The time to act to protect the public from hard drugs is now. People talk about cannabis being the gateway drug, when really, it is the current Misuse of Drugs Act that is gateway LEGISLATION.

Because cannabis is driven underground with all the other hard drugs, this means that the only way for people to get hold of cannabis is to go to drug dealers, who most probably want a customer for their more expensive, and more addictive drugs.

With 51% of the population having tried cannabis and up to 15% of the population actively using cannabis that makes for a lot of people to potentially have exposure to hard drugs. It also shows that despite the illegality of cannabis, people are willing to smoke it.

We need to take control of cannabis out of the hands of drug dealers and gangs. These unregulated distributors sometimes adulterate or lace their cannabis with harder drugs, or harmful substances such as lead particles (to make it weigh more) or microscopic glass beads (to make it look more potent).

This makes the drug a significantly more hazardous to the health of the people that choose to smoke it (regardless of the legality), because the government doesn’t provide a means of safe access.

Cannabis has been scientifically and anecdotally proven to be beneficial for over 300 ailments and diseases. Making cannabis a class D drug would open up the doors for research on it, allowing scientists to extract the chemical cannabinoids and make newer, safer, and natural drugs.

It is a little known fact that in the human body there are four types of cannabinoid receptors (that have been found so far). Cannabinoids are produced in three ways. Naturally by the human brain (endo-cannabinoids), naturally by the cannabis plant (phyto-cannabinoids) and artificially in labs.

I would also like to compare the situations between the Netherlands and the United States. The United States Government is vehemently opposed to drug tolerance, treat drugs as a criminal issue and as a result have very high drug use rates. The Netherlands on the hand, regulate the use of soft drugs, and treat drugs in general as a social health issue – I.E. providing easy access to education and rehab for those that want it. The Netherlands drug use rates are half that of the United States. These figures can be found within 5 mins on google.

Do I need to mention what happened when the United States prohibited Alcohol?

To put cannabis into the class D category is to take a step in the right direction. It is to take a step into governmental control of drugs, instead of governmental restriction. This is what is needed to protect our citizens from hard drugs.

First of all the articles states two different figures for hospitalization for cannabis users in 2005. $32m and $35m.. which one is it? We’ll take the figure of $35m and divide that by the 400,000 users in the country (as reported by the DHI in the NZ herald here) and you have health costs of approximately $80 per user. With an estimation of only half of people surveyed admitting to smoke cannabis you have a figure of 800,000 user in NZ, this equates to around $40 per user. Is this really an issue? And what constitutes an admission for cannabis use? It is my bet from stories I have heard that these admissions are from first time users, having too much and freaking out as can be seen in the documentary “Should I Smoke Dope”. In the documentary the reporter freaks out when she smokes a whole joint at a cannabis shop. First time users should not smoke a whole joint. Its not a danger to their life or bodies at all, however they can freak out and think they are overdosing. But at least cannabis users who freak out and think they are overdosing still have the piece of mind and ability to go to the hospital. Lets see someone with alcohol poisioning or a heroin overdose admit themselves to the hospital.

Now lets look at the alcohol figures quickly. 4700 people a year die from alcohol use with an estimated $1.5b to 2.4b of social harm as reported here in the NZ Herald.

“Cannabis-related hospital admissions exceeded the numbers admitted for opiates, amphetamines and cocaine combined. “

They say there are more admissions to hospital for cannabis use than any other drug. HELLO!!! This is because more people use cannabis than any other drug! This is a good thing, would you rather your kid smoke a harmless herb, or get cooked on Pure Methamphetamine? Approx 95,170 people admitted to using other drugs than cannabis compared to 400,000 cannabis users who admitted to using. I think however times both figures by a factor of two because how many people are going to admit to using illegal drugs?

“The majority of patients were suffering from a psychotic disorder, followed by cannabis poisoning, harmful use, dependence and acute intoxication.”

They say people admitted had a psycotic disorder. Could it be that these people were self medicating with cannabis? So they were using cannabis to fix the psycotic disorder rather than the cannabis causing the psycotic disorder? Treatment of depression and bipolar disporder with cannabis has been proven to be beneficial.

There are over 300 medical uses for cannabis.

“The majority of patients were suffering from a psychotic disorder, followed by cannabis poisoning, harmful use, dependence and acute intoxication.”

It also states that people got marijuana poisoning. This is not possible. Cannabis is not POISON!!! You IDIOTS!!! Do some research and you will quickly find that the chemicals in cannabis are naturally produced by the healthy human brain. These chemicals, known as cannabinoids are produced in the cannabis plant and called Phyto-cannabinoids. The cannabinoids produced in the human brain are called Endo-cannabinoids. There are so far 4 known cannabinoid receptors in the brain and body cells that when stimulated help with pleasure, brain cell generation and neuroprotection among other functions. Cannabis is far from poison.

Health Minister Tony Ryall said he had not yet read the report, but suspected the cost to the health system would be “significantly higher than that, when you consider its contribution to accidents and family breakdown”.

Contribution to accidents? Which? Where? What accidents? And how can cannabis breakdown a family? I think you mean alcohol and its prevalence for causing domestic violence?

“A new breed of powerful cannabis and ballooning costs in treating its health effects have led to calls for urgent action…”

The final beef I had with the article was this opening line. First of all more potent cannabis IS BETTER!!!! It means you have to smoke LESS to get the desired effect. This means there IS LESS SMOKE ENTERING THE LUNGS. And any smoke, even cannabis smoke which has had cancer links disproven, is still not good to inhale. There are better ways to consume cannabis than smoking.

by Rev. Martin Niemoller, 1945

I’m the guy with “911 WAS AN INSIDE JOB” written across the back of his van, and to be honest, I have had more nods of agreement/thumbs up etc, than I’ve had people look at me and shake their heads or whatever. But more often than not people do nothing.

I don’t actually believe anything definite anymore. I can only guess because I don’t actually know and I am on the other side of the world. Sure I watched Loose Change and agreed with some things but the problem is people go nuts at conspiracy theorists because they have a big conspiracy theory story of how it all played out when there is no way anyone can actually know what happened (especially The 9/11 Commission with their limited funding, limited access and lack of subpoena power).

What I do believe is that there are lots of fishy things surrounding the events of 911. But I’m no longer going to try to make up a story. I’m just going to look at all the things that don’t add up and go “Hmmm, thats a bit fishy. Someone should look into this,” and inform people about the things that don’t add up.

So, here is a couple of things that ARE fishy about 911, sans-conspiracy theories.

1. Where did the molten metal underneath the Towers come from?
2. Why did the 911 Commission only get $12m for the investigation (compared to $65m for Clintons blowjob investigation)
3. Why didn’t the 911 Commission have subpoena power?
4. Why were there reports of explosions coming from beneath the towers, after the planes hit?
5. Why have no other skyscrapers in the history of mankind collapsed from fire?
6. Why do they say jet fuel burns really hot and melted the steel when we saw a crapload of jetfuel explode OUTSIDE the buildings?
7. If the floors in the WTC “pancaked” on top of each other like they said, causing the collapse, how come the center column isn’t still standing?
8. What are the chances of three skyscrapers of two different construction types (WTC1+2 & WTC7), all collapsing from fires on the same day?
9. If there was no jetfuel in WTC7, and burning jetfuel is what actually bought the twin towers down, what made WTC7 collapse?
10. Why is there no wreckage from United 93 in the field in Pensylvania?
11. Why was the video footage of the pentagon crash confiscated when video footage of the twin towers was allowed?

Thats all I have for now. I think there are enough questions out there however to warrant a new investigation into the events to answer the questions that the public wants to know. Who disagrees?

Do these guys actually build cars or do they just bitch all day? WTF honestly. Get some fucking tissues, shut the fuck up and build some cars FFS.

Wow they fully slutted out Megan Fox. Not saying I don’t like to see [semi] naked chicks flaunting it but this is just pathetic. The new movie she stars in is called ‘Jennifers Body‘. It just seems so cliche, look at the movie poster even. “Red shoes no panties”, “Hell Yes!” written on the blackboard, short skirt, long legs. Female sexuality at its finest.

Ahhh, sluts eh? I almost don’t want to watch it… almost…

Hi Mr Laws,

I was thinking about this gang patch ban and I was wondering if you
had thought about the consequences about banning the patches in
public.

You could unintentionally create a situation like with the Crips and
Bloods in Los Angeles where the gangs are signified by coloured
clothing instead. This in turn leads to innocent members of the
public being gunned down for wearing the wrong colour.

Problem is, you can’t outlaw wearing the colour red or black. So in
effect the gang patches really signify to the public who it is they
have to stay the f**k away from, protecting the public somewhat. It
will also allow the authorities to instantly identify possible
problematic people. Really the gangs wearing patches plays right into
the authorities hand allowing them to spot people by a patch rather
than by a colour – which could lead to them keeping an eye on the
wrong people.

I am worried that if the gangs eventually start taking your patch ban
seriously you could have more problems than you started out with.
Perhaps you were trying to make sure they didn’t come into public
areas because they weren’t allowed to wear their patch there? I doubt
they will stay home just so they can wear their patch.

Unless of course you have already thought about this and have some
plan to counteract it.

Regards,
Robert McLeod

EDIT: He emailed me back and basicaly what it seems like this law is for is so they can harass the gang members so much that hopefully they don’t bother coming into town. Also gang colours are banned too… on peopl with known gang affiliations. I’m not sure if I like this idea or not.

I’m sure you’ve read about Auckland becoming a Super city and the Maori party of NZ wanted some Maori only seats on the Supercity council. Well John Key has told them to get fucked.

And with good reason! Why should Maori get their own seats!? Are they any better than me or the asian guy looking in your window right now? Its just absolute bullshit again the Maori party is trying to segregate the Maori race from other races.

And still they complain about not getting the same treatment and the white man has stolen all their land blah blah fucking blah blah. They are making sure that they are seen as different.

Pita Sharples whinges about Maori needing representation on the council because 1 in 4 Maori live in Auckland. Big fucking deal, I bet you $10 the other 3 people are white, asian and indian. Are we going to have separate seats for all the races!?

Fuck them. They’re people no different from anyone else. Treating them like they are better than everyone else awarding them land and money and shit for their ancestors dumbass decisions has given the Maoris in the Maori party a status complex. Now they think they should be awarded other shit as well. FUCK THEM!

Do you want seats in the park for Maori’s only? Libraries for Maori’s only? That just isn’t fair, and is just plain racist. This getting just like the South African/American Racial Segregation, except this time its the blacks who think they are better than the whites.

This is finally a step in the right direction, if only we could chuck out the Maori seats in parliament. All the seats are the same fucking colour I HAVE BEEN THERE!!

What the fuck? A Maori Focus unit? What the fuck do we need that for?

What about the Scottish Focus Unit? Welsh Focus Unit? Islands Focus Unit?

This is just plain racist. Why can’t the other ethnic groups have a focus unit to further separate them from the other races in society – cos thats what this unit will do, further separate the Maori from other ethnic groups.

This is what fucks me off the most, Maori want to be treated the same but yet they expect to be treated different and better than everyone else just because they are the “native” people of this country. Which is a load of shit anyway, they’re no more native than any european. The only difference is they got here about 500 years before the european and ate all the original inhabitants.

But the truth is many civilisations have been to New Zealand before the Maori, they just didn’t bother staying, and there is evidence.

Maori aren’t fucking native to this country and anyone who tells you that is fucking stupid. They are immigrants too, we are all immigrants. The original natives of New Zealand were probably immigrants too but the Maori ate them all, and the government has put an embargo on the research of Pre-Maori civilizations so we will never know for sure.

Fucking stupid people, jesus fuck… open your fucking eyes!

FYI: http://www.celticnz.co.nz

It is the smartest and most informed comment I have seen on the subject I just had to post it.

Makes me wonder if humans aren’t acting more like a pathogen on the earth, than a intelligent life form that can plan ahead.

Of course, the solution is that we need to be able to choose leaders that aren’t party of crony capitalist conspiracies and/or psychopaths.

The worlds great problems, can all be traced to someone making a lot of money selling them weapons, or working with their leaders to steal their resources (I’m thinking of you World Bank).

When we have small tribes, and come face to face with our leaders, the chance of getting these psychopathic individuals, who would rather have a war and slaughter people, if it means 20% more profit — and damn the consequences, well, those folks don’t pass the smell test. Our society has grown more complex and the layers of accountability, further apart. The wealthy, the educated, and the powerful, have grown disconnected from the plebes. and our impression of them, is massaged through a TV screen.

Obama may be a good leader on our side, but he has to make happy, very powerful and selfish mega-corporations, who could pull the plug at any moment on our economies.

So ecosystems, get exploited, because we have allowed people to get control, who only care about how large their slice of pie is. The cancer is more valued than the body it feeds on. The King, more worthy than all his people.

If you took the average person, in America or almost any nation, they would say; “I have enough, there is no reason to take what this other country has.” No decent person, want’s another car, if they realize it could mean the starvation of a small village. The problem is, that too many common people, do not think that what they do effects others. The problem is, too many people think that they don’t owe the world, and other people respect and gratitude.

It is not enough to be more powerful, to just have won. There will soon come a time, when we once again value grace and honor — and know what they mean

Well put dude, extremely well put.