Democrats will dangle the possibility of marijuana legalization to entice voters to turn out for the election. But I doubt legalization will actually happen; I'd be delighted to be proven wrong. I'm just too jaded, I guess.
I'm not saying they should just try to get major parties to adopt cannabis legalization as a platform plank. I'm saying they should use cannabis to get adequate popular support for their party in hopes of getting the other parties to adopt the non-cannabis elements of their platform.
Federal legalization/decriminalization is going to happen eventually, so this is a limited-time opportunity for a third party. Make hay while the sun shines.
Big time fail not making cannabis legalization a top-line plank in their platform.
It's overwhelmingly popular, and because this party (like every third party) is doomed to be a spoiler at best, they could attract enough voters with cannabis legalization to perform (optimistically) in the high single digits instead of the high fractions of a digit. High single digits is enough to swing elections, which is enough to force the major parties to adopt the popular elements of your platform.
We'll see what Trump's attorney-general thinks about this.
State-by-state marijuana legalization has existed on the sufferance of the Democratic party on this issue. There is an immense amount of power for the Federal government to crack down on the this if they choose, and Donald Trump has never shied away from engaging in exactly such culture-war issues.
I would not even be surprised to see medical usage rolled back. There's plenty of justification: after all, Schedule I drugs are supposed to have "no legitimate medical uses", despite the reality of the drugs on it. But it will largely come down to culture war: medical marijuana is exactly the camel's nose under the tent that conservatives said it would be.
Politically, legalization is a rallying call for Democrats that pushes turnout. It can be easily snuffed by Republicans, and it will be - the same way the drug war was used in the 70s and 80s.
America made some bad choices last night and we're about to get a nice show of just how much power the Federal government can wield when one party both completely controls all the branches of government and has the will to use it as a blunt instrument of power. States' rights are just a platitude for when Democrats are in power, it's not going to slow Republicans down in the least.
It's an election gimmick for sure. However, there's always a choice of possible election gimmicks - and in the past, this one had never been chosen. Now, it has been. There must be a reason for it - and one may reasonably assume the reason is that there is enough support for relaxing the federal prohibition on marijuana.
You're correct that there are Republicans who support legalization, and there are Democrats who are against it.
But if you look at the demographics of who supports legalization, it's clear which party will eventually pass legislation to legalize. Republicans are increasingly dependant on their aging, white base, and that's the exact demographic that still supports prohibition.
The Republican party as a whole has no reason to support legalization until they decide to try to broaden their appeal, which exactly what they planned on doing after their defeat in 2012. But the rise of Trump changed that. Look at who Trump appointed as his first Attorney General--a man who pined for the Reagan era war on drugs--a man who urged prosecutors to use the death penalty to fight drug trafficking.
If they lose in 2020 and decide to rebrand, who knows, but as of right now there is no chance of a Republican Senate passing legalisation, and I think a small but non-zero chance that a Democratic Senate would.
So some people are upset that this happening in an election season, even though they support it?
This was a lawful and thoughtful exercise of presidential power that helps some people convicted of something that really shouldn't be criminalized. It could also potentially help the Democratic Party in the upcoming election.
But if you believe in what the Democratic Party is trying to do for the country, that's not a bad thing. There's no corruption in doing popular things that can help get people in your party elected. That's just good governance and acting according to the will of the voters.
The majority of people in the US, 60%, and even a plurality of Republicans support decriminalizing recreational cannabis federally. The support for medicinal cannabis, possible if Cannabis wasn't scheduled as it currently is, is even higher.
Why haven't Democrats full-throatily supported legalization? I understand why Republicans haven't, but this seems so popular it seems crazy a major political party hasn't jumped on board.
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.
If you follow the news trail on this topic at all, you would be aware that the Democratic Party has been pretty loud about marihuana reform for at least a year now.
Likewise, a quick google search will show you that the pro-marijuana lobby is a thing. In the upcoming California Legalization ballot the side in favor is outfunding the opposition 45 to 1. The pot industry is already a billion dollar business. So if legalization becomes a fact, will you allow me to conclude that marijuana is legal just because of the lobbying powers of Big Marijuana?
I was under the impression that the primary anti-marijuana lobbies were funded by tobacco companies along with the beer/liquor industry. Medical use aside, marijuana would primarily be competing with those other recreational substances.
Come on. The parties aren't monolithic, and the Democrats have a majority in Congress, but they can't pass anything either. Would you say the Democrats against legalization too?
Support for legal marijuana and ending prohibition is up to 60% and over 70% for democrats and independents, republicans up to 42%[1].
They are fighting a losing battle and most politicians will not go against that type of landslide polling.
Good luck, 2.4 billion in Colorado, 20,000 new jobs and personal freedoms will not go away lightly[2].
They could legalize and end prohibition and throw the other side a bone, but if they pick this fight it will be a huge mistake and an attack on logical/smart people [3] and public opinion [1].
Prohibition makes the punishment on a non-violent personal action into a crime, wasting billions (20-50 billion)[4] of tax dollars and funding cartels, to the tune of 25-50+ billion [5], while harming decent people.
reply