Medical marijuana moves through committee in MN

Medical marijuana bills are moving through the State House and Senate.
The usual stupidity is coming from the Right, of course. Tom Prichard, president of the Minnesota Family Council, had this illuminating remark:

“This bill would allow marijuana dispensaries to set up shop across the state, in homes and storefronts on main streets and neighborhoods and apartment buildings. Why? The only reason I can see is that it is to legitimize, frankly, the broader acceptance of marijuana in the community’s eyes.”

Why, Mr. Prichard? Why would anyone set up dispensaries for marijuana if the bill passed? Perhaps, and I'm just throwing this out there, so that people who have prescriptions for medical marijuana could get those prescriptions filled.

You see, Mr. Prichard, there are operations known as "pharmacies" that "set up shop across the state", even in "storefronts on main streets and neighborhoods", in order to allow people with prescriptions to obtain their authorised medication. Insidious, isn't it?

Yes, virtually every neighbourhood has these outrageous operations (known commonly as "pharmacies") that contain inventories of powerful stimulants, barbiturates, pain-killers, and other narcotics - and they brazenly sell these highly-addictive and readily-abused substances to anyone with the cash and a prescription.

The only reason, as surely a man of Prichard's keen insight can plainly see, for these "pharmacies" is to legitimise the broader acceptance of narcotics in the community's eyes.

The arguments by these loons like Prichard begin and end with "it's illegal".
Yes, and that's why the State is considering legislation to make it legal. Duh.
I guess it's only acceptable to try to legalise things that are already legal.

Let's be clear here. The proposed legislation is not a bill to legalise marijuana and make it available to everyone. It is a bill to allow those with a prescription to be able to fill it. It's no more insidious than allowing someone with a prescription for codeine to be able to fill it.

Does allowing someone to buy codeine with a prescription "legalise" codeine? No, it doesn't. Does it say to the community, "Hey, go ahead and abuse opiates all you want. No problems. No dangers. See, we even sell it out in the open, so it must be great stuff."?
Not really. No, it doesn't. It's illegal to buy, sell, or even possess codeine without a prescription. And there's that word again: prescription. The word that keeps vanishing in the Right's conversation of the issue.

So, yes, if medical marijuana does get approved, there will, in fact, be "dispensaries" to provide those with a prescription to purchase it. Perhaps these nefarious "dispensaries" will even be included in the so-called "pharmacies" that dispense Oxycontin legally. Shocking to consider, but true.

So the major reason for opposing doctors' issuance of medical marijuana prescriptions seems to be that someone could actually fill their prescription. Did anyone at the hearing laugh out loud at Mr. Prichard? If not, they should have.

But the crazy testimony doesn't end with Prichard:

James Stinziani, who said he was part of the “LaRouche operation,” said that the push for medical marijuana was simply a conspiracy drawn up by billionaire George Soros. “What is happening here — if anybody is familiar with George Soros — he is pretty much supporting and funding the major drug operations in the United States.” He accused medical marijuana supporters of being in league with Soros.

Yup. A doctor who may prescribe medical marijuana for their terminally-ill patient is really only trying to push Soros' murky agenda. It's so clear that I won't even attempt to deny it.

It's far better to have terminally-ill patients obtain their marijuana from black-market sources, where the quality is dubious and uncontrolled. At least then we have a shot at putting cancer patients in jail where they belong. And recreational users of marijuana will obviously stop buying it if terminally-ill people can't get a prescription for medical marijuana, because then they will just know that marijuana is Not A Good Thing. Prescriptions mean abuse, but not for narcotics. Marijuana is some kind of special case where prescription sales equate with non-prescription abuse, because we don't have a problem with people abusing prescription medications, right?

It's like saying the State shouldn't issue car titles because people steal cars, and it sends the message that car theft is somehow okay. All of those auto dealerships are pumping more cars out there on the streets every day, just inviting people to steal them. I'll wager George Soros is making millions in auto loans every year, besides. Let's tackle car theft at the source: the cars themselves and the people who profit from them.

The idiocy of tax cuts

Having just done my taxes, I thought I would look at the "stimulus" effect of the proposed Republican tax cuts. It isn't much.

I paid $5840 in federal taxes for 2008. That's just with-holding, not including my refund.
So bear in mind that the "stimulus" I will calculate here will actually be less.
The with-holding works out to $112.30 per week. Let's say the Republicans won me a 10% cut, which is far more than they are proposing.

This would put a whopping $11 (and change) in my pocket each week. Wow. All of my problems are solved, right?

Of course, the real figure once my refund is included is $9.50 each week. Now consider that most of the Republican plans would afford me about a 5% cut in federal taxes, and we see that this wonderful conservative solution would pump the staggering sum of $4.75 into my pocket each week. That isn't even gas for my scooter or a six-pack of cheap beer where I live.

Republicans love to conflate all taxes into the discussion, but the federal government can only cut my federal taxes. They love to combine FICA, Medicare, state and local taxes, and property taxes when they talk about the huge windfall their tax cuts would mean to an ordinary person. The reality is, however, that federal tax cuts produce a "trickle-down" effect of increased taxes down the line. Less federal aid to states means higher state taxes or reduced aid to cities. In my state, with a loony Republican governor, it means the latter. This means cuts in aid to cities, which means my property taxes go up. There goes my $4.75 a week.

Of course, we have already had eight years of tax cuts, which has brought us to this glorious situation. The wealthy have flatly refused to hold up their end of the bargain. They don't invest in job creation; they off-shore jobs instead. They don't invest in small businesses; they buy them out to reduce competition and lay off the workers. They don't invest in capital improvements (updated equipment and machinery, expanded facilities) or worker training; they instead squeeze out a few more pennies from what they have already. They cut workforces, impose hiring freezes and pay cuts on staff, and increase the workloads of those already employed.

In short, it doesn't work.

The wealthy are essentially on strike for a better deal, and the entire economy is being held hostage. What they want is basically a redistribution of wealth from the poor to the wealthy.