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| Welcome to TAX MARIJUANA Bumper Stickers! |
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| DONATE NOW! Our bumper stickers are available at http://www.etsy.com/shop/hempandhamsa. Harold Zvi Baranoff is soon to be released, May 4, '10, from Jesup GA Federal Prison Work Camp. |
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| REGULATE AND TAX MARIJUANA by Zvi Baranoff As the economic melt down continues seemingly without end the government is being asked to carry the burden with a dwindling tax base. Businesses and workers are already feeling squeezed by taxes. It does not take a genius to see that more spending from dwindling resources is untenable. Yet, with this financial crisis at hand, there are millions of Americans and an entire industry not only willing but literally begging to be taxed. It's not just a pipe dream. We can balance the American Budget and resolve the economic crisis by taxing marijuana. Consider the economics from two directions. There is the economic loss of the failed attempts to control marijuana use through prohibition. On the other hand, there are the vast economic advantages to controlling marijuana use by regulation and taxation. Marijuana prohibition is an expensive endeavor. Police manpower are wasted in the attempted enforcement of prohibition. The cost of imprisoning someone convicted of a marijuana offense for a year roughly equals the cost of sending someone to a top grade university - or several someones to trade schools or other educational institutions. The marijuana business does generate wealth, but the incomes are untaxed and much of the cash leaves our country in suitcases and duffel bags to enrich foreign criminal enterprises. Much of the cash that does remain in the country circulates in the underground economy, unable to surface and find it's way into legal investments. Additionally, "side effects" of marijuana prohibition are the near total limitations on medical marijuana and the suppression of hemp cultivation and industrial production and use. Marijuana is an effective medicine, useful for a wide variety of ailments. Marijuana is often more effective, safer and less expensive than available pharmaceuticals. Allowing marijuana use for medical purposes would not ONLY help relieve suffering. Marijuana as medicine will save both individuals and insurance companies money, doing its part to relieve the health and insurance crisis. Hemp production was effectively criminalized by marijuana prohibition. Hemp is a non-psychoactive variety of cannabis that has been used since the earliest days of civilization for fiber. Hemp is essentially marijuana's non-stony cousin. Hemp can be used to produce clothing stronger than cotton, paper stronger than wood pulp, building materials as strong as lumber that are naturally mold and mildew resistant, and fuel 10 times more efficiently than corn. Hemp can be grown on marginal lands without fertilizers or pesticides and processed for industrial use without toxic chemicals. Hemp production could lead to a cleaner environment and enrich farming communities without taking prime lands out of food production. It's time for America to cut our loses from the failed attempts to enforce marijuana prohibition and begin reaping the vast social dividends of regulation and taxation. Stop making marijuana arrests and free all the marijuana prisoners. Direct all enforcement efforts to oversight of the marijuana industry and collection of taxes. Legalize domestic cultivation of marijuana while strictly enforcing a ban on all importation. This will insure that all money generated from the industry will stimulate our economy. Develop a two tier taxation plan for cultivation. A reasonable tax should be placed on individuals for personal cultivation which can be calibrated by the number of plants. Tax commercial growers at a higher rate and regulate the production and distribution. Cultivation can be taxed at every level of government - Federal, State and local. Regulate and control all sales of marijuana. Set a minimum age, maximum package size and establish quality control. Sales of cannabis should only be through regulated establishments. Every sale can be taxed by each level of government. Also, establish an amnesty period to allow those who have unregulated cash hidden away an opportunity to come forward, pay a tax on the underground profits and invest the remainer in the general economy. Recognize medical marijuana's effectiveness and institute increased research into the uses of marijuana as a safe alternative to more dangerous medications. Encourage the production of non-psychoactive industrial hemp as a home grown solution to many of our energy and environmental problems. Promote the development of this clean, green, environmentally aware industry. The increased stimulation of the economy by the newly regulated cannabis industries coupled with the new stream into government coffers as a result of taxation would be a boon for us and for future generations. This is an opportunity that we can no longer afford to put off. This article in part was submitted to Obama's Ideas to Change America- change.org/ideas/view/regulate_ and_tax_marijuana |
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| Support Families of Marijuana Prisoners! Blogspot | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| All proceeds go to support the family of Harold Zvi Baranoff a prisoner at Jesup GA Federal Prison Work Camp. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
email BarbaraMcSpadden TAXMARIJUANA@yahoo.com |
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| Marijuana Nation - Having spent years reporting on the drug wars Lucy Ling offers her perspective on marijuana. See clips from this program on the National Geographic Explorer.. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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