Prompted by “Federal study: Drugged driving rivals alcohol in roadway fatalities”: http://www.thecannabist.co/2015/09/30/study-roadway-fatalities-prescription-drugs-legalized-pot/41624/
Drunken drivers have long been the scourge of the roadways, but now drivers on drugs are becoming a menace that rivals them, according to a new federal report. […]
A report by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette noted that the study data have limitations, including no distinction between THC, the marijuana component that causes impairment, and metabolites that remain in a person’s system long after the effects of smoking pot have worn off.
Impairment is at the heart of this issue, so without that key distinction, any media outlet presenting cannabis as dangerous due to that report is abusing their journalism code of ethics.
The GHSA report recommended more public education and said police officers should be better trained to identify drivers who are high on drugs.
Police officers should have nothing to do with drugs, but are already trained (at least I reasonably assume) to identify impaired driving (e.g. drivers swerving out of lanes, inappropriate speeds, dishonoring signage, etc.)
Reckless driving is not limited to drug influence (including pharmaceuticals too often “legitimately” prescribed that likely factor deeply into traffic problems due to their popularity), but also emotional issues during sobriety. Angry driving is dangerous, for prime example here, as is any emotional state rendering driving as a secondary act, while the driver gets lost in other thoughts.
In surveys and focus groups done in two states — Colorado and Washington — regular marijuana users said they felt their habit did not impair their ability to drive and, in some cases, improved it.
“They believed that they can compensate for any effects of marijuana, for instance by driving more slowly or by allowing greater headways,” the GHSA report said. “They believed it is safer to drive after using marijuana than after drinking alcohol.”
As certain cannabis strains produce stabilizing mental effects (and nicely invitingly prioritizes driving focus), it makes sense that certain cannabis use increases driver safety.
However, not all cannabis strains produce that stability, and intake amount is a key factor (too much of any strain will distract against the possibility of wise driving). Positive set and setting (i.e. a healthy mindset in a safe environment) isn’t just limited to responsible psychedelic use, but also acts such as driving.
The real danger in all of this comes from the mainstream media’s refusal to toughly challenge proponents for Certain Drug Prohibition (the bigger and badder sequel to Alcohol Prohibition, which also failed miserably).
Those proponents constantly proclaim that “weakening” drug laws causes disaster. They have to proclaim that, because if untrue, prohibition has no legitimacy (i.e. just a waste of ample taxpayer resources against the “unalienable” right to liberty).
Drug laws have been “weakened” a lot over the past few decades, so it makes perfect sense for those proponents to launch and perpetuate their ‘See?! We told you so!’ campaign. Yet no such campaign exists — because no such disaster exists (because prohibition does not work at all by any concrete measure).
Instead, they charge forward with their drugged driving scaremongering grounded in woefully inaccurate impairment testing methods (they deceive the public to unethically maintain their prohibition cash cow).
Certain Drug Prohibition is (has been and will always be) a scam. “Leaders” upholding that scam continue to drive our nation into the ground against everything our nation was supposed to be built upon. That includes an unalienable right to liberty that has been repeatedly pushed aside to send the right message to children inclusively in the form of a highly destructive policy that fails to create a “drug free” prison system (nonetheless fails to produce one shred of concrete evidence proving we live in even a slightly more “drug free” America) as a result of spending billions of taxpayer dollars annually. And that prohibition (that message) is illegally ruled constitutional solely by way of an obvious (and illegal) redefining of the Commerce Clause (from “regulate commerce” to ‘regulate any activity having a substantial effect on commerce’ — clearly different, according to the English language).
The actualized disaster is the millions of non-violent citizens persecuted to secure a drug prohibition fix.
Since the mainstream media (for several decades) has demonstrated serious bias towards the war on some drugs, activism needs to focus on alerting the masses of that fact. In other words, publicly focusing upon undermining mainstream media credibility challenges journalists to remedy their serious conflict of interest towards supporting our government (even against public safety) to secure access to the freshest and most distinctive newsworthy information to get their tragic news fix. In other words, due to that necessary access for professional dominance and survival, the mainstream media is disgustingly effectively state-run media in the land of the “free press”.
Ultimately, there’s a lot of blood on the hands of corrupt “leaders” blatantly abusing law to pretend to address drug abuse (but really just end up securing more power for themselves against public safety).
The Rule of Reality (i.e. reality’s scientifically demonstrated need for balance, so basically karma, and a fundamental part of scientific constitutionalism needed to end government by abusive reasoning) is a naturally governing force being stupidly ignored. That Rule, however, is not ignoring the horrific amounts of suffering (including blatant rights-infringement) caused by such outrageously childish “leadership”. Quite the contrary, that Rule insists upon the corruption that happens, but also the balancing correction that inevitably happens.
The fact is education is the only risk management method lawfully possible (in an uncorrupt judicial system) in a nation with a self-evident and unalienable right to liberty. Risk by law (instead of just harm by law) is inevitably rights infringement, because to define risk is to define liberty (an unbearably ignored “elephant in the American room”).
It’s time to understand that reason abuse (the truest form of impairment against driving society) has a terrible cost (nobody possibly ultimately gets away with lying or any form of the ‘partial truth = whole truth’ scam) — too often against the children receiving the “righteous message” from “community leaders” like a ‘national car crash’ igniting mass destruction that unethically never makes the prime-time news.
Our Respect Cannabis campaign is an apolitical exercise ultimately focusing upon intentional perception alteration itself and the reckless and baseless laws thrusting grossly against the liberty to engage in that alteration without rights infringement.
A detailed focus with (dis)respect to that blatantly corrupt law (from thuggish might makes right) comes from our Liberty Shield entertainment project to explore scientific constitutionalism to reinforce constitutional protection (e.g. against “lawfully” idiotic discrimination) by way of leveraging the scientific method (not necessarily imperfect scientific conclusions, or less than 100% “scientific” consensus) to form better certainty in language for robust and clear law focused sharply on what can only ever be honestly defined as harm (not questionable sensitivity grounded in weak suggestive science at best). The fundamental example of that certainty is the self-evident and unalienable right to liberty, which can be objectively defined as the condition of being free from restriction or control with the only limit being the right itself.
Restoring that truly progressive focus brings responsible driving of society to the forefront, but that focus needs mass dominance to be effective, so likely includes your support.
I am an honest freak (or reasonably responsibly balanced "misfit", if you prefer) of an artist working and resting to best carefully contribute towards helping society. Too many people abuse reasoning (e.g. 'partial truth = whole truth' scam), while I exercise reason to explore and express whole truth without any conflict-of-interest -- all within a sometimes offbeat style of psychedelic artistry.
Spirit Wave Journal 
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