Desperation from the Anti-Legalization Crew

Check this out: The liars and criminals on the anti-legalization side of this argument, the ones who wish to subvert the will of the people in order to prop up their own undeserved power and privilege—not to mention obscene profit—are trying like hell to neutralize the Colorado marijuana legalization. You should hear the flailing they’re doing. Check this out:
 

The Colorado legislation would create a 15 percent excise tax and 15 percent special sales tax on marijuana. House Republicans are pushing to lower the rate on both taxes to 10 percent.

In this instance, Republicans are aligned with legalization advocates, who worry that a higher tax rate could result in an expanded black market and even rejection at the hands of tax-averse voters in November.

Doesn’t sound too bad, does it? The Republicans want to lower all those taxes so they can help legalization finish passing—or do they? Add this desire to lower the taxes to this:

That’s where the repeal discussion comes in. Diane Carlson of Smart Colorado, an anti-legalization group, argued that voters should be given the option of repealing Amendment 64 in order to avoid budget cuts to other spending priorities, such as K-12 education.

“This just gives the option for voters that if there is not the money to cover the costs, then Amendment 64 should not be implemented,” said Ms. Carlson. “Are we going to shift money from our schools to fund marijuana? That is not what we were promised in the fall.

Do you see what they’re trying to do there? On one hand, they’re trying to lower both the excise tax and the special sales tax on marijuana, to encourage people to vote this in AND in order to prevent an “expanded black market”. On the other hand, they are trying to create a false dichotomy between “marijuana legalization” and “OUR CHILDREN’S SCHOOLS!!!!11!!!” and convince people that to choose marijuana is to rob our children of an education.

So they know this is a battle they can’t win by public opinion anymore, at least not when it’s simply legalization at stake. They know that all their “Reefer Madness” lies and BS are no longer believed and they can no longer fear-monger people into keeping marijuana illegal because the majority of us can see right through their lies now. So they are trying to create a direct link between something that benefits children and the legalization of pot, create an either/or choice between them, and make sure that by keeping the taxes on the marijuana low enough they will be able to simply eradicate the legalization by saying “oh, sorry folks, it turns out we just can’t derive enough revenue from legalization to even fund the costs of implementing legalization, contrary to the pro-legalization claims that by regulating and taxing we could bring in a lot of revenue.” They are trying to neutralize one of the major positive points of the legalization side by pretending to go along with the pro-legalization majority, and they will use that to reverse this legalization victory and, additionally, create the illusion that taxation and regulation won't work--by making it not work, in the same way that they have self-fulfilled their claims of government incompetence by running for office and dismantling the government to the point where it can't function!

Why should any of this be surprising though?  Every bit of the Drug War has been based on lies, skewed data, political posturing, fear-mongering, false dichotomies (either pro-drug testing or pro-drug use, no other possible opinion can exist, right?) and other techniques of con artists and tyrants.  It is to be expected that these contemptible dishonest authoritarians would fall back on something like this when they're losing on their usual fronts--and they are losing, have no doubt of that.

And this talk about that extra 5% of tax could make people disapprove legalization: Are they serious? Do they really think that people who have fought so long and so hard to legalize are going to say “screw it, just make it illegal again” just because of a 5% difference in the taxes that would be involved—that would only affect people buying the marijuana and do not raise taxes on anything else? Are people more likely to buy black market booze and cigarettes just because of the high taxes we’ve placed on them? And the anti-legalization voters are only going to vote down a tax on marijuana if they know that it will lead to marijuana's legalization being repealed, otherwise they'd be fine with taxing the hell out of it--so you know that is making the rounds among the anti-crowd to ensure their "no" votes.

Let's face it.  Making it legal at all is more likely to hurt the black market sales, not expand it, even with a high tax. I know that if I smoked pot, I’d much prefer to get it from a safe regulated source than from the guy on the street corner who might have laced it with any number of things, for example--even if that meant paying a bit more for it. I find it amazing that anyone on the legalization side would seriously think that a 15% tax, rather than a 10% tax, on the legal sale of marijuana is going to tank the law, and I know perfectly well that the Republicans don’t believe it either. They’re just trying to pave the way for the new “Make Your Choice: Marijuana or OUR CHILDREN” campaign against pot.

Seriously, the Republican Party these days is always aligned with all things anti-choice—at least, when it involves the choices of women, minorities, and anyone who isn’t fabulously wealthy. When they align themselves with the forces of actual freedom and American spirit you should take it as a huge, blazing neon sign to look closer and dig deeper because, rest assured, they have some kind of agenda in place to get you to eliminate your own victory.

Welcome, Fellow Opponents of Drug Testing!

Hello, all.

I have a lot of good ideas laid out for this blog, but first I would like to make an official introduction. I am Demonhype and I am one of the people who opposes drug testing on the grounds that it is an immoral violation of human dignity, on the grounds that it is a subcontracting of Fourth Amendment civil rights violation to the private sector (you don't think your employer isn't writing off the cost of those tests, or getting juicy tax breaks, or other government subsidies like discounts on worker's comp, do you?), on the grounds that it is ineffective and unreliable security theater that is defrauding companies while making them both less safe and less productive by preying on their ignorance and moral panic, and on the grounds that it is counterproductive to the drug problem and actually makes it worse at the expense of people who need help the most.  Anyone who has made an honest effort to educate themselves on this subject knows that all unbiased (read: not conducted by nor paid for by drug testing companies or other financially interested groups) shows all of this to be true.

I was elated when WA and CO legalized marijuana, even though I am not a user, because I know that the vast majority of positive tests are for marijuana--indeed, the Drug War and it's profiteers have pretty much made the War on Drugs into the War on Marijuana, because of it's prevalence and because it helps create an illusion of efficacy for drug testing companies and opportunistic employer-based rehabilitation center. When the effort to neutralize those laws was led by a former DEA agent AND owner of a drug-testing company, I laughed because I knew they were scared. Medical marijuana laws have compromised their ability to force drug testing into every workplace and walk of life in the states that have them--in fact, in my job search I found that a certain trucking company had a bolded pro-suspicionless testing policy at the bottom of every job post in every state except one--Colorado. Friends from California have expressed amazement when I asked about the prevalence of drug testing out there--not that they were surprised that I, a non-user, was asking but why I would have to ask. Legalization is going to restore our rights to us again.

Then the extinction burst hit me. I knew there would be one, but I didn't know it would happen so fast or that I would be caught in the crossfire. I live in a non-medical marijuana state and have been working at a company that had a strict with-suspicion policy. It seems the drug testing companies are ramping up their scare tactics in non-medical marijuana states in order to achieve as near-total a saturation of their dishonest practice as they can. Perhaps they are just trying to get one last boost of profit before they inevitably fail. Perhaps they believe they can keep legalization from happening by forcing marijuana users to stop using. Of course, forcing marijuana users to stop using out of fear isn’t going to stop them from voting pro-legalization--and in fact drug testing not only doesn't stop people from using marijuana or prevent users from finding employment, but it also has a tendency to drive marijuana users into using harder drugs that are essentially a crap shoot to detect given the laughably narrow detection window, but I don’t expect people in favor of the Drug War to think rationally anyway.

Unfortunately they have gotten to my employer and talked them into enacting a full-on suspicion-less testing program, both pre-employment and random, likely by emphasizing that they can actually make money off it in the short term by writing off the tests, getting a huge tax break, and having the government subsidize their workers comp program—and leaving out some of the facts, such as that suspicion-less drug testing programs actually lower worker productivity and morale, lower actual workplace safety (as all drug testing programs dis-incentivize reporting, thus artificially improving the safety record on paper while creating a much more hazardous work environment), and cost more money in the long run by contributing to a higher turnover rate.  Many companies have eliminated at least their random programs because of these very facts, though they cling to pre-employment testing for the juicy government subsidies and the political points they think they will get from a public they can't seem to realize is mostly opposed to the Drug War and no longer impressed by "tough on drugs" posturing.

I was already with my back to the wall. The job I have sucks and is far below my level of intelligence, training and talent, but I worked there because I felt my employer valued and respected me enough not to declare my flesh as company property. However, even then I could only stew and fume in silence because I was afraid if I spoke out against the Drug War and especially drug testing I would be tracked down and forced to be violated. I am not a user and have only a fear of getting a false positive on a drug test (since as many as 30 percent of positive tests are false positives), but I lived in fear of being violated and being forced to submit to something morally wrong in order to pay my bills. But now that I will be violated no matter what I do, I have no more fear. They have left me with nowhere to run, and in doing so they have liberated my tongue. They will not silence me ever again.

When marijuana becomes legal in more and more places and the federal government finally has no choice but to end the federal legislation, and when employers are no longer allowed to fire people for using marijuana, I hope those of you who use marijuana and will no longer have anything to fear will join me in speaking out, loud and proud, against the testing companies. And in the meantime, I hope you can use some of my resources, as well as this safe-space, to help you raise awareness and combat the skewed data and, dare I say it, lies of the drug testing companies.

The corporatists have robbed us of our very flesh with this dishonest security theater, but perhaps we might be able to take our bodies back if we keep talking about this and correcting their deliberate mis-representations of their services.

I will also say a word or two on my commenting policy. This is a safe-space for people who oppose drug testing and a place for the anti-drug testing populace to perhaps have a chance to organize and, as I stated in the paragraph beneath the title, pro-drug testing trolls will not be allowed. You have had the entirety of this country for thirty years now to spew your POV, and even now those of us who oppose drug testing must be afraid to speak out for fear of being targeted in this witch-hunt, while you have the right to blather openly even in the workplace with your privileged, if benighted, view. Even at my workplace, those of us who oppose the company’s “your body is now company property” policy can only walk about with sour faces at best, if we even dare to go that far since even that can be enough to make us a target of the witch-hunters, while those who support the loss of their bodily autonomy have free reign to "rah rah rah" openly about how our loss of civil rights will somehow keep us from being robbed at gunpoint by a meth-head (like I said, I don’t expect rational thought from people who support drug testing at this point—all they have is sound bytes, broad and long-debunked assumptions, and putrid cowardice.) The lies from the Drug War proponents and profiteers, and especially from the drug testing companies, have forcibly monopolized this conversation for decades and continue to bully the opposition by any means necessary. I will allow no pro-drug war trolls to derail the efforts of raising awareness of their dishonesty by spamming the conversation with their falsehoods and sound bytes and, as usual, arguing primarily by gish gallop as they do on every single other such conversation all over the internet.

You do not need yet another platform. It is our turn to speak and your turn to shut up.