Transcript of the above video: 

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing yet again the issue of Cannabis. As you can see from the thumbnail, there are protests now going on here in Thailand against the Public Health Ministry for its quite frankly arbitrary and capricious decisions if you will, which I don't see are really based on legislative due process to basically start "regulating" and there is even talk that they may try to "recriminalize" cannabis. But as discussed in other videos, it's weird to do that when 18,000 premises here in Thailand have been licensed to sell such products. So again the legal posture of this is nebulous to say the least and frankly I have serious issues with this current Public Health Minister in the way that they have done this. 

That said, I thought of making this video after reading a recent article from the Bangkok Post, bangkokpost.com, the article is titled: Pro-cannabis rally plans long stay outside Health Ministry. Something that really needs to be understood about this, especially to outsiders who think this is all about a bunch of potheads or something, one) there are medicinal and non-medicinal purposes for this. The whole issue of Recreational Cannabis I think has been blown completely out of proportion; nobody talks about recreational alcohol or recreational beer. Meanwhile, I do wonder if big interests, Big Pharma for example, Big Alcohol, even tobacco maybe, have issues with Cannabis being legalized especially for "so-called" recreational purposes. The other thing is frankly we have seen the "medical" jurisdictions, especially in the United States, I think a lot of it is a lot of make-work. Frankly it kills the industry and it drives a certain aspect of it underground, along the same sort of logic chain as what Mr. Abhisit talked about with regard to the notion of legalizing casinos here, especially in a limited manner, where yeah by legalizing it in a limited manner, you basically say, "well it's okay, there's no moral issue with it", so then it just becomes sort of an administrative and legal issue and people start saying well what's the difference between the guy that has to charge way more at a dispensary because he's got all the paperwork, versus just selling it under the table and basically it's cheaper. The point I am making here is by putting all this onerous requirement regulations, all of this compliance stuff it doesn't actually solve the problem they claim they want to solve which is actually diminishing usage of cannabis. All it does is create a bifurcated sort of White Market - Black Market system. It's not very good policy to begin with, let alone the problems I've already pointed out many times with regard to the legal posture of it over here. 

That said, as I discussed in our paid news service, and for those who want to get into that, you can email us [email protected]. In the paid news service, I get into how a lot of this has bigger ramifications even in a geopolitical context because look, I mean this has become a major industry in Thailand. There are expats who are concerned about it for a variety of different reasons including for medicinal purposes especially among the retiree community and I get into that in our paid news service, again [email protected]. While I'm talking about it, also real quick here, my better half and I have set up a restaurant here in downtown Bangkok. Pancake Palace, as the name implies, it's breakfast anytime as well as American diner style food. We've got chilli bowls, we've got buffalo wings, we've got cheeseburgers, hamburgers French fries, all that good stuff one of my personal favourites glass bottled Coke and we are down here in downtown Bangkok. If you are interested in breakfast anytime including pancakes, check us out of Pancake Palace, the link is in the description below for the location. 

That said, I thought of making this video after reading a recent article from the Bangkok Post, bangkokpost.com, the article is titled: Pro-Cannabis rally plans long stay outside Health Ministry. Quoting directly: "Cannabis advocates settled in for a long rally outside the Public Health Ministry in Nonthaburi province on Monday, protesting against perceived moves to recriminalise it." Quoting further: "Members of the Writing Thailand's Cannabis Future Network planned a prolonged stay despite objections from the Ministry. Cannabis Network Secretary-General Prasitthichai Noonuan said Public Health Minister Somsak Thepsuthin's comments during an interview last week implied that Cannabis would be recriminalized. If Cannabis was put back on the Category 5 list, many related businesses would be seriously affected, he said." 

Yeah, and I questioned the legality of that when people have affirmative licenses from the Government saying that they can do this. And moreover, as discussed in other videos, without a Parliamentary Act, I have serious qualms about this because what says the Government can't say tulips are a narcotic tomorrow, or alcohol for that matter? They can just unilaterally say something's a narcotic? No! As I discussed in other videos, one of the main planks and I have a Juris Doctorate, but I admit I come from a Common Law tradition, but I have engaged in Comparative Law for nearly 20 years now, academically and practically, and look there is a difference between the way the Civil Law and the Common Law system works. But one of the main pillars of the Civil Law is that in order for something to be made illegal, you have to codify it and it has to go through due process, which means it needs to go through Parliament. A couple years ago when this came up, they said they were going to put it through Parliament. They just never have and now they are just unilaterally deciding, "we don't need to do that, and we are just going to do it like this." Well I don't see where they have the legal authority to do that. On top of that, isn't there a cause of action somewhere out there where there are legal and lawfully issued licenses allowing for this activity, this business activity, and those are being contravened just by this Ministerial Fiat, and again apropos of what law? Where's the underlying law that this is based on where this activity is being restricted? Quoting further: "The demonstrators plan to stay overnight outside the Health Ministry, and he expected Cannabis shop owners would join the demonstration. Yeah, I can't imagine this is going to get smaller. A lot of people invested time, money, resources, blood, sweat and tears, got their licenses, had legitimate storefronts, were selling a legitimate, legal product to the public and then one day some guy at the Ministry of Public Health just said, "Naa, you can't do that anymore, and you just live with it." Well 18,000 businesses were licensed that way. They went out of their way to pay the government fee to get a license. Do you think they are just going to go quietly into the night? I doubt it. Quoting further: "They had started their businesses following the decriminalization of Cannabis three years ago," - I hate that word. Stop it, Bangkok Post. I'm sick of the word play with this. There is no such thing as decriminalization; there's legal and illegal. Those are the terms, okay? This was legalized. Now whether or not people like the procedure under which it was legalized, it became legal, and from that point forward the Doctrine of Codification applied because it was a legal product and if you want to illegalize it again, pass a Law through Parliament. Quoting further: "The demonstrators' petition was received by Thanakrit Jit-areerat, Secretary to the Public Health Minister who said there was no plan to recriminalise Cannabis." Well that is at least some level of good news. Now Lord knows if we can rely on that statement but that said, this is the current state of play with regard to the Cannabis issue here in Thailand.

I'm starting to wonder if we are going to start seeing more vociferous demonstrations with regard to this issue as again, as the sort of thumbnail title implies, there are rice bowls at play here. I remember years and years ago, an old guy who I very, very - I don't know he'd love it if I called him old - but an old guy who was very much a mentor of mine here said, "hey, there's one thing you don't mess with in Thailand or anywhere else in Southeast Asia and that's people's rice bowls, their living, their ability to feed themselves." Well 18,000 businesses had licenses to sell this product and then overnight they are told, "oh well, you don't get to do it that way. That license doesn't really work the way we once said it did "because we say so" and maybe we will go ahead and recriminalise this "because we say so". You are messing with people's rice bowls here, at the end of the day and that's not good policy under any circumstances. And I have got to imagine those people are going to continue being irate about the fact that they can't do their business the way that they could do it not a mere fortnight ago, and the fact that their businesses are being restricted without any kind of Act of Parliament, just "hey we say so, and this is how it is". So it's going to be interesting to see how this plays out, and we will certainly keep you updates on this channel as the situation evolves.