MMJ: Supply the Demand

I saw the headline of a Yahoo News story that groups/gangs (criminals? Mexicans?) were accumulating marijuana in bulk amounts in Colorado and shipping the bulk amounts to “dry” states for a big profit. Do you know anything about this? - EK in Sac

Dude. Calm down. Maybe you are unaware of how the weed game works.

You seem to have the “accumulating MJ in bulk and shipping the bulk amounts to dry states for a big profit” part, but maybe you don’t understand this is done by people from all walks of life, not just gangs.

California grows great weed. People in Atlanta, Miami, New York – anywhere – want great weed. Of course some enterprising soul will figure out a way to get great weed from Cali (or Oregon or Colorado, and even Kentucky) to the good people of Atlanta. A pound of good kush will cost about three or four thousand dollars in California. You can get five to six grand for a pound of that Good-Good Cali Tree in A-Town. Boom. Of course people are going to smuggle weed. Welcome to America.

I am trying to let the weird racist portion of your question go, in the hopes that perhaps you were attempting a joke, but let me inform you that according to recent reports, Mexican gangs are getting out of the weed game. Why? Because marijuana has become cheap and plentiful thanks to current legalization efforts. Think about it: If you are a criminal gang, why would you want to smuggle weed (bulky, stinky, hard to store) if you could make more money with coke or meth or whatever is easier to conceal. The point is: Prohibition causes crime. It’s very simple. Last month, in Texas, cannabis activist Sam Clauder (white dude, if it matters) was arrested and charged with possessing 174 pounds of pot. Authorities claim he was headed to Florida, but couldn’t say whether or not he was planning to sell his stash, or give it away. Knowing Sam, he was probably gonna give most of it away. But it doesn’t matter. What does matter is that instead of growing their own weed, the good people of the Sunshine State have to rely on a 64-year-old man driving a van across the country through a gauntlet of agencies that make money if they deprive him of freedom. Marijuana prohibition is one of the dumbest policies ever. It’s time we change these laws.