[robertpaulsen]

"Probation or not, over half of the space in federal prisons is wasted by cannabis offenders."

First, the space is not "wasted". These are scumbag drug traffickers and drug dealers. Good riddance to bad garbage. Second, the statistic is for all drug offenders, not just marijuana. Third, we have 2 million people in prison (state and federal) in the U.S. 77,000 of them are drug offenders in federal prison. Let's put things in perspective here, Chicken Little.

"I'd think it would be a lot more. Got a source?"

The federal budget is about $2 trillion. The federal WOD is about $20 billion (ie., 1%).

Under the 2003 WOD budget, a number of enforcement agencies were included. This skews the "supply/demand" budget split to 2/3 - 1/3. The 2004 WOD budget transfers some of the enforcement budget to other federal agencies, resulting in a "supply/demand" budget split of about 50-50.

This restructuring (detailed in the link) also reduces the ONDCP budget from $20 billion to $12 billion. The largest reduction, $5 billion, came from the removal of 10 accounts in the DOJ, the largest of which, $3 billion, was for the incarceration of federal prisoners.

[William Terrell]

First, the space is not "wasted". These are scumbag drug traffickers and drug dealers. Good riddance to bad garbage. Second, the statistic is for all drug offenders, not just marijuana. Third, we have 2 million people in prison (state and federal) in the U.S. 77,000 of them are drug offenders in federal prison. Let's put things in perspective here, Chicken Little.

These "scumbags" are human beings that like to smoke a naturally occurring herb, placed on Earth by God Himself, and given for mankind their use (Genesis 2:29,30. This would mean God deals in "drugs". Is God a "scumbag", sweetiepie?

The vast majority are there for cannabis. Opium derivatives are advertised but cannabis is busted, along with some for opium derivatives. The reason for this is simple commonsense; opium derivatives take up small spaces and are smuggled more efficiently and safe from detection, where cannabis takes up much spaces and is easy to detect. Quod Erat Demonstrandum.

The federal budget is about $2 trillion. The federal WOD is about $20 billion (ie., 1%).

But we were discussing the percentage of money used in the WOD for cannabis persecution, not the percentage of the WOD budget of the federal budget. Remember? The issue was if insane clown posse of the DEA would still exit as such without the cannabis star chamber.

Under the 2003 WOD budget, a number of enforcement agencies were included. This skews the "supply/demand" budget split to 2/3 - 1/3. The 2004 WOD budget transfers some of the enforcement budget to other federal agencies, resulting in a "supply/demand" budget split of about 50-50. This restructuring (detailed in the link) also reduces the ONDCP budget from $20 billion to $12 billion. The largest reduction, $5 billion, came from the removal of 10 accounts in the DOJ, the largest of which, $3 billion, was for the incarceration of federal prisoners.

So, what this alphabet soup means is DEA uses it's budget for investigation, sting operations, and the due process chain all the way to conviction but transfers it to other agencies, but still the DEA's budget.

Again, if cannabis were to vanish from the Schedule, and all cannabis related activities, including in foreign countries, were to cease, the DEA would effectively lose the greater part of it budget and the greatest part of it's power.

As I said, our esteemed drug czar would have to seek greener federal pastures for his livelihood and arrogance.