Transcript of the above video: 

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing Cannabis yet again. A lot of folks have been contacting me about this; I think in fact, I am going to do a deep dive on this one in our paid news service. So for those who are interested, we do have a paid news service. I'm getting into this more and more. I kind of like the notion of doing more news-centric, news and comment, and talking about economics and law and politics and how it all interacts. If you are interested in that, email us: [email protected]. For now, it's going to be an email list. We have gotten pretty good response. I've gotten quite a few people who are interested and I have enjoyed the feedback. To all our supporters who are on the paid news service, I really appreciate your feedback; I really appreciate your support. Thank you very much. 

That said, getting into this here, and again I will probably get into this deeper in our paid news service. Quoting directly from a recent article in the Pattaya Mail, that is pattayamail.com, the article is titled: Cannabis in Thailand is now neither legal nor against the law. This article is by Barry Kenyon, and hats off to you sir. We have met before, talked before. He does great coverage of stuff going on here and he's quite good, he knows the nuance of this place. I like that title, "neither legal nor against the law".  Well it's legal insofar as it is not illegal. As I have talked about in other videos, the Doctrine of Codification in Thailand, yes I understand for purposes of Thai Law I am effectively a layman notwithstanding the fact I have a Jurist Doctorate, I've been studying Comparative Law between Thai Civil Law and the American Common Law for nearly two decades but yeah, I am what I am; I'm an American Attorney. I am a naturalized Thai but yeah, I get my limitations. But one of the basic premises of the Civil Law is something is not illegal until it is affirmatively codified as illegal. So you can't just say something's illegal; you have to go through due process, due legislative process to make it illegal. So strictly speaking it's not, and I'm tired of hearing this, “well, they can just relist it." No, that's like saying we can just list tulips as illegal flowers, the same way we can just list cannabis as an illegal flower. I don't buy that, and I don't think the law is behind them on a lot of this. But that said, we have to deal with the practicalities as and when they come, and suffice it to say, I think the title of this video sums it up. We are in kind of a limbo at the moment but let me explain further. Quoting further: "At the last minute, Thailand has delayed for a month or two the Ministerial edict that customers will need a doctor's prescription to buy cannabis." 

So that's a good point he brings up. It isn't currently the rule now that you need to do that. Frankly, I'm sure there are a lot of small businesses here in Thailand, 18,000 in fact, that abided by the prior rules and laws and have affirmative licensure. As discussed in other videos, I think there is an activist group here that because they have affirmative licensure, may be taking something akin to a class action lawsuit or multiple individual lawsuits against this new set of "rule making" which may be why they have delayed it because they don't want lawsuits which will clog up the Court system over something they frankly shouldn't have done in the first place. They should have passed a Bill through Parliament rather than messing around with this "because we say so" nonsense, but either way that's my own opinion, although I think it's backed up by some level of legal reasoning that is justified. In any event, as he points out here, they're delaying it so at least these shop owners can bring some level of a sigh of relief for the moment. 

Quoting further: "Weed cafes are also giving a breather for now, although some smaller ones have already closed as they are not fully registered. The police are likely to ignore most Cannabis smokers for now on the grounds that the drug has not been recriminalized but is a controlled herb." Well illegalized is in my opinion the right word, not recriminalized or decriminalized. Those are nonsense terms, okay. You can't just say something's criminal; you have to go through due process. Quoting further, and as to controlled herb, that's what the licenses are for, so again how do they illegalize something that the government has heretofore licensed. I think that could be a major subject of further lawsuits, and frankly I hope to see this reversed, at least to some degree. Quoting further: "So the enforcement, if any, will rest with the greatly underfunded Food and Drugs Administration." Quoting further: "Even when the latest regulations do come into force, maybe in August, suck it and see will still be the norm. Who exactly qualifies as a doctor is debatable but apparently includes herbalists and even acupuncturists as well as traditional medics." And again, why make all these rules just to then be all vague about it? And this whole notion of, "oh, well we don't want recreational Cannabis." Do you need a doctor to tell you, you can have a beer? Nobody has any problem with recreational alcohol. It does way more physical and mental damage than cannabis doe, I think objectively speaking. And I have got no dog in this fight one way or the other, effectively. It's just nonsense, the logic behind it. And I have to wonder whose interests are being served by all this? Big alcohol? Big pharma? Who? Because it's not the little guy. The little guy - 18,000 of them - set up businesses that detrimentally relied on prior government policy and invested money. Quoting further: "An overseas doctor’s report is also acceptable." What's that? What is that? I mean that could just be made up on with whole cloth. Quoting further: "Many so-called dispensaries, according to Writing Thailand's Cannabis Future Network, will have a doctor available on video link, rather than physically present, to agree a prescription for insomnia or pain in return for immediate payment." You know, it looks to me like Thailand is trying to implement, not even Thailand because nobody asked for this, there was no mandate to do this in this Parliament, and we just got a bunch of frankly I don't know what to call it, just self-important bureaucrats who decided to come in and mess with the livelihoods of 18,000 people who were law abiding citizens and invested their own money in setting up their own enterprises. And what bugs me is now okay, they are going to adopt this "medicinal" marijuana approach from other jurisdictions which is just hypocrisy on parade, that's all it is.

I mean the system was actually working pretty well, and frankly as I discussed in other videos, Cannabis was acting as a cushion in terms of certain aspects of the economy, most especially the real estate sector. And I think we are still going to see a massive fallout in the real estate sector as a result of these changes. My hope is this is reversed, or cooler heads prevailed and they pump the brakes on imposing a lot of this nonsense, because it serves no real function or purpose other than to create some pretextutal process people all have to go through, basically another hassle. All this government, this current Coalition, this rump Coalition now, whatever you want to call it, has been good at doing is bringing the World Economic Forum here and adding hassles to all of our lives; to people that just want to run their businesses, do their work, live a life, make a living, relax in their off time - in this case enjoy “recreational” Cannabis - which is apparently so terrible. All we have seen from these folks is hassle and yet again that is all we are seeing yet again, in the Cannabis space here in the Kingdom of Thailand.