Marijuana In California The problem chosen for my project is about marijuana problem in California. According to California Health and Safety code 11018, "Marijuana” means “all parts of the plant Cannabis sativa L., whether growing or not; the seeds thereof; the resin extracted from any part of the plant; and every compound, manufacture, salt, derivative, mixture, or preparation of the plant, its seeds, or its resin. It does not include the mature stalks of the plant, fiber produced from the stalks, oil or cake made from the seeds of the plant, any other compound, manufacture, salt, derivative, mixture, or preparation of the mature stalks (except the resin extracted therefrom), fiber, oil, or cake, or the sterilized seed of the plant which is incapable of germination.” It truly makes absolutely no sense that marijuana is illegal in this country. It is a naturally occurring weed, serves many medical benefits, is virtually harmless, public polls show a growing favorability to at least decriminalization, and it is finally no longer becoming a fringe issue. Even President Obama had his drug czar, Gil Kelikowske, tell a liberal think-tank (falsely) about the drug war “reforms” that they have made to please their base. With marijuana legalization gaining more press and public acceptance, how is it still illegal? Marijuana is still illegal in most of the US, as the Justice Department reminds California with each medical marijuana dispensary shutdown, and some people interviewed for the Times article declined to use their names for fear it could hurt their careers. But the trend remains unmistakenable. "It's shocking, from my perspective, the number of people that we all know who are recreational marijuana users," says Gavin Newsom, California's lieutenant governor. "[Anti-pot laws] just don’t make sense anymore. It's time for politicians to come out of the closet on this." (Russell, Mark Dec 21, 2012) In “Legal Weed in California is just fine With Mexican Cartels”, the researchers said the only way California's legal pot could cut significantly into cartel revenues is if it were sold across the country. They were skeptical that would happen. "It's very hard to imagine that the feds would sit idly by and just let California marijuana dominate the country," Kilmer said. According to “Marijuana Legalization Being Crushed By Special Interest Groups”, Taylor, Robert said “Almost 75% of all farm subsidies go the richest 10% of farmers. Since 9/11, the U.S. government has spent “8 trillion” on “defense,” which has been one large welfare transfer from the American people to politically popular corporations. Federal regulations tend to be enacted not from a bottom-up, democratic concern for safety but by special interests. Wal-Mart supports government medicine and minimum wage laws, and the pharmaceutical and insurance industries helped pass Obama care, which included a mandate to purchase their services. Although hemp can produce textiles, fabrics, clothes, linen, drapes, bed sheets, and ropes with less cost and less pollution, yet politically connected industries lobbied the government to ban it.”(Robert Taylor, Politics, Drugs)
Taylor explain that there are countless other examples, but the reason that this phenomenon occurs is because of the state’s ability to initiate force and the incentives this creates for well-connected interests that cozy up to it. Special interests spend money lobbying for benefits that will reap them huge and nearly perpetual rewards, with rules and regulations backed up by the aggression of the state. But without this centralized multi-trillion-dollar-a-year auction, special interests would actually have to compete in the market. And it’s easy to see why they are afraid of such a thing. Not only is the market unpredictable, spontaneous, and filled with the ever-changing desires of customers, but without the force of government power propping them up, they may find themselves quickly irrelevant and