Uruguay votes to legalize marijuana sale & growth
The lower house of Uruguay's legislature voted by majorityto allow the cultivation and sale of marijuana.
A vote by their senate to approve is pending
and should occur later this year.
Currently, consumption of marijuana Is legal in Uruguay,
which sort of sets up a conflicting situation.
Those who legally smoke the herb,
have to commit a crime in order to obtain the herb.
This has enhanced the growth (pun intended) of organized crime.
Instead, Uruguay wants to regulate the growth & sale.
It is proposed that only people age 18 and over will legally be able
to get the herb at the pharmacy at a price much cheaper than can be
gotten illegally.
They feel this will help drive the drug cartels out of business
and if this is successful that other South & Central American
countries will follow this lead and do the same.
Here the original CNN story
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THIS JUST IN
Uruguay sees enormous spike in tourism interest - airlines buy more planes to cater to the huge influx of hippie mungbeans flying in from all over the world. Parliment too stoned to care.
So, view this and what happens in Uruguay as a test. If it works you may see a similar de-criminilization push here in the US. Quite simply Uruguay had indeed been fighting the drug war in the traditional US directed way, but there were growing body counts and before they slid into the Hell experienced by Columbia and Bolivia and Mexico, they decided to try a different way. Power to them.