DEA Conference Call Pressures AG Eric Holder To Take A Stand On Marijuana Legalization
The Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) and various drug czars appear to be gearing up for a Constitutional showdown with states considering legalizing marijuana. One of the alleged goals of the cannabis conference call was to put pressure on Attorney General Eric Holder to make a public statement opposing ballot initiatives drafted to allow the controlled and taxed sale of marijuana in multiple states.
Both DEA officials and Office of National Drug Control Policy directors voiced a stringent reminder to the Department of Justice (DOJ) that, if state legalization of marijuana measures pass, such transactions would still violate federal law, the Huffington Post reports.
Conference call moderator and former DEA President, Peter Bensinger, had this to say during the multiple agency communication:
“Next month in Colorado, Oregon, and Washington states, voters will vote on legalizing marijuana. Federal law, the US Constitution, and Supreme Court decisions say this cannot be done because federal law preempts state law. And there is a bigger danger that touches every one of us – legalizing marijuana threatens public health and safety. In states that have legalized medical marijuana, drug driving arrests, accidents, and drug overdose deaths have skyrocketed. Drug treatment admissions are up and the number of teens using this gateway drug is up dramatically.”
Co-Director of the Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol group from Colorado, Mason Tvert, had this to say about the marijuana legalization conference call:
“We believe anything claimed by participants on the call today needs to be taken with many grains of salt. These people have made a living off marijuana prohibition and the laws that keep this relatively benign substance illegal. The nation wastes billions of taxpayer dollars annually on the failed policy of marijuana prohibition and people like Bill Bennett and John Walters are among the biggest cheerleaders for wasting billions more. The call today should be taken as seriously as an event by former coal industry CEOs opposing legislation curtailing greenhouse gas emissions. They are stuck in a certain mindset and no level of evidence demonstrating the weakness of their position will change their views.”
A plethora of anti-marijuana decriminalization officials encompassing the entire alphabet soup of Washington, D.C., agencies were in on the call imploring Attorney General Holder to acknowledge the pending dismissal of federal law in multiple states. The conference call expanded on a message sent to Eric Holder in September urging him to oppose the pending pot legalization ballot issues. In 2010, the Attorney General promised to “vigorously enforce” federal marijuana statutes, but, with only a few weeks left before the presidential election, he has remained decidedly mum on the controversial topic.
Considering America’s struggling economy, the need to create jobs, and generate tax revenue for necessary domestic programs, is there really a legitimate reason not to treat marijuana like booze and permit the sale of cannabis to consenting adults?
Tags : attorney general eric holder, campaign to regulate marijuana like alcohol, cannabis, DEA conference call, legalization of marijuana, legalizing marijuana, marijuana legalization, marijuana prohibition, medical marijuana, office of national drug control policy
Posted: October 15, 2012
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Oct 16, 2012
How can any responsible parent not desire a saner drug policy, and one that’s based on facts rather than reefer madness? Prohibition guarantees that many illegal drugs are far easier for our children to procure than even alcohol or nicotine. That's because, even though these are both very dangerous and addictive drugs, they are at least sold in properly controlled and regulated environments.
Under our present regime, certain plants/concoctions/drugs are sold only by criminals and terrorists; the huge black-market profits are used to threaten innocent civilians, bribe law enforcement officials, and buy support from unconscionable politicians; the availability and usage rates tend to go up, not down, and our prisons have become filled to capacity with easily replaced vendors and smugglers —this list of dangerous and negative consequences is actually endless. To continue prohibition is ludicrous, and those of us who can't see that by now, must be either severely and mentally challenged or using something far stronger than any of us have even heard of.
Why on earth should we be willing to whack ourselves with ever-bigger and more-repressive prohibition hammers, while drug use and availability keep going up, not down, and while we all plunge deeper into Loserville?
Prohibition is the most destructive, dysfunctional, dishonest and racist social policy since Slavery. Prohibition is a holocaust in slow motion. We MUST end it NOW!
Oct 16, 2012
http://www.upworthy.com/meet-the-17-year-old-who-blew-the-lid-off-racial-profiling-with-his-ipod?g=2
Oct 16, 2012
Consider INVESTING in the full legalization movement with stock symbol MJNA (Medical Marijuana Inc) — With the most recent polls surging in Washington (37 and 24 point leads — ALL with majority leads) and Colorado (11 and 5 points leads), there's no telling where this will go in November.
Oct 16, 2012
no its easier to put minorities and kids in prison and ruin their damn lives than it is for our government to act in a sane manner about pot. meanwhile booze islegal, and drunks kill thousands on the highways; cigarettes are legal and they kill hundreds of thousands a year, run our medical costs through the roof, and are more addictive than heroin. the laws against pot are racist, fascist nonsense.
Oct 16, 2012
These are the people responsible for the $1.5 trillion spent by them and accomplishing nothing,,I hope Holder is smart ewnough not to listen to them.
Oct 16, 2012
These are ex-federal employees and appointees, all responsible for the failure of the war on drugs and now they want the federal government to increase spending by attacking states where the people have spoken and are attempting to stop some of the damage their policies have caused,, what constitution did they read?
Oct 19, 2012
This "article" is packed full of lies.. You can't overdose on marijuana. It has never happened. I live in Washington State where we have legal medical marijuana and there have no problems other the DEA forcing the closing of shops for being within 1000 feet of a school. And they have used the "school" designation loosely as in a Sunday school class.
Oct 26, 2012
These guys are over reaching, We all know this has been a huge lie started by a racially prejudice politician. & he did it w/o the knowledge of the AMA, & other medical Assns., it was known as cannabis to them. when Anslinger did this he called it by its slang name, marijuana.We the people are not that stupid in this day & age, but the DEA thinks we are.
Nov 3, 2012
"" In states that have legalized medical marijuana, drug driving arrests, accidents, and drug overdose deaths have skyrocketed. Drug treatment admissions are up and the number of teens using this gateway drug is up dramatically.”.
PURE LIES and Propaganda. Not even close to accurate information.
Dec 7, 2012
Federal law is wrong and should be done away with.
Dec 7, 2012
You know, if Eric Holder is going to keep enforcing these screwed up laws, then I he should also take the blame for Operation Fast and Furious (even though it wasn't his baby he still knew about it)right along with everyone else in the last administration that had a hand in implementing the program to "supposedly" track illegal gun sales to organized criminals (but was actually devised to arm them instead).