Mexico May Decriminalize Marijuana
May 1, 2009 at 6:57 pm 1 comment
On Tuesday, the Mexican Senate passed a bill that would decriminalize small amounts of marijuana, as well as of certain other drugs. Felipe Calderón, the President of Mexico, sponsored the bill, which means that he will certainly sign the bill if it passes through the lower house. The Mexican Congress already passed a similar bill in 2006; however Vicente Fox (then-President of Mexico) vetoed the measure.
This bill would send low-level drug dealing cases to state courts, making the offfenses no longer federal crimes.
If passed, this law could provide a new incentive for the federal government – or even especially state governments in California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas – to adapt local laws in order to make the drug trade from Mexico less profitable. (Hint: one way to do that would be to provide a legal market for drugs within those states!) One of those states is already ahead of the curve with Assembly Bill 390, introduced by Assemblyman Ammiano.
Entry filed under: Uncategorized. Tags: Arizona, Assembly Bill 390, Calderón, California, decriminalization, decriminalize marijuana, drug policy, Felipe Calderón, Fox, legalize marijuana, marijuana, Mexico, New Mexico, relegalize marijuana, Texas, Tom Ammiano, Vicente Fox.
Legal.Now 
1.
Adam | May 18, 2009 at 10:14 am
” I am writing to express my concern over a recent trend developing largely over the last few months. There has been an explosion in support for the legalization of marijuana. This is a terrible idea! If marijuana were to be legal, my entire business would be destroyed overnight. My company, a Mexican drug cartel, makes most of its money from marijuana. In 2004-2005 Mexican drug cartels grossed $8.6 billion from marijuana alone. That’s a huge amount of money that would no longer go to my cartel and others, but instead into the US economy. How could any industry continue to exist if all of a sudden, $8.6 billion was cut out from their income? After all, the next best selling drug is cocaine, but that only brings in $3.9 billion a year, less than half the amount marijuana does.
Plus, reports from other countries that have legalized or decriminalized marijuana have all shown a decrease in the demand for harder drugs, so the $3.9 billion from cocaine would also be drastically reduced.
Please keep the illegal drug trade profitable by keeping marijuana illegal.”