Potent Pot
Potent pot is more myth than reality.
However, even if one assumes that potent pot is a reality it is certainly nothing to be concerned about. Indeed, saying that potent pot is reason for keeping marijuana illegal is akin to saying that alcohol should be banned because gin has a higher alcohol content than beer. It makes no sense. The pharmacological effects depend upon the overall amount of THC consumed not the amount in any one joint. Moreover, as various researchers (e.g., Lester Grinspoon of Harvard Medical School, Mitch Earleywine of the University of Southern California and UCLA's Mark Kleiman) have pointed out, the vast majority of users aim to consume only so much THC and are comfortable consuming only so much THC. As such, potent pot may actually be a welcome development. After all, one of the most prominent health effect related to marijuana, if not the most, is that it is usually smoked. The more potent the pot, the less people have to smoke to achieve the same high.
That said, if potency is the concern, then it should be legalized. The only way to regulate the potency of pot is to legalize it.
Finally, the attempt to scare parents that have grown up on marijuana by distinguishing between potent pot and “your dad's marijuana” is too clever by half. It begs the following question. If today's marijuana is truly different in kind from "dads marijuana", would it be okay to legalize "dad's marijuana", i.e., low potency pot?
Talking Points
1) Saying that potent pot is reason for keeping marijuana illegal is akin to saying that alcohol should be banned because gin has higher alcohol content than beer. It makes no sense.
2) If today's marijuana is truly different in kind from "dads marijuana", would it be okay to legalize "dad's marijuana", i.e., low potency pot?
The US will Never Let it happen
Yes Canadians understand some Americans would not be pleased about legalization. As such, Harper's musings about legalizing marijuana causing trouble at the border seem reasonable enough. The problem is this does not make marijuana prohibition any more legitimate in the eyes of the Canadian people. Support for legalization has been above 50% since 2004 and a recent poll in BC put it at 75% here. In BC the last year 4 attorney generals, a large chunk of the medical establishment, a former police chief, the current mayor of Vancouver and 3 former Vancouver mayors came out in favor of legalization. Support for prohibition has all but collapsed in this province. Whether you think the marijuana issue an important one is somewhat beside the point. We as a society should not pass laws or keep others in place simply to placate foreign governments. We as a society should not be enforcing laws that no one believes in. This goes especially for laws that would result in Canadians languishing in jail. Any perception that Canada is enforcing laws to meet with illegitimate demands of a bullying third party, whoever that may be, is simply poisonous to the health of a functioning democracy.
All that being said, it was one thing for opponents of legalization to employ the let us not piss off the Yanks argument in 2004; it is quite another for them to dust this argument off now and act as if nothing has changed Stateside. Colorado and Washington State voted to legalize marijuana. This changes everything. Indeed, it is hard to fathom Obama going to war with Colorado and Washington State over marijuana legalization yet alone large portion of the Democratic base. Moreover, almost two years out, there is no indication whatsoever that Obama will move against them. Finally, this is an issue that is clearly started to tip not only in Canada but also Stateside. The first polls showing the majority of Americans supporting legalization have started to appear.
Talking points:
1) It is not matter of if the US will legalize marijuana, it is matter of when. Furthermore, this is likely going to happen sooner rather than later and Canada had start preparing.
2) We do pass laws or keep others in place in order placate foreign governments. This goes especially for laws that would result in Canadians languishing in jail.
Gateway Drug
Researchers have rightly noted that people who have try marijuana are statistically more likely try other illicit drugs. This gave rise to the theory that there was something about marijuana that encouraged drug experimentation. Marijuana, it was alleged, is a gateway drug. This, in turn, was given as one more reason to keep the drug illegal. However, the gateway drug theory has until recently fallen on hard times for lack of an intelligible mechanism. The problem was that there was no coherent explanation for why marijuana would lead people to experiment with other drugs. Without this explanation doubt was cast on the relationship being more than mere correlation. That said, in recent years researchers have breathed new life into the theory, albeit with a sociological twist. According to the new version, it is not marijuana's pharmacological properties that serve as a gateway, but rather marijuana's illegal status. Specifically in the process of illegally procuring marijuana, users are introduced to the criminal elements with access to other illicit drugs and hence it is the forged black market relationship between dealer and buyer that serves as gateway.
In this context it should be noted that when the Dutch partially legalized the sale of marijuana, heroin and cocaine use went down despite an initial increase in marijuana use. Dutch use of hard drugs remains well below the European average.
Talking Point
Every time someone goes to buy marijuana they come into contact with criminal elements with access to other hard drugs. This is your gateway. When Holland decriminalized consumption and made it available in coffee shops, heroin and cocaine use went down.
Schizophrenia and Marijuana
Epidemiological studies have consistently failed to show any kind of positive correlation between marijuana use and schizophrenia. Despite a massive increase in the number of Australians consuming the drug since the 1960s, Wayne Hall of the University of Queensland found no increase in the number of cases of schizophrenia in Australia. Mitch Earleywine of the University of Southern California similarly found the same with regard to the US population and Oxford's Leslie Iversen found the same with regard to the population in the UK. According to Columbia's Alan Brown, "If anything, the studies seem to show a possible decline in schizophrenia from the '40s and the ‘ 50,"
Talking Point
There has been an astronomical increase in the number of pot smokers since the 1950s and no increase in the rate of schizophrenia whatsoever.
The gangs will simply move on to other drugs
The market for marijuana positively dwarfs the market for all other drugs combined and marijuana is far and away gangs' biggest money maker. The notion that the gangs would simply shift focus and thereby maintain the same levels of profitability is absurd. Comparable demand for other kinds of drugs is simply not there. Such an argument rests upon a mistaken assumption. Namely, it assumes that the sure size and scope of the marijuana industry is limiting the distribution of other kinds of drugs. The reverse is true. Marijuana profits and sometimes even marijuana itself are providing the seed capital the gangs need to diversify operations (e.g., cocaine, heroin, human trafficking and guns) and to expand those other operations. Moreover, existing infrastructure used in smuggling marijuana stateside, for example, has the potential to used for other purposes. All of this is reason enough why we need to nip this in the bud.
Talking Point
It is not like the gangs have access to capital markets. Marijuana profits and sometimes even marijuana itself are providing the seed capital the gangs need to diversify operations (e.g., cocaine, heroin, human trafficking and guns) and to expand those other operations. This is one of the main reasons why we need to nip this, pardon the pun, in the bud.
The Black Market will live on
It is one thing to illegally sell a legally produced product and make a profit, e.g., black market cigarettes. It is quite another thing to illegally produce and sell a product (e.g., moonshine) in market where there is legal competitors. The reason is simple. The illegality of the product means that your production and distribution costs are significantly higher. Also demand for your product is always going to be less. People want to know what they buying and consuming. So when given the choice of buying an illegally produced product versus a legally produced product they are going to go with the later. (There is one notable exception and that is when an illegally produced product is successfully passed off as a legal one, e.g., fake brand name goods). That is why no matter how much Canadians drank during the time of American prohibition, I am sure that it never crossed the RCMP’s mind that American moonshine might become a competitor of Molson’s.
Talking point
Molson executives do not worry about moonshine eating into their market share. Demand for illegal products is not what it is for legal ones. 
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