Vox: Weed was the real winner of the 2020 election

 On November 3, four American states voted to legalize marijuana: Arizona, New Jersey, Montana and South Dakota. Combined with the other states that have done so in recent years, one in three Americans now live in a state where access to marijuana has been legalized. It shows that Americans are souring on the harsh drug policies that have put millions of people in prison.

But America’s national drug policy is a different story. Under federal law, marijuana is still classified as a “schedule 1” drug, meaning it’s considered to have little medical value and a high risk of abuse, along with drugs like LSD, heroin, ecstasy and psilocybin mushrooms. In states where marijuana has been legalized, that conflict with federal law creates numerous problems for legal marijuana sellers and users. And few national politicians talk about legalizing marijuana throughout the country. But advocates are hoping that by introducing new state laws one by one, Americans who are ready to move on from the country’s decades-long war on drugs will eventually force the federal government’s hand.

The Guardian: Why are poor Americans more patriotic than their wealthier counterparts?

If we define patriotism not only as an attachment to country but also as a belief in its greatness, if not superiority – the brand of patriotism expressed by America’s poor is extraordinary. Data analysis from the authoritative General Social Survey (run by the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago) shows that over 90% of America’s poorest would rather be citizens of the United States than of any other nation. The figure is higher than that for working-class, middle-class and upper-class Americans. About 80% also believe that America is a “better” country than most other countries. [...]

First, America’s poor still see their country as the “last hope” for themselves specifically and for humanity more generally. Because of its foundational social contract, the country offers each citizen a sense of dignity. As Ray (all names have been disguised), an older African American man in Birmingham, Alabama, told me, only in America is everybody equal in principle to everyone else. [...]

Second, to many, America is seen as the land of “milk and honey”. It’s perceived as a rich and generous place, where those who work hard can achieve much. The people I spoke with took personal responsibility for the difficult trajectories they had experienced, even if in fact all odds were stacked against them. As Kysha, an African American woman in her 60s in a shelter in Birmingham, told me, “It’s on you … you got a chance like anyone else … everybody got a chance. Some people don’t wanna do right. You gotta realize that.” America, moreover, gives money to countries all over the world: it’s a place of abundance, that attracts people from all over the world. Under this reasoning, anyone who’s poor in America should be thankful to be here.

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euronews: This report tallied the human and economic toll of gun violence in all 50 states. The cost is staggering.

U.S. teens and young adults, ages 15-24, are 50 times more likely to die by gun violence than they are in other economically advanced countries, according to the 50-state breakdown.

In 2017 — the year of a mass shooting in Las Vegas that killed 58 and injured hundreds — nearly 40,000 people died from gun-related injuries, including 2,500 school children, the report said, noting that six in 10 gun deaths in the U.S. are suicides. [...]

Rural states, meanwhile, have the highest rates of gun deaths and bear the largest costs as a share of their economies. Nationally, the cost of gun violence in the U.S. runs $229 billion a year, or 1.4 percent of the gross domestic product, the report said. [...]

The report noted, however, that the economic toll of gun violence is difficult to measure because of a decades-old federal prohibition on funding for research into the problem. Since 1996, Congress has added a little-known amendment to spending legislation that prohibits the use federal funds to advocate or promote gun control. While lawmakers clarified the provision in aspending package last year, stating that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention can conduct research on the causes of gun violence, no money was allocated for such research. [...]

It also found economically deprived areas outside of rural America are also hit hard. About 7,500 African Americans die from gun violence every year, the report said — making it 20 times more likely that a young black male will die by a firearm homicide than a white peer.

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