No, for real!:
Three months into Colorado's historic legal recreational marijuana sales, crime hasn't gone up in Denver, according to recent data released by the city.
Overall property crime in the first two months of 2014 fell by 14.6 percent in Denver compared to the same period of 2013. There wasn't as dramatic of a shift in overall violent crime rates for the same period, but they were still down by 2.4 percent.
Dude, stoners cannot be bothered to get off their couches long enough to eat Doritos, much less get into any sort of legal trouble. That would mean putting on real clothes and leaving the house, and that is just not gonna happen after one has smoked a j.
I'm just sayin'. This isn't so much good news for the stoner community as it is affirmation of the long-held belief that people who regularly smoke pot: 1) are lazy as fuck; and 2) like to eat anything that isn't nailed down. I've smoked a little bit of weed in my day, and I can absolutely guarantee that to be true.
That's basically a true statement, yeah. This is not news to anyone who's ever smoked weed before, I can tell ya, but it's still nice to know that marijuana inhibits people's need to commit crime. That's fairly awesome.
And this next part is especially delicious:
The data stands in contrast to statements made in 2012, before Amendment 64 passed legalizing marijuana for recreational sale and use, when members of the law enforcement community warned of dire and "harmful" consequences because of legalization. “Expect more crime, more kids using marijuana and pot for sale everywhere," Douglas County Sheriff David Weaver said in a 2012 statement opposing Amendment 64. "I think our entire state will pay the price."
The entire state has not "paid the price" in terms of crime, and I've already explained why to you. Stoners are unmotivated slackers with the munchies who enjoy staring at televisions for inordinate amounts of time at a clip. No, as a matter of fact, legal weed has generated
millions of dollars already for the state of Colorado:
During the first month of recreational marijuana sales, Colorado's licensed dispensaries generated a total of more than $14 million, putting about $2 million of tax revenue into state coffers in the process.
The state Department of Revenue released the figures on Monday, which showed how much Colorado has taken in from both medical and recreational marijuana taxes and fees.
The medical marijuana sales for January generated an additional $900,000 in sales tax, for a total tax revenue of $2.9 million for both sides of the state's marijuana dispensary market. Including fees, the figure jumps to $3.5 million.
How seriously cool is that? Marijuana is just not a dangerous drug, and it's good that states are recognizing that and legalizing it, because the revenue to be made is ridiculously high. Colorado is a good model for that.
Even the commercials for not driving while stoned are hilarious. Check it out:
All the news about recreational marijuana just keeps getting better and better. It's certainly a cash cow for the state of Colorado and, in these times of shrinking state and county governments' budgets, this is a welcome relief for the Coloradan people. This money was sorely needed.