Two days ago, voters in three separate Michigan communities had the final say in deciding whether or not local police would arrest recreational marijuana users.
Ballot proposals in Lansing, Ferndale, and Jackson, would legalize the use of marijuana on private property by anyone who was 21 or older.
Ladies and gentlemen, it’s time to free the weed.
The War on Drugs was pathetic. Drugs are incredibly dirt cheap right now on the street, and will only become cheaper. According to an October 2013 British Medical Journal study, researchers found that the average price of cocaine, heroin and cannabis decreased roughly by 80 percent between 1990 and 2007. Average purity increased by 60 percent, 11 percent and 161 percent respectively.
The U.S. has spent over $51 million per year on the War on Drugs.
In case you’ve been living under a rock lately, marijuana use is more socially acceptable than ever before. Where the hippie generation laid the foundation for the counterculture, the movement to reform the treacherous marijuana laws has been pumped up on HGH, and taken to new heights, especially with the advent of social media. Those pot-smoking punks you loathed before now have a presence.
A recent October Gallup poll revealed that 58 percent of Americans are in favor of legalizing marijuana. 38 percent of Americans have admitted to trying the drug. It’s time as Americans that we open our eyes, not only to how economically beneficial legalization is, but also how it affects us as taxpayers. Right now you’re paying for someone’s jail stay because he was caught with a dimebag of spinach, couldn’t get bailed out and is young and naïve to the legal system.
Better yet, you’re paying for someone’s jail stay who was a legal caregiver, able to grow plants in his backyard, but the local cops acting on an “anonymous tip” arrested him, ruining his livelihood and, ultimately, ruining his ability to help others that are sick and elderly, or others with PTSD from fighting for our nation.
The Obama administration needs to get on board as well. The government is playing cat and mouse with the American people by exercising a fascist approach to legalization under federal law, yet Colorado and Washington remain unchallenged by the government. Those states are under strict monitoring of the sale and distribution of the drug.
So you keep it away from schools, and you tax and regulate it, and watch the economy climb. Prohibition is an immense waste of public resources, and taxation would bring in much-needed revenue. Detroit is broke right now, and Mary Jane could fix that. According to a 2010 estimates by Harvard economist Jeffrey Miron, a sound system of taxation and regulation would yield $17.4 billion in government savings and tax revenues. Not to mention the race statistics and the correlation, but that’s another column.
It’s time to free the weed. It’s time for the whole state of Michigan to get on board. It’s time for Tricky Rick Snyder to get on board, and it’s time for America to get on board.
