MEDICAL POT PROPONENTS KEEP TRYING TO CON US

The proponents of medical pot, like the death penalty abolitionists, keep trying to con us with questionable, if not outright phony statistics in support of their cause.

Some pot proponents at the Rand Corporation severely damaged the reputation of that once highly thought of think tank with their phony claim that the closure of medical pot dispensaries led to an increase in crime.

Now we have a couple of pro-pot professors, one from Montana State University and the other from Colorado University, that have come out with a highly questionable study showing a decrease of traffic fatalities in the 13 states that have legalized medical marijuana – or should I say legalized marijuana?

There are two kinds of research. There are the unbiased scientific research studies and then there are the biased studies in which the researchers set out to prove what they themselves happen to believe.

RAND STUDY ON MEDICAL POT AMONG YEAR’S WORST, SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN SAYS
By Nick Schou

OC Weekly
December 29, 2011

Remember that Rand Corporation study from earlier this year that claimed crime actually increased in L.A. neighborhoods where cops closed medical marijuana dispensaries? The one that forgot to include crime statistics compiled by the Los Angeles Police Department?? The one that Rand had to retract because it was pretty much completely worthless???

Well, if you do, it will come as no surprise that the Santa Monica-based think tank's somewhat, uh, flawed, report is number five on Scientific American's list of 2011's biggest retractions.

But despair not, oh ye advocates of medical ganja, for the year's end brings great tidings of the many miracles this wondrous weed is visiting upon our land. Forget about crime, let's talk drunk driving! Oh wait, that's also a crime. But anyway, what was I saying? Ah yes, let's celebrate a brand new study that purports to show how states that have allowed the medical use of marijuana have seen a drop in both traffic fatalities and beer sales.

The report, by D. Mark Anderson, an economics professor with Montana Sate University, and the University of Colorado's Daniel Rees claims a 9 percent decrease in traffic-related deaths in the 13 states that had legalized medical marijuana as of 2009, according to an article in Montana's Missoulian newspaper. The report also shows that beer consumption in those states has decreased by five percent.

That's nice, although it doesn't necessarily mean that the dwindling beer drinkers are turning to pot rather than Maker's Mark or meth, for that matter. Moreover, the math on the traffic fatalities seems a little fuzzy, too. While the report shows a decrease in fatal accidents at nights and on weekends, when many drunk drivers typically roam the road, that's not the same as proving a direct correlation between medical marijuana and a drop in drunk driving.

In fact, as the newspaper points out, one of the report's own authors admits that the drop in traffic fatalities could be related to just about anything, including the simple possibility that fewer people are driving, which raises another compelling question for men and women of science: does smoking pot make you more likely to sit on your ass rather than leave your house?