As of May 1st, foreigners will no longer be able to buy weed in Dutch coffee shops. I report on this not because it affects me in any way, but because it's a perfect example of the dumbass conservative mindset that's fucking up the planet.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-17865151 The way they'll work it is that all Dutch coffee shops, which have played a strong part in eliminating the street drug trade in the Netherlands, will have to go "members only," with an upper limit of 2000 per shop. Only Dutch residents will be eligible to be members. As far as I can tell from the article above, this dumbass move was inspired by small towns on the Dutch border, where people from other countries come to... uh...shop and then take it back home and resell it there. But it's going to seriously affect the larger cities, in particular Amsterdam. What's going to happen next is the *very* thing that the current very sane "tolerance and control" policies were implemented to prevent -- the descent of the pot trade into the hands of criminals. With the current system, each coffee shop is licensed and heavily mon- itored. Prices are standardized, whether by mandate or by free-market forces I don't know. There are almost ZERO sales of marijuana anywhere else. Because there is no need for it. With one swell foop they eliminated the street drug trade in marijuana by controlling it and taxing it. As of May 1st, it will be back. Dutch residents eager to make a non-taxable buck will become "members" and buy stuff, and then sell it on the streets for a heavy markup. Some of them will get robbed, and then they'll start carrying guns. And the street drug trade will be back where it started before Holland took a sane step with its current policies and eliminated it. Seriously dumbass move, Netherlands.
