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US Republican states. It's not just cannabis prohibition. 2022 Global Cannabis March and 420 map.
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See article with these photos. See videos too. For more photos see: Flat list of event graphics and photos. Alphabetical order by city. There are many more images there than are shown below. Click Full site for images below.
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News. Sources. GMM Facebook. 2022 GMM. Ballotpedia: marijuana and minimum wage. US Congress could legalize or deschedule adult-use cannabis at the federal level if the Republican filibuster was gone. Do not vote for US Senate candidates that support the filibuster. [21].   Republican states. It's not just cannabis prohibition. Note high rates in Republican south   Sao Paulo, Brazil. June 11, 2022. [12][13] 21 June 2022. Mississippi Supreme Court Upholds Life Sentence for Weed Possession. 2.5 ounces. 3 prior felony convictions. None involved actual violence against people. Mississippi is a Republican state. 3rd highest incarceration rate in the world behind Louisiana and Oklahoma. All 3 are far higher than the US as a whole. US has highest rate among countries.
  Sens. Kyrsten Sinema and Joe Manchin could save abortion rights but ... they won't.
Multi-city 420 lists
18 Apr 2022: Legalizing marijuana lowers demand for prescription drugs, study finds. "The reductions in drug utilization that we find could lead to significant cost savings for state Medicaid programs."   Mitch McConnell. More info. 26 Mar 2022: Mitch McConnell’s Confederate Flag Photo Resurfaces as He Announces He Will Oppose Ketanji Brown Jackson’s Supreme Court Confirmation. [39][40] [41][42]. The Republican roots of the racist drug war go all the way back to President Nixon. See: Race, ethnicity, and drug war.
25 Mar 2022: Native Americans Are Operating New York State’s First Legal Cannabis Dispensaries.      Life expectancy vs healthcare spending. US wastes so much money. Source.   16 Mar 2022: Delaware. Cannabis legalization backers question ‘suspicious’ amendments before bill fell short in house vote. [43]. Republicans actually lost this vote. But their anti-democracy rule killed the bill: "The three-fifths vote is required on legislation that raises revenues."  8 Mar 2022: Virginia Bill to Allow Marijuana Resentencing Killed by Republicans.
4 Mar 2022: Upstate New York’s Cayuga Nation expands its legal marijuana business. Several of the state’s Indian nations sell cannabis.  25 Feb 2022: Louisville family held at gunpoint during botched SWAT marijuana raid settles lawsuit for $460K. Some of these cops were later involved in the Breonna Taylor killing.
9 Feb: Ohio. Proposal to legalize marijuana faces yet another roadblock in Senate Republican leader.      
Today: Google News search: Republicans refuse to get vaccinated. The Covid pandemic would be over by now in the US if not for the lies of the Republican echo chamber. Unvaccinated Republicans are dying in droves.
19 Dec 2021: Straight out of Inwood: ‘Legacy’ New York City pot dealers going legit — ‘We got that good work. The best of the best.’   Philippines. Proposed bill to produce and export medical cannabis. Tax the rich! End drug war! The drug war is a control tool of the Republican Party. Nov 2021: 40 under 40 Outstanding BIPOC leaders in Drug Policy - SSDP. BIPOC stands for "Black, Indigenous, and People of Color". SSDP = Students for Sensible Drug Policy.
20 Nov: Oregon raid seizes an epic amount of illegal marijuana. 500,000 pounds. [64][65].   Putin's prisons in Russia. Almost as bad as Syria's torture death camps.  
10 Nov 2021: Senator Warren presses Biden on pardons for nonviolent cannabis convictions. Article: The letter cites the Democratic primary debate in November 2019, during which Biden laid out his views on marijuana reform. "Number one, I think we should decriminalize marijuana, period," Biden said at the time. "And I think everyone — anyone who has a record should be let out of jail, their records expunged, be completely zeroed out."
5 Nov 2021: Australia. Mathias Cormann calls for fossil fuel subsidies to be abolished. And: World spends $423 billion a year to subsidize fossil fuels.
4 Nov: 5 more drug convictions tied to corrupt Chicago cop vacated. 110 convictions vacated so far. Ongoing investigation into more cops. Prison terms already served by some cops.
2 Nov 2021: Judge throws out man’s guilty plea after bodycam footage reveals New York City cop planting cannabis in cupholder of car of a couple of color. Racist prosecutors delayed releasing footage. Cop had done this before. Calls for prosecuting the cop.   28 Oct: Here’s how Biden’s Build Back Better framework would tax the rich. [70]. "The IRS would hire enforcement agents trained to pursue wealthy tax evaders, ... It estimates these measures would raise $400 billion over 10 years."
27 Oct 2021: Private Prison Operator GEO Group Must Pay Inmates Minimum Wage, Jury Rules.
25 Oct 2021: BBC UK. Minimum wage for 23 and above to rise to £9.50 an hour ($13 an hour). [76]. "Independent experts maintain there has been little or no evidence of job losses as a result of rising minimum wage levels."
21 Oct 2021: New York employers are banned from testing most workers for marijuana.
 
US Republicans Voted Often to Kill Coverage of Pre-Existing Conditions. [82][83][84]. Medicare spends less than 2 percent on bureaucracy. 1.4% to be exact. See chart. We need Medicare for All. Nearly a third of our health care dollars go for something other than health care. Health insurance companies, for example. See also: See: More News. And: Cannabis is safer. CannabisVoter.info - Click your state to see which anti-cannabis Republicans to vote out.
The drug war is a control tool of the Republican Party. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Henrik Vanger: "Isn't it interesting how fascists always steal the word 'freedom'?" Real democracy is ranked-choice voting (instant-runoff). And: Remove Presidential veto power. 2022 Global Cannabis March and 420 map. Event links: 2022 talk. & Main talk. US Republican states. It's not just cannabis prohibition. This news feed may have long lapses. Full site / Mobile. To Top or End. News & 2022 GMM & Categories.
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Top
- Share links: drugwar, massincarceration, and majority. This article was written by Timeshifter. See charts and maps. See also: Drug War, mandatory minimum sentencing, handguns. And: Republican-led drug war.
| How the war on drugs affected incarceration rates. By Lauren Carroll, July 10th, 2016. Politifact.
The war on drugs led to "a 500 percent increase in incarceration in our country, disproportionately affecting poor and disproportionately affecting minorities." — Cory Booker on Sunday, July 10, 2016 in an interview on "Meet the Press".  |
Incarceration Nation.. By Fareed Zakaria, Time magazine, April 02, 2012. "America's War on Drugs Drives High Incarceration Rates."
Mass imprisonment of drug users driving global epidemics of HIV, hepatitis, and tuberculosis. 14 July 2016. The Lancet. "In parts of Europe, over a third of inmates inject drugs (38%), in Australia (55%) it is more than half. This is in stark contrast with injecting drug use in the general population (0.3% in EU and 0.2% in Australia)." Many users steal in order to get money for drugs. Thus they end up in jail in high numbers, contributing to mass incarceration.
| Drug war + Trickle-down Reaganomics, = mass incarceration and mass control. |
| See article: Trickle-down economics plus drug war. |
| The majority of people incarcerated in prisons and jails in the USA are in due to drug-related offenses, crimes to get money for drugs, or drug-related parole or probation violations. Wikipedia: Drug-related crime. The number of inmates in the USA has increased almost 5 times over since 1980. It peaked in 2008. Obama's Democrat landslide in 2008 turned the incarceration rate around. But the USA still has the highest incarceration rate of any nation (b c). The cost of the U.S. drug war is at least 1.5 trillion dollars. Cannabis is safer! Share link. |
- See also: Drug war charts and maps. And: Brutality and the drug war.
Emphasis added to the quotes.
- Prisons & Drug Offenders | Drug War Facts.
- Drugs and Crime Facts. U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics: "In 2004, 17% of state prisoners and 18% of federal inmates said they committed their current offense to obtain money for drugs. In 2002 about a quarter of convicted property and drug offenders in local jails had committed their crimes to get money for drugs, compared to 5% of violent and public order offenders. Among state prisoners in 2004 the pattern was similar, with property (30%) and drug offenders (26%) more likely to commit their crimes for drug money than violent (10%) and public-order offenders (7%). In federal prisons property offenders (11%) were less than half as likely as drug offenders (25%) to report drug money as a motive in their offenses."
Let us not forget about the astronomical increase in the number of correctional officers, too. 469,500 in 2012. See: Correctional Officers : Occupational Outlook Handbook : U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. US incarceration peaked in 2008.
489,000 in 2013 (see chart below). For drug offenses alone.
Need to add in drug-related burglary, robbery, murder, etc..
All to get drug money, defend turf, etc..
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Obama helped turn around the Reagan-Bush War on Pot, mandatory minimums, mass incarceration. See: US incarceration peaked in 2008.
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USA: Peak of 7.3 million people in 2007 under adult correctional supervision: On probation or parole, or incarcerated in jail or prison. About 3.2% of the U.S. adult population, or 1 in every 31 adults. More info here. See template.
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In 2009 26.4% of those in federal and state prisons, or on probation or parole, were in due to drug offenses. Jail numbers are not included below. 
How it happened
Chart below covers prison inmates only. See also: timeline combining prison and jail inmates.
Chart source: The Score: Why Prisons Thrive Even When Budgets Shrink. In The Nation. By Mike Konczal and Bryce Covert, September 24, 2014. Quote below from article (emphasis added):
Explosion in incarcerations since the 1980s. Under the "war on drugs," aggressive policing drove up the percentage of those in state prisons for drug offenses from 6.4 percent in 1980 to 22 percent in 1990. More minor drug charges made it easier for prosecutors to push felony charges by citing a defendant’s prior record. These convictions triggered harsh sentences under new guidelines like California’s "three strikes" law, passed during the same period. The enforcement of these punitive new laws was, and remains, racist: according to the ACLU, black people are 3.73 times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession than whites, though they are equally likely to use. This, in turn, makes black people vulnerable to the rest of the criminal-justice system.
See also: commons:File:U.S. incarceration rates 1925 onwards.png.
| The drug war is a big cause of the high US incarceration rate. Also, the rest of the developed world has much lower rates of handgun ownership, and much lower murder rates. They never reached the levels of violence the USA did due to handguns and drug war. So they never had the clamoring of the far-right National Rifle Association (NRA) demanding mandatory minimum sentencing. Canada and Europe have long had much lower incarceration rates, better healthcare, and far fewer and shorter sentences for marijuana offenses. |
U.S. statistics for drug-related homicides are very inadequate.
- Drug Related Crime [86]. March, 2000 article. Office of National Drug Control Policy. Article quote (emphasis added):
Why Statistics on Drug-Related Crime are Difficult To Interpret: Homicide as an Example. ... The FBI does not include as drug-related a murder that occurs during a robbery or a burglary committed by someone under the influence of drugs or a murder that occurs during a robbery committed to obtain money to buy drugs. In these cases, the homicide is recorded by its relationship to the most serious offense only, and robbery and burglary are more serious than drug trafficking in the FBI offense classification and in most State laws. Thus, current FBI homicide information may not categorize a large number of drug-related murders as so related.
- Drugs and Crime Facts. U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics. Has drug-related homicide chart from 1987-2007, with rates of 3.9% to 7.4% for drug-related homicides. "The Uniform Crime Reporting Program (UCR) of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) reported that in 2007, 3.9% of the 14,831 homicides in which circumstances were known were narcotics related. Murders that occurred specifically during a narcotics felony, such as drug trafficking or manufacturing, are considered drug related."
- OPED: War Won't Solve the Drug Problem. July 15, 1999. Washington Post. By Rob Stewart, of the Drug Policy Foundation. "In 1988, just over half of the murders in the city [New York City] were 'drug-related.' But once the researchers examined the circumstances of the murders, they discovered that the clear majority, 74 percent, were results of the drug trade, not drug use (14 percent) or the need to get money for drugs (4 percent)."
- The 50 Most Violent Cities In The World. (On one page). Nov. 10, 2014. By Pamela Engel and Christina Sterbenz. Business Insider. "US cities also made the list, led by Detroit at No. 24 and New Orleans at No. 26." And Baltimore at 36, St. Louis at 45.
Minor parole and probation violations
20 Jun 2019: One-quarter of state prison admissions are for minor parole and probation violations, report finds. The Washington Post.
Cash bail. Innocent people in jail
- The Bail Trap. By Nick Pinto. Aug. 13, 2015. New York Times.
Drugs and probation violations
- Probation and Bail Violations :: Providence Probation Attorney Joseph Lamy. From the article:
| Another difficulty for defendants charged with a probation violation is that the condition “to keep the peace and be of good behavior” is ambiguous and open to interpretation. For example, you are arrested for marijuana possession and are also charged with a violation of probation. Even if the marijuana possession charges are dismissed, you may very likely be found to have violated probation. Why? Because a judge can be “reasonably satisfied” that you were not of good behavior if you were even near drugs or someone who had drugs or involved in any incident that caused the police to be called. |
Parole violations and drugs
16.1% of parole violators returned to state prisons in 1997 for drug related violations; for failing drug tests, possession of drugs, failing to report for drug testing, failing to report for alcohol or drug treatment. Info is from Table 21 (below) of the PDF for this report: Trends in State Parole, 1990-2000. NCJ 184735. October 2001. U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics.
See image info.
Sentence length. Incarceration rate
| Federal mandatory minimum sentencing charts. |
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First mandatory minimums chart below is from an older FAMM report, "Correcting Course: Lessons from the 1970s Repeal of Mandatory Minimum Sentences". FAMM is Families Against Mandatory Minimums. [87]. See Wikipedia: Mandatory minimums. The Fair Sentencing Act of 2010 increased the amounts of crack cocaine required to trigger 5 and 10 year sentences. [88]. See revised charts since then. Share link to this page. For charts of all federal mandatory minimums (not just for drug offenses), go here. Later chart with revisions, such as the amount of crack cocaine required for various sentences: |
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American Exception. Inmate Count in US Dwarfs Other Nations'. April 22, 2008. New York Times. Page 1, section A, front page. Archive. From the article (emphasis added):
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November Coalition graph. Some Congressmen and police who prosecuted the War on Drugs now believe it caused a large increase in the United States incarceration rate. See Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, and larger chart with sources. See template. Incarceration peaked in 2008. |
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- 2003. Federal Judge Quits, Calls Judicial System Unjust. Associated Press (AP) story, National Public Radio interview, and Judge John S. Martin's statement. "The result, he said, is a slew of lengthy prison sentences for low-level drug dealers 'who society failed at every step.' ... While many judges have criticized sentencing guidelines, it is unusual for a judge to publicly cite the frustrations of the job in stepping down." -June 25 2003 AP story. See also: Let Judges Do Their Jobs. By Hon. John S. Martin Jr..
- Dissenting Opinions of Judges, Federal Drug Sentencing, Mandatory Minimum Sentences. A list of many articles by judges. At November Coalition.
Mandatory minimum sentences
| Some people don't know that the National Rifle Association had a large part in causing the huge increase in the U.S. incarceration rate. The NRA strongly lobbied state-by-state for mandatory minimum sentences (also known as "Truth in Sentencing"), and "Two and Three Strikes" laws. Mandatory-minimum sentences, and long sentences in general (compared to other nations), are the root cause of the astronomical US incarceration rate according to a New York Times article. The majority of people incarcerated in the U.S. are in prison or jail due to drug-related offenses, crimes to get money for drugs, or drug-related parole or probation violations. |
See Wikipedia: Mandatory sentencing. See also this page. Mandatory Minimum sentencing is often used for non-violent crimes such as drug possession. It is a modern-day way to create concentration camps for drug-using "undesirables." Sentences that usually do not allow parole until at least around 80% of the sentence served. Federal laws, and most states, have mandatory minimums. The majority of U.S. prisoners are in due to the drug war in some way or another.
See Wikipedia: War on Drugs, and Wikipedia: Sentencing Reform Act.
Life for pot
- See main article: USA. Life for pot. See also: Number of marijuana prisoners in the USA.
- Life in prison for selling marijuana: Meet the people new pot laws forgot. MSNBC. 8 Sep 2015. [89][90]. "At least 67 people are in prison right now, sentenced to die there for selling marijuana". And: LifeForPot.com. And: POW420.com also lists some cannabis lifers. Facebook: Life for Pot. And: Life In Prison For Pot And Other Travesties Of Marijuana Prohibition. 4 Sept. 2014. Forbes.
- Jeff Mizanskey, life without parole: Missouri man freed after spending two decades in prison for marijuana charge. 1 Sep 2015. Guardian. [91]. And: Grandpa Doing Life Without Parole. [92][93]. Nazi Republican prosecutor.
- Saudi Arabia beheads 4 for pot. [94][95][96][97]. Religious Right: Supported Life for Pot. [98][99][100]. Republican Speaker of the US House of Representatives Newt Gingrich proposed a law that would execute people for 2 ounces of marijuana.
- Life for Pot Prisoner Larry Duke Released! [101][102][103][104][105][106][107][108].
Cannabis arrests
Sources for marijuana arrest numbers by year:
- Commons:File:US Cannabis Arrests.svg - see sources and data table below the timeline chart.
- Percent distribution of arrests for drug abuse violations. By type of drug, United States, 1982-2009. Sourcebook of criminal justice statistics Online.
- See also: Wikimedia Commons:Category:Cannabis arrest statistics.
http://norml.org/share/marijuana_arrests_chart.gif
http://www.norml.org/share/marijuana_arrests_chart500_short.gif
Nixon and Reagan. War on Drugs
Nancy and Ronald 6 Wilson 6 Reagan 6 riding the drug war Beast in 1986. Note Nancy's "Just Say NO" sign. Larger image.
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Drug War Invented by Nixon to Extend His Power. By Fintan O'Toole. Aug. 13, 1999. Irish Times.
In June 1971 Richard Nixon declared a "War on Drugs."
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| Tricky Dick Nixon (above) has won his drug war! The Prison-Industrial Complex. A Nixonian "enemies list" that almost everyone is on at some time. |
Bush. Huge drug war escalation
- 2nd nationwide televised Bush speech on drugs on September 12, 1989: Quote from speech:
Some think there won't be room for them in jail. We'll make room. We're almost doubling prison space. Some think there aren't enough prosecutors. We'll hire them, with the largest increase in Federal prosecutors in history.
- Life sentence for buying weed? 25th anniversary of Papa Bush's War on Drugs escalation speech on September 5, 1989. The first prime time address of his presidency. Result: Life for pot.
Propaganda of incarceration nations
- Reagan's war on cannabis is where the U.S. incarceration nation began. Number of marijuana prisoners in the USA: 40,000+ in 2011. All drug offenses: 489,000 in 2013.
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Ronald Reagan, 1980 campaign speech: "Leading medical researchers are coming to the conclusion that marijuana, pot, grass whatever you want to call it, is probably the most dangerous drug in the United States, and we haven't begun to find out all of the ill effects, but they are permanent ill effects. The loss of memory for example." -
Obama helped turn around the Reagan-Bush War on Pot, mandatory minimums, mass incarceration. See: US incarceration peaked in 2008.
Propaganda of incarceration nations. Reaganism is about drug war, code-word racism, hate radio, mass incarceration, and above all, trickle-down economics (Reaganomics).
| Drug war + Trickle-down Reaganomics, = mass incarceration and mass control. |
| See article: Trickle-down economics plus drug war. |
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Nancy Reagan and Ronald Reagan of the USA. The "Just Say No" campaign.
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Joseph Stalin of the Soviet Union.
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See Wikimedia Commons: Category:Government propaganda. Note the "glorious mission" or "glorious war" nature of much propaganda. Like the Republican-led Holy War, the "War on Drugs". See Wikipedia: War on Drugs. It is really a war on some drug users. This particular glorious war was reinvigorated by the cult leaders, Ronald and Nancy Reagan. The B-movie actor Ronald (6) Wilson (6) Reagan (6) is still worshiped like a God (or idol) by some segments of the Republican Party.
Welcome to America
| "Welcome to America, home to 5% of the world's people & 25% of the world's prisoners." NAACP, ACLU File Lawsuit Against City of Philadelphia for Rejecting Criminal Justice Reform Ad. Article by NAACP. Lawsuit filed October 19, 2011 during the period of the Occupy movement. Also see the ad banner article by Courthouse News Service. The drug war and prisons are big business, and a big part of how the 1% controls the 99%. See Facebook comments about the banner. The Republican Party leads the racist drug war.
Incarceration peaked in the USA in 2008. <<--See that article for sources, stats, and charts for the banner. Most inmates are incarcerated due to the drug war.   Image info. See billboard and stats. |
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| Chart below is from a July 2000 report: |
 From this July 2000 report: Poor Prescription: The Costs of Imprisoning Drug Offenders in the United States. From the report: "Nearly one in four persons (23.7%) imprisoned in the United States is currently imprisoned for a drug offense. The number of persons behind bars for drug offenses (458,131) is roughly the same as the entire prison and jail population in 1980 (474,368)." |
The forever drug war
US Republican states. It's not just cannabis prohibition. US Taliban Republicans. Their cannabis war.
Republican gerrymandering and filibustering will allow the cannabis war to go on forever. At least in US Republican states. The US Congress could legalize or deschedule adult-use cannabis at the federal level if the Republican filibuster was gone. So do not vote for US Senate candidates of either party that support the filibuster. [109].
See Wikipedia: Gerrymandering.
Nixon's racist drug war
Republican President Richard Nixon (in office January 20, 1969 – August 9, 1974) initiated the militant racist tone of the forever drug war.
The Republican Party has used its Drug War as a 50+ year distraction. All to serve the rich. See: Republican President Nixon's drug war against blacks and hippies. See Wikipedia: War on drugs. See Race, ethnicity, and drug war. See Wikipedia: Southern Strategy - Keeping poor whites and blacks fighting against each other, instead of the real enemy: rich Republican tax evaders. See Wikipedia: Nixon's Enemies List, of journalists, actors, union leaders, etc. who expose it all. A GOP playbook that has never ended, and played out yet again by billionaire Trump until he was dumped in 2020. |
This quote from Nixon aide John Ehrlichman (in 1994) is from an April 2016 Dan Baum article in Harper's Magazine: Legalize It All. How to win the war on drugs. Quote: "The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did."
See: CNN info. See article: Nixon's drug war against blacks and hippies.
US Republican states
See Wikipedia: List of state parties of the Republican Party (United States).
See article: US Republican states. It's not just cannabis prohibition. And: Cannabis war. Part of Republican war on poor. And: US Taliban Republicans. Their cannabis war. And: NRA drug war. US National Rifle Association. And: Happy alternatives to US Republican-led poverty, mass incarceration, food insecurity, debt, ill health, intense concentration of wealth, endless wars. And: USA. The state of the nation.
| Mostly in U.S. Republican states. |
| Percent of adults with overdue debt in collections. By county. See map. |
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| See Wikipedia: Firearm death rates in the United States by state. And CNN: States with weaker gun laws have higher rates of firearm related homicides and suicides, study finds. |
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| Wikipedia: List of U.S. states and territories by incarceration and correctional supervision rate. Map is for sentenced state prisoners only. No Federal or local jail inmates. See map. |
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Republican minimum wages
Why do US Republican leaders hate Americans? Why won't they raise the US federal minimum wage above $7.25? 62% in US support a $15 federal minimum wage. Stop voting in Republicans if you don't want the low minimum wages found in Republican states.
| 7 Oct 2021: Reallocation effects of the minimum wage. "In January 2015, Germany introduced a uniform minimum wage of €8.50 [$10 an hour today]. ... boosted wages of low-wage workers, did not lower employment, and induced a reallocation toward more productive establishments." 11 Jan 2022: Minimum wage in Germany to be raised once again in 2022. |
| US minimum wage peaked in 1968 in inflation-adjusted dollars. $13.16 in 2022 dollars. [110]. See chart. |
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Cannabis is safer.
Return to top. See article: Cannabis is safer.
Vote out most US Republicans and their cannabis war.
16 Dec 2019: Majority Of Americans Support Marijuana Legalization, Two More New Polls Show. "Voters who supported President Trump in the 2016 election expressed greater opposition to the policy than Republicans and Republican-leaning independents as a whole."
| 2 May 2019: Time to Admit It: Trump Opposed Cannabis Legalization. He opposed 3 bills for veterans’ access to medical cannabis. |
23 Feb 2019: Trump Continued to Flip-Flop on Medical Marijuana.
See: Reagan's war on cannabis. And: Holy War on Drugs, Conservative-led global incarceration.
| Ronald Reagan, 1980 campaign speech: "Leading medical researchers are coming to the conclusion that marijuana, pot, grass whatever you want to call it, is probably the most dangerous drug in the United States, and we haven't begun to find out all of the ill effects, but they are permanent ill effects. The loss of memory for example." |
Share link: Obama.
- Obama correctly said that cannabis is safer than alcohol. See: Cannabis is safer. He also said marijuana should be treated more as a public health issue than a criminal one. And: Obama signals support for legalizing medical marijuana. [111]. See video.
- USA. 1 in 10 deaths of working-age adults are alcohol-related (disease, overdose, car crashes, falls, violence, etc). 87,798 per year, 2006 to 2010. [112][113][114][115][116].
See longer article: Cannabis is safer.
- Imagine if Mitt Romney had been elected President in 2012 instead of Obama.
- Obama on marijuana legalization. [117]. "My suspicion is that you’re gonna see other states start looking at this". The Washington Post. Jan. 22, 2015.
Above quote is from Sanjay Gupta interview of Obama on April 15, 2015. Interview aired on CNN on April 19, 2015. [118][119][120].
- Obama administration asks Supreme Court to reject lawsuit filed by Republican governments in Oklahoma and Nebraska to stop legal marijuana in Colorado [121]. December 2015.
 Obama helped turn around the Reagan-Bush War on Pot, mandatory minimums, mass incarceration. See: US incarceration peaked in 2008. |
- Holder's Legacy: Steering Away From the Drug War and Mass Incarceration. [122]. Attorney General Eric Holder (2009-2015) under President Obama. 25 Sep 2014.
Register and vote for cannabis.
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Today's far-right Republicans
US Republican states. It's not just cannabis prohibition. See also: Happy alternatives to US Republican-led poverty, mass incarceration, food insecurity, debt, ill health, intense concentration of wealth, endless wars.
News: Americans want universal healthcare and progressive taxation.
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11 Aug 2021: Billionaires worldwide gained $5.5 trillion during pandemic. [123]. Hunger. [124]. Wealth inequality at levels not seen since just before the Great Depression. Republican tax cuts for the rich. Record low inflation-adjusted US federal minimum wage. [125].
$70 billion to end pandemic
- 11 Aug 2021: Article. "The world’s 2,690 global billionaires saw their combined wealth rise from $8 trillion on March 20, 2020 to $13.5 trillion as of July 31, 2021, ... The cost of vaccinating the world’s adult population was calculated as follows: two doses at $7 per dose for 5 billion people, for a total of $70 billion."
- 12 Aug 2021: One-off emergency tax on billionaires’ pandemic windfalls could fund Covid-19 jabs for all and cash grant to all unemployed workers.
Mask mandates work
29 Aug 2021: CDC: An Unvaccinated Teacher Took Off Their Mask to Read Aloud. Half the Class Got COVID.
28 Aug 2021: Do face masks work? Here are 49 scientific studies that explain why they do.
Note the high death rates in the Republican south. At the source you can hover cursor over states to see stats: Map of cumulative COVID-19 death rates by US state. See also: Commons map.
GOP taxes screw middle class
Trump signed tax law that gave 83% of benefits to the top 1%.
Republican filibuster equals
- The evil history of the US Senate filibuster, or why the US no longer has simple majority rule. [126]. See Wikipedia: Filibuster.
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US voter suppression
20 Oct 2021: Senate Republicans use filibuster to again block sweeping voting rights bill.
Republicans have disenfranchised black, brown, and poor white people via "The New Jim Crow"; the drug war and mass incarceration. See: Holy War on Drugs, Conservative-led global incarceration.
Black votes matter.
High US taxes on poor
The forever war on the poor. Republican filibuster says to Americans: "Heads we win, tails you lose." Democracy? What democracy?
When Democrats have the majority, the Republican minority uses the filibuster to block higher taxes on the rich, and to block lower taxes on the middle class and poor. When Republicans have the majority they use budget reconciliation to use their simple majority to lower taxes on the rich, and increase user fees, sales taxes, and other regressive taxation to increase taxes on the poor and middle class.
This is the whole purpose of the US Republican Party. To serve the rich. Period.
Minimum wage workers crushed while serving the Republican low-tax-paying rich:
And on US middle class
Chart below. 2017 Republican tax and individual mandate repeal bill. Yellow is for an average increase in cost for people in those groups. Higher costs hitting more people each year. Up to incomes of $75,000.
| Republican tax bill hurts the poor more than originally thought, Congressional Budget Office finds. | "By 2019, Americans earning less than $30,000 a year would be worse off under the Senate bill, CBO found. By 2021, Americans earning $40,000 or less would be net losers, and by 2027, most people earning less than $75,000 a year would be worse off. On the flip side, millionaires and those earning $100,000 to $500,000 would be big beneficiaries". |
| 2 polls: Only 29% of Americans approve of Republican tax plan. 2. | |
Low US minimum wage
Return to top. See: More inequality charts.
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2 Jul 2019: There’s More Evidence That Raising the Minimum Wage Won’t Cost Jobs.
High wealth inequality
See Wikipedia: List of countries by wealth per adult. The average median wealth per adult for Canada ($125,688) is much higher than that of the USA ($79,274). US middle-class wealth has collapsed. [128]. See chart below. Median wealth is exactly in the middle. 50% of adults have more, and 50% have less. Wealth is all assets (money, stocks, property, etc.) minus all debts.
| Median wealth per adult. Credit Suisse. 2021 report. Country links are to Wikipedia articles. Click red column headers to sort. Link. |
per adult.
US dollars
Chart. USA. 1989-2018. Top 1% Up $21 Trillion. Bottom 50% Down $900 Billion. And:US middle class wealth collapsing. [129]. And: 5 Oct 2017: Nine Charts about Wealth Inequality in America (Updated). And: Just 8 men own same wealth as half the world. And see Wikipedia: Wealth in the United States.
Republicans started wars that wasted $8 trillion [130] on ground wars (some based on Bush/CIA lies about weapons of mass destruction). Instead of paying higher minimum wages. As Canada does. See: Wikipedia: List of minimum wages by country.
Low quality of life
Germany has a much lower murder rate than the USA. Also, Germany has better health indicators, and its healthcare cost per person is half US cost (all costs, public and private).
High household debt
Return to top. See Wikipedia: Household debt.
US household debt at all time high. Chart below is from the PDF.
Total household debt. From 1st quarter 2003 through recent times.
Total Household Debt by Type:
- Click to enlarge. Timeline is by quarters.
High US medical debt
Return to top. See: Canadian single-payer universal healthcare versus US healthcare.
This doesn't happen in Canada, due to single-payer universal healthcare: US. 34 Devastating Stories About How People Are Still Crushed By Medical Debt. By Venessa Wong, Jan 17, 2019. BuzzFeed News.
High student loan debt
- Student Loan Debt by State. Map, table, and article.
- Student Loan Debt Statistics: 2022. U.S. student loan debt totals $1.75 trillion as of April 2022.
Public elementary and secondary school in the USA costs an average of $14,891 a year per student in taxes. The money spent between the ages of 16 to 18 could be set aside for 2 years of full-board-and-tuition college. Look at Scotland: Adult at age 16. Scotland. What can I do at my age? And: Age of Legal Capacity (Scotland) Act 1991. And: Wikipedia: Education in Scotland: "In 2014, research by the Office for National Statistics found that Scotland was the most highly educated country in Europe". See: Wikipedia: Age of majority (by country). Wikipedia: Voting age.
Punitive bankruptcy law
- No Fresh Start: Will States Let Debt Collectors Push Families Into Poverty In The Wake of a Pandemic? US map with state-by-state grades on the fairness of bankruptcy laws. "NCLC surveys the exemption laws of the 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands. Sadly, not one jurisdiction’s laws meet basic standards so that debtors can continue to work productively to support themselves and their families."
- Model Family Financial Protection Act. Including fairer bankruptcy and debt laws.
- Debt in America: An Interactive Map. 29% of all adults. 24% of whites. 39% of people of color. See the map there, and below. See the astonishing percentages of adults with debt in collection. By county. Especially in the South. The South has been greatly impoverished by low Republican minimum wages, lack of expanded Medicaid, unfair bankruptcy laws, massive evictions (past and upcoming).
Stagnant US wages
USA. Since 2001, labor’s share of national income has suffered a sustained decline. 11 Sep 2018.
- See above chart source. [131]. And source article.
Chart below: Top 10% of earners receive 50% of all income. When capital gains are included.
- Above graph source. And: Source 2.
| 10 Jul 2018: National (US) Pay Trends. "Since 2006, wages have risen 12.9 percent overall in the US. But when you factor in inflation, real wages' have actually fallen 9.3 percent. In other words, the income for a typical worker today buys them less than it did in 2006." |
2 Jul 2018: An Update for 2018: More Evidence That Half of Americans Are In or Near Poverty. Paul Buchheit. Common Dreams.
For most U.S. workers, real wages have barely budged in decades. 7 Aug 2018. By Drew DeSilver. Pew Research Center. Chart below is from the article. Bottom of chart says: "Data for wages of production and non-supervisory employees on private non-farm payrolls."
Top line in timeline below is hourly wages adjusted for inflation. It is flat: Bottom of chart below says: "Data for wages of production and non-supervisory employees on private non-farm payrolls."
Racist law enforcement
Return to top. See: Race, ethnicity, and drug war.
The KKK owns law enforcement today in the Republican state of Florida.
27 July 2021: Inside a KKK murder plot: Grab him up, take him to the river. "Even though three current and former Florida prison guards were exposed as klansmen, the state’s Department of Corrections says it found no reason to investigate whether other white supremacists were employed in its prisons."
Poorly rated healthcare
- 6 Aug 2021: Stunning new report ranks US dead last in health care among richest countries—despite spending the most. "The U.S. also had the highest infant mortality rate and lowest life expectancy at age 60 compared with other countries. ... The poor performance is nothing new, as the U.S. has landed in last place in all seven studies the Commonwealth Fund has released since 2004."
|
No universal healthcare
Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security all came from Democrats. You pay the taxes while healthier. Republicans prefer you die. 50% in U.S. Fear Bankruptcy Due to Major Health Event. [132]
Google search: 26,000 Americans die each year from not having health insurance.
Single payer costs less
Portugal's drug decrim equals
50 drug overdose deaths yearly
Vs 100,000 yearly US deaths
There were around 107,300 US drug overdose deaths in the year ending January 31, 2022. 294 per day. Only around 30 to 55 per year in Portugal, a country with universal healthcare, and where all drugs have been decriminalized since 2001. See: Youtube: Portugal’s Drug Laws: Decriminalisation in action. May 16, 2018 video from Australia's Special Broadcasting Service. No one has been arrested in Portugal for simple possession (under the limits) since 2001.
President Eisenhower. 1953:
His 91% top marginal tax rate
Equaled prosperity for more.
Eisenhower was not a socialist. He did not support state ownership of industries and businesses.
Eisenhower, an economically progressive Republican President, had a 91% top marginal income tax rate.. He participated in one of the greatest eras of economic prosperity-for-more in the US in the 1950s.
That era had lower overall taxes on the middle class.
| There was a higher average effective tax rate on the top 1 percent of US households in the 1950s. It was 42% when totaling federal, state, and local taxes. In 2014 it was 36.4%. See chart below. |
Chart below. See: Highest US marginal income tax rates over time.
- Above chart source. And: Source 2.
Chart below. Timeline of top US federal marginal tax rate.
Republican President Lincoln
Created first progressive
US federal income tax.
Progressive Capitalism
Is not Socialism, and
It is not state ownership.
Republican president Abraham Lincoln did not believe in state ownership of industries and businesses. So he was not a "socialist". Socialism was not well known at that time. See Wikipedia: Socialism.
| In the United States, the first progressive federal income tax was established by the Revenue Act of 1862. The act was signed into law by Lincoln. It replaced a flat tax. See Wikipedia: Progressive tax. |
Lincoln's economically progressive message below. What a contrast to today's far-right Republican leaders. From a message to the U.S. Congress, 3 December 1861:
"Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration."
More sources: [133]. The full speech. See: Facebook image.
Thomas Paine on the poor
Thomas Paine statue below in Thetford, England. See: Paine Wikiquotes. Search for "poor" within those quotes. For example:
When it shall be said in any country in the world, my poor are happy; neither ignorance nor distress is to be found among them; my jails are empty of prisoners, my streets of beggars; the aged are not in want, the taxes are not oppressive; the rational world is my friend, because I am a friend of its happiness: When these things can be said, then may the country boast of its constitution and its government.
Paine was nothing like today's Republican Party.
Overpopulation = Warming
Politicians need to incentivize more hempcrete construction [134][135][136], so that carbon dioxide levels go down. But that is not enough to stop global warming.
Overpopulation equals more global warming via less greenspace removing carbon dioxide.
- Side-by-side photos. Our underwater future: What sea level rise will look like around the globe. High tide could flood 800 million people by 2060s.
- Wikipedia: List of countries by population (United Nations). Shows population increase rates.
- Wikipedia: List of sovereign states and dependencies by total fertility rate.
Many clueless Republican leaders deny it all. They also block free birth control via universal healthcare. See Wikipedia: Single payer healthcare. It costs less per person and gets better results. See:
As countries prosper in a just and fair way their population stabilizes. See median wealth by country:
Migration has to be limited to within regions of several countries. Countries with low birth control can not dump their overpopulation on to the whole world. There must be multinational aid to fund birth control, not unlimited migration.
See crowded beach below and link:
Global warming. Roswell tech
Walter Haut in 1947
Roswell Daily Record.
July 8, 1947
Roswell UFO craft and alien body retrieval was real according to U.S. Army officer Walter Haut. He signed affidavits to that effect in 1993 and 2002. Released in 2007 after his death in 2005. Video made in 2000. Released in May 2021. Much of the technology has been back engineered, and its carbon-free energy could possibly end global warming. Share link: Roswell UFO. Articles about Haut:
17 Aug 2021: “My father saw the bodies”: chasing the truth about Roswell. By James Jennings. Archived here.
14 May 2021: Ex-Army officer ADMITS he saw ‘alien the size of a 10-year-old child’ after famous Roswell UFO crash in incredible video. By Emma Parry. Archived here. This article has a short excerpt of the video.
May 2021: Roswell Officer Speaks From the Grave: Video Released, Confesses that Alien was "the size of a 10 year old". By Anthony Bragalia. Archived here. From article: "This video clip is part of a memoir video / oral history over two hours in length that covers many personal and professional aspects of Haut's life. The video was taken at the Roswell Museum in 2000 with friends Dennis Balthaser and Wendy Connors."
30 June 2007: Roswell officer's amazing deathbed admission raises possibility that aliens DID visit. By Nick Pope. Archived here.
2002 and 1993 affidavits. Archived here. Scroll down for the affidavits.
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