Posted on 10/21/2012 8:55:10 AM PDT by Oldeconomybuyer
California's annual medical marijuana harvest is just about done, but this year brings a new revelation sweeping the nascent industry: The feel-good herb may not, in fact, be so good for the environment.
From golden Sierra foothills to forested coastal mountains, an explosion of pseudo-legal medical marijuana farms has dramatically changed the state's landscape over the past two years.
A rush to profit from patient demand for pot has resulted in irresponsible forest clearing, illegal stream diversions, and careless pesticide and fertilizer use that has polluted waterways and killed wildlife, state and local government officials said.
(Excerpt) Read more at sacbee.com ...
“The big action, and the big money, is with the criminal growers. Real legalization would make that go away.”
Precisely.
“The War on Drugs has been mishandled as most government programs are but that is not an argument in favor of making drugs legal. Legalization would be just as badly mishandled and the results just as disappointing.”
You fly all over the place and then come to some enormously fallacious conclusion. We have an ACTUAL example of prohibitions’ effect on both criminalization and legalization. Taking alcohol production out of the hands of black marketers is a precise correlation and proves the exact opposite of your conclusion.
Vendome, You are terribly wrong on this issue.
Have you ever lived next to one of these private growers?
Picture this...
Every hour of the day smells like a skunk has moved in under your house! The smell is terrible, and there is no way to get away from it!
My grand children come over and are always asking why our home smells like skunk, and there is no way to explain it away.
It is turning my neighborhood into a stinking mess.
One more thing...
Your referring to “The War on Drugs” as simply mishandled is the most callous understatement since Dear Leader pronounced the deaths in Benghazi as “not optimal”.
“’Scuse me, but since their IS NO Constitutional authority for the federal government to regulate or prohibit ‘drugs’ of any kind.....”
My response dealt with just how far that “IS NO” extended in your opinion.
“And no, it is NOT Constitutional for the feds to regulate anything that crosses the border. They have only a concurrent jurisdiction with the state to collect taxes at the points of entry.”
The states, the federal government and the courts disagree with you and that is the reality we live with. Visas, passports and tariffs are regulations on the border and accepted as constitutional by the courts.
Thanks for the Sam Adams quote. I'm part of the “public” as was Sam. And like him I have to obey laws I may not agree with.
“’ I'll play along and assume from your reply that indeed you do not care about the Constitution.”
I can quote too, if not verbatim, ‘The Constitution is not a suicide pact’.
No, your response was to dodge an assertion by asking questions instead of offering a rebuttal.
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Visas, passports and tariffs are regulations on the border and accepted as constitutional by the courts.
Ah. Now you jump from items to 'persons'.
Well, at least you're consistent....
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I can quote too, if not verbatim, ‘The Constitution is not a suicide pact’.
You're correct, it is not.
It is a treaty between the States for the creation of an administrative organ with a few specified powers.
So again I ask-
Please show me the Constitutional authority possessed by the federal government to regulate or prohibit 'drugs'.
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"The constitution is not an instrument for the government to restrain the people, it is an instrument for the people to restrain the government - lest it come to dominate our lives and interests."
--Patrick Henry
Growing in a national forest avoids all those problems for the grower that doesn't want the oversight that might cut into profits.
Legalization might work like tobacco growing. Heavily regulated and taxed and only the larger companies able to market the end product.
But would legalization stop imports from cheaper growers?
You brushed off the hundreds of dead here and across the border and you think you have a point because I correctly used the modifier simply? You are completely delusional.
I’m not going to engage in defining words for you. I’m just not. If you want to....go for it...be my guest....I’ve better things to do than reply to more petty insults.
LOL! Really? I notice you offer no evidence for that assertion.
They have also held that they could regulate guns under the same clause. Do you agree with that?
FYI- Original Intent
Mr. MADISON was surprised that any gentleman should return to the clauses which had already been discussed. He begged the gentleman to read the clauses which gave the power of exclusive legislation, and he might see that nothing could be done without the consent of the states. With respect to the supposed operation of what was denominated the sweeping clause, the gentleman, he said, was mistaken; for it only extended to the enumerated powers. Should Congress attempt to extend it to any power not enumerated, it would not be warranted by the clause. As to the restriction in the clause under consideration, it was a restraint on the exercise of a power expressly delegated to Congress; namely, that of regulating commerce with foreign nations. St. George Tucker, Blackstone's Commentaries
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This principle is, if possible, still more clear, when applied to commerce "among the several States." They either join each other, in which case they are separated by a mathematical line, or they are remote from each other, in which case other States lie between them. What is commerce "among" them; and how is it to be conducted? Can a trading expedition between two adjoining States, commence and terminate outside of each? And if the trading intercourse be between two States remote from each other, must it not commence in one, terminate in the other, and probably pass through a third? Commerce among the States must, of necessity, be commerce with the States.
Gibbons v. Ogden Chief Justice Marshall
(Notice this Supreme Court of the United States decision says commerce with the States NOT commerce among the People)
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But that is not the point in controversy. It is, whether congress has a right to regulate that, which is not committed to it, under a power, which is committed to it, simply because there is, or may be an intimate connexion between the powers. If this were admitted, the enumeration of the powers of congress would be wholly unnecessary and nugatory. Agriculture, colonies, capital, machinery, the wages of labour, the profits of stock, the rents of land, the punctual performance of contracts, and the diffusion of knowledge would all be within the scope of the power; for all of them bear an intimate relation to commerce. The result would be, that the powers of congress would embrace the widest extent of legislative functions, to the utter demolition of all constitutional boundaries between the state and national governments. When duties are laid, not for purposes of revenue, but of retaliation and restriction, to countervail foreign restrictions, they are strictly within the scope of the power, as a regulation of commerce. But when laid to encourage manufactures, they have nothing to do with it. The power to regulate manufactures is no more confided to congress, than the power to interfere with the systems of education, the poor laws, or the road laws of the states. It is notorious, that, in the convention, an attempt was made to introduce into the constitution a power to encourage manufactures; but it was withheld. Instead of granting the power to congress, permission was given to the states to impose duties, with the consent of that body, to encourage their own manufactures; and thus, in the true spirit of justice, imposing the burthen on those, who were to be benefited. Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution
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The constitution does not discuss drugs per se.
That's right. And where there is no enumeration, there IS NO AUTHORITY!
"The Constitution is a written instrument. As such, its meaning does not alter. That which it meant when it was adopted, it means now."
South Carolina v. United States, 199 U.S. 437, 448 (1905).
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And regulate is regulate, you made no such distinction in your comment, item or persons.
No, I stayed on the subject of the thread, which was drugs.
YOU are the one who went from drugs to tobacco, beef, booze, visas, passports and tariffs.
But it was a very nice attempt at projection-ism on your part.
Read Ganzales vs. Raich. That appears to be one of the latest opinions, other than yours.
And no, I’m not interested in discussing guns here.
The courts have also held that Obamacare is constitutional. Are court decisions your standard for interpreting the Constitution?
And no, I’m not interested in discussing guns here.
You ARE discussing guns when you discuss Raich:
_______________________________________________________________
Stewart appealed his conviction on the grounds that the law making it illegal to “transfer or possess a machinegun” was not a valid exercise of Congress’s power to regulate commerce, and violated his Second Amendment rights to keep and bear arms.
In a previous opinion in the same case, the Ninth Circuit panel agreed with Stewart, holding that possession of a homemade machinegun was not inherently commercial in nature, and that the effect of Stewart’s possessing such guns on interstate commerce was attenuated.
The U.S. Supreme Court then decided the case of Gonzales v. Raich, 125 S. Ct. 2195 (2005) in which it held that Congress’ commerce power extended far enough to allow it to prohibit California residents from growing and using their own marijuana for medicinal purposes pursuant to doctor’s recommendation in compliance with California law.
Supreme Court
The Supreme Court then granted certiorari in Stewart, vacated the Ninth Circuit’s original decision, and remanded the case back for reconsideration in light of Raich.
http://www.metnews.com/articles/2006/stew070306.htm
Uh..No, I wasn't and am not. The question at hand was constitutional authority and drugs. Gonzales v Raich dealt with that question.
LOL! Why not? Neither tariffs, tobacco, visas, beef or booze were the subject of the thread, but you had no trouble throwing THEM into the mix.
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And your response to the multiple examples of sourced material that asserts the commerce clause never had ANY legal authority to operate in the manner in which it is now used is (crickets).
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Typical. You believe the government can do what it does simply because it says it can.
Enjoy your serfdom.
So you support the expansive Commerce Clause? You must, since you cited it for your argument. That's known as spitting on the Tenth Amendment. Read and learn from Justice Thomas:
If Congress can regulate this under the Commerce Clause, then it can regulate virtually anything–and the Federal Government is no longer one of limited and enumerated powers.
J. Thomas, dissenting in Raich
But, but, but.... it's okay because drugs are baaaaaaaad.
LOL!
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Some folks just won't understand that by giving the federal government authority over that which is not expressed, it also gives the federal government authority over that which IS.
And THEY'RE usually the ones who squeal the loudest when their bull gets gored, never realizing they did it to themselves.
I happen to agree with Thomas comment but that wasn't the question or the point I was making.
I'm sure you'll draw whatever conclusions you wish despite the facts.
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