Industrial Marijuana Farming Approved In Oakland 690
Trintech writes "According to MSNBC: 'The city of Oakland, California on Tuesday legalized large-scale marijuana cultivation for medical use and will issue up to four permits for "industrial" cultivation starting next year.
The move by the San Francisco Bay Area city aims to bring medical marijuana cultivation into the open and allow the city to profit by taxing those who grow it.
The resolution passed the city council easily after a nearly four-hour debate that pitted small-scale "garden" growers against advocates of a bigger, industrial system that would become a "Silicon Valley" of pot.' Yes, you read that right. MSNBC just compared computer chip fabrication to pot cultivation."
Northern California (Score:4, Informative)
Although, it would be illegal to grow GMO weed there (search for "Measure H" [wikipedia.org]).
Re:Starting to think of moving to the USA... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Starting to think of moving to the USA... (Score:5, Informative)
Don't move yet. The USA at the federal government level doesn't approve of this (though they are currently turning an INFORMAL blind eye to it), and may well jail anyone who actually tries to run an industrial scale marijuana farm.
Re:lol (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Great Outcome Ridiculous Reasons (Score:3, Informative)
Compared to taxes? Are you crazy?
That is a one time thing, this is on going income.
Re:Pass it to the Left (Score:3, Informative)
Easy solution - eat it instead (Score:4, Informative)
Brownies, cookies and other baked goods. Maybe even a tossed salad with a garnish of buds. Smoking and inhaling is totally not required. For those who are worried about adverse effects of smoking on health, ingestion should do just fine.
Re:Starting to think of moving to the USA... (Score:5, Informative)
That doesn't matter according to the current interpretation of the interstate commerce clause.
The production and sale of pot in California affects the supply and demand within the state, and therefore affects the interstate illegal trade of pot.
It is the same reason that the interstate commerce clause can be used to jail you for building your own automatic weapon. Because by building it yourself, you didn't buy it from a hypothetical supplier that may have been in another state.
Insane? Absolutely. But that is how things work these days.
Re:How long will that last? (Score:5, Informative)
but interstate commerce is domain of the federal government. Pot growing and sale is interstate commerce even if it doesn't leave the state it was grown in. Gonzalez v. Raich, 545 U.S. 1 (2005). An enumerated right does not mean that what is being regulated is specifically stated in the Constitution. That is, you cannot say that the federal government cannot regulate drugs, because it does not specifically say they can regulate drugs in the Constitution.
Re:That didn't take long (Score:2, Informative)
And it is not in the Constitution.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life,_liberty_and_the_pursuit_of_happiness [wikipedia.org]
Re:That didn't take long (Score:3, Informative)
If it has to be "medicine" for "sick people" then so be it; eventually it'll be legal and commercialized.
During prohibition they had the same loophole - you could get a prescription for alcohol for medicinal purposes.
Walgreens went from ~10 stores to ~400 stores during the decade of prohibition and it wasn't by selling milkshakes.
Re:Starting to think of moving to the USA... (Score:3, Informative)
Ayep. Read up on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gonzales_v._Raich [wikipedia.org]
This decision was one of the most dispiriting things about law skool.
Re:Starting to think of moving to the USA... (Score:3, Informative)
Legal pot states
http://medicalmarijuana.procon.org/view.resource.php?resourceID=000881 [procon.org]
1. Alaska 98 1 oz usable; 6 plants (3 mature, 3 immature)
2. California 96 8 oz usable; 18 plants (6 mature, 12 immature)**
3. Colorado 00 2 oz usable; 6 plants (3 mature, 3 immature)
4. Hawaii
5. Maine
6. Michigan
7. Montana
8. Nevada
9. New Jersey
10. New Mexico
11. Oregon
12. Rhode Island
13. Vermont
14. Washington
Several recently (2006-2010) so it is probably gaining momentum.
Re:Oakland needs to mellow out (Score:5, Informative)
Fibres from the marijuana plant produce a material stronger then cotton at a much lower cost to produce (faster growth time, higher yield per plant, able to withstand harsher environmental conditions) thus you have to oft quoted stoner conspiracy that the anti-weed movement was sponsored by America's cotton growers.
Psychological and physiological health issues are shown to be less then that of legal Alcohol and Tobacco. With Marijuana smoke carrying considerably less carcinogens then tobacco smoke, although I'd definitely be behind a dont bong and drive campaign as reaction times are slowed down more then when using alcohol.
I'd also like the US to stop pushing drug laws on other nations. I'd like a "happy" pizza in Cambodia.
Re:How long will that last? (Score:3, Informative)
Taxation will only get so far based on the Laffer curve
Yep... to add to this, though, AFAIK studies that have been done indicate that the maximum is well to the right (higher taxation) side of where the U.S. gov't has tax rates now...
Re:Oakland needs to mellow out (Score:3, Informative)
Fibres from the marijuana plant produce a material stronger then cotton at a much lower cost to produce (faster growth time, higher yield per plant, able to withstand harsher environmental conditions) thus you have to oft quoted stoner conspiracy that the anti-weed movement was sponsored by America's cotton growers.
I believe it was Hearst, and the soft pulp wood guys who were often seen as starting the "reefer madness" not the cotton growers.