The only way to get the government to ever legalize cannabis, as in totally legal and not just for medicinal use, is to prove too the government that it would be beneficial, first and foremost to the government and second to the people and to do that you would have to include industrial hemp in the deal.
If someone could crunch the numbers and show it would be a highly positive plus to the government there would be a legitimate opportunity for legalization.
Start with how much money is spent on interdiction, everything from local cops to the military. Find out how much would be saved by not trying to stop cannabis being grown and smoked. Keep that savings figure in mind
Figure out how much is paid in farm subsidies to farmers, some major corporate farm groups, to not grow certain crops or to not grow more than a certain amount of crops. Remove the subsidies and let them grow industrial hemp in their fields and pot in greenhouses or in somewhat small secure fenced in plots where it could be tended to and grown right. Let farmers EARN all their income rather than have part of it come from taxpayer/government dollars. Keep that savings figure in mind.
Figure out how much the court system and jailing/prison housing costs for pot offenders, and include parole officers for later. Keep that savings figure in mind.
Industrial hemp is better for making biofuels than sugarcane so you push how much more biofuel could be made lessening the nations dependence on foreign oil. There is a whole new industry, a 'Green' one, needing new workers who will then pay taxes on their incomes. That's more money rolling into the federal coffers and less taxpayer/government money spent on unemployment and entitlement programs. It is a double headers, increased income and cutting of spending. Keep that figure in mind.
Industrial hemp needs no fertilization and will grow in areas where nothing else will grow. Fertilizers are in part made from oil. That means less use of foreign oil. It also means less fertilizer runoff that pollutes creeks and streams and rivers and lakes and oceans. That also means lower prices at the pumps and the people will like that. Less for the EPA to worry about, more money saved. Keep that figure in mind.
Industrial hemp does not need pesticides, that also rely in part on oil, and again less runoff causing pollution. More save because less EPA work needed to be done. Keep that amount saved in mind.
Industrial hemp feeds more nutrients back into the ground than other crops so when used in a crop rotation the following years crops will need less fertilization. Again, less oil used and less runoff. More money saved, keep that figure in mind.
Industrial hemp aerates and loosens the soil better than any other plant. That means fields need less work the following year to get them ready for other crops. Less machinery used, less oil products used, less pollution from operating machinery. More savings to keep in mind.
Industrial hemp makes better paper than wood. Fewer trees cut down, the Greens and tree huggers love it because not only do the trees survive and continue to look pretty but also to clean the air, plus you can add large fields of industrial hemp growing in fields and areas that otherwise would be basically scrub land taking in more CO2 and putting out more clean air.
In 1941 Henry Ford unveiled a car made mostly of a combination of industrial hemp fibers, straw fibers and some other fiber held together with a resin. It was basically like a fiberglass car but using natural products. Cars could be made of that, or some similar updated combination and the steel mills will have less pressure on them for production lowering the cost of domestic made steel, due to less demand, so building costs would drop and U.S. made steel would be more competitive price-wise with foreign steel. If the steel mills run less there is less pollution. If with the lowering of price they run as much, more money will be made on exporting the cheaper steel. Export money is important to the economy.
Back to pot. You make it legal, but NOT for everyone to grow, only legitimate medicinal users. You only let farmers who have lost their subsidies grow it, though they would need to be educated in the growing of it. Many of us could help with that and even become 'farmers' ourselves. It would graded like tobacco and when sold at auction it is taxed. When the company who bought it packages it and sells it to outlets, it would be taxed, when it is sold to a retail customer it would be taxed, just like the tobacco industry.
All taxes collected from cannabis, and industrial hemp, are split evenly to making social security sound, the money going into an actual fund like it was before LBJ raided the then existing fund to pay for his war and his Great Society. The taxes would not go into general revenues for Congress to waste. The other half goes directly to paying down the national debt.
Congress would bitch, piss and moan because they would want the money to waste but when you add up all the savings mentioned above, and many, many more I did not take the time to mention so this would not be a 200,000 word long piece, the amount of money Congress would have to waste would still increase, thus making them happy.
If you consider the MASSIVE amount of money from pot sales that goes untaxed each year and then make it taxable, very quickly social security would be sound and the national debt would be dropping fast.
To sell it to congress and the people you say how much of that untaxed money leaves the country and ends up in foreign banks and in foreign investments fueling foreign nations economies rather than fueling the U.S. economy and how the taxes from it would go to securing social security and paying off the national debt. Even hard core anti-pot people would like that idea and find it hard to say no to it.
You point out that law enforcement agencies, right up to the use of the military for drug interdiction, could refocus on dangerous drugs. People on anti-pot detail are switched to fighting meth and crack etc. so it would be like a manpower increase without the cost of hiring more people. They could be more efficient and more successful than before at fighting dangerous drugs. Even if you left their funding at the same level and gave up that savings, because it would all go to fighting hard drugs and there would be better success it would be like those departments getting a funding increase and a manpower increase without it costing taxpayers/government a single penny more.
I have a much longer, far more detailed plan written out where more savings are made and more benefits are listed but it is massive so I was not going to post it and make this any longer than it has to be just to give the basic idea of what would be needed to be done.
I sent it to Every member of congress during both Clinton terms in office along with to Clinton and Gore and even their wives hoping a little pillow talk would happen. I sent it to every Governor at the time. I did almost the same during both terms of office for Dubya, but by then many House members required a zip code for their district to get their email address so it only went to roughly two thirds of them, but it also again went to Governors. I sent it to Obama and every member of the Senate, but only a few members of the House because they have all gone to needing a local zip code to get their email address.
But one voice is nothing, no matter if what they say is good or important or helpful or even needed. A large national group like NORML needs to write up a similar plan with actual crunched numbers and then a national campaign has to be started where individuals like us can sign petitions. Money has to be spent on lobbyists to convince congress.
The 'Green' groups have to be brought on board, and they would gladly join given all their groups would see as being important and needed steps being taken. A media campaign has to be set in motion to tell the 'straight community,' as in non-tokers and not non-gay people, of how much they would benefit from it so they would not think only about how the nation might turn into a bunch of Beavis & Buttheads and how they would save tax dollars and their social security money would be there when they need it and how the national debt would be paid down, and eventually paid off. They have to be told of the strengthening of the economy and of national security due to less dependence on foreign oil.
The only way to get pot legalized is to convince the government that it is highly beneficial to it and by convincing the people, the 'straight community' mainly, that it would be very beneficial to them. We might have to forgo the right to our own little gardens, legally anyway, but if you could bop down to the corner store or to something like a State run booze store and purchase virtually anything you wanted, and because it would be tested and graded from auction to packaging for sale, know that you would be purchasing high quality, I think many of us would be willing to make that trade off for the legal right to enjoy what we love.
The other part is to combat the propaganda campaign the government has run about pot being a gateway drug and how it causes cancer and all sorts of other problems and make it known to all the true proven highly beneficial medicinal use of cannabis and force it to me made legal nationwide and allow true medicinal patients to grow their own if they choose to do so.
First the government has to be convinced it is in it's best interest and in the best interest of the nation and then the 'straight community' has to be convinced it is in it's best interest. If that never happens,
marijuana will never become legal unless it happens in a way where the major pharmaceutical corporations hold a virtual monopoly on it and only, or mainly, they benefit from it. Right now there is too much money and pressure from groups like that fighting against legal
marijuana. They want it kept illegal until they can control it and can bend us all over and ram it home without Vaseline, price-wise, for what they would then sell.
I'm rambling at nothing in particular now. LOL!
