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Comment by trompetenaccoun | Hacker News Reader

It is locally. Also such bizarre situations don't only exist in the US, the Netherlands come to mind as another weird example where it's both legalized and at the same time isn't. And the shop owners also have banking problems: https://www.dutchnews.nl/news/2021/10/abn-raises-charges-for...

Mind you, that's coming from a bank with a history in slave trading only a few generations ago. I find such cases to be almost advertisements for decentralized people-owned banking. Those who control our money control society and almost everything we can or can't do.

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All US localities are subject to federal law. Federal law enforcement is not currently enforcing the law in some situations, but the law remains on the books and still is enforced in many situations.

Federal law still enforced against the ~44% of the population who have constructive possession of a firearm by virtue of owning one themselves or having access to one via living with someone else with one and it either being unlocked or locked in a way other adults in the house may be able to get to it.

If you toss in those under the UCMJ and other people on federal property, etc, I'd say weed laws are federally enforced against the majority or a hair under it.

For such persons there is still actively enforced 10 year jail sentence for being a pot user.

Not to mention all sorts of weird state exceptions. In my state they have legal weed but also a law that says ANY metabolites in your body is a DUI. Inactive metabolites stay in the body a long long time and surviving here on the abysmal public transport without driving would be quite unpleasant. So basically just as illegal as it ever was.

I watched a documentary on police in Texas and apparently there you can get serious jail time even if just "caught" in a traffic stop with what I consider small amounts of relatively harmless drugs like marijuana. Saw them arrest a teenager and the cops said she was going to jail. Absolute unjustifiable madness, there must be so many lives that have been ruined over this. Really broke my heart watching this and the police have no sympathy, they treated the kid like she's some dangerous criminal.

It's hard to understand how a nation can pride itself in being the 'land of the free' while having such dystopian law enforcement. They apparently pick you up and drive you home if you're underage and out too late as well. Kids can shoot guns but they basically control every other aspect of your life. And you better not get into an argument with them or you may be assaulted, it's like dealing with the Sturmabteilung.

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