DID HE JUST SAY THAT? WEED AND BOB RINEARSON

"And although I remain a staunch proponent to the legalization of marijuana,"
EDITORS ERROR? ( you mean Opponent, Bob?? or are you high?) LOL.. 
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Last updated: Fri. Dec. 19, 2014 - 06:03 pm EDT YOUR VOICE We need to educate our youth about the dangers of getting hight By Bob Rinearson PHOTOS Click on image to view. DISCUSS   Comments (0) Comment on this story Another school day and the usual students gather at the bus stop awaiting their school bus. But one of them, a 15-year old boy appears incoherent. As the bus approaches, he staggers and then falls. He stands and attempts to board the bus but falls into the stairwell. When the driver attempts to ask him what is wrong, he slurs his words, and then he vomits yellow vile. The bus driver makes the call for medical response. After he is loaded into the ambulance and his mother arrives on the scene, he is finally able to tell the medics that he smoked Spice after he had left the house that morning. The determination is made that he has overdosed, and he is rushed to the hospital. He’s lucky he is still breathing. If you don’t already know, Spice is a synthetic cannabinoid made in labs. It is designed to reach as well as affect those parts of the brain in the same manner as marijuana. On the streets it is also known as K1, Bliss, Scooby Snax and Moon Rocks. It’s packaged with the intent on making it look like a natural plant substance, appearing much like potpourri. But make no mistake, despite how attractive Spice is being passed off on the streets or to our children, it is not marijuana, not even close. And although I remain a staunch proponent to the legalization of marijuana, Spice is to marijuana as a shotgun is to a slingshot, meaning that Spice is far more unpredictable and dangerous. Yet it has been advertised in drug circles as a “safer” alternative to pot. Certainly it is cheap enough, usually averaging $30-$40 for a 3-gram bag. Even in Fort Wayne, police are regularly dealing with cases involving Spice. And just as in the case of real cannabis, sold in the legal head shops in Colorado, there is no viable way to know what exactly has been added in with the product. Paul Prather, Ph.D., professor of pharmacology and toxicology at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, describes the Spice products as “clearly very different from THC and thus not surprising that their use may result in development of life-threatening adverse effects.” Depending on the amount and kind of synthetic cannabinoid present in any package, smoking Spice can produce a multitude of severe and dangerous symptoms including paranoia, hypkalemia, vomiting, hallucination, tremors and seizures. More serious consequences may include stroke, kidney damage, acute psychosis and even death. Besides the euphoria of getting high, an attraction that draws young drug users to Spice is the idea that a person cannot be tested for use the same way other drug tests are administered. For the kid who is expected to be tested for athletics or is on probation, the promise of still being able to get high without being detected presents an alluring temptation. Up until two years ago, just about anyone could buy Spice from any gas station. It was and still is often passed off as incense. You could select from an assortment of mixtures, all packaged in plastic with psychedelic labels making them attractive to any indulging young person. Finally the Indiana legislature added the synthetic cannabinoid activating drug found in Spice to the schedule of illegal drugs in Indiana. But that hasn’t deterred unscrupulous business owners from still peddling Spice from their back stock rooms or from beneath the counters. In states where possession or even sales of small amounts of marijuana remains illegal, most are treating it as a misdemeanor. But because of the problem that Spice has presented, states such as Florida have declared the distribution of synthetic cannabis products a felony. In Lemon Grove, Calif., a convenience store owner was fined $54,000 for selling Spice, including to those who bartered with food stamps in order to get high. So maybe politicians are reacting to the dangers presented by synthetic marijuana. But what is missing, is an ongoing effort to educate our young to the dangers of getting high, no matter what the drug, be it cocaine, Spice or marijuana. We have allowed the pro-narcotics crowd to control the media and the message. And yes, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration still lists marijuana in the schedule I category of the Controlled Substances Act. Look it up. Young people by nature have a tendency to feel invulnerable to threats. The least we as a nation can do is not to allow delusions and misconceptions about drugs get in the way of their survival. We can start acting like adults. Or perhaps we have thrown in the towel in the war on drugs altogether, surrendering to the peddlers. Bob Rinearson is a resident of Fort Wayne.