Is Marijuana a sacred herb? Why are people afraid of it?

[Victor Forsythe]

Oye Como Va: Carlos Santana wants Obama to legalize pot

"Lord knows you got to change" your mind about marijuana, Mr. President.
That's what legendary rock star Carlos Santana is basically saying.
"President Barack Obama brushed off a question about legalizing marijuana in his online town hall last month, but
guitar god Carlos Santana says he wishes he would seriously consider
it," the Associated Press reports.
"Legalize marijuana and take all that money and invest it in
teachers and in education," Santana told the AP. "You will see a
transformation in America."
More from the article:
During his online town hall on March 26, Obama fielded a
question about whether legalization of the illicit drug would help pull
the nation out of recession. Obama said he didn't think it was good
economic policy, and also joked: "I don't know what this says about the
online audience."
But Santana said making pot legal is "really way overdue, like the prohibition with the alcohol and stuff like that.
"I really believe that as soon as we legalize and decriminalize
marijuana we can actually afford a really good governor who won't keep
taking money away from education and from teachers and send him back to
Hollywood where he can do 'D' movies and we can get an 'A' governor,"
referring to former movie action hero and California Gov. Arnold
Schwarzenegger.

[Marc]

We have had a rather interesting discussion about this plant at aoaond.com
http://architectsofanewdawn.ning.com/forum/topics/marijuana-and-the...

[AkashicWreckage]

I also wondered if someone would bring up Carlos' statement about this issue.
Thanks for doing so.

The only down side for those who really don't want this legalized, is that they'd have a happy populace if it was legalized.
Makes one wonder why that is troublesome for some....
AW

[Joy Hart]

I agree. I think it is a blessed sacrament. Why should it be treated differently than alcohol as far as legality is concerned.

[leehoward]

yes, its time,

I guess Obama didn't get it...the number one question concerning americans...when you going to stop making smoking a joint or ingesting thc a crime? What it showed me, was how many people are in fact smoking out there, just below the radar screen.


We just bailed out the real criminals- the great wall street swindle of 08

give us a damn break...

marijuana and its cousin, hemp, are some of the most useful plants on the planet

we could make industrial hemp legal ( arnie had the chance and bowed to popularity- he's an actor after all...), and whole communities could reap the financial benefits...paper, nuts, foods, oil , fuel to run our cars, clothing fabric, tents for people to live in, homes could be built from it...oh, and we wouldn't have to keep tearing forests down, either for newspapers or paper.

and then there's

marijuana, god's wonder herb

helps control anger
makes you eat better
makes you a better person
makes you more creative
keeps paranoia at bay
eases one's mind
great for sex
for dancing
for painting
for loving
for creating
gets you closer to the plant kingdom; thus god
makes you happy
a better lover to your loved ones
makes you healthier than cigarrettes, debt, fast cars, and booze
causes one to deliberate
to solve
to control one's emotions...to slow down and give...


plus illegal marijuana is california's number one cash crop-obviously many are using it...


c'mon...people !

capitalism has failed us
the american diet has failed us
our thinking has failed us
our financial systems have failed us
psychology has failed us
pharmaceuticals are failing us
guns are failing us
our leaders have failed us
congress is a failure

our families have been ripped apart
divorce is now the norm
happiness has been hijacked
like this country has been

at least let us have our balms and survival herbs...

it'll raise money for the states
send arnie back to hollywood
raise money for localities-for school
for playgrounds


keep money local, instead of sending it to china.

- a concerned human

[Victor Forsythe]

leehoward said:

yes, its time,

I guess Obama didn't get it...the number one question concerning americans...when you going to stop making smoking a joint or ingesting thc a crime? What it showed me, was how many people are in fact smoking out there, just below the radar screen.


We just bailed out the real criminals- the great wall street swindle of 08

give us a damn break...

marijuana and its cousin, hemp, are some of the most useful plants on the planet

we could make industrial hemp legal ( arnie had the chance and bowed to popularity- he's an actor after all...), and whole communities could reap the financial benefits...paper, nuts, foods, oil , fuel to run our cars, clothing fabric, tents for people to live in, homes could be built from it...oh, and we wouldn't have to keep tearing forests down, either for newspapers or paper.

and then there's

marijuana, god's wonder herb

helps control anger
makes you eat better
makes you a better person
makes you more creative
keeps paranoia at bay
eases one's mind
great for sex
for dancing
for painting
for loving
for creating
gets you closer to the plant kingdom; thus god
makes you happy
a better lover to your loved ones
makes you healthier than cigarrettes, debt, fast cars, and booze
causes one to deliberate
to solve
to control one's emotions...to slow down and give...


plus illegal marijuana is california's number one cash crop-obviously many are using it...


c'mon...people !

capitalism has failed us
the american diet has failed us
our thinking has failed us
our financial systems have failed us
psychology has failed us
pharmaceuticals are failing us
guns are failing us
our leaders have failed us
congress is a failure

our families have been ripped apart
divorce is now the norm
happiness has been hijacked
like this country has been

at least let us have our balms and survival herbs...

it'll raise money for the states
send arnie back to hollywood
raise money for localities-for school
for playgrounds


keep money local, instead of sending it to china.

- a concerned human

Well this of course would be ideal and sane. My question is:
How can a Country that ignores the basic question is: is this about justice or about power?

Do some people fear what they dont understand?

A plant that makes a chemical very similar to one already in your brain, that this chemical can really make you think about things like winning the hearts and minds of gooks that we were bombing and poisoning left and right.
I blame this highly noxious weed of making me see Vietnam in this light instead of some alcoholic stupor which led to
the early demise of some of my more gung-ho classmates in 1967-68.
There were others, high on religion, like Rev. Billy Graham would wonder aloud to the world from a stadium with Dick Nixon, how we could possibly lose against Godless communists!

(I tell people, "We still ended up winning cause Nikki has a factory there and quite a few other companies that require very cheap labor. Like China only more competitive!)

First of all although you might think the richest country in the world could bomb and poison a tiny lil really poor country into submission after 10 years, they just kept refusing to take our orders! Finally though, some troops who began tasting this pretty strong pot over there, decided that the war was a lie and that they weren't going to cooperate any more with this whole totally insane freakshow, the whole thing has led to an epidemic of homeless vets in this country asking for dimes, scueze me, did I say dime? Hell no! Dollars are the dimes of yesteryear!

Anyway, the bottom line is I came to the incredible conclusion that pot makes you think about these things, which might have been good to treat Mr. Graham and might have calmed the idiot down a bit and not make a total foo of himself, at least to me.

Kindof like the fall of building #7 on 9-11. I have to think people that saw that and the people that have since known about this coupled with the living in the ORANGE terror code unabated since 9-11, make me hope that the only cure for this insanity is a pot brownie and a copy of Core of Corruption DVD. As long as those are available, there's hope.

[Arin]

Go Carlos!! So glad that the voice of reason has spoken! The anti marijuana argument is based on the usual: fear and ignorance. Why? The usual misguided propaganda leading to the sacred herb's misclassification. Beginning with the fear flick Reefer Madness to the current misconception that marijuana leads to harder drugs. If it were to be considered sacred and medicinal instead of recreational and illicit by those in power, we wouldn't be having this discussion. I am sorely disappointed in Obama for not taking this issue seriously. He also followed Bush's lead and lifted protections for wolves. I support our pres but he really does need to educate himself about certain plants and animals.. and take the right sort of action regarding both. LOL Love the last paragraph about Arnie..

[Victor Forsythe]

leehoward said:

yes, its time,

I guess Obama didn't get it...the number one question concerning americans...when you going to stop making smoking a joint or ingesting thc a crime? What it showed me, was how many people are in fact smoking out there, just below the radar screen.


We just bailed out the real criminals- the great wall street swindle of 08

give us a damn break...

marijuana and its cousin, hemp, are some of the most useful plants on the planet

we could make industrial hemp legal ( arnie had the chance and bowed to popularity- he's an actor after all...), and whole communities could reap the financial benefits...paper, nuts, foods, oil , fuel to run our cars, clothing fabric, tents for people to live in, homes could be built from it...oh, and we wouldn't have to keep tearing forests down, either for newspapers or paper.

and then there's

marijuana, god's wonder herb

helps control anger
makes you eat better
makes you a better person
makes you more creative
keeps paranoia at bay
eases one's mind
great for sex
for dancing
for painting
for loving
for creating
gets you closer to the plant kingdom; thus god
makes you happy
a better lover to your loved ones
makes you healthier than cigarrettes, debt, fast cars, and booze
causes one to deliberate
to solve
to control one's emotions...to slow down and give...


plus illegal marijuana is california's number one cash crop-obviously many are using it...


c'mon...people !

capitalism has failed us
the american diet has failed us
our thinking has failed us
our financial systems have failed us
psychology has failed us
pharmaceuticals are failing us
guns are failing us
our leaders have failed us
congress is a failure

our families have been ripped apart
divorce is now the norm
happiness has been hijacked
like this country has been

at least let us have our balms and survival herbs...

it'll raise money for the states
send arnie back to hollywood
raise money for localities-for school
for playgrounds


keep money local, instead of sending it to china.

- a concerned human

Well this of course would be ideal and sane. My question is:
How can a Country that ignores the basic question is: is this about justice or about power?

Do some people fear what they dont understand?

A plant that makes a chemical very similar to one already in your brain, that this chemical can really make you think about things like winning the hearts and minds of gooks that we were bombing and poisoning left and right.
I blame this highly noxious weed of making me see Vietnam in this light instead of some alcoholic stupor which led to
the early demise of some of my more gung-ho classmates in 1967-68.
There were others, high on religion, like Rev. Billy Graham would wonder aloud to the world from a stadium with Dick Nixon, how we could possibly lose against Godless communists!

(I tell people, "We still ended up winning cause Nikki has a factory there and quite a few other companies that require very cheap labor. Like China only more competitive!)

First of all although you might think the richest country in the world could bomb and poison a tiny lil really poor country into submission after 10 years, they just kept refusing to take our orders! Finally though, some troops who began tasting this pretty strong pot over there, decided that the war was a lie and that they weren't going to cooperate any more with this whole totally insane freakshow, the whole thing has led to an epidemic of homeless vets in this country asking for dimes, scueze me, did I say dime? Hell no! Dollars are the dimes of yesteryear!

Anyway, the bottom line is I came to the incredible conclusion that pot makes you think about these things, which might have been good to treat Mr. Graham and might have calmed the idiot down a bit and not make a total foo of himself, at least to me.

Kindof like the fall of building #7 on 9-11. I have to think people that saw that and the people that have since known about this coupled with the living in the ORANGE terror code unabated since 9-11, make me hope that the only cure for this insanity is a pot brownie and a copy of Core of Corruption DVD. As long as those are available, there's hope.

[Ron Tocknell]

The fact that cannabis has (among many amazing properties) a narcotic effect was a Godsend to the US administration. It provided Hoover and Co. with an excuse to ban all agricultural production and industrial use of a plant that threatened the three main industries on which those who controlled to US economy depended: Timber, Oil and Pharmaceuticals.

Henry Ford had introduced both a plastics made from hempseed oil with which he made the bodywork of a number of models and a fuel also based on hempseed oil on which his experimental prototypes ran effectively and cleanly. The legislation effectively rendered any further production or even research illegal. Ford's hemp plantations were subsequently destroyed by the government.

Plastics made from hemseed are as versatile as those made from petroleum-based chemicals and are cheaper to produce, do not pollute the environment and are biodegradable (the latter was regarded by Ford as a problem at the time as he was aiming at an 'indestructable' material). Fuels made from hempseed oil are clean, efficient and are also biodegradable.

The petrochemical industry did not like this.

"One acre of hemp can produce as much paper as 4 to 10 acres of trees over a 20-year cycle, but hemp stalks only take four months to mature, whereas trees take 20 to 80 years. This information was known in 1916, according to a USDA report. Hemp paper can also be recycled more often, though this fact is not of much value, since hemp is a reusable resource." (Source: http://www.hemphasis.net/Paper/paper.htm)

The timber industry did not like this

Until the legislation against cannabis, the plant's extracts were widely used to address many ailments and cannabis preparations made by small rural industries were widely sold in pharmacies. The medical council ratified the legislation against the use of cannabis because THEY DID NOT KNOW THE 'NARCOTIC' THEY WERE SIGNING AGAINST WAS CANNABIS. The government had coined the term 'marijuana' which, until then had been a little know Mexican slang term. Had they known they were agreeing to the total ban of cannabis, they would not have done so.

The following link will take you to a video outlining all of the issues I have raised and more. It's a long video and the quality is pretty terrible. But stick with it. It's highly informative. http://www.hemphasis.net/kiczenski/kiczenskivideo.htm

[Dieter Hoffmann]

My heart is singing when I read this - although there are two sides to this, like to anything else.
I, too, think that this plant is a gift of god, but I also think that it takes a certain amount of wisdom and maybe even disciplin to handle it properly. I've been using it for about 35 years now and I'm sure it helped me become the person I am now.
Although I still like it a lot, two spiritual teachers warned me about using it, since it may lead you into illusion, because in a way it's a sort of short-cut to a state of mind that can (or should) be achieved through spiritual practice like contemplation or meditation. And, from my own experience, I know that it has effects that affect your ability to drive a car, for example. But of course I can see no sense at all in prohibiting Marijuana, whereas alcohol is legal and available 24/7/365.
I think that we in the western world have lost the tradition of using certain plants to help us expand our consciosness and gain insight to ourselves as well as to the world around us, to connect to the universal mind, nature and the cosmos.
This is another field where we should re-connect. And so, of course YES ! Legalize it.
Love, light and blessings from my heart to all of you

[Ron Tocknell]

As much as I would agree that there is a lot of hysteria regarding the perceived dangers of marijuana, there is also a lot of overblown beliefs about the benefits of smoking it. It does introduce you to another aspect of yourself and this can, to a degree, expand awareness. But it is neither the devil that its critics claim it to be nor the angel that its advocates claim. It's just a drug that can, if you allow your mind to be open to that, give you a nudge in the right direction.

Government fears about cannabis have nothing to do with the narcotic effects and those who suggest that the government is afraid of everyone becoming enlightened through smoking dope probably has an unrealistic view of the plant's potential in that respect. Governments fear the effect that this economically and ecologically significant plant would have on the major corporations that currently dictate our economy.

[Dee Peterson]

This has been a very interesting discussion, with many valid points. Although I do not partake of this plant myself, I believe it needs to be legalized. Why not? Alchohol is legal. I have seen far more damaging effects due to the over-indulging of it throughout my lifetime. ~All things in moderation~

I am of indigenous blood; my ancestors were the "first people" on this land we call Turtle Island. [the US, as it is known today] This plant is both sacred as well as medicinal to us "skins". It is also used for ceremonial purposes. It is a gift from the Creator.

[Jeanne]

Cannibas is a plant... it is neither inherently good or bad. How we use it... as a sacred tool, a medicine or another excessive indulgence is about us and our volition. ...though I would never call it a drug. It is an herb and does not belong in the same category as white powder or pills.

Ron Tocknell said:

As much as I would agree that there is a lot of hysteria regarding the perceived dangers of marijuana, there is also a lot of overblown beliefs about the benefits of smoking it. It does introduce you to another aspect of yourself and this can, to a degree, expand awareness. But it is neither the devil that its critics claim it to be nor the angel that its advocates claim. It's just a drug that can, if you allow your mind to be open to that, give you a nudge in the right direction.

Government fears about cannabis have nothing to do with the narcotic effects and those who suggest that the government is afraid of everyone becoming enlightened through smoking dope probably has an unrealistic view of the plant's potential in that respect. Governments fear the effect that this economically and ecologically significant plant would have on the major corporations that currently dictate our economy.