Now that marijuana looks likely to be legalized in more and more states…
…we realize that we have no idea how to set legal limits for driving under the influence:
The study commissioned by AAA’s safety foundation said it’s not possible to set a blood-test threshold for THC, the chemical in marijuana that makes people high, that can reliably determine impairment. Yet the laws in five of the six states automatically presume a driver guilty if that person tests higher than the limit, and not guilty if it’s lower.
As a result, drivers who are unsafe may be going free while others may be wrongly convicted, the foundation said.
The foundation recommends replacing the laws with ones that rely on specially trained police officers to determine if a driver is impaired, backed up by a test for the presence of THC rather than a specific threshold. The officers are supposed to screen for dozens of indicators of drug use, from pupil dilation and tongue color to behavior.
Oh, that will end well, don’t you think?
I expect they’ll be pulling over the drivers who are doing 30 miles per hour under the speed limit . . .
Rusty…
THC is known to go the other way.
60 mph feels like 30 mph when you’re under the influence.
Further, anxiety is hugely repressed — probably its #1 allure to the consumer.
I expect — after much pain and misery — that a very low THC threshold will be set.
The word will be that you can’t toke and drive, you just can’t.
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A bigger issue is the compelling need to have upper limits on THC concentrations. ALREADY children are being poisoned by laced brownies that have intense concentrations.
The tykes hadn’t a clue as to what they were ingesting.
I can’t think of a better way to dumb down the population in order to keep control than by legalizing pot.
Go to Google scholar and do a search for biological half life of THC. Unlike other drugs that are metabolized by the liver, THC binds to fat, hence it stays in the brain for literally weeks. And that’s just from one dose. If one consumes daily, the stuff never leaves. Also google higher order thinking and THC.
I know from personal experience way back in my undergrad days. Alcohol would make me feel bad for a day,but I could get right back to dealing with a tough differential equation in about 24 hours. With pot it would take me at least 3-4 days and even then I wasn’t at full potential for higher order thinking until about a week. This just goes along with the studies of the bio half life.
The Jeff Spicoli stereotype is not far from the truth…great way to manipulate the masses.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uf5rIuJPTt0
Blert: Well, y’know, different smokes for different folks.
Soma – “great way to manipulate the masses.”
No doubt, technology will catch up to meet the need – for detection.
Like the older “war on poverty”, the 30+ years of the “war on drugs” hasn’t itself made much of a difference, given the huge sums spent. Seems we are pretty much nearing the realization that prohibition is not effective, even in containing the “problem”.
It certainly has been a contributor to our border problem.
Anyway, a long discussion that should be left for another post.
The problem with legalization is today’s Mary Jane is not your mother’s MJ. In order to agree to legalization there has to be a legal limit about THC concentration and an equivalent test to alcohol concentration that can be administered in the field. Otherwise, lets legalize speed.
Isn’t it odd that people demonize smoking, where the effects are not really felt till much later in life? Yet young people who smoke pot suffer the effects immediately–especially in education. The PaulPots have damaged a lot of young people. They are the seemingly thinking part of the Me, Me, Me generation. I am not talking about all who favor libertarian ideas; I am talking to the idiots who wanted the whole election to center on their ability to smoke a joint on weekends. They seemed to have a lot of free time to troll.
@parker – At best, we would likely to eventually see labeling, similar to alcohol, where beer and wine seem to be at certain percentage of content, while “hard” liquor at significantly higher – probably to some max. But, a wide range will be available. Maybe that’s all in place where MJ is available legally, IDK.
With 2008 and now 2016 with Trump, it does give one serious pause to think that some segments in society need protection from themselves.
But, in the end, “over-regulation” seems to cause as many problems as solve any, IMHO. That seems to get easily overlooked in the fearful rhetoric of the “war on drugs”.
“I am talking to the idiots who wanted the whole election to center on their ability to smoke a joint on weekends” – expat
Agree, that it is problematic to have many in the electorate who go all-in for a candidate or party for a single legislative issue.
That is a HUGE mistake, IMHO, be it about drugs, abortion, LGBT “rights”, illegal immigration, etc..
But, so long as people don’t care enough to be educated about a broad range of issues and about the political process, or to take personal responsibility in general, that is what we have to live with, sadly.
The question is, how do we change that?
If I was in charge of the Left’s Sustainable Human Farming and Slave Plantation system, I would make weed a necessary ingredient in the livestock farming process.
The question is, how do we change that?
Give up on the indoctrinated generation. Find the non indoctrinated generation, get them up to speed and armed with arms and armor. Then have them take on the corrupted generation. Cadre training.