Epicurus
Reasonable
Um yeah okay well here is some honest criticism. The notion that he thought distribution should be a felony is absurd. That is not the "change" we were looking for.
Interesting map: The marijuana vote in MA
- Thread starter Chapdog
- Start date
Um yeah okay well here is some honest criticism. The notion that he thought distribution should be a felony is absurd. That is not the "change" we were looking for.
Epicurus
Reasonable
Thanks, bac. By the way welcome back.
Looks like you and I will be in agreement on this.
blackascoal
The Force is With Me
U.S. Attorney Eric H. Holder Jr. said in an interview that he is considering not only prosecuting more marijuana cases but also asking the D.C. Council to enact stiffer penalties for the sale and use of marijuana.
Would his own words be considered "honest criticism?"
blackascoal
The Force is With Me
Thank you young brother .. but you and I are in agreement on a lot of issues, including this one.
I wonder how all those youthful voters who stood in long ass lines feel about this?
Epicurus
Reasonable
BAC - That's what the article says. Where is the support for that? If you can show it to me I'd appreciate it but nothing I have read supports that. Everything in the WaPo article that many are seizing upon relates to distribution, not use or possession.
Epicurus
Reasonable
What praytell is this distinction in your mind between posession and distribution? Because I would let you know that they are very much the same thing in practice on the street.
If you pick up an extra eighth for your friend when you go to your dealer, you are "distributing" by law and can be charged with it. I have friends doing time for that exact thing right now.
If you pick up an extra eighth for your friend when you go to your dealer, you are "distributing" by law and can be charged with it. I have friends doing time for that exact thing right now.
Epicurus
Reasonable
If your house is raided and you own plastic sandwich bags and/or a scale, you can be convicted of distribution.
Same for your car if you are stopped.
Even if an actual dealer gets arrested by the sentence, you are hardly putting away Tony Montana. More likely than not it would be some inner city kid who is making less than minimium wage slinging.
I'm sure it sounds good to you to lock drug dealers up. In practice things are never so easy though.
Same for your car if you are stopped.
Even if an actual dealer gets arrested by the sentence, you are hardly putting away Tony Montana. More likely than not it would be some inner city kid who is making less than minimium wage slinging.
I'm sure it sounds good to you to lock drug dealers up. In practice things are never so easy though.
Look, I'm not arguing one way or the other. I'm just pointing out that much of what BAC claims is just not true. It is true that Holder has a record of being a drug warrior but to pretend that his push to make distribution of marijuana a felony in DC is an attack on marijuana users generally and medical marijuana in particular is just plain crazy.
I seriously doubt that you have even one friend "doing time" for possessing a quarter unless you live in some backward ass southern state. Let's get real here.
Epicurus
Reasonable
I do and I do.
Damn. That blows. Regardless of who is AG you're screwed. Tommy Chong as AG wouldn't help you out.
blackascoal
The Force is With Me
You've got your Obama blinders on brother. Holder's positions on marijuana are well known. He thinks all mj use, including medical mj, are criminal offenses.
Reefer Madness in Washington, DC
... Eric Holder, the U.S. attorney for Washington, D.C., advocates tougher penalties for marijuana offenses.
"Marijuana violence is increasing. We need to nip it in the bud," claims Holder.
Unfortunately, new enforcement initiatives will only worsen the drug problem. The crime surrounding marijuana that Holder complains of results not so much from the drug trade, but from drug prohibition. No one argues that pot is crimogenic. People don't smoke marijuana and then commit crimes.
Rather, killings and robberies inevitably accompany illegal markets. Dealers fight over turf; sellers and customers rob one another. This was evident during Prohibition--the ban on alcohol could not have been better designed to benefit organized crime. Similarly, marijuana and opium have been legal in America for more years than they have been prohibited; only after government forbid their sale earlier this century did crime envelop them.
---
"Marijuana and opium have been legal in America for more years than they have been prohibited; only after government forbid their sale earlier this century did crime envelop them."
Upping the penalties for marijuana of tenses and imposing minimum sentences for nonviolent offenders would only increase the incentive to rely on kids. And it wouldn't end drug abuse. Nationally, there were nearly 600,000 arrests in 1995 for marijuana, over 80 percent of them--an incredible half million --for possession alone.
Pot arrests are up 50 percent over the Bush years, and someone is arrested for a marijuana offense every 54 seconds in America.
Turning drug use, at base a moral and spiritual problem, into a criminal crusade hasn't worked. Despite 10.5 million arrests for pot offenses between 1965 and 1995, more than 60 million Americans have used marijuana. As the police have collared even more people during the l990s, drug use by children has risen. Arresting and jailing even more people won't yield any better results.
It's time to change course. Instead of reinforcing the failed policies of the past, the federal government should fold low states like Arizona and California--and especially Ohio, which has reduced penalties for small-time growers--in de-escalating the war on marijuana.
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=6121
Epicurus
Reasonable
Yeah you are right about that part but it is still not helpful to have an unsympathetic AG.
I'm moving as soon as I finish my degree. But it sucks for the people here who can't afford to leave.
blackascoal
The Force is With Me
It sucks for a lot of people .. except those who profit from "crime" .. like lawyers, judges, politicians, police agencies, and most importantly, the prison/industrial complex and corporations who benefit from prison slave labor.
One further note, I suppose I just have a tough time lambasting the US Attorney in D.C., which you have to admit had very serious crime problems, for taking a hardline approach on the "war on drugs."
Do either of you have people in mind that are good enough to be AG in an Obama administration?
Do either of you have people in mind that are good enough to be AG in an Obama administration?
C
Cancel3
Guest
I have no problem with the "war on drugs" when its dealing with drugs that cause the major problems.
Go after crack, meth, heroin, and shit like that. Busting pot smokers is not doing anything except lowering the stock prices for Dolly Madison.
Take the resources used to go after all the pot in the US and use it to get serious drugs and drug dealers off the street.
Or take the same resources and get the drunks off the roads.
But to put mj in the same category as heroin, crack or meth is just being loony.
Epicurus
Reasonable
Well I'm not doubting DC's drug problem (which is arguably the worst in the nation), but that's not how I think it should be handled.
And no off the top of my head I can't think of a politically acceptable, decriminalization-friendly AG, but that doesn't mean Obama couldn't have.