Meanwhile here in Colombia prohibition reaches its height and any cannabis user must suffer with the risk of incarceration, low quality and criminaity associated with ilegality. We envy you Canadians
1
Well done Canada.
Now don't over tax the product. Don't be greedy and exploitive.
Be happy doing the right thing by your citizens.
Hey 'merica…are you watching?!
C'mon, get a clue and step up~!
6
Having imbibed as a young man, I now ask why? Drunk, stoned and/or both basically was an escape from my being in control of my mind and reality experience, which in retrospect, was otherwise fine. Just say no Dude, just say no.
2
@Logic: Reality is not everybody's cup of tea.
2
Logic,
Many think partaking of The Green enhances the experience and gives one a different perspective and outlook. Which also is otherwise fine.
Just say freedom and choice.
6
Yes for all world lovers of drugs and alcohol, first is recreational marijuana, followed by recreational heroin and recreational cocaine. Is there anything better we can create for the decency and morality of our children?
3
manoflamancha,
How about tolerance and acceptance of others and their choices.?!
Parents modeling said behavior for their children would go a long way to decency and morality wouldn't you say?!
6
@manoflamancha: Is waging a War on Drugs and criminalizing the smoking of cannabis a better plan?
6
Nice article. I was just in Toronto and there were tons of bud and breakfasts to stay in. I found one thru a site called budandbreakfast.com They had an ounce waiting for me when I arrived. It was fabulous!
3
I've long thought that if I ever return to North America, I'd live in either Mexico or Canada.
Canada just pulled ahead.
8
Prohibition, whether cannabis, cigarettes or alcohol, is counterproductive at best and criminalizes a great many people for no good reason. So Canada's decriminalization of cannabis possession is just common sense finally dawning. The Mayor Toronto got it right when he said it will be important to carefully monitor the impacts of the change of legal arrangements, as these impacts could wide-ranging, positive and negative. The only important concern should be that where there is good reason to believe it could impair public health and safety, those uses be restricted by law, just as we have laws all over the continent about drinking and driving, smoking in restaurants, etc.
Whether or not it is good for one's health is a separate matter that needs to be dealt with through public education and fiscal disincentives, to the extent the practice imposes burdens on taxpayer-funded or insurance-premium funded health-care systems; in the case of cigarettes, specific taxes and insurance premiums having smokers' rates arguably pay for the costly health consequences of smoking.
4
Two questions:
1) Will Canada be setting aside part of the marijuana revenue stream to deal with unanticipated social expenses? I worry about private organizations and individuals reaping the profits while society bears the costs.
2) Do they have an exit plan if this does not work out so well?
2
@S Baldwin: The society already bears the cost of alcool and tobacco and the private sector is reaping huge benefit in your and my country.
7
@S Baldwin
Thanks for your questions.
The federal government has committed money to education, but not “social expenses.” But the majority of the tax money collected will go to provinces and each will decide how to allocate that separately. Many have not detailed how they will spend the money yet, and many expect to lose money over the first few years, setting up the system. As for your second question, there is no exit plan, although an editorial in today’s Canadian Medical Association Journal calls for just that if the rate of cannabis use rises.
1
Hurrah for Canada!
Now that cannabis has been legal in California for almost 2 years, my smoking habits have not changed. I've smoked pot, on and off, for over 50 years. During that time, I became a CPA with a Masters in Taxation. I have found that pot, unlike alcohol, is not a highly sociable drug. It is also not a drug in which some, if they've imbibed 'too much' get belligerent and/or start fights. So, I wouldn't worry about the Canadian's behavior. Heck, if they're polite when they drink their beer, they won't be any more annoying while stoned on pot, which they're already smoking.
BTW, legalization has not changed fro whom I buy my weed.
29
The Cruzer,
Really?~! Not sociable?
Hmm... never found that to be the case.
Sharing a bowl and passing the joint around the circle has been a rite since grade school.
But yes, I do find myself partaking solo also.
Time and place and setting eh?!
I'll blaze a bowl and tip the hat for your NYT Pick.
Well done.
3
@Dobby's sock
Unfortunately (sort of), I cannot partake, as I am in Santiago, Chile. FWI, every Sunday young Chileans gather in the park near my hotel and protest marijuana laws while rapping in circle, smoking schwag. I didn't smoke, but I bought and ate some laced cornbread . . . no effect noticed.
Thanks for the tip o' the hat!
Giving Canadians choices...and their alcohol lobby apoplexies.
1
@European American - As it happens, we don't have an alcohol lobby because the provincial governments (like states) have a monopoly and sell booze through crown corporations.
12
A great day for Canada. A new multi-billion dollar, transformative, 'legal', cutting edge industry is born, creating thousands of Canadian jobs, fostering innovation, boosting economic growth, and producing billions in tax revenue. That's what you call win-win.
17
This article's tagline states that: "On Wednesday, after 95 years of prohibition, the country will become the second in the world (after Uruguay) to legalize cannabis"
But just to note that, so far as I know, South Africa officially legalized it a few weeks ago.
11
@Shelley,
Yes they did...this past September 18th. Data bases accessed through Google Search have yet to catch up.
"South Africa’s top court unanimously...upholding a lower court’s decision ruling that it was “unconstitutional and therefore invalid” to criminalize the drug..."
Bloody priceless that...
15
@European American
..."unconstitutional and therefore invalid"..
Hmm..., I’ve never thought about it from that angle before now.
Given his lack of education and experience, legalizing cannabis was the key promise on which Justin Trudeau cound bank when he ran for office: and it's the only one he managed to respect. Decriminalizing would have been a far superior option, but it would have been too subtle for him to understand and explain.
He is therefore throwing the whole country into a social experimentation that we could have done without. That's what happens when a prime minister is elected only for his good looks and empty statements.
5
@FSt-Pierre
Nobody should get a permanent criminal record for smoking pot. Imagine if everybody who ever smoked it went down to the police station and confessed.
I know cops, judges, prosecutors, doctors, lawyers, dentists, accountants, business people, clergy, cabinet ministers and other politicians etc etc who have smoked it
Hardly social experimentation when anyone who wants it can easily get it and have been getting it for years. Legalization removes the bad guys, collects the takes and keeps it from kids. Very sensible public policy.
Like in Colorado, Washington and Alaska. Three great states.
PS Trudeau has been an MP for 4 terms and grew up with heads of state at his dinner table
33
@FSt-Pierre It turns out having a father who was a long serving Prime Minister, visiting a hundred countries, and honing those much maligned skills of passing on knowledge to the next generation (ie. Teaching!) --- creates the right combination needed for inclusive, progressive, leadership.
Oh yea....Obama was also a teacher.
18
@FSt-Pierre
It's an insult to the population of Canada that you accuse them of voting based on good looks. Maybe you would rather live someplace where the majority of the people feel the same way you do.
As for pot, I bet after the initial celebrations and media coverage (don't let it frighten you), that sales taper off. When it's not illegal, young people won't be rebelling against their parents (who secretly smoked it) anymore.
14
The federal and provincial governments have had years to prepare for this, and they have models for how it needs to be regulated in places like Colorado, yet the roll out is a disjointed disaster.
Only in BC is there any sanity; in Ontario, the original nanny state, you see the screaming paradox of something being made legal but effectively unobtainable, and don’t get me started on the People’s Republic of Québec.
Moreover, as someone who works for the federal government in a regulatory department I see near panic as departments struggle to set up for a product that combines the challenges of cigarettes and alcohol.
The people are ready; the government is not.
17
It's been more or less legal here during my entire lifetime. Buying pot meant talking to a classmate and handing over $10 for a gram in Grade 9. Easier than buying alcohol or cigarettes. The only thing that will change are the rules acknowledging use and the products on offer.
17
@M. S.
I concur. The practical difference in use and availability may be small. Removing risk of criminal prosecution, double-standards in enforcement of existing prohibitions, and preventing the enormous illegal profits from accruing to organized crime are big pluses.
But I nevertheless worry about the minority of people for whom marijuana use becomes chronic and life-damaging, and using gambling as an example we can be sure the government will become addicted to their income stream from taxing pot, and set aside only window dressing funding for the collateral damage of overuse.
Hopefully Canadians are sensible enough to realize that not all things are the same for all people, marijuana like alcohol is an intoxicant probably best left alone by many.