Thursday 2 June 2011

A war going to pot!


Panel after panel has recommended it. Police, lawyers, councillors, psychiatrists, even priests have all suggested it will eventually have to be addressed.
What is IT?
IT is the hundreds of millions of dollars spent in dozens of civilized countries in order to marginalize, criminalize and punish large swaths of the population for smoking Cannabis – Marijuana.
I will not get into the numbers and statistics in this little blurb. Perhaps later, or in a response. A quick wiki or google will illustrate to anyone who cares to look: We are spending a military or space program sized budget(s) on jailing kids for getting high, all the while struggling to fight a REAL war for the survival of our way of life.
Outside the protected sphere of our world – the 'west', the inheritors of the classical and 'civilized world', or 'Christendom' as our ancestors called it – beyond the borders of our comfy nations, tens of millions struggle, starve and fight while resources dwindle, forcing further conflict and making more fertile ground for fanaticism and war. Waves of millions of displaced peoples move about from nation to nation, some desperately attempt to reach our shores.
Until now this has been as immigrants and migrants. Migrants that may riot and demand more concessions, as in Paris, but migrants none the less.
Until now. For now. But for how long? When will these desperate hordes reach critical mass?
As far as I can tell there is no real plan with how to deal with this looming issue in a humanitarian way or to answer these unnerving questions– other than to defend what 'is left' of the great colonial nations.

In our nations, behind that thin red line, cutbacks, lay offs, recession, and a dwindling middle class have become accepted as a way of life. Decline is ignored, imagined away, and buried in the propaganda of 'change.'
The very real threats and horrors of the outside world are portrayed as paranoid fantasies of military minds, or worse still: seen preferable to 'boredom'. All the little Neros fiddle away.
Our governments sit on their hands, complaining they have not got the funding to deal with these issues – all the while spending billions collectively on hunting down grass, grass smokers, and grass dealers. For what? To what end to we hunt the 'humble herb'?
Financial apparently. The industry of crime is only partially run by criminals, you see. The vast majority of the economic machine is actually run by what most English speakers would term 'the Justice system'.
So criminals are profitable all around, and non violent criminals? Doubly so!
Basically what I am saying is that substance prohibition is an invented offence to create industry. It may have made sense against Cannabis in it's own cynical way back in the 1950's when smoking pot was not all that popular.
Now? It is an ass backwards strategy no matter how you look at it!
Think about it this way: Fine and punish a few (maybe tens?) thousand users and suppliers that you can CATCH, generating millions or even tens of millions of dollars in revenue – that is real money, folks. Or.... you could legalize and control it levying taxes and quality/age regulations (making it harder for kids to get – dealers don't card for ID), study it's affects for an effective anti-abuse campaign (like booze), and make hundreds of millions (even Billions) in tax revenues. Add to this the initial expense of maintaining prohibition on this single substance that would be saved. A cost of hundreds of millions of dollars nationally (Canada) and Billions internationally. Such a budget could be much better used.
Think of the advances in medicine, social welfare, technology, exploration (space/sea), and agricultural / farming capacity. More people could live much better lives with that money, but instead we spend it to bust college kids with weed plants, hill billies, and Mexican subsistence farmers; while empowering cartels and paramilitary groups such as the Zetas, MS13, Hamas, and Hezbollah – to name but a few - ALL of whom actively engage in the smuggling and facilitation of the underground trade in Cannabis.
If there ever was a sane balance to this cynical equation against the rights of the individual – the right to consume what they want- it has been lost, specially when the equation is applied to pot.
So what am I getting at? What is the solution, and what does it mean to me?
Fairly simple, and these are the reasons for this post.
First I am suggesting the laws on Cannabis in particular, and drugs in general, need to be reassessed and changed to reflect economic, political, and moral realities. Secondly I am suggesting the initial step of legalizing, taxing, and regulating Cannabis (in much the same way alcohol and tobacco are). I believe this step would reduce the power and influence of the cartels and smuggling organizations, reduce bloated budgets, and supply badly needed tax funding for urgent projects such as defence, welfare, and medicine.
What does it mean to me? I cannot claim that it would be some great liberation for me at this point. I am not even really worthy of being called an 'occasional smoker' anymore. But it would be for millions of young men and women. I have seen dozens of young men come through the system in this country and many have had to go through all sorts of extra bullshit because they got CAUGHT doing what all the kids do. These young men are not deadbeats, they are soldiers. Many of them are active as I write. Even more than this, as an officer and a soldier , not some deadlocked middle-class asshole with a joint waving a banner, I see a massive waste of money that could be much better spent defending our civilization.
On a much more personal note it means that people I hold dear who struggled through painful and crippling illnesses would have had easy access to a palliative or remedy; Something to ease their suffering or even help them get better. They could have done so without legal worry or bad conscience.
So why not spend that money on defence.. or even averting further war?

I know there are other sensible arguments as to where that money could be spent, but almost NO ONE but the most fossilized of political dinosaurs agrees with the current situation. Not from the right, left, religious, or secular... most see this for what it is: A Draconian waste of taxpayers money – a War gone to pot!

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1 comment:

  1. I agree that making it legal and REGULATED may be the answer. UNREGULATED, I feel, would just lead to an increase in our current problems, especially with Mexico. First, they share a border with the US and is utilized as a shipping port for NUMEROUS other countries wares. Second, they share a border with the US and provide their OWN product. Third, they share a border with the US and their cartels LOVE to snatch (or kill) our citizens, soldiers, border patrol, immigration agents, etc. to prove the point that "our" interference in "their" business (even within "our" country) won't be tolerated. -ViolentJayson.

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