(05-11-2019 10:58 AM)georgia_tech_swagger Wrote:  

(05-09-2019 10:52 AM)bullet Wrote:  LSD less physical harm than tobacco or alcohol? I call BS on researchers doing their report while on drugs creating BS criteria.

You can take LSD once and it can stick with you the rest of your life.

I disagree. LSD flashbacks are, from my understanding, rare and tend to occur in those who've been frequent users. And while I certainly do not advocate for flippant and irresponsible use of LSD, having a hypothetical flashback for a few moment 5 years later is way safer than (insert cancer of somewhere in the respiratory system here) or (insert DUI deaths or domestic abuse or liver cancer here). To paraphrase Norm MacDonald in his recent Netflix hour, "You mean I take this drug once and I can get high again and again years later? What a bargain! ........... It's been over 20 years. Not one damn flashback yet. Good sales pitch, terrible follow through." Also LSD has a much much lower dependency risk. A full standard deviation lower than tobacco, and considerably less than alcohol too.

that would be accurate...

you're a Rogan fan....there's a podcast with he and Maynard (TOOL vocalist) where they get involved in the discussion of hallucinogens...it's worth the watch...

(05-09-2019 12:11 PM)BadgerMJ Wrote:  Guy from my home town had a "bad trip" when he was young. My Father was friends with his brother. Screwed him up BAD. He basically needed assisted living until the day he died.

All drugs -- even cannabis and alcohol and tobacco and over the counter pharma and Rx pharma -- require responsible use. And if the drugs are illegal and delivered through the black market you take the non-insignificant risk that your product is cross contaminated with other more nasty drugs. I've never seen a police report of any appreciable sample size on even seized cannabis where at least 10% of it wasn't laced with something else. And almost always something else is *VERY* nasty and *VERY* addicting. If you're dealing with the cartels they'll fleece you dry and not think twice about destroying you in the process. In for a penny ... out for your life. That's the price of prohibition. I wish for all drugs we treated it as a health crisis instead of a criminal justice crisis (unless they've harmed others or neglected minors in their care or become a burden to society). I know you like to bring up pot ER cases climbing (what, you expected consumers to self-report when it's illegal? It could ONLY go up at first). But when doing the math don't forget the cost of the unseen in prohibition. How many people are killed, threatened, put into servitude, and all manner of nasty things in full length and breadth of the cartel supply chain? How many people would die or appear in the ER from laced street drugs? These are all areas we don't exactly do good counting in right now if counting is done at all. It's the classic economic seen vs unseen issue. When Paul Krugman says it's an economic boost to break a glass window and then replace it again he's making the same mistake. You see the cost of the window and everybody with a hand in the supply chain of the window being made. You don't see where the owner of the window would have spent that money if it didn't have to go to replacing something that was perfectly functional in the first place.

The illegal pot trade is not going away in Colorado. You tax it, people try to get around it.

(05-11-2019 11:15 AM)bullet Wrote:  The illegal pot trade is not going away in Colorado. You tax it, people try to get around it.

There are still moonshiners as well, but you can't say revoking prohibition did not significantly drop crime involved in the illegal booze business.

(05-11-2019 11:15 AM)bullet Wrote:  The illegal pot trade is not going away in Colorado. You tax it, people try to get around it.

You're not entirely correct or incorrect. Illegal weed is largely eliminated in Colorado because taxes are reasonable. With an in state med card taxes are actually VERY reasonable and modest. The med card isn't expensive. However in states like Washington the taxes are truly exorbitant. In Washington the cannabis tax works like a VAT. And it's more than 20%. So it's grown. 20%+ tax. It then goes to a lab for state mandated potency and composition testing which is then put on the label. 20%+ tax again. It then goes to the retail storefront where it is sold to the customer. 20%+ tax again. By the time you've got it in your hands in the state of Washington over HALF of the price is tax. As a result illegal weed is much cheaper and still flourishes in Washington. I'm largely ignorant of the status quo in other states. I think California has pretty high rates as well but less so on medical.

I think as legalization spreads and states compete with actual neighboring states more and more that taxes will become more reasonable due to competition. You can get away with really high tax rates if you're the oasis of legality in your region. Looking at Michigan. Washington when it first started (now it competes with Oregon). California when it first started (now it competes with Oregon and Nevada). Massachusetts has a *HUGE* bureaucratic labyrinth you have to work through. It took MA YEARS just to bring the first state mandated testing facility online.

There is still room for a few states in a few regions to make an absolute killing on revenue through legalization. Untapped regions: Deep South, Gulf Coast, Breadbasket, Big Sky/Upper Plains. Based largely on statistics from illicit seizure / estimated illicit harvest, historical production of legal hemp, environment, growing season, etc .... The Carolinas, Kentucky, and the old Cotton Belt in particular have perfect growing conditions outdoors. If it becomes recreationally legal in at least the lower 48, those areas are sitting atop yet unclaimed green-tinged gold.

(05-11-2019 12:06 PM)georgia_tech_swagger Wrote:  

(05-11-2019 11:15 AM)bullet Wrote:  The illegal pot trade is not going away in Colorado. You tax it, people try to get around it.

You're not entirely correct or incorrect. Illegal weed is largely eliminated in Colorado because taxes are reasonable. With an in state med card taxes are actually VERY reasonable and modest. The med card isn't expensive. However in states like Washington the taxes are truly exorbitant. In Washington the cannabis tax works like a VAT. And it's more than 20%. So it's grown. 20%+ tax. It then goes to a lab for state mandated potency and composition testing which is then put on the label. 20%+ tax again. It then goes to the retail storefront where it is sold to the customer. 20%+ tax again. By the time you've got it in your hands in the state of Washington over HALF of the price is tax. As a result illegal weed is much cheaper and still flourishes in Washington. I'm largely ignorant of the status quo in other states. I think California has pretty high rates as well but less so on medical.

I think as legalization spreads and states compete with actual neighboring states more and more that taxes will become more reasonable due to competition. You can get away with really high tax rates if you're the oasis of legality in your region. Looking at Michigan. Washington when it first started (now it competes with Oregon). California when it first started (now it competes with Oregon and Nevada). Massachusetts has a *HUGE* bureaucratic labyrinth you have to work through. It took MA YEARS just to bring the first state mandated testing facility online.

There is still room for a few states in a few regions to make an absolute killing on revenue through legalization. Untapped regions: Deep South, Gulf Coast, Breadbasket, Big Sky/Upper Plains. Based largely on statistics from illicit seizure / estimated illicit harvest, historical production of legal hemp, environment, growing season, etc .... The Carolinas, Kentucky, and the old Cotton Belt in particular have perfect growing conditions outdoors. If it becomes recreationally legal in at least the lower 48, those areas are sitting atop yet unclaimed green-tinged gold.

TN has a booming hemp industry as well

I despise Wal-Mart as an entity of any kind but I will give them credit I think this was the right thing to do.

(05-11-2019 12:12 PM)bobdizole Wrote:  

(05-11-2019 12:06 PM)georgia_tech_swagger Wrote:  

(05-11-2019 11:15 AM)bullet Wrote:  The illegal pot trade is not going away in Colorado. You tax it, people try to get around it.

You're not entirely correct or incorrect. Illegal weed is largely eliminated in Colorado because taxes are reasonable. With an in state med card taxes are actually VERY reasonable and modest. The med card isn't expensive. However in states like Washington the taxes are truly exorbitant. In Washington the cannabis tax works like a VAT. And it's more than 20%. So it's grown. 20%+ tax. It then goes to a lab for state mandated potency and composition testing which is then put on the label. 20%+ tax again. It then goes to the retail storefront where it is sold to the customer. 20%+ tax again. By the time you've got it in your hands in the state of Washington over HALF of the price is tax. As a result illegal weed is much cheaper and still flourishes in Washington. I'm largely ignorant of the status quo in other states. I think California has pretty high rates as well but less so on medical.

I think as legalization spreads and states compete with actual neighboring states more and more that taxes will become more reasonable due to competition. You can get away with really high tax rates if you're the oasis of legality in your region. Looking at Michigan. Washington when it first started (now it competes with Oregon). California when it first started (now it competes with Oregon and Nevada). Massachusetts has a *HUGE* bureaucratic labyrinth you have to work through. It took MA YEARS just to bring the first state mandated testing facility online.

There is still room for a few states in a few regions to make an absolute killing on revenue through legalization. Untapped regions: Deep South, Gulf Coast, Breadbasket, Big Sky/Upper Plains. Based largely on statistics from illicit seizure / estimated illicit harvest, historical production of legal hemp, environment, growing season, etc .... The Carolinas, Kentucky, and the old Cotton Belt in particular have perfect growing conditions outdoors. If it becomes recreationally legal in at least the lower 48, those areas are sitting atop yet unclaimed green-tinged gold.

TN has a booming hemp industry as well

which I believe is the most underrated portion of this 'movement'....

engineers and too many other fields to mention are going to have a 'field day' with this moving forward....

thank you DJT for federally decriminalizing and signing into law!

Even Accounting Today (the magazine of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants) had an article on serving clients in the cannabis industry. It was written by a risk manager from an insurance company.

Accounting Today was a punch line in the movie Look Who's Talking (John Travolta, Kirstie Alley. The Mom's parents were accountants and the Dad breaks out laughing while reading Accounting Today. You knew the writers had to be accountants to understand the humor. Accounting Today is one of the driest journals you could imagine. Take whatever you can imagine and multiply by 3. You would never, ever, even grin at an Accounting Today article.

Derivatives are going in a LOT of food products. You will soon see it all over unless the FDA cracks down.

(05-11-2019 12:59 PM)bullet Wrote:  Derivatives are going in a LOT of food products. You will soon see it all over unless the FDA cracks down.

Hemp is shockingly versatile. You can literally build an entire house of it. And yes, people have. The only downsides are those that abuse a substance through flippant and irresponsible use (a problem with every substance, but this one has far more innocuous extremes) and that if cultivated indoors it's very energy intensive and if outdoors at scale very water intensive. It turns out though if you've ever looked out a window in the South in July (and in fact every month other than onset very late fall into early winter) frequent rain isn't exactly a problem. There are areas where you can practically pencil in the 15m afternoon downpour every other day.

(05-11-2019 10:58 AM)georgia_tech_swagger Wrote:  

(05-09-2019 10:52 AM)bullet Wrote:  LSD less physical harm than tobacco or alcohol? I call BS on researchers doing their report while on drugs creating BS criteria.

You can take LSD once and it can stick with you the rest of your life.

I disagree. LSD flashbacks are, from my understanding, rare and tend to occur in those who've been frequent users. And while I certainly do not advocate for flippant and irresponsible use of LSD, having a hypothetical flashback for a few moment 5 years later is way safer than (insert cancer of somewhere in the respiratory system here) or (insert DUI deaths or domestic abuse or liver cancer here). To paraphrase Norm MacDonald in his recent Netflix hour, "You mean I take this drug once and I can get high again and again years later? What a bargain! ........... It's been over 20 years. Not one damn flashback yet. Good sales pitch, terrible follow through." Also LSD has a much much lower dependency risk. A full standard deviation lower than tobacco, and considerably less than alcohol too.

As crazy as it sounds...the evidence is overwhelming that LSD is safer than tobacco. Tobacco related deaths...480,000 annually..just in America. LSD?...almost unheard of. The flash back issue really only comes into play if someone loses a ton of weight. Evidently LSD is stored in fatty tissues and is released when you lose weight.