610. Who Wins and Who Loses Once the U.S. Legalizes Weed?

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Documentary, Society & Culture

4.6 • 32K Ratings

🗓️ 7 November 2024

⏱️ 43 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Some people want the new cannabis economy to look like the craft-beer movement. Others are hoping to build the Amazon of pot. And one expert would prefer a government-run monopoly. We listen in as they fight it out. (Part four of a four-part series.)

Transcript

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0:00.0	In the recent election, it seemed as though the two parties disagreed on just about everything.
0:10.0	Economic policies and tax policies, immigration and abortion, the wars in Russia and the Middle East, even garbage.
0:19.0	If this left you feeling exhausted and dispirited
0:23.2	and looking for even one sliver of unity,
0:27.3	we are here to help.
0:29.2	I think what's fascinating is that Americans,
0:31.7	Democrat, Republican, Independent are all supportive
0:34.7	of seeing major cannabis change.
0:38.2	And why does everyone support major cannabis change?
0:42.3	You know, cannabis is quite popular.
0:44.3	It's polling at 64%.
0:45.9	Politicians typically don't take strong positions on things that are so popular.
0:50.9	The popularity of cannabis these days is significant in terms of public support for
0:56.0	legalization, in terms of the number of daily users. Cannabis is even popular among some public
1:01.9	health officials who see it as a way to reduce the harms of alcohol. But as we've been
1:07.4	exploring in this series, there are a lot of problems.
1:13.9	The cannabis economy is a mess.
1:18.1	We are way behind with research into the drug's potential risks,
1:21.5	especially the risks of the most concentrated forms of the drug.
1:28.1	And there are inconsistencies and contradictions in how individual states have rolled out legalization?
1:32.5	All these problems can be traced back to two central facts.
1:36.5	Number one, cannabis is still illegal on the federal level.
	...

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