negative effects.

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