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tv   Marijuana Legalization Debate  CSPAN  November 26, 2015 12:15pm-1:21pm EST

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on implement in this new policy. the mission was dangerous. men were killed in combat to protect works of art. in the waning months of the war, was a small group that discovered nothing less than the greatest blunder ever perpetrated in the history of civilization. >> tonight, the designing and history of the congressional old metals, america's highest honor. we hear from a graphic designer and then we will show you the ceremony for the world war ii monuments men. that's at 8:00 p.m. eastern here on c-span. all persons having business before the honorable the supreme court of the united states
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should draw near and give attention. >> coming up on "landmark cases com," you are remanded to see the paper and see what it was. what they refuse to do so she grabs out of his hands to look at it. and then a scuffle started and she put this piece of paper into her bosom. very readily, the police officer put his hand into her bosom and removed the paper and thereafter, thereafter, handcuffed her. while the police officers started to search. >> in 1957, the cleveland police went to a woman's home who they believed harboring a suspected bomber and demanded entry. she refused them access without a warrant later returning with a
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document they claimed was a warrant they force themselves into the home and search the premises. not finding this suspect, they pull i confis a trunk containing obscene pictures as you was arrested and sentenced to seven years. she sued in her case made it to the supreme court. andill examine the case explore the matter of evidence obtained through illegal searches and seizures and how this and other supreme court rulings transformed police practices nationwide.that's coming up on the next " at 9:00 cases," live p.m. on c-span. for background on each case while you watch, or your copy of boat the landmark cases" companion book. >> next, a debate on the impact of legalized marijuana
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specifically on teen use, crime, and national politics. this panel was part of the annual steamboat institute freedom conference in colorado. it's about one hour. >> several states are looking at taxing marijuana as a source of revenue. that's typical of the government. trying to squeeze blood from a stoner? [laughter] >> you like that? yeah. [applause] >> i'd like to introduce the moderator. of the debate. mary katharine ham, many of you know from her work. go ahead. [applause] >> she spars weekly with bill o'reilly. on "the o'reilly factor. i think she does a good job. mary catherine is a fox news contributor. she appears regularly. she is very active on twitter.
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those of you who follow twitter, she is very active. she's a fourth-generation newspaper journalist, and i didn't know this, she did a stint covering nascar, high school football, and the county's largest lagoons before embracing new media and heading to washington dc. she has had a varied background. her career goal has been to discover the formula for talking about politics without being a blowhard. i think she has succeeded. she created the heritage foundation's first ever blog in 2004. she has won several awards for her work in the fledgling online video world for her series "hamm nation." she has written for the weekly standard and the daily caller. she is from north carolina, and she graduated from the university of georgia. she was raised on a perfect
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combination of of tobacco road basketball and sec football. she climbed mount kilimanjaro on her honeymoon, and hopes to add more to the list. with her toddler intel. she lives in virginia with her husband and daughter and another little one on the way. we are very glad she could join us. mary katharine hamm and the marijuana debate panel. [applause] ♪ everybody is high ♪ rocky mount high ♪ rocky mountain high ♪ rocky mountain high [laughter] mary: i will let my panelists to their introductions. they know themselves better than
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i do. i am mary catherine. i'll start with my position on the subject and make sure you know my biases. and can take them as needed. i am friendly to colorado's decision to experiment with new laws and ways of doing things in the way we do with drugs. i have had many fights with bill o'reilly on the subject. i am not an expert, but because of my fight with bill o'reilly, i am the "weed girl." [laughter] my parents are very proud. bill would be disappointed that in addition to arguing with him with a baby at home, i now argue about this on stage while pregnant. [laughter] mary: i'm a bad influence all around. he would say. i will let these guys exhibit their expertise. we will see where things go.
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i'm excited to talk about it in a place going through this and actually sort of embracing federalism's concept of being a laboratory of democracy. that comes with ups and downs. with that, i shall handed over to wayne robinson of the colorado springs gazette. [applause] wayne: thank you. i'm no expert either. mason is an expert. i live in colorado. i'm on the editorial page of the colorado springs gazette. the second largest newspaper in colorado. in colorado's second-largest city. my wife, in the audience over here, and i have six boys, and the seventh i took in because his parents were drug addicts. we are here to address the grand
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pot experiment. the world is watching us. i can assure you that the gazette is watching this experiment skeptically. i was initially skeptical of that skepticism. i have been in colorado for a long time, since 1993. my wife move me hear from washington, d.c. we spent the first 15 years in boulder, of all places. we just heard the song "rocky mountain high." i love that song. "friends around the campfire, everybody's high." it always horrified me that one of the friends around the campfire could end up in a colorado prison or jail because everybody was high. i think a lot of people share that feeling.
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i don't think the most reasonable individuals, whether they voted for or against amendment 16, want the casual marijuana user behind bars. on that basis, amendment 64, which legalized pot, had a lot of support right up front. you throw in that it might fund education and and a horrible black market, and that's a pretty enticing prospect. so, dr. ben carson was appear just a little while earlier today. he was talking about his vision, his dream for a country in which everyone can climb the economic ladder, particularly young people, so they can get away from dependency and enjoy the american dream. in this conservative audience, regardless of where you are on the spectrum, that's a good thing. we all dislike dependency.
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we are conservative people. conservatives like people. on another occasion this year, just a couple of months ago, i spoke to dr. carson in denver about marijuana, because he is a world-renowned brain surgeon and scientist, i wanted to know his opinion. on marijuana. he reminded me that reliable science has found that in young people, particularly marijuana use, not even talking about daily marijuana use, it can lower the iq by eight points. that concerned him greatly. we will hear a lot today, and probably in the future as this debate plays out, about marijuana versus alcohol. i thank mason for bringing it up. he has written a book about it. he has shed a lot of light on the evils of alcohol in this
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country. we do pay a very high price for alcohol. i think it's a bit of a false dilemma to say that because alcohol may be worse in some circumstances, i don't know, i'm not a scientist, if we accept that assumption, we should really not concern ourselves with marijuana, which is pushing it on to our youth. that's like saying let's not concern ourselves with diabetes because at least it's not cancer. it may cost you your eyesight and arms and legs, but it will kill you. -- won't kill you. not long ago, i had a conversation with dr. charles krauthammer. he is a harvard trained psychiatrist. i wanted to know his opinion, not just as a pundit at -- as a pundit, but a psychiatrist. he said if we go back many years and do this and dan down the road with marijuana incident
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alcohol, i think we'd be better off. i don't know if i agree with that. i'm not a scientist. my opinion on that is not relevant. he said we cannot get alcohol out of society. he cannot do that. we can't go back and do that. it is in society. the question is, do we want both? in colorado, we have both. we need to ask, what does this do to the culture and what will it do 20 use from now, 30 years from now, and in the rest of the country. if they follow suit? let's look at the costs of having both in colorado. we have a higher marijuana use in colorado, substantially, than the national average. unless you think regular marijuana use is the ticket for kids to get into harvard and yale, or to cure diseases, or to invent things and start
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businesses, it is probably not a way to help us move away from dependence. we have a higher than usual national average among teens. it is up since legalization. teen treatment is up in the state. crime and homelessness are up. ask any police chief or sheriff and they will tell you that. is it a gateway? i don't know. i remain skeptical of that. i remain somewhat skeptical. the fact remains we have seen this tripling, we have seen a tripling of heroin overdose deaths in the last four years. if this correlation means calls, -- involves cause we need to do , something about it. hospitalization for marijuana is up 128% since legalization. workplace accidents and absenteeism are up. the gazette did a special project.
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we interviewed a lot of executives, primarily executives of the major construction businesses throughout colorado. there are even want to hire in -- they don't even want to hire in colorado right now, there is too much of a liability. they are hireling -- hiring from oklahoma, utah. in nebraska and kansas and oklahoma. it is hurting the state. edibles have been a crisis. an absolute disaster. the state defines one serving as 10 milligrams. you can walk out of a store with a bar of hash that contains up to 2000, 800 servings. that's what the state says is a serving. this has led to all sorts of edibles, the children consume. innocent looking gummy bears, gummy worms. you name it. they eat it, the end up in the hospital. the national children's hospital has seen a 610% increase in marijuana poisoning among children under six since being legalized.
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dr. ben carson says that in a country of -- a 350 million people, every individual needs to be exceptional, because 350 million people is not many compared to india and china, which each have more than a billion. they want to be more like the united states. i'm guessing that in china and india, where they are working hard to become more like what we have been for the past 200 plus years, they are not in a race to copy a social experiment that stands to lower an entire generation's iq by eight points. thank you. [applause] mary: we now have mason tibbett. of the marijuana policy project.
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it's hard to say his name. [applause] mason: thank you for having me here to talk about the issue. i guess the sky is calling -- has fallen everywhere in colorado. it seems to be pretty nice out except for marijuana being legal. i codirected the amendment 624 campaign in 2012. i have been working on marijuana policy since 2005. in colorado. i have authored a book called "marijuana is safer, so why do we drive people to drink?" it's the more harmful to substances that of the two substances. i've discussed laws and policies and how they steer people toward using the more harmful substance. ultimately marijuana prohibition , is a failed government program. it has been pushed on the states and has cost us billions of dollars, and it has failed to accomplish much of anything.
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marijuana is still incredibly available, anyone who wants it can get it in any state throughout the country. usage rates have not been going down. they have, in a lot of states, gone up,. whereas we have seen alcohol and tobacco rates go down. we need to ask ourselves not should marijuana be legal or illegal, but what are the potential costs and benefits of prohibition, and what are the potential costs and benefits of replacing that with a different system. in colorado, voters have decided to create a system where marijuana will be regulated and taxed in a manner similar to alcohol. it is different than that product, but the idea is that it is a product that adults 21 years of age and older can possess and consume and it is being sold by licensed businesses that are charging taxes, that are testing their product using proper labeling, using proper packaging, not
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selling to minors, and so on. ultimately, 50 5% of colorado -- 55% of colorado voters in 2012 decided that this would be a more preferable system to prohibition. we have seen that support grow. in february, when the pack poll -- a quinnipiac poll found that support was 58%. another poll found it was at 62%. in april. the fact is that it appears that most coloradans seem to be satisfied with where things are right now. that's not to say that will be the case forever. i cannot say that. i don't know. ultimately, things are going more or less how we intended them to go. when we ran this campaign, we never said we will anti-prisons -- that we will anti-prisons and -- that we will empty prisons
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and prevent people from going to jail. frankly, this doesn't typically lands of the in jail. it does cost people jobs. it does cost people housing. it does mean something for can't get jobs. it does mean people can go to court. they have to pay fines. can you imagine if every time you were found to be drinking a glass of wine or having a beer, you are subjecting yourself to being fined $150 and a day in court? that seems crazy. marijuana is less harmful than alcohol based on every objective standard. it's less addictive. according to the federal government. and less toxic damaging to the body. it is less likely to contribute to violent and aggressive behavior. this is not to say it is harmless. nothing is harmless. it does have potential harm for some people. that potential for harm is to by the potential for alcohol to harm. i'm not here to say that alcohol is bad or wrong or that people should not use it. i think as a country, we have
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figured out what happens when you try to prohibit alcohol. it does not go well. it causes more problems than it solves, which is why our country decided to experiment with alcohol prohibition. it is known as a failed experiment. the great experiment. which we ended. fortunately. we decided to instead regulate alcohol and do what we can to control and educate people about it. we wanted to take care of the harm associated with it without creating harm through an underground market, propping up organized crime, making sure the product is controlled. we don't want people going blind by drinking random, distilled liquors that they don't even know what they are. until 2004, colorado was doing this with marijuana. -- on till 2012, colorado was doing this with marijuana. it's not as if it wasn't in colorado until we passed this law. it was incredibly available. the rate of use has not changed since the law passed. the rate was as high before as
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it is now up it it has not gone up. marijuana was here. people were using it. they could access it. the government refer to it as being "universally available." people who wanted it could get it, but the question is where? illegally, from people on the street. from friends. from whoever they might find it from. that poses problems. again, publics are not passed--products are not tested. the people they are getting it from might have other illegal products. you talk about this gateway fear -- theory and the research shows that marijuana is only a gateway drug in that it is so popular that when people go to access it in the underground, they get exposed to other illegal substances. these are things they would not be exposed to. go to liquor store and buy a bottle of wine. you don't stumble across or get offered cocaine.
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if you buy marijuana illegally from someone who has access to the underground market, that happens. since colorado has decided to change the structure, we now have marijuana being sold in licensed stores that are being controlled, regulated, more so than casinos and liquor stores. that's another debate entirely. it's a group that has its skeptics. i think when it comes to something like marijuana, like with alcohol, we need to have a healthy balance where we ensure the product is controlled, but only the people that are supposed to get it get it. week should not have relation that could force the sale back -- we should not have overregulation that could force sales back into the underground market because it is too burdensome on a legitimate business. in colorado, things are going well. we have hundreds of millions of dollars taking place in these licensed businesses instead of the underground market. we have strict requirements on packaging, labeling,
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restrictions on appetizing. -- on advertising. you don't see commercials. you don't see that kind of stuff all over the place. you see that the adults who do want to go to a store can and those who don't, don't. that's how it should be, frankly. in terms of its impact on society, we heard this would cause a lot of problems. we were told this would result in teen use skyrocketing. but be clear. those who voted in favor of the initiative care just as much about the well-being of young people as those who voted against it. you don't have to be anti-marijuana to be pro-use. th.pro you ththe difference is that the people who voted for this thought there was a better way to protect young people. that's to regulate and control this product, to make sure people are asking friday.
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what we are saying is that teen use rates have not changed. according to the state of colorado, they have put out a report that says teen usage has remained stable since 2005. in the survey data, you see a downward trend. in 2009, 20 4.8% of colorado high school students said they'd used marijuana. that's down to 20%. it has not skyrocketed. we have not seen that huge increase in use. there are concerns regarding people, young people who accidentally ingest it. that's an issue we absolutely need to try to prevent. the thing is that we are saying that that is happening with marijuana being illegal. it's not as if it only started happening now. a lot of people are more likely to report it, because they're less fearful of being punished and the criminalized and facing consequences, but ultimately, we
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need to keep this in context. i don't want to minimize this problem. it's something we want to prevent. that's why we want childproof packaging, for these products to be labeled so people know what they are and don't ingest them. mr. larson referred to this 600% increase in child exposure to marijuana. do know how many cases of people being accidentally exposed to marijuana showed up to the poison center in 2014? 145. 25 for people under the age of eight. -- 45 were people under the age of eight. let me pull the numbers are here to make sure i get it right. 2690 five years of age and younger called poison control for consuming cosmetics. there was 740 for vitamins.
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there were 1500 for cleaning products. this is not to say that we should not worry about it. this is not to claim that there's a massive epidemic. this is not a recent go back to prohibition. not so centered -- this is not a reason to go back to prohibition, not so soon. when it comes to crime, talk to police officers. they can say crime has gone up. i prefer to look at the statistics. look at the arrests and crimes that have been committed and what the state has put up. stay crime has gone down, in a lot of ways. we have no increase in crime associated with marijuana. these businesses, according to the denver police department, are not attracting crime. the gazette recently had an article about how it's medical marijuana businesses are not attracting crime. all they are really doing is generating tax revenue.
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as a result of this law, we no longer have 7000 adults in colorado being punished, sibley -- simply for using marijuana. -- simply for using marijuana. if you don't use it, that doesn't matter. a lot of adults enjoy it for the same reason adults is alcohol. it is relaxing, social, they come home from work, they want a drink, they want to use some. i think every drug should be treated based on its arms. -- based on its relative harms. we are talking about a substance that is potentially less harmful than alcohol. it's easy to say, "well, let's just treat o'kane this way, let's treat her when this way." -- cocaine this way, heroine this way." were not saying that. i know that there was, i heard some chuckles when we talked about the introduction, the tax revenue that would be generated.
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7000 people are no longer being cited and given a record for possessing an illegal drug now that the law passed. i know that there was, i heard some chuckles when we talked about the introduction, the tax revenue that would be generated. we made it very clear that the goal here was not to raise revenue. that's a bonus. the goal is to and prohibition -- and prohibition and the problems associated with it and start treating marijuana more reasonably. but, it is a bonus. we generated a lot of tax revenue. the numbers keep growing. we are on pace to raise more than 100% -- a 100% increase over last year in the state of colorado. is that the best way to raise it? no. but, if the product is legal, this is a way we can treat it. voters have said they want to tax it, and that's what we are doing.
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we are generating millions of dollars in revenue for the state, which is going towards education programs, regarding marijuana, regarding other things. it's going towards legislation and whatever others want. and school construction. when it comes down to is this, marijuana is out there. we didn't vote to have marijuana in colorado. we voted to start controlling marijuana in colorado. right now come we're doing more to control marijuana than any other state in the country. other than washington, which also passed a similar law, and send -- and soon, oregon. we expect to see anywhere between five to 15 states through the next two or three years passed and little laws. colorado is a leader when it comes to this, just like if you would ask would it be something
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to be embarrassed about if your state was the first and alcohol prohibition. i think that would be viewed as a badge of honor. our population was smart enough to recognize how stupid this failed government program was early enough and put an end to it. that's what colorado has done. it seems to be going well. we hope to see how it continues to go over the next several years, at which point we can make better judgment regarding its full on impact. thank you very much. [applause] mary: i can get full on bill o'reilly on both of you. i'm from north airline appeared we consume random -- from north carolina. consuming random alcohol is our state passtime. [laughter] do not take offense at that.
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thank you for laying out the philosophy. you are both disappointingly reasonable in your points of view. [laughter] that requires me to like, go all maury povich appear. -- -- up here. you have moved past the original debate, whether this is a good or bad idea. you're asking about where we are. a lot of the discussion is going to be about competing data. it has not been that long since the law passed. how do you guys assess the data and figure out if this is credible, is this significant, what does this mean for how we legislate? wayne: in this debate, you can find statistics and data to back any point of view, as you can with most things. i will tell you, there certainly
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must be a lot of parents and grandparents in the audience here. i think that if you ask any parent of teenagers in the state if things are the same as they were before legalization began, i'm guessing 90 percent of them will tell you it is not. anecdotally, i can tell you is nowhere near the same. i've raised a lot of children and i talk to a lot of parents. at the gazette, i have spoken to a lot of parents and community organizations. it is not the same. whether or not we should have legalize recreational marijuana is one discussion point. the other is are we accurately regulating it? i believe the answer is no. it is much more available to children, young children and
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teenagers, than it ever was before. the risk-benefit equation that anyone runs in their head before they do something that they should be doing, like smoking cigarettes or sneaking off with a sixpack of beer or whatever it may be, the risk factor is obviously lower than it was before. the state is doing very little in terms of spending money to educate young people away from this drug and keep it away from them. in fact, a lot of the drug education money that was promised from the revenues generated by marijuana sales have gone into advertising the safe use of marijuana. to promote the sale. mary: this is a data point where you had a disagreement. whether these has gone up. a lot of it is, well, kids will have more access. but, they already had a lot of
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access. we do have to evaluate whether it goes up or down. you are focusing on some again it does -- some anecdotes. what's your argument? is the state doing enough to regulate? mason: i'm referencing the colorado healthy kids survey, an annual survey of 15 or 20,000 or more colorado students from around the state. it is done by the department of education, the department of human services. it is done in conjunction with, the other statistics that they look at are those from those from the center of disease control. that's been on an annual basis every other year. i'm referring to our state and federal government surveys, and let me be clear, i'm not suggesting that use appears to be going down because of this law.
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i'm not. i don't know. i'm just saying it clearly has not skyrocketed. the same with crime. i'm not saying the crime has barely gone down because of this law. maybe so, maybe not. all i'm saying is that crime has not skyrocketed, as was predicted. i think we need to see a few more years of data when it comes to the situation with driving. the colorado state patrol came out and said that anyone that says they know the effects this has on driving is giving you a bunch of crap. they said they cannot provide a reasonable and educated assessment of the actual impact of this law for at least a few years. i am fully ready to wait and see that. when it comes to the impact that has on young people, since 2000 -- 2010 colorado high school , graduation rates have increased every year. since 2009, dropout rates have
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decreased. [laughter] i'm sure we associate with different parents show we get different stories -- so we get different stories. [laughter] i have no doubt that you hear concerns. i hear from parents who say things are way better now. what the voters wanted was to start regulating marijuana. wayne: they did. there was a survey, a scientific poll the came out of san diego that found waning support from them and 64. -- four -- amendment 64. mason: sponsored by who? it was an anti-marijuana organization. they oversampled conservatives and republicans voters, no offense to anyone here. [laughter]
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statistically there is more support among left-leaning voters. they took a sample that only had 9% between the ages of 45 and 55, yet something like 60% was between the ages of 65 and 75. the quinnipiac polls have been none regularly over the last two years, and they are not being paid for by a group that is trying to keep marijuana illegal. wayne: if you look at the questions -- the questions in the poll, it has to do if people are satisfied with the law. how well is being regulated? people are not satisfied with the way it's regulated in colorado. as far as how the sampled, i don't think libertarian crowds tend to be more anti-marijuana than democratic crowds.
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i don't sense that to be the case. [laughter] mason: as far as, you know, the national survey on drug use and health in 2014 found that high school aged youth in colorado, we have at 56% higher than the rest of the country. another statistic, 66% marijuana addiction treatment in colorado. that's 2011 to 2014. before we have recreational legalization in colorado, we had medicinal marijuana.
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since 2000. in 2009, i believe, the obama administration justice department came out with a memo that really changed everything in colorado. nobody wanted to invest in medicinal marijuana in colorado. you did not have all these retail outlets. you had very few. in colorado springs, they had won. one and maybe a couple other little ones scattered around. as soon as that memo came out, they proliferated like crazy. every town had more marijuana retail shops than starbucks or 7-eleven spewed ash 7-eleven's. -- more marijuana retail shops than starbucks or 7-eleven's. mason: there's a higher rate of mason: there's a higher rate of use according to the nsduh. but the usage rate has been going down in colorado and up
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nationwide. since since 2009, when medical 2009. marijuana blew up and we saw the stores all over, it was up 24.8%. now it's down to 20%. nationwide, we saw an increase. that rate of marijuana use among high school students was occurring, even when it was illegal. in fact, since 1975, the survey found that more than 80% of high school seniors say it is easy to get marijuana. that's since 1975. if the goal is to make it hard for young people to get marijuana by making it illegal and almost 80% of them say it's easy, their ego. -- there you go. mary: let's talk about unintended consequences. we always recognize there can be good ones, so let's not been anyone into a corner.
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what's an unintended consequence the concerns you? -- and that concerns you? or that is really stood out to you? mason: i think the situation with edible marijuana which wayne brought up is a good example. i don't think it's the question of, now is this an economic of people becoming zombies and dying. i think this is about how this has been rolled out and how this is working. what's interesting about edible marijuana and why the state did not see it coming is that edible marijuana affect the body differently. when you eat marijuana, it takes up to an hour to take affect. it has a different effect on your body. a lot of people are not familiar with how much they are supposed to use. all these differences. a lot of people are familiar with them. -- are not familiar with them. during the medical marijuana years, the only people that were really able to buy these
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products from stores were people who had experience and knew what they were doing. all of a sudden, when you decide to start allowing adults who had no experience with them like like maureen dowd, her experience educates a lot of people. now, they can judge that. she knew better than to show up in denver and order meriting a -- and order a martini and then order another three when she didn't feel it. [laughter] the state has done a lot now to change that, the start to do things like changing packaging, requiring products to be marked, changing the way the servings are handled so that it is broken into the individual servings.
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so that it is not one candy bar with 10 servings, it's actually 10 separate things that someone knows not to eat more than one of. this is something the state has learned and is doing. edibles andook my it "has been a nightmare that the state has tried to deal with. packaging regulations and such. -- the edible thing has been a nightmare that the state has tried to deal with, packing regulations and such. how do you deal with granola taken out of the package and laced with pot? there is still the problem with people who put cookies and candy and brownies into bowls and leave it out and think, well, they don't have any children, or maybe they do. maybe they're just bad parents. i think that's a crisis that needs to be solved.
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children come around. i don't think anybody anticipated that one. when they voted for amendment secondarily, i would say the law 64. attending to eliminate the black market, i'm a libertarian, and thinking in terms of libertarian economics all the time, it does seem that if you legalize something that is not legal, the black market manages to vantage -- the black market than us is the moment you do it. -- vanishes of the moment you do it and that hasn't been the case in colorado. we have cartels who have bought up and rented as warehouses all over the state. the rental market is through the roof. and colorado. no one can rent a house. that's because a lot of growing operations renting rental houses and using them as grow operations. talk to any of the attorney generals from the states suing us, and they will assure you
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that the cartels are alive and well in colorado and exporting pot into their states. that's an unintended consequence i did not anticipate. i did not anticipate a commercialization to this i did not anticipate a commercialization to this extent. i go back to when i was the guy who had friends around the campfire. everybody's getting high. i didn't want to see any of them go to jail. this was a pretty good idea if you looked at it. through that lense. while there may have been some things gained through this, a lot of promises were pretty empty at this point. mary: the black market. tell me about your take. i don't spend a lot of time in it. >> i don't know what data is being referred to or for
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anybody knows the extent of the black market. we know that $700 million of marijuana sales to placed in license businesses -- took place in license businesses. where were those taking place before? underground. at least $700 million is no longer being exchanged for marijuana in the underground market. anyone who thinks that a legal market will get rid of an underground market in 18 months, i don't think so. if that's how you are judging our flaw, yes, we failed, because we did not eliminate and 80 -- an 80-year-old underground market in 18 months. mason: maureen dowd is the classic example of someone who bought and consumed marijuana because it is legal. mason: we don't know the numbers exactly, but we know a lot of them are taking place,.
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we heard people saying it costs too much in the stores, and that will result in the underground market maintaining. well, now it costs the same. now that there are the stores, where do adults want to go? and adult wants to ask is it silly to an adult that wants to use alcohol. do you want to find someone that hasn't and hope that they have what you want and that it is what they say this and that they are actually going to give it to you and you will be safe, or you just want to stop at the store? what we are seeing is that they started very low and have been getting higher and higher because people are becoming more accustomed to this system. that's the reason why more and more people are buying marijuana from the stores than the underground market.
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it is preferable in every way. wayne: if you're a producer in mexico or some other state, and you want the heat off of you, you want to lower the overhead by reducing the amount of security you need to operate underground, guess where you are going to come? colorado. we know it is happening because we now how much is being exported out of the state. another underground feature that i did not expect is that we have this parallel system in colorado. we have the medical marijuana stores. we have the recreational marijuana stores. if you live in colorado and your regular marijuana user, its pre-stupid not to go to a marijuana doctor. this is a doctor who does this for a living. marijuana prescriptions or whatever they call them. you pay them $50 or $100 or whatever the going rate is and for a year, you can go buy medicinal pot. it is no different. it's the same marijuana.
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we can have a different debate over whether it has medicinal qualities. i'm not a doctor. you are going to save taxes doing it that way, so that's another underground market. we have interviewed multiple teenagers who have become adults, and we have interviewed them as teenagers, and as adults who used to be teenagers, who used a red card to purchase this at a great discount and then sold it in parking lots and hallways in schools. it's no different to then when schools for bid candy and soda. you always find some kid who will go to sam's club or cosco and buy in bulk and then come around and start a business in the parking lot in the hallways. that's what's going on. we have this ridiculous system of two competing types of retail. mary: the candy market is big in
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my school. mason: that's gone down over the past few years. there has been less homicide, less violence. i am saying this has not grossly increased, as people have suggested it has. we've seen, i believe in wyoming, a 50% decrease in the amount of marijuana they have seized in 2014 compared to 2013. the medical versus nonmedical thing, let's say that alcohol was being treated this way. would you go to the process of finding a doctor to give you a recommendation which he would have to pay the doctor for and then submit an application to the state and pay a license fee in order to get this license so that when you went to buy up bottle of wine coming -- wine, and that this ended up being three dollars less?
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most wooden. -- wouldn't. we're talking about localities banning adult sales, like colorado springs. the gazette was opposed to allowing adult sales. despite a majority of voters supporting amendment 64, they voted for-three to ban -- 4-3 to ban adult sales. the only way to buy marijuana in colorado springs is to a medical marijuana store. can you blame someone for doing this legally inserted illegally? -- instead of the illegally? .wayne: when people voted for that, they did not go for legalizing marijuana all of her
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colorado. they voted for a law that said the municipalities could decide. that's what colorado springs and the only community and the pike's peak region that has regraded -- legalize mick regional -- recreational marijuana is pueblo springs. if you buy $100 worth of marijuana, which is not a lot, from a medical store, you're not talking about a couple of dollars. do the math. 33%. -- 23%. mason: that's a made-up number. you are paying these taxes either way. we're talking about the state's 10% special sales tax. there's a big difference. we are talking about a 15%
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excise tax in colorado on wholesale transfers between the cultivation facilities and the store. when a cultivation facility produces a bunch of marijuana and transfers it to sell it, it taxes 15%. an ounce of marijuana is anywhere from $60 to $100. in a store, it is $350-- mary: we have to establish how pervasive that market is to begin with. wayne: we know that we have 503 medical stores in colorado. the average age is 22 for the patients. mason: it's 40, i hate to break it to you. wayne: we have an excess of 500 stores. are we sick? are all those people using the stores patients? [laughter] mason: you are basically saying any place that produces products that grows marijuana is a store you can walk into and buy it. that's not the same. the number of stores is far fewer. in minnesota, the problem is they are looking at changing their law because people cannot
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access it. colorado has set up the system. what we have seen is a dramatic migration away from the medical system. medical sales have gone down. people are no longer bothering going through the process of getting a recommendation. unless someone truly has a significant medical need, they already can get a recommendation from a physician.
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they don't have to go out of their way. they have a doctor the already see. ok? mary: we're almost out of time. a quick political discussion of how this is playing for politicians in colorado, and more broadly, for 2016. we have to talk about that. many republican candidates have said, look, i'm ok with this. it is constitutional. it's what the founders intended. it's not my cup of tea. even ted cruz has said this. on the democratic side, oddly enough, they are not super pro. even bernie sanders is not living it up enough to say he would be pro legalization. [laughter] mary: give me a little colorado take on whether this is hurting or helping people as far as politics go.
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wayne: the consensus in colorado is that legalization stems to hurt politicians on the right. i'm not sure that's true. it seemed the crowd was evenly split. it's a young crowd. the consensus that i hear from right of center pundits is that amendment 64 is going to take a purple state and make it permanently blue. i'm not sure that's true. when reason it passed in colorado and we were the first to state to do this, and i don't think there are germany places in the world that have marijuana
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access as liberalized as we do here. we have the libertarian streak that runs the right of center politics in colorado and has for a long time. i know people interested in appealing the amendment were adamant about keeping it off at 2016 ballot. they think it will be a rallying point for democrats. i don't know that that's true. that seems to be the conventional wisdom. the cautionary tale being told by political operatives on the right. mason: only one colorado state legislature brought forward a proposal to repeal amendment 64, john morse. he is the only one. he is one not a lot of people agree with him a lot of things, which is why he's no longer in office. elected officials now recognize this is the direction in which the nation is going. obviously, it's a direction in which the states are going.
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but to -- a majority of americans believe it should be legal. regardless of whether it is legal or illegal, should the government let states decide? you get anywhere between 57 to 67% saying yes. that is what we are seeing among a lot of these presidential candidates and ted cruz -- candidates. ted cruz has said that. so has hillary clinton. you are seeing this on both sides. the only real anti-marijuana candidates are chris christie, dr. carson who has certainly not been friendly on the issue, and mike huckabee, who doesn't think alcohol should be legal. so... anyway, after 23 candidates, nearly half of them have said something to the effect-- mary: i think it's interesting that democrats don't take a few more risks on that. jill biden is an old-school drug warrior. they will be the square party on marijuana.
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mason: this is a republican winning ticket. this is a way to mobilize younger people and make them want to listen to the rest of the republican agenda so that maybe they become interested in it. mary: short last question to but both of you. -- bug both of you. 18 months out, what was the other side's position that was most oversold? wayne: revenue for schools and regulated like alcohol. mason: that colorado would be hurt economically and that teen use would escalate and that we would see all sorts of problems as a result. mary: there you have it. i will be back another time.
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we will have more data. we can learn more things about this adventure we are on in colorado. in the meantime, i will research the black market. [laughter] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2015] >> we will look at free speech on college campuses, looking at protests and marches. live every morning at 7:00 a.m. eastern on c-span. you can join the conversation with your calls and find us on facebook and twitter. tonight, the designing and history of the congressional .old matter -- gold-medal we hear from a graphic designer
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and then we show a ceremony for world war ii monuments men. 8:00 p.m. eastern here on c-span. >> john was the person who shot president reagan paired president reagan was not wearing a bulletproof vest. john was stalking jimmy carter before this. -- feynman talks about various assassination attempts, physical threats made against president and presidential candidates throughout american history. >> cystine presidents faced threats, though not directly, but 16 presidents. i also cover three residential candidates. huey long, in 1935, who was assassinated. rob kennedy was assassinated. george, shot and paralyzed
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for life in 1972. i cover candidates as well as presidents and it is a long list. >> sunday night on c-span's q and a. >> next, a governor, police chief, and drug addiction specialist talks about heroin and painkillers in the united states and ways to deal with the problem. this panel is 45 minutes.
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[applause] >> good evening. thanks for being here. we are here to talk about our country's heroin epidemic. you may have heard some numbers or stories about this. over the past decade, the number of her when users has reportedly while the count of overdose deaths has sorted at faster rates. alone, nearly 700 people die from helen overdoses last year. two weeks ago, a few minutes from where we sit, more than 80 people overdosed as the result of tainted heroin. as i have seen in my own reporting, heroin in chicago is a business, perhaps the biggest employer in some neighborhoods. there are no signs of a slowdown. the trade is particularly visible in chicago and other cities but it is far from unusual in a country that has seen the popularity of heroin spread to areas never seen
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before. today's speakers are working to change that. we are honored to have the governor of for my. just last year, he devoted his entire 34 minutes to the heroin epidemic in his home state. end, i am supposed to keep my mic like this, on the chief leonard campanello.- next to the governor, the cofounder and director of the illinois -- drug policy. her right, dr. carl studied the effects of the drugs on the brain, looking at just what it is that happens to attics and users. users.cts and
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we will keep this pretty light -- not light, not exactly a light topic. keep it moving and keep it fairly casual. a conversation amongst all of us. start off with, i just gave the twitter version of who you all are. give the facebook version, or a slightly longer version of why you're here talking about heroin. keep in mind the clock is running so keep it fairly tight. we heard about the state of the state. what brought this issue to you or how did you end up making this a major part of your policy agenda? mistake probably like a lot of people here. as the governor of vermont, i spent a lot of time talking to people and i find that when i went to chamber of come

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