Woot

http://www.opposingviews.com/articles/research-californians-want-marijuana-legalized-and-taxed

"One of California’s most respected polling firms, Field Research, just released data showing that 56% of registered voters in the state support legalizing and taxing marijuana as a means of generating revenue for the ailing state budget."

ya.. our budget deficit is around 6 billion.. and weed could generate between 1.5 and 14 billion yearly.. we would rather go into massive debt than admit that weed is ok to use...?

isnt our debt more like 20-30 billion

Well, actually in our system, Debt = Wealth.
So the more debt, the more wealth.
This is because all money is borrowed from the Federal reserve.
F.T.I.
It's trillions not billions

i was talking about just california.. let me recheck...

edit: ok - it's 14 billion anticipated this year..

Well, State government has to say they are in debt in order to make way for projected spending.
In other words, we have to "need" more next year otherwise we can't ask for more!?

lol.. that was how the doctor on voyager tricked the alien head doctor into giving his patients more drugs... then the system caught up and discharged all the seriously ill people because they had more than their allotted care...

but, seriously.. our country needs weed revenue - even if its just a tax similar to cigs - $1 per pack of joints.. isn't it the perfect green industry?? all the growers, clippers, rollers, packers, sellers, shippers, labelers, advertisers, etc would create so many jobs...

ahh.. here we go - http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxfacts/displayafact.cfm?Docid=403 - cigs generated 15 billion in 2006 is tax revenue alone.. 1 billion from california..

i think we should get all that legitimate money from weed and hemp and pump it into things like schools and health care... maybe completely stop the 'war on drugs' because it is costing us hundreds of billions to try to stop people from taking drugs - and does it do anything??? can we find even one person who wants to take drugs but is stopped somehow by george bush in a ninja suit? it seems so wasteful...

http://www.drugwarfacts.org/cms/?q=node/38 - we spent about 20 billion in 2003 on the drug war.. also - "In 2003 the United States spent a record $185 billion for police protection, corrections, and judicial and legal activities. Expenditures for operating the Nation's justice system increased from almost $36 billion in 1982 to over $185 billion in 2003, an increase of 418%" and that's probably all to do with drugs and drugs related violence...

btw - my old friend, a man who i met in grade school and smoked my first bowl of pot with, was found murdered yesterday .. a direct victim of the war on drugs.. if cocaine were not forced underground he would not have gotten involved with dealing and certainly would never have been killed in what i imagine could only have been a conflict over unregulated substances..

Sorry, to hear about your friend. I've lost a few to drugs and ALCOHOL.
R.I.P.

i have another friend who is in jail for life because of meth abuse.. he used to be a mild mannered stoner like me.. shy and carefree.. then he started using meth and he got harder..

he was working cleaning carpets and some mean old lady called and said he hadn't done it right.. he went back and did it again for free.. she called again and said he missed a spot.. this escalated a bit until he went into a rage and broke into her house - stabbed her in the neck - and lit her house on fire.. the old woman survived, but her house burnt and one of her dogs died in the fire..

there was talk during the court case of putting him into treatment.. hospitalized.. because he obviously had paranoid dementia from too much meth.. i wish that was what happened for him.. if all drugs were brought into the light - then maybe he wouldn't have hidden his addiction and people would have known how to help him out... perhaps it would have been more obvious that he had a problem.. i blame drug prohibition and ignorance more than i do methamphetamines or fred himself.. maybe if accurate information was everywhere about what meth does to a person - he would have stopped himself...?

i don't mean to make out WOOT thread a total bummer - so here's another positive statistic - we have 160 million regular cannabis users worldwide - that's 1 in 50 people in the entire planet!! if i've learned anything about statistics - a whole percent of any group is nothing to be scoffed at.. you wouldn't download a file with 2% missing would you?
we need to make 100% of our population happy..!!