You don't have to care, I am just pointing out that there are many in the US who are not aware of the overwhelming support for MMJ. I am in favor of taxing and regulating along the line of alcohol and cigarettes, two substances that have ruined many more lives in my opinion. Tobacco totally ruins your health and kills about 400,000 people a year here from emphysema and lung cancer. I see this every day at work in my job as a medical paralegal for a prestigious law firm.
Alcohol's dangers are manifest and multifold and I won't go into them. We are all familiar.
Total deaths from MJ each year? Zero. There is nothing linking it to lung cancer or emphysema, like tobacco.
It's not totally benign, and I don't say this. Smoking stuff is bad for you. I use a vaporizer. It just heats it up and you inhale the vapor, you don't burn it.
Amotivational people are drawn to the plant, per studies. They probably wouldn't amount to much even without access to the herb. It is not causative, per se, but it easy to see why people claim this. I can see a synergistic effect where it reinforces their apathetic behavior. Trying to get marijuana users to become activists is like herding cats. *sigh*
Here is a good opinion piece article written a couple of days ago in a paper in Columbia, SC, certainly not a left-leaning city. I imagine their newspaper could not be considered left wing, either. It is very succinct and lays out the arguments perfectly.
http://www.free-times.com/ (Click on "my turn" - Marijuana Prohibition, fourth from top)
freedomburns