The Commonwealth Club of California held a discussion Wednesday night in San Francisco on the “Economics of Marijuana” and Proposition 19, the ballot initiative to legalize cannabis up to one ounce for those over 21.
Included in the discussion is Oaksterdam founder and co-sponsor of the initiative Richard Lee; Tim Rosales, the campaign manager for No on Prop. 19 and Beau Kilmer, the co-director for RAND Drug Policy Research Center. The program is moderated by the Oakland Tribune political and legal affairs reporter Josh Richman.
ebcitizen.com 
Even though I think that marijuana should be legalized, I’m sort of happy that prop 19 didn’t pass. I have a feeling that the demographic that doesn't smoke primarily “because it's illegal” is going to start experimenting with it, and we're constantly going to have a bunch of old a-holes crashing their cars because they don't know how much they can smoke/can't handle being high. I’d probably say only 10% of the people I know that smoke can drive normally while high, and those people have been smoking for god knows how long. I realize that even if marijuana was legalized that it'd still be illegal to drive high, but there’d still be a percentage of cars on the road that would be driven by these newbs who don't yet understand the technicalities of driving while being stoned out of your mind. For instance, a car ran over my mail box about 2 years ago. My security camera at my home recorded it so I got their license plate, and it turns out that the driver was high and claimed that it was their first time trying to drive on it (you can even see in the video that he’s smoking a joint while he’s driving. I even saved a picture… home security cam marijuana idiot). I’m sure over time that the demographic of “new” smokers will eventually know their limits and when they are not able to drive, but at the moment, I’m glad prop 19 failed because I wasn’t looking forward to buying a new mailbox.
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I think the fact that it conflicts with federal law is the point. As at some point someone will get arrested by federal agents and challenge it in court with the hope that it will instigate a larger change.
Likewise same-sex couples can't get 'married' federally but that doesn't stop certain states from issuing them marriage licenses. Which has allowed citizens from Massachusetts to challenge the Defense of Marriage act.
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As much as I could care less, don't people remember that it's still a federal law? Sure, States Rights…but we seem to forget that all to often these days.
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Oh great, all the losers of society coming together to want to get more people high and stupid.
Manuel
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