Sessions, Pot, The UNITED S Of A, & State Laws That Are Illegal

[Silhouette]

Essentially, yes. But I don't see the majority of any state voting to legalize heroin. Do you?

Yes I do. If the same rationale is applied to heroin as it was to pot. Are you really that daft? I'll bet the revenues a state could glean off of legal heroin sales would be huge.

You know...I hear heroin is getting really popular these days with recreational use...

The "rationale" you're describing isn't the main reason why people have voted to legalize marijuana. They voted that way because the average American just doesn't think weed is that bad anymore.

Soon the average American just won't think heroin is that bad anymore. I mean, it does kill pain and helps alleviate immediate stress. A lot of people are in pain or stressed out these days so...? Plus, it would be an excellent opportunity for regular folks to produce pain-killing substances in their backyard gardens for sale commercially to compete with drug-company grade opioids.

Remember, that was the rationale for medical use pot before it shoehorned its way into recreational use.

 

[martybegan]

Fed law trumps state law. I do think sessions is biased cause he is about lazy as fuck when it comes to his job. THIS is what is important?
Fed gov shouldnt have a say in pot anyways. You know, the Constitution and all. Pretty sure the COTUS trumps fed law

The easy way out is for Congress to modify the Controlled Substances act of 1971 to remove pot from the list of banned substances.

But Congress won't- because they are all too chickenshit to do the responsible thing.

None of them want to be labeled as 'soft on drugs'.

Which is why it was left to the states to do the right thing.

The problem is it creates a situation where people in the trade still run the risk of federal prosecution. And all Obama's directive did was de-emphasize federal interest in pot cases where pot is legal, it never told them to stop.

Democrats could gain a wedge issue if they tried to get this in the floor, and I bet they could get enough republicans onboard.

All this does is force the issue, and that's a good thing, even if Sessions intentions are different.

I think Trump would sign a modification to the 1971 controlled substances act if congress acted.

Frankly I have no clue where Trump would go with the issue.

But I will state again- I think that the majority of Congress- on both sides- are too chickenshit to make any move on this.

Frankly if the Democrats did make that move, the GOP would be all over them labelling them soft on drug- AND soft on crime. And frankly the Democrats would do the same to any GOP congressman.

It would take a bipartisan group of congess with the balls to bring it forward- and I don't see much interest in bipartisan anything in Washington right now.

This may be the one issue that can get passed by both parties. Public opinion is in favor of at least letting the States handle it.

 

[Syriusly]

The Federal government does not have the right to enforce any Federal law in any state- because Federal laws themselves can violate the Constitution.

I guess Sessions is out then to test your theory.

Actually I think Sessions is a rabid Prohibitionist who would have been on board with the Prohibition in 1919.
I think Sessions believes marijuana is evil and that those who use it are evil and his god driven mission is to save people from the evils of marijuana.

However, I think that Sessions opening the doors to enforcement(remember Sessions supposedly has not told his lawyers to take action yet- just authorized them to do so), will lead to some prosecutions and if they happen in California- California will step in and fight the Constitutionality of the law.

Which will lead to some interesting court battles. I frankly don't know how the courts would rule- even though I do not see how Federal drug laws can possibly be considered Constitutional for commerce within a state.

 

[Silhouette]

However, I think that Sessions opening the doors to enforcement(remember Sessions supposedly has not told his lawyers to take action yet- just authorized them to do so), will lead to some prosecutions and if they happen in California- California will step in and fight the Constitutionality of the law.

Which will lead to some interesting court battles. I frankly don't know how the courts would rule- even though I do not see how Federal drug laws can possibly be considered Constitutional for commerce within a state.

Then in a purely legal sense, you are for the legalization of heroin if a state should want to do that outside FDA regulations?

 

[Syriusly]

Essentially, yes. But I don't see the majority of any state voting to legalize heroin. Do you?

Yes I do. If the same rationale is applied to heroin as it was to pot. Are you really that daft? I'll bet the revenues a state could glean off of legal heroin sales would be huge.

You know...I hear heroin is getting really popular these days with recreational use...

The "rationale" you're describing isn't the main reason why people have voted to legalize marijuana. They voted that way because the average American just doesn't think weed is that bad anymore.

Soon the average American just won't think heroin is that bad anymore. I mean, it does kill pain and helps alleviate immediate stress. A lot of people are in pain or stressed out these days so...? Plus, it would be an excellent opportunity for regular folks to produce pain-killing substances in their backyard gardens for sale commercially to compete with drug-company grade opioids.

Except of course the reality is that we have an epidemic of Americans dying from illegal opioid use right now- there has never been an 'epidemic' of Americans dying from marijuana use- because marijuana doesn't kill people. It is safer than alcohol, cigarettes or of course heroin- or even prescription opioids.

Heroin is just your straw man because you have run out of arguments.

 

[theDoctorisIn]

Essentially, yes. But I don't see the majority of any state voting to legalize heroin. Do you?

Yes I do. If the same rationale is applied to heroin as it was to pot. Are you really that daft? I'll bet the revenues a state could glean off of legal heroin sales would be huge.

You know...I hear heroin is getting really popular these days with recreational use...

The "rationale" you're describing isn't the main reason why people have voted to legalize marijuana. They voted that way because the average American just doesn't think weed is that bad anymore.

Soon the average American just won't think heroin is that bad anymore. I mean, it does kill pain and helps alleviate immediate stress. A lot of people are in pain or stressed out these days so...? Plus, it would be an excellent opportunity for regular folks to produce pain-killing substances in their backyard gardens for sale commercially to compete with drug-company grade opioids.

Remember, that was the rationale for medical use pot before it shoehorned its way into recreational use.

Do you really expect that the average American is ever going to decide that heroin isn't that bad?

This is the mistake that you guys made when you classified cannabis as a Schedule 1 drug - you thought that people would always believe that it was "the same" as heroin.

But anyone who's ever smoked it knows it's not the same - and those kids who smoked pot in the 60s and 70s now have kids and grandkids of their own - all who know that Reefer Madness is a joke and weed isn't the devil. That's why it's being legalized.

Do you honestly ever see that happening with heroin? I don't.

(As a side note - it's already not illegal to grow a poppy plant in your yard)

 

[Syriusly]

However, I think that Sessions opening the doors to enforcement(remember Sessions supposedly has not told his lawyers to take action yet- just authorized them to do so), will lead to some prosecutions and if they happen in California- California will step in and fight the Constitutionality of the law.

Which will lead to some interesting court battles. I frankly don't know how the courts would rule- even though I do not see how Federal drug laws can possibly be considered Constitutional for commerce within a state.

Then in a purely legal sense, you are for the legalization of heroin if a state should want to do that outside FDA regulations?

Then in a purely legal sense, you are for the legalization of slavery, if the Constitution is changed to allow legal slavery.

 

[Syriusly]

You aren't understanding how this stuff works.

A state can't pass a law that tells the federal government what to do, any more than the federal government can pass laws to tell the state government what to do.

Well then I guess any state can adopt a law that legalizes illegal aliens, bans the distribution of mail, guts the enforcement of the FCC, bans collection of federal taxes, evicts military bases and makes heroin legal...?

No, they can't, can they?

How many times do I have to explain this before it will get through your head?

Immigration, the post office, the FCC, the IRS and the military are not under the purview of any state governments. The state government has no power over them, and therefore can't pass laws to control them in any way.

On the other hand, local law enforcement is entirely under the purview of the state it's in - and therefore the state has control over them.

When a state "legalizes" marijuana, they are essentially just ordering the state's law enforcement that possession or sale of marijuana is no longer a crime, and they should no longer arrest people for it. That's all the "legalization" does. If the DEA wants to go to Colorado and arrest some hippies, they can do that - and the state can't do anything about it.

Where states might go- and this is just a wild hare- is that the State's may take some action to involve themselves in pot operations so that any prosecution within a state will involve the state somehow- so that the State can pursue a Constitutional case in the courts against the law.

If the Feds pursue this in California, I am fairly certain California would seek some avenue to challenge the constitutionality of the Federal laws in this case.

 

[Silhouette]

Then in a purely legal sense, you are for the legalization of slavery, if the Constitution is changed to allow legal slavery.

(Like the heroin argument Dr.Is in posed) "Surely you don't believe that a majority of Congress would decide that slavery was good for the Union?"...

 

[LaDexter]

Soon the average American just won't think heroin is that bad anymore.

This is the straw man BS from the legal lobby, that we, as people, need big government and the lawyer profession to "guide us" into emptying our wallets into our lawyers' wallets.

Cigarettes, booze, those two are clearly much worse than pot.

OxyContin is worse than pot, yet Jeff Sessions took a huge boatload of $$$$$$$$$$$ to vote for socializing senior drugs and hence, as the libertarians were saying at the time, flooded our high schools with cheap, taxpayer funded OxyContin.

So, if your kid smokes pot, Jeff Sessions hates him.

If your kid is addicted to OxyContin, Jeff Sessions smirks thinking of all that $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
he got for voting to make OxyContin readily available to your kid....

Jeff Sessions has no redeeming qualities at all. He was a completely treasonous big spending whore of a "conservative" Senator. Now, he is bottling up every indictment a Fed Grand Jury gives him to allow him to ask the defendant for more $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ to drop the case...

So far, to date, he has dropped EVERY CASE.

 

[Silhouette]

Where states might go- and this is just a wild hare- is that the State's may take some action to involve themselves in pot operations so that any prosecution within a state will involve the state somehow- so that the State can pursue a Constitutional case in the courts against the law.

If the Feds pursue this in California, I am fairly certain California would seek some avenue to challenge the constitutionality of the Federal laws in this case.

And, because of other Schedule 1 drugs and the legal process for adding or removing them (at the federal level only), states so challenging would lose.

You may not understand how precedent works, but the USSC does.

 

[Syriusly]

Fed law trumps state law. I do think sessions is biased cause he is about lazy as fuck when it comes to his job. THIS is what is important?
Fed gov shouldnt have a say in pot anyways. You know, the Constitution and all. Pretty sure the COTUS trumps fed law

The easy way out is for Congress to modify the Controlled Substances act of 1971 to remove pot from the list of banned substances.

But Congress won't- because they are all too chickenshit to do the responsible thing.

None of them want to be labeled as 'soft on drugs'.

Which is why it was left to the states to do the right thing.

The problem is it creates a situation where people in the trade still run the risk of federal prosecution. And all Obama's directive did was de-emphasize federal interest in pot cases where pot is legal, it never told them to stop.

Democrats could gain a wedge issue if they tried to get this in the floor, and I bet they could get enough republicans onboard.

All this does is force the issue, and that's a good thing, even if Sessions intentions are different.

I think Trump would sign a modification to the 1971 controlled substances act if congress acted.

Frankly I have no clue where Trump would go with the issue.

But I will state again- I think that the majority of Congress- on both sides- are too chickenshit to make any move on this.

Frankly if the Democrats did make that move, the GOP would be all over them labelling them soft on drug- AND soft on crime. And frankly the Democrats would do the same to any GOP congressman.

It would take a bipartisan group of congess with the balls to bring it forward- and I don't see much interest in bipartisan anything in Washington right now.

This may be the one issue that can get passed by both parties. Public opinion is in favor of at least letting the States handle it.

I would love to see it happen. I just will be amazed if it does.

Now- if Trump proposed it- then I could see it happening.

 

[g5000]

Use of legalized marijuana threatened as Sessions rescinds Obama-era directive that eased federal enforcement

Ok. So there's a conflict. Some states say pot is legal. The fed says it's not. Yet we are the UNITED states of America, bound under federal laws on certain vital issues to preserve the cohesion of the Union. Like it or not, narcotics are part of those federally regulated ideas. Presumably someone thought that it might not be good for productivity as a nation, nor as a strong citizenry to all be laced out on mind-altering drugs; easy pickin's for enemies internally and abroad.

Be that as it may, it is what it is. Likewise we have federal laws about immigration, collecting taxes, child trafficking, tampering with the mail, etc. etc.

What California, Colorado and all the other states that "legalized" pot did wrong was: they disobeyed federal law. Let's take CA as an example. There, some folks got a petition together to get an initiative on the ballot. The petition from there goes to Sacramento for approval for inclusion on the ballot. The minute a petition suggesting breaking federal law passed their desks in Sacramento, that's where the idea was mandated to die. Just because those people decided to let the farce continue, doesn't make it any more legal than if CA decided to vote on whether or not illegal aliens can become citizens without due process...or if CA decided on its own that the fed couldn't collect taxes there. Or if CA voted that the fed could no longer have military bases in CA.

The initiative "legalizing" pot is an illegal initiative. It is null and void upon its face. It was mandated to have never gotten beyond Sacramento's process of sifting through legal and illegal initiatives. That's where the failure was. Ignorance is no excuse. Not even in Sacramento. They are mandated to follow the law.

What should have been done by these states who wanted legal pot, or any other federal statute revoked for some new trend, would have been to lobby Congress to change the federal listing of pot as Schedule 1 first, then downgrade it to a "legal" substance for recreation. But they jumped the gun and did it wrong. There seems to be a lot of that going on lately where states suddenly adopt some trend, usually some social trend from CA, and then force all other 49 states to abide by changing the law from the bottom up, without Congress' (the other 49 states') input.

This is a VERY bad precedent to set. It threatens the Union when rogue states force other states without their representation, to adopt repugnant ideas or laws without having a single voice of say in the process. Think about it. Sometimes even just one rogue judge in one rogue state can radically change longstanding social mores of all 50 states without their input or say, outside the Constitution and Congress, if the appeals process is oiled well enough for that rogue decision....

How Does California's Ballot Measure Process Work?

The proponents must submit the draft proposal to the Attorney General’s Office where the public can view it online and comment on it. This comment period lasts 30 days, and the proponents have five days following the end of the comment period to amend the proposal.....Within 50 days of submission to the Attorney General, the Legislative Analyst’s Office and Department of Finance conduct a joint analysis on the proposal’s expected impact on state and local revenues, as well as estimated costs. The Attorney General’s Office uses this analysis to write the title and summary for the measure, which will be submitted to the Secretary of State and included on the signature gathering petitions.

So the CA AG was remiss in allowing a federally-illegal proposal to go forward in the first place! I think this was Kamala Harris who allowed this illegal ballot measure to proceed. Those of you who invested tons and now stand to lose tons because you just realized pot is federally illegal, can thank Kamala Harris for leading you astray.

It's funny how you tards are for states rights, until you aren't.

 

[busybee01]

You aren't understanding how this stuff works.

A state can't pass a law that tells the federal government what to do, any more than the federal government can pass laws to tell the state government what to do.

Well then I guess any state can adopt a law that legalizes illegal aliens, bans the distribution of mail, guts the enforcement of the FCC, bans collection of federal taxes, evicts military bases and makes heroin legal...?

No, they can't, can they?

States do not have to enforce federal immigration laws, they could set separate rules on issues the FCC deals with, and federal taxes are a part of the constitution.

 

[KissMy]

Opioids & Meth are out of control, yet Sessions want's to divert resources attention away to attack Pot! He has to please Repubtards Big Pharma & Tobacco Masters!

 

[usmbguest5318]

So there's a conflict. Some states say pot is legal. The fed says it's not.

Which because of federal supremacy, if federal law enforcement officers -- park police, FBI, Secret Service, etc, -- and prosecutors are of a mind to arrest, charge and prosecute one, what state law has to say about it is irrelevant.

I have my suspicion about why Sessions somewhat stepped up enforcement of "Mary Jane" laws. I surmise that the DOJ will use them to apprehend and deport DACAs and to get around "sanctuary city" protections. They may even go so far as to use "weed" laws for leverage against folks whom the feds don't particularly want to incarcerate, but who may otherwise be reluctant to "give up" someone whom the feds do want.


OT Aside:

Writing about laws and leverage reminded me that some years back in a conversation about gun rights, an attorney friend of mine noted that were Democrats of a mind to "take away people's guns," all they'd need to do is increase enforcement of "weed laws" and DUI laws and lower the threshold for making possession a felony. The very opposite of that is what Democrats have been advocating, and for quite some time.​

 

[Syriusly]

Where states might go- and this is just a wild hare- is that the State's may take some action to involve themselves in pot operations so that any prosecution within a state will involve the state somehow- so that the State can pursue a Constitutional case in the courts against the law.

If the Feds pursue this in California, I am fairly certain California would seek some avenue to challenge the constitutionality of the Federal laws in this case.

And, because of other Schedule 1 drugs and the legal process for adding or removing them (at the federal level only), states so challenging would lose.

You may not understand how precedent works, but the USSC does.

What 'precedent' are you speaking of Silly? There probably is some case regarding the Federal law but I don't know what it is- nor do you.

 

[Silhouette]

Opioids & Meth are out of control, yet Sessions want's to divert resources attention away to attack Pot!

All are Schedule 1. He must attack all of them equally by law. If you don't like it, have states petition Congress to change the listing. Until then, Sessions has a mandate to preserve prohibition of Schedule 1 narcotics for recreational sale.

 

[LaDexter]

if federal law enforcement officers -- park police

I remember when the PARK POLICE rushed in and declared Vince Foster a "suicide" without any autopsy or rational examination of the facts. Meanwhile, because it was a "suicide," it was NOT a CRIME for Hillary to rampage through Foster's office that night, looting all incriminating files....

 

[Syriusly]

Just because Congress is "chickenshit" doesn't mean individual states may override their decision process...

States pass laws that are in conflict with the Constitution or Federal laws quite often. I pointed out abortion- but gun laws are another example. States can pass any law they want to. The Federal government can either continue to enforce Federal law- or challenge the State laws in court. Or individuals can do so.