Happy (early) 4/20 day: "Weed Card" by Garfunkel and Oates

[Video Link]

Riki "Garfunkel" Lindhome and Kate "Oates" Micucci sing about the perils of obtaining medical marijuana in California. Featuring David Koechner. Directed by Raul B Fernandez. (thanks, Mark Day)

• [Blazel]

  I have the biggest crush on G&O. Happy with a razor sharp edge, amazing.

• [PeaceLove]

  I think this song is simple-minded and ignorant and, once again, demeans and ridicules cannabis and those who use it. Cannabis can in fact be effective for literally hundreds of conditions, including most of the ones the ladies list in the song. Yet ridiculing cannabis patients is something of a cottage industry, even among those who perceive themselves as supporters.

  Cannabis patients in states where it is legal often face harassment from police, including arrest. Legal cannabis patients can be fired from their jobs, evicted from their apartments and lose custody of their kids. Thus, cannabis prohibition becomes a free-speech issue as millions of patients are forced to remain underground, unwilling to testify publicly about the benefits of their medicine.

  In any case, the song is ignorant of basic facts. They base the main rhyme on the term “prescription.” Cannabis remains a Schedule One drug and doctors cannot write a prescription, only a “recommendation.”

• [Anonymous]

  As a Dutch person I can’t stop to be amazed by the obsession of American pop culture with weed.

• [awgrbr]

  @burrioflats sounds like somebody needs to mellow out…
  @bcsizemo I believe the correct taxation argument for legalization goes something like this:
  Step 1: Tax Marijuana
  Step 2: ???
  Step 3: Profit!!!!

  I’d use it mostly-recreationaly if it were legal.

• [Angryjim]

  wow. someone schooled those ladies on how to pronounce their R sounds.

• [nemofazer]

  Absolutely. I’m a miserable, cynical git. Really I am, but these two spark the last vestigial spark in innocent fun I have.

• [Anonymous]

  For maximum memage:
  1. Legalize and tax MJ
  2. Everyone smokes weed
  3. Errone gets high errday.
  4. ???
  5. Profit

• [Major Variola (ret)]

  Their eyes are kinda weird.

  But a weedcard lets me treat myself as I have
  been for 20+ years, without the legal worries.
  And I don’t have to drive an hour to LA and back, with
  a QP aboard, it is delivered within the hour.

  Sheeeit I used to pay the equiv of an ounce of gold for an ounce of the plant.

  My Kaiser Prozac takes a week to arrive, and only clamps the negatives, does not help buoyancy.

• [JimEJim]

  Let me put it this way: I knew it was going to be easy to get one when the nurse took a quick webcam picture, printed out a nice plastic card, and stuck it to the chart BEFORE I even saw the doctor. I was all prepared too with some previous prescriptions and other evidence to support my case, but I think I really just had to show up and they’d sign off on it.

• [Jesse M.]

  Funny video…given how I tend to enjoy humor and movies aimed at stoners, I kind of wish I actually liked weed, but most of the time when friends pass it around smoking it weirds me out a little, like I get this vague sense of foreboding…oddly I have a much better reaction to hash, and I’ve had good experiences with psychedelics, but there’s always something a little off about weed for me, maybe it’s just a brain chemistry thing. It does make the music sound better though!

• [endymion]

  nemofazer:

  I am your polar opposite. I’m generally optimistic and generous-of-judegment, but, like our first commenter, I cannot get past G&O’s mega-twee chirpiness. I didn’t last as long as he. Oh well! :)

• [snuf42]

  @Jesse M. – pot effects different people in different ways. I had one friend who consistently got paranoid and had aural hallucinations. Pot was not for him.

  • [Anonymous]

    I guess in the same way that when some people drink they pass out and others might start fights.

    It’s not just drugs, I think you’ll find that people are fundamentally different in their reaction to all stimulus :)

• [Anonymous]

  Senate Bill 420. Those crazy California legislators.

• [Anonymous]

  This is not the “Friday” with Ice Cube, it’s the Rebecca Black version.

• [nehpetsE]

  I love this duo in part because they are the exact west-coast doppelgangers of boston’s own “Steamy Bohemians”

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_QAgus7p3zQ

• [Major Variola (ret)]

  Well, from all us folks who were self-medicating
  from 1980 on, thanks, its been good pounds.

• [burritoflats]

  Well-meaning friends of mine have recommended these two to me before, yet it’s impossible for me to get past the incessant chirpiness and annoying quality of their voices and approach. Though this was somewhat cute up until the point when the cast member from “The Office” appeared. Then I had to switch it off.

  • [dculberson]

    You described exactly what I love about them.

• [bcsizemo]

  It still blows my mind that pot is illegal (and I’ve never done it)…

  Realistically, look at all the tax money we get from cigarettes. Legalize it, sell it, tax it, PROFIT.

  And I mean really it isn’t going to be any worse for you than alcohol.

  • [Anonymous]

    It’s not even just about the tax, it’s an even simpler situation that.

    The money goes into the hands of criminals and gangs, not legitimate business. The conditions under which the product is farmed are often not very nice, by legalising it then it can become a fairtrade product. The police could get on with catching criminals, rather than harassing normal people that have decided to intoxicate themselves via an ‘unapproved’ method (we’re not talking crack addicts here, or even drunks). The money saved from quitting the unwinnable war on marijuana would likely be even more than the revenue gained from taxing it.

    All the government are achieving by keeping it illegal is increasing the deficit, filling their prisons and wasting their time.

    I don’t just think it should be legal, I think it’s utter insanity for it to be illegal.

    But then politics is about getting another term, not promoting common sense.

  • [EH]

    The DEA doesn’t regulate alcohol.

    • [bcsizemo]

      I am aware of that. I was meaning in the sense of being a danger to others once you are on it. It is illegal to drink and drive, or have an open bottle in a car (at least in NC it is). So I assume if it was legal you’d have the same issues, much like you do now, of potentially being arrested for driving while impaired.

      The same basic level of common sense should apply (and judging by the number of DUI’s that are issued, it’s not all that common.)

      @Anon #13

      That’s the whole other side to it. That’s the even more logical way to think about it. Oh I agree with everything you said, the problem is getting everyone else to believe it as well.