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Kiley Holman Report/Evaluation English 2010 Marijuana: Where Money Grows.

You see, homosexuality, dope, immorality in general. These are the enemies of strong societies. Thats why the Communists and the left-wingers are pushing the stuff, theyre trying to destroy us. (Richard Nixon) Richard Nixons War on Drugs campaign was based on nothing but an imprudent prejudice, with the overwhelming evidence that proves the War on Drugs a total failure. Its time for us as a population to look at the marijuana prohibition with an educated mindset. With hundreds of studies that have been done on marijuana there is bountiful information that leads to the truth that marijuana is in fact not as harmful as the government makes it out to be. One of the main arguments of prohibitionists is that marijuana is a gateway drug to much more harmful substances, when in fact if you remove the black market variable from marijuana you are much less likely to be introduced to the hardcore drugs. Eventually people are going to realize the truth about marijuana and would leave to the eventual end of the prohibition. Why not take advantage of marijuana and use it to boost our deprived economy into

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a positive direction? Eradicating the marijuana prohibition would help by creating economic growth, relief in our jail and prison populations, new job opportunities, reducing the black market footprint in America, and allowing people to be who they are. The propaganda created by the government with their messages of anti-marijuana has led to the millions of people believing their lies, even the skewed perception that all smokers are dumb, lazy, criminals, and of poor nature. The state and local government costs for enforcing marijuana prohibition were $5.1 billion for 2000. This is an overstatement of the savings in government costs that would result from legalization. According to Jeffery Miron there are two reasons the supporter of the prohibition see no benefit from decriminalization. First, with prohibition in place police often times seize assets from marijuana violations. The proceeds generated from these seizures are used to fund police and prosecutors, although the taxes collected from legalization of marijuana would be more substantial compared to the seizure of assets. Second, under the prohibition some violators often pay fines which helps cut down on the expenditure of arresting, convicting, and incarceration, and by banning the prohibition this would cut the expenditure by more than 50%.(Miron, Jeffrey A.) With the termination of the prohibition, begins a new supply of tax revenue which will start contributing to our economy and help us get out of the current recession. The people unjustly put in jail or prison for marijuana related crimes would be released, causing a large amount of able bodies to go into the work force and able to begin their life where it left at before they were ripped away from society. All this positive influence marijuana could have on our economy, yet our government prevents that from happening with prohibition. States that have legalized medical marijuana have done so for a logical reason. Legalizing marijuana like nicotine and alcohol industries means that its able to be regulated. Both the legal

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and illegal drug industries are quite lucrative markets. Keeping medical marijuana illegal means that the flow of the taxable money goes into the black market rather than back into the hands of the people and government institution. While the burden of eradicating these illegal money flows is left to the taxpayers and government institutions, such as the $100,000 cost for a three-year sentence over a $200 transaction, which is about one ounce of marijuana (Erb, Kelly Phillips). This exponential cost of fighting marijuana could be used in many more useful ways. Between conflicting state and federal laws lies a grey area, with the continuous growth in number of patients who have received recommendations for medical marijuana from physicians, albeit the actual quantity remains unclear. The demand in California has led to the creation of over 1,000 medical marijuana dispensaries, delivery services, and cooperatives operating in California (Reinarman, Craig). In the U.S. marijuana is the most popular and accessible street drug available. This goes to show that jobs that are created when you decriminalize marijuana, which in turn helps boost the economy. In national surveys, 48 percent of Americans say they have used it, and 6.5 percent of high school seniors admit to habitual use. So it is no shock when, Washington and Colorado, became the first states to legalize non-medical marijuana in November of 2012 for any person over the age of 21. Supporters of this law state that this measure will soon win approval in the rest of our nation (Khamsi, Roxanne). Opening up marijuana to non-medical users allows for a greater taxation and collection of proceeds that the local governments could use to further the economical and society structures. Funding for schools, roads, public services, and much more could be paid for with the taxes collected. Time and time again you will hear people blurt out marijuana will cause physical damage to users that abuse the drug when in fact studies like the one in In Marijuana and Madness Leslie Iverson, Professor of Pharmacology, reports the cause and effect of the THC

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compound reacting with your brain by comparing animals and humans cerebral cortex, particularly frontal regions, and found that these regions contain high densities of CB1 receptors. There are also large accumulations in the basal ganglia, cerebellum, limbic forebrain, and the hypothalamus. With the lack of receptors in the brainstem nuclei accounting for marijuanas low toxicity levels, show otherwise. Although marijuana may change how you feel this does not mean that you are going to go crazy and kill someone, let alone your own brother. Even if you smoked and wanted to kill someone, it would not be from the marijuana but some underlying mental issue. Although I have never heard of someone killing another due to marijuana intoxication, which is very unlikely due to the fact most people who smoke become somewhat of a pacifist. Assumptions in the debate about health and legal status of cannabis and how its looked as a special drug, depending on ones particular belief. Advocates of the drug state that it is a mind expanding drug with no adverse medical side effects, which leads them to believe it is a superior drug compared to alcohol. The adversaries on the other hand state that the drug is deceptively dangerous drug that has an adverse effect on the personalities of users, which they believe would affect the fabric of society. I agree with Kalants proposal, as well as many others to reject both assumptions and take the same approach as we do for alcohol and tobacco. (Kalant) I for one am one who believes that marijuana is in fact not a drug; but a medicine, food, industrial products, and many other things have been created from marijuana and hemp. The implications of non-medical marijuana are much more than one can even fathom. The only thing we could compare to would be the prohibition of alcohol. The government realized that the alcohol prohibition was only making crime in this country much worse. Allowing for organized crime to control the flow of alcohol and costing the government money to prosecute these organizations. The same is true for marijuana. We as a nation need to speak

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out against the unjust marijuana prohibition. Prohibition isnt working, and has never worked from the beginning. The flow of taxable money is being diverted from the government control into unregulated black markets throughout this country and the rest of the world. Our economy needs a boost and why not take advantage of taxing marijuana and putting something bad to good use. The tax revenue could pay for schools, roads, and other infrastructure. This would allow for the growth of our nation in a positive direction, as well as our collective knowledge.

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Works Cited http://www.theliveexperiment.com/legalization-of-marijuana-for-the-economy-survey/ n.d Web. Nov. 25. 2013. http://www.csdp.org/news/news/nixon.htm (~Richard M. Nixon, 1971-72) Miron, Jeffrey A. "The Budgetary Implications of Marijuana Prohibition." Cannabiscommerce.com. Department of Economics Harvard University, n.d. Web. 4 Oct. 2013. <http://www.cannabis-commerce.com/library/Miron_Report_2005.pdf>. Erb, Kelly Phillips. "Stirring the Pot: Could Legalizing Marijuana Save the Economy?" Forbes. Forbes Magazine, 20 Apr. 2012. Web. 4 Oct 2013. <http://www.forbes.com/sites/kellyphillipserb/2012/04/20/stirring-the-pot-could-legalizingmarijuana-save-the-economy/>. Kalant, Harold. The Health Effects of Cannabis. Toronto: Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, 1999. Print. 04 Oct 13. Craig, Reinarman. Who are Medical Marijuana Patients? Population Characteristics from Nine California Assessment Clinics. Journal of Psychoactive Drugs. Volume 43(2). Print Pg. 12836. Apr. 2011. 4 Oct. 2013. Khamsi, Roxanne. Going to Pot. Scientific American, Jun2013, Ebscohost.com, Vol. 308, Issue 6 Web 4 Oct. 2013. Murray, Robin, and Leslie Iverson. "How Cannabis Works in the Brain." Marijuana and Madness. Ed. David J. Castle. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2004. Pg. 19-40. Print 4 Oct 13.