CONVENTION CRASHING: INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF CHIEFS OF POLICE

By Brendan Buhler (contact)

Thursday, Aug. 2, 2007 | 8:05 a.m.

Several hundred police officers from across the nation gathered at the Riviera on Tuesday morning for the lecture.

Finally, it would be told. Perhaps:

"I could really go for a hot dog from 7-Eleven" ... "It's like I'm the god of this Xbox. No one can beat me" ... "Forget the Beatles. Phish did a way better version of 'The White Album.' It's just ... awesome."

Truly, what is going on "Inside the Mind of a Marijuana User"?

"Sometimes it is pretty hazy and fuzzy up there," said Garry Rubinstein, the lecturer and UNR's substance abuse counselor.

"That's my own attempt at a joke," he added.

Several people laughed.

Rubinstein promised not to make too many jokes about such a serious topic.

After all, the officers, mostly traffic cops, had come all this way to the International Association of Chiefs of Police conference on drugs, alcohol and impaired driving training to learn how to recognize when people are on drugs, although he wasn't going to talk to them about pupil dilation, because they already knew about that.

One of the problems with marijuana, Rubinstein said, is that just because it makes you mellow and can't in-and-of-itself kill you, people think it isn't a problem. But it is.

During the talk, which included several color slides illustrating the brain and the areas marijuana affects, Rubinstein rambled through the drug's many pernicious, semipernicious, lives-in-the-same-neighborhood-as-pernicious and maybe not-so-bad properties, such as damaging lungs, not being associated with violence, harming athletic performance in men, reducing PMS in women and making it hard to remember things, focus or react quickly. Those last three make it a bad drug to use before or while driving. Also, it's illegal.

In short, "the mellowing effect is not without risk."

Although, he did allow that hemp makes a very durable fabric.

Rubinstein warned that "anything that can make us feel good has the potential to be addictive." And so, as to marijuana, Rubinstein said, "If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and talks like a duck, then I say it's a fowl situation."

Moreover, not all marijuana cigarettes, or "joints," are made with only marijuana. Sometimes they have other drugs mixed in, and are then called "cocoa puffs," "fritos" or "gremmies."

The crowd of police officers appeared closely interested. Some took notes complete with drawings of the speaker. Others were so lost in thought they slumped forward onto tables or bowed their heads to their chests.

At the end of an hour and a half, Rubinstein said he had only 15 minutes scheduled for questions, but would be happy to stay for more.

Instead, a convention organizer had him announce raffle results.

Brendan Buhler can be reached at 259-8817 or at buhler@lasvegassun.com.

archive