Trying to be objective instead of taking any sides, I'll have to say that marijuana's negative effects are more insidious than certain intoxicants that are currently legal. Because of alcohol's fast half life in the system, we can scientifically determine how much one has consumed within a certain amount of time, and thus judge how it has effected the individual, and thus we can easily pinpoint both acute intoxication as well as determine how much it is affecting the person in question at the time of any situation. i.e. If someone who has been drinking crashes a car because he is drunk, we can take blood samples to prove acute intoxication, thus proving it as a factor in the crash, as well as prove it legally for many various legal charges, and offhanded say "ye, this man has taken of drink, and drunk he drove", whilst the marijuana user who crashes a car due to being under the influence of his drug is quite the opposite, objective scientific tests cannot determine absolutely how much the user has used, nor can it prove acute intoxication, nor can we see acute levels and prove the use of the drug was a definite factor, quite like alcohol. If Johnny Drunkard gets pulled over and blows a 0.2, we know he's driving when he should not be because he just drank; if we get a urine analysis of Pauly Puffer, there is no way to tell if the THC in his system is recent or residual.
tl;dr Alcohol comes and goes, and a man who had a few too many drinks two days ago is completely sober today, whilst the marijuana user has the drug build up in his system, creating long term effects, and making judgements of the effects of the drug on the person to be more difficult. If a person drinks a six pack of beer at 5-7 PM, he will be sober enough to shoot come 9 AM the following morning, and we know for certain his condition. If marijuana becomes more legal, how can employers or peace officer determine when someone is acutely intoxicated, or if their long term status has been harmed enough to make legal determinations, or to terminate employees? We know when someone who sometimes consumes alcohol should and should not be shooting, but with other intoxicants, when and how do we draw lines?
Do we set standards that if one recently consumed the drug, they should not be carrying a gun or participating in shooting sports? How do we determine what is sufficient intoxication, acute or otherwise? Is a complete ban on all users true justice, or are we stripping people of their rights in a very unjust manner?
I say, use what I'll invent as a standard for personal use, The Cough Medicine Rule. If the effects of an over the top medication, that anyone can buy, and are not subject to such hot debates, makes you groggy, sleepy, dopey enough that you should not operate a car or heavy equipment, than any equivalent intoxication by any other substance should prevent you from shooting, driving, ect., and that constitutes a rule of thumb, not so much legal. Don't take it from the point of "I had X amount of substance y", go "if the individual is under the influence, this person should not be doing any of these activities".
I'll step in the mess this thread has become long enough to say this, I'm a "Oakie from Miskogee" kinda guy, I've had my problems with the bottle, and am against all drugs, including marijuana. I'll say that observing those around me who have used marijuana that yes, indeed, it is acutely intoxicating to those who use it, people tend to not notice because it is not as extreme as alcohol, and that there is long term intoxication, which we mistake for personality changes, it is a bad drug with bad effects. Its psychological addiction is worse than alcohol, because users believe the drug is benign, nay, beneficial, and because they think the drug is harmless, they see its abuse as harmless, and refuse to recognize problems and deal with them.
All that being said, marijuana is simply to prevalent in the United States to be eliminated, and we reach a dangerous tipping point when stripping such a large population of rights and enforcing such actions could be logistically impossible, unenforceable, and hit a point of unjustly stripping men of God given rights in a war we have lost for decades, and are reaching a point we cannot win. The ATF and FBI don't prosecute most of the cases of barred individuals who attempt to buy firearms legally in the first place, and when we consider all of the dangerous violent criminals and felons on the streets with guns, it would seem enforcing strong gun restrictions on legal marijuana users is a pipe dream, will probably be as useful as the war on marijuana itself, and will actually drive otherwise legal and healthy individuals who use the drugs back onto black markets to avoid legal recognition for their use with all of the negative legal consequences, thus chasing away potentially law abiding users away from taxed and regulated marijuana, which would defeat any advantages of its legalization.
if I went on too long, as I always do, let me know.
