Why Bill Maher is Right About Marijuana – But Also Terribly Wrong.

Posted on | February 25, 2015 | 2 Comments

Mike Magee

Bill Maher prides himself on logic and clarity, and of course, in-your-face, biting humor. This is on full display during his “New Rules” segment, with which he closes each show. He is especially well known for his personal and professional advocacy for the legalization of marijuana. His major points are that the substance is relatively harmless and that the criminalization of the substance has done far more harm than good, especially for minorities.

As he said last week, (while excoriating Ted Cruz and Jeb Bush, both of whom have admitted using the substance in the past, but are opposed to legalizing it), “Obama should acknowledge that putting people in jail for nonviolent drug offenses was a giant mistake in the first place, and then he should use the power of the presidential pardon and free them all.” And, with special reference to the youthful indiscretions of the Bush brothers, “We should at least be honest with our kids and tell them the truth about drug laws in this country. Kids, if you’re gonna experiment, make absolutely certain that beforehand your parents are white and well-connected.”

And, of course, Maher is right. The “Drug War” has been a disaster, and it is patently racist. Just consider the record in the largest cities on the East and West coast. In New York, during Mayor Bloomberg’s tenure, from 2002 to 2012, 1 million police hours were expended making 400,000 marijuana possession arrests. And who gets arrested? That’s well-documented – it’s primarily blacks and hispanics, caught up in “stop and frisk”.

New York Times columnist Charles Blow went after the city’s Democratic politicians on the “how it happens” piece. As he said, “The war on drugs in this country has become a war focused on marijuana, one being waged primarily against minorities and promoted, fueled, and financed primarily by Democratic politicians. Young police officers are funneled into low income black and Spanish neighborhoods where they are encouraged to aggressively stop and frisk young men. And if you look for something you’ll find it. So they find some of these young people with small amounts of drugs. Then these young people are arrested. The officers will get experience processing arrests and will likely get to file overtime… And the police chiefs will get a measure of productivity from their officers. The young men who were arrested are simply pawns.… No one knows all the repercussions of legalizing marijuana but it is clear that criminalizing it has made it a life ruining racial weapon.”

The practice is mirrored exactly on the West coast. Even though young whites have been shown to use marijuana at higher rates than blacks, LA police officers in the past 20 years have arrested blacks for marijuana possession at a population adjusted rate six times that of whites. How about other cities? San Diego – 6X disparity; Pasadena – 12.5 X disparity. In the state capital of Sacramento, the black population (14% of the total) accounts for over half of all marijuana arrests.

Now when you combine the targeting of minorities with the lack of legal resources to fight these arrests, you begin to understand how a minority that accounts for 13% of the population can be the source of more than 40% of all imprisoned Americans. Compare that with whites, who represent 64% of our population, but contribute only 39% of our prison population.

So Bill Maher is right about marijuana, but he’s also terribly wrong. Where he loses me is in glibly suggesting that weed is harmless, at least in comparison to other substances. On the surface, I’ve always known this to be untrue. After all, you’re breathing chemical-laden smoke deep into the bronchial tree. That can’t be good. Young active minds dulled and confused? That can’t be good. Operating motor equipment while impaired? That can’t be good.

Now a major study, published last month in Addiction magazine, under the auspices of the WHO, supports my biases with facts. The author, Wayne Hall, an addiction specialist at the University of Queensland in Australia, compared populations in 1993 and 2013. He focused on “two New Zealand birth cohort studies whose members lived through a historical period during which a large proportion used cannabis during adolescence and young adulthood; sufficient numbers of these had used cannabis often enough, and for long enough, to provide information about the adverse effects of regular and sustained cannabis use.” His results were in line with other recent cohort studies in Australia, Germany and the Netherlands .

What did Hall find?

Adverse effects of chronic use:

“Psychosocial outcomes:

Regular cannabis users can develop a dependence syndrome, the risks of which are around 1 in 10 of all cannabis users and 1 in 6 among those who start in adolescence.

Regular cannabis users double their risks of experiencing psychotic symptoms and disorders, especially if they have a personal or family history of psychotic disorders, and if they initiate cannabis use in their mid-teens.

Regular adolescent cannabis users have lower educational attainment than non-using peers.

Regular adolescent cannabis users are more likely to use other illicit drugs.

Regular cannabis use that begins in adolescence and continues throughout young adulthood appears to produce cognitive impairment but the mechanism and reversibility of the impairment is unclear.

Regular cannabis use in adolescence approximately doubles the risk of being diagnosed with schizophrenia or reporting psychotic symptoms in adulthood.

All these relationships have persisted after controlling for plausible confounders in well-designed studies, but some researchers still question whether adverse effects are related causally to regular cannabis use or explained by shared risk factors.

Physical health outcomes:

Regular cannabis smokers have higher risks of developing chronic bronchitis, but it is unclear if it impairs respiratory function.

Cannabis smoking by middle-aged adults probably increases the risks of myocardial infarction.”

That’s quite a list. Now Bill Maher is right on two counts: First, alcohol is worse. For example, as we’ve seen on multiple college campuses, you can die from alcohol intoxication. You can’t from marijuana. Second, marijuana possession has become the ultimate “Scarlet Letter” on the records of countless young black and hispanic males in the US. That’s why I’m for legalization.

But at the same time, Maher owes it to his faithful viewers, in his next “New Rules”, to point out that wide open use of marijuana by adolescents and young people is not without risk, and in fact, in Bill’s own words, “Is pretty f—ing stupid!”

For Health Commentary, I’m Mike Magee

Comments

2 Responses to “Why Bill Maher is Right About Marijuana – But Also Terribly Wrong.”

perry
February 25th, 2015 @ 9:11 pm

Mike – I remember attending a conference on ADD and Dr. Amen was speaking (He was recently on PBS for a two hour session. He is a real expert on the brain.
In that conference he gave a strong warning about pot, especially people with ADD. He said it is one of the strongest drugs in respect to brain function and as such it’s effects are not generally appreciated in the general public.
I have spoke to addiction specialists who are strongly against it’s recreational use.
So, yes, lets not inprision using of pot, but to open the flow gates is a big mistake.
Mike Magee
February 26th, 2015 @ 8:11 am

Thanks, Perry, for your insights!