Two Democratic veteran prosecutors are running for prosecutor in Snohomish County, Washington. One is running as a drug reformer. Can his stance lead him to victory?
A tea party insurgent running for the Kentucky Republican gubernatorial nomination said last week he support hemp production. That makes two hempsters in the 2011 race.
In a forthcoming study for the Cato Institute, Jeffrey A. Miron, senior lecturer on economics at Harvard University and a senior fellow at Cato, and Katherine Waldock, professor of economics at New York University, estimate that legalizing drugs would save the government approximately $41.3 billion annually on expenditures related to the enforcement of prohibition. Just as important, drug legalization would translate into higher tax revenues generated by the sale of these newly-legalized products in the open commercial marketplace. Drug legalization would yield tax revenues of $46.7 billion annually, assuming legal drugs were taxed at rates comparable to those on alcohol and tobacco, they said.
Oakland is about to become the first city to authorize large scale marijuana cultivation. The move could generate millions of dollars in taxes and create hundreds of new jobs. While the measure has yet to pass, current medical marijuana growers fear the move will drive many of them out of business.
Looking Backwards: Portland Police Chief James Craig
In California, small time pot possession is still a misdemeanor even though the maximum sentence is a $100 fine. The legislature has just passed a bill to fully decriminalize it by making it an infraction.