The War on Drugs is now taking down free press in other countries, it is has gone too far for too long.
It is essentially funding terror and when you see the billions being made in only a few states such as Colorado with 1+ billion in 2016 [1]. Large amounts of wealth, probably 50-100+ billion going to cartels in the south annually to fund very bad things.
Prohibition always creates a criminal black market that becomes uncontrollable when there is a large demand for a product that is illegal. Better to make it legal, remove the revenue for cartels and use some for taxes and lots of jobs in the US. Colorado already has 20k jobs from ending prohibition on marijuana, that could be a 200k nationwide job creator. Legal markets, education, rehabilitation and safe use could also provide many jobs.
Legal marijuana markets in the US are already at such high growth rates that they rival the dot com boom growth [2]. It makes pro-business and safety sense to legalize and make it a health issue not a criminal one, because the criminalization of it is creating very bad blow back and funding terror essentially, destroying privacy and lives along the way. The punishment of non-violent drug users, enforcement and resulting black market criminals are way worse than the act and it is cruel and unusual punishment on individuals and people now on a massive scale worldwide.
Colorado will make much more than that too, since when legalizing governments option for the lowest taxes possible in order for people to not return to the black market. Give it 5 years when the black market for weed disappears almost completely and full taxes are applied like they are to booze/cigarettes and could easily triple that amount in Colorado.
That sounds reasonable but is naive and does not take into account how corrupt people are. John Ehrlichman, White House counsel to President Nixon said:
"The Nixon campaign in 1968 and the Nixon White House after that had two enemies: the antiwar Left and black people... We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black. But by getting the public to associate hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily"[1]
So taking into account things like cultural prejudice. Those things are unlikely to be fixed just with good will and altruism.
It is essentially funding terror and when you see the billions being made in only a few states such as Colorado with 1+ billion in 2016 [1]. Large amounts of wealth, probably 50-100+ billion going to cartels in the south annually to fund very bad things.
Prohibition always creates a criminal black market that becomes uncontrollable when there is a large demand for a product that is illegal. Better to make it legal, remove the revenue for cartels and use some for taxes and lots of jobs in the US. Colorado already has 20k jobs from ending prohibition on marijuana, that could be a 200k nationwide job creator. Legal markets, education, rehabilitation and safe use could also provide many jobs.
Legal marijuana markets in the US are already at such high growth rates that they rival the dot com boom growth [2]. It makes pro-business and safety sense to legalize and make it a health issue not a criminal one, because the criminalization of it is creating very bad blow back and funding terror essentially, destroying privacy and lives along the way. The punishment of non-violent drug users, enforcement and resulting black market criminals are way worse than the act and it is cruel and unusual punishment on individuals and people now on a massive scale worldwide.
[1] http://www.marketwatch.com/story/marijuana-tax-revenue-hit-2...
[2] http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-01-04/legal-marijuana-sales-...