Shameful. Common sense is not being used. Also why is it that a target gets more attention coming to Portsmouth than the pot store? What message will the schools be communicating? The bottom line is that any kind of illegal drug is and has been bad for your health. Common sense says that if it is and or was illegal it is probably not a food thing. I say take the pot store and leave town away from our kids. Also how can this store be located so close to a public facility (the dump) and near by schools? Sont we have a zoning laws for this new type of quasi illegal business?

Drug prohibition creates an unregulated, violent environment in which children are recruited to sell drugs.

Admit cannabis legally, and users of deadly, not just "bad for your health" legal intoxicants, medications and devices used for self medicating (cigarettes) might switch.

Send an honest message. Drug War IS crime.

Marijuana should be treated as alcohol, with regulation instead of criminalization. We know the lessons of alcohol prohibition, yet we haven't been willing to apply them to other substances. Portugal decriminalized all drugs, and has had a decrease in crime and health problems as a result.

The medicinal use of marijuana is a separate issue. The abuse of analgesics, amphetamines, and tranquilizers doesn't stop us from providing these medications to people who need them. Our refusal to allow the sick to relieve their symptoms with the best or safest medication available, even if it happens to be marijuana, is simply cruel.

The form fit and function of the pot shop sends a completely different message than prescribed drugs from a pharmacy. Why can't the chemical pieces of pot be put into a pill form and sold at pharmacies? This way a clear cut difference between street illegal and prescribed legal is easily understood

It seems that you're one of the few that doesn't understand. There is a clear cut difference now. Where can you go to an established business and by marijana today? It is 50 times easier to pot any day at the high school than it would be from a regulated operation, which this business will be. Let's not mention Heroin and ecstasy, which flow freely at the school too. By the way, selling marijuana for medical purposes is not illeagal.

You need to reread the posts. They are all good arguments for and against the new pot store

1.) Due to prohibition, kids can get pot in school right now, and for the last 50 years its been that way. Drug dealers don't card.
2.) You don't see Mexicans crossing the border with kegs of beer on their back, because there is no black market and no profit in it.
3.) Bootleggers only sell Whiskey, because pound for pound it makes the most money. You can't buy low TCH marijuana because the free market is being suppressed.
4.) Billions of dollars in revenue in the US are going overseas with no taxation and no tariffs. Interesting way to dispense charity...
5.) Laws against marijuana have tried to stop its use for 80+ years. It has not worked at all. The evidence is right before us all. This just drives the price up and turns hardworking people into criminals.
See what this California judge has to say about the issue; He dealt with this in court for many years and knows the issue as few people can: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDKarCeC_Ic

Freedom is the ability to live your life as you chose. If people could grow their own in their homes the mob would not have these dollars in their pocket. Prohibitions and excessive tax create black markets. As a government we try to regulate peoples lives with laws that serve no beneficial purpose .
I look it as a libertarian. The choice should be up to the individual. If you drive drunk or high on drugs that is where you cross the line .What you do in your home is your choice alone.

In 2009 the AMA passed a resolution promoting the investigation of cannabis as a valid medicine:

"The AMA adopted a new policy urging the US federal government to "review" marijuana's status in Schedule I vs. "retain" it in Schedule I as the AMA had formerly recommended. The new policy stated:

"Our AMA urges that marijuana's status as a federal Schedule I controlled substance be reviewed with the goal of facilitating the conduct of clinical research and development of cannabinoid-based medicines, and alternate delivery methods. This should not be viewed as an endorsement of state-based medical cannabis programs, the legalization of marijuana, or that scientific evidence on the therapeutic use of cannabis meets the current standards for a prescription drug product."

Lester Grinspoon, MD, Emeritus Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, wrote in an Aug. 17, 2003 article published in the Boston Globe:

"Doctors and nurses have seen that for many patients, cannabis is more useful, less toxic, and less expensive than the conventional medicines prescribed for diverse syndromes and symptoms, including multiple sclerosis, Crohn's disease, migraine headaches, severe nausea and vomiting, convulsive disorders, the AIDS wasting syndrome, chronic pain, and many others."

Aug. 17, 2003 - Lester Grinspoon, MD

Kate Scannell, MD, Co-Director of the Northern California Ethics Department at Kaiser Permanente and author of Death of the Good Doctor, wrote in an article published in the San Francisco Chronicle on Feb. 16, 2003:

"From working with AIDS and cancer patients, I repeatedly saw how marijuana could ameliorate a patient's debilitating fatigue, restore appetite, diminish pain, remedy nausea, cure vomiting and curtail down-to-the-bone weight loss."

Dr. Scannell concluded by noting:
"...almost every sick and dying patient I've ever known who's tried medical marijuana experienced a kinder death."

Andrew Weil, MD, Director of Integrative Medicine at the University of Arizona College of Medicine, stated in a June 6, 2002 article published in the San Francisco Chronicle:

"Like all medicines, marijuana has its drawbacks, particularly in smoked form. It is not a panacea. I support research into safer delivery systems such as low-temperature vaporizers or inhalers, which offer the fast action of inhaled medicine without the irritants found in smoke. Still, I have seen in my own studies that marijuana is less toxic than most pharmaceutical drugs in current use, and is certainly helpful for some patients, including those with wasting syndrome, chronic muscle spasticity and tractable nausea.

As a physician, I am frustrated that I cannot prescribe marijuana for patients who might benefit from it. At the very least I would like to be able to refer them to a safe, reliable, quality-controlled source."

Do you want to continue? I can post these things all night if we're going to employ the appeal to authority fallacy.

Regardless, none of your studies supports the criminalization of personal use. We don't criminalize drinking alcohol, and the health hazards there are indisputable. No Mr. Linkletter, the fact that there are people who don't get drunk when they drink is irrelevant. The health hazards of excessive drinking are profound and proven. Tobacco smokers never get high, but they sure to get a lot of negative health issues from it.

It's comical to assert that someone who has a habit with potentially deleterious health effects should be put in jail and given a criminal record.

There is a lot of useful and interesting information on here. However, it is largely beside the point.

13 states have already decriminalized marijuana (AK,CA,CO,MA,ME,MN,MS,NC,NE,NV,NY,OH,OR). The only relevant question is whether these states have suffered worse outcomes in crime, health, education, or other social factors than those states which have not deciminalized.

If those of you who oppose decrim in RI cannot provide evidence of any quantifiable harm suffered by the 13 decrim states, then you simply have no leg to stand on.

We went through this with alcohol, and we will go through this with marijuana

Very interesting and thoughtful discussion. I appreciate all the well researched and factual comments as well. This is what the Patch comments section is supposed to be about.

I wish people stopped projecting their own prejudices and misinformation on this subject that is so dear and so important to a lot of us. I just can't wait to be able to buy my marijuana legally and from an approved dispensary. It is the only effective drug that has been able to calm my sister's nausea and anxiety as he goes through radiation therapy for breast cancer. Today, the easiest way to buy this is in the black market. And guess what? The referrals come from high-school aged kids! As for smoking Mr Cosgrove, please inform yourself and stop copying and pasting from your "authorities". Oil infusions and vaporizers provide much better absorption without the drawbacks of smoke. Any of the online cancer support groups will give great insights into the benefits of Marijuana as a drug and the impact that legal dispensaries had.

Find out why more and more cops, judges, and prosecutors who have fought on the front lines of the "war on drugs" are standing up and saying we need to legalize and regulate all drugs to help solve our economic, crime, and public health problems: http://www.facebook.com/CopsSayLegalizeDrugs

The Department of Justice announced that there are now 1.5 million people in prisons across the United States?

Who are they?

What are they in for?

TYPE OF OFFENSE (Sentenced Pop. Only) - Federal Prisoners

Drug Offenses 59.6%

Robbery 9.8%

Property Offenses 5.5%

Extortion, Fraud, Bribery 6.8%

Violent Offenses 2.7%

Firearms, Explosives, Arson 8.6%

White Collar 1.0%

Immigration 2.8%

Courts or Corrections 0.8%

National Security 0.1%

Continuing Criminal Enterprise 0.8%

Miscellaneous 1.5%

Average cost per prisoner at about thirty five thousand dollars annually . Crime pays , for some.

Over 50 percent of people released from prison in Rhode Island are returned to prison within three years. The high recidivism rate undermines public safety, and it contributes to a rapidly growing prison population. In the spring of 2007, the average daily population of Rhode Island’s unified jail and prison system reached an all-time high: 3,800 prisoners.

With Rhode Island spending an average of $40,000 per inmate per year, confronting a sharp projected increase in prison population, and facing a mandate to spend $300 million more to expand capacity, it is reasonable to ask whether the state can approach crime and punishment in a more sensible manner...

"The potential benefits of medicinal Cannabis for people living with cancer include antiemetic effects, appetite stimulation, pain relief, and improved sleep. In the practice of integrative oncology, the health care provider may recommend medicinal Cannabis not only for symptom management but also for its possible direct antitumor effect.

Cannabinoids are a group of terpenophenolic compounds found in Cannabis species (Cannabis sativa L. and Cannabis indica Lam.). This summary will review the role of Cannabis and the cannabinoids in the treatment of people with cancer and disease-related or treatment-related side effects."

. . .

"Cannabinoids may cause antitumor effects by various mechanisms, including induction of cell death, inhibition of cell growth, and inhibition of tumor angiogenesis and metastasis. [9-11] Cannabinoids appear to kill tumor cells but do not affect their nontransformed counterparts and may even protect them from cell death. These compounds have been shown to induce apoptosis in glioma cells in culture and induce regression of glioma tumors in mice and rats. Cannabinoids protect normal glial cells of astroglial and oligodendroglial lineages from apoptosis mediated by the CB1 receptor. [10,11]"

http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/pdq/cam/cannabis/healthprofessional/AllPages

(Now you know that you know, and WE know that you know. )