Drug War Issues
Politics & Advocacy
A bill to legalize marijuana passed the House in the Commonwealth of the Northern Marianas Islands (CNMI), a US territory, November 4. But the governor says he would only sign a medical marijuana bill, and the Senate appears poised to kill it.
Saipan -- moving toward a tropical paradise
The bill, HB 17-45, was championed by Rep. Stanley Torres (I-Saipan). It would "allow individuals 21 years or older to possess, cultivate, or transport marijuana for personal use; permit the regulation and taxation of the commercial production and sale to people 21 years old or older," while barring pot possession on school grounds and use in the presence of minors.
Earlier this year, a cost-benefit analysis performed by the House Committee on Natural Resources said enacting the bill into law "will possibly result in the loss of federal funds but at the same time the Commonwealth government will generate funds through taxation."
Torres and other legalization supporters also argued that the bill would allow access to marijuana by the ill and reduce crime and violence in black markets.
But Senate President Paul Manglona (R-Rota) said Wednesday that the Senate will kill the bill next. "It's for the same reasons I mentioned before," he told the Saipan Tribune, citing concerns about marijuana use's impact on CNMI youth and other ill effects on the community.
And Gov. Beningno Fitial signaled that he was okay with medical marijuana, but not for non-medical.
"I support it for medicinal use," Fitial told reporters. "I never smoke marijuana myself so I cannot talk much about it because I don't have the experience."
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Comments
Congrats
Good start :) congrats ya'll, I hope the rest of us can take a step like this. I wish these senators knew the injustice being done by trying to stop people from having their personal freedoms. I think we have a brighter future for the country though! It makes me so happy to look at all the states that plan on putting legalization on the ballot in 2012, I need to start working on Tennessee :)
"Banning use in presence of minors"
This careful restriction, similar to the one added to Prop. 19, just goes along with the carefully financed and promoted media "tradition" that any cannabis user is potentially a "dirty old man" threatening to "molest" your and my children.
Perspective: each year in the USA some 900,000 children somehow get hooked on nicotine $igarettes, almost enough to replace addicts who died, as the addiction rate creeps slowly, so slowly downward (still almost 20% of all adults). What kind of "mentors" are unhinderedly inducing this many kids to acquire a habit which shortens 400,000 lives a year? Can't the 80% who don't smoke nicotine get their act together and pass a Proposition against that?
And Gov. Beningno Fitial signaled that he was okay with medical
..... But Senate President Paul Manglona (R-Rota) said Wednesday that the Senate will kill the bill next. "It's for the same reasons I mentioned before," he told the Saipan Tribune, citing concerns about marijuana use's impact on CNMI youth and other ill effects on the community.
And Gov. Beningno Fitial signaled that he was okay with medical marijuana, but not for non-medical.
"I support it for medicinal use," Fitial told reporters. "I never smoke marijuana myself so I cannot talk much about it because I don't have the experience." .....
This is so typical of these sado-moralist prohibitionist types and it is so like them to get in government where they can control other people's lives!
Treason
I don't think I could've have said it better than MalcolmKyle. Support for prohibition is a type of treason...against mankind and the earth.
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