Marijuana.com

MagnusCannabis

Sure Cylinder, you can use it, just put me in the bibliography, or at least give me a footnote somewhere...haha

 

shortlk

Congress To Consider Legislation To End Minor Pot Arrests

Quote:Washington, DC: US Congressman Barney Frank (D-MA) will introduce legislation in Congress to strip the federal government of its authority to arrest responsible cannabis consumers. Representative Frank made the announcement last week on the nationally syndicated television show, "Real Time With Bill Maher."

"It's time for the politicians to catch up with the public on this [issue]," Frank told host Bill Maher, who sits on NORML’s Advisory Board. "The notion that you lock people up for smoking marijuana is pretty silly."

Frank's pending bill seeks to eliminate all federal penalties prohibiting the personal use and possession of up to 100 grams (3 1/2 ounces) of marijuana. Under this measure, adults who consume cannabis would no longer face arrest, prison, or even the threat of a civil fine. The bill also eliminates all penalties prohibiting the not-for-profit transfers of up to one ounce of pot.

NORML Legal Counsel Keith Stroup, who worked closely with Frank's staff to draft this legislation, said, "If passed by Congress, this legislation would legalize the possession, use, and non-profit transfer of marijuana by adults for the first time since 1937."

The bill incorporates the primary recommendations of the National Commission on Marijuana and Drug Abuse (also known as the Shafer Commission), which affirmed to Congress 36 years ago, "The actual and potential harm of use of the drug is not great enough to justify intrusion by the criminal law into private behavior, a step which our society takes only with the greatest reluctance."

Currently, 12 states and numerous municipalities have enacted versions of marijuana decriminalization, eliminating criminal penalties for minor pot violations. Passage of these laws has not led to increased marijuana use.

To date, the only US government study ever commissioned to assess whether the enforcement of strict legal penalties positively impacts marijuana use found, "Overall, the preponderance of the evidence which we have gathered and examined points to the conclusion that decriminalization has had virtually no effect either on the marijuana use or on related attitudes and beliefs about marijuana use among American young people."

Similar statewide legislation is pending in New Hampshire and Vermont. Additionally, Massachusetts’ voters will likely decide on a statewide decriminalization measure this November.

According to a nationwide CNN/Time Magazine poll, more than three-quarters of American adults favor decriminalizing marijuana.

http://www.norml.org/index.cfm?Group_ID=7563

StonedImmaculate21

It would be great if this works out, but I have a feeling Bush will veto this in half a second (assuming the bill even makes it past Congress).

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Buzzby

For more articles about this bill that have already been published on Marijuana.com, check out these links:

NORML Teams Up with Rep. Barney Frank To Introduce Fed Decrim Bill

USA : Marijuana Law: Barney Frank to author federal decriminalization bill

USA : Time To Legalize Marijuana

USA : Elimination of marijuana laws smart, but will fail

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"If freedom-loving people throughout the world do not speak out against China's oppression in China and Tibet, we have lost all moral authority to speak on behalf of human rights anywhere in the world."
~ Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, 03/22/2008

drakester

Barney Frank is probably the 1 member of Congress I respect the most, not only because he is an out gay man in a still-homophobic institution, but because he isn't afraid to take on important issues. I think mj is important for one main reason: the thousands of ppl being incarcerated and their lives ruined for getting caught with "too much" (whatever that amount is, depending on the local laws). Meanwhile the screaming hypocrisy of liquor stores that operate with impunity makes a mockery of our judicial system. If substances that make you feel good must be illegal, if you accept that hypothesis, then alcohol must be prohibited, and also a lot of foods that one finds at the grocery store such as chocolate and coffee--of limited nutritional value and used primarily as mood elevators.

 

FunkySkunky

This is parallel to my argument. I believe that there should be no prohibition of what I can put into my own body. If it is my choice and it is a technically ethical choice, then I should be able to make it. If we allow alcohol and tobacco which kill millions of people a year worldwide, then why not marijuana? Go Frank!

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Pompo

As Buzzby pointed out, this story is being covered in the The Drug War Headline News. Merging threads

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Jazz Janga

Are we winning? It sure seems as if there have been a lot of pro-legalization inroads made in the last few years. Let's work hard and see more in the near future.

FievelJMousekewitz

I cant find this article anywhere.
But what really sucks about this "Bill" is it'll die before it has a chance to even start.
Saw this on the news last night, my face was probably really red.
The US government is planning to build walls in between every Boundary with decriminalized law systems. This includes also some of the states that have decriminalized law systems on the drug.
The proposal will cost up and over 1 trillion dollars.
This puts the drug budget well over 2 trillion dollars.
If I’m doing my math right, nearly one quarter of the US Governments Federal Deficit of going on $$ 10,000,000,000,000 $$
Adding the war on terror to that + Iraq easily puts that at about 3.5 Trillion dollars.
That’s so much money, that you could spend 1 million dollars a day, 7 days a week, 365 day of the year, including leap year.
For each approximate year, you would be spending approximately 360,000,000
give or take, a little more on leap year.
And 10,800,000,000 in 30 years. And by the time you would get there, you probably would’ve earned it all back in intrust. And then some.
I believe I may have got the wrong word there, but the point’s clear anyway.
It’s also clear to me, our government just loves to waste money.
If my math is right, our government has now spent over 1.8 trillion dollars on the (War On Drugs) inside of just George W Bush’s term in office.
Which now makes my math way wrong.
This would mean, that over half of the US Governments Federal Deficit is their
(War On Drugs)
is it just me, or does their seem to be a BIG problem here? They claim that it’s helping, but I really am having problems trying to figure exactly how out Government justifies spending 5 trillion dollars on their drug war.
If I’m wrong, and the amount is more, please someone correct me.


It is really time for change.

Buzzby

Each article contains a link back to it's source. Which one can't you find?

Did you find that on ParanoidFantasies.com?

How did you come up with that figure? It's off by a factor of at least 4.