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Germany’s move to legalise cannabis expected to create ‘domino effect’

theguardian.com

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Re: Germany’s move to legalise cannabis expected to create ‘domino effect’

#351

Post by MomoXenosaga »

wickedsight wrote: post #40

The Netherlands will be especially impacted by this. We refused actual legalization for many reasons, many of which will be invalidated by Germany decriminalizing. Our current stance on weed is so confusing that it's hard to explain to any foreigner, but strictly speaking weed isn't legal and not even decriminalized... But yes, Amsterdam is in The Netherlands.

The Netherlands as I'm sorry to say has been in maintenance mode for the last 15 years.

Our glorious leaders governing style has been to do as little as possible to avoid elections and let future generations solve things.

Re: Germany’s move to legalise cannabis expected to create ‘domino effect’

#352

Post by Kerbonut »

withinboredom wrote: post #346
nostromo wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This sounds like the confusing US laws. Cannabis is illegal ( very illegal) nationally. But several states decided to stop prosecuting these crimes, and the states do most of the policing in the US - so it’s all but legal in many states. I wish there was a legal standard whereby if the state stops prosecuting a law, the law automatically can be invalidated by a court. We have lots of things that are illegal that are…

> the law automatically can be invalidated by a court. There are three parts to the law: 1. The legislature must draft the law 2. The executives must enforce the law. 3. The judicial must punish for breaking the law. If (2) never happens, then it never gets to (3). And courts can "invalidate" a law: jury nullification.

SCOTUS ought to invalidate the DEA and drug scheduling considering they’re overturning other perceived federal overreaches.

Re: Germany’s move to legalise cannabis expected to create ‘domino effect’

#353

Post by darkerside »

numerik_meister wrote: post #74
darkerside wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

s/*/That's interesting. I've never thought about what positive effects there might be. Can you expand?/g

I did not intend to ask a question. I know for sure that a lot of potheads really want to push their recreational drug as a miracle do all drug, while ignoring all the negative effects. The negative effects are well documented science. The positive effects are all vaporous claims from questionable studies. Really goes to show the objectivity of HN, that I get downvoted for this.

If you are operating from a place of fact and not opinion, you can also express that by sharing the evidence. Otherwise it's just empty claims on empty claims.

If you want to challenge an empty claim, do it right. Or, don't be a jerk. Either way.

Re: Germany’s move to legalise cannabis expected to create ‘domino effect’

#354

Post by aurizon »

Here in Canada a strange thing happened - all these weed shops openedu, wanting to see at $10/gram. They got some business but had rent, taxes, government added taxes etc - half went broke because the guvmint treated it like a cash cow and though the guvmint would replace the dealers and make big $$. about half people went to them, maybe less. The police stopped bothering with them. Huge grow ops started up on aboriginal lands and sell in aboriginal shops on their lands and many people went there as it was cheaper than the shops. Police had zero interest in stopping hundreds of people as they travelled as most cars held3-4 people buying 25 grams(legal max) = waste of time. dealers walked over land and bought carts full for $800-1000/pound (453 grams) just because the guvmint wanted a cash cow to milk - not seeing that fields full could be grown in the summer for $5-10 a pound. The program stumbles on. Marijuana IPO's are dying like flies in this downturn because the principals simply stole the IPO cash and walked away - now there are dozens of lawsuits of all types. I am a spectator = non smoker of anything!!

Re: Germany’s move to legalise cannabis expected to create ‘domino effect’

#355

Post by JumpCrisscross »

withinboredom wrote: post #346
nostromo wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This sounds like the confusing US laws. Cannabis is illegal ( very illegal) nationally. But several states decided to stop prosecuting these crimes, and the states do most of the policing in the US - so it’s all but legal in many states. I wish there was a legal standard whereby if the state stops prosecuting a law, the law automatically can be invalidated by a court. We have lots of things that are illegal that are…

> the law automatically can be invalidated by a court. There are three parts to the law: 1. The legislature must draft the law 2. The executives must enforce the law. 3. The judicial must punish for breaking the law. If (2) never happens, then it never gets to (3). And courts can "invalidate" a law: jury nullification.

> courts can "invalidate" a law: jury nullification

This doesn’t invalidate the law. It decides one case in a particular way. An invalidated law is unenforceable for everyone.

Re: Germany’s move to legalise cannabis expected to create ‘domino effect’

#356

Post by JumpCrisscross »

Kerbonut wrote: post #352
withinboredom wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the law automatically can be invalidated by a court. There are three parts to the law: 1. The legislature must draft the law 2. The executives must enforce the law. 3. The judicial must punish for breaking the law. If (2) never happens, then it never gets to (3). And courts can "invalidate" a law: jury nullification.

SCOTUS ought to invalidate the DEA and drug scheduling considering they’re overturning other perceived federal overreaches.

Did the DEA create the schedules? Or did the Congress? I thought it was a latter.

Re: Germany’s move to legalise cannabis expected to create ‘domino effect’

#357

Post by ttul »

aurizon wrote: post #354

Here in Canada a strange thing happened - all these weed shops openedu, wanting to see at $10/gram. They got some business but had rent, taxes, government added taxes etc - half went broke because the guvmint treated it like a cash cow and though the guvmint would replace the dealers and make big $$. about half people went to them, maybe less. The police stopped bothering with them. Huge grow ops started up on aborig…

Another Canadian observer here. The roll out was botched in parts of the country because control over licensing was delegated to provinces and some did a better job than others. British Columbia’s legalization effort has been a resounding success, in so far as there are a plentiful supply of well regulated, pleasant shops pretty much everywhere. And you can buy online easily from the government-owned store — literally it’s a Shopify site.

I do not consume cannabis, but here in BC, it has never been difficult to obtain. The difference with legalization is that it’s now just a non-issue. Not sketchy. Not dangerous. It’s just part of the fabric of daily life.

Governments like Germany should focus on maximizing access through private distribution much as is the case for alcohol and tobacco. Trying to control the retail end too much will result in a failure.

Re: Germany’s move to legalise cannabis expected to create ‘domino effect’

#358

Post by pimeys »

yc-kraln wrote: post #350

Coming a bit late to the party, but one aspect of this is that there is already massive usage of cannabis in Germany, and in many areas quite a significant amount is decriminalized. In recent years, however, crappy cannabis adulterated with synthetic cannaboids have become pervasive--they're inferior to the real stuff, addictive, and deeply connected with organized crime. Legalization will likely result in a safer su…

It's funny how different it is between regions here. In Berlin you smell it everywhere on the streets and in the bars. In Munich, if you're caught smoking, the police gets quite interested.

It's obvious how it's going to be legal in Berlin, I'm just wondering how it's going to look like in other places of Germany...

Re: Germany’s move to legalise cannabis expected to create ‘domino effect’

#359

Post by MomoXenosaga »

idleproc wrote: post #330
donkeyd wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, it's not about that. It's that one of the reasons the Netherlands never legalized is that the rest of Europe didn't. So we were afraid that we'd become a place where international criminals come to produce massive amounts of weed legally to then export it illegally. When countries surrounding us start legalizing, we have no reason not to. Since growing weed is purely done by criminals right now, we're also afra…

> we were afraid that we'd become a place where international criminals come to produce massive amounts of weed legally to then export it illegally I remember a few years back, someone in the Dutch police claimed the Netherlands was on its way to becoming a narco-state [1]. I'm ignorant about the domestic issues there, so correct me, but it seems like the legality of drugs is a separate issue to the control of organi…

Drugs earn criminals literally billions of euro every year. Money corrupts. Whether it's in Mexico or the Netherlands.

I think the closest analogy for Americans is what happened during prohibition.

Re: Germany’s move to legalise cannabis expected to create ‘domino effect’

#360

Post by chimeracoder »

nostromo wrote: post #338
wickedsight wrote: post #40

The Netherlands will be especially impacted by this. We refused actual legalization for many reasons, many of which will be invalidated by Germany decriminalizing. Our current stance on weed is so confusing that it's hard to explain to any foreigner, but strictly speaking weed isn't legal and not even decriminalized... But yes, Amsterdam is in The Netherlands.

This sounds like the confusing US laws. Cannabis is illegal ( very illegal) nationally. But several states decided to stop prosecuting these crimes, and the states do most of the policing in the US - so it’s all but legal in many states. I wish there was a legal standard whereby if the state stops prosecuting a law, the law automatically can be invalidated by a court. We have lots of things that are illegal that are…

> This sounds like the confusing US laws. Cannabis is illegal (very illegal) nationally. But several states decided to stop prosecuting these crimes, and the states do most of the policing in the US - so it’s all but legal in many states.

That's not an accurate explanation of the situation in the US.

Cannabis is illegal at the federal level. Separately, it is illegal in some states too (although fewer and fewer as the years go by). States do not have the power to prosecute people under federal law, so in states where the state has legalized marijuana, prosecutors (DA, AG, etc.) have no basis to file criminal charges.

The federal prohibition means that people can be prosecuted for possession on federal land, or if a federal agency (such as the FBI) takes enough interest to enforce the federal law, but they rarely bother at this point.

> I wish there was a legal standard whereby if the state stops prosecuting a law, the law automatically can be invalidated by a court.

What you are describing is actually closer to the Dutch system. Marijuana is illegal there, but because it's been "tolerated" (best translation of the Dutch word) for long enough, it's not actually legal for them to enforce the law anymore. (Well, sort of).

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