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SPECIAL REPORT: Should There Be A Constitutional Court Ruling On Cannabis In Thailand?
Transcript of the above video:
As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing Cannabis yet again. I think a lot of people are out there saying "Ben, what's the deal? Are you like a Pothead lawyer that you're just talking about Cannabis all the time?" No, the reason I am taking this issue so seriously is because it's one I have been following for quite a while and here recently there's been a lot of talk out in whatever you want to call it, the public forum, about "oh we're just going to reclassify this, just sort of unilaterally by Ministerial Decree, Ministerial Regulation. I made a video many people ask me about it and said didn't you think there was a little hyperbolic? Candidly no. At the end of the day, I've seen dictators, I've lived under them. I know what they look like and when they start walking around, under certain circumstances I have been okay; for the exigencies of national security, somebody has to take the reins and do something. What I don't like is arbitrariness and capriciousness about an issue that has had a great deal of benefit for the vast majority of the economy here in Thailand, as well as for the people of Thailand that I have witnessed benefit from this. In the past decade, we saw a lot of things, some good, some bad. I think one unequivocally good thing that came about out of the end of the past Government was this change with respect to Cannabis and Cannabis Policy and the notion that a "democratically elected" government comes into office and then just says "well we're just going to change it", and also after approximately a couple of years now of Parliament trying to come up with a Bill, now comes the Prime Minister saying: "Oh we are just going to change it unilaterally; we'll just rewrite whatever we want", and what's really interesting in all of this, I haven't seen a lot of legally substantive narrative if you will explaining why they are able to do this. I've seen people talking about, "oh well we can do it because we say we can", but I haven't seen a lot of legal basis for that, which is the reason for the title of this video which is "hey maybe we'll just throw this to the Constitutional Court".
Let me be clear, I'm a lay person when it comes to Thai Law. I am an American Attorney, I have experience with Comparative Law. I am a naturalized Thai and as a naturalized Thai, I am concerned about procedurally, the fact that as I said in the prior video, what stops this government from saying flowers for example, florists have to have a special license because ‘we say so’. I mean that's the slope we're on with this and it's not a slippery slope argument insofar as making the accusation that a slippery slope argument is logically fallacious, that's where we're at. I mean if they can say this plant which is clearly not a narcotic, even though at one time people classified it as that, during let's call it the reefer madness era of jurisprudence here in Thailand, to call this a narcotic is ridiculous in my mind. I have said it in other videos, okay narcotics they kill people, fine let's call that what it is, but this isn't, this doesn't do that and to see them say, to see a small group if you will of politicians here in Thailand say, "well we'll just rewrite it, we can't get a Bill past, we can't get it through Parliament, we will just rewrite it on our own and you just have to put up with it". As I said, you don't get to have it both ways. We do have a democratically legitimate Government here in Thailand at the moment, and it's my opinion that they need to operate under due process of law and if you want to change something as fundamental as Cannabis Law, you need to pass it through Parliament. That's the way I see it and again I don't have the answers. I'm honestly asking the question in this video, "Should we have a Constitutional Court ruling?" And let me be clear - to explain this is the comparative law aspect of this video - in the United States, our Supreme Court procedure dictates - going back all the way to John Jay the first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court - that you must have a case or controversy in order to bring a matter before the Supreme Court. So in the American system that prohibits what we call advisory opinions, basically opinions where a law might be passed and the Government, let's say the legislature in the United States, the Congress wants to know "hey would the Supreme Court overturn this law?" Under John Jay they set the precedent that "no we're not in that business of providing advisory opinions regarding the legality of something that might not have occurred yet", and you get into the whole ripeness, mootness, standing, issues pertaining to cause of action and stuff like that, and how the Supreme Court works but one of the key bedrocks of the Supreme Court's mandates if you will going all the way back to its first Chief Justice is "look we don't issue advisory opinions; we don't get political in that way if you will, we instead issue opinions on cases or controversies." Thailand's Court System as I have observed it over the past 16 years, operates a different way. They actually do issue in what I would deem in the American legal vernacular, ‘advisory opinions’. They do issue opinions where they say "hey Parliament, if you pass that, we find that unconstitutional." So my question posed is this notion that okay we have tried for a Bill but we don't seem to be able to have one, now we're just going to change everything, change the Law without it really going through Parliament. We're just going to change the Law sort of kind of in like a cabal; yeah okay it's I shouldn't call it cabal, they say they can do it through the Cabinet but it's my understanding that's really reserved for issues of exigent need, things like National Security; I didn't think and again I'm a layman, I'm genuinely asking these questions, I didn't think that that pertained to something as quite honestly as innocuous and as already settled in its own way as Cannabis. Cannabis is currently a controlled herb; it has a regulatory structure; it is legal; it has been pulled off the Narcotics list. That was done under Emergency Decree which occurred under a previously promulgated set of legislation. From there it gets very complicated because are they able to just relist it as a narcotic without invoked emergency power? It was delisted using invoked emergency power. Now they say they can just relist it without invoked emergency power and that causes me to then bring up the question "well what can't you call illegal without invoked emergency power?" Again, I think that is a good question for the Constitution Court.
That said, I want to get into some further things here because I think this issue goes even deeper than that. So quoting directly from a recent article in the Bangkok Post, bangkokpost.com, the article is titled: Cannabis U-turn could bring protests, lawsuits. Quoting directly: "The Government's move to reclassify Cannabis as a narcotic threatens to trigger street protests and class-action suits by owners of thousands of dispensaries that have sprung up across the country since decriminalization two years ago." Okay, first things first. I really, this is going to be a long video, so those who are watching, strap in, and if you want a little insight into my personal history you're going to get some here. I was here in 2010, and many others were that I know of as well. There are others who were not and there are others who seem to have these big issues with Cannabis and I can't figure out why, that were not here in 2010. When I say I was here in 2010, I was not in some high-rise hotel room nor was I coming in on a private jet into Cambodia 'sniping from the sidelines' to quote Billy Bob Thornton in the movie Primary Colors, no, I was here in Bangkok; I was on the ground. I remember, at the time I was exclusively doing US Immigration work and I actually had to travel through the red zone. There were certain motorbike taxis that had the ability to go through that zone to get over to the Embassy from down here in Silom where our offices were located. I was here for all of that; I was here when it got really bad too and it sort of devolved if you will, into quite honestly mob kind of problems and by that I mean like really like an angry mob kind of thing. It had to be dealt with, it was dealt with. Nobody liked how it all came out and I am here to tell you, I think anybody that went through that who is a reasonable person would prefer not to go through that again. So to those who haven't been here, again let me paraphrase the movie Goodfellas where Joe Pesci says: "You've been gone a long time, maybe nobody told you. We don't want protests here if we can avoid it", especially over innocuous issues that I can't figure out why the people that are supposed to be elected to operate in the interest of the vast majority of Thais, operate in the interest of the people, seem hell bent on ignoring what the people need and just dashing their issues, their hopes, their dreams aside in order to do what? Make something illegal again that shouldn't have been illegal in the first place. To what end? What's the purpose of that? But again, the thing to bear in mind is no one wants to go back to all of that. It was a bad time. So again if this can be handled amicably and if our elected representatives in our Parliament could sit down and hash this out, rather than wandering around in some kind of ego driven pageantry, it would be nice. I'm just saying from the cheap seats, it would be nice.
That said, quoting further: "A complete re-criminalization ordered by Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin," and let's be clear, not "ordered", okay? Again this notion that “Oh, I am just unilaterally calling this illegal”, and by the way I have got a lot of problems with the media in all of this because they seem to be operating as a handmaiden for this message that this is some kind of foregone conclusion and the Law can just be upended overnight because a couple of people say so, who quite frankly, again and it also begs the question, why did we go through all the pageantry of trying to pass a Bill? Could it be because that was the legitimate way to deal with this and now they are trying to take some semi-legitimate or even possibly illegal methodology, again I don't know, it's why I want a Constitutional Court ruling on this at this point, if it's possible. Again I don't know the procedure for that as a lay person and I will get into that here in a second. But again, at the end of the day, I really don't like how this has even been framed as "oh no, no this is legitimate, this can just happen, this is just happening." Yeah what is that, media? And what is the point of the media anymore? Honestly. Post-COVID, what is the point of you folks? After all the time of the people that were actually trying to get real true information out, they were called all kinds of 'dis-info' people, anti-this, anti-that and where were you? What proper, what correct information did you come out with from the gate, media? Yet again, here we are and I don't see any correct information on this whole issue - procedural or otherwise - coming out of much of anywhere of the media. Re-quoting: "A complete re-criminalization ordered by Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin on Wednesday will also push the Cannabis trade underground, said Rattapon Sanrak, owner of Bangkok-based dispensary Highland Cafe." Yeah good point. Quoting further: "Writing Thailand's Cannabis Future, an advocacy group, said it would hold a protest against the move in Bangkok on May 16th." Again, not saying these folks don't have a legitimate interest in protesting, what I'm saying is "where is the Government?" "Where are the cooler heads?" "Where are the reasonable people?" We don't need this now. We need our Parliamentarians to sit down and hash this out. Come up with a real promulgated Law. Come up with a real promulgated Law. Quoting further: "Cannabis currently enjoys the status of a "controlled herb" and there is no outright ban on its recreational use, which has allowed nearly 8,000 dispensaries to open since it was removed from the narcotics list in June 2022. Mr Srettha's directive," again, not an order, it's a directive; he said this is what he wants. It's like when a Prime Minister comes in and says "well this is going to be our new policy". Well that's great, you have to implement it; you have got to put it through Parliament. You don't just get to say this is how it is. Quoting further: "To re-label Cannabis as a category 5 narcotic will make it a crime to quote 'produce, sell, import, export or possess the plant." The 'plant'. Again that and I know people out there go like "oh cocaine comes from plants”, it’s massively processed; “opium comes from plants”, massively processed, okay?" And by the way, I get the argument in those cases. They can kill people. Nobody's dying from this. Why are we wanting to call it a narcotic? Could it be because there are special interests out there that want it to be called a narcotic again? Could Big Alcohol and Big Pharma not like the fact that Cannabis just on its own, in its own natural state, is cutting into their profits? Could that perhaps be a motive for this massive "pearl clutching" campaign against the devil's lettuce or whatever they call it? I mean it's getting ridiculous here. And "use it according to Drug Laws." Again the framework here was well thought out. "Controlled Herb" is a good idea. Again, you have got to be 20 to buy it; you can't be pregnant to buy it, basic stuff. I have said from the get-go, make criminal penalties if you sell it to children, fine. Why are we calling something a narcotic that isn't narcotic? To quote from the series Rome when it came out on HBO, there's a great line where Brutus I think is talking to Marcus Aurelius or Cassius, I can't remember who, but he says "you can call a cat a fish, but you can't make it swim"! I mean you can call something whatever you want, but there's a certain point where it's attenuated from reality, it's not the thing you're calling it and when you start using ridiculous words, it becomes like Marxism where you just, as Lenin said, "we shall win by slogan", because they just make up the language. It's ridiculous. Quoting further: "Cannabis for medical and health purposes, would be allowed according to the premier." But the Government gets to dictate what that entails, and not through due process, not through the elected representatives elected by the Thai people in the Thai Parliament. No just us, a couple of guys that we say so. Quoting further: "We are all doing everything by the book but then suddenly the book is going to change," Mr Rattapon said. "We're gearing up to protest and preparing to file lawsuits in the event it happens." I get where they are coming from. I would really like to see some cooler heads here and as I will get into, there do appear to be some, but again it would be nice if again those you haven't been around in a while, again to quote Joe Pesci, Goodfellas, maybe nobody told you, things are a little different now"; to paraphrase I should say Pesci. Quoting further: "The policy reversal is part of ruling Pheu Thai Party's hardline anti-drug campaign. Earlier this week, Mr Srettha gave a 90-day deadline for law enforcement and local authorities to crack down on drugs in 25 provinces considered as "red zones". And they get into that further in the article. I urge those who are interested, check that out. That being said, I want to quote again: "The policy reversal is part of ruling Pheu Thai Party's hardline anti-drug campaign." Yeah, except for meth! When they said meth, you can have five pills of meth, and now they are like "well two is too much but one, you can", I mean this is the ridiculousness of this. There's an attack on cannabis as a narcotic and yet methamphetamine is just walking around "well what's a big deal with that?"
I want to be clear, I'm not making this for hyperbole purposes, okay? I do agree with the notion of regulation, I really do actually. I really, really do, from tax standpoint and everything else. But to make a 180° turn like this looks really bad to the world. I mean folks that might want to invest from the outside in this industry and let's be honest, Cannabis could be huge agri-business. I'm from Kansas, I know agri-business. We're on the Cutting Edge here Thailand; we can all benefit from this. As we say back home, "this is high cotton” forever, if we want it to be, but instead we have got a bunch of pedantic politicians running around trying to screw it up for everybody else. "The Bhumjaithai Party, which spearheaded decriminalization," again the media on this, I love it, I love it. Just the constant semi obfuscation. It wasn't decriminalized, it was legalized. That's the opposite of something being illegal, it's legal. I have really hated watching this just generally in the legal space, this devouring of self-evident and very precise notions into this very murky nebulous world of "well we can always tell you no!" It's nanny state BS using these kind of weasel words to just kind of take things halfway; they are half measure words and there's a reason for it, because again they want it - there is a certain contingent if you will in this world that enjoys being a "nanny state", a nanny, and this is the methodology they use to exert their "nanny control" if you will. Quoting again: "The Bhumjaithai Party, which spearheaded decriminalization under the previous administration and is now part of the current coalition, said a Bill to regulate recreational use would be more effective than outlawing the plant entirely." Yeah, they are absolutely correct. More to the point, a Bill actually promulgated through Parliament would be better than just some back room where this law just magically pops out of. Quoting further: "But Mr Srettha defended the move on Thursday saying "whatever we decide to do, we do it for the people". You know what? I love that. You know what that reminds me of? That reminds me of, go watch the movie Vice with Christian Bale about Dick Cheney. There's a scene in there where they do a deep dive into what's called the Doctrine of the Unitary Executive Order, Unitary Executive Theory. Basically it's along the lines of what President Nixon said when he said "well when the President does it, it's not illegal!" Well guess what? When the President does stuff, he can do stuff that's illegal. There is no Doctrine of Unitary Executive in my opinion. It doesn't make any sense and I don't want to go any deeper into that. But that said, "Whatever we decide to do, we do it for the people." Really? because I haven't seen you caring about any of these small shop owners that are going to be completely upended, have their sweat equity, their monetary investment, everything they have put into this stuff, you all just say well that could just go up in smoke; "poof!" But we do it for the people! Which people? Who are you talking about? And by the way, what people are being directly harmed from this? Let me be clear. I completely understand Thai people who say “we don't like smelling it on the street, it's a nuisance to us”. Good. We need a law on that. We already have one, I talked about it, it's the Nuisance Law. Thai cops should be arresting people that are smoking dope out on the street. I get it, it makes perfect sense to me. Make some more laws to that end but to say like "oh in your own home, you can't enjoy this for whatever purpose!" Why is it the Government's business? Again, I can see the governmental oversight argument to something that can kill you where they say "look, you can only get a tincture of opium in this amount for example from a physician under certain circumstances", yeah because the stuff kills you. In this instance, this substance doesn't kill anybody and I'm not really saying that hyperbolically, and yes you can go out and find some statistic of some incident, where some person got intoxicated, fell off a roof or something but you can do the exact same thing with alcohol and you can definitely do the exact same thing with methamphetamine, so why are we talking in this vernacular like this? Quoting further: "The country's nascent Cannabis industry has battled legal uncertainty since inception as lawmakers could not agree on how to regulate it. The first attempt to pass a Bill to control Cannabis use last year was blocked in Parliament as part of political jockeying ahead of the election." Question. What part of the currently governing coalition helped block that legislation? You say you want regulations so bad, why didn't you regulate it. Quoting further: "The most recent attempt under the Srettha Government to outlaw recreational use and tighten licensing rules on planting, sales, exports and imports has been stalled by the bureaucratic process. A change in Ministers last week could lead to further delays." I want to go back and say that again. "The most recent attempt under the Srettha Government to outlaw recreational use and tighten licensing rules on planting, sales, exports and imports has been stalled by the bureaucratic process." No, it has been stalled by due process, due process of law, the legislative process because that's the way Thailand works. It's a Civil Law country, that's what I like about it here. You want to make something illegal, pass a Law. And that's the thing, they had the opportunity to do this and they chose not to and now they just want to impose it on everybody. Pass it through Parliament; have a sit down. And by the way, you all get government salaries, you are all paid to be in there. Go sit down, get in a committee and hash this out. Don't put us all in a position where people are out on the streets protesting; all kinds of law cases are going through the Law Courts because you people won't sit down and do your job.
In any event, I was then reading another article in Thai Examiner, thaiexaminer.com. This is going to be one of the few times where I am going to be a little bit critical of the old Thai Examiner here because I didn't think that the title of the article was quite in line with what was really going on here. The headline seemed to want to convey something that in my mind is not what's really happening. That said, yet again, Thai Examiner does, they go through, they do the homework and it's a good article. The article is titled: Anutin accepts the PM's line on Pot. (Let me get into that). “He now calls for foreigners operating weed shops to be arrested by Police.” Okay one side note here. Foreigners I told you from Jump Street, this stuff was always for the Thais, okay? And I know people that really hate me because they contacted us and came in and I did consultations, we talked with the Thai lawyers and things and I advised in my capacity as an American Attorney - just as sort of a an observer - I advised many foreigners you need to stay away from this because this is a Thai thing and me as a Thai, I actually agree with Anutin's position and he has made it clear that look - and I'm going to do another video contemporaneously with this one - but suffice it to say Anutin is saying "hey we're going to be going after foreigners who are in this space because this is a Thailand specific industry." A Thai specific industry; it is a restricted industry for Thais and that is the way Thailand protects its own economy and on that score, I know I'm going to get burned in the comments, but on that score and I'm not trying to be hard on foreigners or whatever, I truly feel bad for people that came in, got invested in all of this and maybe sort of swept up in it, but at the end of the day, this is Thailand so act accordingly. That said, quoting directly: "Deputy Prime Minister Anutin appeared resigned to accept the Government's decision on the matter when it comes before Cabinet for a decision in due course." Well maybe not. “Quote: "In brief, he said the Bhumjaithai Party would argue the position in Cabinet and vote accordingly." It didn't say it was going along with it. He just said "we are going to vote the way we are going to vote in the Cabinet and whatever happens, happens." But again, my big question is after all this time trying to get a Bill, why does the Cabinet just get to unilaterally pass this without it going through the full House of Parliament. And again, I think that's a question that the Constitutional Court is probably best equipped to answer. Again I'm a lay person. I don't know if that's true but I'm asking the question and I think I know the answer, but I don't "know" know the answer. I don't fully know, I know what I don't know and I don't know everything there is to know about Thai Law; I admit that freely. But that said, I think there's a good question here as to whether or not don't we need a Constitutional Court ruling on this? Quoting further: "It would then accept the Government's decision." Well that's what a good Minister does. I've been accused in the past of shilling for Anutin. I made a video once where I was trying to expose my own biases and say I had an affinity for Anutin in all of this that had to do with the Cannabis thing in an effort of full disclosure, and I still have a certain amount of affinity for him. I have even more of an affinity for him now because he seems to be the only reasonable person that doesn't want to see protests in the street and all hell break loose. I'm not saying that's going to happen but what I am saying is I have been there when it did and we need to take all measures necessary to avoid it. Quoting further: "On Thursday however the former Minister of Public Health indicated that he reluctantly accepted the call by the PM. At the same time, at the same time, Mr Anutin made it clear that the regulation of Cannabis through legislation was a better approach." Darn skippy.
Now moving forward over here to a more recent article in the Bangkok Post, bangkokpost.com, the article is titled: Weed use leaps after law eased. Quoting directly: "The Public Health Minister says Cannabis use among young adults is now 10 times greater when compared to two years ago before decriminalization." Again, Legalization! Legalization! A thing is either legal or illegal. I don't know what this "decriminalized" is. It means the cops aren't doing their job. No, the cops are doing their job; they are following the law, and there isn't a law on this. Quoting further: "And he believes the Government's plan to re-list Cannabis as a narcotic must be based on scientific reasoning." Well, okay I guess that's a self-evident statement but going back here. The Public Health Minister says: "Cannabis use among young adults is now 10 times greater." It's legal. Of course it's 10 times greater. These are people that weren't doing it when it was illegal because they are law abiding citizens. Yes of course it's greater. Now here's a question for you. Is murder up 10 times more that Cannabis is legal? Is person crime up 10 times more that cannabis is legal? I don't think so. Meanwhile what is up? Well we've seen a new industry that popped out of the woodwork some two years ago and saw a 1 billion dollar market cap within 7 weeks. Hey I would love to know also what are the statistics on whether or not commercial property prices are up in tourism related centres and how does that correlate with the opening of Cannabis shops? Quoting further: "As for Cannabis businesses concerned about the policy flip-flop, Mr Somsak said: "The Narcotics Control Board decided to de-list Cannabis at the time but that doesn't mean the decision is unchangeable." Okay, nobody is saying it's not unchangeable. It's the way you are changing it that we have a problem with. It was de-listed under emergency power, okay? Now there is no Emergency Decree currently operating, so how can we re-list it without emergency power without going through due process of going through Parliament? Again a good question I would think for the Constitutional Court. Quoting further: "If there is change, it will be for the benefit of the people. I will invite all stakeholders to come to a consensus on the issue." Well thank God there is another reasonable person in the room, and I think if this is how this person is talking again, what's his name again Somsak Thepsuthin, so again, if this is the new Public Health Minister and this is how he is talking, I think we should give him a chance - let's listen to him - because he sounds like at least trying to be reasonable. That's nice to see. "Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin recently said he wanted to," I love the verbiage here. It starts off as "order", it's a foregone conclusion, then becomes a "directive". Now it is he "wanted". Well yeah because he can't just say this. It is like saying a bouquet of roses is illegal from one day to the next; it doesn't make any sense. "Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin recently said he wanted to put Cannabis back on the Narcotics list with an unclear explanation as to how it might get done." Quoting further: "Meanwhile, the Ministry of Public Health has not yet spelt out how it might seek to amend the laws on Cannabis saying it needs to listen to stakeholders first." Good, thank you. At least a little bit of consideration would be nice. There are a lot of people out here; I was in Jomtien Beach over this past weekend - I really love Jomtien - and I went into this guy's little Cannabis shop, he's a Thai guy; I would say he's probably late 20s, early 30s although with Thais, a Thai can be 78 years old and look 22. I mean Thais, it's like they don't age or something, but I am pretty sure this guy was probably in his early 30s at the latest. I went in there and we were talking and he said he owned three shops. He said he owned three shops between Jomtien Beach and all the way down in Rayong, he had three shops. I was sitting there going, here is a late 20s, early 30s guy, he's got a business going; he's paying some taxes; he's adding to the community; he's paying some rents into the commercial real estate sector. Why are we hassling this guy? This is the guy. Who was it, Phil Graham back in the United States, I think he was a Senator or a Governor for a while, he tried to run for President; I remember way back in the day he was in the Republican National Committee. My dad took me there when I was in like kindergarten - it was when Dole ran against Bush, Bush the first, George H.W. Bush - but Phil Graham had this thing where he would say there are wagon pullers and then there are people in the wagon. What he was saying was, there are people, in any given society, there are people who are freeloaders, who are in the wagon, living off of taxes, (politicians) and then there are the people pulling the wagon. The guy with a business, three businesses, who is selling stuff that people want to buy, paying taxes, paying his rent; presumably if he has got three places he is paying employees, he is paying for products; he is transacting in the business community, that's a wagon puller. We want more wagon pullers, we don't want people in the wagon. I especially don't like people in the wagon telling the wagon pullers that what they are doing is illegal.
Quoting further: "Supachai Jaisamut, adviser to Deputy Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul and member of a Bhumjaithai Party, (I think they meant the Bhumjaithai Party), which spearheaded the unlocking of Cannabis from the Narcotics List in the previous government, said the Srettha Administration has clearly spelt out a case for the continuing use of Cannabis for medicine and health." Well that's great, but you know, I get what is trying to be done here. They're trying to create a framework whereby it can be tracked a little bit more easily. Again, I think it's a great thing: criminal penalties, if you sell to kids you do time, there is nothing wrong with that; nothing wrong with taxes, tax it. But again, I see what you're doing. You are trying to put it into this medical rubric and then that allows for more control and more tax. The problem is that is not how it's started and we've already come down this road and you are looking to change it on people, basically pull the rug out from under people, without due process of law. That's what bothers me is that it looks to me like there's a lack of due process of law here. Again it's more, this issue I am more passionate about than anything, the notion they can just again like I made the video, this bouquet of flowers is now illegal because we say so under Ministerial Regulation. Well neat! I mean, and again alcohol producers you should be looking at this and thinking about it because if they can say from one day to the next that one plant or processed plant, however you want to look at it, could just be deemed to be a narcotic or whatever, what about your business? What happens if they maybe want more taxes on you and they want to call alcohol something it isn’t, or higher grade alcohol or something of this nature? What's the difference between beer and spirits? "The Government also has a policy to increase the economic value of Cannabis, which received consensus from all Government parties, he added. So, the best solution is to have a Law to control Cannabis use." Yes, exactly. Quoting further: "He added that in his view, Thailand must have a Law to control its use, not re-list Cannabis as a narcotic." Well put, well put. Quoting further: "He said the Party has done its job by drafting a revised Cannabis legislation and has submitted it for Parliament's consideration. It should be supported by all Parties, he said." And he is bringing up what I am trying to bring up here is I want to see Parliament do this. I don't want to see some closed-door, back room come out with something and just say "This is how it's going to be from now on". Parliament really needs to work this out and I'm really getting tired of all these so-called espousers of democracy talking about it and then when we get a democratic institution like our Parliament, they don't want to use it. Is it because they don't want to use it because the voice of the people isn't going the way that they want it to go? That I ask you. But that said, the one thing I do know, the one thing I definitely know, I would much rather see this matter adjudicated through legal process, preferably due legislative process and promulgation of the Law, but again I, at the end of the day, would much rather see a Constitutional Court ruling rather than protests in the streets.