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U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions will reportedly rescind the Cole Memo (DoJ), effectively ending the moratorium on enforcing cannabis prohibition in states where it has been legalized:
Attorney General Jeff Sessions will roll back an Obama-era policy that gave states leeway to allow marijuana for recreational purposes.
Two sources with knowledge of the decision confirmed to The Hill that Sessions will rescind the so-called Cole memo, which ordered U.S. attorneys in states where marijuana has been legalized to deprioritize prosecution of marijuana-related cases.
The Associated Press first reported the decision.
Sessions, a vocal critic of marijuana legalization, has hinted for months that he would move to crack down on the growing cannabis market.
Republican Senator Cory Gardner says he will hold up the confirmation process for DoJ nominees:
Sen. Cory Gardner (R-Colo.) threatened on Thursday to start holding up the confirmation process for White House Justice Department nominees unless Attorney General Jeff Sessions reverses a decision to roll back a policy allowing legalized recreational use of marijuana in some states.
Gardner said in a series of tweets that Sessions had told him before he was confirmed by the Senate that he would not change an Obama-era policy that discouraged federal prosecutors from pursuing marijuana-related offenses in states where the substance had been legalized. Colorado is one of those states.
[...] The Justice Department's reversal of the Cole memo on Thursday came three days after California's new law allowing recreational marijuana use went into effect.
Other politicians have reacted strongly to the news.
Previously: New Attorney General Claims Legal Weed Drives Violent Crime; Statistics be Damned
4/20: The Third Time's Not the Charm
Jeff Sessions Reboots the Drug War
According to Gallup, American Support for Cannabis Legalization is at an All-Time High
Opioid Commission Drops the Ball, Demonizes Cannabis
Recreational Cannabis Goes on Sale in California
Related: Attorney General Nominee Jeff Sessions Backs Crypto Backdoors
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 04 2018, @10:24PM (33 children)
It's so stupid how Congress has utterly given up its responsibilities by deferring everything to the executive branch, leaving the President and his minions to dictate our lives with the stroke of an individual's pen.
Well, I'm glad Sessions and Trump have been dismantling those executive "laws", because it's finally putting fire to the feet of the politicians who have been mandated to make those decisions through the slow, difficult-to-reverse process of legislation.
Get the executive branch OUT of lawmaking. Make America Great Again!
(Score: 3, Funny) by DeathMonkey on Thursday January 04 2018, @10:35PM (15 children)
Make America Great Again!
Sorry, I don't think we're allowed to make Obama president again.
(Score: 3, Funny) by bob_super on Thursday January 04 2018, @10:44PM (14 children)
Obama had to deal with too much shit. Can we get the Clinton years back?
"Blockchain" is already the new ".com", after all.
(Score: 2, Disagree) by DannyB on Thursday January 04 2018, @10:45PM (3 children)
I never dreamed, in my worst nightmares that I would say this, but . . .
I would be GLAD to have George W Bush back at this point.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Thursday January 04 2018, @10:53PM (2 children)
I wouldn't.
Trump is an idiot, but he hasn't started 2 wars yet. He's working on the deficit and trouncing US international standing, like W.
But Trump wasn't handed a US at peak power and turned it into a declining empire. A self-centered ignorant fool, not a crazy destructive maniac ...
Looks good for the R side, doesn't it? Comparing the last two presidents from each side...
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 04 2018, @11:40PM (1 child)
By work on the deficit - you mean making a massive increase in the deficit right?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by bob_super on Thursday January 04 2018, @11:45PM
Obviously, as a parallel to W turning budget surpluses and shrinking debt (bipartisan-voted, Clinton-signed) into deficits, even before he started his two unbudgeted wars...
The same people who were hollering at Obama's Keynesian stimulus in the midst of the Great Recession just voted a $1,500,000,000,000.00 extra-deficit tax plan.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 04 2018, @11:42PM (9 children)
Really? That's what you want?
More of Slick Willie's Neoliberalism?
Bill Clinton's Five Major Achievements Were Longstanding GOP Objectives [googleusercontent.com] (orig) [truth-out.org]
To find someone that wasn't Neoliberal, you'd have to go back to LBJ--or to Ike (see graphic link, below), just to be sure.
Now, it would have been interesting to see where Jack Kennedy would have taken US if he hadn't gotten his head blown off by the CIA.
OTOH, that trust-fund baby had already signed a giant tax cut for the super-rich. [aquilafunds.com]
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Thursday January 04 2018, @11:51PM (2 children)
Hell, I'd probably be a Republican by now if they hadn't been hijacked by the nutjobs.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 05 2018, @01:08AM (1 child)
There are only 2 kinds of people who vote for Repugs:
The rich and the stupid who will vote against their own best interests.
For over a century, the mantra of the GOP has been
"Make the rich richer and screw everyone else in order to do that."[1]
N.B. Ike was a temporary stay from that.
(His brother Edgar was a full-on Reactionary.)
[1] The GOP has learned to include enough red herrings in their platform to hornswoggle the gullible (abortion, immigration, guns).
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 05 2018, @02:40AM
How the GOP Tax Cut Will Also Shrink Your Paycheck (while making the rich richer) [alternet.org]
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by bob_super on Friday January 05 2018, @12:01AM (3 children)
Let's be reasonable, shall we? The world has changed a bit since LBJ, 50 years ago. Would you like to #MAGA, too?
While some of Clinton' policies have the consequences we know (hindsight blah blah), I wouldn't mind to get back to a world where everybody respects (didn't say "likes") the almighty-imperfect-but-mostly-benevolent-when-benefitting US, and the biggest distraction to watching people's income AND assets go up is whether the smooth guy in charge banged an ugly girl.
The late 90s weren't perfect, but they sure beat the 21st century...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 05 2018, @01:19AM
Yeah, like I said: It's become more Neoliberal.
Apparently, you like good manufacturing jobs being exported.
Clinton'[s] policies
The big giant one was NAFTA.
Did I mention jobs being exported?
{checks} Yeah, I just did.
(The place where I was working sent all product lines that weren't DoD-related to Tijuana.)
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 05 2018, @05:00AM (1 child)
Great, more DMCA bullshit, drug wars, and interventions overseas. Why do you want that neoliberal back? The interventions were obviously unjust even back then, so it isn't just hindsight.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 05 2018, @06:31AM
The alternatives then (as now) were right-wing and ultra right-wing. Yeah, given those possibilities he went right-wing. There is no liberal party in the USA even though the population overwhelmingly prefers liberal policies... gays, drugs, healthcare, etc.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Friday January 05 2018, @07:10PM (1 child)
Jimmy Carter came before neoliberalism really took over the Democratic Party - that was Bill Clinton's doing more than anyone else (with his homie Al Gore's help).
The Republicans aren't neo-liberal, though, they're neo-conservative. The difference is what they do on hot-button social issues (e.g. abortion) while they're being bagmen for the super-rich.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 05 2018, @08:13PM
Carter deregulated interstate trucking and telecommunications.
Carter was a serious inflection point.
Nixon's trip to China opened a major door for offshoring.
I associate Neoconservatism with Imperialism and Militarism.
"World Policeman" is a major subheading.
"Regime change" is another.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by DannyB on Thursday January 04 2018, @10:38PM (2 children)
You must mean stroke of an individual's crayon.
Of course, when the shoe is on the other foot, then executive orders are a good thing. Just sayin'. And I'm no fan of Trump.
Congress cannot take up their responsibilities because they are too busy with fundraising from wealthy donors.
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(Score: 4, Interesting) by AthanasiusKircher on Friday January 05 2018, @02:41AM (1 child)
Absolutely not. There actually are some of us out here who believe in things like separation of powers and in Constitutional limitations, regardless of who is in office. For example, I actually think we need more gun regulation, but I also believe the Second Amendment was likely intended to prohibit some of the kinds of regulation I think should happen. So, I believe we need a Constitutional amendment to do what I think would be good. (And no, please let's not get into an off-topic debate on guns -- I'm just trying to make a point as an example.)
Executive orders, from my perspective, should only ever be made as clarifications of regulation under existing law (i.e., the idea of Executive as implementing law given to it by the Legislature), generally under implementation decisions explicitly left to the Executive by Congress, not as effectively creating new law.
History taught the Founders of the problems that arose when too much power is concentrated in the Executive... or in the government in general. Those who have studied things like the gradual decline of the Roman Republic and its ultimate transformation into a dictatorial empire can easily see parallels to what has happened, particularly in the past 75 years or so. We're on a bad path: one that the Founders tried desperately to try to prevent in the way they set up the system.
It doesn't matter which party you belong to... people should be concerned about this.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Friday January 05 2018, @02:07PM
Yes.
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(Score: 4, Informative) by takyon on Thursday January 04 2018, @10:54PM (6 children)
Congress did very little on this issue before the Cole memo. They passed the Rohrabacher-Farr amendment [wikipedia.org] after the Cole Memo.
Maybe there will be enough pressure for Congress to take this seriously. But the rescindment doesn't help. It just hurts businesses in the states that have legalized cannabis by murking things up. It would have been fine to let the states lead the way. In fact, Trump said during the campaign that he believed [wikipedia.org] states should have the right to decide their own cannabis policies. But after being elected he signaled [bloomberg.com] that he could ignore the Rohrabacher-Farr amendment passed by Congress (every year). In no way has Trump done a "great" thing for America with this move.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 4, Insightful) by realDonaldTrump on Thursday January 04 2018, @11:14PM (1 child)
It's not me, it's Jeff. I really don't care if you kids smoke your pot. I think it's a bad habit. We all have bad habits. Are we babies? We're not babies. Trust me, I have some bad habits of my own. Which, believe me, you don't want to know about. But Jeff has a thing about pot. Which I knew about when I hired him.
Let me tell you, Jeff was very loyal to me at one time. At a very important time. When a lot, a lot of people were saying I would lose. Saying I would never be elected. But little Jeff believed in me. He had a big job in the Senate, but he took time to go to my rallies. To stump for me. Very loyal! So I hired the little guy, even though we don't always see eye to eye. Imagine my surprise when he RECUSED himself! I wanted to fire him for that. But my lawyers, some of my lawyers, told me not to. So we're all stuck with him.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Thursday January 04 2018, @11:55PM
That McDonald's addiction is more of a moral failing than any substance abuse problem!
(Score: 5, Interesting) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday January 04 2018, @11:39PM (3 children)
Funny, this is one of the few things I think he actually did right. The executive branch has no business deciding which laws it will and won't enforce. Selective enforcement of the law is tyranny, plain and simple.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by dry on Friday January 05 2018, @05:48AM (2 children)
It's also tyranny to enforce an immoral, unconstitutional law that neither the courts nor the legislature will take the correct step to strike it from the books.
There is also the question of where resources should be spent. Here, many moons ago, the cops literally said they aren't going to enforce non-profit copyright infringement as they had better things to do with their time. Now they have the same attitude to drugs, at least where I live.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday January 05 2018, @12:25PM (1 child)
Yes, it is. Fortunately there are multiple, entirely legal methods of removing said law.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by dry on Friday January 05 2018, @05:58PM
Unluckily there is a flaw in democracies, namely that 51% can vote to remove rights from the 49%. This is why some countries have a bill of rights in their Constitutions. Unluckily, you can't list all the rights and some were never dreamed of being needed. I'd say that the idea that the government would ban hemp was never imagined and if it was, it may have been added to the bill of rights.
(Score: 1) by insanumingenium on Thursday January 04 2018, @11:27PM (6 children)
Wait a second, law enforcement is the very definition of what is correctly in the hands of the executive branch. Congress can't nor should they take that from them. Are you a troll, or did you skip the checks and balances portion of highschool civics?
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 05 2018, @12:09AM (5 children)
We,, unfortunately this is why prohibition must be enforced, because it is still the law. Double unfortunate is that the courts didn't find all the federal anti narcotics laws unconstitutional, because they are! The prohibition against liquor required a constitutional amendment, the drugs laws should also if they want to ban them. So we have situation with unconstitutional law, and a majority of voters who don't give a damn. IOW we are fucked! Majority rule has reached its logical conclusion. Now we need something completely different. Something where individual liberties can not be taken away by popular whimsy.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 05 2018, @12:20AM (1 child)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarchy [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 05 2018, @02:48AM
Or we could have a constitutional republic to make arbitrarily taking away people's rights more difficult at least, but good luck getting the government to follow the Constitution.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by AthanasiusKircher on Friday January 05 2018, @02:52AM (2 children)
Yeah, SCOTUS used to find such things unconstitutional -- for decades such laws were repeatedly overturned, until the "Switch in Time that Saved Nine." (For those who don't know what I'm talking about, I've traced the history of this fundamental legal shift -- why alcohol required an amendment but drugs don't -- here [stackexchange.com].)
It's important to note that the Founders also were largely afraid of democracies. They knew the ancient and early modern precedents for democracy, and they tried to design a system that gave individual voters only a very limited voice in the federal government. (The original Constitution basically only asked for input from voters for the House of Representatives -- and even then, in many states it was mostly only landed "heads of household," sort of similar to the heads of the "demos" that represented the voice of the people in Athenian democracy. Supreme Court judges were appointed. Senators were elected by state legislators. Presidents were elected by the Electoral College, whose representatives were appointed in a manner set by the states -- and most states in early elections didn't even bother holding popular votes for the presidency. Electors were often appointed by state legislatures, governors, or some combination thereof.)
So "majority rule" (or "mob rule" as some of the Founders would have termed it) was not the way the system was originally designed. But over the years we've modified things to increasingly emphasize popular voice, something that came about largely through the influence of political parties that sought to exploit the will of the masses.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 05 2018, @07:37AM (1 child)
Just wondering... that Constitution thing you're talking about, was that passed down in stone tablets or OMG! voted on by the mob?
(Score: 4, Informative) by AthanasiusKircher on Friday January 05 2018, @01:13PM
The Constitution was never voted on by popular vote, if that's what you're asking in your flippant reply.
It was drafted by representatives from states and then approved by state conventions of representatives, never voted on by everyone (or even by all white male landowner head of households). The Founders didn't even want to subject that to direct democratic vote: they believed, as in the examples I mentioned previously, that the uninformed masses can be too easily swayed by misleading rhetoric. So they left the matter to representatives of the people to vote on: representatives who could take time to become truly informed on a matter of such importance and who could take time to have lengthy public debates (which went on for months in some States) before making an informed decision.
And there were vigorous ratification debates in many states, mostly about the sweeping powers perceived to be given to the new federal government. In many states, the Consitutition was only approved for ratification after being assured that the Bill of Rights amendments would soon follow to constrain federal power significantly.