It's
time to join other States
From the
beginning of recorded history humans have made and consumed mood
altering substances including alcohol and plant products.
Periodically well intended but futile efforts have been made to make
the sale and use of such items illegal.
The best
example of the unintended consequences resulting from such efforts
was the enactment of the prohibition of alcohol in the 1919
The
result was an increased and untaxed manufacture
and consumption of whiskey,
wine and beer. The rise of a national organized crime problem led
by the fabled Al Capone. The
money made by those syndicates
during prohibition was used to finance criminal operations that
we are still dealing with today. After
several years of futile enforcement efforts and a rising lawlessness
the amendment was repealed on
December
5, 1933.
The cause may have been
noble but the reality was worse.
Today
alcohol sales are regulated and taxed. For example, in 2005 Ohio
collected $57.7 million for
beer and wine alone and does not include hard liquor taxes.
For the
last twenty years or so the country has found itself in a similar
situation as regards marijuana use and associated crime. The outright
banning of the sale and use of this relatively mild mood altering
substance has created Mexican billionaires and an unknown trail of
dead bodies strewn along the trade routes. Our jails are overflowing
with non-violent minor sellers and users. The war on marijuana, much
like the war on alcohol, has been lost.
A
marijuana use cost benefit analysis indicates that it costs the tax
payer while it benefits the criminal smugglers, dealers and jailers.
The
statewide cost for the eradication
program amounts to $500,000 a year. Most of that goes to pay for the
helicopter and pilot. Much
additional money is spent by local law enforcement in coordination
with the state effort.
The
Drug Enforcement Administration. DEA figures show there were only 27
arrests in
Ohio
last year.
That
works out to a
taxpayer cost of
about $18 thousand per arrest and $6 per plant destroyed.
In
my opinion
Ohio
should change law and policy to: (a)
Decriminalize
marijuana use and. (b.)Regulate
and tax the sales of the product. Some of the revenue should be spent
in an anti-smoking like ad campaign describing
the bad effects of habitual use.
Legal
availability of marijuana might
even reduce the proliferation of methlabs
Some
of us have an occasional beer, glass of wine or a cocktail without
dire consequences and recreational use of a natural occurring herb is
little different.
Paul
Hunter paulhunter45177@gmail.com
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