So the NYTimes has a mini debate today in its editorial pages about "Legalizing Marijuana." I think LEGALIZING is the wrong focus. Of course it should be legal. What we should be focusing on in these days of recession/depression is TAXING THE SALE OF marijuana. This might save a good chunk of California's bacon all by itself. Instead of closing its beautiful parks and laying off teachers, Calliforneeya (that's how youknowwho says it) could be closing down prisons and converting the sentences of former pot-related criminals by putting them to work picking up roadside trash in the parks and cleaning the beaches.
A guy I know last week said he thought it was good that marijuana was not legalized. He said "Too many people would be high." Sweet jebus...they're high already....but mostly on likker, which is legal and taxed and regulated. You can get a nice buzz on with beer, for example, but you can't drive when you're buzzed or be drunk in public, etc. There are rules, and they work pretty well, too.
Prohibition didn't work. So let's quit fooling around with pot and make that legal, regulated, and TAXABLE. No reason to make all the crooks rich.
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ReplyDeleteYeah. I don't know the specific dollar amounts in California, but the last general statistic I heard was that it costs $50,000+ per year to keep someone in prison: More than many places can afford to pay teachers or cops or firefighters. Sick, hunh?
Especially when you consider that a majority of those incarcerated are there for drug-related offenses, but leave with an education in all types of crime, and a very bad attitude. Consider also that the prisons are so over-crowded that they have to release violent felons to make room for people with only medical problems like drug addiction. And now we're pouring public moneys into private prisons with even worse results. Sick, right?
Then there's all the time, money and energy the cops at the City, County, State and Federal level waste chasing druggies, instead of say, murderers, rapists, child molesters, arsonists, bunko artists, thieves, etc. Result: More expensive, more profitable drugs, more desperate addicts & more drug-related crime, more dangerous drug lords, and whole new mafias springing up all the time. Not to mention the corruption of our criminal justice professionals, and even our military. Sick, yet?
California & Hawaii grow the best pot in the world. They're both in financial trouble, publicly & privately, including agriculture. Legalization and taxation is a 100% no-brainer. No wonder the opponents have no brains, only a vested interest in the current boondoggle. If only this were a democracy, run by enlightened, reasonable, honest, rational, incorruptible, non-ideological, secular people. Ah, well, we can dream, can't we?
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thanks for an excellent response. legalizaton is a no-brainer, and you've listed many specific reasons why. again, thanks....
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ReplyDeleteIt'll never happen. Not unless we completely flush the conservatives and their "moderate" doppelgangers out of power.
Which I'm still hoping could happen in 2010, 2012 & 2016.
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