1ac
Plan
The United States Federal Government should make legal nearly all
marihuana prohibited under the Controlled Substances Act in the
United States.
Adv 1
Advantage 1 – Mexico
Violence is increasing and threatens irreversible state collapse
Dowd, 14 [“Bordering on Chaos”, Alan, senior fellow with the Sagamore Institute, also holds
senior fellow posts with the American Security Council Foundation and Fraser Institute. In
addition, he serves as an adjunct professor at Butler University, Sunday, March 2, 2014 Filed
under: World Watch, Government & Politics,
http://www.american.com/archive/2014/february/steering-mexico-away-from-failed-statestatus]
To optimists, the recent arrest in Mexico of the world's most wanted drug lord, Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzmán, and
Mexico’s bloody drug war generally, are proof that the Mexican government is standing up to the cartels.
But pessimists look at Mexico and see a failing state on America’s border. More than 80,000 people
have been killed in Mexico’s brutal conflict, with the victims beheaded, shot, tortured and worse.
Civil authorities regularly quit or join the warlords, and entire towns have been depopulated as government forces and drug cartels
vie for control. In
2008, the U.S. military issued a report challenging policymakers to prepare for a
worst-case scenario involving the “rapid and sudden collapse” of Mexico, adding, “an
unstable Mexico could represent a homeland security problem of immense proportions to
the United States.” The situation may have improved slightly since then. But the Failed States Index (FSI), where
Mexico ranks 97th, has
described Mexico’s narco-insurgency as
“extremely serious” — and
understandably so. As with several countries at the top of the FSI (which is really the bottom), warlords
have taken over
significant chunks of the country — perhaps as much as 12 percent of Mexico’s territory — and the central
government’s writ is severely circumscribed. Predictably, vigilante groups — autodefensas — have sprung up in
response to the security vacuum. The central government’s reaction to vigilante security forces in the state of Michoacán has served
only to underscore its weakness, as it has alternated from promises to help the local militias, to empty threats that they disarm, to
open clashes with the militias. In a positive development, federal forces and local militias are partnering on security operations in
the Michoacán city of Apatzingán. However, “The government has proposed eventually incorporating some of the vigilantes into a
rural police force,” Reuters reports. That’s not a sign of strength or stability. Police forces in Phoenix, Tucson, Brownsville, and El
Paso link a growing number of violent crimes — shootings, homicides, even bombings — to cartel foot-soldiers. To put Mexico’s
gruesome drug-war death toll in perspective, consider this: The Iraqi government has estimated that 85,694 Iraqi civilians were
killed between 2004 and 2008. That’s 17,139 per year. Mexico’s annual total is around 11,000. But some experts place the drug-war
death toll closer to 130,000, translating into 18,571 violent deaths per year — considerably higher than the annual toll during Iraq’s
insurgency. Whether we accept the official government tally or that of independent researchers, the overall death toll in Mexico is far
higher than that which prompted NATO intervention in Kosovo in 1999 or in Libya in 2011. Corruption
remains a
serious problem in Mexico. According to Transparency International’s measure of corruption, Mexico ranks 106th out of
177 nations. So deep and wide is drug-cartel infiltration at the municipal level that President Enrique Peña Nieto was recently forced
to replace hundreds of local police and customs officials with federal troops. Mexico’s
chaos often spills across
the border. For instance, in 2011, the Zetas drug gang slaughtered 27 Guatemalan farmers. Mexican cartels are also operating
in Honduras and El Salvador — and the United States. American law enforcement agencies report that the tentacles of
Mexico’s cartels reach into scores of U.S. cities. Police forces in Phoenix, Tucson, Brownsville, and El Paso
link a growing number of violent crimes — shootings, homicides, even bombings — to cartel foot-soldiers. Mexico’s cartels
are well-armed, well-organized, highly motivated military adversaries. They deploy fighting
forces nearly as large as the Mexican army, and they use many of the same armaments: mortars, RPGs, bazookas,
land mines, and armored assault vehicles. As Guatemalan government officials observed after their troops engaged a Mexican cartel
inside Guatemala, “The weapons seized … are more than those of some army brigades.”
PEMEX reform passed in December but reductions in cartel violence
are key to effectiveness
AP, 9/24/14 [Mexican Cartels Steal Billions from Oil Industry CIUDAD MIER, Mexico — Sep 25, 2014, 2:28 PM ET,,
http://www.oregonlive.com/today/index.ssf/2014/09/mexican_cartels_steal_billions.html]
Mexico overcame 75 years of nationalist pride to reform its flagging, state-owned oil industry. But as it prepares to
develop rich shale fields along the Gulf Coast, and attract foreign investors, another challenge
awaits: taming the brutal drug cartels that rule the region and are stealing
billions of dollars' worth of oil from pipelines. Figures released by Petroleos Mexicanos last week show the
gangs are becoming more prolific and sophisticated. So far this year, thieves across Mexico have drilled 2,481 illegal taps into stateowned pipelines, up more than one-third from the same period of 2013. Pemex
estimates it's lost some 7.5 million
barrels worth $1.15 billion. More than a fifth of the illegal taps occurred in Tamaulipas, the Gulf
state neighboring Texas that is a cornerstone for Mexico's future oil plans . It has Mexico's
largest fields of recoverable shale gas, the natural gas extracted by fracturing rock layers, or fracking. Mexico, overall, is
believed to have the world's sixth-largest reserves of shale gas — equivalent to 60 billion barrels of crude oil.
That's more than twice the total amount of oil that Mexico has produced by conventional means
over the last century. The energy reform passed in December loosened Mexico's protectionist
policies, opening the way for Pemex to seek foreign investors and expertise to help it exploit
its shale fields. It hopes to draw $10 billion to $15 billion in private investment each year. The attractiveness of the
venture may hinge on bringing Tamaulipas under control. "The energy reform won't
be viable if we aren't successful ... in solving the problem of crime and impunity,"
said Sen. David Penchyna, who heads the Senate Energy Commission. "The biggest challenge we Mexicans have, and I say
it without shame, is Tamaulipas." One foreign oil company that had a brush with violence appears undeterred. In early April,
gunmen opened fire at a hotel in Ciudad Mier, in Tamaulipas' rough Rio Grande Valley, where eight employees of Weatherford
International Ltd., a Swiss-based oil services company, were staying. They were not injured, and Weatherford said in an email
message that "Mexico continues to be a focused market for us with growing potential in 2014 and 2015." But other
potential
bidders may be put off by such incidents.
The impact is heg
Kotkin, 13 [Joel, Professor of Urban Studies at Chapman University in California and
executive editor of newgeography.com, America's True Power In The NAFTA Century,
9/13/2013, http://www.forbes.com/sites/joelkotkin/2013/09/13/americas-true-power-in-thenafta-century/]
OK, I get it. Between George W. Bush
and Barack Obama we have made complete fools of ourselves on
the international stage, outmaneuvered by petty lunatics and crafty kleptocrats like Russia’s Vladimir Putin. Some
even claim we are witnessing “an erosion of world influence” equal to such failed states as the Soviet
Union and the French Third Republic. “Has anyone noticed how diminished, how very Lilliputian, America has become?” my friend
Tunku Varadajaran recently asked. In reality, it’s our politicians who have gotten small, not America. In our embarrassment, we
tend not to notice that our rivals are also shrinking. Take the Middle East — please. Increasingly, we don’t need it because of North
America’s unparalleled resources and economic vitality. Welcome
then to the NAFTA century, in which our
power is fundamentally based on developing a common economic region with our
two large neighbors. Since its origins in 1994, NAFTA has emerged as the world’s largest trading bloc, linking 450 million
people that produce $17 trillion in output. Foreign policy elites in both parties may focus on Europe, Asia and the
Middle East, but our long-term fate lies more with Canada, Mexico and the rest of the Americas. Nowhere is
this shift in power more obvious than in the critical energy arena, the wellspring of our deep involvement in
the lunatic Middle East. Massive finds have given us a new energy lifeline in places like the Gulf coast, the Alberta tar sands, the
Great Plains, the Inland West, Ohio, Pennsylvania and potentially California. And
if Mexico successfully reforms
its state-owned energy monopoly , PEMEX, the world energy — and economic — balance of
power will likely shift more decisively to North America. Mexican President Pena Nieto’s
plan, which would allow increased foreign investment in the energy sector, is projected by at least
one analyst to boost Mexico’s oil output by 20% to 50% in the coming decades. Taken together, the
NAFTA countries now boast larger reserves of oil, gas (and if we want it, coal) than any other part of the world. More important,
given our concerns with greenhouse gases, NAFTA countries now possess, by some estimates, more clean-burning natural gas than
Russia, Iran and Qatar put together. All this at a time when U.S. energy use is declining, further eroding the leverage of these
troublesome countries. This particularly undermines the position of Putin, who has had his way with Obama but faces long-term
political decline. Russia, which relies on hydrocarbons for two-thirds of its export revenues and half its budget, is being forced to cut
gas prices in Europe due to a forthcoming gusher of LNG exports from the U.S. and other countries. In the end, Russia is an
economic one-horse show with declining demography and a discredited political system. In terms of the Middle East, the
NAFTA century means we can disengage, when it threatens our actual strategic interests. Afraid
of a shut off of oil from the Persian Gulf? Our response should be: Make my day. Energy prices
will rise, but this will hurt Europe and China more than us, and also will stimulate more jobs
and economic growth in much of the country, particularly the energy belts of the Gulf Coast and
the Great Plains. China and India have boosted energy imports as we decrease ours; China is expected to surpass the United
States as the world’s largest oil importer this year. At the same time, in the EU, bans on fracking and over-reliance on unreliable,
expensive “green” energy has driven up prices for both gas and electricity. These high prices have not only eroded depleted consumer
spending but is leading some manufacturers, including in Germany, to look at relocating production , notably to energy-rich regions
of the United States. This shift in industrial production is still nascent, but is evidenced by growing U.S. manufacturing at a time
when Europe and Asia, particularly China, are facing stagnation or even declines. Europe’s industry minister recently warned of “an
industrial massacre” brought on in large part by unsustainably high energy prices. The
key beneficiaries of NAFTA’s
energy surge will be energy-intensive industries such as petrochemicals — major new
investments are being made in this sector along the Gulf Coast by both foreign and domestic
companies. But it also can be seen in the resurgence in North American manufacturing in
automobiles, steel and other key sectors. Particularly critical is Mexico’s recharged
industrial boom. In 2011 roughly half of the nearly $20 billion invested in the country was for manufacturing.
Increasingly companies from around the world see our southern neighbor as an ideal locale for
new manufacturing plants; General Motors GM +0.49%, Audi , Honda, Perelli, Alcoa and the Swedish appliance giant
Electrolux have all announced major investments. Critically this is not so much Ross Perot’s old “sucking sound” of American jobs
draining away, but about the shift in the economic balance of power away from China and East Asia. Rather
than rivals, the
U.S., Mexican and Canadian economies are becoming increasingly integrated, with raw materials,
manufacturing goods and services traded across the borders. This integration has proceeded rapidly since NAFTA, with U.S.
merchandise exports to Mexico growing from $41.6 billion in 1993 to $216.3 billion in 2012, an increase of 420%, while service
exports doubled. Meanwhile U.S. imports from Mexico increased from $39.9 billion in 1993 to $277.7 billion in 2012, an increase of
596%. At
the same time, U.S. exports to Canada increased from $100.2 billion in 1993 to $291.8 billion in 2012.
Heg good
Keck 14—Managing Editor of The Diplomat
(Zachary, “America’s Relative Decline: Should We Panic?”, http://thediplomat.com/2014/01/americas-relative-decline-should-wepanic/, dml)
Still, on
balance, the U.S. has been a positive force in the world, especially for a unipolar power. Certainly, it’s
hard to imagine many other countries acting as benignly if they possessed the amount of relative power
America had at the end of the Cold War. Indeed, the British were not nearly as powerful as the U.S. in the 19th Century and they
incorporated most of the globe in their colonial empire. Even when it had to contend with another superpower, Russia occupied half
a continent by brutally suppressing its populace. Had the U.S. collapsed and the Soviet Union emerged as the Cold War victor,
Western Europe would likely be speaking Russian by now. It’s
difficult to imagine China defending a rule-based,
open international order if it were a unipolar power, much less making an effort to uphold a
minimum level of human rights in the world.
Regardless of your opinion on U.S. global leadership over the last two decades, however, there
is good reason to fear its
relative decline compared with China and other emerging nations. To begin with, hegemonic transition
periods have historically been the most destabilizing eras in history. This is not only because of the
malign intentions of the rising and established power(s). Even if all the parties have benign, peaceful intentions,
the rise of new global powers necessitates revisions to the “rules of the road.” This is nearly
impossible to do in any organized fashion given the anarchic nature of the international
system, where there is no central authority that can govern interactions between states.
We are already starting to see the potential dangers of hegemonic transition periods in the AsiaPacific (and arguably the Middle East). As China grows more economically and militarily powerful, it has
unsurprisingly sought to expand its influence in East Asia. This necessarily has to come at the expense
of other powers, which so far has primarily meant the U.S., Japan, Vietnam and the Philippines. Naturally, these powers
have sought to resist Chinese encroachments on their territory and influence, and the situation
grows more tense with each passing day. Should China eventually emerge as a global power, or should nations in
other regions enjoy a similar rise as Kenny suggests, this situation will play itself out elsewhere in the years and decades ahead.
All of this highlights some of the advantages of a unipolar system. Namely, although the U.S. has
asserted military force quite frequently in the post-Cold War era, it has only fought weak powers and thus
its wars have been fairly limited in terms of the number of casualties involved. At the same time,
America’s preponderance of power has prevented a great power war, and even restrained
major regional powers from coming to blows. For instance, the past 25 years haven’t seen
any conflicts on par with the Israeli-Arab or Iran-Iraq wars of the Cold War. As the unipolar era
comes to a close, the possibility of great power conflict and especially major regional wars rises
dramatically. The world will also have to contend with conventionally inferior powers like Japan
acquiring nuclear weapons to protect their interests against their newly empowered rivals.
But even if the transitions caused by China’s and potentially other nations’ rises are managed successfully, there
are still likely to be significant negative effects on international relations. In today’s “globalized” world, it is
commonly asserted that many of the defining challenges of our era can only be solved through
multilateral cooperation. Examples of this include climate change, health pandemics ,
organized crime and terrorism, global financial crises, and the proliferation of weapons of
mass destruction , among many others.
A unipolar system, for all its limitations, is uniquely suited for organizing effective global action
on these transnational issues. This is because there is a clear global leader who can take the initiative
and, to some degree, compel others to fall in line. In addition, the unipole’s preponderance of power
lessens the intensity of competition among the global players involved. Thus, while there are no
shortages of complaints about the limitations of global governance today, there is no question that global governance has
been many times more effective in the last 25 years than it was during the Cold War.
The plan solves –
Legal industry eliminates black markets—aff is a prerequisite to
global reform
Beckley Foundation, 11 [The Beckley Foundation policy programme is dedicated to
improving national and global drug policies, through research that increases understanding of
the health, social and fiscal implications of drug policy, “Legalizing Marijuana: An Exit Strategy
from the War on Drugs,” http://www.beckleyfoundation.org/2011/04/legalizing-marijuana-anexit-strategy-from-the-war-on-drugs/]
There are a few “unknowns” when it comes to the marijuana industry—its effects on productivity and drug-related violence, for example. Experts need
to examine these effects, and policymakers must open their ears to these experts. A government-sponsored marijuana commission is not a new idea; in
fact, Nixon established one in 1972 when he formed the National Commission on Marihuana and Drug Abuse. When the commission opposed Nixon by
supporting decriminalization, he ignored their recommendations and instead intensified his efforts on the “War on Drugs” campaign. This tradition of
adhering to popular and personal beliefs instead of scientific facts is still common today. With the U.S. federal debt sky-high and drug-related violence
in Mexico mounting, legalization is more relevant than ever and the topic is ripe for debate. Here we explore the domestic costs and benefits that the
legalization of marijuana would incur, how it might affect the marijuana industry in the Americas (particularly in Mexico), and aims to debunk the
multitude of popular falsehoods that surround marijuana. Why Current Policies Are Not Working Despite assurances from the Drug Enforcement
Agency (DEA) that the current drug policy is making headway, there are clear signs that prohibition has not succeeded in diminishing drug supply or
demand. Lowering demand for illegal drugs is the most effective way to lower illegal drug production—while vendors may not respond to the threat of
legal repercussions, they certainly respond to market forces. As the largest consumer of Mexican drugs, it is the responsibility of the U.S. to address its
own demand for marijuana. But American demand and accessibility to marijuana are not decreasing. In fact, marijuana use is currently on the rise and,
although usage has oscillated in the past decades, the proportion of use among 12th graders is only a few percentage points below what it was in 1974.
Eighty-one percent of American 12th graders said marijuana was “fairly easy or very easy” to acquire in 2010.2 In a 2009 survey, 16.7 million
Americans over 12 years of age had used marijuana in the past month—that’s 6.6 percent of the total population.3 While
the U.S. may be
unable to control its own demand for marijuana, it could stop its contribution to drug cartel
revenues by allowing a domestic marijuana industry to thrive, shifting profits from
cartels to U.S. growers. While figures on marijuana smuggling into the U.S. fail to provide conclusive evidence of how much of the
drug is entering the country, marijuana seizures have been steady throughout the Americas in the past decade. However, this says nothing certain about
actual production numbers.4 Domestically, the task of restricting U.S. production is becoming more difficult. Indoor crops that use efficient hydroponic
systems are becoming more popular in the U.S. but pose a challenge to law enforcement agencies for a number of reasons. According to the United
Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), indoor systems: “[have] the benefit of having lower chances of detection, high yields with several
harvests per year with high potency cannabis and elevated selling prices. The equipment, knowledge and seeds for indoor growing have become very
accessible… [and] The costs of building an indoor growing site can be quickly recovered.”5 Cultivating high-quality marijuana is becoming easier, less
risky, and more profitable even for the casual grower. The rise of indoor crops will pose a new obstacle to drug enforcement agencies in stopping
marijuana production in the U.S. The UNODC outlines other negative “unintended consequences” that have resulted from the illegality of drugs. The
first is obvious; when
a good is forbidden, a black market inevitably rises. Black markets inherently
lack safety regulations and often finance other criminal activities. A second consequence is that treatment
programs are often underfunded when the bulk of any drug policy budget is spent on law enforcement. Two other consequences have been termed
“geographical” and “substance” displacement. Both
terms involve the idea of the “balloon effect”: when an
activity is suppressed in one area, it simply reappears in another area. Geographical
displacement can be illustrated by events in Colombia, the Caribbean, and Mexico: as the U.S.
cracked down on Colombian drug trafficking, smuggling routes were shifted to Mexico and the
Caribbean. Drug trafficking was not eliminated, but simply moved from one site to another.
Substance displacement is an even more disturbing repercussion: as availability of one drug is mitigated through enforcement, consumers and
suppliers flock to alternate drugs that are more accessible.6 While marijuana is not a harmless substance, most would agree that it is the least harmful
of illicit drugs. Some drug users may be pushed toward more dangerous substances, or “hard” drugs, because marijuana is too difficult to or dangerous
to obtain. Conversely,
raising the accessibility of marijuana could pull users away from hard
drugs. These ramifications of the current drug control system need to be taken into account in the debate over legalization. A critical shortcoming
of U.S. drug policy is that it treats drug addiction as a crime instead of a health matter. Almost 60 percent of the overall economic cost of drug abuse is
due to expenditures spent on “drug crime”—the sale, manufacture, and possession of drugs.7 There seems to be a wide consensus that at the very least,
drug policy must shift its focus to treatment. Tarnishing someone’s record for drug use makes no sense; it encourages criminal activity by obstructing
job opportunities and it does nothing to address the factors that cause drug use. Additionally, treatment is not readily accessible to those seeking help
despite its efficacy in preventing future drug use. In 2009, 20.9 million Americans (8.3 percent of the total population over age 12) who needed
treatment for drug or alcohol abuse did not receive it in a specialty facility—a hospital, a rehab facility, or a mental health facility.8 This is an
unacceptably high number. The U.S. overinvests in its prohibition strategy while severely underfunding treatment options. Marijuana legalization’s
potential role in improving treatment options for all drugs will be discussed later in this article; for now, suffice it to say that the status quo is not
producing the desired results and requires modification. Legalization and The Mexican Drug War The issue of legalization has been brought to the
forefront in recent years because of numerous calls by Latin American leaders to discuss the matter as a viable policy option. Presidents Juan Manuel
Santos of Colombia and Felipe Calderón of Mexico, while not personally advocating legalization, have publicly called for serious discussion of the
concept. Former Mexican President Vicente Fox, who previously took a hard line against drugs, has altered his public stance and now supports
legalization of all drugs, especially marijuana. He argues that prohibition does not work, that drug production ends up funding criminals, and that it is
the responsibility of citizens to decide whether to use drugs or not.9 Former Presidents Fernando Henrique Cardoso of Brazil, Ernesto Zedillo of
Mexico, and César Gaviria of Colombia all supported in a report by The Latin American Commission on Drugs and Democracy that the U.S.
decriminalize marijuana use (Colombia and Mexico have already done so).10 The U.S. has ignored these requests to place drug legalization or
decriminalization on the policy agenda. Drug trafficking is not a national problem; it transcends country borders and needs to be approached from a
hemispheric perspective. Therefore, the United States needs to work with its southern neighbors to formulate a comprehensive drug policy. However, it
is also telling that every Latin American leader who has formally supported legalization or decriminalization has done so only after leaving office,
indicating that such policies are not politically “safe” stances. The difference between decriminalization and legalization is in their degree of leniency
towards drugs; decriminalization
permits drug use while legalization permits both drug use and
production. Those that favor decriminalization maintain that it would enable law enforcement agencies to shift resources from prosecuting drug
users to prosecuting drug suppliers. Decriminalization would also free up resources for effective drug treatment programs. Those that favor
legalization go one step further than decriminalization: in Vicente Fox’s words, “[W]e have to take all the
production chain out of the hands of criminals and into the hands of producers—so there are farmers that produce marijuana and manufacturers that
process it and distributors that distribute it, and shops that sell it.”11 Legalization
would include the benefits of
decriminalization , while also depriving gangs and cartels of a lucrative product; if both the
supply and demand sides are legitimate, a black market would become obsolete.
Legalizing marijuana in the United States, the largest buyer of Mexican drugs, could potentially
weaken drug cartels by limiting their sources of revenue. The UNODC has acknowledged that this is a plausible way of
reducing gang and cartel profits.12 Mexican and American Marijuana Markets Eliminating the marijuana market share of
Mexican cartels would hit them especially hard because it serves as a steady, reliable
source of income and carries relatively little risk for them to produce. The percentage of total cartel drug
revenues from marijuana is greatly debated—Mexican and American official figures range from 50-65 percent, but a study by the RAND Corporation
suggests closer to 15-26 percent.13 Even
the most conservative of these estimates—roughly a fifth of
revenue—would strike a blow to cartel profits if eliminated. Marijuana is particularly
valuable to cartels because they control the entire production line; they both grow and distribute
it themselves, making it more reliable and less risky . Conversely, cocaine is imported to
Mexico mostly from South America, heightening the risk of smuggling it. More troubling is that cartels are
now even growing marijuana on U.S. public lands, mostly throughout national parks and forests, in order to avoid the task of smuggling drugs across
the U.S.-Mexican border.14 If Mexico were to reach the point of legalizing marijuana, the U.S. could continue to buy the drug legally from south of the
a domestic
U.S. industry could fill the role of the supplier and eliminate the need for Mexican marijuana.
border, like many other consumer goods. But even if Mexico did not implement its own legalization, recent data indicates that
The drug is increasingly grown domestically15 and U.S. growers are already posing a threat to Mexican market share. Exact numbers are impossible to
assess, but figures of American domestic marijuana production range from 30-60 percent of the total consumed in the U.S.16 Additionally, a report by
the RAND Corporation found that legalizing marijuana in California alone (and a subsequent rise in state-wide marijuana production) could lower
Mexican cartel marijuana revenues by 65-85 percent. This could occur if Californian marijuana were smuggled to the rest of the U.S. where the drug
would still be illegal. The marijuana’s projected high quality and low price would make it an extremely competitive product.17 It seems reasonable to
assume that if the drug were legalized in all fifty states, the domestic market could easily overwhelm the Mexican market share. In terms of tangible
effects on Mexican drug violence, the RAND Corporation and UNODC agree that removing U.S. demand for illegal marijuana would increase violence
in the short run because Mexican cartels would be fighting for dominance in a shrinking market.18 But in the long run, once U.S. demand is met by
domestic supply, cartels would be financially debilitated and, most likely, some of the violence quelled. The
U.S. population is by far
the largest drug market for Mexico, making our action necessary for any transnational
legalization to be effective. While cocaine, methamphetamines, and heroin are still funding
cartels, drug violence will not be completely eliminated; but any move to starve their resources
is a step forward in weakening them and, ultimately, saving lives.
Enforcement efforts increase violence – legalization eliminates black
markets
Armentano, 09 [Paul, Deputy Director of NORML and the NORML Foundation,
recognized as an expert on the subject of marijuana policy, “How to End Mexico's Deadly Drug
War”, http://www.fee.org/the_freeman/detail/how-to-end-mexicos-deadly-drug-war]
How much of this goes directly to Mexican cartels is difficult to quantify, but no doubt the percentage is significant. Government officials estimate
that approximately half the marijuana consumed in the United States originates from outside its borders, and they have
identified Mexico
as far and away America’s largest pot provider. Because Mexican-grown marijuana tends to fetch lower prices on the black
market than domestically grown weed (a result attributed largely to lower production costs—the Mexican variety tends to be grown outdoors, while an
increasing percentage of American-grown pot is produced hydroponically indoors), it remains consistently popular among U.S. consumers, particularly
in a down economy. As a result, U.S. law officials now report that some Mexican cartels are moving to the United States to set up shop permanently. A
Congressional Research Service report says low-level cartel members are now establishing clandestine growing operations inside the United States
(thus eliminating the need to cross the border), as well as partnering with domestic gangs and other criminal enterprises. A March 23 New York Times
story speculated that Mexican drug gangs or their affiliates are now active in some 230 U.S. cities, extending from Tucson, Arizona, to Anchorage,
Alaska. In
short, America’s multibillion-dollar demand for pot is fueling the Mexican drug trade
and much of the turf battles and carnage associated with it. Same Old “Solutions” So what are the administration’s plans
to quell the cartels’ growing influence and surging violence? Troublingly, the White House appears intent on recycling the very strategies that gave rise
to Mexico’s infamous drug lords in the first place. In March the administration requested $700 million from Congress to “bolster existing efforts by
Washington and Mexican President Felipe Calderón’s administration to fight violent trafficking in drugs . . . into the United States.” These efforts, as
described by the Los Angeles Times, include: “vowing to send U.S. money, manpower, and technology to the southwestern border” and “reducing illegal
flows (of drugs) in both directions across the border.” The administration also announced that it intends to clamp down on the U.S. demand for illicit
drugs by increasing funding for drug treatment and drug courts. There are three primary problems with this strategy. First, marijuana
production is a lucrative business that attracts criminal entrepreneurs precisely because it is a
black-market (and highly sought after) commodity. As long as pot remains federally
prohibited its retail price to the consumer will remain artificially high , and its production
and distribution will attract criminal enterprises willing to turn to violence (rather than the
judicial system) to maintain their slice of the multi-billion-dollar pie. Second, the United States is already
spending more money on illicit-drug law enforcement, drug treatment, and drug courts than at any time in our history. FBI data show that domestic
marijuana arrests have increased from under 300,000 annually in 1991 to over 800,000 today. Police seizures of marijuana have also risen
dramatically in recent years, as has the amount of taxpayer dollars federal officials have spent on so-called “educational efforts” to discourage the drug’s
use. (For example, since the late 1990s Congress has appropriated well over a billion dollars in anti-pot public service announcements alone.) Yet
despite these combined efforts to discourage demand, Americans use more pot than anyone else in the world. Third, law
enforcement’s
recent attempts to crack down on the cartels’ marijuana distribution rings, particularly new efforts
launched by the Calderón administration in Mexico, are driving the unprecedented wave in Mexican
violence—not abating it. The New York Times states: “A crackdown begun more than two years ago by President Felipe
Calderón, coupled with feuds over turf and control of the organizations, has set off an unprecedented wave of killings
in Mexico. . . . Many of the victims were tortured. Beheadings have become common.” Because of this escalating violence,
Mexico now ranks behind only Pakistan and Iran as the administration’s top international security
concern. Despite the rising death toll, drug war hawks at the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) remain adamant that the United States’
and Mexico’s “supply side” strategies are in fact successful. “Our view is that the violence we have been seeing is a signpost of the success our very
courageous Mexican counterparts are having,” acting DEA administrator Michele Lionhart said recently. “The cartels are acting out like caged animals,
because they are caged animals.” President Obama also appears to share this view. After visiting with the Calderón government in April, he told CNN he
intended to “beef up” security on the border. When asked whether the administration would consider alternative strategies, such as potentially
liberalizing pot’s criminal classification, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano replied that such an option “is not on the table.” A New Remedy
By contrast the Calderón administration appears open to the idea of legalizing marijuana—or at least reducing criminal sanctions on the possession of
small quantities of drugs—as a way to stem the tide of violence. Last spring Mexican lawmakers made the possession of personal-use quantities of
cannabis and other illicit substances a noncriminal offense. And in April Mexico’s ambassador to the United States, Arturo Sarukhan, told CBS’s Face
the Nation that legalizing the marijuana trade was a legitimate option for both the Mexican and U.S. governments. “[T]hose who would suggest that
some of these measures [legalization] be looked at understand the dynamics of the drug trade,” Sarukhan said. Former Mexican President Vicente Fox
recently echoed Sarukhan’s remarks, as did a commission of former Latin American presidents. “I believe it’s time to open the debate over legalizing
drugs,” Fox told CNN in May. “It can’t be that the only way [to try to control illicit drug use] is for the state to use force.” Writing recently on CNN.com,
Harvard economist and Freeman contributor Jeffrey
Miron said that ending drug prohibition —on both sides of the
the only realistic and viable way to put a permanent stop to the rising power
and violence associated with Mexico’s drug traffickers. “Prohibition creates violence because it
drives the drug market underground,” he wrote. “This means buyers and sellers cannot resolve their
disputes with lawsuits, arbitration or advertising, so they resort to violence instead. . . . The only
way to reduce violence, therefore, is to legalize drugs.” Growing Support Americans’ support for legalizing the
border—is
regulated production and sale of cannabis—an option that would not likely rid the world of cartels, but would arguably reduce their primary source of
income—is at all an all-time high. In May a national Zogby telephone poll of 3,937 voters by the Republican-leaning O’Leary Report discovered, for the
first time ever, that a slight majority (52 percent) of Americans “favor the legalization of marijuana.” A separate Zogby poll reported even stronger
support (58 percent) among west-coast voters. Predictably,
critics of marijuana legalization claim that such a strategy
would do little to undermine drug traffickers’ profit margins because cartels would simply
supplement their revenues by selling greater quantities of other illicit drugs. Although this
scenario sounds plausible in theory, it appears to be far less likely in practice. As noted, Mexican
drug lords derive an estimated 60 to 70 percent of their illicit income from pot sales. (By comparison,
only about 28 percent of their profits are derived from the distribution of cocaine, and less than 1 percent comes from trafficking methamphetamine.)
It is unrealistic to think that cartels could feasibly replace this void by stepping up their sales of
cocaine, methamphetamine or heroin—all of which remain far less popular among U.S. drug
consumers anyway. Just how much less? U.S. Department of Health and Human Services survey data show that roughly two
million Americans use cocaine, compared to 15 million for pot. Fewer than 600,000 use
methamphetamine, and fewer than 155,000 use heroin. In short, this is hardly the sort of demand
that would keep Mexico’s drug barons in the lucrative lifestyle to which they’ve become
accustomed. Of course, it’s unrealistic to think that pot legalization would wipe out prohibitioninspired violence altogether. After all, ending alcohol prohibition in America didn’t single-handedly put the Mafia out of business
(though it greatly reduced its power and influence). And it’s always possible that Mexico’s drug cartels would continue to engage in violent acts toward
one another as competing factions fought over the crumbs of America’s drastically shrunken illicit-drug market. That said, it’s
equally
unrealistic, if not more so, to think that continuing our same failed drug war policies will do anything
but exponentially increase the catastrophe they’ve spawned, both in Mexico and at home. It’s time to engage in a
different strategy. It’s time to seriously consider legalizing marijuana and other drugs.
Outweighs diversification and lashout – guts resources that fund
violence
Robelo, 12 [“Demand Reduction or Redirection? Channeling Illicit Drug Demand towards a
Regulated Supply to Diminish Violence in Latin America”, Research Coordinator for the Drug
Policy Alliance, 91 OR. L. REV. 1227, p. Hein online]
B. Levels of Violence It is also impossible to foresee how regulation would affect levels of violence. Some analysts believe a shortterm increase in violence is possible (as competition over a smaller market could intensify), but that violence in the longer term will
decline.106 Some analysts point
out that organized crime may further diversify into other activities,
such as extortion and kidnapping, though these have been shown to be considerably less
profitable than drug trafficking. As one scholar notes, given the profitability of the drug trade, “it
would take roughly 50,000 kidnappings to equal 10% of cocaine revenues from the U.S.107 While the
American mafia certainly diversified into other criminal endeavors after the Repeal of alcohol
Prohibition, homicide rates nevertheless declined dramatically. 108 Combining marijuana
regulation with medical regulatory models for heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine could strike a major blow to
the corrosive economic power of violent trafficking organizations, diminishing their ability to
perpetrate murder, hire recruits, purchase weapons, corrupt officials, operate with impunity,
and terrorize societies. Moreover, these approaches promise concrete results—potentially
significant reductions in DTO revenues—unlike all other strategies that Mexico or the United
States have tried to date.109 Criminal organizations would still rely on other activities for their
income, but they would be left weaker and less of a threat to security. Furthermore, the United
States and Latin American governments would save resources currently wasted on prohibition
enforcement and generate new revenues in taxes—resources which could be applied more
effectively towards confronting violence and other crimes that directly threaten public
safety.
CSA removal is key to greenlight the industry
Firestone, 14 [David, Assistant Editor and Editorial Writer for the New York Times, “Let
States Decide on Marijuana”, New York Times,
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/27/opinion/sunday/high-time-let-states-decide-onmarijuana.html?_r=0]
That law , so antique that it uses the spelling “marihuana,” is still on the books , and is the
principal reason that possessing the substance in Senator Dodd’s package is considered illegal by the
United States government. Changing it wouldn’t even require an act of Congress — the attorney general or the secretary of
Health and Human Services could each do so — although the law should be changed to make sure that future
administrations could not reimpose the ban. Repealing it would allow the states to decide
whether to permit marijuana use and under what conditions. Nearly three-fourths of them
have already begun to do so, liberalizing their laws in defiance of the federal ban. Two have legalized
recreational use outright, and if the federal government also recognized the growing public sentiment to
legalize and regulate marijuana, that would almost certainly prompt more states to follow along.
The increasing absurdity of the federal government’s position is evident in the text of the Nixon-era law. “Marihuana” is listed in
Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act alongside some of the most dangerous and mind-altering drugs on earth, ranked as high
as heroin, LSD and bufotenine, a highly toxic and hallucinogenic toad venom that can cause cardiac arrest. By contrast, cocaine and
methamphetamine are a notch down on the government’s rankings, listed in Schedule II. That illogical distinction shows why
many states have begun to disregard the federal government’s archaic rules. Schedule II drugs, while
carrying a high potential for abuse, have a legitimate medical use. (Even meth is sold in prescription form for weight loss.) But
according to the language of the law, marijuana and the other Schedule I drugs have “no currently accepted medical use in treatment
in the United States.” States Take the Lead No medical use? That would come as news to the millions of people who have found that
marijuana helped them through the pain of AIDS, or the nausea and vomiting of chemotherapy, or the seizures of epilepsy.
As of
this month, 35 states and the District of Columbia permit some form of marijuana consumption
for medical purposes. New York is one of the latest states to defy the tired edict of the Controlled
Substances Act. It’s hard for the public to take seriously a law that says marijuana and heroin have exactly the same “high
potential for abuse,” since that ignores the vastly more addictive power of narcotics, which have destroyed the lives of millions of
people around the world. (There are no documented deaths from a marijuana overdose.) The 44-year refusal of Congress and eight
administrations to alter marijuana’s place on Schedule I has made the law a laughingstock, one that states are openly flouting. In
addition to the medical exceptions, 18 states and the District of Columbia have decriminalized marijuana, generally meaning that
possession of small amounts is treated like a traffic ticket or ignored. Two states, Colorado and Washington, have gone even further
and legalized it for recreational purposes; two others, Alaska and Oregon, will decide whether to do the same later this year. The
states are taking the lead because they’re weary of locking up thousands of their own citizens for possessing a substance that has less
potential for abuse and destructive behavior than alcohol. A decision about what kinds of substances to permit, and under what
conditions, belongs in the purview of the states, as alcohol is handled. Consuming marijuana is not a fundamental right that should
be imposed on the states by the federal government, in the manner of abortion rights, health insurance, or the freedom to marry a
partner of either sex. It’s a choice that states should be allowed to make based on their culture and their values, and it’s
not
surprising that the early adopters would be socially liberal states like Colorado and Washington,
while others hang back to gauge the results. Pre-empted by Washington Many states are unwilling
to legalize marijuana as long as possessing or growing it remains a federal crime.
Colorado, for instance, allows its largest stores to cultivate up to 10,200 cannabis plants at a time. But the federal penalty for
growing more than 1,000 plants is a minimum of 10 years in prison and a fine of up to $10 million. That has created a
state of confusion in which law-abiding growers in Colorado can face federal penalties. Last August, the
Justice Department issued a memo saying it would not interfere with the legalization plans of Colorado and Washington as long as
they met several conditions: keeping marijuana out of the hands of minors or criminal gangs; prohibiting its transport out of the
state; and enforcing prohibitions against drugged driving, violence and other illegal drugs. The government has also said banks can
do business with marijuana sellers, easing a huge problem for a growing industry. But the Justice
Department guidance
is loose; aggressive federal prosecutors can ignore it “if state enforcement efforts are not
sufficiently robust,” the memo says. That’s a shaky foundation on which to build confidence in a
state’s legalization plan. More important, it applies only to this moment in this presidential
administration. President Obama’s Justice Department could change its policy at any time, and so
of course could the next administration. How to End the Federal Ban Allowing states to make their own
decisions on marijuana — just as they did with alcohol after the end of Prohibition in 1933 — requires unambiguous
federal action. The most comprehensive plan to do so is a bill introduced last year by Representative Jared Polis, Democrat
of Colorado, known as the Ending Federal Marijuana Prohibition Act. It would eliminate marijuana from the Controlled Substances
Act, require a federal permit for growing and distributing it, and have it regulated (just as alcohol is now) by the Food and Drug
Administration and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. An alternative bill, which would not be as effective,
was introduced by Representative Dana Rohrabacher, Republican of California, as the Respect State Marijuana Laws Act. It would
not remove marijuana from Schedule I but would eliminate enforcement of the Controlled Substances Act against anyone acting in
compliance with a state marijuana law.
Adv 2
Advantage 2 – War on Drugs
Removing marijuana from the CSA is key to end the global
prohibition regime
Wild, 13 [Joshua, JD, Suffolk University, EPIC FAILURE: THE UNCOMFORTABLE TRUTH
ABOUT THE UNITED STATES' ROLE IN THE FAILURE OF THE GLOBAL WAR ON DRUGS
AND HOW IT IS GOING TO FIX IT, Suffolk University Suffolk Transnational Law Review
Summer, 2013, 36 Suffolk Transnat'l L. Rev. 423, p. lexis]
C. Step 2: Real Reform - the U.S. Needs to Stand at the Forefront of Drug Policy Reformation The
U.S. wields
considerable influence over the rest of the world, so it is no surprise that its call for the
development and maintenance of prohibitive, punitive drug policies resulted in a majority of the
international community following. n105 Conversely, if the U.S. leads the call for the
development and maintenance of more tolerant drug policies grounded in health,
humanity and science, a majority of the international community will also follow. n106 Cultural
shifts do not take place overnight, and the idea of complete U.S. drug policy reformation is too
aggressive and stark in contrast to succeed against modern bureaucracy and political alliances.
n107 On the other hand, a more moderate, piecemeal approach could effectively act as a
catalyst for this transformation while simultaneously serving as a case study for opponents of legal regulation.
n108 [*442] If the U.S. is serious about addressing the ineffectiveness of the War on Drugs , then
the federal government must remove marijuana from its list of
criminally banned substances. n109 The tone of the Obama administration is a
significant step in this direction. n110 President Obama has explicitly acknowledged the need to treat drugs as more of a
public health problem, as well as the validity of debate on alternatives, but he does not favor drug legalization. n111 This
progressive rhetoric is a significant step in the right direction, but until there is some real reform
confronting the issue, reducing punitive measures and supporting other countries to develop drug policies that suit their context,
there is still an abdication of policy responsibility. n112 1. Starting Small - Potential Positive Effects of
Regulation and Taxation of Marijuana in the U.S. If marijuana was legal in the U.S., it would function
similarly to the market of legal substances such as liquor, coffee and tobacco. n113 Individual and
corporate participants in the market would pay taxes, increasing revenues and saving the government from the exorbitant cost of
trying to enforce prohibition laws. n114 Consumers' human rights would be promoted through self-determination, autonomy and
access to more accurate information about the product they are consuming. n115 Additionally, case studies and research suggest that
the decriminalization or legalization [*443] of marijuana reduces the drugs' consumption and does not necessarily result in a more
favorable attitude towards it. n116 The legal regulation of marijuana would relieve the current displaced burden the drug places on
law enforcement, domestically and internationally. n117 In the
U.S., law enforcement could refocus their efforts
away from reducing the marijuana market per se and instead towards reducing harm to
individuals, communities and national security. n118 Abroad, U.S. international relations
would improve because of the reduced levels of corruption and violence at
home and afar. n119 The precarious position repressive policies place on foreign governments when they have to destroy the
livelihoods of agricultural workers would be reduced. n120 Additionally, legalization and regulation would
provide
assistance to governments in regaining some degree of control over the regions dominated by
drug dealers and terrorist groups because those groups would lose a major source of funding for their organizations.
n121 2. Health Concerns? - Marijuana in Comparison to Other Similar Legal Substances The federal government, acknowledging the
risks inherent in alcohol and tobacco, argues that adding a third substance to that mix cannot be beneficial. n122 Adding anything to
a class of [*444] dangerous substances is likely never going to be beneficial; however marijuana would be incorrectly classified if it
was equated with those two substances. n123 Marijuana is far less toxic and addictive than alcohol and tobacco. n124 Long term use
of marijuana is far less damaging than long term alcohol or tobacco use. n125 Alcohol use contributes to aggressive and reckless
behavior, acts of violence and serious injuries while marijuana actually reduces likelihood of aggressive behavior or violence during
intoxication and is seldom associated with emergency room visits. n126 As with most things in life, there can be no guarantee that
the legalization or decriminalization of marijuana would lead the U.S. to a better socio-economical position in the future. n127 Two
things however, are certain: that the legalization of marijuana in the U.S. would dramatically
reduce most of the costs associated with the current drug policies , domestically and
internationally, and [*445] if the U.S. is serious about its objective of considering the costs of drug
control measures, then it is vital and rational for the legalization option is considered. n128 D.
Why the Time is Ripe for U.S. Drug Policy Reformation The political atmosphere at the end of World War I and II was leverage for
the U.S., emerging as the dominant political, economic and military power. n129 This leverage allowed it to shape a prohibitive drug
control regime that until now has remained in perpetuity. n130 Today, we stand in a unique moment inside of U.S. history. n131 The
generational, political and cultural shifts that accompanied the U.S. emergence from the "Great Recession" resulted in a
sociopolitical climate that may be what is necessary for real reform. n132 Politically, marijuana has become a hot issue;
economically, the marijuana industry is bolstering a faltering economy and socially, marijuana is poised to transform the way we live
and view medicine. n133 The public disdain for the widespread problems prohibition caused in the early 20th century resulted in the
end of alcohol prohibition during the Great Depression. n134 If history does actually repeat itself than the Great recession may have
been much more telling than expected. n135 V. Conclusion The U.S. and its prohibitionist ideals exacerbated the failure of both the
international and its own domestic drug policies. n136 As a result, the
U.S. should accept accountability for its
mistakes by reforming its drug policies in a way that will help [*446] place the global drug market
back into a manageable position. n137 Marijuana is an actionable, evidence based mechanism for
constructive legal and policy reform that through a domino effect can transform the
global drug prohibition regime . n138 The generational, political and cultural shifts that accompanied the U.S.
emergence from the "Great Recession" have resulted in a sociopolitical climate ready for real reform. n139 The U.S. will
capitalize on this unique moment by removing marijuana from the list of
federally banned substances, setting the stage for future international and
domestic drug policies that are actually effective . n140
Federal legalization is vital to signal support for rule of law – middle
ground solutions fail to create legal certainty
Reid, 14 [Copyright (c) 2014 New Mexico Law Review New Mexico Law Review Spring, 2014
New Mexico Law Review 44 N.M.L. Rev. 169 LENGTH: 17061 words ARTICLE: THE
QUAGMIRE THAT NOBODY IN THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT WANTS TO TALK ABOUT:
MARIJUANA NAME: Melanie Reid * BIO: * Associate Professor of Law, Lincoln Memorial
University-Duncan School of Law, p. lexis]
VI. CONCLUSION: WHY CONGRESS MUST ACT NOW The
U nited S tates is currently in a precarious state caused by a
lack of leadership on the marijuana legalization issue. State and federal laws are in
conflict. In two states, a citizen can possess marijuana, but cannot grow, distribute, or import marijuana without risking federal prosecution.
There is sufficient overlap between federal and state laws that the issue can be no longer ignored. Congress is aware that: Controlled substances
manufactured and distributed interstate cannot be differentiated from controlled substances manufactured and distributed intrastate. Thus, it is not
feasible to distinguish, in terms of controls, between controlled substances manufactured and distributed interstate and controlled substances
manufactured and distributed intrastate. . . . Federal control of the intrastate incidents [*203] of the traffic in controlled substances is essential to the
effective control of the interstate incidents of such traffic. n204 Moreover, it would not be sensible to amend federal laws that currently prohibit simple
possession under 21 U.S.C. § 844 to allow possession of small amounts of marijuana, if there are state laws that criminalize its use. Demand for
marijuana invariably leads to its cultivation and production, and yet, in some states, selling and manufacturing marijuana is labeled as a crime, while
possession is not. n205 In
this current environment, Colorado and Washington may become the
Amsterdam of the United States. In 2012, in Colorado alone, "there were 274 marijuana interdiction seizures destined for other
states, compared to 54 of such seizures in 2005. This is a 407 percent increase." n206 Citizens from other states will take
marijuana vacations to these two states, perhaps giving rise to the same effects witnessed by
Dutch coffee shops catering to international tourists--too many visitors bringing in a criminal
element to the state, creating a black market for marijuana. Colorado and Washington could overtake
Mexico to become the leading suppliers of marijuana to the rest of the United States. One grower in California dreams of "bud'n'breakfast inns" and
"tasting rooms"--"[t]ourism in Mendocino could be bigger than pot tourism in Amsterdam." n207 [*204] Legalization in one state, and criminalization
in the others simply does not work. n208 Professor Sam Kamin has suggested that a
type of "cooperative federalism" could
result from state-level legalization, where the federal government looks the other way, and states
that have legalized marijuana effectively regulate marijuana within its own borders. n209 However,
this proposed solution flies in the face of the rule of law: A collection of legal principles that all
relate to the placement of limitations on the exercise of political power and the operation of government. Those principles include (1)
government must follow its own rules; (2) government must apply the law impartially ; and (3)
government must provide due process for those accused of breaking the rules. n210 The federal government
violates the rule of law when it chooses to apply federal laws without impartiality
by prosecuting federal marijuana cases in states that have not legalized marijuana and
[ignoring] turning a blind eye in states that have legalized marijuana. The federal government
must either legalize and regulate or criminalize and prohibit marijuana production and use. As to
legalization (Option 1), two bills, the Ending Federal Marijuana Prohibition Act of [*205] 2013 n211 and the Marijuana Tax Equity
Act of 2013, n212 are currently before Congress that would effectively make the transition from criminalization to legalization a reality at the federal
level. States should enlist federal agencies to provide expertise and oversight in handling licensing, quality control, and enforcement of regulatory laws.
States are incapable of independently handling this issue. There is some indication that Congress might be moving in this direction. In June 2013, the
House of Representatives voted to approve an amendment to the Federal Agriculture Reform and Risk Management Act of 2013 (the FARRM bill). This
Act would allow colleges and universities to grow and cultivate industrial hemp for research purposes, as long as it is legal in the particular state and the
hemp plant contains no more than a 0.3 percent THC content. n213 Advocates for hemp and marijuana see this as a positive step in the marijuana
legalization movement at the federal level. n214 As to criminalization (Option 3), since Washington and Colorado have
legalized recreational use of marijuana, the federal government must act soon if it chooses to enforce the CSA. Otherwise, it will find it difficult to stop
the momentum in favor of legalization that the marijuana industry has fought so hard to create. State and federal governments should not consider the
legalization of marijuana for medical use (Option 2) as a stepping-stone towards outright legalization. Thus, the States' Medical Marijuana Protection
Act n215 and the States' Medical Marijuana Property Rights Protection Act, n216 should not be considered, because they merely advocate continued
conflict between the states who have approved marijuana use for medical purposes and the federal government. States that are considering legalizing
[*206] marijuana for medical use should choose to legalize marijuana for all types of use (Option 1). The options outlined here have been considered or
implemented on numerous occasions since the discovery of marijuana.
What is important today is a decision on
there are no
happy middle grounds, and no workable compromises between
Option 1 and Option 3. Under the current status quo, the true beneficiaries are the profiteering, opportunistic owners of
the legality of marijuana production and use. Unfortunately,
the medical marijuana clinics, and the doctors who recommend medical cards. They work in an environment free of taxes and strict regulations.
Meanwhile, we continue to hear crickets, adding many more years of silence, uncertainty, and
damage to both sides of the debate. n217 The federal government must take a stand and
either crack down on the growing marijuana business, or legalize it , and begin the arduous task of regulating and taxing
marijuana production and use, while at the same time advocating for minimal use. The United States can examine the policies
The federal
government must act, because this current quagmire cannot be
sustained.
of other countries while determining an effective path forward.
War on drugs collapses Afghanistan
Felbab-Brown, 09 [Testimony October 1, 2009 Transnational Drug Enterprises: Threats
to Global Stability and U.S. National Security By: Vanda Felbab-Brown, Senior Fellow, Foreign
Policy, Center for 21st Century Security and Intelligence,
http://www.brookings.edu/research/testimony/2009/10/01-drug-enterprises-felbabbrown]
illicit economies
have pernicious effects on a country’s law enforcement
and judicial systems. the illicit economy grows, the investigative capacity of the law
Large
dominated by powerful traffickers also
As
enforcement and judicial systems diminishes. Impunity for criminal activity increases,
undermining the credibility of law enforcement, the judicial system, and the authority of the
government. Powerful traffickers frequently turn to violent means to deter and avoid
prosecution, killing off or bribing prosecutors, judges, and witnesses. Colombia in the late 1980s
and Mexico today are powerful reminders of the corruption and paralysis of law enforcement as
a result of extensive criminal networks and the devastating effects of high levels of violent
criminality on the judicial system. In addition, illicit economies have large economic effects.
Drug cultivation and processing, for example, on the one hand generate employment for the poor rural populations and may even facilitate upward mobility. As mentioned before, they can also have powerful marcoeconomic spillover effects in terms of boosting
overall economic activity. But a burgeoning drug economy also contributes to inflation and can hence harm legitimate, export-oriented, import-substituting industries. It encourages real estate speculation and undermines currency stability.
It
also
displaces legitimate production
the
local population is frequently uninterested in, or unable to, participate in other (legal) kinds of
economic activity. The illicit economy can thus lead to
Dutch disease
. Since the drug economy is more profitable than legal production, requires less security and infrastructure, a nd imposes smaller sunk and transaction costs,
a form of so-called
where a boom in an isolated sector of the economy causes
or is accompanied by stagnation in other core sectors since it gives rise to appreciation of land and labor costs. Effects of Regional Manifestations of the Drug-Conflict Nexus on U.S. Security Even though the drug-violent-conflict nexus follows these general dynamics
nowhere
in the world does the presence of a large-scaled illicit economy threaten U.S. security
as
much in Afghanistan. There the anti-American Taliban strengthens its insurgency campaign by
deriving both vast financial profits and great political capital from sponsoring the
illicit economy. The strengthened insurgency threatens
Afghanistan’s stability
The
opium poppy economy also
undermines these goals by fueling widespread corruption
A failure to prevail against the insurgency will result in the likely collapse of the national
government and Taliban domination of Afghanistan’s south, possibly coupled with civil
war. failure to stabilize Afghanistan will in turn further destabilize Pakistan emboldening
the jihadists in Pakistan and weakening the resolve of Pakistan’s military and
intelligence services to take on the jihadists
seriousness of the threat and the strategic importance of the stakes do not imply that
aggressive counternarcotics suppression measures today will enhance U.S. objec
Indeed, just the opposite Premature measures, such as extensive eradication before legal
livelihoods are in place, will simply cement the bonds between the rural population
dependent on poppy for basic livelihood and the Taliban, limit intelligence flows to Afghan and
NATO forces, and further discredit the Afghan government and tribal elites sponsoring
eradication.
eradication so far has failed to accomplish that
while already generating the above mentioned counterproductive outcomes.
irrespective of the locale, how acute a threat to U.S. security interests it presents depends on the strategic significance of the state weakened by such connections and the orientation of the belligerent group toward the United States. Perhaps
primary
interests
,
in turn
the vital U.S. objectives of counterterrorism and
plus the lives of U.S. soldiers and civilians deployed there to promote these objectives.
large-scale
of Afghanistan government and law enforcement, especially the police forces.
A
,
. Pakistan may likely once again calculate that it needs to cultivate its jihadi assets to counter India’s influence in Afghanistan
– perceived or actual. But the
tives and global stability.
.
Nor, given the Taliban’s large sources of other income, will eradication bankrupt the Taliban. In fact,
After years of such inappropriate focus on eradication
of the poppy crop, the new counternarcotics strategy for Afghanistan, announced by U.S. government officials in summer 2009, promises to mesh well with the counterinsurgency and state-building effort. By scaling back eradication and emphasizing interdiction
and development, it will help separate the population from the Taliban. A well-designed counternarcotics policy is not on its own sufficient for success in Afghanistan. But it is indispensible. Counterinsurgent forces can prevail against belligerents profiting from the
drug trade when they increase their own counterinsurgency resources and improve the strategy. Moreover, “success” in suppressing poppy in Afghanistan may well increase threats to U.S. security in other ways.
Given existing
global demand, poppy cultivation will shift elsewhere
A shift to Pakistan would be the most worrisome
Pakistani
jihadi groups would not only be able to increase their profits, but also, and most dangerously,
their political capital
If
widespread poppy cultivation shifted to these areas, Kashmir
the jihadist
belligerents would be much strengthened by
. There are many countries where poppy can be grown; but Burma, which used to be the number one producer for
many years, Central Asia, and Pakistan are likely candidates.
by far
. In that case,
. Today, they have little to offer but ideological succor to the dissatisfied populations in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, the Northwest Frontier Province, and wider Pakistan.
, and possibly even parts of Punjab,
providing real-time economic benefits to marginalized populations.
Extinction
Morgan 7 (Stephen J., Political Writer and Former Member of the British Labour Party
Executive Committee, “Better another Taliban Afghanistan, than a Taliban NUCLEAR
Pakistan!?”, 9-23,
http://www.freearticlesarchive.com/article/_Better_another_Taliban_Afghanistan__than_a_
Taliban_NUCLEAR_Pakistan___/99961/0/)
As the war intensifies, he has no guarantees that the current autonomy may yet burgeon into a separatist
movement. Appetite comes with eating, as they say. Moreover, should the Taliban fail to re-conquer al of Afghanistan, as looks
likely, but captures at least half of the country, then a Taliban Pashtun caliphate could be established which would act
as a magnet to separatist Pashtuns in Pakistan. Then, the likely break up of Afghanistan along ethnic
lines, could, indeed, lead the way to the break up of Pakistan, as well. Strong centrifugal forces have always
bedevilled the stability and unity of Pakistan, and, in the context of the new world situation, the country could be faced
with civil wars and popular fundamentalist uprisings, probably including a military-fundamentalist coup
d’état. Fundamentalism is deeply rooted in Pakistan society. The fact that in the year following 9/11, the most popular name given to
male children born that year was “Osama” (not a Pakistani name) is a small indication of the mood. Given the weakening base of the
traditional, secular opposition parties, conditions would be ripe for a coup d’état by the fundamentalist wing of the Army and ISI,
leaning on the radicalised masses to take power. Some form of radical, military Islamic regime, where legal powers would shift to
Islamic courts and forms of shira law would be likely. Although, even then, this might not take place outside of a protracted crisis of
upheaval and civil war conditions, mixing fundamentalist movements with nationalist uprisings and sectarian violence between the
Sunni and minority Shia populations. The nightmare that is now Iraq would take on gothic proportions across the continent. The
prophesy of an
arc of civil war over Lebanon, Palestine and Iraq would spread to south Asia, stretching
from Pakistan to Palestine, through Afghanistan into Iraq and up to the Mediterranean coast.
Undoubtedly, this would also spill over into India both with regards to the Muslim community and Kashmir.
Border clashes, terrorist attacks, sectarian pogroms and insurgency would break out. A new war, and possibly
nuclear war, between Pakistan and India could not be ruled out. Atomic Al Qaeda Should Pakistan break down
completely, a Taliban-style government with strong Al Qaeda influence is a real possibility. Such deep chaos would, of
course, open a “Pandora's box” for the region and the world. With the possibility of unstable clerical and military
fundamentalist elements being in control of the Pakistan nuclear arsenal, not only their use against India, but Israel becomes a
possibility, as well as the acquisition of nuclear and other deadly weapons secrets by Al Qaeda. Invading Pakistan would not be an
option for America. Therefore a
nuclear war would now again become a real strategic possibility. This would bring a shift in the
usher in a new Cold War with China and Russia pitted against
tectonic plates of global relations. It could
the US.
Now is key
Cordesman, 9/25/14 [Losing the “Forgotten War” The US Strategic Vacuum in
Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Central Asia By Anthony H. Cordesman September 25, 2014, Arleigh
A. Burke Chair in Strategy, CSIS]
if
corruption is allowed to continue unabated it will likely jeopardize every gain we’ve made so far in
Afghanistan.…Corruption destroys the populace’s confidence in their elected officials, siphons off
funds that would be used to combat insurgents or build infrastructure, and ultimately leads to a
government that is ineffectual and distrusted. The threat from unabated corruption is especially
exemplified right now in light of the ongoing election crisis. A crisis spawned from corruption,
which many fear is putting Afghanistan’s entire future in jeopardy . …However, the problem of
Corruption is another enormous inter-agency challenge facing reconstruction in Afghanistan. The consensus among everyone I speak with is that
corruption isn’t new. Experts and SIGAR have been highlighting concerns about corruption for a long time. Top U.S. officials are very much aware of
Afghan corruption. A report commissioned by General Dunford last year noted that “Corruption directly threatens the viability and legitimacy of the
Afghan state.” USAID’s own assistant administrator for Afghanistan and Pakistan, Larry Sampler, told Congress that Afghanistan is “the most corrupt
place I’ve ever been to.” And Retired Marine Gen. John Allen identified corruption as the biggest threat to Afghanistan’s future an even bigger threat
than the Taliban. The Afghans are also concerned with corruption. In June, Integrity Watch Afghanistan (an Afghan NGO) issued their latest national
corruption survey. It found that corruption tied for second as the greatest challenge facing Afghanistan, after security. While 18% of respondents in the
2012 survey said they faced corruption within the last 12 months, 21% of respondents said they faced corruption in the 2014 survey. The survey also
noted that Afghans believe corruption in most public sectors undermined their access to services. The same services the U.S. invested billions in
establishing….For example, 28% of respondents believed that their households were deprived of access to electricity because of corruption and 18% said
corruption blocked their access to higher education. The exact same areas where U.S. agencies commonly claim great success. In fact, the corruption
percentages for electricity and education are not only up from 2012 but they are also higher than for justice by the courts and security by the police. In
June, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace singled out Afghanistan as an example of a state where governing systems have been bent to
benefit one or a very few networks. According to the report, President Karzai regularly calls his attorney general to influence cases or personally orders
the release of suspects from pre-trial detention, quashing the cases against them. This is the same Attorney General that recently threw a respected New
York Times reporter out of the country because he didn’t like his reporting. The DOD and the State Department have repeatedly noted that the Afghan
AG has deliberately avoided prosecuting either senior officials or individuals with ties to senior officials and stymied the work of the investigatory arm
of his own internal-control and monitoring unit….SIGAR has also had problems with the Attorney General. In one case, SIGAR worked to freeze and
seize nearly $70 million in funds, stolen from the U.S. government, that was sitting in Afghan banks. For months we pressed the Attorney General's
Office to freeze the money and begin the legal process to seize the cash. At first, we were told the bank account was frozen and the money protected.
Unfortunately, as is too often the case, we later learned that the money was mysteriously unfrozen by some powerful bureaucrat in Kabul. SIGAR has
issued a number of reports on U.S. efforts to combat corruption. These reports have continually pointed out that the United States lacks a unified anticorruption strategy in Afghanistan. This is astonishing, given that Afghanistan is one of the most corrupt countries in the world, and a country that the
United States is spending billions of dollars in….Yet there has been no progress made toward developing a unified anti-corruption strategy. In fact,
things could get worse with the drawdown. We cannot shy away from the challenge of corruption. We need a strategy, and we need to hold the Afghans
feet to the fire on this issue. SIGAR will continue to point out how well or poorly not only U.S. officials but also Afghan officials perform in their
promises to reduce corruption. …Directly
tied to corruption is the final inter-agency challenge I wanted to talk about today
of the drug trade. This challenge is no secret to anyone; the U.S. has already spent nearly $7.6 billion to
combat the opium industry. Yet, by every conceivable metric, we’ve failed…Production and cultivation
are up , interdiction and eradication are down, financial support to the insurgency is up, and addiction and
countering the growth
abuse are at unprecedented levels in Afghanistan. During my trips to Afghanistan I’ve met with U.S., Afghan and international officials involved in
implementing and evaluating counternarcotics programs. In the opinion of almost everyone I’ve met, the
counternarcotics situation
in Afghanistan is dire, with little prospect for improvement. As with sustainability and corruption, the expanding
cultivation and trafficking of drugs puts the entire Afghan reconstruction
effort at risk. ..The narcotics trade poisons the Afghan financial sector and fuels a
growing illicit economy. This, in turn, undermines the Afghan state’s legitimacy by
stoking corruption, nourishing criminal networks and providing significant
financial support to the Taliban and other insurgent groups… There are already signs that elements
within the Afghan security forces are reaching arrangements with rural communities to allow opium poppy cultivation even encouraging production to
build local patronage networks and generate illicit income.
Also spills over to a harm’s reduction model
Ford, 13 [Brian A. JD, Golden Gate University School of Law, FROM MOUNTAINS TO
MOLEHILLS: A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF DRUG POLICY, Annual Survey of
International & Comparative Law Golden Gate University School of Law Spring, 2013 Annual
Survey of International & Comparative Law 19 Ann. Surv. Int'l & Comp. L. 197, p. lexis]
C. LEGALIZATION HARMONIZES THE HARMS REDUCTION APPROACH WITH EXISTING LAW Besides the ability to prevent mass death, human rights atrocities, and the
the legalization of drugs would resolve the clash between the laws
of prohibition and the realities of harms reduction approaches . The reality that harms
social destruction generated by prohibitionist policies,
reduction policies are in fact pursued internationally and domestically contradicts
the
existence of prohibitionist law, creating a clash between fact and law. This clash is readily
apparent when comparing the national harms reduction policies of the Netherlands, Portugal, and Bolivia to the international obligations of prohibition imposed under the
the effect of this clash on the rule of law is better expressed in the U.S.,
where state laws embracing harms reduction approaches and the use of federally
scheduled and prohibited substances results in arbitrary enforcement of the law and legal
uncertainty. Despite a federal prohibition of drugs in the U.S., many states have loosened their drug
laws to decrease criminal sentences and enforcement. Nineteen states and the District of Columbia have passed medical marijuana laws, which aim
SCND, CPS, and CAIT. However,
to permit the use of a federally prohibited drug in the medical treatment of patients.171 Since California passed the first medical marijuana law in 1996, the number of states
duplicating such laws has grown steadily. There are an additional eleven states with legislation currently under consideration to legalize medical marijuana.1Similar to state
efforts to legalize medical marijuana, state efforts to legalize the recreational use of marijuana are also rapidly gaining momentum. In 2010, California attempted to pass a law
legalizing the possession and use of marijuana under state law, but narrowly failed.173 Two states have gone so far as to legalize the recreational use of marijuana, and as many
as seven other states are considering similar legislation.174 While these hard fought legislative efforts represent the evolution of drug policy in the U.S. and perhaps even herald
these states' laws remain in conflict with established and preemptive
federal law. The production, transportation, possession, and sale of federally scheduled
substances is criminally prohibited by the CSA, and the federal government still uses a
the eventual demise of prohibition,
scheme of mandatory sentences to guarantee the imprisonment of offenders.175 However, what the
federal government does with the enforcement of the federal law in relation to the states has
proven to be inconsistent at best. Generally, the federal government in the U.S. has chosen not to interfere with state medical marijuana laws. Recently,
the U.S. Attorney General even went so far as to issue what is popularly called the Ogden Memo, a memo to all U.S. Attorneys instructing them that state law regarding medical
marijuana is to be respected.176 However, the Obama administration has drastically changed the course of federal enforcement on facilities operating within the precepts of
state law. Contrary to the Ogden Memo, U.S. Attorneys issued letters to state governments threatening prosecution of state officials participating in the regulation of medical
marijuana dispensaries.177 In 2012, the U.S. DEA and Internal Revenue Service recently raided Oaksterdam University and the home of its proprietor, Richard Lee.178 Richard
Lee was a pioneer in developing the medical marijuana system in California and an advocate for legalization of marijuana but decided to surrender all of his businesses out of
fear of federal prosecution.179 Richard Lee and Oaksterdam University serve as examples of the legal risk implicit in a flawed system that yields a clash between fact and law.
Oaksterdam University was similarly situated to many of the coffee shops in the Netherlands in that its business is technically prohibited by national law but permitted by local
Legitimate
businesses will not take part in the drug trade under the current prohibitionist regime, because
they are under threat of prosecution by a national government. Illegal actors, however, will participate in the drug trade
law. With the recent advent of legalized marijuana for recreational use in two states, it remains unclear how the federal government will respond.
regardless of the legality of the market. Legalization, however, would encourage legitimate businesses to participate in the drug market. A policy encouraging legitimate
businesses is best understood as a harms reduction approach to drug policy. Legitimate businesses willingly submit to regulation and can be monitored and controlled more
easily. They do not perpetuate violence and they sell a product that can be subjected to governmental controls of quality and taxation. Illegal actors are not subject to any of these
controls and have no incentive to comply with government regulations at all. If efforts to address the harms imposed by the international prohibition of drugs are ever to be
realized, it is clear that some form of legal protection from prosecution is necessary. On the international level, there is no enforcement mechanism equivalent to the U.S. federal
member States can
exert significant pressure on each other to comply with international law , to get back in line
government over state governments, but there are other means by which the global norm of prohibition is enforced. Specifically,
with the herd. We can see this at practice with the pressures the U.S. exerts over its neighbors to the South, both financially and politically, with efforts like Plan Colombia and
The need for legalization on all levels of government, domestic and international, is essential to ever
effectively combat the problems with drugs.
the Mérida Initiative.
Harms reduction policies are necessary to combat AIDS
Csete, 10 [Joanne, professor of Clinic Population and Family Health at Columbia University’s
Mailman Public Health School, with Richard Parker and Nancy Worthington, Rethinking the
War on Drugs: The Impact of US Drug Control Policy on Global Public Health, March,
http://www.mailman.columbia.edu/sites/default/files/rethinking-the-war-on-drugs.pdf]
During the closing years of the 20th century, particularly with the emergence of the HIV epidemic and a growing
awareness of the role of injection drug use and needle sharing in driving this epidemic in many countries outside sub-Saharan Africa
public health
experts highlighted the need for risk-reduction to take precedence over criminal
approaches to the problem of drug dependency. A significant increase in social and behavioral research
carried out in response to HIV and AIDS in the late 1980s and the early 1990s provided an unprecedented level of
scientific evidence for the effectiveness of harm reduction services, such as medication-assisted drug
dependence treatment, needle exchange, and safer injection facilities, in improving the health of drug users without increasing levels
of drug use,* As evidence for the effectiveness of such measures in preventing injection-driven HIV infection grew during the late
1990s and into the present decade, it
seemed reasonable to assume that the harm reduction approaches
grounded in public health principles would be adopted, and that the unprecedented scale-up of HIV
services would, in turn, force a rethinking of the global war on drugs that impeded access to HIV
services and pressed hundreds of thousands into institutions where no such services were
available. Yet any review of global policy debates over the course of the past decade would have
to conclude that the results have been far more ambiguous than might have been expected. At best, the
international community seems to have oscillated between reaffirmation of the drug war mentality and relatively timid steps in the
direction of public health approaches. If we open the timeframe of our analysis to include the 1998 20a United Nations General
Assembly Special Session (UNGASS) on illicit drugs, we find the UN General Assembly committing member states to achieving "a
drug-free world."5 The 1998 UNGASS Declaration outlined what it described as a comprehensive global strategy for simultaneously
reducing both the supply of and demand for illicit drugs and developed a mandate for the UN International Drug Control
Programme (UNDCP) to "develop strategies with a view to eliminating or significantly reducing the illicit cultivation of the coca
bush, the cannabis plant and the opium poppy by the year 2008."6 Disappointing those who had hoped for meaningful drug policy
reform, it basically reasserted the same goals that had driven the global war on drugs for decades. HIV was unmentioned. Just a few
years later, however, at the 2001 UNGASS on HIV and AIDS, an assembly of the same nations seemed to signal a possible shift of
emphasis, including harm reduction efforts and access to sterile injecting equipment as part of the stated goals in its Declaration of
In 2003, at the mid-term review of the UNGASS on drugs, the focus seemed to have
reverted back to prohibition, with UNODC arguing that important progress had been made on reaching the goals and
Commitment.7
targets that had been established in 1998 and citing long lists of drug control measures undertaken by member states in the five
years that had passed.8 In June of 2005, the Programme Coordinating Board (PCB), which governs the Joint United Nations
Programme on AIDS (UNAIDS), pushed back in the opposite direction, approving a UNAIDS policy position paper, "Intensifying
HIV Prevention," that officially affirmed support for needle exchange programs as a key part of the global fight against the epidemic;
both the paper and the PCB report approving it, however, explicitly noted that the USA (the largest donor to UNAIDS) could not
support needle exchange because it contradicts its domestic drug policies.9 And in 2008, at the ten-year review point for the 1998
UNGASS, which was initiated at the 2008 meeting of the Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND) in Vienna, the debate seemed to
veer back yet again, with the UNODC claiming major successes in the control of coca and opium production and reaffirming the
need to place greater emphasis on demand reduction in resource- rich consumer countries.10 While a range of complex factors have
nothing has been more
important than the policy positions promoted and defended internationally by the
US government . Indeed, no matter which side of the debate one comes down on, for or against the war on drugs, all
observers agree that the US has been at the center of most of the major decisions and activities
driving international drug policy since its inception more than a century ago, and US policies related to drugs
have largely determined drug control practices globally. Even in the wake of the global
HIV and AIDS epidemic, US commitment to the war on drugs has been one of the central factors
underlying resistance to the adoption of more scientifically-informed policies grounded in
contemporary public health approaches to health promotion and disease prevention. The history of US policy in
surely affected the development of these contradictory policy debates, probably
relation to these issues has also been marked by changes over time, as well as by conflicts and differences of opinion that have
shifted policy emphasis both within and between different administrations. There
can be no doubt, for example, that the
policies pursued by the Bush administration, from 2001 to 2009, and the Bush administration's commitment to promoting
those policies globally, are among the most important factors that have shaped the development of
international drug policy debates over the course of the past decade. Recognizing the importance that US
policies have had in shaping responses to drug use globally, and the likelihood that this will continue to be the case in the future, this
paper seeks to review the development of US policy on drugs over the course of the past decade, with a primary focus on its
relevance for the politics of global public health more broadly. We are particularly interested in looking at the consequences of US
policy during the eight years of the Bush administration, from 2001 to 2009, as well as the initial steps taken by the Obama
administration, since its inauguration at the start of 2009, in order to assess the potential policy impact of both administrations in
relation to the broader context of global public health in the early 21st century.
AIDS causes extinction
Tom Kerns 99, professor of philosophy, “AIDS and Apocalyptics for Questioning Millennium
Madness, http://bioethicscourse.info/aidsite/lec-millemad.html
The worst threat to humankind AIDS is "the number one health problem on this planet." (C. Everett Koop, former US
Surgeon General) " AIDS is the single greatest threat to well-being facing the world's
population today." (Marc Lappé) AIDS is "a messenger of apocalyptic change," as it is spread
through "one of the most biologically urgent of human behaviors." - Dr June Osborn (former member of the US
Presidential Commission on HIV/AIDS, & professor in U Mich SPH) Economic costs are high "Although it is less than a decade since the virus that causes AIDS was
it has become increasingly evident that this pandemic will have profound economic
and social implications for both developed and developing countries. The importance of
health as an input to the economic development and growth of a country is well established a healthier population is more productive and has an increased capacity for learning. The
adverse impacts of the HIV/AIDS pandemic will undermine improvements in health status
and, in turn, reduce the potential for economic growth. AIDS is distinct from other diseases,
and its impact can be expected to be quite severe.... Its most critical feature, distinguishing AIDS from other life-threatening and
fatal illnesses, such as diarrhea (among children in developing countries) or cancer (among the elderly in developed countries), is that it selectively affects
adults in their sexually most active ages, which coincide with their prime productive and
reproductive years." - in AIDS in the World, 1992, p 195 (Jill Armstrong is an economist in the Eastern Africa Dept of the World Bank, Washington, DC.
Eduard Bos is a demographer in the Population, Health, and Nutrition Division of the World Bank's Population and Human Resources Department.) E. " Whatever
else AIDS is, it's not just another disease." (Dr June Osborne, former member of the US Presidential Commission on HIV/AIDS) Features
discovered,
that make AIDS unique: * High morbidity & mortality * Lifelong infectiousness * lengthy asymptomatic stage * highly mutable virus Joshua Lederberg considers the
possibility of HIV "learning the tricks of airborne transmission:"
"We know that HIV is still evolving. Its global spread has
meant there is far more HIV on earth today than ever before in history. What are the odds of
its learning the tricks of airborne transmission? The short answer is "No one can be sure."
... [A]s time passes, and HIV seems settled in a certain groove, that is momentary reassurance in itself. However, gi ven its other ugly attributes, it
is hard to imagine a worse threat to humanity than an airborne variant of AIDS . No rule of nature
contradicts such a possibility; the proliferation of AIDS cases with secondary pneumonia [and TB]
multiplies the odds of such a mutant, as an analog to the emergence of pneumonic plague." *
effective modes of transmission * destroys the immune system * viral reservoir expanding Dr Barry D Schoub, Director of the National Institute of Virology at the
T]he ability of the virus to cause a slow, progressive and
permanent infection with permanent infectivity makes it a unique cause of epidemic disease.
Thus, with no recovery, no loss of infectivity, no development of either individual or herd
immunity, there is no known biological mechanism which can stop the continuing expansion
of the disease unless an effective vaccine were to come about, and at present there is no feasible design for such an
effective vaccine. The progressive increase in the pool of HIV can, in theory, only lead to an exponential increase in
the number of individuals who will become infected until eventually the majority of the
sexually active population will be infected unless interventions are at lease moderately
successful."
University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, sums up thus: "[
And nuclear war
Koblentz, 10 (Deputy Director of the Biodefense Program @ GMU, Assistant Professor in
Public and International Affairs, March, "Biosecurity Reconsidered: Calibrating Biological
Threats and Responses." International Security Vol. 34, No. 4, p. 96-132)
Pandemics are disease outbreaks that occur over a wide geographic area, such as a region,
continent, or the entire world, and infect an unusually high proportion of the population. Two
pandemic diseases are widely cited as having the potential to pose direct threats to the
stability and security of states: HIV/AIDS and influenza. HIV/AIDS. Since it was first identified in 1981, HIV is
estimated to have killed more than 25 million people worldwide. According to the Joint UN Program on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), the
percentage of the global population with HIV has stabilized since 2000, but the overall number of people living with HIV (33 million
in 2007) has steadily increased. Sub-Saharan Africa continues to bear a disproportionate share of the global burden of HIV with 35
percent of new HIV infections, 75 percent of AIDS deaths, and 67 percent of all people living with HIV. 116 Scholars have identified
four ways that HIV/AIDS can affect security. 117 First, the disproportionately high prevalence of HIV/AIDS in the armed forces of
some nations, particularly in Southern Africa, may compromise the ability of those states to defend themselves from internal or
external threats. Militaries with high rates of HIV infection may suffer losses in combat readiness and effectiveness as infected
troops are transferred out of combat roles, units lose cohesion because of high turnover rates, middle management is "hollowed out"
by the early death or disability of officers, and defense budgets are strained because of rising medical costs and the need to recruit
and train replacements for sick soldiers. The second threat is that HIV/AIDS
will undermine the international
peace-keeping system. Nations with militaries with high rates of HIV/AIDS will be unable to
provide troops for international peacekeeping missions; nations with healthy militaries may be
unwilling to commit troops to peacekeeping operations in nations with a high prevalence rate of
HIV/AIDS; and war-torn nations may be unwilling to accept peacekeepers for fear they will
spread the disease in their country. The third threat is that a "second wave" of HIV/AIDS could
strike large, strategically important countries such as China, India, and Russia. These states,
which possess nuclear weapons and are important players in critical regions, also suffer from
internal security challenges that could be aggravated by a severe AIDS epidemic and its attendant socioeconomic
disruptions. The fourth threat is that the high prevalence of HIV in less developed countries will
cause political instability that could degenerate into internal conflict or spread into
neighboring countries. Unlike most diseases, which affect primarily the poor, young, and old,
HIV/AIDS strikes young adults and members of the middle and upper classes. By sickening and
killing members of society when they should be their most productive, HIV/AIDS has inflicted
the "single greatest reversal in human development" in modern history. 118
Adv 3
Advantage 2 is Organic Cultivation
Congressional policy change is necessary to greenlight a sustainable
pot industry
Fine, 13 [Doug, B.A Stanford 1992, investigative journalist with publications in the
Washington Post, Salon, and NPR, his work is also extensively part of the Congressional Record,
“Will Marijuana Farming in Mendocino County, California, Lead America to Pot?,” Truthout,
Intervied By Mark Karlin, July 19, 2013, http://tinyurl.com/mrxv9je]
Why does the political class in DC persist in promoting a "reefer madness" image of marijuana as a dangerous drug? After all, even the Obama administration periodically cracks
Congress has made no moves to ease up on
federal prosecution of marijuana growing and distribution, as it continues to finance a war on drugs that is fueled by taxpayer dollars and law
enforcement and contracted-industry financial incentives. But there is a populist revolt brewing. Beginning with state legalization of marijuana
down on states that have legally allowed the dispensing of medical marijuana.
use for easing medical pain, the movement to fully decriminalize pot has picked up steam as the voters of Washington and Colorado approved an end to marijuana prohibition.
California is pointing the way . Doug Fine, author and rancher, detailed how the de facto tolerance
for marijuana farms and use in Mendocino County is likely a harbinger for a new green economic
revolution in the United States: a legalized pot industry . Truthout talked with Fine about the issues covered in his book
As with many trends,
"Too High to Fail" and what he calls "the coming drug peace era." Get your copy of "Too High to Fail" now with a $30 minimum contribution (including shipping and handling)
to Truthout. Click here. Mark Karlin: Let's take a look at a recurring focus that you adopt in "Too High to Fail." Why should marijuana be legalized for its positive economic
impact on the US economy? How much tax revenue and spinoff economic development could it create as legally taxed product that could be grown in the United States and sold
Following a year of field-side research alongside farmers of America’s number one
crop (cannabis), I believe most conventional estimates about the size of the crop are way low .
In “Too High to Fail,” I studied the progress of one California county, Mendocino, whose deciders legalized and permitted the regional
cannabis farmers, out of economic necessity. The sheriff signed on, as did the local government.
Why? $6 billion . That is a conservative estimate of the plant’s value to local farmers (on paper) in one of
California’s poorest counties. The way I came to that figure was that the 600,000 plants seized by law enforcement in 2010 were estimated (also by law
enforcement) to be 10 percent of the crop. I gave the 6 million plants that did make it to market a very low-end value of $1,000 per plant. In other words, cannabis is
not just America’s number one cash crop, it is that by far. We shouldn’t be surprised. One hundred million
Americans have used the plant, including the past three presidents. Tax that plant nationwide, and you not just
generate billions in tax revenue (Harvard’s Jeffrey Miron estimates $30 billion annually ) but you cripple criminal enterprises, the way that the
here? Doug Fine:
end of alcohol prohibition pretty much put bootleggers out of work. California already generates $100 million annually from its medical cannabis industry, and that’s with the
majority of farmers still operating underground until federal prohibition ends. Space is preventing me from getting into ancillary industries, but in Mendocino County alone the
legalizing of the local economic engine supported inspectors, contractors and flower trimmers (where skill and experience matter and are well-remunerated) – dozens of jobs per
farm. Mark Karlin: We've engaged in a decades-long "war on drugs" that has resulted in the deaths of tens of thousands of people in Mexico and Latin America and enriched
drug cartels. Would the end of legal prohibition in the United States put the narcos out of business and reduce the dramatic death toll in Mexico? Doug Fine: Without question
ending the war on cannabis will be devastating to criminal enterprises south of the border. This is why
Latin American governments (as well as an increasing number of European ones) are lining up behind
ending the drug war. The Mendocino County, California, experiment I followed in “Too High to Fail” itself hurt criminal
cartels by bringing the local industry aboveground. The administrator of what was called the Zip-tie Program (for
the bright yellow bracelets every permitted plant wore) is named Captain Randy Johnson. A 27-year veteran of the force, most of
those as a conventional drug warrior, Johnson told me that most important reason the program is an important model nationwide is not just
the revenue it raised (saving seven deputy jobs locally). “It’s that we brought an entire community back into the law-abiding fold.” South of the border, Bill Martin at Rice
University estimates that up to 70 percent of cartel profits derive from cannabis (just as most drug war funding goes to the fruitless and unnecessary war on cannabis).
Whenever I throw these numbers out in debates with the last of the taxpayer-funded drug war boosters (they’re becoming rare), I hear, “Oh, that’s exaggerated. Cannabis is only
responsible for 50 percent of cartel proceeds, and they’ve diversified.” Hmm, I’d hate to lose 50 percent of my income. Mark Karlin: What is the story with the ongoing
stigmatization of marijuana on a political level that is far out of touch with its use on a social level? How can it be more evil than alcohol when liquor counts for far, far more road
accidents, more addictions, deaths and violent encounters? Doug Fine: The war on drugs, America’s longest and most expensive (with a price tag of $1 trillion to you and me
already, with $40 billion more added to our tab every year), is based at core on a crucial lie: that cannabis is very dangerous. Now, I’m a father, and I want my kids to grow up in
a safe, responsible society. Guess what? Even youth cannabis use rates go down, without fail, in places that legalize cannabis, whether completely (Portugal) or for medicinal use
(New England). So why does such a fundamental lie endure? The easiest way to understand it is through the concept of a tipping point. Along with “soft on crime,” “soft on
drugs” has, for 40 years, been something every politician fears hearing in an opponent’s television spot. The good news, for those interested in a stronger, safer America, is that
the Drug Peace tipping point has been reached. Across the nation, across all demographics, Americans want to end the Drug War. Forty percent of Colorado Republicans voted
to legalize cannabis in 2012, and youth turnout (the holy grail for Democrats since 18-year-olds got the vote in 1972) was up 12 percent in Colorado in 2012 vs. the 2008 “Yes We
Can” election. This is the issue that galvanizes all Americans. Even in my very conservative New Mexico valley, the cowgirl next to me in the post office line might believe that our
president was born in Kenya, but she knows from seeing our border region chaos with her own eyes that cannabis is not the problem with our region’s public safety. The war on
cannabis is the problem (along with meth and prescription pill abuse). In fact, it was a massive raid of my AARP member retiree rancher neighbor for something like a dozen
cannabis plants that spurred me to write “Too High to Fail.” The raid, paid for by you and me, pointedly ignored criminal cartels operating with impunity nearby. Eighty percent
of Americans call the drug war a failure, which it is. Almost everyone is onto the myths and lies that allowed the war on cannabis to endure for ten times longer than World War
II. Mark Karlin: A lot of urban rumors have circulated that the cigarette industry is sitting on brand names and marketing plans for selling marijuana when "the time is right."
Where does big tobacco stand on marijuana legalization? Doug Fine: More than one tobacco company has, at some point during the war on drugs, said or done something that
having spent so much time with small farmers,
I take to heart the views of Tomas Balogh, co-founder of the Emerald Growers Association farmer trade
group, which is creating a brand of Northern California’s sustainable, outdoor-cultivated,
third-generation cannabis culture . In his view, the cannabis crop is already
decentralized and farmer-controlled, and it’s up to consumers to keep it that way after
legalization. As I often put it when “Emerald Triangle” farmers speak of creating a top-shelf, regionally based international brand (like Champagne), “If Napa is any
model, get ready for the Bud and Breakfast.” When prohibition ends, some consumers will choose a Big Tobacco or Big Alcohol model, and some
will seek out the co-op, farmers market or CSA farm. That’s why we have Dom Perignon and Two Buck Chuck. Mark Karlin:
indicates it wasn’t opposed to profiting from cannabis when the time was right. But
Obviously, the jury is still out on the how the recent legalization of possession in Washington and Colorado will play out. What do you think the passage of the two statewide
propositions mean to the pace of legalization? Doug Fine: It’s the fall of the Drug War’s Berlin Wall – the end of America’s worst policy since segregation. The tipping point has
been reached – I think we’ll see cannabis removed from the Controlled Substances Act entirely within five years. And not a moment too soon – states want to regulate it and
need the revenue. Another huge event was last week’s inclusion of hemp cultivation provisions in the House side of the Farm Bill. It’s imperative that the Senate come on board,
too. I’m researching a hemp book now, and it will play a significant role in America’s energy independence. Already, a Kentucky utility company is planning to plant hemp on
coal-damaged land to use to generate electricity via ethanol and other processes. Mark Karlin: The Washington and Colorado votes came after years of inroads in state approvals
of medical marijuana use. In at least some jurisdictions, the Obama Department of Justice has pounced on medical marijuana dispensaries, including in California. Doesn't Eric
Holder have better things to do with our taxpayer dollars? Doug Fine: If there’s one thing that pretty much full-time, front-line coverage of the cannabis plant during the drug
looking for rationality in the execution of this war is an exercise in futility.
At this point the drug war, having lost both scientific and public support, operates on
bureaucratic inertia, and even many of the law enforcers who have to fight the war admit as
much. The bottom line is that the people have spoken, their voices are only getting louder, and the people who are paid to win elections realize this. This is why President
war’s final battles has taught me, it’s that
Obama, in his first major post-re-election interview in December 2012 (with Barbara Walters) for the first time took a cannabis legalization question seriously. He said he didn’t
“yet” support it, but he had “bigger fish to fry” than harassing Colorado and Washington. If you want to know why federal policy suddenly became laissez-faire, it’s about public
opinion in swing states. Arizona, just about as silver and red a state as a Goldwaterite could wish for, is polling at 56 percent in support of regulating cannabis for adult use like
alcohol. In heartland Illinois, 63 percent of voters support the about-to-be-enacted medicinal marijuana program. Heck, 60 percent of Kentuckians favor medical cannabis. The
fact is, if President Obama were to step to the podium next week and announce that he was returning to his pre-2008 drug policy position, which called the Drug War an “utter
failure,” his favorable numbers would go up in key swing states. This is true for anyone who’d like to succeed the president by spurring an energized youth turnout in 2016. Mark
Karlin: How does marijuana-growing in Mendocino County, which you feature prominently in your book, present a model for future breakthroughs in marijuana becoming a
the Mendocino Zip-tie
model is a vital one if small independent farmers are to retain a foothold in the industry
that is born around America’s number one cash crop after prohibition ends. The craft beer
model is illustrative here. Yes, Coors et al. control the corner store, but the microbrew sector is worth $10 billion
annually. The Emerald Triangle farmers of Northern California acutely realize this – they are
developing what Michael Pollan calls “supermarket pastoral .” This is the story that an organic food provider tells on her
packaging – we imagine the chickens who lay our eggs playing cards and attending square dances. If any cannabis cultivating region can
brand itself as top shelf, the way we have fine wines coming from Washington to Vermont, it can beat Wall Street’s offerings. And
as with wine and craft beer, farmers in plenty of places besides California, such as Oregon, Kentucky,
Louisiana and Colorado, to name a few, that can claim to have top-shelf cannabis farmers. The
most marketable branding model , I believe, will be family-owned, outdoor cultivating
sustainable farmers explaining that they’re just growing a plant that the original American
colonist cannabis farmers (including Thomas Jefferson and George Washington) did. When the kind of people who shop at farmer’s markets start
national and legal homegrown industry? Doug Fine: As a sustainability journalist who lives on a solar-powered goat ranch,
asking how their cannabis is grown,
models like this will be huge ; I think even bigger than for high-end wine and beer.
That spills over internationally
Fine, 13 [Doug, B.A Stanford 1992, investigative journalist with publications in the
Washington Post, Salon, and NPR, his work is also extensively part of the Congressional Record,
“Making Sure the End of Cannabis Prohibition Benefits the Small Farmer,” Alternet, February 7,
2013, pg. http://tinyurl.com/l72zvya]
the stacked deck at the mass production level is explicitly why the
cultivators of the Emerald Growers Association (EGA), a cannabis farmer trade group based in Northern California, prefer
Regardless of corporate boardroom strategy,
describing the “craft brew” model for the post-prohibition cannabis economy. In a world of Coors, these
farmers plan to provide Fat Tire Ale. “We’re not afraid of what might be stocked next to cheap beer and cigarettes at the corner
store,” says Tomas Balogh, EGA board member. “Let’s remember that American craft beer was nearly an $8 billion
market in the U.S. last year.” So when people ask him if globalized corporate models or small farming community-based
models will emerge when the drug war ends here in a few years, Balogh says, “Both.” His point is that of course major players
are going to enter the fray when we’re talking about what is already a $35-billion-a-year crop in the U.S., greater than the combined value of corn and wheat. Although
the end of cannabis prohibition will almost certainly cause short-term wholesale price drops, what Balogh
says to jittery farmers like Mark is, “even if your worst, most paranoid fears about modern corporate ethics are
correct, there is still a lucrative (and expanding) niche for top-shelf, organically grown
cannabis like the Emerald Triangle provides.” If it’s done right. The same shopper who today looks for local broccoli at
her food co-op is going to demand organic techniques in her morning cannabis health shake. If a black-market farmer is
simply churning out quick turnaround, pesticide-heavy, indoor-grown popcorn buds to pay the mortgage, that farmer is going to lose out to Coors-style mass-produced
if the three-generation knowledge base that caused
Michael Pollan to call cannabis cultivators “the best farmers of my generation ” is put to use
in the cause of long-term product quality and local community health, small-scale (maybe we can call it
“microbud”) cultivators will help the region become an internationally recognized paragon
of consistent top-shelf production. That is called a brand. “The best part is farmers can keep the industry benefiting their local
economy ,” Balogh told me from his own Mendocino County farm in 2011. Indeed, local farmers already hold meetings (I’ve attended several) in which they
discuss the fact that the economy of cannabis cultivation communities can expand beyond the already
considerable value of the psychoactive flower. To give one example, the Bavarian community of Feldheim, Germany
has become entirely energy independent (while nearly eliminating local
unemployment ) by generating municipal power generated from the unused stalks from the
rural community’s farms. When cannabis comes aboveground, its cultivators are likewise in prime
position to benefit from fermenting or gasifying stalks that would otherwise be compost. Where would
cannabis, because he’s essentially growing a Coors-quality product already. But
funding for such planet-saving entrepreneurialism come from? Perhaps from the 21st-century Homesteading Act that fifth-generation Colorado rancher Michael Bowman and
others are proposing: these would be micro-grants for micro-intensive, local community-enriching farming projects. (Social/medicinal cannabis is a specialty crop requiring a
great deal of farmer attention to every plant. For industrial cannabis in places like North Dakota and Kentucky, the grants might be on a larger scale, reflecting larger farming
Such plans are very much in the blackboard stage. After all, cannabis isn’t legal yet. That
can throw up roadblocks in the federal grant application process. Yet the discussions continue. In the Emerald Triangle,
farmers have brainstormed about cost-saving techniques for the local industry that include centralized bud-trimming facilities, warehousing and quality testing
services. These will bring local employment, as will “bud-and-breakfast” value-added tourism. You can’t talk to
operations.)
an EGA farmer without hearing how Mendocino and Humboldt counties are going to do for cannabis “what Napa did for wine.” (Napa did $11 billion just in tourism business in
2011.)
It sets the tone for a sustainable model of agriculture
Fine, 13 [Doug, B.A Stanford 1992, investigative journalist with publications in the
Washington Post, Salon, and NPR, his work is also extensively part of the Congressional Record,
“Can the Cannabis Economy Be Ecologically Sustainable?” Huffington Post, Updated: March 17,
2013, p. http://tinyurl.com/qzfwoqd]
Because of this isolation, prohibition, and now, cultural tradition, Northern California's remote Emerald
Triangle is poised to provide a model for a sustainable post-prohibition cannabis industry. In
particular, this model, which was institutionalized in a landmark cannabis farmer permitting program by the Sheriff's Department in Mendocino
County in 2011, can provide a farmer-owned, outdoor cultivation playbook to counter some of the grow
room-based models that are in danger of becoming institutionalized in the first U.S. states to re-legalize
full adult use of the plant. "This is part of the larger food revolution we're seeing everywhere," the overalls-wearing Fuzzy
told me during what became a sodden farmer caucus during a break between speakers at the Cup, contemplatively stroking his red chest length beard.
While thick, icy raindrops fell quite audibly from redwood eaves all around me, I thought about my own produce shopping preferences. I wouldn't buy a
spear of supermarket hothouse broccoli when there's a local organic heirloom variety available at the weekend farmer's market. This kind of
conversation was the explicit reason why I had jetted into the ankle-soaking winter puddles and moss-covered power lines of Redway, Calif. to give my
own talk at The Cup: I believe that figuring
out how to keep the cannabis industry decentralized, farmercontrolled and sustainable once prohibition ends is a key piece in the "allow my kids to inherit an
inhabitable planet" puzzle . I'm a sustainability journalist and solar-powered goat rancher who's just reported just from the front
lines of the Drug War for a year. We're talking about the United States' number one crop, already worth
$35 billion per year, according to ABC News. We don't have the time or resources to initiate any more carbon intensive
industries. The good news is that cannabis is now, in 2013, in the blueprint phase. I think we're three to five years from full federal cannabis
legalization. That's enough planning time. What can be done to make sure the planet's greenest industry is born Green? It's about incorporating
sustainable cannabis methods no matter how and where the plant is cultivated -- and this includes the industrial side (hemp) in places like North
Dakota. If I weren't already driving on vegetable oil and being routinely outwitted by goats, I would have become aware of the sustainable cannabis
imperative when Nobel Laureate Evan Mills, a researcher on the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change team that won the prize,
approached me after a live event I was doing in support of my recent book, Too High to Fail: Cannabis and the New Green Economic Revolution. As a
follow-up project to his UN panel work, Mills had in 2011 published a much-discussed report on the energy demand of California's (mostly indoorgrown) cannabis industry (which he concluded is responsible for 3 percent of all of California's energy use). Our email dialogue since meeting has been
spirited: as a guy who has visited probably three dozen cannabis farms, both indoor and outdoor, in the course of my research, I find myself with
notes on farming
techniques that not only help with my own tomatoes and beans, but which represent the
cutting edge of an agricultural sector that Michael Pollan describes as including "the best
farmers of my generation." Yet exchanges with Mills always force me to more critically ask questions like, "Is that farmer's drip
irrigation technique really sustainable?" and "Does the Mendocino County, California locavore permitting program that worked so well locally scale to
mass industrial sizes?" Although I followed intentionally sustainable cannabis farmers in my book, I'd have to be blind not to be aware that a segment
of the outdoor farming community in the U.S. and Mexico requires as much education as indoor gardeners do when it comes to issues like waterway
diversion and pesticide use. The truth is, most farmers here in the Emerald Triangle get it. A third generation Humboldt County farmer named Mike
told me as he stared admiringly at the rows of finalist buds behind the glass display at the Emerald Cup's straw bale-lined Growers' Tent, "The plants
adapt to the climate. Why wouldn't I use God's own sun instead of a generator?" Case in point, this year's winner of the Emerald Cup grand prize (a trip
to Jamaica), Leo Bell of nearby Laytonville (for his "exceptionally smooth, enticing and very sticky...nasturtium-scented" Chem Dawg strain, according
to judges), noted in his victory speech that during the 2012 growing season (a region-wide vintage said to be the best in a decade and a half), "I watered
by hand, and gave my heart to these plants, five (pause while choked up) hours every day." Now, if
all of humanity's agricultural
engineers operated according to such principles, climate change would be a much more
relaxed discussion. This moment presents the opportunity for the cannabis industry to chart
the very best course , or the very worst. On the dark side, you have the Drug War-inspired violent cartels,
profiteers, and poison pesticide purveyors that prohibition economies create. On the positive
side, think of the Doctor Bronner's Soap model, where organic and Fair Trade principles are embedded in every
product (many of which derive from hemp) and the CEO makes five times the salary of the lowest-paid
employee. This is the model that the farmers of the Emerald Growers Association trade group
(EGA) are using as they brand the region's cannabis crop in anticipation of a time when busy
moms in the Whole Foods cannabis section will be seeking "organic, fairly traded, local farmer-owned" plants
for Sunday's Super Bowl party dip. As for farmer Fuzzy's point about the importance of native soil, I can tell you after two decades of sustainability
journalism that he is spot-on: when I visited a local cannabis strain developer named Rock on his coastal farm, he showed me that his technique
basically involves crossing two promising strains and seeing if they like the local dirt. And Rock's strains have placed very high at past Emerald Cups.
The Emerald Triangle's barn-side genetics laboratories work. My
year of touring cannabis farms has taught me that
without question, no hydroponic set-up or garden store soil mix can approach the complex
microbial soup found in a mature Emerald Triangle farm. These are the same regional conditions and knowledge of
how to exploit them that long ago branded places like Champagne, France and Parmesan, Italy: you can't, by international law, call the same cheese
from somewhere else by the name Parmesan. And only family-level farming allows the kind of tender loving care that results in such universally
recognized branding. "Water your plants with a cup while singing to them" could never be taught at an ag school. Will the Emerald Triangle farmer
survive the inevitable period of instability and likely price drops which will follow the start of the Drug Peace era? "I think so," said Cup organizer Blake.
"We're a culture." The branding of this culture and its famous flowers is already underway. "We want people to associate the Emerald Triangle with top
shelf cannabis the way they do Napa with wine and wine tourism," explained Tomas Balogh, board member of the EGA. The worldwide post-Drug War
cannabis industry train has left the station. Working against Emerald farmer organization is the longstanding cultivator fear that legalization will bring
millions
of consumers are going to be seeking the cannabis version of Fat Tire Ale. If the region's
cultivators band together to aim for the microbrew aficionado, the EGA thinking goes, there's nothing to
fear from Coors. Craft beer was a $7.6 billion market in 2010. For the plan to work, sustainable
practices have to be taught, followed and certified in the Emerald Triangle. Especially to newer and younger
about the Coors or Marlboro version of cannabis production. And I think that concern is legitimate -- for the run of the mill farmer. But
farmers. Even Fuzzy got serious for a moment when I asked him if, alongside his own efficiently drip-irrigated crops, he sees non-sustainable practices,
such as river diversion, among his farming neighbors. "We do need standards," he admitted. It's
a small planet, and the EGA's Balogh
says that cultivators
have to prepare now to take advantage of the legalization free-for-all and
emerge as the world's number one sustainable crop . "We don't have a choice with this," he says. "We have to get
it right."
The impact is extinction
Altieri, 08 [Professor of agroecology @ University of California, Berkeley [Miguel Altieri
(President, Sociedad Cientifica LatinoAmericana de Agroecologia (SOCLA), “Small farms as a
planetary ecological asset: Five key reasons why we should support the revitalization of small
farms in the Global South,” Food First, May 9, 2008, p.
http://www.foodfirst.org/en/node/2115]
The Via Campesina has long argued that farmers need land to produce food for their own communities and for their country and for this reason has
advocated for genuine agrarian reforms to access and control land, water, agrobiodiversity, etc, which are of central importance for communities to be
able to meet growing food demands. The Via Campesina believes that in order to protect livelihoods, jobs, people's food security and health, as well as
the environment, food
production has to remain in the hands of small- scale
sustainable farmers and cannot be
left under the control of large agribusiness companies or supermarket chains. Only by changing the export-led, free-trade based, industrial agriculture
model of large farms can the downward spiral of poverty, low wages, rural-urban migration, hunger and environmental degradation be halted. Social
rural movements embrace the concept of food sovereignty as an alternative to the neo-liberal approach that puts its faith in inequitable international
trade to solve the world’s food problem. Instead, food sovereignty focuses on local autonomy, local markets, local production-consumption cycles,
energy and technological sovereignty and farmer to farmer networks. This global movement, the Via Campesina, has recently brought their message to
the North, partly to gain the support of foundations and consumers, as political pressure from a wealthier public that increasingly depends on unique
food products from the South marketed via organic, fair trade, or slow food channels could marshal the sufficient political will to curb the expansion of
biofuels, transgenic crops and agro-exports, and put an end to subsidies to industrial farming and dumping practices that hurt small farmers in the
South. But can these arguments really captivate the attention and support of northern consumers and philanthropists? Or is there a need for a different
argument—one that emphasizes that the very quality of life and food security of the populations in the North depends not only on the food products,
but in the ecological services provided by small farms of the South. In fact, it is herein argued that the
functions performed by small
farming systems still prevalent in Africa, Asia and Latin America—in the post-peak oil era that humanity is
entering—comprise an ecological asset for humankind and planetary survival . In fact, in an era of
escalating fuel and food costs, climate change, environmental degradation, GMO pollution and corporate- dominated food systems, small, biodiverse,
agroecologically managed farms in the Global South are the only viable form of agriculture that will feed the world under the new ecological and
economic scenario. There are at last five reasons why it is in the interest of Northern consumers to support the cause and struggle of small farmers in
the South: 1. Small farmers are key for the world’s food security While 91% of the planet’s 1.5 billion hectares of agricultural land are increasingly being
devoted to agro-export crops, biofuels and transgenic soybean to feed cars and cattle, millions
of small farmers in the Global
South still produce the majority of staple crops needed to feed the planet ’s rural and urban
populations. In Latin America, about 17 million peasant production units occupying close to 60.5 million hectares, or 34.5% of the total
cultivated land with average farm sizes of about 1.8 hectares, produce 51% of the maize, 77% of the beans, and 61% of the potatoes for domestic
consumption. Africa has approximately 33 million small farms, representing 80 percent of all farms in the region. Despite the fact that Africa now
imports huge amounts of cereals, the majority of African farmers (many of them women) who are smallholders with farms below 2 hectares, produce a
significant amount of basic food crops with virtually no or little use of fertilizers and improved seed. In Asia, the majority of more than 200 million rice
farmers, few farm more than 2 hectares of rice make up the bulk of the rice produced by Asian small farmers. Small
increases in yields
on these small farms that produce most of the world´s staple crops will have far more impact
on food availability at the local and regional levels, than the doubtful increases predicted for
distant and corporate-controlled large monocultures managed with such high tech
solutions as genetically modified seeds. 2.Small farms are more productive and resource conserving than large-scale
monocultures Although the conventional wisdom is that small family farms are backward and unproductive, research shows that small
farms are much more productive than large farms if total output is considered rather than yield
from a single crop. Integrated farming systems in which the small-scale farmer produces grains, fruits, vegetables, fodder, and animal products outproduce yield per unit of single crops such as corn (monocultures) on large-scale farms. A large farm may produce more corn per hectare than a small
farm in which the corn is grown as part of a polyculture that also includes beans, squash, potato, and fodder. In polycultures developed by smallholders,
productivity, in terms of harvestable products, per unit area is higher than under sole cropping with the same level of management. Yield
advantages range from 20 percent to 60 percent, because polycultures reduce losses due to
weeds, insects and diseases, and make more efficient use of the available resources of water,
light and nutrients. In overall output, the diversified farm produces much more food, even if measured in dollars. In the USA, data shows that the
smallest two hectare farms produced $15,104 per hectare and netted about $2,902 per acre. The largest farms, averaging 15,581 hectares, yielded $249
per hectare and netted about $52 per hectare. Not only do small to medium sized farms exhibit higher yields than conventional farms, but do so with
much lower negative impact on the environment. Small farms are ‘multi-functional’– more productive, more efficient, and contribute more to economic
development than do large farms. Communities
surrounded by many small farms have healthier economies than
do communities surrounded by depopulated, large mechanized farms. Small
farmers also take better care of natural
resources, including reducing soil erosion and conserving biodiversity. The inverse relationship
between farm size and output can be attributed to the more efficient use of land, water, biodiversity and other agricultural resources by small farmers.
So in terms of converting inputs into outputs, society would be better off with small-scale farmers. Building strong rural economies in the Global South
based on productive small-scale farming will allow the people of the South to remain with their families and will help to stem the tide of migration. And
as population continues to grow and the amount of farmland and water available to each person continues to shrink, a small
farm structure may become central to feeding the planet, especially when large- scale agriculture devotes itself to
feeding car tanks. 3. Small traditional and biodiverse farms are models of sustainability Despite the onslaught of industrial farming, the persistence of
thousands of hectares under traditional agricultural management documents a successful indigenous agricultural strategy of
adaptability and resiliency. These microcosms of traditional agriculture that have stood the test of time, and that can still be found almost untouched
since 4 thousand years in the Andes, MesoAmerica, Southeast Asia and parts of Africa, offer
promising models of
sustainability as they promote biodiversity , thrive without agrochemicals, and sustain year-round yields
even under marginal environmental conditions. The local knowledge accumulated during millennia and the forms of agriculture
and agrobiodiversity that this wisdom has nurtured, comprise a Neolithic legacy embedded with
ecological and cultural resources of fundamental value for the future of humankind .
Recent research suggests that many small farmers cope and even prepare for climate change,
minimizing crop failure through increased use of drought tolerant local varieties, water
harvesting, mixed cropping, opportunistic weeding, agroforestry and a series of other traditional
techniques. Surveys conducted in hillsides after Hurricane Mitch in Central America showed that
farmers using sustainable practices such as “mucuna” cover crops, intercropping, and agroforestry suffered less
“damage” than their conventional neighbors. The study spanning 360 communities and 24
departments in Nicaragua, Honduras and Guatemala showed that diversified plots had 20% to
40% more topsoil, greater soil moisture, less erosion, and experienced lower economic losses than
their conventional neighbors. This demonstrates that a re-evaluation of indigenous technology can serve as a key
source of information on adaptive capacity and resilient capabilities exhibited by small farms—features of
strategic importance for world farmers to cope with climatic change . In addition, indigenous
technologies often reflect a worldview and an understanding of our relationship to the natural world that is more realistic and more sustainable that
those of our Western European heritage. 4. Small farms represent a sanctuary of GMO-free agrobiodiversity In general, traditional small scale farmers
grow a wide variety of cultivars . Many of these plants are landraces grown from seed passed down from generation to generation, more genetically
heterogeneous than modern cultivars, and thus offering greater defenses against vulnerability and enhancing harvest security in the midst of diseases,
pests, droughts and other stresses. In a worldwide survey of crop varietal diversity on farms involving 27 crops, scientists found that considerable crop
genetic diversity continues to be maintained on farms in the form of traditional crop varieties, especially of major staple crops. In most cases, farmers
maintain diversity as an insurance to meet future environmental change or social and economic needs. Many researchers have concluded that this
varietal richness enhances productivity and reduces yield variability. For example, studies by plant pathologists provide evidence that mixing of crop
species and or varieties can delay the onset of diseases by reducing the spread of disease carrying spores, and by modifying environmental conditions so
that they are less favorable to the spread of certain pathogens. Recent research in China, where four different mixtures of rice varieties grown by
farmers from fifteen different townships over 3000 hectares, suffered 44% less blast incidence and exhibited 89% greater yield than homogeneous
fields without the need to use chemicals. It is possible that traits important to indigenous farmers (resistance to drought, competitive ability,
performance on intercrops, storage quality, etc) could be traded for transgenic qualities which may not be important to farmers (Jordan, 2001). Under
this scenario, risk could increase and farmers would lose their ability to adapt to changing biophysical environments and increase their success with
relatively stable yields with a minimum of external inputs while supporting their communities’ food security. Although there is a high probability that
the introduction of transgenic crops will enter centers of genetic diversity, it is crucial to protect areas of peasant agriculture free of contamination from
GMO crops, as traits important to indigenous farmers (resistance to drought, food or fodder quality, maturity, competitive ability, performance on
intercrops, storage quality, taste or cooking properties, compatibility with household labor conditions, etc) could be traded for transgenic qualities (i.e.
herbicide resistance) which are of no importance to farmers who don’t use agrochemicals . Under this scenario risk will increase and farmers will lose
their ability to produce relatively stable yields with a minimum of external inputs under changing biophysical environments. The social impacts of local
crop shortfalls, resulting from changes in the genetic integrity of local varieties due to genetic pollution, can be considerable in the margins of the
Global South. Maintaining pools of genetic diversity, geographically isolated from any possibility of cross fertilization or genetic pollution from uniform
transgenic crops will create “islands” of intact germplasm which will act as extant safeguards against potential ecological failure derived from the
second green revolution increasingly being imposed with programs such as the Gates-Rockefeller AGRA in Africa. These genetic sanctuary islands will
serve as the only source of GMO-free seeds that will be needed to repopulate the organic farms in the North inevitably contaminated by the advance of
transgenic agriculture. The small farmers and indigenous communities of the Global South, with the help of scientists and NGOs, can continue to create
and guard biological and genetic diversity that has enriched the food culture of the whole planet. 5. Small farms cool the climate While industrial
agriculture contributes directly to climate change through no less than one third of total emissions of the major greenhouse gases — Carbon dioxide
(CO2), methane (CH4), and nitrous oxide (N2O), small, biodiverse organic farms have the opposite effect by sequestering more carbon in soils. Small
farmers usually treat their soils with organic compost materials that absorb and sequester carbon better than soils that are farmed with conventional
fertilizers. Researchers have suggested that the conversion of 10,000 small- to medium-sized farms to organic production would store carbon in the soil
equivalent to taking 1,174,400 cars off the road. Further climate amelioration contributions by small farms accrue from the fact that most use
significantly less fossil fuel in comparison to conventional agriculture mainly due to a reduction of chemical fertilizer and pesticide use, relying instead
on organic manures, legume-based rotations, and diversity schemes to enhance beneficial insects. Farmers who live in rural communities near cities
and towns and are linked to local markets, avoid the energy wasted and the gas emissions associated with transporting food hundreds and even
thousands of miles. Conclusions The great advantage of small farming systems is their high levels of agrobidoversity arranged in the form of variety
mixtures, polycultures, crop-livestock combinations and/or agroforestry patterns. Modeling new agroecosystems using such diversified designs are
extremely valuable to farmers whose systems are collapsing due to debt, pesticide use, transgenic treadmills, or climate change. Such diverse systems
buffer against natural or human-induced variations in production conditions. There is much to learn from indigenous modes of production, as these
systems have a strong ecological basis, maintain valuable genetic diversity, and lead to regeneration and preservation of biodiversity and natural
resources. Traditional methods are particularly instructive because they provide a long-term perspective on successful agricultural management under
conditions of climatic variability. Organized
social rural movements in the Global South oppose industrial
agriculture in all its manifestations, and increasingly their territories constitute isolated areas
rich in unique agrobiodiversity, including genetically diverse material, therefore acting as
extant safeguards against the potential ecological failure derived from inappropriate
agricultural modernization schemes. It is precisely the ability to generate and maintain diverse crop
genetic resources that offer “unique” niche possibilities to small farmers that cannot be replicated by
farmers in the North who are condemned to uniform cultivars and to co-exist with GMOs. The “ cibo pulito, justo e buono” that Slow Food promotes,
the Fair Trade coffee, bananas, and the organic products so much in demand by northern consumers can only be produced in the agroecological islands
of the South. This
“difference” inherent to traditional systems, can be strategically utilized to revitalize small
farming communities by exploiting opportunities that exist for linking traditional agrobiodiversity with
local/national/international markets, as long as these activities are justly compensated by the North and
all the segments of the market remain under grassroots control. Consumers of the North can play a major role
by supporting these more equitable markets which do not perpetuate the colonial model of “agriculture of the poor for
the rich,” but rather a model that promotes small biodiverse farms as the basis for strong rural economies in the Global
South. Such economies will not only provide sustainable production of healthy, agroecologically-produced, accessible
food for all, but will allow indigenous peoples and small farmers to continue their millennial work of building and
conserving the agricultural and natural biodiversity on which we all depend now and even more so in the
future.
Climate shocks to ag production make nuclear war possible
Cribb 14 [Julian, “Human extinction: it is possible?” Sydney Morning Herald, Published:
April 2, 2014, p. http://www.smh.com.au/comment/human-extinction-it-is-possible20140402-zqpln.html]
However our own
behaviour is liable to be a far more immediate determinant of human survival or
extinction. Above two degrees – which we have already locked in – the world’s food harvest is going to become
increasingly unreliable, as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned this week. That means mid-century
famines in places like India, China, the Middle East and Africa . But what scientists cannot predict is how
humans living in the tropics and subtropics will respond to this form of stress. So let us turn to the strategic and military think tanks, who like to
explore such scenarios, instead. The Age of Consequences study by the US Centre for Strategic and International Studies says that under a 2.6 degree
rise “nations around the world will be overwhelmed by the scale of change and pernicious challenges, such as pandemic disease. The internal
cohesion of nations will be under great stress…as a result of a dramatic rise in migration and changes in
agricultural patterns and water availability. The flooding of coastal communities around the world… has the potential to challenge regional
and even national identities. Armed conflict between nations over resources… is likely and nuclear war is
possible . The social consequences range from increased religious fervour to outright chaos.” Of five degrees – which the world is on course for
by 2100 if present carbon emissions continue – it simply says the consequences are "inconceivable". Eighteen nations currently have
nuclear weapons technology or access to it, raising the stakes on nuclear conflict to the
highest level since the end of the Cold War. At the same time, with more than 4 billion people living in the world’s most
vulnerable regions, scope for refugee tsunamis and pandemic disease is also large. It is on the basis of scenarios such as these
that scientists like Peter Schellnhuber – science advisor to German President Angela Merkel – and Canadian author Gwynne
Dyer have warned of the potential loss of most of the human population in the conflicts, famines
and pandemics spinning out of climate impacts. Whether that adds up to extinction or not rather
depends on how many of the world’s 20,000 nukes are let off in the process. These issues all involve
assumptions about human, national and religious behaviour and are thus beyond the remit of scientific bodies like the IPCC, which can only hint at
what they truly think will happen. So you are not getting the full picture from them.
Federal legalization allows ecogrown marijuana to dominate.
Consumers will reward sustainability
Bienenstock, 14 [A columnist and frequent contributor at Vice Media, and a ten-year
veteran of High Times magazine [David Bienenstock, “Growing Greener Grass,” Vice, Aug 15
2014, pg. http://tinyurl.com/nns7pyv]
when it comes to conserving energy and promoting sustainability , nothing comes
close to growing cannabis in the sun—provided you've got a suitable climate and sound environmental practices. Remember, the serious problems up in
California's Emerald Triangle aren't inherent to outdoor marijuana cultivation, but instead stem from
the current grey market's unfettered incentivization of short term profit and total lack
of effective regulation. Outdoor growing also costs a lot less than indoor, which is why the longterm future of legal cannabis in Colorado may lie in large-scale greenhouses with supplemental light. At least until the federal
government's all-out ban on marijuana ends, and interstate cannabis commerce opens up,
allowing the nation's marijuana supply to be grown wherever conditions prove most suitable
Of course,
—just like any other other commercial crop. In the meantime, green-minded ganja consumers can opt to do their part
by supporting eco-friendly marijuana cultivators. For most of the country, reliably sourcing herb grown in this
manner remains something of a pipe dream due to the “take it or leave it” nature of most illegal
marijuana sales, but the good news is that when marketed effectively in legal states, the pot buying
public does seem willing to reward those who strive to produce Mary Jane without harming
Mother Earth. According to Rick Pfommer, Director of Education at Harborside Health Center in Oakland, California—
the nation's largest cannabis retailer—sun-grown marijuana grew from 5 percent to over 20
percent of their total sales in 2012, the first year they adopted the term to describe their outdoor and greenhouse-grown
offerings. And sun grown buds not only tread lightly on the planet, they also offer a superior medicinal product with a longer lasting high. “Sun Grown cannabis contains many more cannabinoids than its lamp
all of us, should be
demanding that the cannabis they consume has been grown with as little ecological impact as
possible. And the only way to ensure that is by using the sun.”
grown counterparts,” Pfommer wrote in a recent essay for Cannabis Now magazine. “As more states legalize, those with a stake in the future, and I believe that is
2ac
AT: Diversification
Diversification doesn’t solve – it’s not as profitable, for example
50,000 kidnappings equal only 1/10th of a single drug’s revenue -marijuana is a steady source of revenue as cartels control the entire
supply chain – that’s Beckley and Robelo
Decreased revenue is enough – it decreases money that’s used to
purchase arms or corrupt officials
Jones, 14 [Nathan, the Alfred C. Glassell III Postdoctoral Fellow in Drug Policy at the Baker
Institute. 14, "Will recreational marijuana sales in Colorado hurt Mexican cartels?," 9-12-2014,
Baker Institute Blog, http://blog.chron.com/bakerblog/2014/01/will-recreational-marijuanasales-in-colorado-hurt-mexican-cartels/]
-In terms of the impact on Mexican cartels in the short term, we might see a spike in other extortion-related crimes as profit starvation sets in for certain cells in illicit networks. Attributing this to changing market
These illicit networks may
further diversify into territorial extortionist activities , but over the long term will be wiped out by civil
society and the state as these crimes draw a powerful backlash . I documented this process in
Tijuana in my 2011 doctoral dissertation. The real benefits of legalization will be seen in the medium- and longterm. By cutting into Mexican cartel profits, other cartel activities and power could be reduced. We
know that cartel profits can be redistributed to local cells to maintain territorial control.
The ability to weaken or reduce these payments could limit their activities and capital
investments in kidnapping and extortion franchises . Finally, reducing cartel profits could help
Mexico strengthen its institutions . Building effective police and security institutions takes decades. Decades can stretch into centuries if those agencies
are constantly rejiggered and re-corrupted by highly profitable and sophisticated organized criminal networks. Reducing illicit
profits could have an important and salubrious effect on the ability of Mexico to strengthen its
security apparatus . Colorado’s legalization of marijuana will have a negligible impact on drug-related violence in Mexico because Colorado is too small a market, and enforcement on
dynamics in the United States will be difficult, given that violent black market forces (rival cartels) may be a much more important confounding variable.
marijuana leaving the state will be artificially tight for the first year or two. As other states legalize — Washington is set to fully implement its voter-approved initiative later this year and states like California and
Washington appear poised to do so in the coming years — we will see a larger impact. If a state such as Texas were to legalize, we would see a rapid and much greater impact due to the state’s size, geographic
proximity to Mexico, and penchant for limited regulation of big business. It is Colorado’s leadership role in this broader trend that could have a real impact over the long term on cartel profits and violence in
Mexico.
Kilmer is AFF
Beau Kilmer et al 10, Jonathan P. Caulkins, Brittany M. Bond, Peter H. Reuter (Kilmer-Codirector, RAND Drug Policy Research Center; Senior Policy Researcher, RAND; Professor,
Pardee RAND Graduate School, Ph.D. in public policy, Harvard University; M.P.P., University of
California, Berkeley; B.A. in international relations, Michigan State University, Caulkins--Stever
Professor of Operations Research and Public Policy at Carnegie Mellon University, Bond-research economist in the Office of the Chief Economist of the US Department of Commerce's
Economics and Statistics Administration, Reuter--Professor in the School of Public Policy and
the Department of Criminology at the University of Maryland. “Reducing Drug Trafficking
Revenues and Violence in Mexico Would Legalizing Marijuana in California Help?” RAND
occasional paper (peer reviewed),
http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/occasional_papers/2010/RAND_OP325.pdf
However, there
is at least one countervailing factor that might reduce violence in the short run.
Given that the signal of market decline will be strong and unambiguous, experienced
participants might accept the fact that their earnings and the market as a whole are in decline.
This could lead to a reduced effort on their part to fight for control of routes or officials, since
those areas of control are now less valuable. Of course, that does presume strategic thinking in a population that appears
to have a propensity for expressive and instrumental violence. The natural projection in the long run is more optimistic.
Fewer young males will enter the drug trade, and the incentives for violence will decline as
the economic returns to leader- ship of a DTO fall. 10 However, the long run is indeterminably measured: probably years,
and perhaps many years. The outcome, either in the short or long term, of a substantial decline in the U.S. market for Mexican marijuana in 2011 is a
matter of conjecture. One view is that, in the short run, there could be more violence as the DTO leadership faces a very disturbing change in circumstances. The fact that a decline in their share of the marijuana market would come after a period in which there has been rapid turnover at the top
of their organizations and much change in their relationships with corrupt police could make it particularly difficult for the DTOs to reach a cooperative
accommodation to their shrunken market. However, if the Mexi- can government lessens pressures and signals its willingness to reach an
accommodation with a more collaborative set of DTOs, the result could be a reduction in violence. In the long run, the analysis is different. One would
think that
DTO participation would become less attractive . However, the government’s actions are again
capable of reversing this. The government might take advantage of the weakened state of its adversary to break up the larger DTOs; a configuration of
many smaller organizations could lead to greater competitive violence.
Resource redirection is sufficient
Carlsen, 10 [Laura Carlsen 10, director of the CIP Americas Program, “How Legalizing
Marijuana Would Weaken Mexican Drug Cartels,” Nov 3, http://www.cipamericas.org/wpcontent/uploads/wp-post-to-pdf-cache/1/how-legalizing-marijuana-would-weaken-mexicandrug-cartels.pdf]
In the months leading up to the vote, opponents of legalization issued a barrage of confused and contradictory arguments aimed at
convincing voters to ignore a basic common-sense fact: legal
sourcing erodes the black-market profits of
organized crime. But organized crime is a business . Reducing demand through providing
legal sources would hurt that business and cut deeply into resources used to recruit youth,
buy off politicians and purchase weapons . The most recent argument thrown out in the anti-Prop. 19
campaign, claims that the California marijuana market is insignificant to Mexican drug traffickers. That argument was blown out of
the water on October 18 when the Mexican Army and police seized 134 tons of marijuana, wrapped and ready to be smuggled from
Tijuana across the border. The huge cache was estimated to be worth at least $338 million dollars on the street. Mexican authorities
guessed that it was owned by the nation's most powerful drug-trafficking organization, the Sinaloa Cartel. Even if much of that is
distributed to other states, the sheer size of the potential shipment shows that the U.S. marijuana market for Mexican traffickers,
calculated at $20 billion a year, is well worth fighting for. Since before Prop. 19 came along, reports
showed that Mexico's
drug cartels were concerned about how U.S. production and legalization of medical marijuana
cut into their profits. Prohibition creates the underground market that generates their economic,
political and military strength. With the drop in income from marijuana sales, cartels have less
money for buying arms and politicians, or recruiting young people into the trade. The drug cartels also
consider the marijuana black market worth killing for. Just days after the historic bust, thirteen young men were massacred at a
drug rehabilitation center. An anonymous voice came over police radio saying the act was "a taste of Juarez" and that up to 135
people could be murdered in retaliation for the bust--one per ton. Although calculating Mexican cartel earnings from marijuana
sales will always be a guessing game, it's indisputable that as long as it's illegal every penny of those earnings goes into the pockets of
organized crime. From the peasant who converts his land from corn to pot to feed his family, to the truckdriver who takes on a bonus
cargo, to the Mexican and U.S. border officials who open "windows" in international customs controls, to the youth gangs who sell in
U.S. cities--all are sucked into a highly organized and brutal system of contraband. Legalization
in part of the world's
leading market would take a huge chunk out of this transnational business. The government of Mexican
president Felipe Calderon, along with Colombian president Juan Manuel Santos, has redoubled efforts in U.S. media and
international forums to oppose the California legalization measure. This is not surprising. These two nations are deeply entrenched
in a military-model drug war that has channeled a combined total of nearly $9 billion dollars in U.S. government funds to their
governments. As in any war, powerful political and economic interests are at stake in perpetuating the drug war. It's interesting to
see what they say though. Neither President Santos nor Calderon argue that legalization will strengthen drug cartels. Instead, both
complain that legalization will erode their drug war by heightening the contradiction between violent crackdowns on growers and
traffickers in their countries and the lax attitude toward consumption of marijuana in the United States. At a recent meeting of the
Tuxtla Dialogue in Cartagena, Colombia's President Juan Manuel Santos said, "It's confusing for our people to see that, while we lose
lives and invest resources in the fight against drug trafficking, in consuming countries initiatives like California's referendum are
being promoted." It's about time that contradiction was exposed. But the way to resolve it is not to increase fumigation operations
that destroy peasant livelihoods and the environment and seizures of marijuana shipments that lead to the deaths of innocent
civilians, while further criminalizing consumption in the U.S. The
way to resolve it is to halt ineffective
measures to stop marijuana use, and focus scarce resources on attacking the
financial and violent aspects of transnational organized crime, and providing
employment and services for vulnerable sectors. Legalization of marijuana, in addition to
reducing the economic base of the cartels, frees up resources to do just that.
AT: Can’t be Federal
Counter interpretation – ‘United States’ includes federal action
Anderson, 55 - Professor Emeritus of Political Science, University of Minnesota (William, The
Nation and the States, Rivals Or Partners?, google books)
United States. Both the Articles and the Constitution utilize this term to designate the organized nation or the group of states taken
as a single entity. In fact "United
States" became the standard term at the time of the Declaration of
Independence to designate the national unit of government and has been used in that
way ever since.
There is, however, a subtle difference between the Articles and the Constitution in the way in which "United States" is used. Nearly
every use of the term in the Articles is in the phrase "the United States in Congress assembled," as if the United States did not exist
except when the delegates from the several state legislatures were assembled in a Congress. Usually the words "United States in
Congress assembled" are not even capitalized. Clearly the term "United States" did not as yet mean a fully united nation or a political
entity with an established name, a government, and a being of its own.
On the other hand, the framers of the Constitution, just ten years after the Articles were drafted, spoke of the United States and the
people of the United States as if they already existed as one nation. "The
government of the United States" is
recognized as a distinct government, in Article I, section 8, paragraph 18, of the Constitution, and
evidently as something separate from and not dependent upon the state governments; while the
Congress of the United States is spoken of as such, and never as "the United States in Congress assembled." In contrast with
the term "the United States" the framers used the phrase "the several states" to refer to the
separate states and their local or particular governments.
And, the federal government can legalize
Valente, 13 [Executive Director of the Partnership for a Drug-Free New Jersey [Angelo M.
Valente, “Marijuana Legalization: Now What?,” Partnership for a Drug Free New Jersey, Posted
9/4/2013, pg. http://tinyurl.com/mccvw9k]
Marijuana is a schedule I classification drug under the Controlled Substances Act in the United States, meaning that it
has a high potential for abuse and there is no ACCEPTED medical precedent for it. Therefore, it is illegal to possess or sell in the United
States. This is federal law . According to Article IV, Clause 2 of the Constitution of the United States,
better known as the Supremacy Clause, “This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States…shall be the supreme
law of the land; and the judges in every state shall be bound thereby, anything in the
constitution or laws of any state to the contrary notwithstanding.” In other words, Washington can pass the
Undiscovered Species Protection Act, which makes it illegal to harass Bigfoot or any other undiscovered species but it can’t legalize
marijuana because it is against federal law and the law of the U nited S tates supersedes that of
the state.
‘legalization’ is removing a legal prohibition
Rolles 9 [Stephen Rolles, Company Director of Transform Drugs Campaign Limited, “A
Comparison of the Cost-effectiveness of Prohibition and Regulation of Drugs”, April,
http://www.tdpf.org.uk/sites/default/files/Cost-Effectiveness.pdf]
‘Prohibition’ is used in this paper to refer to the set of policies that formally prohibit—through the
application of legal sanctions —all production, distribution and possession of specific psychoactive drugs for nonmedical use, as defined under the UN drug conventions and the Misuse of Drugs Act 197137. Reduction in use, specifically the aim of
a ‘drug free’ society, is often given as the primary goal. ‘Decriminalisation’, which is often confused with legalisation/regulation, is
the reduction or abolition (actual or de facto) of criminal penalties in relation to certain acts. While decriminalised acts are no longer
crimes, they may still be the subject of regulation; for example, a civil or administrative penalty (commonly a fine) in place of a
criminal charge for the possession of a decriminalised drug for personal use. ‘Legalisation’,
in contrast to
decriminalisation, is the process of removing a legal prohibition against something which
is currently illegal. ‘Legalisation’ describes a process or shift in legal status , rather than describing a
policy position or form of legal regulation.
AT: Use DA
THIS DA is dumb – Coogan is about the effect on recruitment b/c of
stuff that isn’t marijuana and their public health systems good now
card is about costs, not anything related to the military
Coogan, Newsela Chief Content Officer, 2013
(Jennifer, “Military leaders fear America’s youth can’t make the cut”, 4-29,
https://newsela.com/articles/military-recruits/id/46/, ldg)
In an interview on National Public Radio (NPR), General Martin Dempsey said, “I think it’s
fairly common knowledge that our population of military-age young men who qualify for the
military is declining.” Drugs, Dropouts And Arrests According to the NPR report, too many
young men are disqualified from joining the military because they have had trouble with the law,
lack a high-school diploma or have used drugs. Recruits must have a clean criminal record,
pass a drug test and meet academic requirements. For young American men, these standards
are getting harder to meet. NPR pointed out that in all 50 states, more boys than girls drop out
of school. Young men also account for three-fourths of all arrests in the United States. Since the
majority of people applying to the armed forces are male, this represents a thorny problem for
military recruiters who are trying to meet their enlistment goals. Young Women Wanted The
military realized that if this trend continued, by 2020 there would not be enough male recruits
to fill the ranks. So it decided it needed to increase female recruitment. By opening up ground
combat roles to women, it’s hoped the military can attract more female applicants by showing
that women can have just as successful careers in the military as men. Ground combat units,
which include jobs like operating a tank or firing mortars, have been off-limits to female troops.
The jobs are tough and dangerous, but serving in those units is often a requirement for certain
leadership roles in the military. Still, the plan to open ground combat jobs to women will not
solve all the military’s recruitment problems. Female soldiers and Marines must pass exhausting
training courses and have superior fitness levels to be admitted to these units. Fighting Fat
Fitness is yet another hurdle for would-be recruits. American youth are suffering from an
obesity crisis. According to the Department of Defense, 27 percent of Americans aged 17 to 24
are too heavy to serve in the military. When combined with the number of people who are
disqualified for academic, criminal and drug-related reasons, only one in four young Americans
is eligible to join the military. Not having enough recruits threatens U.S. military readiness -- the
ability of the armed forces to respond to threats and accomplish their missions.
Use is inevitable --- state legalization coming now AND people will just
use marijuana illegally anyway
No empirical evidence for increased use
Duke, 13 [Copyright (c) 2013 University of Oregon Oregon Law Review 2013 Oregon Law
Review 91 Or. L. Rev. 1301 LENGTH: 7972 words Article: The Future of Marijuana in the United
States NAME: STEVEN B. DUKE* BIO: * Professor of Law, Yale Law School, p. lexis]
A. If Marijuana Is Legalized, More People Will Use More of It This is surely true but not weighty.
Decriminalization at the state level during the 1970s did not lead to significant increases
in the usage of marijuana . n70 Nor did that occur in the Netherlands where marijuana was de
facto decriminalized decades ago. n71 Nor has it happened in Portugal, which in 2001
decriminalized possession and use of small quantities of all drugs. n72 Because no country has yet actually
legalized the distribution of marijuana, however, these examples of decriminalization are of limited value in predicting the increases
in consumption that are likely when both distribution and use of the drug are lawful. Marijuana distribution will be more efficient
and the drug far less costly when producing and distributing [*1315] it is no longer a black-market operation, as it is even in those
countries that have decriminalized or legalized the use and possession of marijuana. The
failure of marijuana
prohibition, both in the United States and globally, n73 is due in part to the plant's ease of
cultivation. It can be grown virtually anywhere, indoors and out, requiring little horticultural expertise or
significant financial investment. In this respect it resembles alcohol, which was widely homemade during Prohibition and can
likewise be produced almost anywhere at little expense. Thus,
with both marijuana and alcohol, it is
impossible to eradicate the drug's source , and efforts to interdict the smuggling of the drug have only
marginal effects on price and consumption. Because marijuana is so easy to produce, the price of legalized marijuana to the
consumer could not be maintained at anywhere near its current level by imposing high taxes. High taxes would create another black
market and defeat many of the objectives of legalization. The price of legalized marijuana would have to be a fraction of its present
black market price. Also, when marijuana is regulated, as it would be under full legalization, the consumer will feel more
comfortable, morally and otherwise, in buying and consuming the drug. Thus, it is almost certain that legalizing both the use and the
distribution of marijuana would substantially increase consumption. Even
if marijuana use were to triple under a
legalized regime, which no prohibitionist predicts, this would be a small price to pay for the benefits of
legalization. Not only would the drug be safer and less potent, n74 its increased use would
likely reduce the consumption of alcohol, a far more harmful drug. Even though the
physical and psychological effects of alcohol and marijuana are quite different, there is
substantial evidence that drinkers who take up marijuana drink less alcohol. n75 It also seems
likely that the consciousness-alteration obtained with cheaper and lawful marijuana would
reduce [*1316] the appetite for heroin, cocaine, amphetamines, and other illegal, dangerous drugs.
Increased consumption of legalized marijuana could prove to be a benefit of legalization, not a
cost. n76
We straight turn readiness – heg is a precursor to deterrence AND
they don’t have a threshold card
Doesn’t impact health AND trades off with worse drugs
Duke, 13 [Copyright (c) 2013 University of Oregon Oregon Law Review 2013 Oregon Law
Review 91 Or. L. Rev. 1301 LENGTH: 7972 words Article: The Future of Marijuana in the United
States NAME: STEVEN B. DUKE* BIO: * Professor of Law, Yale Law School, p. lexis]
decade after decade, researchers have
found no reliable evidence that marijuana is a serious threat to the physical or
psychological health of a normal, adult user. n30 Both alcohol and tobacco are far more
damaging to the human body, as is obesity. n31 Unlike alcohol consumption, marijuana use is
not chemically linked to violence and crime. n32 Millions of marijuana users have decided through experience what the studies suggest:
although powerful, marijuana is not a dangerous drug and most of its users lead healthy, productive
lives. Absent too is evidence of the so-called "gateway effect," the theory that marijuana causes
the user to move on to stronger drugs. n33 About two out of three marijuana users never even [*1308]
try harder drugs like cocaine or heroin, and for every frequent user of cocaine or heroin, there
are about eight frequent users of marijuana. n34 By satisfying a consciousness-altering appetite,
marijuana may in fact prevent many people from using harder drugs. If the
A. Marijuana Is Far Less Harmful than Many Legal, Regulated Drugs In study after study,
availability of marijuana has any effect on the consumption of hard drugs, it more likely acts as a
"moat" than as a "gateway" to hard drug use.
No risk of bioterrorism – the impact is small
Mueller ’10 [John E, Professor of Political Science @ Ohio State, “Atomic obsession: nuclear
alarmism from Hiroshima to al-Qaeda”, pages 12-13]
Properly developed and deployed, biological weapons could potentially, if thus far only in theory, kill hundreds of
thousands, perhaps even millions, of people. The discussion remains theoretical because biological weapons
have scarcely ever been used. For the most destructive results, they need to be dispersed in very
low-altitude aerosol clouds. Since aerosols do not appreciably settle, pathogens like anthrax
(which is not easy to spread or catch and is not contagious) would probably have to be sprayed
near nose level. Moreover, 90 percent of the microorganisms are likely to die during the process of
aerosolization, while their effectiveness could be reduced still further by sunlight , smog ,
humidity, and temperature changes . Explosive methods of dispersion may destroy the
organisms , and, except for anthrax spores, long-term storage of lethal organisms in bombs or warheads is
difficult: even if refrigerated, most of the organisms have a limited lifetime. Such weapons can take days or
weeks to have full effect, during which time they can be countered with medical and civil defense
measures. In the summary judgment of two careful analysts, delivering microbes and toxins over a wide area in
the form most suitable for inflicting mass casualties—as an aerosol that could be inhaled—requires a delivery
system of enormous sophistication, and even then effective dispersal could easily be disrupted
by unfavorable environmental and meteorological conditions.27
Plan solves the environment
Merchant, 09 [Brian is a freelance writer and editor that covers politics with a focus on
climate and energy issues, http://www.treehugger.com/corporate-responsibility/drug-cartelsturning-us-forests-into-marijuana-plantations-toxic-messes.html, “Drug Cartels Turning US
Forests into Marijuana Plantations, Toxic Messes”]
illegal
marijuana plantations endanger forests by operating under the radar--and unregulated --in
some of our most pristine natural areas . They contaminate water supplies , result in
deforestation, and threaten indigenous species . But I had no idea how widespread
the destruction really was--just recently, the "Save our Sierras" campaign uncovered 69 marijuana
plantations run by Mexican drug cartels and seized over a billion dollars worth of plants in California national forests.
According to a report in Greenwire, "Mexican drug trafficking organizations have been operating on public
lands to cultivate marijuana, with serious consequences for the environment and public
safety," said Gil Kerlikowske, chief of the White House's Office of National Drug Control Policy. In creating, and eventually
abandoning, vast marijuana plantations the cartels are leaving heaps of trash , slaughtered
animals , copious amounts of pesticides , and dangerous spilled fuels in their wake. Essentially, each
plantation results in an environmental disaster . But the campaign to stop them is vigorous, and is
When I argued a few months back that legalizing marijuana would be good for the environment, my main point was that
already seeing encouraging results: The massive operation that began in February has already seized about 318,000 marijuana
plants worth an estimated $1.1 billion, officials announced last week. In addition to 82 arrests, the multi-jurisdictional federal, state
and local operation netted 42 pounds of processed marijuana, more than $40,000 in cash, 25 weapons and three vehicles. But
there are still believed to be many plantations still in operation, and the cartels aren't slowing
down . They've realized that it's cheaper and easier to fund the plantations from below the
border and grow the marijuana closer to prime US markets--eliminating the need to smuggle the
drugs across the border. Instead, US forests are suffering . The pesticides are perhaps the worst
byproduct of the operations: Growers in Fresno County used a cocktail of pesticides and fertilizers many
times stronger than what is used on residential lawns to cultivate their crop . . . While the chemical pesticides
kill insects and other organisms directly, fertilizer runoff contaminates local waterways and
aids in the growth of algae and weeds. The vegetation in turn impedes water flows that are critical
to frogs, toads and salamanders in the Kings and San Joaquin rivers. As a response to the issue, California is hiring
more forest service law enforcement, and expanding their efforts. But it seems to me that the surest way to prevent
such destruction in the forests is to legalize the growing of marijuana , and thus
removing the incentives to operate recklessly and clandestinely--and allowing for regulation
of pesticide and fertilizer use . For now, however, I wish the Save our Sierras program continued luck in their good
work.
Extinction
Chivian 11, Dr. Eric S. Chivian is the founder and Director of the Center for Health and the
Global Environment (CHGE) at Harvard Medical School and directs the Biodiversity and
Human Health Progam. He is also an Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard
Medical School. Chivian works with the United Nations on how to address the pressing
environmental problems the world is facing. (“Species Extinction, Biodiversity Loss and Human
Health”, http://www.ilo.org/oshenc/part-vii/environmental-health-hazards/item/505-speciesextinction-biodiversity-loss-and-human-health, 2011)
Human activity is causing the extinction of animal, plant and microbial species at rates that are
a thousand times greater than those which would have occurred naturally (Wilson l992),
approximating the largest extinctions in geological history . When homo sapiens evolved, some l00
thousand years ago, the number of species that existed was the largest ever to inhabit the Earth (Wilson l989). Current rates of species loss are reducing
these levels to the lowest since the end of the Age of Dinosaurs, 65 million years ago, with estimates that one-fourth of all species will become extinct in
the next 50 years (Ehrlich and Wilson l99l). In addition to the ethical issues involved - that we have no right to kill off countless other organisms, many
of which came into being tens of millions of years prior to our arrival - this
behaviour is ultimately self-destructive, upsetting the
delicate ecological balance on which all life depends, including our own , and destroying the
biological diversity that makes soils fertile, creates the air we breathe and provides food and other life-sustaining natural products, most of which
remain to be discovered. The exponential growth in human population coupled with an even greater rise in the consumption of resources and in the
production of wastes, are the main factors endangering the survival of other species. Global
warming, acid rain, the depletion
of stratospheric ozone and the discharge of toxic chemicals into the air, soil and fresh- and salt-water ecosystems - all these
ultimately lead to a loss of biodiversity. But it is habitat destruction by human activities, particularly
deforestation, that is the greatest destroyer. This is especially the case for tropical rainforests. Less than 50% of
the area originally covered by prehistoric tropical rainforests remains, but they are still being cut and burned at a rate of approximately l42,000 square
kilometres each year, equal in area to the countries of Switzerland and the Netherlands combined; this is a loss of forest cover each second the size of a
football field (Wilson l992). It is this
destruction which is primarily responsible for the mass extinction
of the world’s species . It has been estimated that there are somewhere between l0 million and l00 million different species on Earth.
Even if a conservative estimate of 20 million total world species is used, then l0 million species would be found in tropical rainforests, and at current
rates of tropical deforestation, this would mean 27,000 species would be lost in tropical rainforests alone each year, or more than seventy-four per day,
three each hour (Wilson l992). This article examines the human health implications resulting from this widespread loss of biological diversity. It
is
the author’s belief that if people fully comprehended the effect these massive species extinctions
will have - in foreclosing the possibility of understanding and treating many incurable diseases,
and ultimately, perhaps, in threatening human survival - then they would recognize that
the current rates of biodiversity loss represent nothing less than a slowly evolving medical
emergency and would demand that efforts to preserve species and ecosystems be given the highest priority.
AT: States CP (2ac)
Doesn’t solve either advantage – the threat of federal backlash creates
uncertainty
Kamin, 14 [Sam, Professor and Director, Constitutional Rights and Remedies Program,
University of Denver, Sturm College of Law; J.D., Ph.D., University of California, Berkeley, “The
Limits of Marijuana Legalization in the States”, Iowa Law Review Bulletin,
http://www.uiowa.edu/~ilr/bulletin/ILRB_99_Kamin.pdf]
This increasingly
differential treatment of marijuana under state and federal law creates
significant legal uncertainty . The reason for the scare quotes in the previous paragraph, of course, is
states cannot simply legalize that which the federal government prohibits. While
a state may remove its own marijuana prohibition and may even create a regulatory system under which
licensed dispensaries sell marijuana to those who can show a medical need, a state is powerless to insulate its citizens
that
from the threat of federal law enforcement. Also hanging over the states is
the specter of
federal preemption —the possibility that the federal government will sue in federal court to enjoin the states’
attempts to tax and regulate marijuana on the basis that federal law preempts such state action.2 II. OVERVIEW OF RECENT
DEVELOPMENTS The Obama administration has
repeatedly attempted to clarify the legal status of state
legalization efforts, but these attempts have often led to far more confusion than
certainty. For example, in 2009, Deputy Attorney General David Ogden stated in a memorandum to U.S. Attorneys that
individuals or entities operating in clear and unambiguous compliance with state medical marijuana laws were not an appropriate
target of federal law enforcement actions.3 This statement led to an explosion in the number of medical marijuana dispensaries
opening in Colorado4 and elsewhere as medical marijuana practitioners read the memo, either sincerely or optimistically, as a major
change in federal policy. Predictably, the
expansion of marijuana retailing in the states led to a federal
backlash. In 2010, as California prepared to vote on a full legalization initiative—a measure that would have made marijuana
legally available to all those over the age of 21, not just those with a medical recommendation5—Attorney General Eric Holder
publicly voiced his opposition to the measure. He made clear that the CSA was still the law of the land and that any attempt to
extend marijuana legalization beyond medical patients would be met with a full federal crackdown.6 The following year, Deputy
Attorney General James Cole, Ogden’s successor, issued a memo stating that the Ogden Memo had been misread by those who saw it
as a green light to begin large-scale cultivation and sale of marijuana: [W]ithin the past 12 months, several jurisdictions have
considered or enacted legislation to authorize multiple large-scale, privatelyoperated industrial marijuana cultivation centers. Some
of these planned facilities have revenue projections of millions of dollars based on the planned cultivation of tens of thousands of
cannabis plants. The Ogden Memorandum was never intended to shield such activities from federal enforcement action and
prosecution, even where those activities purport to comply with state law. Persons who are in the business of cultivating, selling or
distributing marijuana, and those who knowingly facilitate such activities, are in violation of the Controlled Substances Act,
regardless of state law.7 Following the Cole Memo, U.S. Attorneys used prosecution and threats of prosecution to shut down a
number of marijuana businesses operating under state law throughout the country.8 It would seem, though, that events on the
ground quickly outstripped the pace of policy pronouncements from the nation’s capital. In 2012, Colorado and Washington passed
legalization initiatives similar to the one rejected in California two years earlier while the federal government remained silent.9 The
governors of both states quickly sought guidance from the Justice Department regarding whether the federal government would take
steps to block the implementation of the new laws.10 Months of frustrating silence passed without an answer. Finally, on August 29,
2013—nearly ten months after the passage of the Colorado and Washington initiatives—Cole wrote yet another memo attempting to
clarify the legal status of the new laws.11 In what I have described elsewhere as a major change in federal policy,12 Cole made clear
that the Justice Department would not immediately intervene to block the licensing of recreational marijuana operations in both
states,13 licensing which will now almost certainly go into effect in 2014. While
the second Cole Memo kept open the
possibility of federal enforcement down the road if the states’ regulation of marijuana was
insufficiently robust,14 it also took the novel step of announcing that those states that wished to
regulate marijuana would be largely left alone to handle it on their own. So long as the states regulated
marijuana in a way that addressed federal concerns,15 the Justice Department would not enforce the federal prohibition of
marijuana, either civilly or criminally in those states. The second Cole Memo also made clear that the previous bright-line distinction
that the federal government had drawn between medical and recreational marijuana legalization would no longer govern
enforcement decisions; instead, what mattered crucially was the capacity of a state to minimize the negative externalities of
marijuana through robust regulation.16 III. CONTINUED TENSION BETWEEN STATE AND FEDERAL MARIJUANA POLICY As
welcome as the second Cole Memo was to those working to regulate marijuana in Colorado and Washington (and to those
advocating the repeal of state marijuana prohibitions more generally) it did not end the state– federal tension over marijuana
regulation. Even
if the federal government promises—in a non-binding way—to forestall
enforcement of the CSA in those states enacting rigorous regulations, doing so only eases the
most obvious tensions between state and federal law in this area. So long as the federal
prohibition remains in place, state policy aimed at removing the impediments to the taxation
and regulation of marijuana will necessarily be hamstrung. Professor Leff’s recent article in the
Iowa Law Review provides a prime example of the ongoing state–federal tension.17 He demonstrates the difficulty that
a Reagan-era tax provision can pose to marijuana professionals, even to those who do not currently fear
arrest or forfeiture of their assets under the CSA.18 Section 280E of the Internal Revenue Code makes the running of a marijuana
business nearly impossible.19 As Leff points out, § 280E forbids these operators from deducting operating expenses, except the price
of the goods themselves, from their taxes.20 As a result, marijuana practitioners are disadvantaged not just vis-à-vis other legitimate
businesspersons but also vis-à-vis those involved in other, more serious, criminal conduct. As Leff points out, the assassin for hire is
able to deduct the price of her sniper rifle while the marijuana retailer cannot deduct the cost of paying her employees.21Leff’s
solution, which he takes pains to say is not a “loophole,”22 is clever. Leff’s thesis, that marijuana businesses that cannot qualify as
501(c)(3) corporations might qualify as 501(c)(4) corporations, seems both novel and inventive. What is more, Leff makes a very
important point about giving marijuana practitioners incentives to comply with the law: if participation in a legal, regulated
marijuana market is made too onerous, many practitioners will remain (or return) underground, society will lose out as tax revenues
will not be collected, and the goal of moving marijuana distribution from street corners to regulated dispensaries will be defeated.
However, as the focus of legalization efforts in the states shifts from medical marijuana to recreational or adult-use marijuana, the
argument loses some of its currency. While medical marijuana businesses have at least a colorable argument that they are doing
good—for both their communities and their patients—it is difficult to see how businesses selling mind-altering substances to anyone
of legal age, regardless of medical need, can make the same claim. Unless one can imagine a liquor store in a disadvantaged
neighborhood qualifying as a 501(c)(4) non-profit, it is hard to see how a marijuana dispensary would be able to make the same
claim. While it is true that adult-use dispensaries will face many of the same tax difficulties that medical marijuana businesses do—
here, the inability to deduct most business expenses—their ability to claim a tax exemption under § 501(c)(4) will be significantly
impaired. If medical marijuana is, as I suspect, the awkward adolescent of marijuana law reform, I worry that Leff’s solution will
become increasingly less relevant to marijuana practitioners going forward. My expertise is in constitutional law and federal courts,
not in tax; I cannot speak to the wisdom or plausibility of his solution as a matter of tax law. For me, though, the strength of Leff’s
article is that it highlights the hoops that scholars and lawmakers must jump through to accommodate a state’s decision to legalize
what the federal government continues to condemn. And it is important to see that this is as true after the second Cole Memo as it
was before. If
that memo removed—at least for now or for the duration of this administration—the threat that those
engaged in the regulated marijuana industry would be sent to prison or would forfeit all of their
capital and assets, the continuing existence of a de jure federal prohibition has the effect of
unsettling the expectations of marijuana providers and customers in myriad and unexpected
ways. Below I provide an illustrative, if not exhaustive, list of these difficulties.
AT: Treaties CP
The UN is toothless and doesn’t solve conflict
Hiken 12 ("The Impotence of International Law" Luke Hiken, Associate Director Institute for
Public Accuracy, 7-17-'12 http://www.fpif.org/blog/the_impotence_of_international_law)
Whenever a lawyer or historian describes how a particular action “violates international law” many people stop listening or reading further. It
is a
bit alienating to hear the words “this action constitutes a violation of international law” time and
time again – and especially at the end of a debate when a speaker has no other arguments available. The statement is inevitably followed by:
“…and it is a war crime and it denies people their human rights.” A plethora of international law violations are
perpetrated by every major power in the world each day, and thus, the empty
invocation of international law does nothing but reinforce our own sense of impotence and helplessness in the
face of international lawlessness. The United States, alone, and on a daily basis violates every principle of
international law ever envisioned: unprovoked wars of aggression; unmanned drone attacks;
tortures and renditions; assassinations of our alleged “enemies”; sales of nuclear weapons;
destabilization of unfriendly governments; creating the largest prison population in the world – the
list is virtually endless. Obviously one would wish that there existed a body of international law that could put an end to these
abuses, but such laws exist in theory, not in practice. Each time a legal scholar points out the
particular treaties being ignored by the superpowers (and everyone else) the only appropriate
response is “so what!” or “they always say that.” If there is no enforcement mechanism to prevent the
violations, and no military force with the power to intervene on behalf of those victimized by the
violations, what possible good does it do to invoke principles of “truth and justice” that border on fantasy? The
assumption is that by invoking human rights principles, legal scholars hope to reinforce the importance of, and need for, such a body of law. Yet, in
reality, the invocation means nothing at the present time, and goes nowhere. In the real world, it would be
nice to focus on suggestions that are enforceable, and have some potential to prevent the atrocities taking place around the globe.
Treaty collapse inevitable:
State legalization
Crick, 13 [Emily, research associate at Transform Drug Policy Foundation, , Legally regulated
cannabis markets in the US: Implications and possibilities, Policy Report 1 | November 2013,
http://www.swansea.ac.uk/media/Leg%20Reg%20Cannabis%20digital%20new-1.pdf]
The INCB is, of course, unlikely to agree with the view that since the CSA remains in place
across the nation the US is not in breach.197¶ And admittedly on this point it is standing on strong
legal ground. It is certainly correct when it claims that the situation within the¶ country
'constitutes a significant challenge to the objective of the international drug¶ control treaties to
which the United States¶ is a party'.198 Furthermore, there is clearly concern that any accommodation by
the US federal government of regulative frameworks¶ within Washington and Colorado would
further destabilise an increasingly creaky international drug control system .199
Whether or not the US is technically in 'breach' of the treaties, that it was a key player
in the establishment of¶ the current treaty framework and continues¶ to play a major role in its
implementation¶ certainly adds a degree of irony to the present situation. Moreover, in more practical
terms, if¶ the Uruguayan marijuana regulation bill makes¶ it onto the statute books, the
US's awkward domestic
predicament will reduce its ability to exert pressure to defend the existing UN treaty
structure within the CND and beyond. 'The US, which so far has always been the first and¶
quickest to denounce if countries breach the¶ treaties...now cannot really exercise
pressure' ¶ says Jelsma. The federal government, he¶ continues, 'is not in a position to criticise¶ other countries that are
basically doing the¶ same as internally some states in the Unites¶ States are doing.' In terms of cannabis policies,¶ 'this
relieves the whole global system of the¶ pressure' exerted by the US and 'gives
oxygen'¶ to reform oriented processes — processes that¶ will surely receive significant attention at the¶ next CND
meeting in March 2014 (See Box 5).
The plan solves –
Threat of denouncement creates pressure for revision
Bewley-Taylor, 13 - Department of Political and Cultural Studies, College of Arts and
Humanities, Swansea University, UK (David, “Towards revision of the UN drug control
conventions:
Harnessing like-mindedness” International Journal of Drug Policy 24 (2013) 60– 68,
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.drugpo.2012.09.001) LMGs = Like Minded Groups
However, in another scenario, an effective and strategically shrewd development of a cannabis
regulation group, might generate enough support for, or critically limit resistance towards,
treaty amendment. This would be more likely if the LMG contained a credible mix of nations,
including one or more ‘critical’ states with what Pentland (1989, p. 6) calls ‘presence’ and status
within the UN, which could withstand or pacify opposition from other sections of the
international community. Although fluid, these states might include Mexico, Australia and some
from the EU. In terms of process, it is worth pointing out that although strengthening the
prohibitive credentials of the regime, the 1972 Protocol Amending the Single Convention is the
final product of numerous amendment proposals from the US with support from other states
including the UK (Jelsma, 2011, p. 5). In this respect, the use of denunciation may also be
appropriate, but here as a trigger for treaty revision. By merely making moves to leave the
confines of the regime, an LMG might be able to generate a critical mass sufficient to compel
states favouring the status quo to engage with the process. Moreover, prohibition-oriented
states, as well as those parts of the UN apparatus resistant to change, might be more open to
treaty modification or amendment if it was felt that such a concession would prevent
the collapse of the control system. By Helfer’s (2005, p. 1588) analysis ‘withdrawing from
an agreement (or threatening to withdraw) can give a denouncing state additional voice . . . by
increasing its leverage to reshape the treaty. . .’ (Emphasis added).
Under such circumstances, subsequent changes may be an acceptable cost to nations favouring
the dominant architecture of the existing regime. Such a scenario is plausible since it is generally
agreed that denunciation of any treaty can lead to its demise. This would be possible in relation
to the drug control treaties due to the nature of the issue and a reliance on widespread
transnational adherence. Indeed, a sufficiently weighty ‘denouncers’ group may be able not only
to withstand pressure from prohibition-oriented states, but also to apply significant pressure
itself. This is an important consideration bearing in mind the trenchant opposition displayed by
Washington not only towards La Paz in relation to the coca and the Single Convention, but also
vis-à-vis recent discussions about alternative policy approaches taking place in Latin America
more generally (Archibold, 2012; Nadelmann, 2012). Moreover, regular meetings between likeminded countries outside the formal setting of CND sessions may, over time, create sufficient
momentum to elicit a change in outlook within the Commission itself. And although driven by
the specific goal of the group, circumventing the Commission in Vienna through engagement
with other UN bodies elsewhere, such as the Human Rights Council in Geneva or the UN
Permanent Forum on Indigenous Peoples in New York, may generate additional pressure for
substantive change.
Zero impact to cyber-attacks --- overwhelming consensus of qualified
authors goes neg
- No motivation---can’t be used for coercive leverage
- Defenses solve---benefits of offense are overstated
- Too difficult to execute/mistakes in code are inevitable
- AT: Infrastructure attacks
- Military networks are air-gapped/difficult to access
- Overwhelming consensus goes neg
Colin S. Gray 13, Prof. of International Politics and Strategic Studies @ the University of
Reading and External Researcher @ the Strategic Studies Institute @ the U.S. Army War
College, April, “Making Strategic Sense of Cyber Power: Why the Sky Is Not Falling,” U.S. Army
War College Press, http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pdffiles/PUB1147.pdf
CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS: THE SKY IS NOT FALLING ¶ This analysis has sought to explore, identify, and
explain the strategic meaning of cyber power. The organizing and thematic question that has shaped and driven the inquiry has been “So what?” Today
we all do cyber, but this behavior usually has not been much informed by an understanding that reaches beyond the tactical and technical. I have
endeavored to analyze in strategic terms what is on offer from the largely technical and tactical literature on cyber. What can or might be done and how
to go about doing it are vitally important bodies of knowledge. But at least as important is understanding what cyber, as a fifth domain of warfare,
brings to national security when it is considered strategically. Military history is stocked abundantly with examples of tactical behavior un - guided by
any credible semblance of strategy. This inquiry has not been a campaign to reveal what cy ber can and might do; a large literature already exists that
claims fairly convincingly to explain “how to . . .” But what does cyber power mean, and how does it fit strategically, if it does? These Conclusions and
Rec ommendations offer some understanding of this fifth geography of war in terms that make sense to this strategist, at least. ¶ 1. Cyber can only be an
enabler of physical effort. Stand-alone (popularly misnamed as “strategic”) cyber
action is inherently grossly limited
by its immateriality. The physicality of conflict with cyber’s human participants and mechanical artifacts has not been a passing phase
in our species’ strategic history. Cyber action, quite independent of action on land, at sea, in the air, and in orbital space, certainly is possible. But the
strategic logic of such behavior, keyed to anticipated success in tactical achievement, is not promising. To date, “What
if . . .” speculation about strategic cyber attack usually is either contextually too light, or, more often, contextually
unpersuasive . 49 However, this is not a great strategic truth, though it is a judgment advanced with considerable confidence. Although
societies could, of course, be hurt by cyber action, it is important not to lose touch with the fact, in Libicki’s apposite words, that “[i]n the
absence of physical combat, cyber war cannot lead to the occupation of territory. It is almost
inconceivable that a sufficiently vigorous cyber war can overthrow the adversary’s
government and replace it with a more pliable one.” 50 In the same way that the concepts of sea war, air war, and space
war are fundamentally unsound, so also the idea of cyber war is unpersuasive. ¶ It is not impossible, but then, neither is war conducted only at sea, or in
the air, or in space. On the one hand, cyber war may seem more probable than like environmentally independent action at sea or in the air. After all,
cyber warfare would be very unlikely to harm human beings directly, let alone damage
physically the machines on which they depend. These near-facts (cyber attack might cause socially critical machines to
behave in a rogue manner with damaging physical consequences) might seem to ren - der cyber a safer zone of belligerent engagement than would
physically violent action in other domains. But most likely there
would be serious uncertainties pertaining to the
consequences of cyber action, which must include the possibility of escalation into other
domains of conflict. Despite popular assertions to the contrary, cyber is not likely to prove a precision weapon
anytime soon. 51 In addition, assuming that the political and strategic contexts for cyber war were as serious as surely they would need to be to
trigger events warranting plausible labeling as cyber war, the distinctly limited harm likely to follow from cyber
assault would hardly appeal as prospectively effective coercive moves. On balance, it is most probable that
cyber’s strategic future in war will be as a contribut - ing enabler of effectiveness of physical efforts in the other four geographies of conflict. Speculation
about cyber war, defined strictly as hostile action by net - worked computers against networked computers, is hugely unconvincing. ¶ 2. Cyber
defense is difficult, but should be sufficiently effective. The structural advantages of the offense in
cyber conflict are as obvious as they are easy to overstate. Penetration and exploitation, or even attack,
would need to be by surprise. It can be swift almost beyond the imagination of those encultured by the traditional demands of physical
combat. Cyber attack may be so stealthy that it escapes notice for a long while, or it might wreak digital havoc by com - plete surprise. And need one
emphasize, that at least for a while, hostile cyber action is likely to be hard (though not quite impossible) to attribute with a cy - berized equivalent to a
“smoking gun.” Once one is in the realm of the catastrophic “What if . . . ,” the world is indeed a frightening place. On a personal note, this defense
analyst was for some years exposed to highly speculative briefings that hypothesized how unques - tionably cunning plans for nuclear attack could so
promptly disable the United States as a functioning state that our nuclear retaliation would likely be still - born. I should hardly need to add that the
briefers of these Scary Scenarios were obliged to make a series of Heroic Assumptions. ¶ The
literature of cyber scare is more
than mildly reminiscent of the nuclear attack stories with which I was assailed in the 1970s and
1980s. As one may observe regarding what Winston Churchill wrote of the disaster that was the Gallipoli campaign of 1915, “[t]he terrible ‘Ifs’
accumulate.” 52 Of course, there are dangers in the cyber domain. Not only are there cyber-competent competitors and enemies abroad; there are also
Americans who make mistakes in cyber operation. Furthermore, there are the manufacturers and constructors of the physical artifacts behind (or in,
depending upon the preferred definition) cyber - space who assuredly err in this and that detail. The
more sophisticated—usually
meaning complex—the code for cyber, the more certain must it be that mistakes both lurk in
the program and will be made in digital communication.¶ What I have just outlined minimally is not a reluc - tant
admission of the fallibility of cyber, but rather a statement of what is obvious and should be anticipat - ed about people and material in a domain of war.
All human activities are more or less harassed by friction and carry with them some risk of failure, great or small. A strategist who has read Clausewitz,
especially Book One of On War , 53 will know this. Alternatively, anyone who skims my summary version of the general theory of strategy will note that
Dictum 14 states explicitly that “Strategy is more difficult to devise and execute than are policy, operations, and tactics: friction of all kinds comprise
phenomena inseparable from the mak - ing and execution of strategies.” 54 Because of its often widely distributed character, the physical infrastruc ture of an enemy’s cyber power is typically, though not invariably, an impracticable target set for physical assault. Happily, this probable fact should
have only annoying consequences. The discretionary nature and therefore the variable possible characters feasible for friendly cyberspace(s), mean that
the more danger - ous potential vulnerabilities that in theory could be the condition of our cyber-dependency ought to be avoidable at best, or bearable
and survivable at worst. Libicki offers forthright advice on this aspect of the subject that deserves to be taken at face value: ¶ [T]here is no inherent
reason that improving informa - tion technologies should lead to a rise in the amount of critical information in existence (for example, the names of
every secret agent). Really critical information should never see a computer; if it sees a computer, it should not be one that is networked; and if the
computer is networked, it should be air-gapped.¶ Cyber defense admittedly is difficult to do, but so is cyber offense. To
quote Libicki yet again, “[i]n this medium [cyberspace] the best defense is not necessarily a good offense; it is usually a good defense.” 56 Unlike the
geostrategic context for nuclear-framed competition in U.S.–Soviet/Russian rivalry, the
geographical domain of cyberspace
definitely is defensible. Even when the enemy is both clever and lucky, it will be our own design and operating fault if he is able to do more
than disrupt and irritate us temporarily.¶ When cyber is contextually regarded properly— which means first, in particular, when it is viewed as but the
latest military domain for defense planning—it should be plain to see that cyber performance needs to be good enough rather than perfect. 57 Our
Landpower, sea power, air power, and prospectively our space systems also will have to be capable of
accepting combat damage and loss, then recovering and carrying on. There is no fundamental
reason that less should be demanded of our cyber power. Second, given that cyber is not of a nature or potential
character at all likely to parallel nuclear dangers in the menace it could con - tain, we should anticipate international cyber rivalry to follow the
competitive dynamic path already fol - lowed in the other domains in the past. Because the digital age is so young, the pace of technical change and
tactical invention can be startling. However, the mechanization RMA of the 1920s and 1930s recorded reaction to the new science and technology of the
time that is reminiscent of the cyber alarmism that has flour - ished of recent years. 58 We
can be confident that cyber defense
should be able to function well enough, given the strength of political, military, and
commercial motivation for it to do so. The technical context here is a medium that is a constructed one, which provides airgapping options for choice regarding the extent of networking. Naturally, a price is paid in convenience for some closing off of possible cyberspace(s),
but all important defense decisions involve choice, so what is novel about that? There is nothing new about accepting some limitations on utility as a
price worth paying for security.¶ 3. Intelligence is critically important, but informa - tion should not be overvalued. The strategic history of cyber over
the past decade confirms what we could know already from the science and technology of this new domain for conflict. Specifically,
cyber power
is not technically forgiving of user error. Cyber warriors seeking criminal or military benefit
require precise information if their intended exploits are to succeed. Lucky guesses should not stumble upon
passwords, while efforts to disrupt electronic Supervisory Con - trol and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems ought to be
unable to achieve widespread harmful effects. But obviously there are practical limits to the air-gap op - tion, given that
control (and command) systems need to be networks for communication. However, Internet connection needs to be treated as a potential source of
serious danger.¶ It
is one thing to be able to be an electronic nuisance, to annoy, disrupt, and perhaps delay. But it is
quite another to be capable of inflicting real persisting harm on the fighting power of an enemy.
Critically important military computer networks are, of course, accessible neither to the inspired
amateur outsider, nor to the malignant political enemy. Easy passing reference to a hypothetical
“cyber Pearl Harbor” reflects both poor history and ignorance of contemporary military
common sense. Critical potential military (and other) targets for cyber attack are extremely
hard to access and influence (I believe and certainly hope), and the technical knowledge, skills, and effort
required to do serious harm to national security is forbiddingly high. This is not to claim, foolishly, that
cyber means absolutely could not secure near-catastrophic results. However, it is to say that such a scenario is
extremely improbable . Cyber defense is advancing all the time, as is cyber offense, of course. But so discretionary in vital detail can
one be in the making of cyberspace, that confidence—real confidence—in cyber attack could not plausibly be high. It should be noted that I am
confining this particular discussion to what rather idly tends to be called cyber war. In political and strategic practice, it is unlikely that war would or,
more importantly, ever could be restricted to the EMS. Somewhat rhetorically, one should pose the question: Is it likely (almost anything, strictly, is
possible) that cyber war with the potential to inflict catastrophic damage would be allowed to stand unsupported in and by action in the other four
geographical domains of war? I believe not.¶ Because we have told ourselves that ours uniquely is the Information Age, we have become unduly
respectful of the potency of this rather slippery catch-all term. As usual, it is helpful to contextualize the al - legedly magical ingredient, information, by
locating it properly in strategic history as just one important element contributing to net strategic effectiveness. This mild caveat is supported usefully
by recognizing the general contemporary rule that information per se harms nothing and nobody. The electrons in cyber - ized conflict have to be
interpreted and acted upon by physical forces (including agency by physical human beings). As one might say, intelligence (alone) sinks no ship; only
men and machines can sink ships! That said, there is no doubt that if friendly cyber action can infiltrate and misinform the electronic informa - tion on
which advisory weaponry and other machines depend, considerable warfighting advantage could be gained. I do not intend to join Clausewitz in his dis
- dain for intelligence, but I will argue that in strategic affairs, intelligence usually is somewhat uncertain. 59 Detailed up-to-date intelligence literally is
essential for successful cyber offense, but it can be healthily sobering to appreciate that the strategic rewards of intelligence often are considerably
exaggerated. The basic reason is not hard to recognize. Strategic success is a complex endeavor that requires adequate perfor - mances by many
necessary contributors at every level of conflict (from the political to the tactical). ¶ When thoroughly reliable intelligence on the en - emy is in short
supply, which usually is the case, the strategist finds ways to compensate as best he or she can. The IT-led RMA of the past 2 decades was fueled in part
by the prospect of a quality of military effec - tiveness that was believed to flow from “dominant battle space knowledge,” to deploy a familiar con - cept.
60 While there is much to be said in praise of this idea, it is not unreasonable to ask why it has been that our ever-improving battle space knowledge
has been compatible with so troubled a course of events in the 2000s in Iraq and Afghanistan. What we might have misunderstood is not the value of
knowledge, or of the information from which knowledge is quarried, or even the merit in the IT that passed information and knowledge around.
Instead, we may well have failed to grasp and grip understanding of the whole context of war and strategy for which battle space knowledge
unquestionably is vital. One must say “vital” rather than strictly essential, because relatively ignorant armies can and have fought and won despite their
ig - norance. History requires only that one’s net strategic performance is superior to that of the enemy. One is not required to be deeply well informed
about the en - emy. It is historically quite commonplace for armies to fight in a condition of more-than-marginal reciprocal and strategic cultural
ignorance. Intelligence is king in electronic warfare, but such warfare is unlikely to be solely, or even close to solely, sovereign in war and its warfare,
considered overall as they should be.¶ 4. Why the sky will not fall. More accurately, one should say that the
sky will not fall because of
hostile action against us in cyberspace unless we are improb - ably careless and foolish. David J. Betz and Tim Ste vens strike the
right note when they conclude that “[i]f cyberspace is not quite the hoped-for Garden of Eden, it is also not quite the pestilential swamp of the
imagination of the cyber-alarmists.” 61 Our understanding of cyber is high at the technical and tactical level, but re - mains distinctly rudimentary as
one ascends through operations to the more rarified altitudes of strategy and policy. Nonetheless,
our scientific,
technological, and tactical knowledge and understanding clearly indicates that the
sky is not falling and is unlikely to fall in the future as a result of hostile cyber action.
This analysis has weighed the more technical and tactical literature on cyber and concludes, not
simply on balance, that cyber alarmism has little basis save in the imagination of the alarmists. There is military
and civil peril in the hostile use of cyber, which is why we must take cyber security seriously, even to the point of buying redundant capabilities for a
range of command and control systems. 62 So seriously should we regard cyber danger that it is only prudent to as - sume that we will be the target for
hostile cyber action in future conflicts, and that some of that action will promote disruption and uncertainty in the damage it will cause. ¶ That granted,
this analysis recommends strongly that the U.S. Army, and indeed the whole of the U.S. Government, should strive to comprehend cyber in context.
Approached in isolation as a new technol - ogy, it is not unduly hard to be over impressed with its potential both for good and harm. But if we see
networked computing as just the latest RMA in an episodic succession of revolutionary changes in the way information is packaged and communicated,
the computer-led IT revolution is set where it belongs, in historical context. In modern strategic history, there has been only one truly game-changing
basket of tech - nologies, those pertaining to the creation and deliv - ery of nuclear weapons. Everything else has altered the tools with which conflict
has been supported and waged, but has not changed the game. The nuclear revolution alone raised still-unanswered questions about the viability of
interstate armed conflict. How - ever, it would be accurate to claim that since 1945, methods have been found to pursue fairly traditional political ends
in ways that accommodate nonuse of nuclear means, notwithstanding the permanent pres - ence of those means.¶ The light cast by general strategic
theory reveals what requires revealing strategically about networked computers. Once one sheds some of the sheer wonder at the seeming miracle of
cyber’s ubiquity, instanta - neity, and (near) anonymity, one realizes that cyber is just another operational domain, though certainly one very different
from the others in its nonphysi - cality in direct agency. Having placed cyber where it belongs, as a domain of war, next it is essential to recognize that
its nonphysicality compels that cyber should be treated as an enabler of joint action, rather than as an agent of military action capable of behav - ing
independently for useful coercive strategic effect. There
are stand-alone possibilities for cyber action, but they are
not convincing as attractive options either for or in opposition to a great power, let alone a
superpower. No matter how intriguing the scenario design for cyber war strictly or for cyber
warfare, the logic of grand and military strategy and a common sense fueled by understanding of
the course of strategic history, require one so to contextualize cyber war that its independence is
seen as too close to absurd to merit much concern.
AT: Kentucky Midterms
Open trade is locked in—no protectionism
Kim 13
Soo Yeon Kim, of the National University of Singapore, associate professor of music at Nazareth
College of Rochester, New York, Fellow of the Transatlantic Academy, based at the German
Marshall Fund of the United States, The Monkey Cage, January 30, 2013, " Protectionism
During Recessions: Is This Time Different?",
http://themonkeycage.org/blog/2013/01/30/protectionism-during-recessions-is-this-timedifferent/
There is widespread agreement regarding the critical role of international institutions as
“firewalls” against protectionism during this recession. Economic and non-economic international institutions
have served as conveyors of information and mechanisms of commitment and socialization. Their
informational function enhances the transparency and accountability of states’ trade policies, and
they mitigate uncertainty when it is running high. Specialized international institutions devoted to trade, such as the
WTO and preferential trade agreements (PTAs), also lock in commitments to liberal trade through legal
obligations that make defections costly, thus creating accountability in the actions of its members. Equally important,
international institutions are also arenas of socialization that help propagate important norms such as the
commitment to the liberal trading system and cooperative economic behavior. In this connection, the
degree to which a particular country was embedded in the global network of economic and non-economic international institutions has been found to
be strongly correlated with fewer instances of protectionist trade measures.¶ Information provided to date by international institutions, with the
exception of the GTA project, largely agree that states
have not resorted to large-scale protectionism during this
recession, in spite of the fact that the “great trade collapse” at the beginning of the current crisis was steeper and more sudden than that of its
Great Depression predecessor. The WTO Secretariat, in addition to its regular individual reports on members’ trade policies under the Trade Policy
Review Mechanism (TPRM), has issued more than a dozen reports on member states’ trade policies during the crisis. At the request of the G-20
countries, which pledged not to adopt protectionist trade measures at the onset of the crisis in 2008, the WTO, the OECD, and UNCTAD have produced
joint reports on the trade and investment measures of the world’s largest trading states. They, too, find that G-20 countries had largely adhered to their
commitment not to raise trade and investment barriers. In the World Bank’s Temporary Trade Barriers (TTB) project, an important and unique data
collection that includes information on pre-crisis and crisis trade policy behavior, Bown finds that temporary trade barriers such as safeguards,
countervailing and antidumping duties saw only a slight increase of usage by developed countries, in the neighborhood of 4%. In contrast, emerging
market economies were the heavy users of TTBs, whose usage rose by almost 40% between 2008 and 2009. ¶ As scholarly insights accumulate on the
current recession and its impact on protectionism (or lack thereof), two questions emerge for further research. First, to what extent have governments
employed policy substitutes that have the same effect as trade protectionism? International institutions may appear to have been successful in
preventing protectionism, but governments may well have looked elsewhere to defend national economies. This question can be seen in the broader
context of the “open economy trilemma,” in which governments may achieve only two of three macroeconomic policy objectives: stable exchange rates,
stable prices, and open trade. Irwin argues that governments that abandoned the gold standard during the Great Depression were less protectionist,
and their economies also suffered less from the recession. Existing scholarship
also indicates that governments are likely
to employ policy substitutes, opting for monetary autonomy when facing trade policy
constraints, for example, due to membership in a preferential trade agreement. Moreover, at the time of
writing, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has announced that it has dropped its objections to capital controls, albeit cautiously and only under
certain conditions, thus potentially providing another policy alternative for governments to achieve economic stability during this crisis. Future
research may further extend the application to policy substitutes that are deployed during economic downturns. ¶ Finally, why did firms not push for
more protection? Protectionist
policies are not adopted by governments in a political vacuum. In order
to adopt trade defense measures such as anti-dumping duties, governments first conduct
investigations to assess the extent of injury. Such investigations are initiated when firms apply for them
through the domestic political process. If indeed governments did not appeal extensively or unusually to protectionist trade
policies, the explanation to a significant degree lies in firm behavior. A distinguished body of research exists in this area that is due for a revisit in the
age of extensive international supply chains, from Schattschneider’s classic examination of the domestic pressures that led to the Smoot-Hawley Act to
Helen Milner’s study of export-dependent firms that resisted protectionism during the crisis of the 1920s and the 1970s. Milner rightly pointed out that
“firms are central,” and over the years the export-dependent, multinational firm has evolved in
tandem with the increasing complexity of the international supply chain. Today’s firm is not
only heavily export-dependent but equally import-dependent in its reliance on intermediate
inputs, whether through intra-firm trade or from foreign firms. The extensive international supply chain thus often
puts exporting and importing firms on the same side of the political debate, especially when they are
members of large multinational firms. Moreover, the study of firm-level behavior must extend beyond the developed world to consider firms in
emerging market economies, which have been the heavy users of trade defense measures during the current recession. How the internationalization of
production, driven by investment and trade in intermediate goods, restrained multinational firms from pushing for more protection remains an
important question for further research.
No TPP or TPA even with a GOP congress
Feldman, 14 --- partner at BakerHostetler LLP, his international practice concentrates on
all forms of trade disputes (6/23/2014, Elliot J., “The pivot to Asia and the inevitable failure of
the Trans-Pacific Partnership,” www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=64175cf7-2586-4b5abb59-49fe3bf5e3f1)
The Status Of Negotiations TPP
negotiations are unlikely to produce an international agreement
regardless whether Japan or South Korea are parties. There are too many fundamental disagreements among the
twelve countries in the talks, and the American attempt to infuse the region with American values and American legalities is
transparent. Despite the secrecy of negotiations, documents have leaked. Some have included full draft texts, as for an
environmental chapter. Mostly, they have exposed the lack of international progress. Following the November 2013 Round of
Negotiations in Salt Lake City, the internal commentary of one participating government contained, in no particular order of
importance, numerous observations. According to the leaked document, notwithstanding that “the U.S. is exerting great pressure to
close as many issues as possible this week,” “The results are mediocre.” The meeting, this commentary reported, ”served to confirm
the large differences that continue in most areas of the [IP] chapter.” For medicines, the United States “resubmitted a text that had
been strongly rejected in the past.” “The United States, as in previous rounds, has shown no flexibility on its proposal [for
investment] . . . Only the U.S. and Japan support the proposal.” The chapter on State-Owned Enterprises “is very far from closed.”
There was “very little progress” on Rules of Origin, and the negotiations over textiles were in “a major crisis.” The “Meeting” on the
environment “was interrupted because we could not get past the second issue [on] the definition of environmental law.” There was
“inadequate progress” on financial services: “The positions are still paralysed. United States shows zero flexibility.” The United
States had been aiming to close the entire deal by the end of 2013 and get it before Congress before the summer election campaign.
Historically, the United States has had its way in international negotiations most when forging bilateral agreements because it has
always been the dominant player. Other countries typically want to draw the United States into multilateral negotiations because
they can band together to dilute American power and influence. Here, the United States has been drawn into a multilateral
negotiation that it has tried to treat as a collection of bilaterals (an opportunity to dismantle Canada’s supply management; Japan’s
agricultural protectionism; Vietnam’s textile preferences; and so forth). Yet, even were the United States somehow successful
internationally in the negotiations, Congress — probably for the wrong reasons – would not close the deal. The
United States’
strategy for negotiation and ratification has been complicated and backwards. The process, as it
has evolved, has been to place the initial burden on Japan and to present Congress with a deal it
could not refuse. Congress, nonetheless, whatever it is – Republican or Democrat — will refuse
it, for at least three reasons. First, a Republican Congress will not give President Obama a signature
foreign policy success in trade. Republicans consider international trade their domain (the history of
trade commitments to the contrary notwithstanding), and the current Republican Party is obstructionist
regarding all Obama initiatives. Second, the President’s own Party does not support the
Agreement, suspicious about labor, the environment, banks, pharmaceutical companies. And
third, most of Congress feels betrayed by the alleged secrecy in making the deal. Had Obama followed
the historical process, in which TPA precedes TPP, he may have been more successful, or he would have known sooner that the
objective could not be reached. Now he is presented with the risk of failure where American credibility throughout Asia is at stake. It
would have been better to know earlier, or to have lowered expectations. Those options are gone. Conclusion The
President
needs to complete a very attractive TPP in order to persuade Congress to vote it up or down,
requiring prior TPA legislation. His international partners, however, are not making their best
and final offers without TPA coming first. Prime Minister Abe, for example, does not want to take on his whole
agricultural sector in order to make a deal that could fail in the United States Congress. There seem to be almost daily reports that
Japan will not give up its protection of five “sacred” agricultural products, a position guaranteed to crater the deal. So, TPP
can’t
be completed successfully without TPA, and TPA cannot be passed without a completed and
attractive TPP. At first, China seemed to interpret the TPP as a U.S.-led attempt at containment. Over time, China seemed to
recognize fatal problems with the negotiations and worried less. At one point, a year ago, China called the U.S bluff that it might be
included in the talks, whether because China was genuinely interested, or because China wanted to expose the real purpose of the
TPP. Today,
China’s public discord with the United States is concentrated on the American
engagement as an ally of Japan in sovereignty disputes. Trade disputes — principally American complaints
about state owned enterprises and Chinese state support for exported merchandise – continue unabated in the friendly confines of
government investigating agencies and dispute panels of the WTO, and seem reminiscent of the American confrontations with Japan
during the 1980s, in the days of the GATT. Even
as trade disagreements sometimes take on the appearance
of a trade war, security issues have replaced them in prominence and have induced President
Obama to insist again on the American acceptance of China’s rise as a major power. One last word for
our European friends, who have been as seduced by TTIP as our Asian friends have been drawn into one protracted negotiation
round after another for TPP. The Administration has made TPA dependent on TPP instead of the other way around. Consequently, it
perceives TPA as a one-off on behalf of TPP. Even were it possible to imagine that this strategy could succeed once, it could not
succeed twice. Therefore, at
least for the life of this presidency, TTIP is even deader than TPP.
Dems win --- financial edge, focus on local issues and empirics
Barabak & Mascaro, 9/29/14 (Mark Z. Barabak, Lisa Mascaro, “As election
nears, control of Senate looks surprisingly uncertain,”
http://www.latimes.com/nation/politics/la-na-2014-election-20140929-story.html#page=1,
JMP)
Just over a month before the midterm election, control of the U.S. Senate remains surprisingly
up for grabs as Democrats parlay a financial edge and other advantages to battle
history and a strong anti-Obama tide. Republicans still enjoy the more secure position. The GOP is almost certain
to win open-seat contests in Montana, South Dakota and West Virginia, getting them halfway to the six seats needed to win a
majority and gain control. But the party's candidates
have yet to put away any of the 10 or so most
competitive Senate races, buoying Democratic hopes they can hang on to at least one chamber of
Congress despite what appeared, at the start of this election year, to be long odds. In Louisiana,
Arkansas and Alaska, where President Obama's approval ratings are particularly low, Democratic incumbents have kept their uphill
races within striking distance. It helps that the candidates — Mary L. Landrieu, Mark Pryor and Mark Begich — come from
prominent political families, making them familiar brand names in their respective states. But even in North Carolina, first-term
Democratic Sen. Kay Hagan, a prime Republican target, has clung to a small but consistent lead in recent voter surveys. Part
of
the reason is money. Democrats, unexpectedly, have had more of it this year than Republicans. And part
of it is mechanics — allocating resources, targeting voters, getting them to the polls — which
national Democrats have excelled at over the last decade. In that time, Democrats
have defeated 12 sitting Republican senators. Republicans have ousted just three
Democratic incumbents , two of them in the last midterm election under Obama, in 2010. Historically, the midterm
vote has been a referendum on the president, and this one appears to be no exception. There are three typical outcomes for the party
in the White House, said Charlie Cook, a longtime nonpartisan campaign analyst: "Bad; really bad; and really, really bad." To a great
extent Democrats are simply fighting for the least bad result, which would be clinging to the Senate by the narrowest of margins.
(Republicans are expected to modestly pad their majority in the House and could lose a handful of governor's seats.) The
GOP
started the year with a distinct advantage in the Senate fight. Democrats have been forced to defend far more
seats, thanks to their gains when Obama was elected in 2008, and a number of retirements in conservative-leaning states. Of the
most competitive races, all but a handful are in places that Obama lost in 2012, several by landslide margins. Also working in favor
of Republicans are the election's broad themes — the appropriate size and scope of government, Obama's leadership and
competence — which match those of 2010, a banner year for the GOP. Democrats
have tried to shift the focus from
a debate over big government, embodied by the unpopular national healthcare law, to the merits of popular
programs, such as Social Security and Medicare, and issues that are especially resonant to
minorities, young people and single women. All are Democratic-leaning voter groups that tend
to sit out midterm elections. "Our candidates are asking theirs, 'Where are you on minimum
wage? Where are you on equal pay [for women]? Where are you on college tuition?'" said Sen.
Charles E. Schumer of New York, one of the Democratic Party's top political strategists. That tactic — one party
trying to nationalize the election, the other trying to make contests more localized
and issue-specific — is also typical of midterm elections. Another time-honored tradition is candidates
distancing themselves from the unpopular president of their own party; some Democrats this year have gone so far as to criticize
Obama in their TV advertising. "I disagree with him on guns, coal" and the Environmental Protection Agency, says a skeet-shooting
Alison Lundergan Grimes, Kentucky's Democratic secretary of state, who faces Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell in a fiercely
fought contest. Begich, locked in a tough race with former GOP Atty. Gen. Dan Sullivan, cited several differences with Obama in a
recent TV spot, over taxes, the environment and defense spending. "True Alaska," read the logo opening Begich's advertisement.
What is notable this year is Democrats'
considerable financial advantage, which will not necessarily determine
control of the Senate but, at the least, has kept many contests close heading into the final five weeks of the
campaign. The Democrats' Senate campaign committee raised $111 million through August, nearly $30 million more than the
Republican committee, and outside groups have enhanced the party's cash lead. In the 10 most competitive Senate races, proDemocratic forces have outspent their Republican counterparts $80 million to $73 million through Friday, according to data from
the Center for Responsive Politics, an organization that tracks campaign spending. Crucially,
the Democrats have used
their money edge to reserve far more TV air time than Republicans in the campaign's final
stretch, meaning even if the GOP and its allies catch up financially they will have to pay much higher last-minute rates. Writing in
the Wall Street Journal this month, Republican strategist Karl Rove lamented the financial disparity in a commentary that amounted
to a thinly veiled plea for donors to open their checkbooks. "The midterm environment is terrible for Democrats," Rove wrote, "yet
each passing day provides evidence as to why a GOP Senate majority is still in doubt." (Many Republican donors have sat on their
wallets out of frustration with a Rove-affiliated "super PAC" and other groups that collected tens of millions of dollars in 2012 and
failed to elect Mitt Romney president or deliver a Republican Senate.) Scott Reed, a Republican strategist for the U.S. Chamber of
Commerce, remains sanguine. "The sand continues to feel like it's shifting our way," he said, though he also sounded a cautionary
note: "Experience shows it's not easy defeating incumbent Democratic U.S. senators." Whatever happens Nov. 4, it
is likely that
today's toss-up races will break decisively in favor of one party. "It doesn't have to be a wave, or
even a strong wind," said Cook, the independent campaign analyst. "Just a whiff can make
races that are fundamentally tied fall almost entirely in the same direction." Even
then control of the Senate may not be decided. Under their election rules, the contests in Louisiana and Georgia could push into
December and January, respectively, if no candidate wins more than 50% in November.
The economic strategy will be successful for Dems
Williams, 9/29/14 --- author and political analyst for Fox News Channel (Juan, “Juan Williams: Economy
could tip election to Dem s,” http://thehill.com/opinion/juan-williams/219140-juan-williams-economy-could-tipelection-to-dems, JMP) One of the biggest surprises on the midterm campaign trail is hearing President
Obama echo President Reagan’s famous question by asking voters whether “you are better off than
you were four years ago.” The question is the hammer in Obama’s toolbox for nailing
down his Democratic majority in the Senate in this year’s midterm election. “By almost every
economic measure, we are better off today than we were when I took office,” the president said in
a Sept. 19 speech to the Women’s Leadership Forum, sponsored by the Democratic National Committee. Speaking to a Labor Day
rally of union workers in Milwaukee, he also pointed to America’s improved economic performance over the last five years. “You
wouldn’t know it from watching the news,” he lamented. In fact, Reuters
recently confirmed the president’s
upbeat claims. The news agency reported that, however slow, the economic recovery has lasted longer than
average. The report adds, “There seems to be more gas in the tank. The International Monetary Fund expects the U.S. economy to
grow 3 percent next year and in 2016. On Obama’s watch, 5.1 million jobs have also been added to payrolls, the S&P/Case-Shiller
national home price index is up about 17 percent and the S&P 500 stock index has more than doubled while hitting all-time records.”
There are more hard facts to bolster the president’s economic case. A Kiplinger’s economic
outlook from this month is full of good news. The economy “looks better than was previously
thought,” Kiplinger reports, “setting the stage for more sustained growth in coming months.” The
unemployment rate has been lower over the last five months than at any point in the last five years, dropping to 6.1 percent in
August. The Dow Jones industrial average is hovering around its all-time high, now regularly closing at over 17,000 points.
Consumer confidence in August also rose to its highest point in almost seven years. This, in turn, is key to consumer spending, which
is the biggest part of the economy. Is all the good economic news helping Democrats with the voters? Not really – or, at least, not yet.
RealClearPolitics has 55 percent of Americans disapproving of the president’s handling of the economy, to only 40 percent
approving. Democrats
must get voters to turn that negative economic view around. This month, a
CBS/New York Times poll indicated that the economy is the No. 1 issue to voters. A September Gallup poll similarly found that,
other than “dissatisfaction with government,” the top concern is “the economy in general.” With all the good statistics, why does
America’s kitchen-table assessment of the economy remain glum? Perhaps because median household incomes fell by more than
$2,100 in Obama’s first term, according to the Census Bureau. Sagging wages have created lingering discomfort and anxiety.
Democrats running for Congress are reminding voters of the GOP’s lack of interest in boosting
wages for working people. The GOP has turned back efforts to raise the minimum wage and to
invest in infrastructure. Democrats also point to the House GOP’s denial of extended
unemployment benefits for the long-term jobless. Republicans, meanwhile, are promising that, if they take total
control of Congress, they will boost the economy by cutting Wall Street regulation. They also plan to fight new rules from the
Environmental Protection Agency and support oil and gas exploration. Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) handed ammunition to the
Democrats this month when he said some Americans have “this idea” that, instead of finding a job, “I think I’d rather just sit
around.” Before Congress left for the campaign trail, the party race to win voters, stressed out over low pay, turned into an unusual
fight over the Export-Import Bank. The bank was reauthorized for only nine months. But first, small-government Republicans —
with the Club for Growth and Heritage Action support — pushed to kill the bank, blasting it as an example of “crony capitalism” and
the big government “picking winners and losers.” That divided the GOP because the GOP-leaning Chamber of Commerce is
supporting the bank. It points to “thousands of businesses” that risk failure without the bank. The New York Times reports that the
bank is a key issue, a “wild card” in North Carolina, Iowa and Louisiana Senate races. “Our candidates have been leaning heavily into
this and this really goes to the heart of making the economy work,” a Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee spokesman told
Obama is on to something. If the midterms turn into a referendum
on which party to trust to boost middle-class wages, look for Democrats to hold
the Senate.
the Times. President
The plan wrecks this strategy – ensures GOP victory
Raffin, 9 --- Editor in Chief at The Stanford Progressive (May 2009, Ross, “Legalizing
Marijuana the Federalist Way,” http://progressive.stanford.edu/cgibin/article.php?article_id=339)
Many advocates of legalizing or decriminalizing marijuana feel Obama has abandoned them.
White
House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel is a consistent warrior against decriminalization. Attorney General Eric Holder has a history of opposing drug policy reforms and considers the adult use of marijuana equivalent to public nuisance. Even Joe Biden, when asked
about pain management and medical cannabis, responded that “there's got to be a better answer than marijuana.” But the reality is that the Obama administration has turned the tides in favor of legalization and decriminalization in a much stronger and subtler way
Optimism for drug reform began when Obama ended federal raids on cannabis
dispensaries in states which allow medical marijuana.
he Obama
administration initiated a small but extremely important step towards legalization
it has
done so in a way to insulate itself from Republican attacks and attempts to distract the
public.
than open rhetorical endorsements.
What marijuana advocates fail to realize is that with this t
. More importantly,
At the heart of the marijuana debate is federalism, the separation of state and national governmental power. For most of America's history, marijuana was treated as a crop subject to state regulation. However, the national government justified
regulating marijuana through a variety of means, mainly the Commerce Clause of the Constitution which gives Congress po wer to regulate inter-state trade. This line of reasoning was forcefully used by the John Ashcroft in 2001 to enforce federal raids on medical
marijuana dispensaries. When a state legalizes marijuana, medical or otherwise, state law is in contradiction with federal law. This grey area leads to very confusing legal proceedings. For instance, if a state patrolman finds a medical marijuana patient in possession
of marijuana, nothing happens. However, if a federal officer found a medical marijuana patient in possession of the same amount of marijuana, the federal officer can and usually will arrest the patient and prosecute under federal law. This hypocrisy is at the base of
the current trials going on against elderly medical marijuana patients. The Obama administration drastically changed this dynamic with just a slight alteration of criteria for federal intervention with marijuana dispensaries. Eric Holder announced that the federal
government will no longer pursue medical marijuana dispensaries or patients unless they violate both federal and state laws. In the case of California, because medical marijuana is legal, federal interven tion is no longer allowed in cases where California's medical
marijuana laws are not broken. Thus, if California were to fully legalize marijuana, under current policy the federal government would not intervene. This leaves Republicans in a very tough spot. Small government is the bedrock foundation of the party. However, if a
Obama's actions cannot be criticized
as an attempt to “deregulate” marijuana. Instead, it is a triumph of state rights over federal
intervention.
Consider the
strategy of legalizing marijuana on a national level
first through Obama
Imagine the campaigns
that could be waged if Obama so much as hinted that he wants to legalize
marijuana. Not only would there be insinuations that Obama wants drugs for personal use,
but inevitably racial dynamics and stereotypes would enter discourse. It would be the
ultimate redirect from the economy. Instead of focusing on regulations and expenditures,
emphasis would be on the president who is destroying traditional American values with reefer.
“liberal” state legalizes marijuana, the only tool left to combat the legalization of marijuana is for the federal government to extend power over state government.
More importantly, any attempt to fight state legalization of marijuana through suit automatically goes to the Supreme Court. This creates an opportunity to strike down previous legislation criminalizing marijuana as opposed to
having the Democrats introduce a bill on the Senate floor to legalize pot
alternative
. In the current political environment, the leading accusations against the president range from terrorist to Marxist to illegal alien.
If
Obama or the Democrats proposed legalization, all the Republicans have to do is have several governors or senators who refuse to implement the federal law. Th is would frame the argument as Obama trying to extend the government's power to regulate what some
consider the moral fabric of society. With just a few rhetorical shuffles, Obama's proposal could be linked to general monetary and budget extensions of power. This would be like the Republican's in the 30s arguing against the New Deal as a whole by linking it with a
Obama
public hesitation towards marijuana legalization is not only
understandable but, considering the impact of the current economic legislation and programs
the administration is endorsing, the most pragmatic and efficient route for the moment.
government proposal to force states to legalize prostitution. The
administration's
Legalization and
decriminalization advocates should focus efforts on state-wide legalization, not nation-wide. If states are challenged in lawsuits, than the Supreme Court will be forced to rule on whether legislation criminalizing marijuana should be struck down. This is preferable to
the executive putting forward a proposal to legalize marijuana from the top down. When Obama tells the country that marijuana legalization is not the path he chooses for America, he means to say that the path must first be drawn by us.
Plan makes marijuana a controversial national issue and wrecks
Dems’ election strategy
James, 14 (1/21/2014, Frank, “Obama's Marijuana Remarks Light Up Legalization Debate,”
http://www.npr.org/blogs/itsallpolitics/2014/01/21/264551314/obamas-marijuana-remarkslight-up-legalization-debate)
That President Obama could openly speculate about marijuana being less dangerous than
alcohol — and embrace the state-level legalization of the drug — is a measure of just how far the
nation has moved since the 1980s.
Back then, the Reagan administration's approach was absolute: "Just Say No." It's more
complicated today.
Obama's interview with the New Yorker's David Remnick gave a measure of validation to friends
of legalization and served as a buzz kill to its foes. But even supporters of decriminalizing
marijuana were careful not to claim that Obama's statement had altered the overall dynamics of
the debate.
For one thing, Obama was characteristically cautious in how he framed the issue, to the point of
ambivalence. While he said that marijuana was less dangerous than alcohol — an assertion in
dispute — he also said he told his daughters that it was "a bad idea, a waste of time, not very
healthy."
He seemed most concerned about the disproportionate impact marijuana arrests and
convictions were having on minority young people. And he also worried about where to draw the
line with other more dangerous drugs like cocaine or methamphetamine.
Obama, as a politician and leader of the Democratic Party, is also wary of intentionally
putting his party at a political disadvantage, especially as the 2014 midterm and
2016 presidential elections come into view.
So while Allen St. Pierre, executive director of NORML, the best-known marijuana legalization
advocacy group, welcomed the president's comments, he wasn't expecting a burst of federal
legislative activity or executive directives from the president's pen.
"Let's get politically pragmatic here. His approval ratings right now are not that high," St. Pierre
said. "So the idea of coming out full bore for marijuana legalization is probably not
a strategy to raise his overall ratings. Second, he's a Democrat who would like to hand off
his eight-year presidency to another Democrat.
"And so it's very likely that he and his aides are very conscious of the idea marijuana is a
political hot potato," he said. While libertarian conservatives tend to to be pro-legalization,
many other Republicans aren't.
"And so do they want to hand such a massive triangulation to Republicans who would cast Mr.
Obama and other Democrats as a bunch of legalizing dopers?" St. Pierre asks rhetorically. Not
likely to happen, says NORML's leader, who has lobbied in Washington for legalization for
decades.
Obama was already a target for such attacks from conservatives because of his
acknowledgement that he smoked pot and tried other drugs as a teenager and young man, even
leading the self-styled Choom Gang of young marijuana aficionados.
And it's not just non-libertarian-oriented Republicans who would oppose the president if he
decided to push for federal decriminalization. Patrick Kennedy, the former congressman and
son of Sen. Edward Kennedy, who has experienced his own battle with substance abuse, took
Obama to task for saying that marijuana was benign relative to alcohol. In a statement Kennedy,
chairman of Smart Approaches to Marijuana, said:
"We take issue with the President's comparisons between marijuana and alcohol, and we
strongly encourage him — a president who has, on many occasions, championed rigorous
science — to work closely with his senior drug policy advisors and scientists, who fully
acknowledge the growing world body of science showing the harms of marijuana use to
individuals and communities. Today's marijuana is far more potent than the marijuana the
President has acknowledged using during his teens and early adulthood."
Obama's comments, cautious as they were, could still fuel momentum for legalization at the
state level, especially since he endorsed that approach. Only two states, Washington and
Colorado, have legalized marijuana for recreational use. Beyond them, 20 states and the District
of Columbia have more or less legalized the drug for medical purposes.
Democrats won’t take credit – risk aversion
Salon, 14 (4/10/2014, “Tea Party’s reefer hypocrisy: Why “states’ rights” is a situational
sham; Turns out the states are only sovereign when they're denying equal rights to their citizens
-- not for pain relief,”
http://www.salon.com/2014/04/10/tea_partys_reefer_hypocrisy_why_states_rights_is_a_sit
uational_sham/)
So why is the Democratic administration that came so far on gay marriage in such a short time
still balking on using its power to go with the times on marijuana? It’s simple, really. They are
afraid of being perceived as “soft on crime,” the stalest trope of the modern era. It’s so pervasive
that according to this New York Times article even Democratic governors in blue states like
California and Connecticut (with majority support among the citizens) refuse to consider
endorsing legalization.
This fear goes deep into the collective American political psyche and usually relates to race and
left-wing politics, both of which have close associations with marijuana. As Rick Perlstein
illustrated in “Nixonland,” his epic history of the late ’60s and early ’70s, Republican code words
for racial issues and broader cultural unrest was ”States’ Rights” in the South and “Law and
Order” in the North. And ever since then, Democratic politicians have been living in fear of
becoming tarred with the unruly hippies and “urban” unrest (if you know what I mean). Not that
the current discussion has anything to do with that, or that a politician will be hurt by taking this
popular stand:
There is little evidence in most states that a politician would pay a price for supporting
legalization, said Anna Greenberg, a Democratic pollster. “We’ve moved into a frame that’s not
ideological, “ she said. “It’s about a system being broken, not working, and that legalization
involves strict regulation that would allow the state to collect revenues. That makes a lot of sense
to the kind of voters that electeds are most concerned about. If that’s the way it’s being
discussed, it isn’t a liability for a politician.”
Some, like California’s Jerry Brown, probably are scarred by their (relatively) youthful
encounters with rabid conservatives, thinking it will reignite the old “Governor Moonbeam”
stereotype. But it’s clear that most of them are just following their finely honed instinct for
avoiding taking a leadership position on anything. (That won’t stop them from basking in the
popularity of the policy if the people and the courts manage to make it happen, so they have that
to look forward to.)
All of which is to say that Democratic congressmen like Steve Cohen (from that bastion of
liberalism Tennessee) really do deserve some accolades from progressive Democrats. He took a
rational, sane, decent public position on a hot issue — a position that happens to be shared by
the vast majority of the people in his party and a majority of people in the country. That
practically makes him a unicorn in Democratic Party politics.
The plan should pass first in the next Congressional session – this is
best because it allows debate to dovetail with the world debaters are
trying to influence – empirical support and election education is
inevitable b/c of lame duck disads
Mataconis, 9/27/14 --- J.D. from George Mason University School of Law (Doug, “Should
the next attorney general be confirmed in a lame-duck session?”
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/DC-Decoder/Decoder-Voices/2014/0927/Should-the-nextattorney-general-be-confirmed-in-a-lame-duck-session, JMP)
I’m somewhat sympathetic to the arguments that Republicans are making here. Traditionally, at least, lame-duck sessions are intended for Congress to finish up business that
could not get done prior to the election. Typically this involves budget matters, and that will be one of the matters that Congress will need to take up when it returns. The idea of
members of the Senate who are leaving office, or who have just been voted out of office, voting on consequential matters like the confirmation of presidential appointees or a
vote to authorize future military action against the Islamic State, on the other hand, raises serious issues that shouldn’t be dismissed lightly. Just a week before Congress returns,
after all, the people will have spoken and that will likely include voting out of office several incumbents in both the House and the Senate; the idea that these legislators would
then have a vote on controversial and important issues is somewhat discomforting. Yes, it’s their job, but they will have just been effectively fired from their job by the voters,
and it seems somewhat wrong for them to be voting as is nothing has happened, especially when the election has resulted in the party switch for their seat. The argument is the
For better or worse, though, it’s become
common practice for both parties to use these lame-duck sessions to push through
things that couldn’t get passed prior to an election. During President Obama’s tenure, for
example, we have seen budget agreements, extensions of the Bush Tax cuts, and the repeal of Don’t
Ask, Don’t Tell all passed by a lame-duck Congress. This issue has come up before, and there was even a West Wing episode about it
same for legislators who have announced that they are retiring when the current session of Congress ends.
that focused on a defeated senator who decided he could not in good conscience go against the will of the voters that had just elected his opponent, despite the fact that it would
hurt the administration and his party. Four years ago, several Republican senators implored Harry Reid to delay consideration of the new START Treaty until the new Congress
convened in January 2011. Democrats would still control the Senate at that time, but their majority would be a lot slimmer and Republicans would likely have had a better
opportunity to influence the debate. Ultimately, Reid went forward with the vote and the treaty was ratified by a comfortable margin. At the time, though, the issue raised some
serious concerns about the role of lame-duck congressional sessions, and not just from people on the right. Yale Law Professor Bruce Ackerman noted that there were some
serious constitutional issues raised when lame-duck sessions include the consideration of controversial legislation, especially if that legislation was part of the election. At the
given the fact that
Congress has gotten into the habit of delaying the work it needs to get done until after
elections to the point where it is starting to become tradition, it’s unlikely that we’re going to
see an end to these kinds of tactics in the near future.
time, I noted that the entire process seemed anti-democratic and rife with possibilities for abuse. These concerns are all well founded, but
Turn --- plan causes the election to become nationalized, crushing
Dems
Raju & Everett, 9/18/14 (Manu & Burgess, “Harry Reid’s plot to keep the Senate,”
http://www.politico.com/story/2014/09/harry-reid-senate-elections-2014-111115.html?hp=f3,
JMP)
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid believes Republicans have walked into his trap.
As he’s tightened his grip on the Senate and protected vulnerable Democrats from casting
politically tough votes, furious Republicans have made the mantra “fire Reid” a rallying cry and
major fundraising push ahead of the midterm elections.
But in Reid’s mind, Republicans are training all their fire on a guy most voters barely even know.
(POLITICO's 2014 race ratings)
“I’m meaningless,” Reid, a three-decade Hill veteran and the most powerful Democrat in
Congress, told POLITICO Thursday. “People in red states don’t even know who I am.”
If Democrats keep control of the Senate this year, they believe, it will be because they have
prevented Republicans from nationalizing the midterm elections, keeping the focus
squarely on the two candidates in their respective states rather than an unpopular President
Barack Obama. For that reason, Reid has been more than willing to shield his
vulnerable Democrats from casting votes on politically charged amendments even
if he takes sustained fire from the GOP for running a dysfunctional Senate.
While Republicans say Democrats are still saddled with backing much of Obama’s agenda and
helping enact controversial laws over health care and financial services, some Republicans wish
they could make Reid’s handling of the Senate an even bigger focus this midterm season.
(Full 2014 election results)
“It should be a bigger issue,” said Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio, a top official at the Senate
Republicans’ campaign arm. “I wish it were something that more people are interested in, it’s
partly our fault in not having a way to describe it in a way that makes sense to people and how it
affects their lives.”
The Senate plans to adjourn Thursday until after the elections, avoiding many hot-button votes
over changing Obamacare, illegal immigration and taxes. It caps a yearlong effort by Senate
Democratic leaders who have the singular focus aimed at bolstering the reelection
chances of senators from battleground states — namely Louisiana, Arkansas, North
Carolina, Alaska, New Hampshire and Colorado.
1ar
Farms
Farms
Industrial agriculture is unsustainable and risks extinction –
transition to sustainable ag is key to prevent feedbacks that collapse
civilization
Ehrlich and Ehrlich, 13 – Paul R., Department of Biology, Stanford University and Anne
H., (“Can a collapse of global civilization be avoided?,” Proceedings of the Royal Society, vol.
280, no. 1754, 3/7/13,
http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/280/1754/20122845.full)Red
Virtually every past civilization has eventually undergone collapse, a loss of socio-political-economic complexity usually
accompanied by a dramatic decline in population size [1]. Some, such as those of Egypt and China, have recovered from collapses at various stages; others, such as that of Easter
All those previous collapses were local or regional; elsewhere, other societies and
In many, if not most, cases,
overexploitation of the environment was one proximate or an ultimate cause [3]. But today,
for the first time, humanity's global civilization—the worldwide, increasingly interconnected, highly
technological society in which we all are to one degree or another, embedded—is threatened with
collapse by an array of environmental problems. Humankind finds itself engaged in what Prince Charles described as ‘an act of
suicide on a grand scale’ [4], facing what the UK's Chief Scientific Advisor John Beddington called a ‘perfect storm’ of environmental problems [5]. The most
Island or the Classic Maya, were apparently permanent [1,2].
civilizations persisted unaffected. Sometimes, as in the Tigris and Euphrates valleys, new civilizations rose in succession.
serious of these problems show signs of rapidly escalating severity, especially climate disruption. But other elements could potentially also contribute to a collapse: an
accelerating extinction of animal and plant populations and species, which could lead to a loss of ecosystem services essential for human survival; land degradation and land-use
change; a pole-to-pole spread of toxic compounds; ocean acidification and eutrophication (dead zones); worsening of some aspects of the epidemiological environment (factors
that make human populations susceptible to infectious diseases); depletion of increasingly scarce resources [6,7], including especially groundwater, which is being overexploited
in many key agricultural areas [8]; and resource wars [9]. These are not separate problems; rather they interact in two gigantic complex adaptive systems: the biosphere system
and the human socio-economic system. The negative manifestations of these interactions are often referred to as ‘the human predicament’ [10], and determining how to prevent
The human predicament is driven by
overpopulation, overconsumption of natural resources and the use of unnecessarily
environmentally damaging technologies and socio-economic-political arrangements to service Homo sapiens’ aggregate consumption [11–17].
it from generating a global collapse is perhaps the foremost challenge confronting humanity.
How far the human population size now is above the planet's long-term carrying capacity is suggested (conservatively) by ecological footprint analysis [18–20]. It shows that to
support today's population of seven billion sustainably (i.e. with business as usual, including current technologies and standards of living) would require roughly half an
additional planet; to do so, if all citizens of Earth consumed resources at the US level would take four to five more Earths. Adding the projected 2.5 billion more people by 2050
would make the human assault on civilization's life-support systems disproportionately worse, because almost everywhere people face systems with nonlinear responses [11,21–
the claim is often made that
humanity will expand Earth's carrying capacity dramatically with technological innovation [24],
but it is widely recognized that technologies can both add and subtract from carrying capacity. The
plough evidently first expanded it and now appears to be reducing it [3]. Overall, careful analysis of the prospects
does not provide much confidence that technology will save us [25] or that gross domestic product can be
23], in which environmental damage increases at a rate that becomes faster with each additional person. Of course,
disengaged from resource use [26]. 2. Do current trends portend a collapse? What is the likelihood of this set of interconnected predicaments [27] leading to a global collapse in
this century? There have been many definitions and much discussion of past ‘collapses’ [1,3,28–31], but a future global collapse does not require a careful definition. It could be
triggered by anything from a ‘small’ nuclear war, whose ecological effects could quickly end civilization [32], to a more gradual breakdown because famines, epidemics and
resource shortages cause a disintegration of central control within nations, in concert with disruptions of trade and conflicts over increasingly scarce necessities. In either case,
regardless of survivors or replacement societies, the world familiar to anyone reading this study and the well-being of the vast majority of people would disappear. How likely is
No civilization can avoid collapse if it fails to feed its population. The world's success so far, and
Agriculture made
civilization possible, and over the last 80 years or so, an industrial agricultural revolution has created a
technology-dependent global food system. That system, humanity's single biggest industry, has generated miracles
of food production. But it has also created serious long-run vulnerabilities, especially in its
dependence on stable climates, crop monocultures, industrially produced fertilizers and
pesticides, petroleum, antibiotic feed supplements and rapid, efficient transportation. Despite
those food production miracles, today at least two billion people are hungry or poorly nourished.
The Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that increasing food production by some 70 per cent would be required
to feed a 35 per cent bigger and still growing human population adequately by 2050 [41]. What are the
prospects that H. sapiens can produce and distribute sufficient food? To do so, it probably will be necessary to accomplish many or all of the following
such a collapse to occur?
the prospective ability to feed future generations at least as well, has been under relatively intensive discussion for half a century [33–40].
tasks: severely limit climate disruption; restrict expansion of land area for agriculture (to preserve ecosystem services); raise yields where possible; put much more effort into
soil conservation [3]; increase efficiency in the use of fertilizers, water and energy; become more vegetarian; grow more food for people (not fuel for vehicles); reduce food
wastage; stop degradation of the oceans and better regulate aquaculture;
significantly increase investment in sustainable
agricultural and aquacultural research; and move increasing equity and feeding everyone to the very top of the policy agenda. Most of these long-recommended
tasks require changes in human behaviour thus far elusive. The problem of food wastage and the need for more and better agricultural research have been discussed for decades.
So have ‘technology will save us’ schemes such as building ‘nuclear agro-industrial complexes’ [42], where energy would be so cheap that it could support a new kind of desert
agriculture in ‘food factories’, where crops would be grown on desalinated water and precisely machine fertilized. Unhappily, sufficiently cheap energy has never been produced
by nuclear power to enable large-scale agriculture to move in that direction. Nor has agriculture moved towards feeding people protein extracted from leaves or bacteria grown
on petroleum [43, pp. 95–112]. None of these schemes has even resulted in a coordinated development effort. Meanwhile, growing numbers of newly well-off people have
increased demand for meat [44], thereby raising global demand for feedgrains. Perhaps even more critical, climate disruption may pose insurmountable biophysical barriers to
with the climate, there may be reductions in yields of major
crops [45], although near-term this may be unlikely to affect harvests globally [46]. Nonetheless, rising temperatures already seem to be
slowing previous trends of increasing yields of basic grains [45,47], and unless greenhouse gas emissions are dramatically
increasing crop yields. Indeed, if humanity is very unlucky
reduced, dangerous anthropogenic climate change [48] could ravage agriculture. Also, in addition to falling yields from many oceanic fish stocks because of widespread
overfishing [49], warming and acidification of the oceans threaten the protein supply of some of the most nutritionally vulnerable people [50], especially those who cannot
the agricultural system has complex connections with all the chief
drivers of environmental deterioration. Agriculture itself is a major emitter of greenhouse gases
and thus is an important cause of climate disruption as well as being exceptionally vulnerable to
its consequences. More than a millennium of change in temperature and precipitation patterns is apparently now entrained [51], with the prospect of increasingly
afford to purchase farmed fish. Unfortunately,
severe storms, droughts, heat waves and floods, all of which seem already evident and all of which threaten agricultural production. Land is an essential resource for farming,
and one facing multiple threats. In addition to the serious and widespread problems of soil degradation, sea-level rise (the most certain consequence of global warming) will take
important areas out of production either by inundating them (a 1 m rise would flood 17.5% of Bangladesh [52]), exposing them to more frequent storm surges, or salinizing
coastal aquifers essential for irrigation water. Another important problem for the food system is the loss of prime farmland to urbanization, a trend that seems certain to
accelerate [53] as population growth steadily erodes the per capita supply of farmland. The critical importance of substantially boosting the inadequate current action on the
demographic problem can be seen in the time required to change the trajectory of population growth humanely and sensibly. We know from such things as the World War II
mobilizations that many consumption patterns can be altered dramatically within a year, given appropriate incentives [54]. If food shortages became acute, then a rapid reaction
would ensue as hunger became much more widespread. Food prices would rise, and diets would temporarily change (e.g. the number of meals consumed per day or amount of
meat consumed) to compensate the shortage. Over the long term, however, expanding the global food supply and distributing it more equitably would be a slow and difficult
process. Even though a major famine might well provoke investment in long-needed improvements in food production and distribution, they would take time to plan, test and
agriculture is a leading cause of losses of biodiversity and thus of the
critical ecosystem services supplied to agriculture itself (e.g. pollination, pest control,
soil fertility, climate stability) and other human enterprises. Farming is also a principal source
of global toxification, as has been clear since the days of Carson [55], exposing the human population to myriad subtle
poisons. These pose further potential risks to food production.
implement. Furthermore,
Treaties
Cyber
Finishing
- No motivation---can’t be used for coercive leverage
- Defenses solve---benefits of offense are overstated
- Too difficult to execute/mistakes in code are inevitable
- AT: Infrastructure attacks
- Military networks are air-gapped/difficult to access
- Overwhelming consensus goes neg
Colin S. Gray 13, Prof. of International Politics and Strategic Studies @ the University of
Reading and External Researcher @ the Strategic Studies Institute @ the U.S. Army War
College, April, “Making Strategic Sense of Cyber Power: Why the Sky Is Not Falling,” U.S. Army
War College Press, http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pdffiles/PUB1147.pdf
CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS: THE SKY IS NOT FALLING ¶ This analysis has sought to explore, identify, and
explain the strategic meaning of cyber power. The organizing and thematic question that has shaped and driven the inquiry has been “So what?” Today
we all do cyber, but this behavior usually has not been much informed by an understanding that reaches beyond the tactical and technical. I have
endeavored to analyze in strategic terms what is on offer from the largely technical and tactical literature on cyber. What can or might be done and how
to go about doing it are vitally important bodies of knowledge. But at least as important is understanding what cyber, as a fifth domain of warfare,
brings to national security when it is considered strategically. Military history is stocked abundantly with examples of tactical behavior un - guided by
any credible semblance of strategy. This inquiry has not been a campaign to reveal what cy ber can and might do; a large literature already exists that
claims fairly convincingly to explain “how to . . .” But what does cyber power mean, and how does it fit strategically, if it does? These Conclusions and
Rec ommendations offer some understanding of this fifth geography of war in terms that make sense to this strategist, at least. ¶ 1. Cyber can only be an
enabler of physical effort. Stand-alone (popularly misnamed as “strategic”) cyber
action is inherently grossly limited
by its immateriality. The physicality of conflict with cyber’s human participants and mechanical artifacts has not been a passing phase
in our species’ strategic history. Cyber action, quite independent of action on land, at sea, in the air, and in orbital space, certainly is possible. But the
strategic logic of such behavior, keyed to anticipated success in tactical achievement, is not promising. To date, “What
if . . .” speculation about strategic cyber attack usually is either contextually too light, or, more often, contextually
unpersuasive . 49 However, this is not a great strategic truth, though it is a judgment advanced with considerable confidence. Although
societies could, of course, be hurt by cyber action, it is important not to lose touch with the fact, in Libicki’s apposite words, that “[i]n the
absence of physical combat, cyber war cannot lead to the occupation of territory. It is almost
inconceivable that a sufficiently vigorous cyber war can overthrow the adversary’s
government and replace it with a more pliable one.” 50 In the same way that the concepts of sea war, air war, and space
war are fundamentally unsound, so also the idea of cyber war is unpersuasive. ¶ It is not impossible, but then, neither is war conducted only at sea, or in
the air, or in space. On the one hand, cyber war may seem more probable than like environmentally independent action at sea or in the air. After all,
cyber warfare would be very unlikely to harm human beings directly, let alone damage
physically the machines on which they depend. These near-facts (cyber attack might cause socially critical machines to
behave in a rogue manner with damaging physical consequences) might seem to ren - der cyber a safer zone of belligerent engagement than would
physically violent action in other domains. But most likely there
would be serious uncertainties pertaining to the
consequences of cyber action, which must include the possibility of escalation into other
domains of conflict. Despite popular assertions to the contrary, cyber is not likely to prove a precision weapon
anytime soon. 51 In addition, assuming that the political and strategic contexts for cyber war were as serious as surely they would need to be to
trigger events warranting plausible labeling as cyber war, the distinctly limited harm likely to follow from cyber
assault would hardly appeal as prospectively effective coercive moves. On balance, it is most probable that
cyber’s strategic future in war will be as a contribut - ing enabler of effectiveness of physical efforts in the other four geographies of conflict. Speculation
about cyber war, defined strictly as hostile action by net - worked computers against networked computers, is hugely unconvincing.¶ 2. Cyber
defense is difficult, but should be sufficiently effective. The structural advantages of the offense in
cyber conflict are as obvious as they are easy to overstate. Penetration and exploitation, or even attack,
would need to be by surprise. It can be swift almost beyond the imagination of those encultured by the traditional demands of physical
combat. Cyber attack may be so stealthy that it escapes notice for a long while, or it might wreak digital havoc by com - plete surprise. And need one
emphasize, that at least for a while, hostile cyber action is likely to be hard (though not quite impossible) to attribute with a cy - berized equivalent to a
“smoking gun.” Once one is in the realm of the catastrophic “What if . . . ,” the world is indeed a frightening place. On a personal note, this defense
analyst was for some years exposed to highly speculative briefings that hypothesized how unques - tionably cunning plans for nuclear attack could so
promptly disable the United States as a functioning state that our nuclear retaliation would likely be still - born. I should hardly need to add that the
briefers of these Scary Scenarios were obliged to make a series of Heroic Assumptions. ¶ The
literature of cyber scare is more
than mildly reminiscent of the nuclear attack stories with which I was assailed in the 1970s and
1980s. As one may observe regarding what Winston Churchill wrote of the disaster that was the Gallipoli campaign of 1915, “[t]he terrible ‘Ifs’
accumulate.” 52 Of course, there are dangers in the cyber domain. Not only are there cyber-competent competitors and enemies abroad; there are also
Americans who make mistakes in cyber operation. Furthermore, there are the manufacturers and constructors of the physical artifacts behind (or in,
depending upon the preferred definition) cyber - space who assuredly err in this and that detail. The
more sophisticated—usually
meaning complex—the code for cyber, the more certain must it be that mistakes both lurk in
the program and will be made in digital communication.¶ What I have just outlined minimally is not a reluc - tant
admission of the fallibility of cyber, but rather a statement of what is obvious and should be anticipat - ed about people and material in a domain of war.
All human activities are more or less harassed by friction and carry with them some risk of failure, great or small. A strategist who has read Clausewitz,
especially Book One of On War , 53 will know this. Alternatively, anyone who skims my summary version of the general theory of strategy will note that
Dictum 14 states explicitly that “Strategy is more difficult to devise and execute than are policy, operations, and tactics: friction of all kinds comprise
phenomena inseparable from the mak - ing and execution of strategies.” 54 Because of its often widely distributed character, the physical infrastruc ture of an enemy’s cyber power is typically, though not invariably, an impracticable target set for physical assault. Happily, this probable fact should
have only annoying consequences. The discretionary nature and therefore the variable possible characters feasible for friendly cyberspace(s), mean that
the more danger - ous potential vulnerabilities that in theory could be the condition of our cyber-dependency ought to be avoidable at best, or bearable
and survivable at worst. Libicki offers forthright advice on this aspect of the subject that deserves to be taken at face value: ¶ [T]here is no inherent
reason that improving informa - tion technologies should lead to a rise in the amount of critical information in existence (for example, the names of
every secret agent). Really critical information should never see a computer; if it sees a computer, it should not be one that is networked; and if the
computer is networked, it should be air-gapped.¶ Cyber defense admittedly is difficult to do, but so is cyber offense. To
quote Libicki yet again, “[i]n this medium [cyberspace] the best defense is not necessarily a good offense; it is usually a good defense.” 56 Unlike the
geostrategic context for nuclear-framed competition in U.S.–Soviet/Russian rivalry, the
geographical domain of cyberspace
definitely is defensible. Even when the enemy is both clever and lucky, it will be our own design and operating fault if he is able to do more
than disrupt and irritate us temporarily.¶ When cyber is contextually regarded properly— which means first, in particular, when it is viewed as but the
latest military domain for defense planning—it should be plain to see that cyber performance needs to be good enough rather than perfect. 57 Our
Landpower, sea power, air power, and prospectively our space systems also will have to be capable of
accepting combat damage and loss, then recovering and carrying on. There is no fundamental
reason that less should be demanded of our cyber power. Second, given that cyber is not of a nature or potential
character at all likely to parallel nuclear dangers in the menace it could con - tain, we should anticipate international cyber rivalry to follow the
competitive dynamic path already fol - lowed in the other domains in the past. Because the digital age is so young, the pace of technical change and
tactical invention can be startling. However, the mechanization RMA of the 1920s and 1930s recorded reaction to the new science and technology of the
time that is reminiscent of the cyber alarmism that has flour - ished of recent years. 58 We
can be confident that cyber defense
should be able to function well enough, given the strength of political, military, and
commercial motivation for it to do so. The technical context here is a medium that is a constructed one, which provides airgapping options for choice regarding the extent of networking. Naturally, a price is paid in convenience for some closing off of possible cyberspace(s),
but all important defense decisions involve choice, so what is novel about that? There is nothing new about accepting some limitations on utility as a
price worth paying for security.¶ 3. Intelligence is critically important, but informa - tion should not be overvalued. The strategic history of cyber over
the past decade confirms what we could know already from the science and technology of this new domain for conflict. Specifically,
cyber power
is not technically forgiving of user error. Cyber warriors seeking criminal or military benefit
require precise information if their intended exploits are to succeed. Lucky guesses should not stumble upon
passwords, while efforts to disrupt electronic Supervisory Con - trol and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems ought to be
unable to achieve widespread harmful effects. But obviously there are practical limits to the air-gap op - tion, given that
control (and command) systems need to be networks for communication. However, Internet connection needs to be treated as a potential source of
serious danger.¶ It
is one thing to be able to be an electronic nuisance, to annoy, disrupt, and perhaps delay. But it is
quite another to be capable of inflicting real persisting harm on the fighting power of an enemy.
Critically important military computer networks are, of course, accessible neither to the inspired
amateur outsider, nor to the malignant political enemy. Easy passing reference to a hypothetical
“cyber Pearl Harbor” reflects both poor history and ignorance of contemporary military
common sense.
Critical potential military (and other) targets for cyber attack are extremely hard to access and
influence (I believe and certainly hope), and the technical knowledge, skills, and effort required to do
serious harm to national security is forbiddingly high. This is not to claim, foolishly, that cyber means absolutely
could not secure near-catastrophic results. However, it is to say that such a scenario is extremely
improbable . Cyber defense is advancing all the time, as is cyber offense, of course. But so discretionary in vital detail can one be in the
making of cyberspace, that confidence—real confidence—in cyber attack could not plausibly be high. It should be noted that I am confining this
particular discussion to what rather idly tends to be called cyber war. In political and strategic practice, it is unlikely that war would or, more
importantly, ever could be restricted to the EMS. Somewhat rhetorically, one should pose the question: Is it likely (almost anything, strictly, is possible)
that cyber war with the potential to inflict catastrophic damage would be allowed to stand unsupported in and by action in the other four geographical
domains of war? I believe not.¶ Because we have told ourselves that ours uniquely is the Information Age, we have become unduly respectful of the
potency of this rather slippery catch-all term. As usual, it is helpful to contextualize the al - legedly magical ingredient, information, by locating it
properly in strategic history as just one important element contributing to net strategic effectiveness. This mild caveat is supported usefully by
recognizing the general contemporary rule that information per se harms nothing and nobody. The electrons in cyber - ized conflict have to be
interpreted and acted upon by physical forces (including agency by physical human beings). As one might say, intelligence (alone) sinks no ship; only
men and machines can sink ships! That said, there is no doubt that if friendly cyber action can infiltrate and misinform the electronic informa - tion on
which advisory weaponry and other machines depend, considerable warfighting advantage could be gained. I do not intend to join Clausewitz in his dis
- dain for intelligence, but I will argue that in strategic affairs, intelligence usually is somewhat uncertain. 59 Detailed up-to-date intelligence literally is
essential for successful cyber offense, but it can be healthily sobering to appreciate that the strategic rewards of intelligence often are considerably
exaggerated. The basic reason is not hard to recognize. Strategic success is a complex endeavor that requires adequate perfor - mances by many
necessary contributors at every level of conflict (from the political to the tactical). ¶ When thoroughly reliable intelligence on the en - emy is in short
supply, which usually is the case, the strategist finds ways to compensate as best he or she can. The IT-led RMA of the past 2 decades was fueled in part
by the prospect of a quality of military effec - tiveness that was believed to flow from “dominant battle space knowledge,” to deploy a familiar con - cept.
60 While there is much to be said in praise of this idea, it is not unreasonable to ask why it has been that our ever-improving battle space knowledge
has been compatible with so troubled a course of events in the 2000s in Iraq and Afghanistan. What we might have misunderstood is not the value of
knowledge, or of the information from which knowledge is quarried, or even the merit in the IT that passed information and knowledge around.
Instead, we may well have failed to grasp and grip understanding of the whole context of war and strategy for which battle space knowledge
unquestionably is vital. One must say “vital” rather than strictly essential, because relatively ignorant armies can and have fought and won despite their
ig - norance. History requires only that one’s net strategic performance is superior to that of the enemy. One is not required to be deeply well informed
about the en - emy. It is historically quite commonplace for armies to fight in a condition of more-than-marginal reciprocal and strategic cultural
ignorance. Intelligence is king in electronic warfare, but such warfare is unlikely to be solely, or even close to solely, sovereign in war and its warfare,
considered overall as they should be.¶ 4. Why the sky will not fall. More accurately, one should say that the
sky will not fall because of
hostile action against us in cyberspace unless we are improb - ably careless and foolish. David J. Betz and Tim Ste vens strike the
right note when they conclude that “[i]f cyberspace is not quite the hoped-for Garden of Eden, it is also not quite the pestilential swamp of the
imagination of the cyber-alarmists.” 61 Our understanding of cyber is high at the technical and tactical level, but re - mains distinctly rudimentary as
one ascends through operations to the more rarified altitudes of strategy and policy. Nonetheless,
our scientific,
technological, and tactical knowledge and understanding clearly indicates that the
sky is not falling and is unlikely to fall in the future as a result of hostile cyber action.
This analysis has weighed the more technical and tactical literature on cyber and concludes, not
simply on balance, that cyber alarmism has little basis save in the imagination of the alarmists. There is military
and civil peril in the hostile use of cyber, which is why we must take cyber security seriously, even to the point of buying redundant capabilities for a
range of command and control systems. 62 So seriously should we regard cyber danger that it is only prudent to as - sume that we will be the target for
hostile cyber action in future conflicts, and that some of that action will promote disruption and uncertainty in the damage it will cause.¶ That granted,
this analysis recommends strongly that the U.S. Army, and indeed the whole of the U.S. Government, should strive to comprehend cyber in context.
Approached in isolation as a new technol - ogy, it is not unduly hard to be over impressed with its potential both for good and harm. But if we see
networked computing as just the latest RMA in an episodic succession of revolutionary changes in the way information is packaged and communicated,
the computer-led IT revolution is set where it belongs, in historical context. In modern strategic history, there has been only one truly game-changing
basket of tech - nologies, those pertaining to the creation and deliv - ery of nuclear weapons. Everything else has altered the tools with which conflict
has been supported and waged, but has not changed the game. The nuclear revolution alone raised still-unanswered questions about the viability of
interstate armed conflict. How - ever, it would be accurate to claim that since 1945, methods have been found to pursue fairly traditional political ends
in ways that accommodate nonuse of nuclear means, notwithstanding the permanent pres - ence of those means.¶ The light cast by general strategic
theory reveals what requires revealing strategically about networked computers. Once one sheds some of the sheer wonder at the seeming miracle of
cyber’s ubiquity, instanta - neity, and (near) anonymity, one realizes that cyber is just another operational domain, though certainly one very different
from the others in its nonphysi - cality in direct agency. Having placed cyber where it belongs, as a domain of war, next it is essential to recognize that
its nonphysicality compels that cyber should be treated as an enabler of joint action, rather than as an agent of military action capable of behav - ing
independently for useful coercive strategic effect. There
are stand-alone possibilities for cyber action, but they are
not convincing as attractive options either for or in opposition to a great power, let alone a
superpower. No matter how intriguing the scenario design for cyber war strictly or for cyber
warfare, the logic of grand and military strategy and a common sense fueled by understanding of
the course of strategic history, require one so to contextualize cyber war that its independence is
seen as too close to absurd to merit much concern.
Deterrence and rapid response check
Fox 11—Assistant Editor, InnovationNewsDaily (Stuart, 2 July 2011, “Why Cyberwar Is Unlikely
,” http://www.securitynewsdaily.com/cyberwar-unlikely-deterrence-cyber-war-0931/, RBatra)
In the two decades since cyberwar first became possible, there hasn't been a single event that
politicians, generals and security experts agree on as having passed the threshold for strategic cyberwar .
In fact, the attacks that have occurred have fallen so far short of a proper cyberwar that many have begun
to doubt that cyberwarfare is even possible. The reluctance to engage in strategic cyberwarfare
stems mostly from the uncertain results such a conflict would bring, the lack of motivation on
the part of the possible combatants and their shared inability to defend against
counterattacks. Many of the systems that an aggressive cyberattack would damage are actually as valuable to any potential
attacker as they would be to the victim. The five countries capable of large-scale cyberwar (Israel, the U.S., the
U.K., Russia and China) have more to lose if a cyberwar were to escalate into a shooting war than they would gain
from a successful cyberattack. "The half-dozen countries that have cyber capability are deterred from cyberwar because of the fear of
the American response. Nobody
wants this to spiral out of control," said James Lewis, senior
fellow and director of technology and public policy at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in
Washington, D.C. "The countries that are capable of doing this don't have a reason to ," Lewis added.
"Chinese officials have said to me, 'Why would we bring down Wall Street when we own so much
of it?' They like money almost as much as we do." Big deterrent: retaliation Deterrence plays a major
factor in preventing cyberwar. Attacks across the Internet would favor the aggressor so heavily that no country has
developed an effective defense. Should one country initiate a cyberattack, the victim could quickly
counter-attack, leaving both countries equally degraded, Lewis told InnovationNewsDaily. Even if an
attacker were to overcome his fear of retaliation, the low rate of success would naturally give
him pause. Any cyberattack would target the types of complex systems that could collapse on
their own, such as electrical systems or banking networks. But experience gained in fixing day-today problems on those systems would allow the engineers who maintain them to quickly undo
damage caused by even the most complex cyberattack , said George Smith, a senior fellow at
Globalsecurity.org in Alexandria, Va. "You mean to tell me that the people who work the electrical system
24 hours a day don't respond to problems? What prevents people from turning the lights right
back on?" Smith told SecurityNewsDaily. "And attacks on the financial system have always been a non-starter for me. I mean, [in
2008] the financial system attacked the U.S.!"
at: killer robots
Come on now
Blanchard 2/23/2014 – former General Counsel of the U.S. Air Force, panelist at a Chatham
House conference on autonomous weapons (Charles, Lawfare, “Autonomous Weapons: Is an
Arms Race Really a Threat?”, http://www.lawfareblog.com/2014/02/autonomous-weapons-isan-arms-race-really-a-threat/#.UwpPs0JdVFB)
There has certainly been much written about the controversy over autonomous weapons
systems, but in my preparation for a Chatham House conference on autonomous weapons, I
found one argument made by advocates of a ban on such weapons, however, that merits some
close examination. These advocates make the point that there will be a robotics arms race that
will result in development and deployment of autonomous weapons even if these weapons are
not able to comply with international law. For example, here is a Human Rights Watch
statement: “But the temptation will grow to acquire fully autonomous weapons, also known as
‘lethal autonomous robotics’ or ‘killer robots.’ If one nation acquires these weapons, others may
feel they have to follow suit to avoid falling behind in a robotic arms race.”
In essence, Human Rights Watch is arguing that even nations, like the United States, that are
taking a very cautious approach to autonomous weapons will feel compelled to deploy these
weapons for fear of losing a military advantage. The result will be the deployment of these
weapons despite the fact that the technology does not really ensure compliance with
international law.
This is a powerful argument except for one fatal flaw: a robotic weapon that cannot meet
international norms is unlikely to have a military advantage on the battlefield.
Under well established principles of international law, every targeting decision in war requires a
careful set of judgments that are now done by human beings: Is this target a legitimate military
target? Will there be harm to civilians from the strike? Is the value of the military target
nonetheless proportional to this harm? As much as progress has been made in robotics, it is
unlikely that any autonomous robot in even the near future would have the capacity to
determine military targets from civilians with any accuracy or make the critical judgment about
the proportionality of military value to civilian harm.
Would deployment of even these inadequate autonomous weapons provide an advantage on the
battlefield? Even if these weapons will have difficulty distinguishing a civilian target from a
legitimate military target, would they provide a military advantage over weapons still controlled
by humans? I doubt it.
Effectiveness on the battlefield actually requires a higher degree of judgment than that required
to meet international legal requirements. It is not enough to hit a legitimate target.
Effectiveness on the battlefield requires that a weapon hit the most important targets and in the
right sequence. A computer that even has difficulty making judgments about what is a
legitimate target will not do well making the more challenging tactical and operational decisions
required on the battlefield.
In addition, an autonomous weapon that can’t easily distinguish civilians from military targets
can all too easily be fooled by an enemy. Sun Tzu famously wrote that all warfare is based on
deception and deception techniques (such as decoys) were used quite effectively by Serbia
against the NATO air campaign in Kosovo.
Perhaps the best evidence that there will be no robotic arms race is the fact that no major
military power is rushing to develop or deploy these weapons. For example, while there is
certainly a great deal of research activity on autonomous systems, there is no current DoD
program of record for any autonomous weapon. DoD is showing great caution in the
development of autonomous weapons not merely out of concern for international law. While
that is obviously a significant concern, there is also great skepticism that purely autonomous
weapons will provide a military advantage even in the battle spaces twenty or more years in the
future.
In short, an autonomous weapon that cannot satisfy the laws of war is unlikely to be an effective
weapon on the battlefield. Concerns about robotic arms race are misplaced.
LOAC can’t solve and there’s no impact – enforcing regulations on
tech is impossible, but there’s not a breakout prolif threat
Kenneth Anderson and Matthew Waxman 11-26-2012 Kenneth Anderson is professor of law at Washington
College of Law, American University Matthew Waxman is a law professor at Columbia Law School, “Human Rights Watch Report
on Killer Robots, and Our Critique” http://www.lawfareblog.com/2012/11/human-rights-watch-report-on-killer-robots-and-ourcritique/
At a more fundamental level than any of these specific differences, though, our view is that autonomy
in weapons
systems will develop very incrementally. Instead of some determinate, ascertainable break-point
between the human-controlled system and the machine-controlled one, it is far more likely that the evolution of
weapons technology will be gradual, slowly and indistinctly eroding the role of the human in
the firing loop. As to a preemptive prohibition on developing such systems (distinct from deploying
them), even if it were desirable, the technologies at the heart of such weapons are
fundamentally the same as at the heart of a wide variety of civilian or non-weapons military
systems, and weapons systems will frequently be so interwoven into the machine system as a
whole that disentangling what’s prohibited and what’s not, and at what point in the path of
weapons development, will not be feasible.
Midterms
trade d
Econ’s resilient—global governance works
Daniel W. Drezner 12, Professor, The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Tufts
University, October 2012, “The Irony of Global Economic Governance: The System Worked,”
http://www.globaleconomicgovernance.org/wp-content/uploads/IR-Colloquium-MT12-Week5_The-Irony-of-Global-Economic-Governance.pdf
Prior to 2008, numerous foreign policy analysts had predicted a looming crisis in global economic
governance. Analysts only reinforced this perception since the financial crisis, declaring that we live in a “G-Zero” world.
This paper takes a closer look at the global response to the financial crisis. It reveals a more optimistic
picture. Despite initial shocks that were actually more severe than the 1929 financial crisis, global
economic governance structures responded quickly and robustly. Whether one measures results by economic
outcomes, policy outputs, or institutional flexibility, global economic governance has displayed surprising
resiliency since 2008. Multilateral economic institutions performed well in crisis situations to
reinforce open economic policies, especially in contrast to the 1930s. While there are areas where governance has either
faltered or failed, on the whole, the system has worked. Misperceptions about global economic governance persist
because the Great Recession has disproportionately affected the core economies – and because the efficiency of past periods of
global economic governance has been badly overestimated. Why the system has worked better than expected remains an open
question. The rest of this paper explores the possible role that the distribution of power, the robustness of international regimes, and
the resilience of economic ideas might have played.
Even the worst-case scenario is pretty bland
Ikenson, 9 – associate director for the Center for Trade Policy Studies at the Cato Institute
(Daniel, “A Protectionism Fling: Why Tariff Hikes and Other Trade Barriers Will Be ShortLived,” 3/12, http://www.freetrade.org/pubs/FTBs/FTB-037.html
Although some governments will dabble in some degree of protectionism, the combination of a
sturdy rules-based system of trade and the economic self interest in being open to participation
in the global economy will limit the risk of a protectionist pandemic. According to recent estimates from the
International Food Policy Research Institute, if all WTO members were to raise all of their applied tariffs to
the maximum bound rates, the average global rate of duty would double and the value of global
trade would decline by 7.7 percent over five years.8 That would be a substantial decline relative to the 5.5 percent annual
rate of trade growth experienced this decade.9¶ But, to put that 7.7 percent decline in historical perspective, the
value of global trade declined by 66 percent between 1929 and 1934, a period mostly in the wake
of Smoot Hawley's passage in 1930.10 So the potential downside today from what Bergsten calls "legal
protectionism" is actually not that "massive," even if all WTO members raised all of their tariffs
to the highest permissible rates.¶ If most developing countries raised their tariffs to their bound rates, there would be an adverse
impact on the countries that raise barriers and on their most important trade partners. But most developing countries that have room to backslide (i.e.,
not China) are not major importers, and thus the impact on global trade flows would not be that significant. OECD countries and China account for the
top twothirds of global import value.11 Backsliding from India, Indonesia, and Argentina (who collectively account for 2.4 percent of global imports) is
not going to be the spark that ignites a global trade war. Nevertheless, governments are keenly aware of the events that transpired in the 1930s, and
have made various pledges to avoid protectionist measures in combating the current economic situation.¶ In the United States, after President Obama
publicly registered his concern that the "Buy American" provision in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act might be perceived as protectionist
or could incite a trade war, Congress agreed to revise the legislation to stipulate that the Buy American provision "be applied in a manner consistent
with United States obligations under international agreements." In early February, China's vice commerce minister, Jiang Zengwei, announced that
China would not include "Buy China" provisions in its own $586 billion stimulus bill.12 ¶ But even more promising than pledges to avoid trade
provocations are actions taken to reduce existing trade barriers. In an effort to "reduce business operating costs, attract and retain foreign investment,
raise business productivity, and provide consumers a greater variety and better quality of goods and services at competitive prices," the Mexican
government initiated a plan in January to unilaterally reduce tariffs on about 70 percent of the items on its tariff schedule. Those 8,000 items,
comprising 20 different industrial sectors, accounted for about half of all Mexican import value in 2007. When the final phase of the plan is
implemented on January 1, 2013, the average industrial tariff rate in Mexico will have fallen from 10.4 percent to 4.3 percent.13 ¶ And Mexico is not
alone. In February, the Brazilian government suspended tariffs entirely on some capital goods imports and reduced to 2 percent duties on a wide
variety of machinery and other capital equipment, and on communications and information technology products.14 That decision came on the heels of
late-January decision in Brazil to scrap plans for an import licensing program that would have affected 60 percent of the county's imports.15¶
Meanwhile, on February 27, a new free trade agreement was signed between Australia, New Zealand, and the 10 member countries of the Association of
Southeast Asian Nations to reduce and ultimately eliminate tariffs on 96 percent of all goods by 2020.¶ While
the media and members
of the trade policy community fixate on how various protectionist measures around the world
might foreshadow a plunge into the abyss, there is plenty of evidence that governments remain
interested in removing barriers to trade. Despite the occasional temptation to indulge
discredited policies, there is a growing body of institutional knowledge that when people are free
to engage in commerce with one another as they choose, regardless of the nationality or location of the other parties,
they can leverage that freedom to accomplish economic outcomes far more impressive than
when governments attempt to limit choices through policy constraints.
Uniqueness
The economic strategy will be successful for Dems
Williams, 9/29/14 --- author and political analyst for Fox News Channel (Juan, “Juan Williams: Economy
could tip election to Dem s,” http://thehill.com/opinion/juan-williams/219140-juan-williams-economy-could-tipelection-to-dems, JMP) One of the biggest surprises on the midterm campaign trail is hearing President
Obama echo President Reagan’s famous question by asking voters whether “you are better off than
you were four years ago.” The question is the hammer in Obama’s toolbox for nailing
down his Democratic majority in the Senate in this year’s midterm election. “By almost every
economic measure, we are better off today than we were when I took office,” the president said in
a Sept. 19 speech to the Women’s Leadership Forum, sponsored by the Democratic National Committee. Speaking to a Labor Day
rally of union workers in Milwaukee, he also pointed to America’s improved economic performance over the last five years. “You
wouldn’t know it from watching the news,” he lamented. In fact, Reuters
recently confirmed the president’s
upbeat claims. The news agency reported that, however slow, the economic recovery has lasted longer than
average. The report adds, “There seems to be more gas in the tank. The International Monetary Fund expects the U.S. economy to
grow 3 percent next year and in 2016. On Obama’s watch, 5.1 million jobs have also been added to payrolls, the S&P/Case-Shiller
national home price index is up about 17 percent and the S&P 500 stock index has more than doubled while hitting all-time records.”
There are more hard facts to bolster the president’s economic case. A Kiplinger’s economic
outlook from this month is full of good news.
The economy “looks better than was previously thought,” Kiplinger reports, “setting the stage for
more sustained growth in coming months.” The unemployment rate has been lower over the last five months than at
any point in the last five years, dropping to 6.1 percent in August. The Dow Jones industrial average is hovering around its all-time
high, now regularly closing at over 17,000 points. Consumer confidence in August also rose to its highest point in almost seven
years. This, in turn, is key to consumer spending, which is the biggest part of the economy. Is all the good economic news helping
Democrats with the voters? Not really – or, at least, not yet. RealClearPolitics has 55 percent of Americans disapproving of the
president’s handling of the economy, to only 40 percent approving. Democrats
must get voters to turn that
negative economic view around. This month, a CBS/New York Times poll indicated that the economy is the No. 1 issue
to voters. A September Gallup poll similarly found that, other than “dissatisfaction with government,” the top concern is “the
economy in general.” With all the good statistics, why does America’s kitchen-table assessment of the economy remain glum?
Perhaps because median household incomes fell by more than $2,100 in Obama’s first term, according to the Census Bureau.
Sagging wages have created lingering discomfort and anxiety. Democrats
running for Congress are reminding
voters of the GOP’s lack of interest in boosting wages for working people. The GOP has turned
back efforts to raise the minimum wage and to invest in infrastructure. Democrats also point to
the House GOP’s denial of extended unemployment benefits for the long-term jobless. Republicans,
meanwhile, are promising that, if they take total control of Congress, they will boost the economy by cutting Wall Street regulation.
They also plan to fight new rules from the Environmental Protection Agency and support oil and gas exploration. Speaker John
Boehner (R-Ohio) handed ammunition to the Democrats this month when he said some Americans have “this idea” that, instead of
finding a job, “I think I’d rather just sit around.” Before Congress left for the campaign trail, the party race to win voters, stressed out
over low pay, turned into an unusual fight over the Export-Import Bank. The bank was reauthorized for only nine months. But first,
small-government Republicans — with the Club for Growth and Heritage Action support — pushed to kill the bank, blasting it as an
example of “crony capitalism” and the big government “picking winners and losers.” That divided the GOP because the GOP-leaning
Chamber of Commerce is supporting the bank. It points to “thousands of businesses” that risk failure without the bank. The New
York Times reports that the bank is a key issue, a “wild card” in North Carolina, Iowa and Louisiana Senate races. “Our candidates
have been leaning heavily into this and this really goes to the heart of making the economy work,” a Democratic Senatorial
Obama is on to something. If the midterms
turn into a referendum on which party to trust to boost middle-class wages, look
for Democrats to hold the Senate.
Campaign Committee spokesman told the Times. President