Kind of makes you want to stop obeying laws, doesn’t it?

Don't forget he pardoned supreme liar and felon Roger Stone who went on to plotting assassinations.

Two reason: Conservatism and Christianity.

Reminds me of the Ballarat Bandit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-gBErW4aoY

To put it short, he was a guy who led federal officers on a chase through the desert. They didn't know who he was, but he was stealing from travelers passing through. It wasn't far from some US government facilities, and this being not long after 9/11, they're super worried he's a terrorist.

Spoiler: he was a Canadian who started growing weed to help his wife's medical issues. He apparently made some primo bud and started selling it. Naturally, he got caught and was thrown in jail. When he got out, he moved out to the desert and tried to survive on his own.

Jail changed him. He became more paranoid and detached from his family, friends, and society. He wasn't the least bit dangerous until they threw him in prison.

There's one very good reason, according to authoritarians: slave labor. 'Murica.

These people are kept in jail to be used in labor. It’s not about being cruel. It’s about making money in the cheapest way possible. Since Alabama is a hellhole with no workforce they turn to modern day slavery.

Alabama actually has medical cannabis now, maybe soon?

Some guy beat someone so bad they need 24hr supervision, and he got 7 years. Cops get of with paid vacation for shooting or running over: dogs, unarmed adults and children, flash bang babies, drunk driving, beating their SO, planting drugs on innocent people. Did I miss anything?

War on drugs, no, it's a war on personal freedoms.

It's actually a requirement I think.

In WA during lockdown, they requested compassionate release of someone who was paralyzed on half his body and confined to a chair. The DOC decided that he was a threat to society and needed to be kept in the COVID greenhouse.

I'm 6400km tall if you include the earth under my feet

Who, actually, believes society is better off for caging this man??

An old pot grower's adage goes something like: if the sentencing minimum is for between 1-99 plants, you might as well grow 99.

People like Bud serve as the real life example for this kind of saying sadly.

It's 16 in Minnesota and 17 in New York, but 18 in North Dakota. Let's not act like a higher age of consent is directly tied to progressive policies.

I hope you don’t consider the 50-50 split Senate to be one of the times we “gave Democrats Congress and the presidency”. Do you think they were going to find 10 Republicans and overcome the filibuster for that legislation?

The last time the Democrats had control that gave them a realistic chance of doing something like this, marijuana legalization didn’t even have majority support in the US. Even among Democrats it was pretty divided.

The time before that, Bill Clinton was president and was under fire for admitting he had ever tried marijuana in his life, and had to claim he “didn’t inhale”.

And those were all the times in my life that the Democrats had any sort of majority in Congress and a Dem president.

You make it sound like there have been these chances over and over. But there isn’t even one single time you can look back at and say “right here, you had all the opportunity in the world and we asked you to do it, and you didn’t do it”.

Didn't return your grocery cart? Straight to jail.

Free healthcare in that the prison doctor or nurse will refuse to diagnose him with anything until he's on his death bed and then give him comfort release so they don't have to take care of him?