December 31, 2008 at 00:07:12

by Bruce Cain

What is more important, right now, is to get as many votes on "Re-Legalization" as possible. Here is how you can efficiently register your recommendation for Obama to Re-Legalize marijuana.

(1) First goto
http://change.gov/

(2) Click on "Open for Questions: Round two"
(3) Click on "Open for Questions" link on new webpage.
(4) Click on "View Questions"
(5) Type "marijuana" in "Search questions" field and click

http://www.opednews.com/articles/Mar...81230-709.html

Note: The following statistics were collected 12/30/2008 at 3:00 PM EST. This is important to know as the polling is continuing till at least 12/31/2008. At that time 44,298 people have submitted 36,864 questions and cast 1,962,040 votes.

I visited Obama's www.change.gov website to see if marijuana Re-Legalization was leading again, as it came in first in during the first poll. At first I was disappointed because the first Re-Legalization question was ranked 26th of 36,864 questions. Still not bad. And the leading scoring question was a good one at that:

"I'm concerned about the banks who received tax payers money and have had no
accountability. Will this be corrected after President elect Obama is in
office?"

The leading question (above) below got 9,862 Yes and 600 no votes
But I then typed "marijuana" in "Search questions" field and clicked to find that 1,071 questions had been submitted regarding marijuana Legalization. In other words a little less than 3 percent of the questions were focused on Re-Legalizing marijuana.

And as I went down the list of "marijuana" questions I noticed that many had overwhelming percentages in favor of Re-Legalization and many had "yes" responses of over 2,000. So there is little doubt that, in aggregate, marijuana Re-Legalization is destined to come in first place in the second Obama poll. In fact I believe there is more support for Legalization in the 2nd poll than in the first. But Obama's website does not have the tools available to quantify this.

The only unfortunate aspect of the marijuana questions is that they invariably insist on taxing and regulating it, which I believe to be a very bad idea. This "legalize and tax" model appears to be an instilled "Pavlovian" response of far too many marijuana Re-Legalization advocates.

Still, it is great to see such support for marijuana Re-Legalization. Perhaps this second poll will convince Obama that saying "No" to Re-Legalization is just going to seriously "piss off" the American People?
I would highly recommend that my readers consider the MERP Model for Re-Legalization over any "legalize and tax" model. The following links will provide all the background you need to understand the MERP Model that I had authored around 2000.

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marijuana: Past, Present and Future from Bruce Cain on Vimeo.
http://www.vimeo.com/2056650

Why Lou Dobbs Should Support marijuana Legalization
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9VKf5YfQb7s&

The MERP Project
The marijuana Re-Legalization Policy (MRP) Project

http://www.newagecitizen.com/ReLegalization01.htm
http://www.newagecitizen.com/editori...rijuana_re.htm

Bruce W. Cain Discusses the MERP Model, for marijuana Relegalization, with "Sense and Sensimilla"
http://senseandsensi.libsyn.com/inde...post_id=270029

Video Biography of Bruce W. Cain
http://www.newagecitizen.com/Videos.htm
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The Beekeepers
"When the student is ready, the teacher will appear" -the Buddha

its actually in second. when you do a search of course its going to be first. instead of doing the search, select additional issues on the left side.

here i did it for you, select additional issues on the left and there u go

http://change.gov/page/content/openf...tions20081229/

well its total fail atm. its like number 20 something on the list

lol, maybe we should fix the economy first. I'm just saying...I want to keep my job and my money.

If they legalize it could fix the ecomony. Think of the money that won't be spent anymore criminilizing marijuana users combined with the amount of tax dollars it would bring in. Let's also factor in jobs. It would create jobs. If people suddenly have jobs, they're going to be able to make their mortgage payments and they'll be going out and buying stuff.


Everyone go and propose your own question, the more questions the more they'll have to see what we have to say. Make sure to vote on other marijuana questions too. The time is now, we MUST all stand together and be counted !!!

MissHester, I read the summary of MRP and question your opposition to taxation on MJ. Alcohol is currently legal to produce in one's home (beer and wine). This is not subject to taxation. The production of alcohol is not subject to taxation either. The SALE of alcohol products is taxed, often at a specific rate, and producers pay income tax as well. Likewise, I would favor taxation on MJ sales. It's no different from cheese or pig iron. If it's marketed, it's taxed. So you could grow freely for personal consumption but growing for resale would be taxed, just like any other commodity (knitting hats at home, whatever). Okay, my argument is not complete, but I thought I'd see what your response is.

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Quote:

Originally Posted by 323cheezy it is are animalistic mammalian ways to take advantage of the week...n nature there are no morals....survival of the fittest...the futile will die ....

I'm not sure what the question is specifically. If big gov is worried that too many people will grow on their own and they will miss out on that money, they could sell a yearly gardening license, but I would expect home beer brewers / wine makers to be subjected to a similar tax.

If stipulations are made on how much marijuana a person could possess I would expect similar stipluations to be place on alcohol possession. I.E. If people are only allowed to posses 3 ounces of marijuana, there should be a 3 case of beer / wine limitation too.

My question is that your proposal doesn't support the taxation of any aspect of legalized MJ, and that would, IMO, create an exceptional situation, where MJ is not the equivalent of any other agricultural commodity. Legalization should equal Normalization and MJ should be just another product, subject to gov regulation and taxation like any other.

There probably are state-by-state limits on how much beer/wine you can produce at home, but you don't hear of raids on homes for illegal alcohol production (Maybe moonshine). Nor is there a licensing requirement for manufacturing beer and wine at home. I can't see how there could be such a requirement for a substance you grow in your garden if it is legal. Commerce is another matter and is rightly subject to 'big gov' taking its cut (some may disagree, but I like taxes; they are used for stuff that I consider essential to my well=being). If Anheuser-Busch starts marketing MJ, I want the government to get a cut.

I think governments, local, state and fed, would seek to regulate commerce, but not private growing. If the government can't win 'the war on drugs', how can they expect to control private cultivation and consumption? Go from house to house looking for 5 plants at a time?

I think, also, that most MJ users, would prefer someone else to grow their weed, so there would still be a healthy commercial market which would provide plenty of government revenue from the buyer side, not the seller side.

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Quote:

Originally Posted by 323cheezy it is are animalistic mammalian ways to take advantage of the week...n nature there are no morals....survival of the fittest...the futile will die ....

First of all, I never said they shouldn't tax it, but they shouldn't tax it at a rate higher than alcohol or tobacco. I did specifically say "think of the tax dollars it would being it".

Secondly I was talking about regulated possession. In med states they regulate how much ready to smoke weed you are allowed to have. Some states only allow a person to have 1 ounce of weed and still be legal. If the governement was to place limits on possession then those limits should to extend to the alcohol industry as well.

Thirdly I was only saying that if the government tries to puss out on legalization by citing that people could just grow their own and not be paying taxes, then gardening licenses could be sold. It's not that I think people would bother to buy them, but it's a great come back to their excuses. People have to have a license to hunt, to fish, to drive, yet there are thousands of people who still do those things without the license, they just have to not get caught. You don't think the cops go from car to car to look for licensed drivers do you? Do they go from house to house looking for fishing poles? No they don't.

Actually, you don't address the large-scale corporate production of mj that would surely follow legalization, only the current situation of many private cultivators and what might happen to them. I still think most smokers would prefer someone else produce their bud and it would probably evolve into large corporations because there's just too much money to be made.

I don't think I have any great disagreement with you, but I was curious about this aspect of your proposal. Anyway, your last response seems testy, so I'll butt out of your thread. I'm not sure why you don't care for this exchange, but I'm out.

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Quote:

Originally Posted by 323cheezy it is are animalistic mammalian ways to take advantage of the week...n nature there are no morals....survival of the fittest...the futile will die ....