Check erowid.org for more information. Apparently, when smoking catnip and tobacco in a 50/50 ratio, it does provide euphoria, assumably more so than the nicotine alone.
Once, some friends tried to trick me into smoking a bowl of catnip, pretending it was weed. I noticed what was up, but I pretended to smoke it, and we successfully tricked another friend into actually smoking it. We didn't have the heart to tell him what we'd done, but, placebo effect or not (we were smoking weed and cigarettes at the time anyway), it put him on another, higher, level.
Not sure about any dangerous side effects. Certainly it can't be anywhere as bad as the evil tobacco plant, but that's just my guess.
Once, some friends tried to trick me into smoking a bowl of catnip, pretending it was weed. I noticed what was up, but I pretended to smoke it, and we successfully tricked another friend into actually smoking it. We didn't have the heart to tell him what we'd done, but, placebo effect or not (we were smoking weed and cigarettes at the time anyway), it put him on another, higher, level.
Not sure about any dangerous side effects. Certainly it can't be anywhere as bad as the evil tobacco plant, but that's just my guess.