Community | October 13, 2009 | 26 comments

Who’s Behind Pot Prohibition? The Answer Is Obvious

source: http://www.cannabisculture.com/v2/content/who-s-behind-pot-prohibition-answer-obvious

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The common inference behind this question is that there must be some behind the scenes cabal of Big Pharma, Tobacco, and Alcohol executives conspiring to keep cannabis illegal. By contrast, the real culprits behind pot prohibition are far more overt.

Law enforcement organizations — including cops, district attorneys, prosecutors, prison guard unions, sheriffs, and narcotics officers associations — remain the primary force working against sensible marijuana law reform.

Case in point? Look no further than these two egregious examples:

Los Angeles County D.A. prepares to crack down on pot outlets
via the Los Angeles Times

Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley said Thursday he will prosecute medical marijuana dispensaries for over-the-counter sales, targeting a practice that has become commonplace under an initiative approved by California voters more than a decade ago.

“The vast, vast, vast majority, about 100%, of dispensaries in Los Angeles County and the city are operating illegally, they are dealing marijuana illegally, according to our theory,” he said. “The time is right to deal with this problem.”

Cooley and Los Angeles City Atty. Carmen Trutanich recently concluded that state law bars sales of medical marijuana, an opinion that could spark a renewed effort by law enforcement across the state to rein in the use of marijuana. It comes as polls show a majority of state voters back legalization of marijuana, and supporters are working to place the issue on the ballot next year.

Even prior to the passage of California’s passage of Prop. 215, cannabis dispensaries — the same sort of dispensaries that D.A. Cooley now unilaterally defines as a “problem” — operated openly, and without incident, in L.A. County. Today, over 1,000 such operations exist in Los Angeles. District Attorney Cooley has now arbitrarily declared that “100%” of these dispensaries are acting illegally based not on a court decision, but rather on his own personal anti-pot bias.

Do a majority of public of L.A. county share D.A. Cooley’s view that open market, regulated medi-pot transactions are, in fact, a “problem?” Not at all. Does the will of the voters actually matter to their District Attorney? Not at all.

According to a separate story from the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin, D.A. Cooley “was one of dozens of guests at a recent conference … in which the topic was the ‘eradication of medical-marijuana dispensaries in the city of Los Angeles and Los Angeles County,’ according to a flier advertising the event hosted by the California Narcotics Officers’ Association.”

This, of course, would be the same California Narcotics Officers Association that just last month issued the white paper: “California Police Chiefs Association Position Paper on the Decriminalization of Marijuana.” You can read the entire position paper here (Have a potent anti-emetic handy!), but here’s some excerpts.

“Proposition 215, the Compassionate Use Act, was passed by California voters in 1996 on a ballot initiative promoted by those who subscribe to the idea that all drug use should be legalized.”

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  1. groups:
    Community,   News and Politics,   H.E.M.P.,   Make Marijuana Matter More
  2. tags:
    Marijuana Prohibition
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26 comments // Who’s Behind Pot Prohibition? The Answer Is Obvious

  • FoosMaster
    • 0
      FoosMaster  

    • It’s about the MONEY!!!
      Regardless of what group or organization is behind keeping Marijuana illegal it is only about the money. It’s not personal, it’s just business. Marijuana itself does not destroy peoples lives, laws against marijuana destroys peoples lives. Big business, (including police drug agencies), care more about making money than supporting the rights of the individual.
      It’s about the MONEY!!!

    • 2 years ago
  • juicie
    • 0
      juicie  

    • Well you better listen my sister's and brothers,
      'cause if you do you can hear
      there are voices still calling across the years.
      And they're all crying across the ocean,
      and they're cryin across the land,
      and they will till we all come to understand.

      None of us are free.
      None of us are free.
      None of us are free, one of us are chained.
      None of us are free.

      And there are people still in darkness,
      and they just can't see the light.
      If you don't say it's wrong then that says it right.
      We got try to feel for each other, let our brother's know that we care.
      Got to get the message, send it out loud and clear.

      (Chorus)

      It's a simple truth we all need, just to hear and to see.
      None of us are free, one of us is chained.
      None of us are free.
      now I swear your salvation isn't too hard too find,
      None of us can find it on our own.
      We've got to join together in sprirt, heart and mind.
      So that every soul who's suffering will know they're not alone.

      (Chorus)

      If you just look around you,
      your gonna see what I say.
      Cause the world is getting smaller each passing day.
      Now it's time to start making changes,
      and it's time for us all to realize,
      that the truth is shining real bright right before our eyes.

      (Chorus and Fade)

    • 2 years ago
  • pandaman2105
  • bailey78
  • Conniepae
    • 0
      Conniepae  
    • bailey78:

      Growing your own sounds good, all it takes is a seed, soil and water. But, in many states cultivation is automatic jail time. I would rather fight to have cannabis hemp reclassified. I'm 54, I don't have time to spend in jail. My days are passing far too fast as it is.

      It's time to reclassify cannabis hemp and let the conversation and research begin. Many, many years ago Americans grew hemp for industry. Long before we were so technologically advanced. I think with modern technology, cannabis hemp possibilities are limitless. We really should be having the conversation, for our economy and our environment. Hemp is 100% biodegradable and can replace many of the products, which are destroying our environment.

    • 2 years ago
  • bailey78
    • 0
      bailey78  
    • bailey78:

      I'm with you 101% but I will still put the seed in the ground. I don't blame you for not growing your own. Some times it's safer just to get it from friends. Yes I also believe that many things can and should be made from hemp and hemp byproducts. The petrol Chemacal companies would loose a lot of money from it. How ever Us as Americans would profit from the use of hemp and hemp products. All we can do is vote for change in the Laws that we have now.

    • 2 years ago
  • a_d_4_m
    • 0
      a_d_4_m  

    • bombastinator....do you think killing ~witches~ is okay? The law once required innocent people to be tortured and killed...sometimes it's wiser to think with your own mind rather than enforce idiotic rules. We are human, we are capable of making decisions, don't be stupid like the cops...they are generally people who can't make it anywhere else in the world, they are those who can't think, they lack originality and uninqueness...poor power tripping critters

    • 2 years ago
  • spacemikey
    • 0
      spacemikey [removed]  

    • I think they all play a part in it, from the police officer unions to big pharma. To probably even the logging industries because they know if you legalize pot, you gotta legalize hemp too.

      Too many people are making a living or more successful living due to pot prohibition. And just think what would happen if there were a change in policy, and people had to admit that prohibition was wrong? Even if the government wormed it's way out of compensating the countless people it has wrongly imprisoned, or otherwise abused; they're to proud to admit they were wrong.

      I think that's what a lot of it boils down to... pride.

      It's outrageous though, I could go out and buy a liter of 151 (legally) and probably die drinking the whole thing as fast as I could. If I went out and bought a pound of pot and started smoking as fast and as much as I could, I probably wouldn't make it through a quarter oz. before passing out, and that would be about the worse consequence other than maybe waking up still high......

      Now which one has more grounds for being legal?

    • 2 years ago
  • freshfish
  • bailey78
  • remanns
  • KaylaMoon
  • bombastinator
    • 0
      bombastinator  

    • so the police are a cabal because they are enforcing the law? This is like saying that the true enemy of the gourmet is the health department because they enforce safety regulations.

      The police didn't raid the shops because they were selling cannabis, they did it because they were doing some of it in an illegal manner.

    • 2 years ago
  • freshfish
    • 0
      freshfish  
    • bombastinator:

      They do it because they are sensing the game is almost over and the monies they were getting on the side, not to mention the almost unlimited power these assholes wield is hopefully about to be stripped from them.
      These police unions are scary in some parts of this country, modern day integrated S.S. preaching their personal beliefs on the rest of us via the POLICE. They have forgotten that they serve the public, not the other way around.

      The Sad thing is none of our office holders will stand up to them because they can not get re-elected without the support of the local police unions.

    • 2 years ago
  • bombastinator
    • 0
      bombastinator  
    • bombastinator:

      >"the almost unlimited power these assholes wield is hopefully about to be stripped from them"<
      Police have FEWER rights and powers of arrest than private citizens. Strange but true. They just have training in how to apply them. Security guards actually have a lot more leeway than cops do. They don't have to follow Miranda rules for example.

      From what you wrotehere you seem to somehow think that society is somehow going to get rid of police or something and this is all somehow based on pot legalization?! There's got to be something else wrong in your head there besides too much cannabis. Huffing maybe. Police powers or job security is simply not threatened by pot legalization. They just have no reason to care in that way.

    • 2 years ago
  • idealist
  • bombastinator
    • 0
      bombastinator  
    • idealist:

      hemp is not all it's cracked up to be. It's good and worthwhile, but it's not that desperately game changing. If it was we would import more of it. There are countries that produce it you know.

    • 2 years ago
  • FoosMaster
  • idealist
  • hunzedog
    • 0
      hunzedog  

    • i bet emery is having second thoughts now......jail sucks.
      everybody gets the gitmo treatment in jail !!!!!they say cuz i smoke pot im a terrorist ? the president smokes pot. so does clinton.........go arrest them you chumps.

    • 2 years ago
  • bombastinator
  • hunzedog
    • 0
      hunzedog  

    • you should join LEAP NOW> before we come kick your fu)king door in and take all your shit.! ! put you in jail and take all of your guns and rights away. because you are not responsible. you are all on powertrips. you forget who you work for ....we have you surrounded ..you are surrounded ....you have betrayed the people you should be protecting. what the hell is wrong with you ........repent

    • 2 years ago
  • hunzedog
  • hunzedog
    • 0
      hunzedog  

    • free all the slaves locked up in the drug war, if they were non-violent offenders set them free!. or you are the violent offenders !!!!............assholes !

    • 2 years ago
  • H0M3GR0WN
  • hunzedog
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