Would dispensaries on every street corner go up in smoke? Earlier this week, the Trump administration revealed its Marijuana Policy Committee, in which the administration would work with federal agencies to find ways to “prevent Americans from having access to the drug”.

“It’s a big step towards the prohibitionist status quo that we were in prior to the [President Barack] Obama years. It’s not a step back [in the sense that] we’re not behind where we were in the 1930s, but we’re moving closer to where we were in the 1930s.-Justin Strekal, political director for National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML)

As if going back to the pre-choom-errr-Obama years would be a bad thing?

“Clearly, under the Department of Justice under the leadership of Jeff Sessions and the Trump administration at large, have many leaders who are still suffering from ‘Reefer Madness’ prohibitionist era rhetoric. Even coming out and publicly spreading things that are patently false is going to possibly curb the momentum that we have seen play out through the states and the explosion of public support that we have. Marijuana policy should not be characterized as a partisan issue, and unfortunately under a Republican administration, if they choose to make support for reform become a partisan issue, then it’s going to hurt them politically.”-Justin Strekal

The sky is falling, dude! Trump wants to take America back to the “prohibitionist era” and wants to grab your weed! Americans across the aisles argue for the use of medical marijuana with cancer patients and individuals with other chronic illnesses who may benefit. This an argument I can get behind. But, a billboard for recreational weed on every corner? A dispensary at every traffic light? It is a bit much:

As a Washington State resident, I can attest to dispensaries for recreational marijuana not having much of a benefit. While Inslee says we have “great weed”, we have seen an influx of people who have moved to Washington because of the relaxed pot laws. They can get their blends, their brownies, whatever the heck else they get at these shops and unwind after a stressful work week. As more dispensaries pop up in my neck of the woods, we also see an increasing number of homeless encampments in residential areas. When more homeless encampments pop up in these residential areas, we see more thefts, more undesirable debris hanging around (I have found crack pipes, needles and used condoms in the parking lot of a local shopping center) and in general, more crime. The increase in crimes due to the legalization of pot. News reports will push this under the carpet. They will tell you that statistics of teenagers using marijuana is down since its legalization. Of course they will. They will tell you violent crime is down. But thefts in our neighborhoods? Ask anyone on my street who has a Ring security system!

And while democrats will say the Trump administration is waging war on weed, I happen to think it is for a good reason. As a child, I have witnessed addiction in my family. It started innocently enough with pot and graduated to cocaine and when cocaine got too expensive, my uncle moved on to heroin which eventually killed him. The normalization of marijuana-glamorized on billboards and attractively packaged at legal weed shops are enough to desensitize a young adult into thinking the practice of smoking pot isn’t such a big deal. Perhaps it isn’t…until one does enough of it and is in a constant stoner stupor and suddenly, pretty much nothing is that big of a deal.

But yeah, go on, Salon. The evil “Nazis” are coming after your weed. Because having a bunch of people stoned all of the time is not a step backwards? The world is ending. Better hide your kush and stock up on the Funyuns.

Photo: https://stuffstonerslike.com/is-president-trump-coming-for-your-weed/