this post was submitted on 30 Sep 2024
1051 points (98.8% liked)

politics

19232 readers
3913 users here now

Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!

Rules:

  1. Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.

Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.

Example:

  1. Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
  2. Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
  3. No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive. Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
  4. Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
  5. No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.

That's all the rules!

Civic Links

Register To Vote

Citizenship Resource Center

Congressional Awards Program

Federal Government Agencies

Library of Congress Legislative Resources

The White House

U.S. House of Representatives

U.S. Senate

Partnered Communities:

News

World News

Business News

Political Discussion

Ask Politics

Military News

Global Politics

Moderate Politics

Progressive Politics

UK Politics

Canadian Politics

Australian Politics

New Zealand Politics

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 49 points 2 months ago (3 children)

The public comments were overwhelmingly in favor of full deschedule/legalization, but all he's pushing for is reschedule to 3, which means they'll probably go to 2 because fuck you that's why. Hopefully Harris can lean into it a little harder than Biden has.

[–] [email protected] 38 points 2 months ago (2 children)

As a senator Harris introduced bills that would've fully legalized it. Meanwhile I don't think Biden ever publicly said he wanted full legalization

I think there's pretty good odds she would go further than Biden in executive action alone

[–] Bonesince1997 27 points 2 months ago (3 children)

Biden was calling it a gateway drug just before entering the office of president. I don't believe he's evolved personally at all. Policy, which is kind of weak, may be another thing. But I don't think the man sees any value in marijuana, for anybody.

[–] Furbag 9 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Is anyone actually surprised that Biden is extremely anti-narcotics given his son's battle with drug addiction?

Harris doesn't have the same baggage. If she were at the helm, I think she'd follow through.

[–] Bonesince1997 14 points 2 months ago (1 children)

But that's just the point. Part of marijuana adoption is getting away from worse drugs. There is plenty of supporting data at this point. The sooner people see this they'll see where the bar ought to be set. This is only one example of course.

[–] Crismus 3 points 2 months ago

One of the best ways to get through withdrawal symptoms is Marijuana. When I was getting off some pretty rough mental meds, Marijuana allowed me to keep going.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 months ago

Yeah at best Biden probably only is in favor of it for textile products and maybe CBD derivatives for medical use. Which mind you is still a massive improvement over damned near every president since it was putlawed but still a woefully insufficient, a solid summary of Biden now that I think about it.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago

He’s too old. Society has moved beyond him on this and it’s an example of why we need to start electing younger people.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 15 points 2 months ago

Plus this post is literally about her going to the "All The Smokes" podcast and calling for legal weed there. Could not imagine Biden doing

[–] OccamsTeapot 14 points 2 months ago (1 children)

all he's pushing for is reschedule to 3, which means they'll probably go to 2 because fuck you that's why

I figure you're partially joking but they can't really make it 2. The HHS recommendation was 3 and even the DEA kind of has to agree even if they don't want to. It would have been super controversial to do something else, they're mainly supposed to follow it through with the rulemaking process unless they're willing to make a serious case. And even then it would probably be to leave it where it is.

One of the theories going around as to why they added the hearing is that they wanted to take the heat off themselves for the call they've made by really drawing out the public consultation. Like people will be mad at them for following the recommendation so they want to make a big show of the fact they're listening to concerns etc.

Hopefully Harris can take some stronger action or legalize through executive order or something. Schedule III is better but it's then in the same class as ketamine. No judgement of people who like ketamine but COME ON

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Interesting, didn't know that about the process, TIL. So am I reading you right that they're effectively locked into reschedule to 3 no matter what now due to the HHS recommendation? Or do they still have the option to just not change a thing as well?

[–] OccamsTeapot 6 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Yeah my understanding is that since HHS said "the science suggests it should be in 3," the DEA would have a bit of a challenge making any other rule. The schedules (theoretically) tell you what the addiction risk and medical value of a substance is, with lower risk & more effective medicine being the least restricted. So since HHS made that determination and the DEA are not scientists, it would be kind of wild for them to try to argue with that.

I think technically they could propose anything they like, but 2 would never go through because there's no basis for it, and I think even keeping it in 1 would be a difficult sell with Biden having called for the review and the recommendation being what it was. Plus as you said most public comments (and experts) said they didn't go far enough.

Honestly I think they're stuck. They probably can't just come out and recommend descheduling (and going by public statements probably don't want to) but the current position is untenable. So they have to just sign up for the "better but nobody is especially happy" option HHS gave them

One thing I wish I understood more was whether Harris could just legalize through an executive order. Biden (and now Harris) said nobody should go to jail for weed but schedule III does not solve that problem at all.

[–] Crismus 1 points 2 months ago (1 children)

The classification problem will lead to the DEA gaining control of all the dispensaries in every state.

Maybe I'm being alarmist, but rescheduling Marijuana is worse than leaving things alone. Oversight by the DEA is the wrong way to go.

[–] OccamsTeapot 1 points 2 months ago

Yeah I wouldn't say alarmist but this is likely a non issue. Under the current system, every legal state is breaking federal law in a bunch of ways, but the DEA and other agencies have not acted. Technically putting it in schedule III would mean it could be treated like other substances in that schedule, available only with FDA oversight, but that is not likely. Basically everything has been totally hands off so far, so it's very unlikely that the government reducing the level of control of cannabis would lead to agencies increasing their control.

The biggest threat at the moment imo is a Trump presidency, but based on his comments about Florida's ballot initiative, his "change with the wind" opinion is currently also in favor of not sending people to jail for it.

[–] Viking_Hippie -2 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

The public comments were overwhelmingly in favor of full deschedule/legalization, but all he's pushing for is reschedule to 3, which means they'll probably go to 2 because fuck you that's why

The Lesser Evil Party in a nutshell 😮‍💨

Granted, it's of course still a MUCH lesser evil than the American Fascist Party, but fucking HELL! Your very bleak guess is probably the best case scenario with these fuckers!