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Comment by sliverstorm | Hacker News Reader

On the other hand, if the Feds just keep turning a blind eye, that might provide the time needed to accrue evidence and sway public opinion enough to legalize at the federal level.

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On yet another hand, as someone who doesn't smoke marijuana but thinks it should be legal, I'm more interested and clarifying the precedent so there's a better, more concrete understanding of how our state democracies relate to the federal democracy.

> clarifying the precedent so there's a better, more concrete understanding of how our state democracies relate to the federal democracy

I think that's been a somewhat fuzzy, ongoing debate all the way back to the beginning, so I'm not really holding out too much hope on it being clearer any time soon.

the feds only have power from the states, so that's pretty clear. What isn't clear is what the states will do about the federal government over-reaching like with obamacare.

The Feds can pull their "commerce clause" card and do whatever they want.

That's a domain I'd really rather not travel lightly, as in recent years the government (courts, Justice department) have decided that Some Things are just fine which I felt were not so cool. I'd really rather not get them to decide on a states-rights issue, if we can instead find a way to make it legal federally, as the penalty (to states) of losing sounds high.

A law that isn't currently enforced is a dangerous one. What would happen if all cops started pulling over anyone driving +5 over the speed limit?

The state gets addicted to the revenue, people spend more time looking at their speedometers instead of the road, and the limits keep going down (instead of becoming more realistic) because the 'think of the children' crowd is just as powerful as ever. Source: Melbourne, Australia

People would dislike cops (even) more, slow down while driving, and municipalities would suddenly have an increase in revenue.

That's a big risk. If it's not done by 2016, and a conservative or someone interested in playing the "drug war" card gets into office, we could see a totally new Justice Department filing cases against all of these (and whatever new) States.

Yeah. Now, when even people like my religious-right father living in a red-state supports legalization, is a good time to do it. That sort of support could dissolve in the future if the Feds go back to being "the good guys" to people like him after an administration change (instead of "those evil states-rights hating guys"), or if there is another strong push on the morality of drugs (something that is damn-near impossible to reason with, you just have to wear it down over time).

A Democrat administration fighting and losing this battle is the best chance it has and we don't want to miss this window.

Of course, where there's risk, there's money to be made...

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