How Cannabis Legalization Should Have Gone, And Still Can If We Want To

The TSAP and Twenty-One Debunked have both long supported full cannabis legalization for everyone over 18, period.  And we took what we could get thus far towards that goal, even with all the compromises that had to be made along the way (especially that utterly abominable 21 age limit unique to the USA and Quebec). And no, legalization is still NOT a disaster.  

But the status quo leaves much to be desired, and surely we can aim higher.  How has it disappointed?  Let us count the ways:

• First of all, the age limit is still 21, not 18 like it should be by now (and really should have always been).
• Limits on self-cultivation are far too tight, if it is even allowed at all.
• Taxes, licensing fees, and licensing restrictions were far too high and onerous from the get-go to quash the still-existing and thriving black market.
• The transition period from legalization of possession and use to legalization of commercial sales was at utterly glacial pace, and still is in some states.  Not only has that been a drag, but it even gave the black market time to get a head start once the state telegraphed its intentions at least a year or two in advance.
• Only specific types of dedicated stores (dispensaries) can sell it legally.  Unlike alcohol or tobacco in most states.
• Big Tobacco, Big Alcohol, and even Big Pharma, all once sworn enemies of cannabis and cannabis legalization, are now getting a piece of the action by heavily investing in a rapidly growing cannabis industry that is making artificially high profits from being propped up by onerous regulations that keep smaller competitors out.
• And last but not least, legalization at the federal level is still pending, fully TEN YEARS after the first states began to legalize recreational cannabis at the state level.

Let's do a thought experiment:  Imagine if all of these rules and regulations were to suddenly apply to tomatoes.  What would happen to the market?  What would develop as a result?  Can you say, "Big Tomato"?  And a massive tomato black market in the shadow of it all as well.  Now, that sounds pretty silly indeed.  Tomatoes are not psychoactive drugs, after all.  But now apply this paradigm to alcohol, tobacco, or even coffee or tea.  Doesn't sound quite so farfetched now, does it?

On the other side, some rules have been roundly criticized for being too lax, most notably the potency limits (or more accurately, the lack thereof) for commercial sales compared to countries like Canada and Uruguay.  And as long as potency limits are reasonable and phased down gradually, it is quite unlikely that they will foment black market sales significantly more than the status quo does.  Ditto for taxing cannabis based on potency (X cents per milligram of THC), which only a few states do now.

The federal legalization efforts keep stalling as well, due in part to well-meaning legislators trying to shoehorn so much social justice stuff into it, and in part due to other legislators that still oppose cannabis.  While the social justice stuff is good, it may be an overreach compared to getting through a bill that simply removes cannabis from the Controlled Substances Act, period.  Or better yet, one like Bruce Cain's MERP Model that also explicitly allows unlimited, untaxed, and unregulated self-cultivation of cannabis for anyone over 18, while not precluding legal taxed and regulated commercial sales alongside it.  The black market and the emerging Big Pot oligopolies would thus both be destroyed in one fell swoop, plus all of the other benefits of full legalization.  That's the power of ABUNDANCE, baby!

So what are we waiting for?  Time to finish the job already!

UPDATE:  A new study finds that there is a very strong inverse correlation between the number of legal dispensaries per capita, and the size of the black market.  Local bans on dispensaries, largely due to NIMBY politics, and most notably found in large swathes of California, seem to be perpetuating the black market, basically.  In other news, study finds that water is wet and the sun rises in the east.  

And this NIMBY-ism is completely unfounded, as honest research finds that legal dispensaries actually increase property values and decrease crime in their neighborhoods.  Let that sink in for a moment.

The Most Bizarre Ageist Law In All Of History

New York now has the dubious honor of having enacted the most bizarre ageist law in all of recorded history.  Passed in November 2021, it went largely unnoticed until a photo from an Albany convenience store about it went viral in recent weeks.  So what is this new and ridiculous law?

Apparently, in New York you need to be 21 or older to buy cans of....whipped cream.  Yes, you read that right.  That is because whipped cream cans contain nitrous oxide (N2O, whippits, or laughing gas) as a propellant, that can give one a brief high when inhaled.  If you honestly felt your IQ just drop ten points or more while reading this....

It is hard to begin to list all the ways this law is both stupid and wrong on so many levels:

• Of all the abusable inhalants out there (glue, paint, gasoline, aerosols, gases, solvents, "poppers", "rush", etc.) out there, nitrous oxide, especially in the form of whipped cream cans, is probably the least dangerous one of all.
• Many far more hazardous abusable but legal substances have either no age limit at all, or an age limit of 18 at most. Singling out whipped cream makes zero sense whatsoever.
• There is not currently any reported trend of teens and young adults using whippets in large numbers, nor was there before the law went into effect either.  It is really not a very popular way for young people to get high.
• Other sources of nitrous oxide gas can be readily purchased online.
• Whipped cream is clearly NOT only used as a way to get high.  But it is yet another thing people need to show ID for these days, because reasons. 
• And last but not least, setting the age limit at 21, fully three years higher than the age of majority (18), is inherently overreaching, illiberal, arbitrary unjust and ageist discrimination.

In other words, there is absolutely ZERO justification for such an ageist abomination.  But sadly, we are not really all that surprised that they would do this.  First it was alcohol, then tobacco, then cannabis, and then it was only a matter of time before they would find a way to make 21 the new 18 in other ever more illiberal ways as well.  As capitalism devolves to "late capitalism", so too does ageism devolve to "late ageism" as well, with all of its increasing absurdities.

UPDATE:  Apparently, the way the actual law is written, it really only applies to whipped cream chargers, those little steel cartridges containing nitrous oxide for use in fancy whipped cream dispensers, not cans of whipped cream itself.  Those chargers are the ones that are more likely to be used to get high by cracking and discharging the contents into a large balloon and then inhaling from the balloon.  Still a ridiculous law, but they are apparently attempting enforcing it beyond its actual scope by requiring ID to buy whipped cream cans.

For the chargers specifically, we could almost understand setting the age limit at 18 perhaps.  But 21 is way too ridiculous either way.  And any age limit on the whipped cream cans is beyond ridiculous.

(The UK appears to be even more into the moral panic about nitrous oxide lately, exaggerating the dangers, and there has been talk about banning it, but interestingly nothing about a 21 age limit.)