XPost: talk.politics.misc, alt.politics, soc.culture.usa   
   From: wyo@road.kill   
      
   On 1/4/2018 8:03 PM, Mr. B1ack wrote:   
   > On Thu, 4 Jan 2018 07:49:41 -0800 (PST), Walt In Seattle   
   >  wrote:   
   >   
   >> Word is this morning that U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions will take on   
   legalized marijuana in the states where medical and recreational marijuana   
   have been legalized. For those who believe marijuana is harmless or less   
   harmful than alcoholic    
   beverages, I doubt Sessions would agree or care.   
   >   
   >     For some reason, Sessions thinks reefer=heroin.   
   >     Dunno why. Maybe he gets lots of donations from   
   >     the liquor industry ?   
   >   
   >   
   >> To Sessions, marijuana is a scheduled controlled substance covered under   
   the Controlled Substances Act, the supremacy of which has been well-litigated   
   in federal courts. Sessions would probably say state initiatives, propositions   
   or referenda on use    
   of marijuana are NOT withstanding. There will likely be some BIG battles over   
   state's rights -- a concept many Republicans rally around. But, in the end and   
   unless Congress acts to remove marijuana from the Controlled Substances Act's   
   purview, states    
   will ultimately lose, including my home state of Washington. The only hope the   
   states have is that litigation will proceed through the courts over a period   
   of years, with lower courts finding in favor   
   >> of state's rights, while President Trump is not re-elected in 2020 and the   
   next president, along with his/her new Attorney General, being Democrats with   
   a philosophy more in line with the Obama Administrations's point of view on   
   legalized marijuana at    
   the state level. If Trump somehow wins a second term, the U.S. Supreme Court   
   will take and hear cases on this issue. I have no doubt they'll side with   
   federal supremacy. Will Congress act to remove marijuana from the list of   
   scheduled drugs covered by    
   the Controlled Substances Act? As long as Congress is controlled by   
   Republicans, the anser is "probably NOT"!   
   >   
   >     What Sessions did was remove the Obama "memo" about   
   >     always applying tons of slack when it came to states and   
   >     marijuana laws. We may see more cases where the local   
   >     federal prosecutors go after particular players in the reefer   
   >     industry ... but at this juncture I don't see any massive effort   
   >     to try and coerce states to shut down these industries   
   >     entirely. They won't ... and it'll be like California and the   
   >     'sanctuary' battle. States that legalize have seen big gains   
   >     in tax revenues too ... and money TALKS.   
   >   
   >     But frankly, too much of that stuff WILL make you kinda   
   >     stupid. Even if you live in a "green" state it's not the best   
   >     idea to gobble down every product you see. I'd rather   
   >     deal with stoners than drunks ... but the drunks aren't   
   >     gonna go away just because there's a vending machine   
   >     full of weed in the lobby. Now we get BOTH  :-)   
   >   
   >     I will note the role of "Soma" in "Brave New World". It was   
   >     a world people maybe couldn't bear to live in UNLESS   
   >     they were stoned a lot of the time. Has our world become   
   >     that world, that oppressive and micro-managed ?   
   >   
      
   Huxley was as predictive and frightening in his own idiom as was Orwell   
   or Phillip K Dick.   
      
   Or Franz Kafka.   
      
   We are living under the shadowing auspices of the monsters from our own   
   own Id.   
      
   Who are the Krell?   
      
   We are.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)