State Considers Legalizing All Marijuana

KMJ 580 ^ | 10-29-09 | Marcus Wohlsen

[Enterprise]

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) _ No tie-dye was on display at a standing-room only hearing held by a California lawmaker on Wednesday in a bid to get his marijuana legalization bill taken seriously.

Instead, suits and sober discussion were the rule at the state Capitol as Assemblyman Tom Ammiano presided over what his office said was the first legislative consideration of the issue since California banned the drug in 1913.

[Enterprise]

Tax marijuana, and smoke a joint. It's for the children.

[GeronL]

All those criminals and gangbangers will get jobs and be respectable members of society if this passes. /sarcasm

[muawiyah]

One question ~ if we have a fender bender and the offending party is high on pot do we get to beat down on them ~ there's just no reasoning with these pukes otherwise.

They can't, or won't give their names, they can't write down necessary insurance information, on and on and on.

If you render them unconscious you can usually get their billfolds out and check up on stuff though.

Does California want to immunize the rest of us against criminal or civil charges regarding what we will have to do to with these guys?

[HiTech RedNeck]

Laugh if you must, but even the existing medpot program has put a large dent in the smuggling from Mexico.

[darkside321]

not a bad idea at all. it´s legal in the netherlands for example and they have not faced big problems because of that (beside that visiting amsterdam has become very atractive for the european youth).

[Izzy Dunne]

I’m opening up a few Chee-tos manufacturing plants if this passes...

[Just mythoughts]

Tax marijuana, and smoke a joint. It's for the children.

And Soros!!!!

[GeronL]

lol.

Pot is not smuggled, most of it is probably grown right here.

[HiTech RedNeck]

Ask the same silly questions about a roaring drunk... obviously the answer is CALL the COPS unless acting alone in defense of life and limb (if in Texas, defense of your car may also count).

[Enterprise]

I have also read that the existing policy on medical marijuana has caused a financial strain on the Mexican drug cartels.

[a fool in paradise]

You can’t smoke tobacco in public in Holland anymore.

[muawiyah]

Two things about Nederland. (1) You can get STDs there that are unknown in the rest of the planet, and (2) They frequently euthenize people who show up in hospital emergency rooms with IDs.

Say what you will the Dutch are definitely eliminating dopers one toke at a time.

[VAFreedom]

I think the ‘people’ down there will end up trafficking to Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas instead to make more money.

Still, I support American made, #1 cash crop of Kentucky over any mexican skunk weed anyday.

[VanDeKoik]

All those criminals and gangbangers will get jobs and be respectable members of society if this passes. /sarcasm

*shrugs*

It certainly helped when they ended Prohibition.

[muawiyah]

CORRECTION: Two things about Nederland. (1) You can get STDs there that are unknown in the rest of the planet, and (2) They frequently euthenize people who show up in hospital emergency rooms withOUT IDs.

Say what you will the Dutch are definitely eliminating dopers one toke at a time.

Hope that clarifies what's going on.

I'd advise you to hang onto your wallet while blowing dope or visiting the whores.

[HiTech RedNeck]

No senor. Quite a lot of pot traffic involves Mexico.

[ClearCase_guy]

The state is going to have to hire a lot more workers --

Somebody is going to have to kick in the doors of the homeowners who grow marijuana and don't pay the tax.

You know that's how gun control really got rolling, right? $200 tax on the sale of $10 guns. Sure, you can buy the gun -- but BATF will kill your family if you don't pay the tax.

The state of California may legalize marijuana, but the result is not likely to be pleasing to anyone -- the state is not doing this because it wants to make people happy. It wants to make people pay.

[GeronL]

The reason pot smuggling is down is because more of it is grown here. Not because of any MediPot scam.

[muawiyah]

Roaring drunks ~ I am inclined to let them run out into traffic. Aren’t you? Dopers are different ~ they wanna’ be your buddy.

[HiTech RedNeck]

I would be happy to furnish Soros with all the pot he could smoke for 200 years. Then he might leave us alone.

[kbennkc]

I hope they still ban giggle weed .

[gdani]

I live in Ohio where one can have up to 100 grams (a pretty large amount) and it's only a minor misdmeanor - like jaywalking.

As far as I'm concerned, at this point, they might as well legalize it & make some money off it.

[darkside321]

just a question what are STDs? i never heard of this. hey i have been to amsterdam and no one tried to euthanize
me ;-)

[RockyMtnMan]

No? So long as it’s valuable it will be imported.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,255523,00.html

Once it’s legal there will be no value in exporting it from Mexico.

[qam1]

So you will be able to smoke a joint in a bar in California but not a cigarette

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOkkkkkkkkkkkkkk

[spodefly]

If California would legalize pot and develop the Northern California pot industry into an export business, they could solve their budget shortfalls. Combine that with releasing all those incarcerated for marijuana and there might even be a budget surplus.

Of course I haven’t really worked the numbers on that and I am pretty stoned at the moment, but it sounds like a plan that would work ...

Be right back ... going to get some chips ...

[GeronL]

Will it be legal to sell on the street? to kids? Can parents still teach their kids not to use it? Will it be illegal to grow it in the backyard or garage?

Can we jail quacks who prescribe it for everything under the sun? Don’t like school? Doc says smoke crack or something lol..

California is a failed state anyway, this will make little difference.

[GeronL]

Nobody ever smuggles cigarettes into New York to avoid taxes either.

[Hoodat]

I know there's a reason why marijuana should remain illegal, but I can't seem to remember what it is.

(there's a very good reason why they call it dope)

[RockyMtnMan]

Frankly, from a Constitutional perspective, that is entirely up to the state of California. The Commerce clause should not be used to usurp state’s rights. Just as Tax law should not be used to regulate “machine guns”. The commerce clause is invoked to prevent growing, distribution and sales.

The side benefit is all the pot heads will move to California and hopefully out of my state.

[GeronL]

Let them. As long as we don’t have to pay for their welfare programs that would be fine.

[mouse_35]

Why would it be anymore available to kids than tobacco or alcohol? My kids told me point blank that it would be easier for them to get marijuana than alcohol or tobacco.

[patriotUSA]

California is a failed state anyway, this will make little difference.

DING-DING-DING. We have a winner!

[GeronL]

And this would make it easier.

[muawiyah]

I've known two people who had minor heart attacks and in the US, or virtually any other country, they would have made it from the airport to the hospital for treatment.

Alas, they were in Nederland and didn't survive the ride.

BTW, you are probably not ever going to discover someone trying to euthenize you ~

[wita]

Hey Mu, what’s your preference a drunk illegal or someone puffing a joint. I know which one I would choose. Yes, I know there are other choices that one just jumped to the front of the line.

I would like to see a three year sunset test of legalization. Clear out the non violent offenders filling up the jails, eliminate the obscene profit motive for pot, and generally get on with normalizing something that never should have been made illegal IMHO. If Booze and tobacco are legal knowing the effects they have on society, there is precious little to say negatively about pot in comparison. Again to repeat IMHO.

[muawiyah]

STDs are "sexually transmitted diseases". The influx of new hookers from Eastern Europe has overwhelmed the pitiful attempts by the city fathers to control the whores of Amsterdam.

[RockyMtnMan]

Actually it will. The more libtards we can get to congregate on the left coast (see elections) the better off we’ll be. Call Kali a loss and encourage every last one of them to move there and out of the “Red” states (making them purple or even blue!).

I live in a purple state and it pisses me off. We were a Red state when I moved here.

[Macoozie]

Legalize it. Tax it like any other farm crop. Some will grow their own, so be it. Others will sell it, so tax it and regulate it like tobacco. Apply the same rules to weed. DUI? Treat it the same as every thing else.

You drink Beer, Wine or Scotch? Don’t tell me I can’t smoke my ganja. It’s none of your dang bid’ness.

[fr_freak]

Pot is not smuggled, most of it is probably grown right here.

Actually, quite a bit is smuggled in from Mexico. However, you are correct in one sense: the Mexican drug cartels also like to co-opt our national parks to set up pot farms.

[darkside321]

And this would make it easier.

---

no it would be even more difficult to buy for kids in the long run. because if you can buy it legal (of course if you are old enought) in a shop why buy from a “dealer”? so in the long run they would be out of buisness for selling pot.
or have you ever seen people selling beer to little kids in dark corners? to be serious pot does not more harm (even less) then alcohol to your body. the only difference is alcohol is legal and pot not (btw. i don´t even smoke it but i have many friends who do).

[muawiyah]

Don't be silly. Driving stoned or DUI is not really the same thing. IF it were you'd not find stoners trying to pal around with you after smashing in your rear bumper.

That makes communications difficult hence my inquiry about beat downs. The state owes us that much if they legalize this stuff.

[mowowie]

Same here MA.
I think it a hundrend dollars for up to an ounce.

[fr_freak]

Nobody ever smuggles cigarettes into New York to avoid taxes either.

You are missing (at least) two important points:

1) You are referring to legalities involving the sale of marijuana (or cigarettes). If pot were legalized in CA, then the sale might be regulated, but possession and usage (with, presumably the same restrictions as alcohol - no driving, no being in public, etc) would be legal. People going to jail for possession would no longer be going to jail and cops would no longer be mounting military urban assaults on homeowners to find a quarter ounce. Big legal change there.

2) If we are truly talking about legalization, then it would no longer be a crime to grow your own. All the people currently growing plants in their closets could come out of the closet, so to speak. CA may try to tax that, but there really is no practical way of doing so. If there remain massive restrictions on growing a few plants on your own, then we aren't really talking about legalization, are we?

Lastly, there is no argument against the legalization of marijuana that you can't equally apply to alcohol, not if you are intellectually honest. All of this talk of "we don't want to pay dopers medical bills" and "dopers will be driving" actually apply more to alcohol than marijuana anyway. Let's hear from some ER people: do you see more bloody bodies come in from being high on pot, or from being drunk?

Myself, I'd like to see this happen just to force a states' rights showdown. It will be an excellent opportunity to assert states' rights, because it is an effort that both left-wingers (who want to get high) and right-wingers (who want to see states' rights asserted) can both support. Quite frankly, opposition to the right of a state to do this because of some misplaced concern about the dangers of marijuana is simply the result of decades of brainwashing people to accept the police state. It's bad for you, so we must forfeit our rights and give unlimited power to the state so they can save us from ourselves!

[GeronL]

I know people who are potheads. It does do damage, these people are STOOOOOPID

[BertWheeler]

Just do it. Legalize marijuana in California and it will be a test state. If everything goes well, the rest of the U.S. should legalize marijuana. Doing right is doing right. And there is no wrong in a substance, only in the hearts and minds of man.

Frankly, marijuana can’t make a good man go bad.

[howlinhound]

“Tax marijuana, and smoke a joint. It’s for the children.”

Yeah man, y’know, like..er..what was the question again?

[redpoll]

Marijuana legalization just another rest stop on the freeway to hell.

[RockyMtnMan]

“God... has formed us moral agents... that we may promote the happiness of those with whom He has placed us in society, by acting honestly towards all, benevolently to those who fall within our way, respecting sacredly their rights, bodily and mental, and cherishing especially their freedom of conscience, as we value our own.” —Thomas Jefferson

Let the sinner sin, it's not up to you and me. A man who wishes to be immoral will be such and the government should have no part in setting the standard. Many will fall and it's simply our duty to sway them to righteousness rather than imprison them for their vices.

[Tail Gunner John]

You, my friend, are the voice of reason on this issue.

Ever see the show Cops? The police are never investigating or arresting violent felons or thieves. The “perps” are always poor hapless dopers who’ve never harmed a soul in their lives. The dope half ruins their life, the police finish the job. I am fed up paying to incarcerate these people while the real threats to society are released out the prison back door to make room.