by Doug French, Mises Institute
Thousands lined up to purchase recreational marijuana legally at 12:01 a.m. on July 1. At Euphoria Wellness, with a location in southwest Las Vegas, a crowd of 400 to 500 people were lined up at midnight. Other locations had just as many.
Among the first to purchase was state senator Tick Segerblom, who has a strain of weed named after him: โSegerblom Haze.โ The senator tweeted that he believed the state would rake in a million dollars in tax money this first weekend. Judging from the lines out the doors at dispensaries in just my neighborhood, I donโt doubt his projection.
Even with it being a scorching 107 degrees this afternoon, Las Vegans were waiting patiently in the sun to go up in smoke.
Theย Las Vegas Sunย reports, โDestiny Diaz stood in line for nearly three hours at the Jardin Premium Cannabis dispensary in central Las Vegas to celebrate what some were calling the end of marijuana prohibition in Nevada.โ
โA local resident for 35 years, [Steve] Evans, 54, said he arrived just before 7:30 p.m. and that the nearly five-hour wait Friday night was the longest he had been away from his home in over eight years.
โโI want an ounce of Gorilla Glue 4, and then Iโm going home to sink into the sofa and be with my wife,โ Evans said, referring to one of the dispensaryโs best-selling marijuana flower strains. โPretty simple.โโ
It turns out the reality of supply, demand and the tax man bites for medical users. โPaul Pastwa, a medical marijuana cardholder who said he shops at Jardin twice a week, complained that a half-ounce of marijuana flower climbed from $60 to over $100 for medical buyers since he last shopped at the dispensary,โ writes Chris Kudailis. โWe understood that recreational buyers would have to pay more, but not medical,โ Pastwa said. โMy price has doubled overnight.โ
Adam Denmark Cohen, Jardin’s owner, โsaid he was forced to raise prices because of a state-mandated increase in marijuana wholesale distribution taxes for shipment of items from cultivation and production facilities to dispensaries.โ
Theย Sunย reports that Essence Cannabis Dispensary saw 1,200 customers at its two locations early this morning. Local laws allowed dispensaries to be open from midnight to 3 a.m., but then had to close until 6 a.m. As an aside,ย Sunย newspaper CEO Brian Greenspan owns a portion of Essence. Marijuana licenses went to the politically connected, not necessarily to those with expertise in the business.
All this reefer madness is happening after Attorney General Jeff Sessions sent aย letterย to Mitch McConnell, Paul Ryan, Nancy Pelosi, and Chuck Schumer voicing the Department of Justiceโs opposition to anything that would โinhibit the DOJโs authority to enforce the Controlled Substances Act (CSA).โ
The attorney general claims marijuana use has โsignificant negative health effects,โ including the loss of IQ points, which is funny coming from a guy, who claims โmarijuana has a high potential for abuse [and] no currently accepted medical treatment in use in the United States.โ He evidently hasnโt readย this articleย from the Business Insider listing 23 health benefits of marijuana.
But, Sessionsย contends, โGood people donโt smoke marijuana.โ
As Mark Thornton wrote forย mises.org, โAttorney General Sessionsโs argument really does not make any sense. Legalized marijuana greatly reduces the size of the illegal drug market and the violence it causes, both by eliminating the illegal marijuana market and by encouraging producers and consumers to switch from hard drugs such as heroin, cocaine, and crystal meth to marijuana/cannabis which is non-addictive and non-lethal.โ
The out of touch Sessions told a crowd in Arizona, โWhen they nominated me for attorney general, you would have thought the biggest issue in America was when I said, โI donโt think Americaโs going to be a better place if they sell marijuana at every corner grocery store.โ โ
โ[People] didnโt like that; Iโm surprised they didnโt like that,โ he added.
When in 1986 the Senate Judiciary Committeeย rejectedย the nomination of Sessions to be a Federal district judge in Alabama, Mr. Sessions apologized for once saying he had thought members of the Klu Klux Klan โwere O.K. until I found out they smoked pot.โ
AG Sessions, the war is over. The government lost, and has decided to take the money.
This post was originally published at Mises.org and is reposted here under aย CreativeCommons, Non-Commericial 3.0 license.
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