http://www.sacbee.com/topstories/story/1837124.html
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Governor asks: What if pot's legal and taxed?
Last Modified: Wednesday, May. 6, 2009 - 1:06 pm
As California struggles to find cash, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said Tuesday it's time to study whether to legalize and tax marijuana for recreational use.
The Republican governor did not support legalization – and the federal government still bans marijuana use – but advocates hailed the fact that Schwarzenegger endorsed studying a once-taboo political subject.
"Well, I think it's not time for (legalization), but I think it's time for a debate," Schwarzenegger said. "I think all of those ideas of creating extra revenues, I'm always for an open debate on it. And I think we ought to study very carefully what other countries are doing that have legalized marijuana and other drugs, what effect did it have on those countries?"
Schwarzenegger was at a fire safety event in Davis when he answered a question about a recent Field Poll showing 56 percent of registered voters support legalizing and taxing marijuana to raise revenue for cash-strapped California. Voters in 1996 authorized marijuana for medical purposes.
Assemblyman Tom Ammiano, D-San Francisco, has written legislation to allow the legal sale of marijuana to adults 21 years and older for recreational use. His Assembly Bill 390 would charge cannabis wholesalers initial and annual flat fees, while retailers would pay $50 per ounce to the state.
The proposal would ban cannabis near schools and prohibit smoking marijuana in public places.
Marijuana legalization would raise an estimated $1.34 billion annually in tax revenue, according to a February estimate by the Board of Equalization. That amount could be offset by a reduction in cigarette or alcohol sales if consumers use marijuana as a substitute.
Besides raising additional tax revenue, the state could save money on law enforcement costs, Ammiano believes. But he shelved the bill until next year because it remains controversial in the Capitol, according to his spokesman, Quintin Mecke.
"We're certainly in full agreement with the governor," Mecke said. "I think it's a great opportunity. I think he's also being very realistic about understanding sort of the overall context, not only economically but otherwise."
Schwarzenegger previously has shown a casual attitude toward marijuana. He was filmed smoking a joint in the 1977 film, "Pumping Iron." And he told the British version of GQ in 2007, "That is not a drug. It's a leaf." Spokesman Aaron McLear downplayed the governor's comment as a joke at the time.
Even if California were to legalize marijuana, the state would hit a roadblock with the federal government, which prohibits its use. Ammiano hopes for a shift in federal policy, but President Barack Obama said in March he doesn't think legalization is a good strategy.
Any study would find plenty of arguments, judging by responses Tuesday.
Assemblyman Chuck DeVore, R-Irvine, said he's open to a study, but he remains opposed to legalization. He warned that society could bear significant burdens. He downplayed enforcement and incarceration savings because he believes drug courts are already effective in removing low-level offenders from the system.
"Studies have shown there is impairment with marijuana use," DeVore said. "People can get paranoid, can lose some of their initiative to work, and we don't live in some idealized libertarian society where every person is responsible completely to himself. We live in a society where the cost of your poor decisions are borne by your fellow taxpayers."
But Bruce Mirken of the Marijuana Policy Project said studies show alcohol has worse effects on users than marijuana in terms of addiction and long-term effects. His group believes marijuana should be regulated and taxed just like alcoholic beverages.
"There are reams of scientific data that show marijuana is less harmful than alcohol," Mirken said. "Just look at the brain of an alcoholic. In an autopsy, you wouldn't need a microscope to see the damage. Marijuana doesn't do anything like that."
Schwarzenegger said he would like to see results from Europe as part of a study.
The Austrian parliament last year authorized cultivation of medical marijuana. But Schwarzenegger talked with a police officer in his hometown of Graz and found the liberalization was not fully supported, McLear said.
"It could very well be that everyone is happy with that decision and then we could move to that," Schwarzenegger said. "If not, we shouldn't do it. But just because of raising revenues … we have to be careful not to make mistakes at the same time."
--------------------Issues:
1. It's downright abhorrent (and I believe intrinsically evil) for a government to say something is dangerous to the people and that they should be protected from it, and then turn around and legalize it solely so that they can collect tax revenue from it. Either the people should be protected from it, or they shouldn't. Raising tax revenue from its sale should be secondary. Allowing the people to be at risk from a "dangerous" substance simply for the money that can be gained from it is irresponsible at best, and downright criminal at worst. Personally, I believe the Constitution leaves this right to the states to determine what their people can and cannot do, NOT the Federal government. (Granted this can of worms will be addressed shortly a little further down where the actual danger posed by Marijuana is brought up)
It is not the government's job to protect us from ourselves. Rather, it is the government's job to maintain an environment where we are given the widest possible latitude to determine our own success or failure while infringing the least on others' rights to do the same. For example, if I want to blow my life on drugs, that is my right. Where my right stops is when my blowing my life on drugs causes me to injure someone else in the course of using drugs or while under the influence of drugs. For example, a DUI, or committing a crime while under the influence of drugs.
2. Marijuana specifically used to be not only legal in the U.S., but mandatory by law to be grown in colonial virginia by landowners possessing at least 2000 acres, was used as currency, and was one of the largest exports of the U.S. up until the civil war. Thomas Jefferson even risked an international incident to bring particularly good hemp seed in from China (a capital offense in China at the time was the export of its prized hemp seeds).
http://www.jackherer.com/chapter01.html
http://www.thetruthseeker.co.uk/article.asp?ID=3774
What caused it's decline?
- It is a very labor intensive plant to harvest and with the end of the civil war there was a severe shortage of cheap labor - i.e. slaves
- The Cotton Gin was invented making Cotton a much more viable cash crop as a result (this is VERY important later)
The invention of a machine in Germany to harvest hemp more efficiently threatened to ruin not only the Cotton Industry, but also the profitability of many major companies whos owners were quite well connected politically.
http://www.jackherer.com/chapter02.html
3. Alcohol and Tobacco are far more dangerous to users and cause far more deaths (both principal and secondary) than does Marijuana. They are also far more costly to society in terms of health care and property damage. The danger argument simply does not hold water.
The Bottom Line:
Marijuana (Hemp) should be re-legalized at ONCE! If the restoration of legitimate personal liberties and freedoms weren't enough, then the massive economic boon to our economy should be.
Tree huggers and environazi's should rejoice at the millions of trees to be saved by using hemp instead of wood pulp. They should also rejoice at the millions of fewer chemicals being used in the manufacturing process and being released into the environment.
Charity groups and those concerned with economic parity in the world should be overjoyed that smaller countries could now compete on the world market with their hemp exports raising the standard of living for all of their citizens. (Imagine African countries being able to export hemp - wouldn't that go a long way to solve a lot of problems over there?)
The bottom line is that crooked deals were made via pressure (and most likely payments) to Congressmen to draft legislation (which is how all laws come about - via legislation being drafted) which would protect certain financial interests for very influential rich people at the expense of, well, the rest of humanity and the Nation itself.
Now, has your view of legalizing hemp changed? Whether it's being smoked or not, how do you outlaw a plant? Is God a criminal for creating it? Was God wrong when he made it? By the very definition of God, he cannot be either of the above. Which then leaves the issue with the Federal Government, once again passing a law to benefit the few at the expense of the many. A return to the correct Constitutional restraints of the federal government would alleviate this problem and return our nation to the prominent place it once had - and deserves to have again.
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