[420 Girl]

Guys like Al Capone would see to that. Big Al, they say, was knocking down $60 million per year in the late 1920s from alcohol alone, during a period when our government brain trust decided the best way to get people to sober up was to pass an 18th Amendment banning the sale, transportation and manufacturing of alcohol in America.

Big Al wasn't that smart, but he was smart enough to know a sucker when he saw one and Uncle Sam was the biggest sucker of all.

Unfortunately, Uncle Sam doesn't learn from his mistakes (don't get me started).

This War On Drugs he is waging today is a loser, serving only to create more Al Capones than ever before and draining our resources to the point that we may soon spend more to eradicate and incarcerate than educate.

The definition of insanity, they say, is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.

Last week there was a raid on some federal land around here where they say some Mexican nationals were growing a thousand or more marijuana plants.

It was a sizable bust and the law enforcement task force filled bags and bags of the weed that an estimated 15 million Americans smoke at least once per month.

It made great headlines, but if you read between the lines, it won't make a difference. Especially not to the so-called Mexican cartel leader who probably sent a handful of poor laborers up here to plant and grow pot.

The poor guy they caught was probably living in the woods, working his tail off by day, sleeping in the dirt by night, supplied with tortillas and beans and maybe, if he made it home with the pot, a pocketful of pesos.

He didn't make it home with the pot, but to the guys at the top, who sit in Mexican palaces and control everything around them, last week's bust was nothing. A few seeds lost, maybe some tortilla money and a few laborers who could be replaced with the snap of the fingers.

I ran across a column last week from the former governor of New Mexico Gary Johnson headlined, “Legalize Marijuana To Stop Drug Cartels.”

In it, Johnson indicates that Mexican drug cartels make at least 60 percent of their revenue from selling marijuana in the United States.

The FBI, he writes, estimates that the cartels now control distribution in more than 230 American cities.

“How are they able to do this?” he asks. “Because America's policy for nearly 70 years has been to keep marijuana — arguably no more harmful than alcohol — confined to the illicit market, meaning we are giving criminals a virtual monopoly on something that U.S. researcher Jon Gettman estimates is a $36 billion per year industry, greater than the corn and wheat combined.”

I know.

“Marijuana is a gateway drug! If we legalize it our kids will smoke it and then start shooting heroin into their eyeballs!”

I don't think so. Most people I know say they had a drink long before they smoked pot. Our parents kept the liquor cabinet well stocked.

Besides, any high schooler will tell you it may be more difficult to buy beer than pot in Nevada County.

Dealers don't ask for IDs.

Since the bad guys always control the illegal drug trade — much as Capone and his men did in the Roaring 20s (an estimated 227 gangsters were killed during a four-year span in Chicago) — there is a lot of blood, as the various cartels fight for control of the industry.

“The violence in Mexico is out of control and is destroying that country,” Johnson writes. “Some schools are even teaching their students to duck and cover to avoid being caught in the crossfire.”

Mexico's President Felipe Calderon has finally concluded that a new approach is needed and that an open debate on legalizing and regulating marijuana in particular may be the only way to end the violence that has killed more than 28,000 Mexicans in just the last four years.

Unfortunately, the U.S. government hasn't been interested in joining that debate, which makes you at least wonder what's really behind the so-called War On Drugs (again ... don't get me started).

What our government ought to figure out is why its citizens like to get stoned and/or drunk every day. What are they trying to escape?

Ten minutes of CNN might answer that one.

According to the Proposition 19 advocates (on the November ballot to legalize marijuana), there is an estimated $14 BILLION in marijuana sales each year in California alone and the cash-strapped state gets nothing.

Under Prop 19, juveniles would not be allowed to legally purchase or possess marijuana, just like alcohol today.

And ... just as with alcohol ... you wouldn't be allowed to drive under the influence of marijuana.

Advocates argue that legalization would allow our cops and courts to focus on the really bad crimes, saving hundreds of millions of dollars currently spent arresting, jailing and prosecuting non-violent pot growers and users.

And then there are the taxes. The state tax collector and Board of Equalization estimate that California — facing a $20 billion shortfall and no budget — could generate more than $1.4 billion by taxing marijuana, adding it to the list of so-called “sin taxes” that includes alcohol and tobacco.

I'm not a huge fan of taxes, but I'd rather see some of the pot money go to our schools and highways than to fund some Fat Cat's illegal empire.

At the end of the day, argue Prop 19 advocates, “Outlawing marijuana hasn't stopped 100 million Americans from trying it.”

It should not go unnoticed, as you head to the polls in November, that the most strident opponents of California's Prop 19 are the drug lords and growers who stand to lose their tax-free fortunes. They would love your support.


NewsHawk: User: 420 MAGAZINE
Source: theunion.com
Author: Jeff Ackerman
Copyright: 2010 Swift Communications, Inc.
Contact: TheUnion.com Online News | Grass Valley & Nevada County California
Website: Jeff Ackerman: Pot busts — Reading between the lines | TheUnion.com


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