Bitchin...
Posted on 02/14/2014 5:51:25 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
As promised, the Obama administration has now officially spoken on the matter of banks and pot dispensaries. According to a memo from the Justice Department, the Treasury will allow banks to accept accounts from marijuana shops. This announcement is meant to encourage banks to do business with legal state dealers, despite the fact that selling marijuana is still illegal under federal law.
It's unclear whether banks will take this encouragement to heart. As Ryan J. Reilly at The Huffington Post explains,
"The DOJ memo falls short of expressly protecting banks that work with state-compliant marijuana businesses from prosecution. It states only that banks that work with businesses that don't violate one of DOJ's eight areas of concern related to the pot trade, like distribution of marijuana to minors, violence and the use of firearms, are less likely to be targeted by federal prosecutors."
In the memo, Deputy Attorney General James Cole wrote (emphasis added), "If a financial institution or individual offers services to a marijuana-related business whose activities do not implicate any of the eight priority factors, prosecution for those offenses may not be appropriate." That "may not" isn't going to help worried banks sleep at night. The Justice Department has lessened, but not eliminated, the threat of federal prosecution.
Still, this is a step in the right direction for legal weed dispensaries, who have been forced to deal almost entirely in cash. As Attorney General Eric Holder expressed in January,
"You don’t want just huge amounts of cash in these places. They want to be able to use the banking system. There’s a public safety component to this. Huge amounts of cash — substantial amounts of cash just kind of lying around with no place for it to be appropriately deposited is something that would worry me, just from a law enforcement perspective."
The Treasury guidelines state that banks dealing with pot businesses should still file a "suspicious activity report," or SAR. The SAR would be "marijuana limited," which means that the bank does not believe the business is doing anything illegal besides selling marijuana.
Treasury officials expect that small and medium-sized banks may begin dealing with pot shops in light of these new guidelines. Bank of America still has a strict policy against accepting dispensaries as customers.
Bitchin...
bump
There are no laws. There are only whims now.
What a duplicitous government we voters have suborned.
Smart gang bangers will open up medical wacky weed shops and it will all be legal.
Look for bammy to move to Colorado after he retires. Not sure where moo moo will be.
No way. Colorado is the boondocks.
Caliph Baraq will be like the Clintons and head to NYC where the spotlight always shines.
You voted for Mr. Obama?
This is a set up. The JUSTUS department is saying that
banks can accept money from marijuana businesses that
if to do so does not violate federal law. The growth,
sale, possession and use of marijuana ALL violate federal
laws. What will happen is these “dispensaries” over the
course of the next year or so will deposit a LOT, a BUTTLOAD, a FREAKIN FREIGHT TRAIN, of cashola into banks.
Once that has occurred the criminals in DC will declare this
money to be the fruit of activity that violates federal laws and seize all that money. Only an IDIOT would put that
money into a US bank.
Of course. They have been for the last thirty years or so for marxists. Senate dims protect the lawless as long as they have to be impeached to be removed from office. Let’s not forget about the courts and federal agencies also.
The dims have taken Colorado now. The dopers will flock there. In the majority they are very likely to vote dim. So...count CO lost for 2016.
If your bank takes weed money, it can keep weed money. PERIOD.
Who would trust this cash hungry government?
A stupid docile stoned population is A Democrat wet dream. More pot smokers does not create more libertarians. It creates more Obama voters. Sucking off the state and Federale tits.
And you get to pay for it!!!! (via taxes)
I’ll bet 80% on up of pot smokers are Obama voters. More legalized marijuana equals more Democrat voters....The Dem operatives just have to get (these idiots) them to the polls or to mail it in
Absentee ballots are ideal for pot heads
Never in this or any other life would I have voted for Obama. But significant numbers of the population apparently did. I never thought the American people would be stupid enough to vote for Carter, they did. I was confident there were not enough idiots to elect Slick. They did. Certainly no one would vote to elect Obama. They did. I can only wonder what the preponderance of Americans will vote for in the future. Surely, Hillary is unelectable. But I have been wrong before...
Yep.
Now folks who sell the hard stuff will have an easy way to launder their cash...
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