Ric Size     ” The Cliche Song”

Florida’s Amendment 2, is a popular initiative ballot measure concerning legalizing medical marijuana; which the public will vote upon this coming November 4.
Early polling shows public support in Florida to be 70-80% in favor of legal medical weed.
Unless there is major manipulation of the electronic voting from conservative interests, this measure is likely to pass.

The origin of this amendment is, of course, the grassroots campaigning of pro-pot activists to legalize marijuana.
Reformists & their business partners always insist on a multi-staged approach, as this slows things down enough to make sure the money gets funnelled to the right people.
John Morgan, an Orlando-based attorney has spent $4 million getting this measure legal traction through Florida’s notoriously murky political machinery.
The Good Old Boys have been paid for now, and Morgan can add Amendment 2 to his resume when he runs for political office in 2016, as is widely speculated.

Unfortunately, Amendment 2 leaves many hurdles to be cleared after it is approved by the voters, and very little public discussion is currently taking place.
One issue that is conveniently being ignored is that there is no provision for patients to grow their own medical marijuana.
Production is limited to five (5) select large-scale growers, thus establishing a monopoly.
Patients who can’t afford dispensary prices (estimated to range from $225-450 per ounce) are priced out of their medicine, and have no right to grow their own.

Is marijuana medicine?
The correct answer is: yes, for some.
Generally speaking, medical marijuana used for pain relief has higher cannabidiol (CBD) and lower tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) content.
It is THC that gets the user high; CBD does not.

For most, marijuana is about getting high, which makes it roughly equivalent to alcohol & tobacco; and therefore it is sensible for its recreational use to be regulated in a similar manner.
Obstacles to legalization will continue to be religious groups everywhere, as well as the pharmaceuticals, big alcohol & tobacco; who use their influence & lobbying money to keep a strategic competitor out of their market space.
The major breweries would also take a hit in revenue if recreational marijuana was legalized.
Legalized marijuana federally would wipe out billions in annual profits for these industries, which is considered anti-capitalist in ruling circles.

Marijuana comes from cannabis, an extremely versatile plant.
The banning of hemp, one of the most useful industrial crops known to man, only proves how unscientific & unreasonable the anti-cannabis position has become.

Hemp is a high-growing variety of cannabis that has many useful qualities such as: strong & durable fibers that can be made into rope, paper & clothing.
It has resins & oils that burn cleaner than petroleum-based comparables.
Hemp can replace Styrofoam, plastics, nylon and other petroleum-based synthetics that end up polluting our Earth.
Hemp seed is widely understood to be healthy food.
It has a low THC content, but is kept illegal under federal law as part of a fanatical ‘zero-tolerance’ policy in its war on marijuana.

Federally, marijuana is a Schedule I drug, and the DEA can always claim jurisdiction to bust pot growers, dispensaries and users.
DEA funding is starting to scale back, as it’s becoming clear to most that legal marijuana is going to happen, eventually.
Legalizing medical marijuana in Florida sends a clear message, which is: if one of the most conservative & politically-rigged states can pass medical weed, then it’s time to legalize it everywhere.

Florida will have a long way to go after November 4, to win the rights the voters of Colorado & Washington have earned.
Unless all people are allowed to grow marijuana, then there really is no freedom won in Florida’s Amendment 2.
Still, Amendment 2 is a clear signal that the tide has qualitatively shifted in the war on drugs, as the greater public is no longer heeding Uncle Sam’s ethics.

When enough people finally realize the war on drugs is really a war on the working class, then the fight for legal marijuana will become a plank in the program for medical science & revolutionary socialism.

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Post Script:   Amendment 2 was killed by $6.2 million [mostly] from Las Vegas casino mogul Sheldon Adelson:

Legalization reformists vow they will be back in 2016