OLIVER
COOK: Marijuana does not contribute to terrorism
After watching
yet another commercial stating that the purchase of marijuana supports
terrorism, I realized that I had to write a column illustrating my
disdain for the Bush administration, DEA, and inefficient prohibition
in general.
If I were not
to write this column, I would be engendering the victory of ignorance,
religious fanaticism, and the general desire by authoritarian, poorly
endowed madmen to tell other individuals how to manage their personal
activities.
Enjoy
and please read with an open mind...
Unlike the racist
religious right who criminalized marijuana in the first place (Harrison
Act of 1916), I would like to point out that while marijuana does
not contribute to terrorism, the purchase of cocaine does serve to
fuel the senseless, decades-long war in Columbia. Right-wing paramilitaries,
as well as the brigands who claim to be Marxists, offer protection
for drug lords who in turn supply these groups with money and weapons.
The drug lords
then use the profits from the cocaine trade to literally buy the government,
who in turn looks the other way as insurgency, counterinsurgency,
and terrorism occurs. Not only does cocaine cause long-term damage
to one's body and mind, but it also perpetuates a bloody, potentially
irrevocably damaging war.
The majority of
marijuana, on the other hand, is cultivated domestically, with the
two largest foreign suppliers being Mexico and Canada. While there
may be large cartels that produce vast amounts of marijuana in any
of these three countries, they do not contribute to terrorism.
These cartels
are about making money just like any other businessmen, and the less
criminal activity they engage in outside of cultivation, the better.
The fact is, according to the US Department of Labor, only 40 percent
of cultivators are these large-scale operations. The fact that marijuana
is the most lucrative cash crop on the continent leads to the other
60 percent of cultivators being made up of individuals and small operations
in both rural and urban areas.
A recent statistic
shows that the approximate worth of marijuana cultivation to growers
is between $15-20 billion. The street retail value on the other hand
is between $40-50 billion, and that is were the small businessmen
and women come in. Anybody working a dead-end job in the service sector
can get a piece of this market through a relatively minor investment
and a little patience.
Purchasing marijuana
encourages sustainable development within our own country by keeping
United States currency in circulation within the country. For example,
a Mexican cartel that controls a large operation in California is
going to keep their profits within the United States rather than laundering
large sums back home.
Also, according
to the USDL, the employees of these operations make far more than
any other manufacturing industry, and 50 percent of them possess a
bachelor's degree or higher. Their wages stay here, benefiting local
economies across the country. The marijuana industry makes money for
people through non-violent means - unlike cocaine, crystal meth, heroin,
crack, and other amphetamines, which not only squander the economy,
but support terrorism and sometimes engender domestic violence.
Why then does
the government waste $10 billion a year just on efforts to eradicate
marijuana? This $10 billion is only a fraction of the entire "War
on Drugs" budget, which is between $40-200 billion in both real
and opportunity costs.
It just seems
sensible to decriminalize a harmless plant so as to not only make
incredible profits from taxation, but to also decrease expenditures,
and quit ruining relatively innocent people's lives in an experiment
that has gotten way out of control.
