It's a good question. I know what Republicans would say...no way. But my own thoughts are that I am concerned that pot is a gateway drug to more serious things like heroine, coke, and meth. Kids especially are in danger of taking things too far. So in my experience, it's best to keep kids away from drugs. Legalizing pot across the country is going to have a lot of knock on impacts that we are only just now starting to see. Think of the opioid crisis. What if that became a permanent feature of our landscape, but instead, we have a permanently stoned 50% of the population. What a waste of productive mental power, not to mention the destructive force that would have on the economy.
One of my best friends in high school was number 1 in our class all the way through middle school. Towards the end of middle school, his parents got divorced and he started smoking pot, since they weren't paying too much attention to his behavior anymore. By high school, he'd dropped down to middle of the class and by the time we all graduated, he was in the bottom 10%. He later went to college and started doing coke and mushrooms and all sorts of other stuff and failed out of college. He never did graduate. Pot was his gateway.
I just have serious concerns about what drugs do to young minds and maybe I'm just a conservative old fart, but I worry about what widespread legalization will do to our next generations. Ultimately, it can kill this country. At the end of the day, all those people who say there is an endless amount of money that we can use to pay for everyone not cable of taking care of themselves....they are lying to you. Socialism and corruption of our culture through things like drug legalization, ignoring the values that come from religion, and the disdain for simple things like independence, a good work ethic, and freedom that I see now pervading this new culture...that will kill this country. |
