War on pot rejected by voters

[Mark Stapleton]

I've long tried to understand the government's determination to keep pot illegal. What is the strategy?

Is it so that private prisons will be kept full of poor victims of the archaic drug laws so there can be more free/cheap prison labor?

Is it because pot competes with the CIA's drug business?

Is it a form of mass mind control to force people in society to go along with immoral laws and make juries participate in the persecution of others?

WTF?

Myra, here's my ten cents worth:

The police, lawyers, and the prison establishment see it as a serious threat to their careers, and they're right. The prison officers union in California is always campaigning against drug law reform. It's the same here. Cannabis busts make up the majority of all arrests. It's easy work for drug cops because it's mainly just waiting for informers to call. Not as hard as solving a difficult murder case. Lawyers who appear on behalf of defendants would lose business, and of course the prison guards and the supporting bureaucracy of the prison establishment would suffer significant job losses. And the DEA with its massive annual taxpayer burden of billions of dollars, would lose half its workload. The DEA's paranoia extends to plantation hemp, despite its absence of THC.

The tabloid media campaigns fervently against drug reform because they have been dining out on salacious drug stories for decades. They would lose serious money from a lower crime rate and more peaceful society. They are scum.

Governments of all political stripes think the idea stinks. This is purely about money. While reaping a nice harvest from tobacco and alcohol taxes, they know they can't effectively tax pot, because people can easily grow it themselves. The idea that people could alter their consciousness and not give them a cut drives them crazy.

Big Pharma hates the idea because pot is unwanted competition for a number of ailments, and if people can grow the drug for personal use, BP gets chopped out of the loop and can't make any money from it.

The cost to the taxpayer for maintaining this circus is massive. The media hides this from the public because it's in their interests to do so. Although it would mean a lower tax burden, reform would cause job losses so this has to be considered.

The DEA is the driving global force behind drug prohibition. They bully other nations, including Australia, into enforcing their agenda.

I agree it's mind control--worthy of Eddie Bernays.