Lawmaker Predicts Marijuana Will Be Legal Within 5 Years

[TheRussianRocket.]

huffpost.com/us/entry/5065594?utm_content=buffer83483&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer

Lawmaker Predicts Marijuana Will Be Legal Within 5 Years

Matt Ferner04/02/14 07:39 AM ET

Two states with legal recreational use. Twenty more that allow medical use. Record-high support at the national level for more permissive policies. It seems fair to say that the United States' official stance on marijuana is shifting quickly. In fact, one congressman is predicting that U.S. pot prohibition will be a thing of the past before the end of the decade.

"I think its game over in less than five years," Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.) said Monday during an interview with The Huffington Post.

"There's no question that we're likely to see another state or two this year legalizing [recreational] use," Blumenauer said. "We're going to see more medical marijuana progress. The crazy prohibitions on bank services and probably the tax disparities -- these are all eroding."

As of now, 20 states have legalized marijuana for medical purposes, and voters in Colorado and Washington have approved marijuana for recreational use. About a dozen more states are expected to legalize marijuana in some form over the next several years. One recent study has projected a $10 billion legal marijuana industry by 2018.

Despite a growing and profitable legal marijuana industry, the federal government continues to ban the plant, classifying it as a Schedule I substance alongside drugs like heroin and LSD, and maintaining that it has "no currently accepted medical use."

Such policies cause a number of problems for state-legal, state-licensed pot businesses. Banks often refuse to work with marijuana businesses out of fear that they could be implicated as money launderers if they offer traditional banking services. The pot businesses also can't deduct traditional business expenses like advertising costs, employee payroll, rent and health insurance from their combined federal and state taxes, meaning that dispensary owners around the U.S. often face effective tax rates of anywhere from 50 to 80 percent, due to an antiquated Internal Revenue Service rule.

But more than a dozen members of Congress, including Blumenauer, have sponsored legislation aimed at reforming federal marijuana laws. Blumenauer himself has sponsored three bills -- States' Medical Marijuana Patient Protection (H.R. 689), Marijuana Tax Equity Act (H.R. 501) and the Small Business Tax Equity Act (H.R. 2240) -- and has supported several other bills seeking everything from increased banking access for pot businesses to a complete end to federal marijuana prohibition.

It's already possible to observe significant shifts in federal policy toward pot. The federal government allowed Colorado and Washington's laws to take effect last year. The FDA recently green-lit a clinical trial that will study the safety and efficacy of cannabidiol in children with severe epilepsy. And just this month, the Department of Health and Human Services approved a long-delayed study looking at marijuana's effect on veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder.

President Barack Obama's recent signing of the Farm Bill, which legalized industrial hemp production for research purposes in the 12 states that permit it, is one of the most recent indications that the federal government's decades-long war on cannabis may be winding down, Blumenauer said. He also pointed to the flood of state hemp bills this year as further evidence.

"Part of what is going on with the hemp discussion is that people are seeing through the nonsense that somehow this is cover for surreptitious marijuana production, conflating industrial hemp with marijuana," said Blumenauer. "And throughout the whole marijuana issue debate, there are numerous flat-out falsehoods. Schedule I drug? No therapeutic use? Worse than cocaine and meth? I mean, wait a minute."

"But the hemp one, that was so blatant and so obvious," Blumenauer went on. "And that is what's changing the whole marijuana landscape, is that all the falsehoods, misrepresentations and misclassification that have been basically sanctioned by inertia no longer work. And hemp is the best example of that."

This is great news and I hope people realize how advancing of a step this would be for society.

Marijuana is one of the best things you can take for your health. There are no negative effects to it - nothing, zip, nadda - and all it's effects are positives. As much as media and governments have portrayed marijuana to be a horrible thing, it isn't and it's proven at every level of scientific experimenting.

There has never been any person killed due to an overdose of marijuana, it's just a myth and has been labelled as a horrendous thing that destroys people's lives; funny enough, alcohol and cigarettes are 1,000,000x worse but is legal. People that have screwed over their life and smoke pot, it's not the pot that did it. Those people have weak habitats for success and are lazy in most cases. Before they do weed, they're like that too so in any case, they'd be in the same position they are even if they never did pot. It's just false media perception.

Marijuana has literally hundreds and thousand of positive effects and it cures a huge chunk of the health conditions people currently have. It really is a miracle plant and another reason governments don't legalize it in most cases is because it'd be big economical blow for pharmaceutical cooperations. Weed comes at the fraction of the cost most medical drugs cost and it's 100x more effective. Most cases weed cures the general symptoms of people and governments/medical companies would lose a ton of profit. Marijuana is an excellent benefit for people if they use it when they are in need of it. If people take it for the hell of it, then yea you can call it a drug because they're addicted to it and doing it for the pleasure only. However, as hard as it may be to not do that and control it, if you use marijuana for it's medical advantages, there is absolutely no way you can be harmed by it. Even people that are addicted doing it as a drug, it's doing no harm to them but at the same time there's no point because they aren't taking the benefit out of it which they can. You can inhale marijuana, eat it, juice it, use it as cream and it really is something people just truly research and become aware of instead of being falsely mislead to believing it is bad. I'm not a pot user and haven't used it yet, but one day I likely will for the health need and there's nothing wrong with it.

Generally, people over the age of 18 should be allowed it. Anyone under that has no reason at all to be doing so unless medically needed and in most cases people who do it under 18 are doing it as a drug just addicted and for the hell of it. Again, no harm but it's useless doing it that way and they really shouldn't as they don't have a valid reason to be at that age when they are still developing. Just my 2 cents...would be a great day once marijuana is legalized in majority of places an used correctly.

[King Heffy]

Full disclosure: I'm a medical user.

I see this as the best way to balance the budget. Tax it, stop wasting money on prosecution, not to mention the social costs. I ran some numbers a while ago and the economic benefits to BC alone were in the billions on an annual basis. (completely ignoring the fact we'd benefit from some of the Federal taxation too)

[drummer4now]

Full disclosure: I'm a medical user.

I see this as the best way to balance the budget. Tax it, stop wasting money on prosecution, not to mention the social costs. I ran some numbers a while ago and the economic benefits to BC alone were in the billions on an annual basis. (completely ignoring the fact we'd benefit from some of the Federal taxation too)

How did you get it medically lol? Chronic pain?

[King Heffy]

How did you get it medically lol? Chronic pain?

For a legitimate medical issue that I'd prefer not to discuss on a public forum.

[drummer4now]

For a legitimate medical issue that I'd prefer not to discuss on a public forum.

Sure no problem..

[Horvat]

For a legitimate medical issue that I'd prefer not to discuss on a public forum.

Oh i get it

[nuckin_futz]

For a legitimate medical issue that I'd prefer not to discuss on a public forum.

It's good to be King.

[King Heffy]

It's good to be King.

[Magikal]

Good but it shouldn't be just for medical use. It should be no different than alcohol. Legalize and tax it. It's a multi billion dollar industry in BC alone. Stop wasting money fighting a victimless crime (smoking pot) and start taking in profits on it instead. Maybe then we won't be in as much debt and police/public servants can focus on dealing with real issues.

Instead of worry about how it could dumb down the future generations, use the tax money to fun our education system. A less crowded class room with more teacher assistants and positive after school programs would do wonders for the country's youth.

Take money from the criminals and keep our police focused on the real criminals. Sounds like a pretty good plan to reduce crime if you ask me.

Oh and if we want to keep it out of the hands of kids then regulation is the best solution. When I was in school it was easier to get pot or coke then it was to get booze or cigarettes.

[HowYaDrouin]

I've never tried it, but I'm totally indifferent to it. I'd prefer to not have people blowing it in my face as i walk by them on my way to work, school, etc. but the amount of revenue that the government can get from taxing it makes me surprised that they haven't legalized it already..

[Offensive Threat]

Notice that the people who were college kids in the 1970s are the current lawmakers? They remember what they were doing back then lol.

Until its allowed under federal law in the US its a tough business to get behind down there. The people in Colorado and Washington running these businesses cant get bank loans and are having to deal in cash regularly (the old days of taking a couple grand to deposit in the bank every day come to mind). Because it is still illegal at the federal level. The Fed have said that as long as the states that have made it legal are regulating and enforcing those regulations (number one being not selling it to minors) Then they will not interfere. But until it is legal at the federal level they could come in any time they want to and arrest anyone for possession, selling, cultivating etc and in the US those are serious long term jail times for convictions. The only thing stopping them is them saying they wont. I sure wouldnt build a business around that.

Legalize + regulate + tax = everybody wins

[Bilbro Baggins]

Would this really surprise anyone? If marijuana isn't legalized in the next 5 years, I'd be shocked

[drummer4now]

One thing interesting about Marijuana is that it only seems to be very popular in western countries. In places like Asia where it grows wild people literally burn it for tinder. I know in India it is regarded as a low grade drug that isn't very popular with the youth maybe because its so common and legal?

[Mr. Ambien]

How did you get it medically lol? Chronic pain?

Doesn't really matter, back in Ontario my family doc said he'd prescribe me marijuana if I thought I needed it.

Probably will wind up being legal in BC first, in which case, 3 hour drive to Fernie, Golden, or Invermere, since there's pretty much no shot of federal legalisation (and same odds for Alberta) any time soon.

[Toni Zamboni]

hopefully canada pulls their head out and gets with the program as well.

[Captain Aerosex]

Just legalize all drugs.

[Jägermeister]

The fact that two US States legalized marijuana before us is almost embarrassing given the much stronger stigma towards it down there is.

Massive untapped revenue source.

[ronthecivil]

Doesn't really matter, back in Ontario my family doc said he'd prescribe me marijuana if I thought I needed it.

Probably will wind up being legal in BC first, in which case, 3 hour drive to Fernie, Golden, or Invermere, since there's pretty much no shot of federal legalisation (and same odds for Alberta) any time soon.

It's for the feds and the feds alone to decide so it won't be legal in BC but not in Alberta it will be all or nothing.

That said, two of the three federal parties are in favour of either legalizing or decriminalizing and even the cons are turning the medical industry into a big business.

[AllEyezOnMe]

Just legalize all drugs.

Uhhh no

[aGENT]

Uhhh no

Uhhh yes.

They're a medical issue, not a criminal one.