For all the kids who got trolled by reilly, go watch the union on youtube so you can spit back information and sound smart as **** about bud.
Smoking pot gave me something to do for a while, since I'm only 18 I couldn't say "I smoke pot for my health" and since I'm not one to go and flaunt I wouldn't say "Oh it helps me relax and relieves me stress." Reality was I was a bored teenager who got high put his ipod on and spaced out, or just talked to friends and had some really fun memories.
It's not a gateway drug in my opinion, you can be a little ass kid drink apple juice on a day to day basis and say "ohh I loved to drink apple juice so now that's why I drink alcohol." Doesn't work that way, the desire to use more intense and harder "drugs" is all on the person and the amount of pressure or curiosity he has to go and take the next step. Educate before you medicate is what a lot of us say around here.
I'm not saying I want the government to make it 100% legal for recreational use because there will be a high rate of teens who don't want to do anything but sit around and smoke bud. They will think they are getting **** done but believe me, I have had friends who went out to California for college and come home due to dropping out because they just wanted to chill smoke bud and hang with whoever. Now the kid who had a job making decent money while in college is at home in his mom and dads house working only 15 hours a week making ****. When you smoke bud daily, you think about it a lot and yeah it can get in the way of things.
The government should at least 100% legalize the ability to grow 'Industrial Hemp,' I think it's only legal to grow it in a few states in the midwest of the U.S. You can't smoke Ind Hemp, yet our economy would boom. You can create so many natural fibers, bio fuels, clothing, paper, even use the seeds to make a type of skim milk or even consume the seeds. Would solve some of this debt as well solve a lot of problems and create solutions for natural fuels, as well as solutions for the energy crisis or even provide clothing for the needy people.