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Comment by loeg | Hacker News Reader

Popehat thinks the impact of Sessions' latest announcement is pretty minimal without other changes: https://www.popehat.com/2018/01/04/lawsplainer-attorney-gene...

In particular:

> In 2014, in the Rohrabacher-Farr amendment to an appropriations bill, Congress prohibited the Department of Justice from using federal money to "prevent" states from implementing laws making medical use of marijuana legal. Courts have found that this amendment may prohibit federal prosecutions for medical marijuana activities that are legal under state law.

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Rohrabacher-Farr has to be passed anew with each spending authorization and the current one expires later this month. If the administration decided they really don't want it, they can go hard line on that, though there's political risk involved.

It explicitly also applies only to medical marijuana laws even as previously drafted; even if they don't go hardline against it they could either seek to have Congress revise it slightly to provide a clearer delineation of the medical boundary, or just go full-out against non-medical operations in recreational-use states and let the courts sort out the boundary; start a few RICO and/or Continuing Criminal Enterprise prosecutions with the associated broad forfeiture that can come with those (and the 20-year, or if your business is more successful, life) mandatory prison sentences available under the latter, and you'll drive lots of people that aren't yet being prosecuted out of “legal” pot and supporting businesses even before any legal challenges are resolved.

I respect Popehat a lot, but I think that while the minimization of the legal risk to individual users is accurate, it misses the real risk, which is to trade as a whole through selective targeting of major operations and supporting businesses. Individual users lose out because the “legal” industry goes away from legal risk, not because they are individually targeted for prosecution.

Sure, but who's to say over the counter purchasing of marijuana isn't medical by definition?

It's a drug. It would certainly be a plausible argument that rescinding the need to have a doctor's prescription or some other formality does not change that fact.

Presumably allowing aspirin or bandages to be sold at gas stations or supermarkets doesn't stop them from being medical devices.

> Sure, but who's to say over the counter purchasing of marijuana isn't medical by definition?

In the first instance, the Department of Justice.

If people disagree, it becomes a dispute in the courts as people try to rollback the DoJ’s actions.

I’ve pointed out that this argument is available in another subthread, but you really don't want to be in the position of having to make it: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16075569

If the administration decided they really don't want it, they can go hard line on that, though there's political risk involved.

It's not like the administration has a whole lot of political capital to play with right now. Vetoing their own appropriations bill doesn't seem like a winning strategy, though obviously rational political calculus doesn't count for much in the White House these days.

> It's not like the administration has a whole lot of political capital to play with right now.

Sure, and if this administration showed any sign not of conserving political capital based on consistent coherent priorities rather than burning it on a whim, that'd play a bigger role in my assessment of the risk of them deciding to stand and fight on this.

Then again, if they had been doing that, they'd also probably have a lot more political capital pright now.

> Vetoing their own appropriations bill doesn't seem like a winning strategy

OTOH, threatening to over Rohrabacher-Farr might be—at least in the immediate term; it's quite possible that Congress isn't willing to shutdown the government over it but would believe the President might be.

Banking system is federalized though. Both currency and deposit insurance. They'll make it harder and harder for any weed dispensary or manufacturer to use banks, which is hilarious to imagine the crime around a liquor store having to use cash for every transaction.

But step back for a moment, and realize that they have probably 20 more policies just like this already in the hopper for a "rainy day", like yesterday, so they can completely control the media/narrative due to the outrage. Its literally the strategy that they state publicly. The problem of course is all the collateral damage, but at this point red state voters only care about sticking it to blue states. We're turning into a bi-cultural country to the point not seen since the civil war.

Yes.

Americans are the most divided right now. Polling these questions began in the 1990s.

IIRC General Mad Dog Mattis (not sure) when asked what's the biggest threat said it's the internal divisions and not terrorists, Russia, etc.

General Mad Dog Mattis should do something about it then, since he's in a position of power.

Really not a fan of the glib condescending style, and then:

> Practically speaking, it will be an impediment to personal-use prosecutions as well to the extent defendants claim they are in business to produce for medical use.

That defense is gonna last right up until the moment you find sales records to any not-strictly-medical distributor, which will be basically every one in legal recreational states. So yes, the door is completely open to federal prosecution of the vast majority of people in the business.

Is aspirin not a drug or medicine when sold at a gas station?

What about 'recreational'?

You can make an argument (though media typically characterizes it as “recreational”), that the states that have authorized pot withoit a physician recommendation have actually legalized it for OTC medical use like any of the wide range of drugs people are free to buy and use according to their own interpretation of their medical needs.

OTOH, if the DoJ decides to push the limits of its authority, that's an argument that will potentially have to be made after they’ve seized your assets and charged you everyone in your business—and potentially outside business partners who knew what your business is—with major felonies some of which have 20-year mandatory sentences, and maybe offered you a chance to plea down to a few years. So, even pushing the argument will be a big risk.

If the state laws were written explicitly referencing 'OTC medical use', I would agree.

However, the state laws of Oregon, for instance, specifically use the "recreational" terminology. It is not an invention of the media.

https://www.oregonlegislature.gov/bills_laws/ors/ors475B.htm...

> If the state laws were written explicitly referencing 'OTC medical use', I would agree.

There would make it a much easier argument, sure.

> However, the state laws of Oregon, for instance, specifically use the "recreational" terminology.

Other states, like California, with general legalization do not.

> It is not an invention of the media.

The use of it for all legalization regimes that aren't predicated on a physicians recommendation is, though.

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