Transforming Washington's Budget

Browse Ideas with tag 'marijuana':

• Recent Ideas (3)
• Popular Ideas (3)
• Hot Ideas (0)
• In Review Ideas (0)
• In Progress Ideas (0)
• Complete Ideas (0)

• I agree

  Voting is Disabled

  898 votes

  I disagree
  This idea is active.
  Effective Government »

  Legalizing Marijuana

  I have never ingested marijuana or any illicit drugs, but you could help the budget by legalizing a fairly benign substance in marijuana as i-1068 would have done. The polling data is fairly neutral regarding this topic in Washington state. Both state polls I have seen show legalization favored by slightly over 50% though. You would be doing this in two ways. 1.) Not having to waste money on law enforcement, judicial ...more »

  I have never ingested marijuana or any illicit drugs, but you could help the budget by legalizing a fairly benign substance in marijuana as i-1068 would have done. The polling data is fairly neutral regarding this topic in Washington state. Both state polls I have seen show legalization favored by slightly over 50% though.

  You would be doing this in two ways. 1.) Not having to waste money on law enforcement, judicial proceedings, and incarceration. 2.) Potentially collecting taxes from those that sell it. Another interesting way to go with that would be to treat it like alcohol by selling it in a regulated manner as they do in Amsterdam (despite it not being legal). Interestingly, use in Amsterdam is the lowest in Europe despite how easy it is to obtain. Why? Drug dealers do not check for I.D.

  I became interested in this topic ever since the state held a committee hearing in Olympia in January of this year. I have done the research and it has changed my mind from disagreeing with legalizing to thinking legalizing is probably the way to go.

  Thank you.

  « less full details »

  199 comments for Idea: Legalizing Marijuana

  Submitted by Guy B. Anonymous 2 years ago

• I agree

  Voting is Disabled

  229 votes

  I disagree
  This idea is active.
  Natural Resources »

  Hemp as a cash crop

  Hemp is a useful material with a rich history. It can be used for clothing, for food (high in protein and omega-3), and bio-fuels among other things. It CANNOT be ingested to get you high. So why is it essentially illegal to grow? It has a close association with Marijuana. It is, technically, a marijuana plant. However, since other countries can grow industrial hemp legally, why can't we? Currently, we import millions ...more »

  Hemp is a useful material with a rich history. It can be used for clothing, for food (high in protein and omega-3), and bio-fuels among other things. It CANNOT be ingested to get you high. So why is it essentially illegal to grow? It has a close association with Marijuana. It is, technically, a marijuana plant. However, since other countries can grow industrial hemp legally, why can't we?

  Currently, we import millions of pounds of hemp into the United States. How much money can we save if we grew it ourselves? A lot. In fact when googling hemp us import the first result is a USDA report from late '99. The first sentence of the second paragraph is extremely telling. "Imports of raw hemp fiber have increased dramatically in the last few years, rising from less than 500 pounds in 1994 to over 1.5 million pounds for the first 9 months of 1999 (table 1)."

  I do not have current import numbers unfortunately, but I can only assume that they have followed the trend.

  As mentioned earlier it is essentially illegal to grow hemp in the U.S. It isn't really illegal, but it might as well be. You need special permits from the DEA which are very expensive and that alone makes it nearly impossible for anyone to grow hemp at a profit. Is there any way Washington state could look into superseding the DEA? As long as there are people regulating the hemp and making sure THC levels are near 0% there should be no problems.

  If you are interested to learn about the history of hemp I have included some information below. If not you can stop here.

  -------

  Quick history lesson. In colonial times people were asked to grow hemp on their properties. George Washington grew hemp. The sails and rope of the ships that first landed here were made out of hemp.

  We threw it all away because of a smear campaign by DuPont (google DuPont and Hemp).

  Interestingly, our government decided we should grow hemp again during WWII due to material shortages which prompted the video "Hemp for Victory" -- Which is on youtube.

  After WWII our troops burned all hemp fields.

  That's all. Knowledge is power.

  « less full details »

  14 comments for Idea: Hemp as a cash crop

  Submitted by Guy B. Anonymous 2 years ago

• I agree

  Voting is Disabled

  32 votes

  I disagree
  This idea is active.
  Effective Government »

  Two obvious concepts...

  Require bicyclists to be licensed and registered to be on the roads complete with a license plate clearly visible. And legalize marijuana already and tax it heavily. That alone would solve the budget shortfall and put it into a surplus.

  7 comments for Idea: Two obvious concepts...

  Submitted by Common American 2 years ago

Displaying all 3 Ideas