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Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

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Re: Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

#391

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've yet to understand why 'land' should have a stronger vote than 'people'

Why even have states? Or cities? What purpose do they serve?

Cities have no representation at the federal level, so we can leave those out of the question.

Why have states? Why indeed!

One answer: to create a level of governmental organization smaller than the federal one that can act as a set of laboratories for legislative and legal experimentation.

Another answer: to reflect the fact that not all laws and regulations make sense across a diverse range of climate and geography and demographics and economies.

Neither of those answers, however, require states to be considered inviolable sovereign entities, and a lot of us born after 1880 don't think of them that way.

Re: Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

#392

Where'd all this abolish the senate nonsense come from recently? I get people have been complaining about 'flyover' states for a while now, but the Republicans also have the majority in the House at the moment. At least wait until the House doesn't represent the current majority party in the Senate (like it almost certainly will again eventually) to make that argument. I'm mildly worried that it's just an attempt to…

It's nothing new. It's fundamentally undemocratic and the reasons for having it are long gone. I don't care who controls it, it should go or at the very least be dramatically reformed.

Re: Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

#393

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Both Senators in California, my state, voted for the ban. Neither has explained why.

Newsom recently banned hemp-based THC at the state level anyway, so there's no real change in California. https://www.cannabisbusinesstimes.com/us-states/california/n... They were taking very low % hemp that is supposed to be for textiles and extracting the little THC there was into low quality vapes. Because they didn't need the state growers licenses to grow hemp, there was no mechanism to test for pesticides and s…

> They were taking very low % hemp that is supposed to be for textiles and extracting the little THC there was into low quality vapes.

This is not at all what was happening. These aren't some special strains or cultivars where there is a remnant of THC that is getting squeezed out from a large quantity of plants to make a small quantity of product - they are same strains and cultivars being used by the legal dispensaries. It is a matter of timing and process - harvest and undercure the flower and it will not have converted enough THCa to Delta9 THC to hit the legal limit. In fact, many legal operations follow similar timing on harvesting and similar processing - the flower in your local dispensary is still mostly THCa, and a good chunk of it is likely under the limit for D9 THC as well.

Much if it is effectively the exact same thing under a different label.

> When we do have all that infrastructure for legal THC regulation, why allow people to sidestep all that?

I do agree here. There's no need for the unregulated market when a proper legal market exists.

Re: Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

#394

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, in case you didn't notice, everything we are stating is opinions. I absolutely reject the notion that the senator from Wyoming should have equal political power to the senator from Texas or California, I think it is absurd, I don't doubt that some people in Wyoming disagree. I think Wyoming joining the US as a state without equal representation as the most populous state would still be a massive win for them and…

> I think Wyoming joining the US as a state without equal representation as the most populous state would still be a massive win for them and they would have almost certainly taken the deal at the time. I doubt that very much. But more pertinent is this: we know for a fact that the smaller founding states would not have joined without the compromise in how Congress is structured. They were, after all, the whole reaso…

A bunch of states wouldn't have entered the union without the compromise on slavery.

But we ended that "compromise" some time ago. No reason that equal Senate representation, or even general state "sovereignty" couldn't be revisited either.

Re: Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

#395

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Newsom recently banned hemp-based THC at the state level anyway, so there's no real change in California. https://www.cannabisbusinesstimes.com/us-states/california/n... They were taking very low % hemp that is supposed to be for textiles and extracting the little THC there was into low quality vapes. Because they didn't need the state growers licenses to grow hemp, there was no mechanism to test for pesticides and s…

I don't understand how this has anything to do with federal hemp law, under federal law marijuana doesn't have any testing requirements either as it's just plain illegal. So what does California have to gain in testing by dumping hemp into the marijuana bucket at a federal level, neither of which improves the testing requirements in California? California could simply require hemp to be tested, but making hemp federa…

In general this kind of excuse is used by incumbents to pass laws to thwart competition.

You have some regulatory framework which has already been created by captured regulators, so it has a couple of rules that it ought to have (always the ones pointed to in order to justify it) and then others that exist merely to exclude competitors or make sure fixed costs are high enough that only large incumbents can meet them.

The latter set of rules are unreasonable so the market finds a way around them. The incumbents then call this a "loophole" and insist that the competitors be forced into the entire framework rather than just the subset of reasonable rules they'd be able to satisfy without being destroyed. Which destroys them, as intended.

Re: Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

#396

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought that was because of the tit-for-tat with Canada. I'd think a joint and a glass of bourbon would go hand-in-hand. Personally, I don't drink or smoke, but I think the "war on drugs" has been a miserable failure that has been, for the most part, a footgun.

> I'd think a joint and a glass of bourbon would go hand-in-hand. They don't. Drunkenness just kind of nullifies pot. I might have a beer when I'm stoned, but only a very tasty one, and only one. I think that extremely light pot smoking is killing alcohol sales. The tiniest bit of pot is just as pleasing as a mild alcohol buzz, and an alcohol buzz kills the effect of pot. I know I got in the habit for a while of smok…

> Drunkenness just kind of nullifies pot.

???

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=l11hARAnpcM

Re: Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

#397

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The States are a gerrymandering. Five states have populations less than a million and three wouldn't even qualify for Member of Congress by census. Yet they get two Senators, a Member and three Electoral College votes. You've got filibuster backwards. Filibuster grants rights to a Senate minority.

> You've got filibuster backwards. Filibuster grants rights to a Senate minority. Yeah, I meant that 50.1% can't force legislation through. I should have said tiny majority. States aren't gerrymandering because the people decide for themselves where to live.

> States aren't gerrymandering because the people decide for themselves where to live.

The people can also decide for themselves where they want to live with respect to gerrymandered Congressional and other districts. So by your logic, gerrymandering doesn't exist at that level either.

You're not going to convince me that some procedural nonsense is more important than equal representation.

Re: Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

#398
post #85

I feel like I am missing something here, and it is around it being called "hemp". Does this actually have any impact on legal dispensaries, their products, farms, etc? Does this make it harder to eventually de-schedule pot.

Only indirectly (see other comment). In 2018 a provision was attached to the Farm Bill to legalize "hemp". The public and presumably the senators were led to believe this was about legalizing textiles and things like that, not drugs. It turned out that the language actually legalized delta-8 too. Many people were displeased with that outcome, because in many states it's completely unregulated with no additional taxes…

This is a perfect example of the opportunity for federalism. Any state could —and many did— close the loophole. You mentioned emergency regulation from the Texas governor. New recreational substances are discovered and introduced to market continuously. States can use their legislative authority to address them. Delta-9, Spice, and other delta-8 THC analogues have been successfully addressed by states.

The side effects of this provision make hemp plants in the ground illegal, according to Senator Paul. It is reasonable for the public to be outraged about a hastily-written amendment whose authors failed to understand the unintended consequences.

Re: Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

#399

Where'd all this abolish the senate nonsense come from recently? I get people have been complaining about 'flyover' states for a while now, but the Republicans also have the majority in the House at the moment. At least wait until the House doesn't represent the current majority party in the Senate (like it almost certainly will again eventually) to make that argument. I'm mildly worried that it's just an attempt to…

It's nothing new. It's fundamentally undemocratic and the reasons for having it are long gone. I don't care who controls it, it should go or at the very least be dramatically reformed.

There is the concept of illiberal democracy. The Senate, according to most political scientists who study this, is an important part of cutting that off that because bicameralism along with independent courts etc are good.

It's mostly populism rising and not realizing how dangerous it would be to have another check on power removed. Reform the system, don't just turn to blind populism.

Re: Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

#400
post #354

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honest question but how is hemp competing with weed? Are these different plants?

Hemp is classified as below .3% THC (compared to old-school weed strains at 15% and modern levels at mid 30%s). Hemp is male and female, and trash in potency, but THC and other products derived from it are fair game in some jurisdictions, or a grey area. It is certainly a different market than legal, high potency THC, as well as medical.

> compared to old-school weed strains at 15% and modern levels at mid 30%s)

These levels are still primarily based on THCa content, not Delta9 THC. Even your regulated legal flower is very low in D9 THC.

> It is certainly a different market than legal, high potency THC, as well as medical.

Much of it is literally the exact same. They are growing the exact same strains and cultivars as the regulated legal marijuana industry, just making sure to harvest and process them in a way that prevents the decarboxylation of THCa into D9 THC from going over .3%

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