Plainsman1963

Obama's Marijuana Prohibition Acid Test
01-13-2009 | FreePress.Org | Bob Fitrakis & Harvey Wasserman

The parallels between the 1933 coming of Franklin Roosevelt and the upcoming inauguration of Barack Obama must include the issue of Prohibition: alcohol in 1933, and marijuana today. As FDR did back then, Obama must now help end an utterly failed, socially destructive, reactionary crusade.

Marijuana prohibition is a core cause of the nation's economic problems. It now costs the U.S. more than tens of billions per year to track, arrest, try, defend and imprison marijuana consumers who pose little harm to society. The social toll soars even higher when we account for social violence, lost work, ruined careers and damaged families. In 2007, 775,137 people were arrested in the U.S. for mere possession of this ancient crop, according to the FBI’s uniform crime report.

Like the Prohibition on alcohol that plagued the nation from 1919 to 1933, marijuana prohibition (which essentially began in 1937) feeds organized crime and a socially useless prison-industrial complex that includes judges, lawyers, police, prison guards, prison contractors, and more.

A dozen states have now passed public referenda confirming medical uses for marijuana based on voluminous research dating back 5,000 years. Confirmed medicinal uses for marijuana include treatment for glaucoma, hypertension, arthritis, pain relief, nausea relief, reducing muscle spasticity from spinal cord injuries and multiple sclerosis, and diminishing tremors in multiple sclerosis patients. Medical reports also prove smoked marijuana provides relief from migraine headaches, depression, seizures, and insomnia, according to NORML. In recent years its use has become critical to thousands of cancer and AIDS sufferers who need to it to maintain their appetite while undergoing chemotherapy.

The ban on marijuana has been extended in the U.S. to include hemp, one of the most widely used agricultural products in human history. Unlike many other industrial crops, hemp is extremely prolific in a natural state, requiring no pesticides, herbicides, extraordinary fertilizing or inappropriate irrigation. Its core uses include paper, cloth, sails, rope, cosmetics, fuel, supplements and food. Its seeds are a potentially huge source of bio-diesel fuel, and its leaves and stems an obvious choice for cellulosic ethanol, both critically important for a conversion to a Solartopian renewable energy supply.

Hemp was grown in large quantities by George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and many more of the nation's founders, most of whom would likely be dumbfounded to hear it is illegal in the United States (based on entries in Washington's agricultural diaries, referring to the separation of male and female plants, it's likely he and his cohorts raised an earlier form of "medicinal" marijuana as well).

The growing of hemp was mandatory in some circumstances in early America, and again during World War II, when virtually the entire state of Kansas was planted in it. The current ban on industrial hemp costs the U.S. billiions of dollars in lost production and revenue from a plant that can produce superior paper, clothing, fuel and other critical materials at a fraction of the financial cost and environmental damage imposed by less worthy sources.

In 1919, fundamentalist crusaders help pass the 19th Amendment, making the sale of alcohol illegal. The ensuing 14-year Prohibition was by all accounts a ludicrous failure epitomized by gang violence and lethal "amateur" product that added to the death toll. Its only real winner was organized crime.

FDR's support was critical to passing the 22d Amendment repealing Prohibition. It ended a period of gratuitous social repression and gave the American economy a substantial boost.

Marijuana prohibition has escalated substantially since Richard Nixon's 1970 declaration of the War on Drugs. There was a brief reprieve when Steve Ford, the son of President Gerald Ford appeared on the cover of Rolling Stone barefoot and claiming that the best place to smoke pot was in the White House. In 1980, President Jimmy Carter’s last year in office, only 338,664 were arrested for marijuana possession. Following Reagan, President George Herbert Walker Bush recorded a low of 260,390 marijuana possession arrests.

Ronald Reagan renewed the War on Drugs and declared his “Zero Tolerance” policy, despite his daughter Patti Davis’ claim the Gipper smoked weed with a major donor. This utterly failed reactionary crusade has resulted in millions of incarcerations costing billions of dollars with, again, whose only real beneficiaries have been organized crime and the prison-industrial complex that is its twin.

On a percentage basis, more American high school students (who report virtually unlimited access to marijuana and a wide range of other drugs) smoke more pot than students in Holland, where it is legal. Because so many Americans use it, and it is so readily available, marijuana prohibition can only be seen as a virtually universal assault on the basic liberties of our citizenry.

In a 2005 U.S. Department of Health and Human Services survey, more than 97 million Americans admitted to having tried pot, like Barack.

Barack Obama has made it clear in his book Dreams From My Father, he has smoked---and inhaled---marijuana (he is also apparently addicted to a far more dangerous drug, tobacco). In the long run, marijuana should be taxed. Like alcohol and tobacco, a minimum age for legal access should be set at 21.

The War on Drugs as a whole has been a catastrophic failure. The violence and repression it continues to impose on the American public need to be ended.

No part of that war is more destructive or less defensible than the marijuana laws. Like FDR, Obama needs to demonstrate the courage and good sense to end this insane, absurd legal disaster. Along with ending the war in Iraq, there are few single steps Obama could take toward restoring prosperity and sanity to American society than ending the war on this age-old medicinal herb.

satintiesclub

we are 45 years old at this time. atleast we still have 25 to 30 years to enjoy. from the gobi desert to the hotel rooms in myanmar organized crime is laughing on us, as the world go by more people will die, encarcerated for simple ancient herb that mankind should benefit from the leaf. legalization will bring mankind one step closer to fairness in life.

Lurkerboy (T)

I'm not American, so I wouldn't know, but is marijuana really a major cause of the US's economic problems? What's the budget that the country has each year, versus how much they spend on combating weed? I know lots of jobs are lost, and that many people are put into jail unfairly, but is this really a MAJOR causes for economic downfall?

PS: I'm Canadian. Eh.

EDIT: Whoops, I guess I'm just gonna say that I specifically have no knowledge of the US's budget and spending patterns.

dirtbomb

Canada actually has a very good view of what's going on in the States.
Peter Mansbridge has managed to fight off ridiculously lavish offers from American TV networks, because he has that perspective. ABC had to settle for Peter Jennings. :P

Whew! Meanwhile back at the ranch.........

Pot prohibition has cost thousands of Americans untold misery and financial ruin.
The key is not just to get Obama hip to this, but to show the nation as a whole, what has been going on for the last seventy years since Cannabis was criminalized.
Whether you smoke or not, approve or disapprove of it, the drug war is costing taxpayers billions of dollars. William F. Buckley, Milton Friedman and other conservative decision makers and commentators have/ had repeatedly hammered this bit of info home.
I would not (at least in this lifetime) consider myself particularly conservative, but their views seem to carry a lot more credibility to most Americans who consider pot to be some sort of leftist tool to indoctrinate their children. I've heard a few of these types prattle on about such things.
Legalizing Marijuana would not solve America's financial disaster in one fell swoop. It would, however, remove a major obstacle to our fiscal recovery.

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LowRider

Well said. Also i would like to add it cost a lot just for the fact GANGS are pushing the stuff. take away the drugs and they won't be around, no more killings over something stupid like someone selling on your block. There will still be crime as there always was, even before prohibition. there just won't be as much, should be a better future for us all if prohibition was to end.

druiddreams

Heh... first off, greetings to a fellow frost-bitten forum member *In Minnesota myself, so I'm feelin' the cold too.

Second, while I don't know that it's a MAJOR factor leading to the US' economic problems, I do believe MJ prohibition IS a waste of substantial of citizen's tax dollars. I can see it with the harder drugs, but this stance on MJ is just f'ing stupid. Kudos on Canada at least waking up enough to not criminalize ownership of seeds as novelties (even if MJ cultivation is illegal there, it's a start anyway). Heh... 'scuse me while I go put these "novelties" to use...

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'When life gives you lemons, you paint that shit gold...' -Atmosphere.

Amen brother...

BillieBudd

As much as I would like to see it happen, legalizing and taxing weed is not the cure all some might think it to be.
Finding other more productive things to spend the money on makes a great deal of sense (70 billion per annum, I thought I read) but when you talk trillions, it is pocket change...

Purpose420

together with hemp it would most definitely save the failing economy I'm no economic specialist, and I don't think you are either.

I suggest you read this thread http://www.marijuana.com/legalizatio...ent-sites.html

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"If (marijuana) were unknown, and bio-prospectors were suddenly to find it in some remote mountain crevice, its discovery would no doubt be hailed as a medical breakthrough. Scientists would praise its potential for treating everything from pain to cancer, and marvel at its rich pharmacopoeia -- many of whose chemicals mimic vital molecules in the human body." -- The Economist, "Reefer Madness: Marijuana Is Medically Useful Whether Politicians Like It or Not," April 29, 2006

Long live the VaporStore

LowRider

again it would be a jump start. reason being is the financial collapse. companies are having harder times getting loans and more and more companies are coming forward to claim money that otherwise wouldn't. You would have to legalize all drugs in some way to save a penny and to start paying off the debt we owe. the tax dollars that would be created with just marijuana/hemp just wouldn't be there to really save us. it would definitely jump start it as it would create a lot of new businesses and industry up. it would be like alcohol prohibition back in the 30's, just a jump start.

source: Time to Legalize Marijuana? - 500+ Economists Endorse Marijuana Legalization

its more of a summary but explains it pretty well.

Purpose420

That say's "marijuana" it DOES NOT mention hemp.