Why is the Obama Administration Suddenly Fixated on Stomping Out Medical Pot? Click the link to read the article.
The man who once pledged on the campaign trail that he was “not going to be using Justice Department resources to try to circumvent state laws on this issue,” has – since taking the Presidential oaths of office – done virtually everything in his administration’s power to do precisely that. Yet he's taken these steps at the very time that a record number of Americans, including 57 percent of democrats and a whopping 69 percent of self-described liberals, endorse doing just the opposite. Nonetheless, in recent months, the Obama administration – via a virtual alphabet soup of federal agencies – has launched an unprecedented series of attacks against medical cannabis patients, providers, and in some cases even their advocates.
Opinions vary on what is the greatest underlying motivator for the administration’s sudden and severe crackdown on medical marijuana providers and patients. The candidates, in no particular order are:
1.) Pressure from the pharmaceutical industry, to eliminate competition in the marketplace for their own forthcoming, soon-to-be FDA-approved cannabis-based drug.
2.) A Machiavellian attempt on the part of the President and his advisors to appeal to independent, conservative-leaning swing voters during an election year.
3.) Neither President Obama or Attorney General Eric Holder are likely to expend even a shred of political capital to halt the efforts of the administration’s more ardent drug warriors.
4.) A desire to preserve America’s longstanding criminalization of cannabis for everyone else. There is little doubt that the rapid rise of the medical marijuana industry and the legal commerce inherent to it is arguably the single biggest threat to federal cannabis prohibition.
In states like California and Colorado, voters have largely become accustomed to the reality that there can be safe, secure, well-run businesses that deliver consistent, reliable, tested cannabis products. They have come to understand that well-regulated cannabis dispensaries can revitalize sagging economies, provide jobs, and contribute taxes to budget-starved localities. Most importantly, the public in these states and others are finally realizing that all the years of scaremongering by the government about what would happen if marijuana were legal, even for sick people, was nothing but hysterical propaganda. As a result, a majority of American voters are now for the first time asking their federal officials: ‘Why we don’t just legalize marijuana for everyone in a similarly responsible manner?’
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You know it’s not about me, personally. I’ve been clean and sober for twenty years. So legalize or criminalize whatever drugs you want, it’s not going to affect my life. That said, to me marijuana laws are ridiculous. As with most drug laws, they just make the drug companies richer and allow the government to put more poor people in jail. If you want to cut down on the amount of money spent locking people up, legalize pot. Hell, legalize a few other things while you're at it. I suppose that’s just naïve thinking on my part. Along the lines of since you have like 750 out of every 100,000 people in jail anyway, why not have them work growing food to feed the poor. Free labor to give the poor free food. Nobody makes a profit, people just work while in jail knowing they are feeding the hungry. That would be cool no? I get that I am too naïve and simplistic a thinker, but still. Anyway, the reasons why we keep things the way they are is because somebody, lots of some bodies are making big bucks off of it. Pharmaceutical companies have a vested interest in the status quo, as well as prisons for profit. Now that we have privatized the prison system the more the merrier.
LINK
“America certainly has a unique stance on crime and punishment. Some actions that would cause the typical American to go to prison for a significant period of time aren’t even considered crimes in most other countries around the world. As a result, we’ve accumulated some interesting, sometimes alarming statistics showing just how crowded we’ve made our prison system. The ones below describe the state of the system, especially compared to the rest of the world, and the social impact of our policies.”
The U.S. has an incarceration rate of 743 per 100,000 people
The U.S. houses a quarter of the world’s prisoners
The U.S. houses more inmates than the top 35 European countries combined
The federal prison population has more than doubled since 1995
Those who have spent time in prison earn 40 percent less annually