Matt Welch Discusses Eric Holder's Proposal to Reduce Prison Population on Kudlow

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Matt Welch Discusses Eric Holder's Proposal to Reduce Prison Population on Kudlow

Reason Editor-in-Chief Matt Welch discusses Attorney General Eric Holder's proposal to curb mandatory minimums in order to reduce mass incarceration on CNBC's Kudlow Report.

Airdate:  August 12, 2013.

About 6 minutes.

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Comments

[dr"Smokey"]

Appropriately handled, the legalization, regulation and taxation of marijuana will ultimately provide our nation an estimated $80 billion+ in annual GDP. Others have calculated the addition of industrial Hemp production into this marijuana annual GDP, and believe that the hemp fiber that we now import plus the usable hemp-oil as diesel fuel and other uses for the nearly 400 organic chemical compounds that will ultimately be used in a host of products yet to be determined, may add up to over and added $3 billion in GDP (this includes money saved by eliminating the importing of industrial cannabis products) My research into this estimate, closely parallels what I have found in the U.S. produced industrial hemp products as a source of annual GDP. I factored in savings and increased employment in both figures for smoked cannabis sativa and industrial hemp production. The former tobacco farmers would have a new, job producing product in the former tobacco producing areas of our country. By my estimate, the number of heavy alcohol users that would stop the heavy drinking and switch to legal marijuana. Of the over 400 organic compounds available in the cannabis sativa plant, about half will find their way into new pharmaceutical products that are safer and have fewer adverse side effects. I am sure there are many other, yet to be determined value, uses that are just waiting to be found and a few that should be in use now but are blocked by the law.

[dr"Smokey"]

I should note that I have over half a century in dealing with the science of addictions using a (w)holistic, 360 degree approach to the subject. This provides equal evaluation regarding the positive and the negative aspects of mind/mood altering chemicals, both legal and non-legal. I have been termed "an expert in the science of addiction" however; with all that there is yet to be discovered, I do not believe that "expert" is the correct terminology. Very knowledgeable and yet, not expert. In the near future, you will find more in the series of e-books that I am currently working on. I hope to have something in this fact based fiction series ready before Christmas. There you will be able to see the unbelievable and mostly unknown and/or misunderstood scope of fact, in this unbelievably extensive field of very complicated addictions realities.

[dr"Smokey"]

Upon a second viewing of the current video, I should note that from every science based standpoint, overuse of marijuana is NOT WORSE than the OVERUSE OF ALCOHOL. Alcohol kills on a daily basis, and marijuana use does not. These are irrefutable facts and my collection of over half-a-century of scientific and clinical research very easily bears that out quite well. Marijuana has become a huge "Money-go-Round" for far too many people. It would be well to review the President Nixon tapes when he declared it a "Class One Narcotic" and his seriously flawed reasoning for doing so (by Executive Order). He saw it as a big "money-maker" but only as a Federal Law. Absent marijuana, the War on Drugs would have died a natural death long ago. Reality and absolute fact stand as irrefutable proof. Pseudoscience and false data statistics do not in any way support marijuana being anything but safe in all regards compared to the use of alcohol. I have observed personally the excessive use of alcohol on Capitol Hill and I know why Congress supports and protects their "right to overuse" alcohol. I also know the damage and lasting effects of the overuse of alcohol. Who want's a "drunk" making laws?