Drug War Issues
Politics & Advocacy
Canada's opposition Liberal Party head Justin Trudeau has called for the legalization of marijuana, putting himself and his party on a collision course with the ruling Conservatives ahead of 2015 elections. Trudeau's stand also differentiates the Liberals from the New Democratic Party (NDP), which has been the progressive party on drug reform, but which only calls for decriminalization.
Justin Trudeau (wikimedia.org)
Trudeau revived drug policy as an issue when, at a Kelowna, British Columbia, event Sunday, he spotted someone in the crowd holding a sign calling for decriminalization.
"I'll take that as a question," he volunteered. "I'm actually not in favor of decriminalizing cannabis, I'm in favor of legalizing it, tax and regulate," he said to applause. "It's one of the only ways to keep it out of the hands of our kids, because the current war on drugs, the current model, is not working."
In Vancouver on Thursday, Trudeau elaborated.
"Listen, marijuana is not a health food supplement, it's not great for you," he told reporters, but added that it was no worse for people than cigarettes or alcohol and he was now willing to go further than just decrim. "I have evolved in my own thinking," Trudeau said. "I was more hesitant to even decriminalize not so much as five years ago. But I did a lot of listening, a lot of reading, and a lot of paying attention to the very serious studies that have come out and I realize that going the road of legalization is actually a responsible thing to look at and to do."
When Liberals controlled the national government at the beginning of this century, they moved to reform the marijuana laws. But the Liberals only favored a quasi-decriminalization, and they ended up not even being able to move that forward.
The Conservatives have held national power since 2006 and have ratcheted up penalties for some drug offenses, including some marijuana offenses. Responding to Trudeau's comments this week, the party said it was staying the prohibitionist course.
"These drugs are illegal because of the harmful effect they have on users and on society, including violent crime. Our government has no interest in seeing any of these drugs legalized or made more easily available to youth," the prime minister's office said in a statement.
The Conservatives' position on marijuana puts them out of step with most Canadians on the issue. An Angus-Reid poll last fall showed Canadian support for legalization at 57%, and other surveys have polled even higher.
This work by StoptheDrugWar.org is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International
Comments
When's the next election?
When's the next election?
In reply to When's the next election? by Paul Pot (not verified)
Trudeau the new "good" puppet in the same old puppet show.
The next Canadian Federal General Elections are set to begin in October, 2015.
Too bad that the ONLY good thing about Liberals is that they now promote neoprohibitionist "legalization." Otherwise, they are same old mainstream morons, and puppets for the banksters, who repeated 9/11 lies, etc., and otherwise generally are the same old professional liars, and immaculate hypocrites. I WISH that the rest of the Liberals were not so bad! HOWEVER, they are still mostly deliberately ignorant.
Trudeau is a popular puppet, that may be way better than the continuation of the power of the Harper led Conservatives! However, in no significant way is Justin Trudeau anything more than a potentially popular puppet. ... Oh well, that makes no practical difference to me. I shall be forced to continue the same old strategic advice to vote against the Conservatives as before. The only apparent difference is that might mean (assuming October-November 2015 looks like the world looks now, instead of DIFFERENT) then there probably will be many more ridings where voting Liberal, rather than for the NDP, makes more strategic sense than it did before.
In reply to When's the next election? by Paul Pot (not verified)
Trudeau the new "good" puppet in the same old puppet show.
The next Canadian Federal General Elections are set to begin in October, 2015.
Too bad that the ONLY good thing about Liberals is that they now promote neoprohibitionist "legalization." Otherwise, they are same old mainstream morons, and puppets for the banksters, who repeated 9/11 lies, etc., and otherwise generally are the same old professional liars, and immaculate hypocrites. I WISH that the rest of the Liberals were not so bad! HOWEVER, they are still mostly deliberately ignorant.
Trudeau is a popular puppet, that may be way better than the continuation of the power of the Harper led Conservatives! However, in no significant way is Justin Trudeau anything more than a potentially popular puppet. ... Oh well, that makes no practical difference to me. I shall be forced to continue the same old strategic advice to vote against the Conservatives as before. The only apparent difference is that might mean (assuming October-November 2015 looks like the world looks now, instead of DIFFERENT) then there probably will be many more ridings where voting Liberal, rather than for the NDP, makes more strategic sense than it did before.
In reply to When's the next election? by Paul Pot (not verified)
October 2015
October 2015
God bless him.
Canada has taken a leadership role in the industrial cannabis industry since the early nineties and Canadian courts have forced the world to recognize that the species does have medicinal properties that are not present in other sources. It's only fitting that Canadians would elect a champion who will be the first to slay the beast.
"Our government has no
"Our government has no interest in seeing any of these drugs legalized or made more easily available to youth,"
Can't have it both ways. Making it legal would make it as hard for kids to get their hands on as alcohol and tobacco, even scratch tickets which is significantly harder, in case anyone is unaware.
Cheap tricks
I have no love for the conservatives. But like all politicians in this country this is a calculated move by one of the world's greatest douchebags to gain support for the next election. Understand more about him before you elect him... pffffft... dude.
Hard to get?
I'm from Sweden, and from my experience Canada is much alike.
Here it's almost if not easier to get your hands on Marijuana then liqueur. One phone call away and u will have it 30 min. rather then liqueur is government controlled and you can only get it from "systembolaget" where there is only a few stores in every city and there open hours is limited.
If you make it legal and make it government controlled you can use the income to help people with heavy drug problem and other health related problems instead of going to drug dealers etc.
now i'm not taking in any facts about the side effects of the drug itself, but the availability is very high.
Turmel: Who is still bustable under Trudeau's "regulation?"
Then we'll know what he really means.
Pushes the debate, but....
Unfortunately, as others have mentioned, Trudeau's support for new thinking on drug war issues is about the only thing going for him here in Canada. On many issues, he is at least as bad as the current Conservative government. For example, as reported in Huffington Post in May,
"Federal Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau has praised Alberta Premier Alison Redford for her efforts to get the United States to approve the Keystone XL pipeline. But Trudeau said Prime Minister Stephen Harper's government hasn't done enough to push the project."
Well, at least, he has fanned the fires of debate. Biggest problem is that in the first past the post electoral system here in multi-party Canada, otherwise non-voting disaffected youth who are charmed by his marijuana position may once again split the vote and enable Stephen Harper and his ilk to carry on destroying all vestiges of democracy in Canada, as well as the environment.
Regains Liberal Fed Opposition at best...
Island Defender makes a sound point... Trudeau's new revelation is a clear tactic to gain a particular voting block for greater potential in 2015. The irony being, at best this new stance might garner enough new Liberal voters to sway the party back into the official Federal opposition, splitting the vote further than current standings as Trudeau would be dipping into NDP votership rather than the Conservative pool. As ghastly as they are, The Conservatives would probably come out on top. It's just divide and conquer, and "majority" vs "minority" govt depends on the particulars. I guess we'll see in 2015...
Legalization Will Not Happen
It's all a show. The Liberals are trying to win votes from the younger crowd hoping to get the majority in 2015.
Even if they win, it's highly doubtful we will see cannabis legalization. We have different colours and names (Liberals, NDP, Cons, etc) that share different views on how the government should run, but in the end, they all work for the same puppet master.
Don't believe anything these talking heads say. We already know big corps control the government.
In reply to Legalization Will Not Happen by Captain Nemo (not verified)
excellent insight !!!
excellent insight !!!
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