[HN Gopher] Cannabis is legal in most US states but federal laws...
___________________________________________________________________
Cannabis is legal in most US states but federal laws block
businesses from banks
Author : paulpauper
Score : 193 points
Date : 2022-12-24 15:16 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.usatoday.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.usatoday.com)
| kube-system wrote:
| I am pro legalization, but I hate headlines like this. It's not
| accurate and it's not productive. Cannabis is prohibited by at
| least one law everywhere in the US.
| jjulius wrote:
| How is it inaccurate? Cannabis _is_ legal in much of the
| country (at the state level) and the businesses _are_ blocked
| from much of the banking system because it 's federally
| illegal.
|
| Edit: OP, if you're going to completely change the last
| sentence of your post after people respond, which then changes
| your point, at least highlight that you've made a significant
| change.
| adam_arthur wrote:
| It's illegal everywhere due to federal law... states altering
| their laws doesn't change that.
|
| The federal government just doesn't enforce it in most cases.
| The DEA can start enforcing tomorrow if they wanted
| sgjohnson wrote:
| > The DEA can enforce and arrest people tomorrow if they
| wanted
|
| I'm sure it would go down really really well if the DEA
| started arresting people for simple possession in states
| where it's perfectly legal.
| salawat wrote:
| The problem is the process of producing it (manufacture)
| and selling it (commerce), are inextricably tied to
| Interstate commerce, thanks to some stupid case about how
| wheat grown for intra-state non-commerce is inextricably
| still covered by Federal jurisdiction because that intra-
| state non-sale effects the interstate market.
|
| I kid you not. Link below, read it.
|
| The same logic that is applied to making production of
| fully automatic weapons for personal use a no-no in a
| State that explicitly allows it is the exact same legal
| logic that makes THC prosecutable at will by the Feds.
|
| You can't take out one without taking out the other,
| because they both stem from the most abusable pieces of
| jurisprudence ever admitted to the U.S. code.
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wickard_v._Filburn
|
| Enjoy. If you are a U.S. citizen, this is the case that
| basically gave the Feds carte blanche to drop in on
| anything because of whatever tenuous excuse the
| judges/DA's in question decided to apply to link it to
| Interstate Commerce.
|
| I have come across few cases that make me scream more
| than Wickard v. Filburn.
| adam_arthur wrote:
| Regardless of your perspective on the morality of it,
| cannabis is still illegal nationally. Which is the point
| of this thread
|
| To say its legal is simply wrong
| jjulius wrote:
| >To say its legal is simply wrong
|
| To say that is "simply wrong" is to ignore nuance and, in
| point of fact, is "simply wrong". It is legal at the
| state level, meaning no state official will punish you
| for it. It is illegal at the federal level, meaning a
| federal official could punish you for it.
|
| Isn't nuance fun!? :)
| sgjohnson wrote:
| Just because there's a jurisdictional overlap doesn't
| make it illegal at state level.
| salawat wrote:
| Federal law supercedes State law. That is why the
| Constitution is "the highest law of the Land".
|
| It's also why so much is pushed for to be done at the
| Federal level, because it completely sidesteps the chance
| for States to make their own local laws on the matter.
| The danger there, is that as it turns out, different
| places/populations have different views on things, which
| often do not exactly line up with D.C.'s.
|
| Hence why Federal overreach side of things has been a hot
| button topic in politics for decades.
| sgjohnson wrote:
| But it doesn't. The states are free to ignore federal
| law. Yes, the states can't stop the feds from doing
| enforcement themselves, but it would be basically
| unprecedented outside of a few limited examples.
|
| So no, the line is definitely not as clear as "federal
| law supersedes state law, period." It's a lot more
| nuanced than that, and in practice, in most situations
| it's the state law that reigns supreme.
| eternalban wrote:
| As of now, you can definitely get your daily supply of
| Cannabis if you want. There are a lot of little businesses
| that legally sell it. So these federal laws are not
| preventing you from exercising your legal right to get high
| in e.g. NY state.
|
| I would like to get the pulse of hn on this:
|
| What do we think if e.g. the Coca-Cola Company got in the pot
| business? Is the fact that these Federal constraints are
| keeping big business out of the pot business good or bad?
| BossingAround wrote:
| > What do we think if e.g. the Coca-Cola Company got in the
| pot business? Is the fact that these Federal constraints
| are keeping big business out of the pot business good or
| bad?
|
| That's one of the biggest fears of cannabis producers in
| states where it's currently legal, and it's actually a
| reason for some of the small business not supporting
| federal legalization. They don't want Amazon to invest
| billions of dollars, completely destroying current
| dispensaries.
|
| I think the problem is that in the world of billion to
| trillion dollar corporations, like Amazon or Wallmart, the
| business can't be mediocre to survive. In the past, simply
| being "all right" got you by, but big corporations can do
| "all right" products. To survive nowadays, businesses must
| differentiate from the corporations to survive.
|
| For the consumers, I think corporations taking over "all
| right" businesses is a good thing. For the society at
| large..? This probably shrinks the middle class throughout
| the world, and increases inequality in multiple ways, e.g.
| the inequality between the one CEO (and upper management)
| and hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of employees.
| So I'd personally count that as a "probably pretty
| horrible" reality.
| lazide wrote:
| Those businesses are not legal, since there are active law
| enforcement agencies active that could arrest them on
| sight.
|
| They are defacto legalized, because practically those
| agencies won't. But that is not the same thing.
|
| The Supreme Court ruled back in the Great Depression days
| that the feds can regulate local businesses, if the goods
| sold are similar to goods sold that _could_ be sold in
| interstate commerce.
|
| So the DEA is still a thing.
| kube-system wrote:
| All of those businesses that sell cannabis are in violation
| of the Controlled Substances Act. They are, quite plainly,
| operating businesses that are illegal under federal law.
| The reason you don't see too many DEA raids (anymore) is
| that the feds don't have any money to enforce it: https://e
| n.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rohrabacher%E2%80%93Farr_amend...
| trillic wrote:
| The overton window has shifted. It is no longer popular
| for armies of feds to raid businesses acting entirely
| within state laws and only performing intrastate
| commerce.
|
| The President of the United States, head of Executive
| branch, directed with enforcement of Federal law has
| pardoned ALL federal marijuana convictions and doesn't
| plan to pursue more.
|
| It is effectively legal federally, no matter how much
| that makes you clutch your pearls.
|
| The current federal government has determined it to be an
| issue left to the states. Reducing the influence the
| federal government has in everyday American's lives, it's
| left the Republican party in quite an ironic situation.
| kube-system wrote:
| > It is effectively legal federally
|
| It is not "effectively legal". You cannot do any of these
| while possessing and/or using marijuana:
|
| * Pass federal employment drug tests
|
| * Fly on a plane
|
| * Buy a gun
|
| etc.
| trillic wrote:
| Are you an pedantic absolutist with everything? Or just
| fun stuff? Nobody here is claiming you could do any of
| those things. 10 years ago if you told me I could
| purchase Cannabis in Mississippi of all places I'd laugh
| in your face.
|
| Don't let perfection get in the way of progress, you
| claim to be pro-legalization but any conversation
| regarding the progress of it you only bring up the
| negatives and letter-of-the-law exclusions.
|
| News flash buddy, there's lots of shit you can't fly
| with. Lot's of other reasons to not be allowed to
| purchase a gun. As well as other legal substances that
| will prevent you from passing federal employment drug
| tests (Hemp-derived CBD, Kratom). That doesn't make those
| things any more illegal, just a side-effect of the
| federal governments involvement in your life.
| kube-system wrote:
| I celebrate the progress, but I don't think it's pedantic
| at all to point out the gaps that still exist. Law _is_ a
| pedantic realm.
| jjulius wrote:
| Yes, you absolutely can fly with it. TSA has gone on the
| record, at least in local newspapers, stating that they
| defer to local police if they find cannabis. If it's for
| personal use, local PD won't do anything other than
| suggest you throw it away or else risk punishment if
| you're flying somewhere legal. I've researched this
| extensively before flying out of specific airports in
| legal states up and down the west coast and the story is
| always the same.
|
| I've even had a TSA agent rummage through my carry-on in
| Oakland airport, pull out prerolls and buds, dig further
| to find the half-full water bottle I forgot I'd had, tell
| me they have to throw it away, and return my cannabis to
| me. I've flown with it entirely too many times to count,
| never attempting to conceal it, and have never had a
| problem.
|
| The only time you're likely to run into trouble flying
| out of a legal state is if it looks like you're traveling
| with the intent to distribute.
| salawat wrote:
| That still does not change it to being legal, the law is
| still on the books, and no repeal has passed.
|
| It is still illegal, and all it will take is someone
| plopping into the Exec seat and getting a hair, then it
| is back to square 1.
|
| Legal exposure is kind of like HIV, herpes, or COVID.
| There is a _big_ difference between "I don't have it",
| and "It's not an issue right now", wherein the exact
| state of affairs drastically effects how one moves
| forward.
|
| Until it is off the books /repealed, nothing has changed
| in the grand scheme of things.
| jjulius wrote:
| As one of the comments above you suggested, the overton
| window has shifted. And that's _precisely because_ states
| have legalized it at the state level. It has become more
| normalized and more accepted, and it 's federal
| legalization has earned more support because of states
| legalizing it. The further we dive into states legalizing
| it, the more pressure is put on the federal government to
| legalize it precisely because of these grey areas.
|
| Because we've reached this point, you're not going to see
| someone come into the exec seat and target weed. It's
| just not going to happen. The cat's out of the bag and
| it's not going back in.
|
| So yes, things have changed in the grand scheme of
| things. This is progress, even if it's a fucked up legal
| grey area.
| kube-system wrote:
| Ah, fair enough. I guess that guidance has changed since
| the last time I looked it up.
| 33955985 wrote:
| Coca-Cola would be an odd choice, since they don't deal in
| this kind of market already. I think a better question
| would be, "What if Philip Morris got into the pot
| business?"
|
| It would be fascinating and good for consumers because they
| could be held accountable for regulating an industry that
| is badly in need of it.
|
| That doesn't change my opinion of Philip Morris (or parent
| company Altria). Evil sons of bitches through and through.
| trillic wrote:
| There are lots of really big businesses that sell it too.
|
| Cresco Labs, Verano Holdings, Curaleaf.
|
| Going to a Cresco run "Sunnyside" dispensary is like the
| Apple store of pot. It's kind of ridiculous.
| eternalban wrote:
| > Going to a Cresco run "Sunnyside" dispensary is like
| the Apple store of pot. It's kind of ridiculous.
|
| You were not kidding: https://www.crescolabs.com/ & hey,
| there is one near me.
| trillic wrote:
| Sunnyside Wrigleyville, Chicago, IL
|
| Publicly traded corporation. Pays taxes.
|
| https://i.imgur.com/NUi8fL0.jpg
| kube-system wrote:
| Cannabis is illegal under the Controlled Substances Act
| everywhere within the US. The feds are _voluntarily_ [0]
| turning a blind eye to states that have changed their own
| state laws... but federal law has not changed.
|
| 0: https://www.justice.gov/iso/opa/resources/3052013829132756
| 85...
| jjulius wrote:
| Fully aware. This discrepancy is exactly what this article
| is about.
| kube-system wrote:
| Which is why I'm specifically criticizing the framing of
| the headline. It's celebrating a victory that hasn't
| happened. A better headline would be "Most of America
| _wants_ cannabis to be legal, but federal law still bans
| it. "
|
| I think that implying that it's "legal" _in_ certain
| places, which has happened repeatedly over the last
| decade, is part of the problem. If everyone thinks
| cannabis is already legal, then who is going to push for
| federal legalization?
| 33955985 wrote:
| It's not misleading. It reflects the lived experience of
| most Americans. That it's "technically illegal" under
| federal law means nothing to anyone except -- as the
| article points out -- for the industry itself.
|
| And since when were national laws made by consumers?
| Federal legalization will happen when a big industry
| partner wants it it be legalized and not before.
| kube-system wrote:
| The law is inherently technical. "Technically illegal" is
| simply "illegal".
|
| And it is completely false that this only affects the
| "industry itself". There are other federal laws that
| concern the rights and privileges of people who use
| illegal drugs. For instance, if you use _federally_
| illegal drugs, you may not legally purchase (or possess)
| a firearm. There are other examples in terms of
| employment, etc.
| sebzim4500 wrote:
| What is written on some bit of paper somewhere is
| irrelevant. What matters is what is being enforced.
|
| If you can wave cannabis around in front of a policeman
| and have no fear of repercussions than it is legal in
| practice.
| kube-system wrote:
| Those examples are being enforced.
| 33955985 wrote:
| The law outside its application is meaningless. That's
| why there's so many "Did you know it's illegal to wash
| your aardvark on Wednesday" laws still on the books.
|
| Regarding drugs and guns -- how is that enforced? Can't
| see how a gun dealer would know.
|
| Also, employers can drug test for nicotine, which is
| legal, and deny employmet.
| kube-system wrote:
| I picked those examples specifically because they are
| enforced.
|
| > Regarding drugs and guns -- how is that enforced? Can't
| see how a gun dealer would know.
|
| All gun dealers must record form ATF form 4473 for each
| gun purchase, which specifically asks questions about
| drug use. If you say yes, you will be denied the gun. If
| you lie, you may face up to 5 years in prison plus $10K
| fines. If your state has a medical marijuana registry,
| this may be cross referenced. If you are later found to
| be in possession of a gun and marijuana (or evidence of
| use like a marijuana card), you are a "prohibited person"
| in illegal possession of a firearm. These still happen,
| they just get reported as "weapons charges" because
| that's what they are.
|
| > Also, employers can drug test for nicotine, which is
| legal, and deny employmet.
|
| Federal jobs (or federally regulated jobs, i.e. being a
| pilot[0]) don't ban it.
|
| 0: https://www.kgns.tv/content/news/Colorado-pilot-fired-
| after-...
| 33955985 wrote:
| Circling back to your original point, then: the
| headline's framing is misleading because it leaves out
| potential gun buyers and people applying to federal jobs?
| Seems like an awfully small minority to be concerned with
| in... a headline for a national newspaper. How would you
| write the headline?
| kube-system wrote:
| Gun owners alone are 1/3 of US adults. The US government
| is the largest employer in the US (and in the world).
|
| I said how I'd write the headline above:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34118464
| 10000truths wrote:
| An "unenforced" law is more dangerous than a repealed law
| because it provides the opportunity for selective
| enforcement. A perfect avenue for discrimination of
| protected classes, parallel construction to bypass due
| process, and other such abuses of people's civil
| liberties with impunity - all stemming from pushing
| people into the precarious status of "you technically
| violated the law but we'll ignore it as long as..."
| shkkmo wrote:
| I suspect there is also a desire to avoid creating cases
| that might reach the Supreme Court and challenge
| enforcement of the Controlled Substances Act based on
| several potential constitutional issues. This is a not just
| a fringe legal theory, but one endorsed by several supreme
| court justices in their dissents to Gonzales v. Raich. I
| think there is a good chance that if the right case made it
| to this supreme court, the federal government would lose.
|
| > Relying on Congress' abstract assertions, the Court has
| endorsed making it a federal crime to grow small amounts of
| marijuana in one's own home for one's own medicinal use.
| This overreaching stifles an express choice by some States,
| concerned for the lives and liberties of their people, to
| regulate medical marijuana differently.
|
| > If the Federal Government can regulate growing a half-
| dozen cannabis plants for personal consumption (not because
| it is interstate commerce, but because it is inextricably
| bound up with interstate commerce), then Congress' Article
| I powers - as expanded by the Necessary and Proper Clause -
| have no meaningful limits.
|
| I would also note that the Cole memo was rescinded in 2018
| by Sessions and decisions about enforcement were pushed
| back onto federal DAs. I do not believe that Garland has
| reversed Sessions memo so the blind eye policy is informal.
| kmonsen wrote:
| That is also fairly bad, the justices view here seems
| extremely reasonable. I don't necessarily like it but
| legally it is pretty clear from how the US is set up that
| we have a strong federal overreach.
| acapybara wrote:
| For these businesses, I'd set up something like a myNode [1] or a
| RaspiBlitz [2]. This way, all the merchant needs is an internet
| connection.
|
| Granted, customers will need something like BLW [3]. If they've
| got no other options to pay the merchant, then that should be
| sufficient.
|
| Accept either physical Federal Reserve Notes, or decentralized
| electronic payments.
|
| 1. https://mynodebtc.com/
|
| 2. https://shop.fulmo.org/raspiblitz/
|
| 3. https://f-droid.org/packages/com.lightning.walletapp/
| susadmin wrote:
| Yea not sure why the down-votes, this is a handy setup, thanks.
| shanebellone wrote:
| They'll never accept crypto.
|
| They generally take cash, debit card, and a prepaid debit card
| (something prepaid like that) and use modern PoS.
|
| Bank access is coming soon too.
| jjulius wrote:
| >... debit card...
|
| Technically, at least in CA/OR, they're often just processed
| as an ATM withdrawal that occurs at point of sale.
| shanebellone wrote:
| Doesn't seem to be the case in Massachusetts. Although I
| don't use my debit card anywhere.
|
| What's the reason for CA/OR? Local banking shouldn't be an
| issue?
| djbusby wrote:
| Cashless ATM is now blocked
| jjulius wrote:
| I purchased via this method in Oregon this morning.
| Perhaps it'll change here soon.
| mynameisvlad wrote:
| Some local stores actually tried crypto back when Bitcoin was
| exploding. It was so inconvenient and volatile that it only
| lasted months.
| shanebellone wrote:
| Flower prices are dropping, and their cost is pretty close
| to fixed (with technology advancements representing a
| massive caveat).
|
| Variability in currency would destroy these companies
| quickly.
| [deleted]
| quickthrowman wrote:
| How would you deal with the currency risk inherent in dealing
| with cryptocurrency? Assume that the landlord, vendors, tax
| man, and employees all want USD from you, and do not accept
| cryptocurrency as payment.
|
| Please explain how you would protect yourself from adverse
| price movements in cryptocurrencies as a merchant to ensure you
| have enough USD to pay all your obligations.
| michaelsbradley wrote:
| Accept DAI and form a relationship with a crypto-fiat
| exchange that offers institutional accounts?
|
| https://www.coingecko.com/en/coins/dai
| Zpalmtree wrote:
| swap your Bitcoin/eth/whatever for usdc/usdt/dai/other
| stables
| sethd wrote:
| I believe you're being downvoted because the solution you're
| proposing does not handle any of the problems solved by a bank.
| irusensei wrote:
| They are being downvoted because majority of hacker news
| audience hates Bitcoin.
| trinsic2 wrote:
| With good reason.
| shanebellone wrote:
| To be more specific... too much cash is dangerous and
| impractical.
| m463 wrote:
| I think it is kind of an interesting experiment going on here.
|
| This might inadvertently be a limit on corporate size/power, and
| you might get lots of smaller players competing instead of one or
| two big "efficient" players.
| funstuff007 wrote:
| Didn't we fight the bloodiest war in the history of this country
| based on which laws (State or Federal) had primacy? And it's
| still not settled due to Obama's weed policies.
| kodyo wrote:
| A war was fought because one country didn't want part of itself
| to become another country.
| jonathanlb wrote:
| > based on which laws (State or Federal) had primacy
|
| Primacy to do what?
| tyre wrote:
| No, the US fought a war over slavery.
|
| The "states' rights" framing of the US Civil War skips over
| which specific right the southerns states were willing to die
| for. It wasn't abstract, though it was papered over as such.
|
| The history of later southern political leaders (e.g. Richard
| Russell) confirms that the fundamental issue was the
| enslavement (ideal, for them) or segregation and oppression of
| blacks in the US.
|
| Which isn't to say that the state vs. federal power struggle of
| constitutional interpretation isn't still happening. These
| cases rise to the SCOTUS regularly. The US Civil War, however,
| wasn't that.
| Spooky23 wrote:
| Like most complex things, there's no one magical simple
| answer.
|
| States rights was a huge deal from day one, to the point that
| the mostly forgotten original government of the United States
| was a confederation of nominally sovereign states, almost EU
| style. Under the Articles of Confederation, the US government
| was very weak.
|
| Slavery was essential to southern land barons. It was not
| essential to northern industrialists, who were better off
| with immigrant labor. The issue at the end of the day is that
| Southern wealth was largely defined by chattel slaves - they
| were the human equivalent of industrial equipment. End of the
| day, it was about amoral consideration of preserving wealth
| above all else. (A lesson for any era certainly)
|
| The problem was that the writing was on the wall - machines
| would replace slaves. But the owners of these big slave
| estates needed the political power to keep it going long
| enough to pivot to something new -- the vision as I
| understand it was to build the west with slavery and realize
| imperialist visions with slavery in Latin America.
|
| Wrapping this craven nonsense in high minded ideals was key
| for support and to get soldiers. Johnny Reb wasn't dying for
| _his_ slaves, for the most part these guys were victims of
| slavery in a sense as well as the wages for working class
| people were suppressed by enslaved people.
|
| It's important to fight lost cause bullshit. But the path to
| victory is rejecting the notion of slavery attacking the
| moral failure of slavery and association with it.
| Bikeshedding over trivia is like arguing with gun nerds over
| the nuances of firearms.
| AlbertCory wrote:
| It ended up being about slavery (with the Emancipation
| Proclamation), and slavery was the root cause for the hatred
| between the states. They were also very different societies.
| Almost no immigrants moved to the South, for instance, and
| there wasn't nearly as much industry.
|
| As another thread points out, if slavery was prohibited in
| all the new states from the West, it would be game over in
| Congress, and the slave states knew it. Hence the Kansas-
| Nebraska Act.
|
| That said: "save the Union" was a much bigger motivator for
| Union soldiers than "abolish slavery." That's what made them
| volunteer.
|
| For the Southern soldiers who mostly did not own any slaves,
| it was more "defending our homes and our way of life" than
| "states' rights."
|
| In other words, it's more nuanced than you present.
| nonethewiser wrote:
| > No, the US fought a war over slavery.
|
| Seems to me these aren't mutually exclusive. I find your
| argument to be overly concerned with injustice of slavery. No
| one is defending it. And the southern states absolutely did
| not want to adhere to the laws set by the northern states.
| sidlls wrote:
| The context is important: southern states were fighting
| specifically for the right to continue to enslave people.
| Any argument that doesn't focus on slavery in the context
| of the civil war we had isn't valid, or at least is
| incomplete, because it elides the reason for the war in the
| first place.
| kneebonian wrote:
| So I've been a big fan of studying warfare in all it's
| dimensions throughout my life, including the causes of
| various conflicts, one thing I gave come to realize is
| that we talk about "the reason" for a war or "the cause"
| but there really isn't a single cause or reason, because
| for a war to happen you have to have thousands of people
| willing to march off and die and each of them have their
| own reasons and their own cause they were fighting for. I
| mean for Johnny Scott who marched off to war the reason
| for the war for him was to win a medal so Size Bradshaw
| will finally love him. Or the Crusades there were
| probably plenty of people who the war was about going and
| fighting for absolution of their sins by reclaiming the
| holy land.
|
| At the end of the day there are as many causes for the
| war as there are people participating, there can be
| various factors that led to the outbreak of the war, and
| sometimes we are lucky and they are clear cut, but often
| there will be several different prominent factors and
| trying to attribute the war to any one of them is just
| historical masturbatory navel gazing, or more insidiously
| trying to rewrite history to fit an agenda.
|
| So those who claim the Civil War was only about slavery
| are just as disingenuous as those who claim the Civil war
| was only about states rights. Ultimately these were both
| major contributing factors and trying to attach primacy
| to one of them is unproductive and pointless.
|
| If you want a perfect example go ahead and tell me what
| caused WW1.
| sidlls wrote:
| You're conflating a number of completely unrelated items,
| at least: individual motivations, catalysts, and the
| broad-strokes reasons a group fights in a war.
|
| The civil war was fought because the southern states
| wanted to maintain their slave economy. It is as clear,
| cut and dried as that. Individual southerners may have
| fought for glory, for Suzy to love them, for money, or
| for any other reason, but the prosecutors of the war
| effort for the south did it because their economy was
| dependent on slaves and they wanted that to continue.
| It's not disingenuous to state that.
| kneebonian wrote:
| Your wrong. The Civil war was fought because the
| confederate states of America fired on Fort Sumter, the
| establishment of the confederacy the freeing of the
| slaves all of those happened as a consequence or prior to
| the actual war.
|
| If you want to get that reductive than I am right. The
| Civil war happened because the Confederate States of
| America fired on Fort Sumter and everything else was
| ancillary. Just like WW1 happened because the Archduke
| Franz Ferdinand got assassinated.
|
| Youre argument is overly reductive and your ignorant of
| history
| fineIllregister wrote:
| > And the southern states absolutely did not want to adhere
| to the laws set by the northern states.
|
| To add to the sibling comments, the southern states hated
| states' rights when northern states were liberating escaped
| slaves within their jurisdiction. The Fugitive Slave Act
| immediately destroys any argument that the Civil War was
| about states' rights.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > Seems to me these aren't mutually exclusive
|
| In the abstract, they are not.
|
| Its just that the slavery explanation is factually true and
| the other is false, though it represents part of one sides
| propaganda (and more strongly that of the retrospective
| sympathizers of that side than the actual side, which was
| quite explicit about slavery specifically as the
| motivation.)
| Retric wrote:
| It's mutually exclusive because it wasn't the internal
| rights of individual states that set off the civil war, but
| the question of which way western states would be. In other
| words southern states wanted to _impose rules on the union
| outside their borders._
|
| Florida trying to tell California what to do is by
| definition not a states rights issue.
| flagsrule wrote:
| The civil war was not fought over slavery. The union chose to
| free the slaves because it hurt the south economically more
| than it hurt the north economically.
| ffggffggj wrote:
| Sorry, this is simply not true. The declarations of
| secession explicitly spell this out. You are welcome to
| read them yourself, here is one for example
| https://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/csa_scarsec.asp
|
| Mississippi's is even more explicit
| https://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/csa_missec.asp -
| "Our position is thoroughly identified with slavery -- the
| greatest material interest of the world"
|
| The civil war was fought because slave states wanted to
| force slavery on other parts of our country, outside their
| own borders.
| Dawnyhf2 wrote:
| I noticed there's a huge push on this site to link Obama with
| negative policy's. Look how many comments are flat out confused
| by the above post. It's literally just a name drop. Like
| "something-something holocaust something-something George W
| Bush" level of criticism, not really adding anything to the
| conversation.
| michaelsshaw wrote:
| Federal laws do trump state laws in most cases, it is settled.
| This case is due to the fed's noninterference policy, which
| they chose for themselves, it's not being forced on them
| because of some Civil War-era debate.
| funstuff007 wrote:
| The Feds should never fear interfering with state laws when
| federal law is in direct opposition. It's the basis of the
| entire system.
| amanaplanacanal wrote:
| The Feds don't have the resources to handle local law
| enforcement, even if they wanted to. I can't see that this
| is a way for either party to pick up a bunch of votes, so
| interest is low.
| AlbertCory wrote:
| > It's the basis of the entire system
|
| No, it isn't. The Constitution is the basis of the entire
| system, and it defines the powers of the Federal
| government. The 10th amendment says:
|
| _The powers not delegated to the United States by the
| Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are
| reserved to the states respectively, or to the people._
| funstuff007 wrote:
| The conclusion of the data you provided is in agreement
| with my statement.
| dalbasal wrote:
| Never is a foolish frame, if you're talking about real
| politics in the real world.
| shkkmo wrote:
| > Federal laws do trump state laws in most cases, it is
| settled.
|
| This simply isn't true. There are areas where federal laws
| can contravene states laws and areas where they cannot.
|
| Additionally, the federal laws often don't "trump" state
| laws, but supplement them. Generally speaking (there are
| exceptions), state law enforcement can only enforce state
| laws.
| ksherlock wrote:
| The powers not delegated to the United States by the
| Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved
| to the States respectively, or to the people.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| The comment you're responding to is referring to the
| supremacy clause.
| AlbertCory wrote:
| OP said, "Federal laws do trump state laws in most cases."
|
| That is quite properly nuanced, and "in most cases" means
| "those cases where the Federal law is constitutional."
| SCOTUS rules on that issue all the time.
| nonethewiser wrote:
| Interstate commerce clause is the federal government's
| loophole for this inconvenient fact.
| prottog wrote:
| The same interstate commerce clause that the federal
| government interpreted as giving them regulatory authority
| over intrastate non-commerce, in Wickard v. Filburn.
| Finnucane wrote:
| Not really,no.
| greggarious wrote:
| Is that why at multiple medical dispensaries, they trolled me, an
| autistic trauma survivor, until I raised my voice then seized the
| opportunity to act aggrieved? Each of them was allowing cards,
| and seemed uneasy about it. They seem to relish that the lack of
| federal recognition combined with being a state program meant
| that the same type of cop who used to beat down minorities at
| "Wetback Wednesday" in Oakland could now bring that level of
| (lack of) customer service to a whole new set of vulnerable
| people.
|
| Solvevo Wellness, Delta 9, and Maitri Medical should all be
| raided the by the goddamn DEA, and I say that as someone who had
| nothing but pleasant experiences in Amsterdam, Denver, Las Vegas,
| and California when I was purchasing _recreationally_.
|
| As I said when speaking with the governor's office yesterday, I
| am not going to renew my card lest I reward extortion and abuse
| that never seems to cease.
|
| (As they say in Appalachia: fuck around and find out -- sue me
| for slander if you don't like what I've written, you literal
| gangsters.)
| skymast wrote:
| They are doing the same thing to the gun industry, using the
| banks as a weapon.
| gamegoblin wrote:
| Prediction: Dems will make a move on federal legalization in the
| months before the 2024 presidential election, or at least make
| federal legalization a major election issue.
|
| A lot of right wing / libertarian adjacent people were hoping
| Trump would come out in favor of it as a 2020 election issue, to
| outflank Biden on at least one issue. It didn't happen, but I bet
| it would have made the election a bit closer -- it would have
| cooled support for Biden by a lot of younger and disillusioned
| voters.
|
| I predict they'll make it a campaign issue and force the
| Republican candidate to come out strongly _against_ it, to try to
| cool support from a lot of younger and pro-legalization
| Republicans.
| [deleted]
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| Difficult to see what this comment adds to the discussion. The
| House is divided. So unless the GOP adopts this as their issue,
| the next chance for change is the next election.
| gamegoblin wrote:
| The Dems explicitly _did not_ make legalization a notable
| part of the 2020 national campaign. They focused on making
| the campaign a referendum on Trump in general and COVID in
| particular. This was a good strategic play.
|
| My comment is that making the 2024 election a referendum on
| legalization (and a few other big issues like abortion) will
| likely be the good strategic play. You could imagine a
| future, though, where they go ignore legalization and focus
| entirely on abortion and other issues.
|
| But they would risk getting outflanked on legalization by a
| more libertarian-minded Republican, which could cost the
| election due to reducing turnout of young and disillusioned
| voters who would otherwise go Dem.
| BossingAround wrote:
| > My comment is that making the 2024 election a referendum
| on legalization
|
| My take is that most people don't see cannabis legalization
| as an important-enough issue. It's kind of "would be nice"
| issue that's overweighted by issues like economy,
| democracy, and immigration.
|
| I'm not in the US, but that's my only explanation for why
| hasn't cannabis been legalized on the federal level yet,
| i.e. that people simply don't care enough about it to even
| be a part of the discussion.
| gamegoblin wrote:
| That's totally possible. There is definitely a potential
| timeline where it just gets basically ignored.
|
| The big divide is really by age. Older voters (in both
| parties) tend to oppose it. 72% of people under 30 are
| pro-legalization, but only 30% of people older than 75
| are. The average for all US adults is 60%.
|
| Younger voters' low turnout messes up the calculus here.
| But as soon as the number of young voters you'd gain
| exceeds the number of old voters a candidate would lose,
| you'll start to see this play out, and I think we're
| really close to that tipping point.
| pstuart wrote:
| Part of the problem is that for most people the subject
| of legalizing cannabis is considered only in the context
| of "more people are going to use drugs". It needs to be
| framed in how much it costs society to enforce those laws
| (both in money and freedom).
| Doubtme wrote:
| Cannabis banking came up on this 1.7 trillion dollar bill that
| just got passed.
|
| It wasn't included thanks to Republicans.
| gamegoblin wrote:
| I think the correct strategic move would be to make it an
| issue in the months before the election, and try to force the
| R challenger to come out strongly against it. I would not
| expect any serious boat rocking right now due to where we are
| in the political cycle.
| Doubtme wrote:
| That is unfortunately not your fault. You see. There is no
| strategy.
|
| So whenever good people try and come up with ideas about
| literally any subject. the republicans ie McConnell are
| ready to strike it down 100% of the time.
|
| It doesn't matter that it has majority support. It doesn't
| matter if it helps save American lives. It does not matter
| what the logistics are or how much money is involved. It
| does not matter if it helps military veterans and
| minorities.
|
| Every plan. Every thought. Every move. will be without
| fail. Denied. Denied. Denied.
|
| That is their only play. and it will also be their
| downfall. much like a DDOS attack on a network. All we have
| to do is create a network stronger then the ones they have
| in play and they will cease to exist entirely. aka -
| voting. and with republicans saying don't vote - don't vote
| with mail in ballots - don't vote early.
|
| They got absolutely destroyed pushing their own agenda. Its
| honestly amazing.
| neuronexmachina wrote:
| I hadn't heard about that, found more info here:
| https://thehill.com/policy/finance/3782514-marijuana-
| advocat...
|
| >It passed the House seven times -- receiving a whopping 321
| votes last year -- and had enough GOP support to reach 60
| votes in the Senate.
|
| >But it did not have the support of McConnell, whose
| opposition kept it out of the spending bill.
|
| >McConnell first blocked the SAFE Banking Act's inclusion in
| the defense bill earlier this month, arguing that it would
| make the U.S. financial system "more sympathetic to illegal
| drugs."
| p0pcult wrote:
| The pocket veto is a ridiculous thing.
| zdragnar wrote:
| I don't think it is unreasonable for them to have blocked it,
| for the simple reason it would allow banks to engage in
| businesses that are violating federal law.
|
| The only true policy is a coherent policy- anything else is
| just the whims of whoever holds executive fiat.
|
| It should just be fully legalized.
| matthewdgreen wrote:
| Encouraging legal businesses to deal in cash outside of the
| standard Federal banking system (with its various AML/CTF
| protections) seems like it's a bad thing, at least if one
| believes bank compliance is an important goal.
| [deleted]
| BurningFrog wrote:
| If a criminal has a bank account, it's insane to me that
| that means the bank is engaged in a criminal business.
| treis wrote:
| I don't see how it's insane. In fact, it seems perfectly
| logical to me that you can't knowingly help people commit
| crimes.
| jonathanlb wrote:
| In some cases it is. Wachovia (acquired by Wells Fargo)
| laundered drug money:
| https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/apr/03/us-bank-
| mexico...
|
| > Primarily, these involved deposits of traveller's
| cheques in euros. They had sequential numbers and
| deposited larger amounts of money than any innocent
| travelling person would need, with inadequate or no KYC
| [know your client] information on them and what seemed to
| a trained eye to be dubious signatures. "It was basic
| work," he says. "They didn't answer the obvious
| questions: 'Is the transaction real, or does it look
| synthetic? Does the traveller's cheque meet the
| protocols? Is it all there, and if not, why not?'"
| Doubtme wrote:
| - a law that makes it legal and safe for banks to engage in
| business with corporate cannabis companies that are also
| legal as defined by the states that have passed their own
| recreational and medical cannabis laws -
|
| - Should be denied because its currently not passed yet
|
| - https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/house-
| bill/1996
|
| - Passed House (04/19/2021)
|
| - " It should just be fully legalized " -
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HrHecD8JhfY
|
| - Then why does the government lie to its own people to
| push agendas ? Why is that allowed ?
|
| - Oh right its because nobody knows how to read anymore. or
| educate themselves.
|
| - Banks violate federal law on purpose pay a slap on the
| wrist fine and keep engaging in behavior that ruins the
| lives of millions around the world yet here you are FUCKING
| ACTING LIKE YOUR ABOVE ALL THIS BULLSHIT.
|
| - Naw fam. Read.
|
| - EDIT: fentanyl is a bigger priority. Yet you would
| probably convince yourself that somehow overdosing millions
| of Americans is completely fine unchecked -
| https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2022/12/22/us-life-
| exp...
|
| - " The fentanyl category of opioids accounted for 53,480
| preventable deaths in 2020, representing a 59% increase
| over the 33,725 total in 2019. "
|
| - " Preventable drug overdose deaths increased 34.4% in
| 2020, from 62,172 in 2019. In 2020, 83,558 people died from
| preventable drug overdoses - an increase of 649% since
| 1999. These deaths represent 91% of the total 91,799 drug
| overdose deaths in the United States, which also include
| suicide, homicide, and undetermined intents. "
|
| - AND BANKS CANT TAKE CASH FROM ALREADY LEGAL BUSINESSES OK
| DUDE. WHATEVER YOU SAY
|
| https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/apr/03/us-bank-
| mexico...
|
| https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-
| magazine/books/article/3...
|
| https://www.icij.org/investigations/fincen-files/global-
| bank...
|
| https://www.reuters.com/business/finance/us-
| fines-16-major-w...
|
| https://violationtracker.goodjobsfirst.org/industry/financi
| a...
|
| https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/20/investing/wells-fargo-cfpb-
| fo...
| scifibestfi wrote:
| It sucks how everything is a political football instead of just
| doing the right thing. They had full control and could have
| legalized it. But no, they keep holding onto just to drag
| voters along every election.
| anon84873628 wrote:
| Really we should blame all the executive administrations for
| not forcing the DEA to do their job properly. Keeping
| cannabis as a Schedule 1 is completely scientifically
| unjustified. There was already an existing legal framework
| available to legalize the drug. But since the DEA/FDA is so
| corrupt, we have to fall back to checks & balances available
| in the states and Congress.
| pstuart wrote:
| We should be legalizing (and regulating/taxing) _all_
| drugs. The DEA is obviously incentivized to fight this as
| that would kill their raison d 'etre.
|
| The War on Drugs has effectively brainwashed _most people_
| to think that the best way to control "dangerous" drugs is
| to make them illegal.
|
| And the politics of this is that were the Dems to try to do
| this then the GOP would campaign on the Dems trying to give
| drugs to kids like candy.
| janalsncm wrote:
| Vast majority of cannabis arrests are at the local level.
| Even a federal legalization law would not stop that.
| GeneralMayhem wrote:
| >They had full control and could have legalized it
|
| That's not how the Senate works. A 50-50 "majority" is not
| full control.
|
| In any case, it's pretty silly to blame the party that's on
| your side for not being able to overcome the bad-faith
| obstructionism of the opposing party. It's not about
| political "footballs", it's about having finite time and
| public attention to be able to get things done. If every
| single fight has to be dragged into the public to shame the
| other side into taking a few minutes off from looting and
| pillaging, then you have to prioritize and pick the optimal
| time for each battle.
| UnpossibleJim wrote:
| >>In any case, it's pretty silly to blame the party that's
| on your side<<
|
| Not to be a complete downer, but there is so much special
| interest money involved in our political system, neither
| the Democrats or the Republicans are on your side. They are
| both on the moneyed interest side. These political
| footballs are, for the most part, to string along voters on
| "hot button" issues to keep the public disinterested on the
| numerous things that these parties actually agree on, like
| expanded military spending, global expansionism, corporate
| tax reduction, lessening monopoly laws, reducing banking
| restrictions, reducing spending on interstate
| infrastructure, cutting education spending and restricting
| the ability for fair and equal elections through
| redistricting. All of these (and more I can't think of) are
| bipartisan efforts.
|
| Sorry... I shouldn't watch the news. It's a bummer =)
| gamegoblin wrote:
| Yes, the current fillibuster rules require a 60-40
| supermajority to get anything done, but the fillubuster
| rule itself can be changed with a simple majority of 50%+1.
| But the incentive structure is not there to actually change
| this rule -- both parties benefit from it.
| wyldfire wrote:
| > both parties benefit from it.
|
| Is that really the case? It is a bias towards the status
| quo.
|
| Regardless, IMO the constituents represented by those
| parties don't benefit from it.
| BurningFrog wrote:
| > _It is a bias towards the status quo._
|
| Not a fan of the status quo, but with two largely insane
| parties fighting for power, I'm thankful for moderating
| forces.
| wonderwonder wrote:
| I've decided to actually base my vote on the status quo
| now. I want divided government because of how radicalized
| both parties have become. If something is very important,
| it will get votes from both parties. The current status
| quo is better than what either party wants
| bobthepanda wrote:
| There are "kingmaker" senators in both parties that cross
| the aisle occasionally, that this rule benefits (and also
| generally their specific constituents, since their
| outsize influence gets them more than they might
| otherwise get in negotiations.)
|
| Given that these kingmakers are what causes things to go
| over 50-50 they want to preserve their power.
| doktorhladnjak wrote:
| If a majority of senators did not benefit from having the
| filibuster, they would repeal it. The minority party is
| for it because it blocks the majority party. Moderates
| are for it because it protects them from having to go on
| the record by voting on controversial issues.
| rewgs wrote:
| > both parties benefit from it.
|
| > It is a bias towards the status quo.
|
| These are the same thing.
| Me1000 wrote:
| That's also not how the Senate works. Senators are
| beholden to their respective constituencies, not the
| party of which they're a member. A conservative Democrat
| from West Virginia has more job security when he runs
| against his party sometimes.
|
| Blaming the party rather than individual Senators is not
| a helpful way of looking at the problem.
| HDThoreaun wrote:
| As much as manchin likes to say, democrats do not benefit
| from the filibuster. Tons of Republican issues are single
| issue nonsense that the majority of the country would
| detest if passed, so republicans rely on the filibuster
| to just not do anything. Forcing republicans to actually
| pass laws would be good for democrats politically.
|
| The filibuster continues to exist because it gives people
| like manchin compete power, so the most moderate of each
| party will always try to keep it alive.
| coffeebeqn wrote:
| I believe the FDA could de schedule it?
| chiefalchemist wrote:
| Similar is true of abortions. The majority/control was there
| - more than once - and despite knowing Roe v Wade was on
| shifting sands the Dems refused to act. The issue empowers
| The Politics Industrial Complex but does little to work for
| We The People.
|
| https://freakonomics.com/podcast/im-your-biggest-fan/
| [deleted]
| quadrifoliate wrote:
| It sucks how uneducated about basic things US voters are.
|
| The Affordable Care Act is probably the most impactful law
| passed by Democrats in the recent past. In a survey of 2000
| voters, a staggering _thirty-five percent_ did not know [1]
| that the ACA and the colloquial "Obamacare" were the same
| thing. Bizarrely, an additional number didn't know that
| 'Obamacare repealed = ACA repealed'.
|
| I cannot blame either party for playing political football
| when dealing with this sort of electorate.
|
| ----------------------------------------
|
| [1] https://www.npr.org/2017/02/11/514732211/obamacare-and-
| affor...
| ransom1538 wrote:
| "The national uninsured rate in the United States has
| reached an all-time low of 8%". Given this, I would say 92%
| US citizens don't care. Most people get insurance from
| work, family or are of the 120 million Medicare/Medicaid
| patients. On the other hand, if the US population wasn't
| health care insured (like Europe believes) - they would
| know each word of those bills.
| quadrifoliate wrote:
| > Given this, I would say 92% US citizens don't care.
|
| That's what is so mind-boggling to me.
|
| The US as a whole spends more on healthcare than any
| other OECD country, and the fact that most people in the
| electorate don't care about this is kind of depressing.
| mjevans wrote:
| I can. People are so focused on not disenfranchising voters
| (like actually happened / might still happen against
| marginalized segments of the population), that they don't
| wonder, what is _empowering_ a citizen as a voter?
|
| I DO support a basic civics and mathematics test, on a
| recurring basis, for voters. HOWEVER, that's only with the
| catch that failing or opting out of the test creates
| benefits designed to encourage the citizen to pass the test
| in the future. A benefit like, access to public education
| to work on that math skills and civics awareness. Or
| possibly someone is disabled (often silently, dementia is a
| real issue!) and the voter tests might be one of the places
| it's discovered.
| kapildev wrote:
| >They had full control and could have legalized it.
|
| Them having full control wasn't enough.
|
| Democrats passed it in the House and all Democratic Senators
| supported it in the Senate. However, Republicans killed it
| because Democrats wanted the Omnibus bill to pass for which
| support from Mitch McConnell was necessary. Mitch McConnell
| was opposed to this Cannabis bill.
|
| Link: https://thehill.com/policy/finance/3782514-marijuana-
| advocat...
| gamegoblin wrote:
| It does suck, but it's what the system of democracy we
| currently have incentivizes.
|
| I've kind of become a bit of a voting reform absolutist for
| this reason. Publicly funded elections, get rid of first-
| past-the-post plurality voting (and replace with approval,
| ranked choice, anything really), electoral college reform,
| Wyoming rule, etc.
|
| If these problems were fixed, the incentives to solve the
| other problems are much more aligned.
| ratorx wrote:
| I think the problem is more fundamental than that. There's
| no mechanism in the system for feedback on improving the
| system itself because it would disadvantage the people who
| have been elected by the current system (since those are
| the people that have figured out how to exploit it the
| best).
|
| The only current method would be to somehow convince the
| people in power that they will need to overhaul the system
| to stay in power in the future. But that's not gonna happen
| because the existing loopholes are so massive (e.g.
| gerrymandering), that they can basically guarantee that
| anyway.
|
| It's also not a policy issue, and it feels weird to vote
| for it (or vote for people who promise it), because it's
| not a direct thing that will affect your daily life and is
| more second order than that.
| Spooky23 wrote:
| You're right. The federal system is designed to blunt the
| mob.
| [deleted]
| janalsncm wrote:
| > political football
|
| That's what a democracy is. Democracies aren't nicer places
| to live because our politicians are nice people. It's because
| our interests happen to align with those of politicians. It's
| not a bug, it's a feature.
|
| CGP Grey had a nice video on this, which I plagiarized for
| the comment above:
|
| https://youtu.be/rStL7niR7gs
| klyrs wrote:
| https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/marijuana-banking-bill-excluded-...
|
| Actually, they made this move just recently, not tied to an
| election. But Republicans blocked it in Senate.
|
| Obama was elected on his promise of "hope" and "change" and he
| asked his voter base what to spend his time on. The top two
| issues were health care and cannabis. He noped cannabis.
|
| Perhaps making this an election issue is actually the necessary
| ingredient to bring republicans on board.
| chadlavi wrote:
| Unfortunately Biden himself has a pretty staunchly anti-
| marijuana track record from his time in the senate. He changed
| his tune somewhat when he joined the Obama admin but I don't
| think that push for national legalization is going to come from
| the Oval Office.
| godelski wrote:
| I used to hold a similar belief but my prediction was that they
| would do it in two parts: first decriminalize cannabis around
| the midterms, second, push for legalization around the 2024
| election. Decriminalization could have come with talks about
| performing research, helping minority communities with
| policing, and allowing banks to work with state producers. Now
| I just don't think they are as good at political scheming as I
| thought and potentially that neither party is actually seeking
| a win so much as seeking drama.
| xwowsersx wrote:
| > and force the Republican candidate to come out strongly
| against it
|
| If the polls are to be believed, this seems an unlikely
| outcome. I don't see a Republican candidate doing this, but
| stranger things have happened, I guess.
|
| https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2022/11/22/americans-o...
| HDThoreaun wrote:
| The only thing that matters is the primary. Ignore general
| polls and look at the party ones to see which policies will
| be championed. Candidates try to back off after they win the
| primary but it's usually ineffective and commonly backfires
| when the opponent calls them a flip flopper.
| WiseWeasel wrote:
| Here's some coverage of the latest bipartisan failure of the
| senate to get this passed:
|
| https://thehill.com/policy/finance/3782514-marijuana-advocat...
| Sebguer wrote:
| In some California counties, and other adjacent states with
| similarly-minded sheriffs, the police treat armored cars carrying
| funds from legal dispensaries as piggy banks where they get to
| take the cash and the business is responsible for proving its
| legality.
| https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-01-28/marijuan...
| Rebelgecko wrote:
| It's also notable that they're only able to do this with the
| cooperation of the federal government. For the most part, asset
| forfeiture without due process isn't a thing in California. But
| it is at the federal level, so local cops can launder money by
| sending it to the federal DOJ, who take a 20% cut and return
| the rest of the money to the local police through something
| called the "equitable sharing program"
| glasss wrote:
| Worked with a cannabis client that was on Box for corporate file
| storage for a few years. One day all of their Box services
| stopped working, and we couldn't even get into the accounts to
| investigate.
|
| Turns out Box realized this client was in the cannabis industry
| and shut their service off for violating TOS. We did get into the
| accounts after working with support so we could migrate, but
| there were no warnings. I guess reading and abiding by the TOS
| should be warning enough, but no one had actually read it.
| charcircuit wrote:
| If it's not legal federally it is not legal in any state due to
| the concept of federal supremacy
| steve76 wrote:
| [dead]
| ClumsyPilot wrote:
| UN has moved to stop resticting it's use for medicinal purposes,
| but it is still banned for private consumption. As a signatory to
| the UN drugs convention, US has voted againsy decriminalisation.
|
| This is a clumsy summary, ANAL
|
| https://news.un.org/en/story/2020/12/1079132
| Scoundreller wrote:
| Welp, Canada has ignored that convention and has yet to receive
| the first or final steps of a UN response: a strongly worded
| letter.
|
| Safe to say we can all ignore that treaty with impunity.
|
| edit: Oh and the sky didn't fall either. If anything, the
| opposite: marijuana isn't a cool edgy thing anymore. You just
| do it if you want to, or don't if you don't.
|
| The black market still exists, but prices have cratered, so
| assuming black market demand is unchanged (it's probably
| lower), the criminal element has shrunk in size.
| greggarious wrote:
| Canada does a lot of things.
| Scoundreller wrote:
| Mostly resource extraction and real estate financial
| engineering. Increasingly the latter.
| greggarious wrote:
| Without tone of voice, it's hard to tell if you're doing
| sarcastic finger quotes on the internet.
|
| I wouldn't call using the office of the privacy
| commissioner as cover for CSIS "resource extraction" or
| "financial engineering", but I'll give them credit, they
| are quite good at playing dumb.
| sgjohnson wrote:
| That convention (alongside virtually every other UN convention
| or resoultion) is unenforceable and can be ignored with no
| consequences whatsoever.
| 33955985 wrote:
| Your comment implies the US is somehow bound to this agreement
| for the making of federal laws. This is not the case and never
| has been.
| ClumsyPilot wrote:
| I do not inderstand what you are arguing against.
|
| Are you saying US is not a signatory to the convention?
|
| Are you saying that US is not bound by international
| agreements, treaties and contracts that it has signed up to,
| of it's own accord?
|
| Are you saying that US can leave the agreement at any time?
| (I beleive it can)
|
| Or are you saying that is US breaks the obligations it signed
| up to, the UN cannot hold it accountable?
| 33955985 wrote:
| The US is a signatory, but there is nothing in US law that
| makes being a signatory binding for the creation,
| amendment, or repeal of any US law. In fact, the opposite
| is true: the US explicitly maintains sovereignty for its
| domestic laws in the face of all UN agreements. It doesn't
| need to leave the agreement.
|
| In general the US, as the world dominant cultural, military
| and economic power, signs agreements to bind others, not
| themselves.
| [deleted]
| wdb wrote:
| Still amazing that the country that started the drugs war is more
| liberal on this subject than The Netherlands were cannabis is
| illegal
| BlargMcLarg wrote:
| In other news, despite stereotypes, the NL is not nearly as
| obsessed with recreational drugs as the US is.
| xeromal wrote:
| This is kind of a tangent, not so great point, but I listen to
| Dan Carlin who is a pop-style historian who isn't really
| credentialed but manages to tell history in a fun way.
|
| One of his episodes involves a medieval Germany who has
| outlawed a ton of things and has tortured people hanging high
| in the sky off a massive church. One of his points in the
| episode is that if you end up making too many things illegal,
| people just stop caring and continue to do the illegal thing.
| Makes me wonder if my country's heavy handed approached just
| ended up making people more curious and now cannabis is very
| popular.
| pantalaimon wrote:
| What's more amazing is that US states have more autonomy in the
| matter than EU countries.
|
| Germany's current legislation attempts are thwarted by EU which
| prohibits any legal market for the drug.
|
| NL style decriminalization is OK because it's still illegal,
| individual users are just not prosecuted and the state turns a
| blind eye on the shops.
|
| But the shops have to get their supply on the black market -
| something Germany explicitly does not want.
|
| But EU does not allow a legal market.
| mtlmtlmtlmtl wrote:
| While I've always supported legalisation, I'm bummed that the US
| is following suit so fast.
|
| Kind of worried about the following scenario: US legalise weed
| with next to no regulations on e.g advertising. US
| consumerism/advertising + social media + lack of widespread
| cultural norms = massive peak in usage short term. Anti-drug
| lobby uses this as "proof" that legalisation is wrong, convincing
| enough politicians to keep Europe in the dark ages for another 20
| years.
| AlbertCory wrote:
| In the first episode of _Tulsa King_ (which is on a streaming
| service, so I haven 't watched any more of it), Sylvester
| Stallone is a mobster who gets out of prison after a long term,
| and is surprised to see a marijuana dealership. He realizes that
| they must keep a lot of cash, because banks won't deal with them.
|
| So he sees his opportunity and becomes their "partner."
|
| If it's a legal business, banks should not discriminate against
| the dealers. They're not selling fentanyl, after all.
| aliqot wrote:
| state legality and federal legality are two different parts of
| the equation. A store is licensed by the state, the bank is
| overseen by the federal jurisdiction, which has no reciprocity
| with the state for marijuana.
| AlbertCory wrote:
| I'm aware of that. That was a "common sense" argument, not a
| legal one.
| cm2187 wrote:
| There are also lots of references to being "raided by the feds"
| which I don't understand. Is it still a federal offense even
| though it is legal at the state level?
| jliptzin wrote:
| Yes
| galleywest200 wrote:
| While still federally illegal, they have not done these
| raids regularly for years. In 2015 a judge ordered the
| federal government to stop going after medical places in
| legal states [1]. If I recall correctly the Obama Admin
| ordered the DEA to stop busting shops in recreational legal
| states too. I am unsure if the GOP's recent tenure in the
| Whitehouse reversed these common sense ideas.
|
| [1] https://time.com/4080110/dea-medical-marijuana-
| california-ru...
| dragonwriter wrote:
| Jeff Sessions, Trump's first AG, issued this memo
| purporting to reverse thr policy
|
| https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-issues-
| mem...
|
| However, federal law since 2014 has prohibited
| expenditures of federal funds to interfere with state
| _medical_ cannabis laws, which limits what the executive
| can do (on its face, it only applies to state medical-use
| laws, though, so in principal federal enforcement against
| state-legal not-purely-medical marijuana might be
| viable.)
| trillic wrote:
| 45 didn't roll that back he made a deal with the Dems to
| get some judges passed in exchange for not killing
| intrastate commerce of Cannabis [1]
|
| https://hightimes.com/news/trump-makes-deal-protect-
| states-l...
| akiselev wrote:
| They're still liable for paying taxes, which they do largely
| by mailing the IRS shoeboxes full of cash. By paying taxes
| they're essentially admitting to a felony to the US
| government, which makes them trivially easy to raid.
|
| That said, raids are relatively rare now due to executive
| order and the Oakland mess. In 2012 the DEA raided Oaksterdam
| [1] without properly notifying the Oakland PD, tying them up
| right as a local college was getting shot up [2]. It was a
| minor scandal that collapsed support for the DEA on the west
| coast and they haven't done much cannabis enforcement since.
|
| [1]
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oaksterdam_University#Raid
|
| [2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oikos_University_shooting
| rosnd wrote:
| > By paying taxes they're essentially admitting to a felony
| to the US government, which makes them trivially easy to
| raid.
|
| That's not how it works, taxpayers enjoy fifth amendment
| protections against self incrimination.
|
| IRS can't share this information with other LE without a
| warrant anyway.
| ElevenLathe wrote:
| It's also a little beside the point. Dispensaries operate
| openly. DEA can just Google "weed" and they will get a
| list of places to raid.
| eyelidlessness wrote:
| The concise "yes" is correct, but a more explanatory answer
| might be helpful. Cannabis is still a schedule 1 substance by
| federal law. Almost all federal jurisdiction in state matters
| is derived from the interstate commerce clause in the
| constitution. When the first states passed legalization
| measures, the DOJ issued a memo (Cole) basically saying they
| would not intervene in states with well defined rules for
| tracking cannabis sales to prevent product crossing state
| lines. Credit card processors and most banks are either not
| willing or not allowed to process electronic transactions for
| cannabis because they do tend to cross state lines.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > it still a federal offense even though it is legal at the
| state level?
|
| Yes, though there is a federal policy against _most_
| enforcement activity where use is allowed by state law. But,
| yes, its still illegal, and those making lots of money in (or
| even as major investors in firms in) the industry are
| violating the drug kingpin statute and, were the non-
| enforcement policy to be removed, coild suddenly find
| themselves facing 20+ year, or life, sentences in federal
| prison.
|
| This has a significant effect on who is in the industry and
| how they conduct business.
| satellites wrote:
| Yes. It's farcical at this point.
| AdrianB1 wrote:
| It is still a federal offence and even if there are no raids,
| there are indirect fights, including civil asset forfeiture
| or even raiding the armored transports that carry the cash
| from the sales. Feds are harassing the state-legal merchants
| by targeting the money movement at any level.
| Doubtme wrote:
| [flagged]
| trynewideas wrote:
| Dispensary payment is a big opportunity in the weed tech space.
| Dutchie's tried to solve it with a combo of tech and lobbying,[1]
| cashless ATMs tried to hack around it it,[2] but it's such a
| weird and difficult space. It's productized social engineering
| around a policy that makes no sense.
|
| 1: https://business.dutchie.com/payments
|
| 2: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-12-05/how-to-
| bu...
| HDThoreaun wrote:
| All of the dispensaries in Illinois and Michigan at least are
| doing the cashless atm thing now. Costs $3 extra but well worth
| it for me, and certainly for them since I don't think it costs
| them anything.
| labrador wrote:
| The local dispensary in San Jose CA just started accepting debit
| cards and I was able to make a purchase with mine.
| llIIllIIllIIl wrote:
| Airfield (San Jose, CA) accepts debit cards for quite some time
| already. The additional fee is astronomical.
| labrador wrote:
| I'll have to check my receipt next time from Purple Lotus.
| I'll pay cash if they want to charge me for a debit card.
| Seems like I'm doing them a favor so they shouldn't charge
| me.
| perardi wrote:
| This is frustrating, because I think it's a near certainty
| marijuana _will_ be legalized federally. If I was a betting man,
| which I'm not, certainly not enough to mess with prediction
| markets, I'd call myself 95% certain.
|
| All this ambiguity is just grinding inefficiency in the meantime.
| Look at all that states where this is legal or decriminalized:
|
| https://disa.com/maps/marijuana-legality-by-state
|
| And even in states where it's still illegal, I really have
| trouble believing they are spending a whole lot of time enforcing
| that. States have legalized it, they have seen great tax revenue,
| they have not seen huge swatches of marijuana-related crimes and
| medical emergencies (though I admit that's hard to pick out above
| the noise of all the other stuff over the past few years). It's
| going to happen. Everyone knows it's going to happen. But we have
| to go through this song and dance where we keep it illegal,
| because reasons.
| loeg wrote:
| > States have legalized it, they have seen great tax revenue,
| they have not seen huge swatches of marijuana-related crimes
| and medical emergencies.
|
| States have seen increased theft from marijuana businesses.
| Both because they need to hold a lot of cash (very related to
| being locked out of banking) and because the weed itself has
| some resale value on the black market.
|
| (I still think legalization is obviously worth it, just want to
| clarify that particular part of your statement.)
| robocat wrote:
| > States have _seen_ increased theft
|
| That is possibly selection bias. Marijuana thefts were
| previously not reported to the authorities, so it is
| difficult to estimate whether the actual number of thefts has
| changed.
| eldritch_4ier wrote:
| I think right now is exactly where I want weed to be in
| society: a taboo, not normalized in the mainstream, you get in
| trouble if you're stupid with it, but otherwise if you're just
| an occasional user you can get it just fine. This is pretty
| much perfect to me.
|
| What I don't want is broad normalization of it. Maybe some
| cultures do just fine with that, but the trend is America has
| been to maximize the individual liberty without any concept of
| duty or decency to others, and the obvious consequence is
| rampant abuse and widespread degeneracy that everyone is
| subjected to whether they consent to it or not. In other words,
| I don't think we're mature enough as a society to have easy
| access to the cookie jar without deciding to eat cookies for
| every meal. Walk through the streets of NYC or SF to see what I
| mean. People don't give a shit about anyone but themselves, and
| giving them more tools to be self indulgent while avoiding
| social responsibility + spewing externalities is just a no-go
| at the moment.
|
| I imagine a world with legal weed is a lot like a world with
| legal porn: it's everywhere, even children get exposed to it
| insanely young, people treat it like "a human right" and so
| fight any reasonable restrictions made to curb the broader
| social effects, and the externalities hit everyone whether they
| like it or not.
|
| Not every vice needs to be legal. Keep it illegal and weaken
| enforcement. Keep it a taboo, and for those who really need it
| they can still find it.
|
| And for the record: I have edibles at home. I'm not against
| responsible weed use at all, I just don't think society at
| large will be responsible users and I don't want to live in a
| society full of that. Porn went through the exact same
| evolution as weed is and now it's everywhere
| kmonsen wrote:
| I don't really disagree but my counter argument is that I
| think breaking the law should be meaningful and enforcement
| should not be random and perhaps politically motivated. Weed
| in particular has been used to stop and search cars with
| minority populations due to the police officer claiming to
| smell it. Also the US has a culture of having too many laws
| that are selectively enforced (IMHO but I think this is
| widely held belief).
| mgbmtl wrote:
| I find that cultures who keep things as taboo tend to create
| a vicious cycle of education problems. Education does not
| encourage, it exposes both the good and the bad. You learn
| the navigate the problem instead of being trapped by it. I
| lost many friends to alcohol/drugs when it was more taboo but
| easy to access.
|
| There was an old expression "say know to drugs". I spent a
| lot of time as a teen reading about various drugs and their
| effects. Ultimately, it made me stop exploring. Otherwise I
| probably would have taken way more risks (which I did before
| discovering sites such as Erowid back then).
|
| I have a teenager, and so far so good. Whether it's fast-
| food, drugs, alcohol, sex or porn, they exist. My logic
| usually has been: 1) wait if you can, 2) be moderate, 3) know
| the good and the bad, learn to set boundaries.
|
| My main grief is with alcohol. It's glorified, associated to
| socializing and sports. The bad impacts of alcohol are taboo,
| and yet they're everywhere, but it's a big business. I like a
| drink now and then, with my partner or with friends, but with
| my partner we have a hard boundary of 2 glasses per week
| each, and with friends it's max 3 pints, max twice per month.
| Cannabis twice per month, in small quantities.
| saiya-jin wrote:
| Not really grokking your comment, a lot of inconsistency. You
| point to deeper issues in American society, and you are very
| much fine with playing endless whack-a-mole with its symptoms
| manifesting left and right instead of dealing with issue like
| grown ups do - attack the underlying problem, instead of
| seeing endless spiral of growing issues that it brings.
|
| You base this on extreme idea that when weed is legalized it
| will be literally everywhere, which is incorrect, outdated
| and the very source of utter republican clusterfuck that War
| on drugs was and is. Hasn't this produced enough evil in
| whole world so we should wise up for a change?
| honkycat wrote:
| You can't download weed.
| eikenberry wrote:
| The big downside to porn as it stands in the US today is the
| fact that it is still taboo. It keeps the workers in the
| industry from getting proper respect and representation, so
| they are taken advantage a lot. IE. The problem isn't that
| it's legal and everywhere, the problem is that it is still
| taboo. Sex is such an integral part of being a human and I
| find our shame of it sad.
| pstuart wrote:
| > Not every vice needs to be legal.
|
| Yes, they should. We've collectively agreed that dangerous
| drugs should be legal (i.e., alcohol and tobacco). Making
| them illegal doesn't make it go away, it just fosters
| criminal activity.
|
| Tax and regulate them. Educate the people about the dangers
| (honestly) and treat abuse as a health issue, not a criminal
| issue.
| BatteryMountain wrote:
| Checkout the Huberman episode about cannabis, specifically
| the part about pregnant women using cannabis during pregnancy
| like its no big deal. Resonates with your comment.
| wishfish wrote:
| We have something very close to national legalization right
| now. Fortunately, it seems to be flying under the radar so red
| state legislatures aren't acting against it.
|
| By "legalization", I'm talking mostly about THC edibles. There
| are now hemp-based edibles which contain as much THC as
| traditional MJ edibles. Legal in all states. Achieved thanks to
| the Hemp Act and some creative processing of hemp.
|
| It's an interesting wrinkle to this whole mess.
| ogogmad wrote:
| There's still a chance that cannabis might trigger schizophrenia,
| especially among people who start very young. This is at right
| angles to the legalisation debate, because alcohol and tobacco
| are likely to be even more harmful. It remains the case that
| intellectual honestly about this point should not get drowned out
| in all the politics.
|
| Be careful what you put in your body. Especially if the thing is
| some novel substance. I guess this principle applies much more
| broadly than to cannabis.
| saiya-jin wrote:
| This is valid for alcohol too (father of ex-gf had
| schizophrenia triggered by alcohol binge at 18 and had to take
| strong meds for rest of his life, brain half vegetable). Or
| stressful event - we should ban those too.
|
| In the same time we let people freely get drowned in one of
| strongest addictions - nicotine. Oh but we banned (in some
| places) advertisement for it. We even get kids get hooked on it
| for life too via vaping.
| ogogmad wrote:
| Your comment demonstrates a lack of reading comprehension. I
| don't care what we "let" people do, as I stressed in my
| comment. The actual point was that it's not as "safe" as many
| of its most blinkered advocates say it is.
| josephcsible wrote:
| The headline isn't true. Cannabis is illegal in all of America,
| since it's still on Schedule I at the federal level. While some
| states may have removed their own laws against it, that in itself
| doesn't make it legal there.
| meroes wrote:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B1NggzEkltM
|
| https://www.vice.com/en/article/dp3e4y/the-us-government-has...
|
| There's at least 1 federally legal marijuana patient.
| CoastalCoder wrote:
| I've started wondering how much my views on civil ethics are
| influenced by (likely) having Asperger's.
|
| I absolutely _hate_ having a persistent divergence between laws
| on the books, and what 's enforced. In my view, that gap exists
| only to be exploited by villains: both those who would
| selfishly break the law, and those who would capriciously
| enforce it. Policies like this make chumps of anyone who obeys
| such laws, invites tyranny, and are anti-democratic.
|
| It took me a long time to realize that my views were in the
| minority. I still struggle to understand how that could be. But
| I think I see a trend where this correlates with Asperger's.
| I'm curious if others see this too.
| CoastalCoder wrote:
| Tangent: I also wonder if this correlates with preferring
| static typing over dynamic typing on programming languages.
| (Or maybe more generally, using strong contracts at subsystem
| interfaces.)
|
| The common thread being that everyone agrees up front what
| the rules are, and then expects all parties to adhere to
| them.
| drdaeman wrote:
| It doesn't require being anywhere in particular on the
| spectrum to hate inconsistencies and "it's not supposed to be
| like that but that's how it is in practice" unspoken policies
| BS. And especially selective enforcement, which I think is a
| symptom of corruption.
|
| At least, I don't think I have that, but I sure hate the
| unfortunate fact that the world (and this seems to be
| universal, not specific to any country or culture) is that
| way.
| kmonsen wrote:
| I don't have Asperger's but I fully agree with you. I also
| grew up in Scandinavia were laws are not this selectively
| enforced. Not saying it never happens, but most people think
| it is wrong.
| gilbert_vanova wrote:
| The US in particular is occupied by many competing powers. No
| one group has sweeping control of anything; most everyone is
| held in a deathgrip by interests to either side of their
| desired positions.
|
| From city councils to the oval office, a lot of leaders have
| a short list of who's approval they need and can't get to do
| anything at all.
|
| Federalism invites this type of incongruity. The silver
| lining is that it's a game that keeps a certain type of
| person preoccupied so as not to pursue worse ways of
| exploiting the rest of us.
| jjcon wrote:
| Not to nitpick but technically only thc is illegal federally
| and only in certain quantities- you can legally buy some
| cannabis products like cbd oil federally. In most states the
| rest is effectively legal even if the federal government says
| no but technically you are correct there.
| trillic wrote:
| Currently 37 of 50 states have some sort of law on their books
| allowing legal Cannabis sales in some form.
|
| The 13 with no legalization:
|
| Idaho
|
| Wyoming
|
| Nebraska
|
| Kansas
|
| Iowa
|
| Wisconsin
|
| Indiana
|
| Kentucky
|
| Texas
|
| Tennessee
|
| North Carolina
|
| South Carolina
|
| Georgia
| ausbah wrote:
| most of these states have active efforts for legalization in at
| least some context, many have CBD legal but not THC (what gets
| you high), and at least in Kansas there is a "loophole" where
| hemp products can contain up to .3% THC (so just really big
| edibles)
| TrackerFF wrote:
| The elephant in the room is that right wing politics intersects
| with a certain group of people that will never ever approve
| liberalization of cannabis (or any drug for that matter), and
| will lobby hard against it.
|
| This is not only the case for USA - but something you see in
| other countries.
|
| Maybe something more specific to the US, would be the people and
| corporations that benefit from keeping cannabis illegal, and thus
| lobby equally hard against it.
|
| Sometimes market liberalization and conservative thinking does
| not go hand in hand.
| killdozer wrote:
| `Sometimes market liberalization and conservative thinking does
| not go hand in hand. ` I would say it never has, but that the
| market liberalization and social conservative wings of the
| larger conservative party had an uneasy truce and their
| ultimate goals were always in conflict. Looking at the current
| conservative movement in the US and how they're pushing back
| against capital for being "too woke" (whatever that means) it's
| clear (at least to me) that the market liberalization wing lost
| a lot of power and doesn't seem to have too much pull anymore.
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