Cannabis, Prisons, Taxation and Regulation...

Here is a complicated issue for me. I have held several stances on medical marijuana and recreational marijuana for years. I have been a medical marijuana patient (officially) since 2004 under California State law as well as local laws in Los Angeles county. I have many conflicts with both the government and the marijuana movement. I will try and explain my beliefs in a clear manner.

First off I have a problem with outlawing crimes which essentially hurt no one besides the "lawbreaker". As much as they try and tell us cannabis (or any drug) causes violence between gangs/cartels and funds terrorism, it's complete horse shit. The only thing that causes violence in the drug business is the reactions of cartels and gangs to the boundaries of prohibition. There would be no drug cartels if drugs were legalized. They would be sold in stores, and if any violence was happening behind the scenes, it wouldn't be any more than violence between oil or banana cartels. The only thing prohibition has ever done is anger people, violate the constitution, raise drug prices, cause violence, and give more power to the underground thugs.

But as you know I am very pro counter economics. As much violence that goes on because of the black market, I believe it's possibly our most valuable tool in giving power back to the people. So my next problem is with the complete legalization, taxation, and regulation of marijuana. Medical and recreational marijuana advocates act like if it's legalized it will be available for sale in high quantity/quality for a good price, and that they'll be able to grow it in their back yards. The reality of government regulation has never been so nice.

In Canada when the government set up a medical marijuana "stash" to send out to varified medical marijuana patients, patients complained it was a low quality grade of dry cannabis which was shred up into "shake" and then sent.

When our government took over the tobacco industry not only did tobacco become filled with toxic and addictive chemicals, the price has increased significantly and you must have a license to grow or sell tobacco.

When prohibition was repealed alcohol's quality probably increased as far as safety, but the alcohol content has been decreased significantly and it's still not legal to make your own booze.

When the government began to come up with opiate derived painkillers they were outlawed for use without a prescription, and to grow for use entirely. The price increased dramatically, and many were combined with very harmful drugs like tylenol or aspirin.

The steps that it seems the government takes when legalizing drugs are the following: Control who can grow and/or sell it, Tax it as much as possible, control active chemical content (usually reduce). Why does anyone in their right mind believe the government will just let California's number one cash crop (above grapes) go to the stoners? Why when California alone could pull in ATLEAST 1.5 Billion dollars anually would our corrupt, financially devistated state legislature ever give it up? This is just California. Our federal government is also in serious financial trouble, and I doubt they are going to let billions of dollars in revenue and billions of dollars saved in the war on drugs go out the window?

I guarantee that if marijuana is entirely legalized/taxed it will increase in price, decrease in quality, decrease in availability, and be almost impossible to grow or sell it legally. I'll use California as an example. As of last year they began taxing medical marijuana. A gram that used to cost $20 now costs about $22. Not a huge amount, but enough to screw the average sick person out of their medecine for that day. I've gone there with $20 and had to beg them to let me owe them $2. If they're willing to tax the sick, then I imagine they won't think twice about taxing the average stoner.

Now my major problem with drug laws (particularly cannabis) is the amount of people we have in prisons for non violent marijuana related crimes. 2003 figures from an article on police overcrowding stated that:

2,078,570 men and women incarcerated on June, 30, 2003, an increase of 57,000 more inmates than state, local, and federal officials held on the same state a year earlier.

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2001 Statistics on marijuana arrests stated:

641,108 people were arrested in 2001 for marijuana possession charges.

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While this does bring in revenue from all the useless marijuana tickets given out, the amount of people who don't have the money to pay the ticket (in California) and wind up doing jail time is significant. This is a loss of revenue. Statistics also show that people incarcerated have a much higher chance of reoffending than if they were never introduced to the prison enviroment.

Another thing this does is it takes up the time of police, when they could be doing things like stopping burglaries, or solving murders. In Los Angeles towns like Downtown's skid row, or South Central - the Police spend more time harassing drug dealers and buyers than they do stopping the horrid crimes that go on there every minute of the day.
There are old homeless women who get abducted by crackheads. They imprison them in a tent or squat and once a month force them to cash their social security checks. Homeless people and meth heads kill eachother on the corner for someone looking at them wrong. There are children being abused by their family members both physically and sexually. It's amazing that they feel busting a pot dealer is significant even in the smallest meaning of the word.

So in conclusion, my hope for cannabis is that it becomes decriminalized and/or tolerated as in Amsterdam. Coffee shops function there freely, people smoke and buy cannabis there without being harassed. Hell, people smoke crack on the streets there. And time has shown that their crime rates and addiction rates are quite low, considering. I hope that personal marijuana growing will be possible, sales and purchase of marijuana will not be a crime, and that the price and quality of cannabis stays in the hands of the people.

All I'm saying is, be careful what you wish for.