Guest Post by Kit O’Connell
While Colorado receives the lion’s share of national attention for its successful efforts at legalizing and regulating marijuana, the legal landscape is shifting toward more permissive laws nationwide.
(MINTPRESS) Minneapolis, MN – Keith Stroup, founder of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, or NORML, noted in an Oct. 30 article for Alternet that a majority of Americans support marijuana legalization. Quoting a recent Gallup poll, he reported:
“Among those poll respondents age 18 to 34, 71 percent endorse legalization. Among respondents age 35 to 49 years of age, 64 percent support legalizing marijuana. Among those age 65 and up, support fell to 35 percent, but this too reflected a sharp increase in support.”
Of the 23 states which offer some form of access to medical marijuana, four states plus the District of Columbia have legalized cannabis for recreational use.
Earlier this month, medical marijuana sales kicked off in Illinois with the opening of the state’s first eight dispensaries. According to The Chicago Sun-Times, sales of medical marijuana reached $210,000 in the first week. Josh McGee, a reporter for DNAinfo.com Chicago, interviewed Sue Cook, a “budtender,” or legal marijuana seller, on Nov. 15 at one of the city’s first dispensaries: “It’s been nonstop since noon, some people from the neighborhood and a lot of people have just been waiting to sign up.”
Colorado’s legalization efforts have become so successful that tax revenue for marijuana outpaced tax revenue from liquor sales in fiscal year 2014. Washington state also successfully legalized marijuana in 2012. Last week, the Olympian reported that the industry is growing so rapidly that almost 1,000 businesses are applying for retail marijuana licenses, while farmers are chafing against that state’s restrictions on new cannabis growing licenses, which are relatively restrictive compared to Colorado law.
There are even signs of change in states which have traditionally been seen as hostile to legalization efforts. During the 2015 legislative session, Texas made landmark efforts toward reforming its drug laws, with a bill to end marijuana prohibition passing a house committee in May. Although efforts to pass the bill ultimately stalled, the state did vote to offer limited access to CBD oil, a cannabis derivative which shows promise for relieving some forms of otherwise untreatable epilepsy.
“[W]e have seen promising results from CBD oil testing and with the passage of this legislation, there is now hope for thousands of families who deal with the effects of intractable epilepsy every day,” wrote Texas Gov. Greg Abbott in a statement after signing the medical CBD oil bill into law in June.
A total of 15 states now offer medical access to CBD oil, which is showing increased support from Republican legislators in part because it offers well-documented medicinal benefits without any recreational side effects.
After a recent defeat in Ohio, advocates for marijuana policy reform are setting their sights on the 2016 election. Christopher Ingraham, writing for the Washington Post’s Wonkblog, reported that a dozen states could consider recreational marijuana ballot initiatives in the next election, with an additional five states potentially set to consider medical marijuana laws. “Two other states, Rhode Island and Vermont, may become the first to legalize recreational marijuana via legislative action, rather than popular vote,” Ingraham noted.
This is funny, pot is legal and I can’t buy the light bulbs I want to buy.
card802, your comment illustrates the whole problem with all government prohibitions, which is that they make people want to rebel against them by doing the very things that the government prohibits, which most people wouldn’t want to do if they weren’t prohibited, and therefore Forbidden Fruit.
Now that dope is no longer “Forbidden Fruit”, most of the people jamming the dispensaries now, will grow bored with it, and usage will probably level off and even drop, after the substance has been legal for a few years. Now that it will no longer be glamorized, people will realize it is a very boring substance.
However, thanks to laws and regs mandating the phase-out of incandescent light bulbs, we still have millions of people just like you who are hankering after these energy-guzzlers, so they can use 4X as much electricity to get the same amount of light. My bet is that most of these die-hard folks would have happily given up old fashioned light bulbs, and adopted CFL and LED bulbs if the gubermint had just stayed the hell out of it. Sure, I spent $240 outfitting my dining room chandelier with 12 LED chandelier bulbs, but I have already gotten that money back in the electricity I save by not burning 10-watt chandelier bulbs. I use only CFLs and LEDs, and, even though I do absolutely everything- cook, wash and dry clothes- with electricity except heat, my electric bill is only $25 a month on average, and tops at $35 in the summer when I use the living room A/C unit.
Legalizing it is one thing, creating an industry in it is another.
I favor the former and oppose the latter.
Pot is the most harmless mind-altering drug in existence. As Chicago illustrates, govt prohibitions never work and usually accomplish the exact opposite result intended. In Colorado the results of legalization has been a whole lot of not much. I don’t smoke, never been to a pot shop, but I work in a neighborhood where there are a lot of growers. It is no big deal. That’s the real point….govt scare tactics are just a lot of hot air, always.
Also, no matter where you stand on marijuana, this is funny shit:
Chicago,
You’re going to have to show some real life numbers about those savings and how you achieve them.
Your claimed energy costs would indicate you need to go almost 10 months of total average household usage for your entire house to save that 240 dollars (25 a month for 10 months means 250 dollars total for the entire period),
And that would be running that chandelier 24 hours a day 7 days a week to achieve that.
With those low bills for a total electric home I would have to assume you have a subsidized solar system where someone else is actually paying for most of the real cost of your electricity (if you have a 12 light chandelier I would assume you’re not living along is a single room with one light bulb and a hot plate as your only appliances).
http://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/nov/27/smoking-high-strength-cannabis-skunk-may-damage-nerves-brain
So as long as you still take care of yourself and shoulder the cost of your life that’s fine with me for you to make that choice.
But when you start expecting me to support you because of it that’s a different story. Keep it to yourself and that’s your business, force its consequences on me and it’s mine.
And yes, I feel the same about alcohol and tobacco. What you handle yourself is your business, what you push off on me is mine.
We live in a theocracy that might be called The Church of Universalism.
It is far more collectivist than was any communist nation that ever existed. It’s main tenet of dogma is Equalitarianism, that all people are EXACTLY THE SAME, and all conditions of persons should BE EXACTLY THE SAME, and if they are not, the cause is SIN!
The Church (or as Moldbug calls it, the Cathedral) saturates every molecule of Western Civilization now, and is expressed through Progressivism, Social Democracy and Fabian Socialism.
Prohibition waxes and wanes as an aspect of Cathedral dogma. Bear markets in social mood cause Prohibition to relax (as alcohol prohibition relaxed during the Great Depression.)
It isn’t just the chandelier, Anon. It’s everything else I do and use.
And, NO, I do NOT have a subsidized solar system. I pay ComEd- Exelon the normal $.0699 per KwH that every Chicago-area householder pays, and I pay the $16 a month connection charge. I use about $9 a month in actual electricity.
Now, mind you, I’m a one-person household, and I’m frugal in my use. I run the dining room chandelier maybe two nights a week. All lights are off in any room I am not occupying- I used to be amazed that my mom left lights burning allover her house, and that many other people do, too. The washer and dryer are mini-models that sip power. I cook on an induction burner, and only power up the electric oven once in a while, during holidays- I use top cooking as much as possible. I also try to cook stuff that be cooked in one pan. I have a laptop that uses about 45 watts an hour with all the drives spinning, NOT a desktop setup that uses more like 235 watts an hour. I only air condition the room I’m occupying, not the whole 5 room apartment. I have 3 CFL light bulbs burning in the living room, a 3 watt mini in a cabinet, a 13 watt on my desk, and a 25 watt on a side table. I do not have a TV set going constantly- watch only when I want to view a film. It is a smallish LED. I disposed of all my boutique stereo gear years ago, and have 17 gigs of music on my laptop, which I play over a 4.1 speaker system. And nothing is playing all the time.
Also, I do NOT, when given a choice, elect for my power to be solar or wind. Nuclear and coal are fine with me.
I am not subsidized in any way, shape, or form. I live in an 85-year-old condo building that gets no breaks or subsidies of any sort.
It’s a plant. The government has made a plant illegal. Think about that. Nature, whether a result of Divine creation or natural selection has produced an abundance of living things that populate the biosphere of the planet, some wonderful and beautiful and nutritious, some dangerous, repulsive and life threatening- depending upon your species. What kind of hubris does it take to deem a life-form “illegal”? How can you can you even begin to wrap your head around it? And the very same people who oppose the very existence of a natural life-form endorse and regulate the use of man-made substances that are not only far more dangerous, but completely artificial in construction.
I joke with my children every time we see an advertisement for a pharmaceutical like this one-
[img]http://www.ispot.tv/ad/7UYo/belsomra-cats-and-dogs[/img]
And yet-
“The U.S. Food and Drug Administration today approved Belsomra…”
http://www.fda.gov/NewsEvents/Newsroom/PressAnnouncements/ucm409950.htm
Human beings are either sovereign- they belong first to themselves and free to make choices regarding that life- or they are slaves to the State. You don’t need chains and whips- although the threat of arrest and imprisonment are nothing short of that- to be a slave. You need only surrender your life to the tyranny of the State and it’s diktats.
And anon above is absolutely correct, no one should be mandated to pay for the poor choices of others, but that relates to a whole host of issues from overeating to education to public accommodation, yet he/she failed to mention those costly impositions.
Frankly I don’t care what the majority of Americans think about anything, that’s not relevant to the discussion. What matters is what is truth and what is false and the truth in this matter is that the State cannot justify making Nature illegal. It may vilify, terrorize, fear monger and guilt, it can enforce it’s will through force and violence, but it cannot make it’s argument through either logic or reason.
Chicago,
Running the chandelier only two knights a week casts even more doubt on your savings claim
And with a total of 9 buck a month of total electricity it would take almost 27 months to save the 240 dollars if that chandelier was responsible for the total usage (which it obviously isn’t).
It’s gonna take you a long, long time to pay that 240 dollar bill for LED’s if you only save less than 120 watts (the LED’s consume something) for a few hours a day -or even 24 hours a day- two days a week.
Like maybe 20+ years.
And to tell the truth, I don’t see how you can electrically heat your home in Chicago during the winter for that little amount, even a little space heater is going to draw 1500 or so watts and doesn’t heat all that large an area.
Well said, HSF. For every side in every debate there are pragmatic arguments and there are idealistic arguments. For marijuana both are in absolute lockstep agreement that prohibition (telling others that they can’t use a PLANT) is both pointless and self-defeating on a pragmatic level and morally ridiculous.
I find that this happens quite often: both the pragmatic and idealistic arguments quite often align in favor of liberty.
Legal use of opium (opioids) by prescription is off the hook in this country. Pot will just be another legalized pain killer for the sheep to help them endure watching the USA!USA!USA! circle the bowl in the FINAL FLUSH down the toilet.
I know a lot of people who can’t face the day unless they are in a altered state. Huxley said that use of drugs would lull the sheep into acceptance of their complete enslavement and actually enjoy being a slave. So far I think he may be spot on.
HSF- Poppys are plants……..
Bea Leaver, people aren’t eating poppies. You’re far too smart and I would expect you give me enough credit to not use that straw man in this argument. Heroin is not a poppy and THC is not a marijuana plant. I am speaking about the prohibition on the use of a plant. And frankly if people want to inject battery acid into their veins I would not prescribe a law against it. Human beings have the right to make bad choices and to live with the results of them, I simply believe that it is indefensible to posit that the State has the right to decide which plant is allowable for a human being to use.
You want to convince people not to do something? Give them iron clad arguments based on facts and data and then let them decide.
HF- I’m on your side.
I take back any reservations…the more I think of it, both practical and moral arguments are always in favor of liberty.
Who cares if poppies are a plant and who cares if heroin must be chemically refined? What business is it of the state if an individual decides to put it into his body. Now prohibition on the manufacture of heroin or other opioids, that is another argument, both on a practical and moral basis…one that gets to the nature of rights and the fact that they can only exist for INDIVIDUALS, never for groups and certainly never for corporations. That is a huge can of worms and one of the most fundamental problems we have in our society.
@DRUD,
If each individual has the right to chemically refine poppies into heroine, how can it be that they lose that right if they get together and do it in a group? For the record, I’m in favor of no laws regarding the commercial manufacture of heroine, just as it was in this country prior to the 1920’s.
Anon, if you will read my first post more carefully, I said that I use electricity for everything BUT heat. The bill would of course be much higher if I used electricity for heat.
Our building has a central gas boiler, and the heat cost is included in my HOA. It is unfortunately not cheap. We will have to do a lot of weatherization on this building to reduce our heat costs. Double-glaze windows will not do it.
Since I expect the LEDs in the chandelier to last pretty much the rest of my life, I will more than recover the cost. A similar 12 light chandelier with 10 watt incandescents uses 3X the power, and the bulbs don’t last half as long, if even.
My CFL bulbs don’t last quite as long as LEDs, yet all my bulbs are more than 5 years old, and the 3-way in my living room is a 10 year old bulb I ordered from a place called Noli Controls. I date the boxes my bulbs come in, to keep track of how long they last.
AP
There is no need for anyone to grow and refine opium, the government will always be on top of that industry. Big Pharma would love to hook you up, they are the new Dr Feelgood.
Pagan says: “If each individual has the right to chemically refine poppies into heroine, how can it be that they lose that right if they get together and do it in a group?”
O good question…and I guess the distinction is between a loose, anarchic group of people and a corporation…which has a hierarchical power structure, with a motive for maximum profit. This is a touchy area for me, because I am as free market as they come, but am also a strong believer that power corrupts. How to keep a free market and yet stop corporate tyranny from raising its ugly head? That is a question with no good answer.
Long answer, I agree with you, but it is one of those arenas which would always be an ugly part of a free society. There are more than a few of them, but IMHO FAR less than there are with big, powerful governments.
Bea – I just gave your last comment a thumbs up. It feels weird.
One of my friends, john demott, just got awarded one of five franchises in florida to grow weed. It didn’t pass the referendum in 2014, but the state is blazing ahead anyway. They want those taxes. Of the five guys who got the gig, john was the only one not on the rules committee. Rule 1, you had to have been in business for 30 years. So fucking crooked.
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/miami-dade/article46050920.html
The most abused drug in this country by volume is refined white sugar which is also refined down to a white powder and is very addictive. Sugar cane is a plant used to make a anti-nutritive that has killed more people than guns.
Want to improve the health and well being of people in this country ban refined white sugar in lieu of the natural dried juice of cane (sucanat). Sucanat retains the vitamins and mineral of cane, that is what I use.
Thanks DRUD !
Bea, I’m not a nutritional expert, but did anybody get fat prior to high fructose corn syrup?
Star- Yes.
DRUD,
I share your reservations about corporations, but I think the solution has to include the realization that a corporation is not a free market entity, but a government-chartered fiction with legal privileges and immunities not enjoyed by those without the incorporation papers. In practice, it becomes very difficult to hold actors inside the corporation personally accountable for wrongdoing, as with the GM ignition-key scandal, no one did prison time because no one was personally responsible. I’m not sure how, in a free society, capital would be pooled for large projects, but there’s got to be a better way, and Lloyd’s of London shows that it’s possible.
Starfcker: Spot on about HFCS. It’s the evil twin of aspartame, which is also a toxic substance.
A freedom issue. Everyone should have the ability as adults to decide. Pot has already been available for anyone who wants it during my lifetime. It really isn’t hard to find. I do support the ability to grow small amounts for personal use,Considering the insane cost in these money making shops.
Pagan – your definition of an American Corporation as ” a government-chartered fiction with legal privileges and immunities not enjoyed by those without the incorporation papers,” is spot on. The point I was making wasn’t about current laws or landscapes, but more general. As much as I think a free market is by far the best way for an economy to work…there is no mechanism for stopping large commercial entities from growing larger and more powerful, which in turn, always leads to corruption, then tyranny. It is a drawback to a free market, but only inasmuch as greed is a drawback of humanity.
Drud, you are incorrect. There is a mechanism to stop commercial entities from becoming too powerful, it’s called sherman anti-trust, and it’s the law of the land. Clinton abandoned it, and john roberts has done his best to bury it, but it’s going to matter again at some point.
” I date the boxes my bulbs come in, to keep track of how long they last.”
Just write the date on the bulb with a sharpie.
Gosh,
what is this kindergarten?
The issue is pot. It grows wild all over in the USA and it is
just a plant. We had a cadre of MRAPs up here 2 years ago
for a c/o pot growers in the woods. Illegal Spanish only speakers
run by Somalis out of Minnesota. That is what you get making
the hemp plant illegal. All sorts of bad guys wrecking the woods,
and carrying guns. Then the military police show up.
Thanks HS for putting the REAL into it.
The sleep drug? Another hypnotic. Dangerous.
Belsomra/suvorexant is an orexin receptor antagonist…
I am fairly up to date on my neuro chemicals and neuroleptics…
I’ll be looking it up. Never heard of orexin. Maybe they made it up.
MSU.
The fat cats are laughing their xxxes off about CFLs. LED? Wash
your hands well after handling them and don’t keep in use over
3 years. Whatever.
Sorry chicago999444…get a life. Plus you are fibbing. I track my costs
carefully and am frugal. The tax/fees on elec are more than the actual
energy costs and you ain’t paying no $25/mo.
“That is what you get making the hemp plant illegal.”
—-susanna
Sorry, cupcake. Hemp is not marijuana. Same family, different plant. Hemp has 10% of the THC content of a natural marijuana plant. Yes, hemp is also illegal to grow in the U.S. (we import most of it from France, of all places), but you have to smoke a shit ton of it to get high.
I was gonna post a serious comment, then I got high
https://youtu.be/zhM9-ywkx0M?t=121
To the “It’s just a plant” crowd, starting with Hardscrabble Farmer. Some of the marijuana sold today is not your 1960s and 1970s weed that made you mellow and chill out. It’s a hybrid, cross-pollinated plant that contains up to 10 times the amount of THC of the natural marijuana dope sold 40-50 years ago. It is creating skyrocketing visits to emergency rooms and yes, deaths.
And the weed being sold in medical marijuana clinics and legal pot shops is the powerful hybrid shit. Got that, pilgrims? Mexican (illegal) weed is the real natural deal and costs about $40-50 an ounce here in Tucson. Know how much it costs for that legal and potent medical marijuana shit here? $20 a gram. Know how may grams there are in an ounce? 28. Let me do the math for you. That’s $560 an ounce. Hmmm. Natural pot for $50 an ounce versus hybrid, STATE-SANCTIONED pot at $560 an ounce that can kill you.
You legalization fools need to just surrender to my wisdom and adopt my user misdemeanor route.
SSS- If you or I don’t like pot we just don’t need to partake. I’m still with you on decriminalization but there are still 70 million+ people who use weed and you just can’t lock up a quarter of the population.
EC
There are times late at night when your posts beg to ask the question “is El high”?
“I’m still with you on decriminalization but there are still 70 million+ people who use weed and you just can’t lock up a quarter of the population.”
—-Bea Lever @ SSS
I don’t want to lock them up. I want to fine them. As in …. speeding ticket.
SSS- They are not speeding, though, why should they be fined?
“Belsomra”
Yeah………this shit can’t be good. I’ve seen the commercial for it a few times. I forget the exact wording but in the ad they say something to the effect…..”Belsomra is BELIEVED to work by doing such and such…….” REALLY!???
I’m sorry but they don’t KNOW how this shit works? They BELIEVE it works by doing such and such…? They go on to list one of the side effects as an “inability to move”………that’s right, temporary paralysis. What if your house is on fire or your baby is crying?
What fucking sheep hears that and says “Sure, I’d like to try some of that, sign me up”…….?
@ SSS –
You’ve made a pretty audacious claim, IMO, that pot is now killing people.
Can you provide a source, please?
Also, I’ve asked you this question before, but I don’t think you saw it. Can you please explain to me the difference between decriminalization and legalization? I don’t understand the difference.
I’m totally in favor of legalizing all individual liberty to consume whatever product, evil or good ,people choose , but that does not negate the fact that I’ve never met a pothead yet, that wasn’t a total dumbass , and even stupider when high on pot. That said , upon legalization of the stupid weed, there should also be language in the act that guarantees the right of an employer to administers a piss test in order to weed out applicants who are potheads. Personally , I would not hire one.
@ flash:
I agree with the last sentence, entirely. That’s a total free market solution, right? In fact, why does there have to be a “law” that guarantees an employer the right to piss test employees? Why can’t an employer just do what he needs to do to take care of his business?
I work for a construction company. Statistics prove that people that smoke pot (and do other drugs) have more injuries and cause more damage than non-drug users. More injuries/property damage = higher insurance costs for my employer. Thus, it’s reasonable for him to not want to hire drug users and to screen out those people by way of pre-employment and random screenings. Then, that puts the responsibility on the squarely on the applicant/employee. If I want to work for this guy, he says “no drugs.” If I want to use drugs, then I need to go down the street and work for “Brand X” at a fraction of what I get paid now, or find another industry to work in.
If I owned my own construction company, I’d want the right to protect my property. One way of protecting my property is by eliminating/not hiring drug users. If I was a Mormon and I had a cultural bias against alcohol users, it should totally be within my rights to not hire people who drink alcohol. As a company owner, I should be able to do whatever I want within my own company, so long as it doesn’t infringe on the rights of others.
SSS- That is revenue collecting and will not stop or deter the masses from taking a toke. Handing out tickets would be abused and you would have to have a police state scenario to catch even a small amount of the offenders.
Tim says:
@ SSS – You’ve made a pretty audacious claim, IMO, that pot is now killing people.
I posted an article on TBP about a kid in Colorado who overdosed on a marijuana cookie and jumped off a 4th story balcony and killed himself. The cause of death on his death certificate was certified as “marijuana overdose.” Plus there are dozens of stories of young people who have died of heart attacks from using too much marijuana. You need to get out more.
“SSS- That is revenue collecting (fining people caught with a “user” amount of weed) and will not stop or deter the masses from taking a toke.”
—-Bea Lever
I never said anything about fines being a deterrence to using marijuana, Bea. Fines won’t stop or deter people from smoking or ingesting grass. I know that. But they’ve broken the law in most states and must be punished. Fines for a misdemeanor offense, just like speeding tickets, are the answer, and not a felony charge which could land offenders in jail and stay on their record forever.
Why is that so fucking hard for people like Tim to understand? Look the words m
Once SSS learns to post a complete thought with hitting “Submit Comment” he may be abl
BEA LEVER says: EC There are times late at night when your posts beg to ask the question “is El high”?
No, there are times late at night when the inner child takes over. It happens to all people: the adult in the morning signs off and the kid takes over, that is why most fuckups occur at night; Chernobyl, DWI, Adultery…
If you listen to the message of the piece, it is not a recommendation for THC, it’s a way of fucking up your life.
Que pasa, Bea? Your sharper than that.