Rebranding Marijuana: How weed could save the economy, end Mexican drug wars, and heal the world

Mexico: 


"We have believed for some time that Mexico should legalize marijuana and perhaps other drugs. But until now, most discussion of this possibility has foundered because our country's drug problem and the U.S. drug problem are so inextricably linked: What our country produces, Americans consume. As a result, the debate over legalization has inevitably gotten hung up over whether Mexico should wait until the United States is willing and able to do the same.

Proposition 19 changes this calculation. For Mexico, California is almost the whole enchilada: Our overall trade with the largest state of the union is huge, an immense number of Californians are of Mexican origin, and an enormous proportion of American visitors to Mexico come from California. Passage of Prop 19 would therefore flip the terms of the debate about drug policy: If California legalizes marijuana, will it be viable for our country to continue hunting down drug lords in Tijuana? Will Wild West-style shootouts to stop Mexican cannabis from crossing the border make any sense when, just over that border, the local 7-Eleven sells pot?"

Héctor Aguilar Camín and Jorge G. Castañeda, The Washington Post

The Economy:

While California struggles to address the state's swelling budget deficit, the legalization of marijuana looms as an attractive way of raising revenue for the state.

The benefits of legalization include:

* An excise tax of $50 per ounce of marijuana would raise about $770 - 900 million per year.

* Retail sales on the legal market would range from $3 - $4.5 billion, generating
another $240 - 360 million in sales taxes.

* Legalization would save over $200 million in law enforcement costs for arrest, prosecution, trial and imprisonment of marijuana offenders. Need for CAMP helicopter surveillance would also be eliminated.

* Based on experience with the cigarette tax, total revenues of $1.5 - $2.5 billion might ultiimately be realized.

* Industrial hemp could also become a major business, comparable to the $3.4 billion cotton industry in California.

Source


The World:

“Hemps prohibition has led to untold suffering around the globe. If we— the global human population — had been able to grow the miracle plant hemp (Cannabis genus) locally and to use it for local industries and businesses, including and especially for fuel, we would never have needed to be addicted to oil...

“None of this oil-related...degradation of the environment would have occurred if hemp had not been prohibited but had been used wisely and intelligently as a major foundation of human society. Indeed, hemp-based economies could still save the human world, while hemp planting could go a massively long way in rescuing the natural world as well.”

Source

How to Manufacture a Global Food Crisis: Lessons from the World Bank, IMF, and WTO

When tens of thousands of people staged demonstrations in Mexico last year to protest a 60 percent increase in the price of tortillas, many analysts pointed to biofuel as the culprit. Because of US government subsidies, American farmers were devoting more and more acreage to corn for ethanol than for food, which sparked a steep rise in corn prices, says Walden Bello.

THE ROLE OF THE USA IN HAITI HUNGER RIOTS

In the same way that US cotton farm subsidies hurt African cotton farmers by depressing the world market, Bill Quigley argues that by subsidizing its rice farmers, the US has gravely hurt Haitian rice farmers. Riots in Haiti over explosive rises in food costs have claimed the lives of six people. There have also been food riots world-wide in Burkina Faso, Cameroon,Cote d'Ivoire, Egypt, Guinea, Mauritania, Mexico, Morocco, Senegal, Uzbekistan and Yemen.

The Economist, which calls the current crisis the silent tsunami, reports that last year wheat prices rose 77% and rice 16%, but since January rice prices have risen 141%. The reasons include rising fuel costs, weather problems, increased demand in China and India, as well as the push to create biofuels from cereal crops.

Mexican norteño musicians murders

In the last several years, at least one dozen Mexican norteño musicians have been murdered in a wave of violence bearing the brazenness and brutality of Mexico’s drug cartels. Most of the victims performed what are known as “narcocorridos,” popular folk songs that tell the stories of the Mexican drug trade — and, depending on who you ask, celebrate its leaders as folk heroes.

For years, the cartels encouraged these types of songs; in fact, many traffickers commissioned well-known musicians to write about their exploits. But now, in the midst of a government offensive against the traffickers and brutal infighting among the cartels, some corrido musicians have found themselves in the middle of the violence. The murders are just one reflection of how Northern Mexico's complicated relationship with the drug trade is changing.

Mexican cop killings

Esteban Robles Espinosa (died May 9, 2008) was the commander of Mexico City's Investigative Police Force. He headed Mexico City's anti-kidnapping unit until 2003 and served on the internal affairs commission. He was fatally shot down on 9 May 2008 around dawn by armed men, a day after the death of Federal Police chief dgar Eusebio Millán Gómez, probably in retaliation for the recent crackdown on organized crime. eferences 2 top Mexican police officials killed" (http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD /americas/05/09/mexico.violence/index.html) . CNN. 2008-05-09.
http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/americas/05/09/mexico.violence
/index.html. Retrieved 2008-05-10.
Édgar Eusebio Millán Gómez (1967 – 8 May 2008) was a
third-ranking member of Mexico's Secretariat of Public
Security and acting commissioner of the Federal Preventive
Police. Born in Mexico City, he received a law degree from
the Universidad del Valle de México. After graduating he
started his career in the Mexican Federal Police and received
training in several countries. He was notable for his loyalty to
the rule of law and lead many strikes to the Mexican drug
cartels at the height of the Mexican Drug War.