Barack to Legalize the Bud in the USA

[NYCBudHog]

It's about time...Obama Coffeeshop is needed in Netherlands, but you know how that goes

http://www.esquire.com/the-side/richard ... ion-122308

Why Obama Really Might Decriminalize Marijuana
The stoner community is clamoring to say it: "Yes we cannabis!" Turns out, with several drug-war veterans close to the president-elect's ear, insiders think reform could come in Obama's second term -- or sooner.

By: John H. Richardson



Writer-at-large John H. Richardson's column, "The Richardson Report," runs right here each Tuesday.

Famously, Franklin Delano Roosevelt saved the United States banking system during the first seven days of his first term.

And what did he do on the eighth day? "I think this would be a good time for beer," he said.

Congress had already repealed Prohibition, pending ratification from the states. But the people needed a lift, and legalizing beer would create a million jobs. And lo, booze was back. Two days after the bill passed, Milwaukee brewers hired six hundred people and paid their first $10 million in taxes. Soon the auto industry was tooling up the first $12 million worth of delivery trucks, and brewers were pouring tens of millions into new plants.

"Roosevelt's move to legalize beer had the effect he intended," says Adam Cohen, author of Nothing To Fear, a thrilling new history of FDR's first hundred days. "It was, one journalist observed, 'like a stick of dynamite into a log jam.'"

Many in the marijuana world are now hoping for something similar from Barack Obama. After all, the president-elect said in 2004 that the war on drugs had been "an utter failure" and that America should decriminalize pot:



In July, Obama told Rolling Stone that he believed in "shifting the paradigm" to a public-health approach: "I would start with nonviolent, first-time drug offenders. The notion that we are imposing felonies on them or sending them to prison, where they are getting advanced degrees in criminality, instead of thinking about ways like drug courts that can get them back on track in their lives -- it's expensive, it's counterproductive, and it doesn't make sense."

Meanwhile, economists have been making the beer argument. In a paper titled "Budgetary Implications of Marijuana Prohibition," Dr. Jeffrey Miron of Harvard argues that legalized marijuana would generate between $10 and $14 billion in savings and taxes every year -- conclusions endorsed by 300 top economists, including Milton "Free Market" Friedman himself.

And two weeks ago, when the Obama team asked the public to vote on the top problems facing America, this was the public's No. 1 question: "Will you consider legalizing marijuana so that the government can regulate it, tax it, put age limits on it, and create millions of new jobs and a billion dollar industry right here in the U.S.?"

But alas, the answer from Camp Obama was -- as it has been for years -- a flat one-liner: "President-elect Obama is not in favor of the legalization of marijuana." And at least two of Obama's top people are drug-war supporters: Rahm Emanuel has been a long-time enemy of reform, and Joe Biden is a drug-war mainstay who helped create the position of "drug czar."

Meanwhile, in 2007, the last year for which statistics are available, 782,000 Americans were arrested for marijuana-related crimes (90 percent of them for possession), with approximately 60,000 to 85,000 of them serving sentences in jail or prison. It's the continuation of an unnecessary stream of suffering that now has taught generations of Americans just how capricious their government can be. The irony is that the preference for "decriminalization" over legalization actually supports the continued existence of criminal drug mafias.

Nevertheless, the marijuana community is guardedly optimistic. "Reformers will probably be disappointed that Obama is not going to go as far as they want, but we're probably not going to continue this mindless path of prohibition," NORML executive director Allen St. Pierre tells me.

Some of Obama's biggest financial donors are friends of the legalization movement, St. Pierre notes. "Frankly, George Soros, Peter Lewis, and John Sperling -- this triumvirate of billionaires -- if those three men, who put up $50 to $60 million to get Democrats and Obama elected, can't pick up the phone and actually get a one-to-one meeting on where this drug policy is going, then maybe it's true that when you give money, you don't expect favors."

Another member of that moneyed group: Marsha Rosenbaum, the former head of the San Francisco office of the Drug Policy Alliance, who quit last year to become a fundraiser for Obama and "bundled" an impressive $204,000 for his campaign. She said that based on what she hears from inside the transition team, she expects Obama to play it very safe. "He said at one point that he's not going to use any political capital with this -- that's a concern," Rosenbaum tells me. And the Path to Change will probably have to pass through the Valley of Studies and Reports. "I'm hoping that what the administration will do," she says, "is something this country hasn't done since 1971, which is to undertake a presidential commission to look at drug policy, convene a group of blue-ribbon experts to look at the issue, and make recommendations."

But ultimately, Rosenbaum remains confident that those recommendations would call for an end to the drug war. "Once everything settles down in the second term, we have a shot at seeing some real reform."

Still, a certain paranoia prevails. Rumors about Obama's choice for drug czar have lingered on Republican Congressman Jim Ramstad. "He's been a standard anti-drug warrior for the whole time he's been in Congress," says St. Pierre. Another possibility is Atlanta police chief Richard Pennington, who raises fears in the legalization community of more of the same law-enforcement model. Another prospect stirring the bong waters is Dr. Don Vereen, the chief drug policy thinker on the transition team. "He's really a believer in prohibition and he can excite an audience," says Rosenbaum, who says a friend on the transition team refused to hint at final contenders for the drug czar pick. "I'm joking with him, 'I'm going to have to open up the New York Times for this, aren't I?'" His answer: "We're going to send out smoke signals."

[courtjester]

I didn't vote for either position in the poll. I certainly wouldn't vote for "never," because never and always are both hellaciously long periods of time -- infinite, even. As for what Obama does, I'll be in a better position to vote on this in Dec. 2012 than Dec. 2008.

If he wins reelection, that's when the move happens. He'd be a complete moron to make a move this term and we know he isn't that.

[SRH_Spaded]

I didnt vote for either also because I dont think Obama will be the man to decriminalize it, i think he might lighten up the harrassment of the goverment on the states the have medical marijuana, but he will not do it nationally and also i am not going to say that it will never happen because like before mentioned never is along time.

[DERICK]

http://www.nowpublic.com/culture/cannab ... site[quote][/quote]

When did Obama stop taking drugs?
Autobiography admits use of pot, cocaine, his temptation by heroin

Dream on me beauty's

[Saynt]

Marijuana will never be legal in the states until the American public realizes the monetary value that this plant would bring too the United States. Marijuana could bring thousands of jobs and billions of dollars into our economy. Thing is that Pharmaceutical, Textile, and even Alcohol companies spend millions of dollars lobbying for the prohibition of cannabis. And in the sad state of our once great political system that is the way business is done now. I donate millions of dollars to your campaign to get you elected and when the time is right you look out for my interests and not the interests of the constituents of your state. The public has made it known that the majority of people in the United States do not see cannabis as a harmful drug. I believe a Gallup poll in 2003 stated that 80% of Americans believe that.

Not only do these companies buy politicians that also spend alot of money on bogus propaganda stating the the harmful effects of marijuana. Lets just take the pharmaceuticals for a moment. These companies make billions of dollars off of people being sick. Now what would happen to their business if something was out there that take care of a wide range of illnesses and that any person could grow it themselves. As a business standpoint I could clearly see why they would want to keep it from ever being legal. Bottom line this comes down to just about any major issues in the world. Money! Money! The War in Iraq(which I served and it was until I got there saw the bullshit with my own eyes) was never about WMD's. It is about the control of the Iraqi oil interests. Money! It is about military industrialization. Money! If we are so concerned about the people and their freedoms, why are we not in Africa where hundreds of thousands of people die every year due to genocide. This does not include the number that die of famine and disease every year. I'll tell you why. Those countries do not have anything to offer in terms of money. Why spend millions of dollars into a military operation if there is nothing to gain?

Now why should the American who doesn't smoke marijuana care about this issue? They say it does not affect them since they do not smoke. But it does in ways we have just become accustomed to. Taxes! Now what if someone told the American public that legalizing cannabis(through taxation and regulation) that there is a possibility that they could have a lower taxes. Less money to spend on law enforcement and corrections. Less money for the prison to keep non violent drug offenders behind bars. Through taxation of cannabis more money could be generated to improve our health care, our education system, and our social security system just to name a few. I bet their ears would perk up then. That more jobs would be created from the exploding business that would start from the legalization of cannabis. Think they might consider the idea then?

Amsterdam is one of the pioneering nations in the reform of marijuana laws. Tourism is a major business for Amsterdam. How many of us would go to Amsterdam if it was not for their views of marijuana? I seriously doubt I would be trying to make a trip every year. I might go there once or twice to say I went but not every year.

I know some of this is spotty and random but I was never one to be able to put what I was thinking on paper very well. But until the average joe realizes the potential benefits of the legalization our dream of of being without fear of persecution will never come true.



Knowledge is Power! Pass it On!



One Love!

[ed the head]

As elated as I am to have Obama replace the Evil King W, I think it extremely unlikely he will take a stance on this issue.

It would be GREAT if he worked to repeal the mandatory minimum penalties imposed by the Federal Government, but even this seems unlikely in the current environment, at least during his first term.

There has been some progress in State Government where New Jersey recently passed a medical marijuana law.

This is really a shame, because enabling reasonable use would create a lots of new jobs and result in societal benefits in the form of increase tax revenues.

If Obama works to mitigate the influence of special interest lobbiests like the liquor manufacturers and the American Medical Association, we will have a much better chance of getting some progress in this matter. This MAY actually happen if Obama is what he portrays himself as, a representative of the PEOPLE.

Let's hope for the best.