What I gather from reading your reply is "We are all better off with less liberty than more."
if that is all you took away from my posts, then i'd say you need to work on your reading comprehension. though we must be willing to give up some amount of total liberty to coexist within a society, it is never a good thing to be forced to do so. this isn't about surrendering our liberty, it's about
regaining it and, in so doing, advancing all our liberties. it is about reinforcing the concept of the self-ownership, something we have been increasingly willing to abdicate to the state for quite some time. every day we see the public less prone to trusting itself, insisting that government determine the proper course for our lives, and this is the path we must alter in order to regain the path toward the liberty of the individual.
it isn't that your aim is altogether faulty. you merely suffer from the same childish impatience that is so prevalent among modern liberals. you don't seem to understand that no one simply arrives at a destination, no matter how important that destination might be. the goal is not just to legalize a harmless and beneficial plant, it is to free us all from the natural tyranny of the state. this can't be done through legislation alone, but demands the steady loosening of the regulations that bind us and enslave us to the state. it takes the somewhat radical shift in our outlook away from dependence on laws and toward the more natural reliance on the responsibility of the individual. such a shift does not and should not happen overnight, but by gradual stages that allow the people to acclimatize themselves to this new environment.
And I should say that given a choice for a corporation to make money off cannabis I'd rather see the people do it.
your words here come straight from the playbook of institutionalized populism, a mindset that seems custom made to ensure our division and subservience to the true elite - the political class. what is a corporation, after all, but a group of individuals banded together to succeed within the private sector. it is as much a part of "the people" as you or i. it is as subject to the forces of the marketplace and the whims of government regulation as the rest of us. successful corporate entities and the wealthy may be better prepared to guard against the vagaries of the marketplace and even able to influence the onerous regulations of a power mad bureaucracy, but the violent force of government is not available to them as it is to the state. demanding that they be handicapped to make up for their advantage is not a victory for "the common man", it is a victory for the power of the state that we demand enforce those handicaps.
the inanity of your position is made all the more evident in the other thread you started, where you advance the proposition that we can somehow legalize this happy little plant for the people and not allow business a place at the table. just who do you think these "evil" business owners are? they are the people. just because you don't number yourself among them, doesn't mean that they should not have all the same rights that you propose for "the little guy". what you want is not progress, it is a return to the mom and pop stores and the elimination of the mass marketing that is a natural progression from those beginnings. you simply can't turn back the clock because our present circumstances are uncomfortable for you. any attempt at legalization must take into account our present situation, not cater to an idealized past. warehouse stores, mass marketers and conglomerates are a reality you can't ignore. while specialty and "boutique" stores certainly must and will have their place, demanding that those with the advantage of accumulated capital be handicapped will only assure further delays in the process of legalization.
RESPECT to all.