America’s going to pot

It long has been the position of the Trends Research Institute that marijuana should not be legalized — but rather decriminalized.

Legalizing marijuana would, in effect, create an industry that would enable government’s long regulative arm to reach into and, eventually, play party favorites with Big Pharma and other established mainstream companies.

The neighborhood “pot-eries” you keep reading about in Colorado, for example, are merely micro-labs for the mega-strategic plans big corporations soon will introduce to dominate market share and control the potency, variety and availability of pot products.

With about two dozen states already having some form, usually medical, of legalized marijuana use, and lawmakers nationwide salivating at new and potentially robust revenue streams, expect new state laws governing the substance, and commerce, of marijuana. Then watch for those laws to morph into federal legislation favoring companies and industries long in bed with government.

Marijuana-based products will be created, packaged and marketed with key demographics in mind — and mass-produced in the same manner other pharmaceuticals are force-fed to the public. Spin-off businesses, from boutique pot hotels to hemp gift shops, will drive growing segments of legal-pot states’ leisure and tourism businesses. Oil- and food-based marijuana products will drive big-company research-and-development initiatives. And politicians will be heavily lobbied to accelerate product-to-market avenues for Big Pharma and other industries.

As we forecast a year ago in the Trends Journal: “… big money is coming into the game. And that means politicians will be easily brought on board and eager to push pro-pot agendas… How ironic, too, is this development? After decades of ruining millions of lives with oppressive pot laws that disproportionately punished users and sellers, smoking pot is now becoming legal and accepted.”

And, soon, controlled by government — and lining the pockets of big industry.