Ban on Marijuana Users Owning Guns is Unconstitutional

[teratos]

I'm astonished at the number of people from all walks of life who would be OK with putting it on the record.

Now that most medical records are digitised and online, you just know that Big Govt is taking it all down. Hunter Biden is the exception, not the rule.

Right?

People are stupid. My medical assistant dutifully puts it in the chart. I delete it.

 

[Muleskinner]

Back to the original topic;

The 4473 says "Are you an unlawful user of, or addicted to, marijuana or any depressant, stimulant, narcotic drug, or any other controlled substance?

While cannabis is listed as schedule 1 the true answer for someone that has EVER consumed Cannabis is yes ( let's assume for purposes of discussion that everyone is fully truthful on the form). I'm keying in on the word "unlawful".

Say the DEA follows the current HHS recommendation and changes it from schedule 1 to schedule 3. My understanding is schedule 3 can be lawfully possessed with a prescription.

Say one gets a Maryland weed card and actually consumes Cannabis. Say aside from the federal scheduling change, there are no other changes to the current status quo, including the 4473. Does that mean a MD resident with a valid medical weed card can consume and lawfully answer "no" on the 4473?

I'm asking for a friend.

Okay let's say they do that. Is having a medicinal marijuana card in your pocket the same as having a prescription? I don't think there's a doctor alive who would write a prescription for endless Viagra or Valium or Ambien. They might write you 3 months worth but then you have to go back see the doc and get a new prescription if it's warranted. Using that logic a medical marijuana card should only entitle you to x number of purchases before you have to go back to the doctor verify that you still need the substance and get a new card right?

 

[Crazytrain]

Okay let's say they do that. Is having a medicinal marijuana card in your pocket the same as having a prescription? I don't think there's a doctor alive who would write a prescription for endless Viagra or Valium or Ambien. They might write you 3 months worth but then you have to go back see the doc and get a new prescription if it's warranted. Using that logic a medical marijuana card should only entitle you to x number of purchases before you have to go back to the doctor verify that you still need the substance and get a new card right?

In many countries it's all over the counter anyhow. Probably should be here.

 

[Muleskinner]

In many countries it's all over the counter anyhow. Probably should be here.

I agree. I believe most medications should be allowed to be sold over the counter. Anything non-narcotic however that's not the way it is and probably never will be.

 

[Biggfoot44]

So the ability to drive drunk is a natural right and is only a crime if/when me doing so hurts someone. Got it.

Not quite what he's saying .

You can possess a car , and simultaneously posses a 750ml of Whiskey . You just can simultaneously chug one while driving the other .

 

[Crazytrain]

So the ability to drive drunk is a natural right and is only a crime if/when me doing so hurts someone. Got it.

Sorta kinda. I mean, it's a crime because it is against the law. If the law is legitimate is a fair question worthy of debate. But one thing to keep in mind is that rights are entwined with responsibility. You can't have one without the other. Causing harm by irresponsibly exercising a right makes you fully responsible for the outcome. It is easily argued that it is a good and right thing to proactively prevent the irresponsible execution of a right in order to prevent harm. The natural problem with this approach is that we are outsourcing our decision making, and to an extent, our responsibility, and by extension, our rights, to an outside authority. I think we've all observed in our lives that power corrupts and we inevitably end up in a tug of war between liberty and tyranny.

So... If you get to choose, which choice would you make? An authoritarian world with a somewhat reduced risk (debatable , but let's go with it for now), or a dangerous free world?

(It's very late, I'm two wines in, and typing on my phone...I hope what I wrote made sense)

 

[Bob A]

It is easily argued that it is a good and right thing to proactively prevent the irresponsible execution of a right in order to prevent harm. The natural problem with this approach is that we are outsourcing our decision making, and to an extent, our responsibility, and by extension, our rights, to an outside authority. I think we've all observed in our lives that power corrupts and we inevitably end up in a tug of war between liberty and tyranny.

So... If you get to choose, which choice would you make? An authoritarian world with a somewhat reduced risk (debatable , but let's go with it for now), or a dangerous free world?

(It's very late, I'm two wines in, and typing on my phone...I hope what I wrote made sense)

I think your point is well stated. My inclination would be strongly toward freedom; I have little respect for the authoritarian. Aside from authority's natural inclination to seek to extend and exercise its power, it degrades into a self-serving organism, and becomes a medium ripe for corruption.

 

[Crazytrain]

So the ability to drive drunk is a natural right and is only a crime if/when me doing so hurts someone. Got it.

I'm apparently something of a masochist, and I'm dangerously three bourbons in (which is one past where I make good-ish decisions), and I've been thinking about this a little for awhile.

Premise: You have the right to do with your property whatever you want so long as it doesn't impact the rights of others. More than anything else, you own yourself, so you should be able to do pretty much anything you want so long as it doesn't impact the rights of others.

Counter Argument: That means you can drive drunk and no one can do anything until you hurt someone?

Further context: If you are drinking, drugging, or whatever, you should not be forced to give up your right to self defense.

OK. Like I said at the top, I've been thinking a little about this.

First, I am currently three bourbons in. There is a loaded pistol sitting on a table three feet away from me. It will continue sitting, inertly, three feet away from me until I crawl into bed in about five minutes. If someone where to break into my house and threaten me or mine, I would have no problem using said firearm in my defense. No doubt I would not be as effective as I would be if wide awake and fully sober, but I'm not giving up my right to self defense, which is probably the single most important right any of us has, because I'm trying to unwind after a long, long, long day.

If I'm in a bar and I want a have a few drinks, I should be able to be armed. I've heard it said that bars are where there is the greatest chance of violence. That is not a reason to disarm. Quite the opposite. HOWEVER, I, for damned sure, am still responsible for my actions. If I know I do dumb stuff when drinking I should proactively prevent myself from the opportunity to do dumb stuff. The mere presence of a firearm does not imply threat. If I start operating that firearm by handling it, clearing it, showing it off, shooting it in the sky, I am then unreasonably putting others at risk, and have then exceeded the limits of my rights as I am now implicating the rights of others.

Driving impaired implicates the rights of others by unreasonably putting them at risk. If I am sleeping behind the wheel with the engine idling to keep the heater running and the car in park, I am NOT unreasonably putting others at risk (a friend of my fathers got busted for DUI by sleeping, in a parking lot, in his turned off car while drunk. Seemed unfair to me). If I'm driving 90 MPH down I-70 with my current three bourbons...yeah, I am irresponsibly implicating your rights at that point.

If we are going to live in a world of reason and justice, as opposed to an anarchistic/barbaric system of survival of the fittest/luckiest, we need a certain amount of rules. I don't like it, but don't see a better solution. So a social contract, eventually leading to a legal framework, is formed. Frankly, it gets hard to define right and wrong. A champion race car driver probably drives better after three beers than my mother does after a glass of orange juice. But we need to have clear, simple, easily understood rules of what is ok and what isn't. No law should require 50 pages of MDS commentary to figure out what is legal and what isn't. Unfortunately, rules require administration meaning authority. Only folks who want power pursue said authority. And once those power hungry folks get the authority, they are going to want to use it. And abuse it. It's human nature. So we will always be in a perpetual struggle of rights vs authority lest we descend into anarchy.

And that's why the tree needs to be fed periodically.

 

[Doctor_M]

All walks of life. A LOT of lawyers.

No wonder we can't understand what they write.

 

[Mark75H]

Right?

People are stupid. My medical assistant dutifully puts it in the chart. I delete it.

NSA is keylogging you

 

[teratos]

NSA is keylogging you

Probably the case.

 

[Darkemp]

Oh, jeez, I was trying to be so clever with the slavery thing I completely forgot about the 9th.

Oh, and for what it's worth, I agree with eruby. Even if you are drinking or smoking or shooting meth you don't lose your right to armed self defense. It can be argued whether it is wise to carry if impaired (or just having a glass of wine with dinner), but mere possession of a weapon should not be a crime. However, you are always fully responsible for the consequences of exercising your right. I know most here disagree.

I do agree with this as well, every human being has a right to self defense, this right cannot be given or taken away, is is innate upon birth and the implement used is irrelevant.

 

[outrider58]

If you consider your body to be your property, you presumably have the right to to to it and with it whatever you please, so long as it creates no harm to others.

Sounds like trans-sexuality, abortion, drugging, drinking and fornicating for profit would fall into that area. Probably even more that I haven't thought of.

I can see a lot of heads exploding at the thought of that level of extended freedom.

Actually, for me, I see his range of personal freedom(if you will) being quite restrictive and regulated(not a bad thing). When you think about it, day to day life puts you in direct contact with hundreds to thousands of people, particularly in urban environs. Those numbers open you up to all kinds of problems if you aren't playing by the rules.

I am pretty much in line with his thinking.

 

[Bob A]

If you consider your body to be your property, you presumably have the right to to to it and with it whatever you please, so long as it creates no harm to others.

Sounds like trans-sexuality, abortion, drugging, drinking and fornicating for profit would fall into that area. Probably even more that I haven't thought of.

I can see a lot of heads exploding at the thought of that level of extended freedom.

Actually, for me, I see his range of personal freedom(if you will) being quite restrictive and regulated(not a bad thing). When you think about it, day to day life puts you in direct contact with hundreds to thousands of people, particularly in urban environs. Those numbers open you up to all kinds of problems if you aren't playing by the rules.

I am pretty much in line with his thinking.

Don't overlook my first sentence, regarding responsibility re: rights of others.

My "heads exploding" was addressed to the line above it, where I mentioned a number of things that go along with the extremes of personal freedom.

Liberty may be its own reward, but the thoughtful and moral individual, living in society, should ideally recognise that no one is an island, and that personal choices impact the lives of others. Self-regulation is a good thing, an ideal. Forced personal regulation is not ideal, and I'm against it, completely.

If one transgresses his moral code and as a consequence damages others, that should be dealt with.
However, drinking or drugging to the extent that it damages one's ability to exercise personal responsibility is a failure of the person.How society chooses to deal with that becomes society's problem.

Determining the punishment for personal failure at the societal level is determined by the nature of that society. As we have seen, this can vary tremendously in a given society over a generation or two, and usually not for the better. Entropy increases, and chaos is one of its agents.

I've always thought that mankind's ideal should be to be an anti-entropic force in the universe. That is where Man may approach the Godhead.

 

[babalou]

Don't overlook my first sentence, regarding responsibility re: rights of others.

My "heads exploding" was addressed to the line above it, where I mentioned a number of things that go along with the extremes of personal freedom.

Liberty may be its own reward, but the thoughtful and moral individual, living in society, should ideally recognise that no one is an island, and that personal choices impact the lives of others. Self-regulation is a good thing, an ideal. Forced personal regulation is not ideal, and I'm against it, completely.

If one transgresses his moral code and as a consequence damages others, that should be dealt with.
However, drinking or drugging to the extent that it damages one's ability to exercise personal responsibility is a failure of the person.How society chooses to deal with that becomes society's problem.

Determining the punishment for personal failure at the societal level is determined by the nature of that society. As we have seen, this can vary tremendously in a given society over a generation or two, and usually not for the better. Entropy increases, and chaos is one of its agents.

I've always thought that mankind's ideal should be to be an anti-entropic force in the universe. That is where Man may approach the Godhead.

Bob A, besides the pleasure of meeting you a few times, it is always a pleasure to read your well thought out succinct writings.

 

[Bob A]

Bob A, besides the pleasure of meeting you a few times, it is always a pleasure to read your well thought out succinct writings.

Thanks; it's been a pleasure hanging out with you, as well!