But I think that ED may be making a strong point if he thinks that MJ just doesn’t have the strong social harms that are supposed to be the justification for “sin taxes.”

Most of our problem is that the beer-drinking tradition in America is stronger than the pot-smoking tradition.

Why don’t we offer an olive branch?

Why don’t we get into a coalition with the beer-drinkers–instead of a pissing match? (Besides, how are you going to win a pissing match against a man who just chugged a 24-case of Bud Light?)

Why don’t we offer to *lower* the alcohol tax in exchange for a rather higher tax on legal pot? All of a sudden, the beer-drinkers and pot-smokers will be united in a pro-fun coalition. Surely, pro-fun has to be the majority in one of our 50 wonderful states. right? Right?

A man can dream, anyway…

Somehow ED thinks legal marijuana wouldn’t be like legal artichokes or legal carrots or legal potatoes, which have regulations controlling how the farmers may grow it and taxes on the sale of it.

Grow up, ED. When marijuana is re-legalized, it will be taxed, just like everything else. But just like you can go buy some artichoke seeds and plant some in your home garden, and harvest them and eat them without any taxes or interference (except the sales tax you paid on the seeds), you’ll be able to do the same with cannabis. But if you want to convert your whole yard into a large-scale artichoke farm and sell your artichokes at the farmer’s market, then you’re going to have to follow some government regulation and pay some more taxes. Just like cannabis will be taxed and regulated.

Now, if you want to have a discussion about “sin taxes” and whether cannabis should be taxed more than other crops, you’ve got a valid point (I may even agree; I think cannabis taxes should be less than alcohol or tobacco because cannabis doesn’t cause the social harm). Or if you want to discuss whether legalization initiatives should have the taxation directly in the text, rather than just making initiatives that legalize while assuming once passed, natural taxation and regulation would be promulgated or cannabis would just fall under some existing agricultural category of taxation, there’s a valid argument to make. But please, cease this fantasy that somehow marijuana will be legalized completely free of taxation and regulation; it’s a specious argument.

(There is a similar battle going on in the battle for recognition of gay people’s right to marry. Some say we should support the incrementalism of civil unions, for at least half a loaf is better than none. Some say cut the push for non-discrimination laws for the transgendered so it can get passed for the gays and lesbians.)

I, for one, am tired of being told that I’m a criminal and I need to shut up and accept being a criminal for just a little while longer, that I need to tolerate going without a joint just a while longer, lest I mess up the chance for a cancer patient to have a joint with her chemo. It feels a bit like extortion, don’t you think? “How could you do anything to deny a suffering person?” is the line we used to use against the prohibitionists, now it’s being used against us “legalizers”.

Say somebody put forth an initiative that only lets a guy with two weeks to live named Chet smoke <5% THC medical marijuana between 2pm-4pm in a locked room with armed guards. Would we have activists saying, "Well, we've got to support the Chet Medical Marijuana bill, because at least it is some movement forward to legalization”? In a sense, every medical marijuana measure is a way of saying, “OK, everybody deserves to be locked up for marijuana, except these few people, because they are sick.” And as that list of “few people” keeps getting shorter and shorter, it is making the list of people whom we think should be locked up longer.

I’m not against any medical marijuana measure; however, I worry about “medicalization” getting locked in and “legalization” being pushed out. Because as these medical marijuana measures get stricter and stricter, they are immunizing the people who would be least likely to be busted and imprisoned even if marijuana remains illegal anyway. Really, if they catch the terminal cancer patient in Arizona with half an ounce of weed NOW, do you think any D.A. will press charges?

What’s being instituted lately is a medical marijuana system that only protects the sickest of the sickest (the ones who’d not likely be prosecuted anyway), underprotects them in terms of medicine allowed (we reduce the law to only the worst cases, then reduce the limits to a point that would only help the best cases), and locks them into the same paradigm of pharmaceutical health care that requires strict doctor supervision and routine visits to a pharmacy to acquire medicine at ridiculously marked-up prices.

I think the mistake in reasoning is trying to compare “the right to a buzz” with “access to medicine”. Why the distinction? That leads to a litmus test as to who’s healthy enough to be locked in jail for choosing to use cannabis. I’m saying that with twelve years of medical marijuana, and now knowing how medically useful it is for stress, anxiety, depression, PTSD, etc., and knowing how superior it is to alcohol as a social relaxant, these medical marijuana laws should be getting bolder, not more timid. If marijuana ends up being solidified as only “medicine” in the public’s mind, then people like me will be looked at like those who chug cough syrup for a “buzz” at best or those who forge Oxycontin scrips at worst.

I’m neither. I’m just a guy who likes to drink a beer on occasion, except it isn’t a beer, it’s a bowl.

I would say that it’s as safe as an “over the counter” but would have to be a “behind the counter” drug to age restrict it. Compared to OTC drugs it would be hard to justify prescription status. BTC status fits the goal of what NORML has wanted all along. Focus on the fact that cannabis is safer than OTC drugs when debating medical use of cannabis.

…the medical side could kill any hope of ending prohibition…

Similarly, bills that try to lure support with cash, by taxing consumers who choose to exercise their right to responsibly use cannabis, will impede progress toward the real freedom to which we are all entitled. Ending prohibition should provide all the financial incentive necessary. You should not have to pay a tax to exercise your rights. By supporting measures that include special taxes for consumers of cannabis, you are inviting continued governmental interference and abuse.

Legalize it and leave it alone.

So, if you would like to be free of unreasonable government interference, then please tell the purveyors of the “legalize it and tax it” bills that you are down with the “legalize it” part, but insist that they remove the “tax it” part before you support their legislation.

-ED

See my testimony at the MA State House, I’m the last speaker in the video, linked below. The medical bill in MA has 80%+ voter support, yet as the days go by, I’m less and less optimistic it will pass or survive without getting gutted like the others have.

Our head of the ONDCP said the biggest issue facing America in terms of drug abuse is presciptions like Oxycontin. They want to divert to treatments and Drug Courts instead of jail, treat it like a health care issue.

This could be a setup to make money off of anyone without a prescription to cannabis in the future because then basically no one could get a prescription or grow it and they could bust everyone again.

Instead of sending to people jail for cannabis we will be sending them to treatment and labeling people as drug addicts and prescription medication abusers. Maybe they won’t get healthcare, or they have to pay extra.

I see the government thinking REALLY hard, as hard as it possibly could, about taking this medical marijuana thing and running with it and the money.

It seems to me what Obama said about morphine and what Kerlikowski said about the health problem of prescription abuse are premonitions.

While I certainly support relegalization, I believe we must consider the urgency of medical access. Just because the opposition to MMJ has been successful in weakening recent medical cannabis laws doesn’t mean it’s a lost battle. Most of us can tolerate doing without a joint for recreation, but some of us are sick, disabled, or dying, and shouldn’t have to needlessly suffer for lack of access to medical cannabis.

Getting a buzz in a responsible, appropriate way should be everyone’s right, and the debate must carry on, but not if it means more delays for those medically in need in 37 states and D.C.

It’s a matter of priorities. Is the right to a buzz more urgent than access to medicine?

Too many people are in pain every minute of every day of their lives. Pain which can be lessened with marijuana. Are you saying we need to tell them they need to put their needs on the back burner while we work out this legalization thing?

Just one side-thought: Any chance the opposition is fueling this debate? Divide and conquer?