AN IDEA WHOSE TIME HAS COME

This week Richard Lee of Oaksterdam University announced that he has
gathered over 680,000 signatures to place an initiative to legalize,
tax, and regulate marijuana on the November 2010 ballot:

The petition drive, which was run by a professional
signature-gathering firm, collected more than 680,000 signatures, 57%
more than the 433,971 valid signatures needed to put it on the
ballot, said Richard Lee, the measure's main proponent.

"It was so easy to get them," Lee said. "People were so eager to sign."

The initiative would also allow cities and counties to adopt their
own laws to allow marijuana to be grown and sold, and the localities
could impose taxes on any aspect of marijuana production and sales.
It would make it legal for adults over 21 years old to possess up to
an ounce of marijuana and to grow it in a 25-square-foot area for personal use.

Because this particular initiative creates a "local option" for
taxation, on top of a statewide legalization, it is hard to quantify
exactly how much money this would raise.Initiative proponents cite
the Legislative Analyst who says it could generate up to $1.4 billion
in new revenue, in addition to an unknown but likely significant
amount of savings in prison and court costs.

Although some other legalization initiatives are floating around out
there, this is the only one that's expected to make the 2010 ballot.
And despite some earlier debate over whether 2010 or 2012 was the
best time to go the ballot, other marijuana legalization advocates
plan to support this initiative fully and work to pass it. They may
be joined by the rest of the state:

Polls have shown that a majority of California voters support
legalization. A Field Poll taken in mid-April found that 56% of
voters in the state and 60% in Los Angeles County want to make
legalize and tax pot as a way to help solve the state's fiscal
crisis. In October, a poll taken by a nonpartisan firm for the
Marijuana Policy Project found 54% support in the county.

A poll taken for the initiative's proponents by EMC Research, an
opinion research firm in Seattle, found that 51% of likely voters
supported it based on language similar to what will be on the ballot,
but support increased to 54% when they were read a more general synopsis.

Those numbers are no slam dunk. But they also show that this is
clearly an idea whose time has come. California has proven that the
costs of the war on drugs are unacceptably high, and that we need to
bring that stupid and pointless conflict to an end before it
bankrupts the state.

There's still 11 long months to go between now and the November 2010
election. But I'm hoping that Californians are ready to take the
national lead in legalizing and taxing marijuana as part of a more
rational and sensible approach to drug policy, prison reform, and the
budget crisis.