Oh you silly voters! Back in November you voted yes in eight states to defy marijuana prohibition. Obviously you ill-informed citizens didnt know what you were doing and now you need the benevolent and prudent interference of us your state lawmakers. Gee whats the hurry Massachusetts? You voters in Massachusetts passed full-on legalization of marijuana thinking it would go into effect January 1 2018. How wicked dumb are you people? This isnt like how we lawmakers implemented regulations to deal with an entirely new industry of electronic ride-sharing a full year ahead of schedule. That was just ensuring criminal background checks across state and federal databases for thousands of independent drivers working unpredictable schedules for one or more multi-national online ride-sharing serviceseasy peasy. What youre taking about is annually licensing about 75 growers processors and retailers of marijuana statewide! The devils lettuce! Luckily for you Massholes we got together in the middle of the night in a barely-mentioned special session and pushed back the implementation of the law by another six months. This is for your own good Bay State! Maine thinks cannabis is a plant! Farther north in Maine you thought that the Maine Department of Agriculture Conservation and Forestry should oversee regulating legalized marijuana as if cannabis were an agricultural product. Amateurs! How fortunate that the august and wise Gov. LePage issued an order transferring control to the Maine Bureau of Alcoholic Beverages and Lottery Operations. Then that legalization you Mainiacs passed allowed for people to possess up to 2.5 ounces of marijuana productsincluding concentrates! Clearly thats way too much dabbage so we went and lowered that to just seven percent of what you approved or five grams. And again whats the rush people? You act as if buying black market weed for a while longer is somehow dangerous. We did you a favor and pushed back your legal marijuana retail in Maine by three months for you. Californias only had about 20years to prepare! Out west in California its almost as if you thought after 20years of a quasi-legal medical marijuana system the Golden State was primed and ready to begin selling marijuana out of storefronts (legally). You all thought that just because the legalization initiative was based on the language in the medical marijuana regulations we passed in 2015 that it would be a breeze for us to implement it. Clearly you dont know how government works as were mulling the idea of pushing back the January 1 2018 deadline like Massachusetts has. Nevada weed isnt expensive enough! Next door in the Silver State you brain-damaged Nevada voters passed marijuana legalization even though your governor like all good lawmakers was against it. But now that you defied his wisdom by passing it hes decided that the 15 percent excise tax you placed on marijuana plus the existing eight percent sales tax means marijuana wontcost enough so he is proposing adding another 10 percent tax on top of that. North Dakota is clueless on medical marijuana! Then there is the disaster to be averted up in North Dakota. You simple-minded voters in the Roughrider State foolishly thought that patients of all ages ought to have affordable access to medical marijuana as soon as possible! Without us lawmakers pushing back the roll out of dispensaries to July we wouldnt have the time to fix all your egregious mistakes like reducing the three ounce limit you passed down to 2.5 ounces lengthening the time between selling you those 2.5 ounces from 14 days to 30 days raising the patient card fee from $25 to $300 raising the dispensary license fee from $5000 to $100000 eliminating smoked marijuana as an option for adults limiting children to only cannabis oil and changing the ban on home growing from anywhere within 40 miles of a dispensary to just plain anywhere. Thank goodness you naïve voters have us compassionate and thoughtful lawmakers here to show you how to legalize marijuana the right way. Without us low-priced legal marijuana would be available at retail outlets too soon it would help far too many sick and disabled people and it would be too easy for entrepreneurs to get into the industry. Previously in Radical Rant: Baby Steps in VirginiaClick here for all of Russ Belvilles columns by Russ Belville at High Times