Transcript of the above video: 

Wow, so let's just dive in here, what we are talking about. Ostensibly we are talking about agriculture which I will get into in a minute. It is primarily a Cannabis related video. I thought of making this after reading a recent article from Thai PBS World, that's thaipbsworld.com, the article is titled: Thai Government to reclassify Cannabis as a narcotic. You know the Press on this, will you stop, that is not what is happening here. This is a proposal to possibly change things, it's not a foregone conclusion. What is the media out there getting paid? Where's the Daddy Warbucks, where's the big pockets that are paying media to talk this way and to frame it this way rather than not being disingenuous and actually explaining what is procedurally happening here. Quoting directly: "In a reversal of the previous Administration Policy to decriminalize cannabis and hemp," that is not what happened, it was legalized through an interesting sort of inversion if you will of the Doctrine of Codification which is the basis of Civil Law. Quoting further: "The Phue Thai led Government has decided to reclassify Cannabis as a category 5 narcotic with the exception of medical and health issues. Public Health Ministry was instructed by Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin to amend its Ministerial Regulations to include Cannabis on the list of Category 5 narcotics, to be completed for enforcement within this year." Well they have already been talking about this. Now what's changing here is that they are saying "well we're going to do this under Ministerial Regulations." I'll get into that in a minute. Quoting further: "Another key issue raised by the Prime Minister is the law concerning methamphetamine or "yaa baa". He said that the current law does not specify the number of pills that can be considered possession for personal consumption or for trafficking, making it difficult for law enforcement to know whether to treat a suspect as a drug user or a drug dealer." How about you just treat him as a drug dealer? How about you just treat him as just somebody that is dealing with something that is a highly addictive narcotic and does kill people, as opposed to Cannabis which is an herb that doesn't kill anybody. Quoting further: "To clear up the confusion, the Prime Minister said that the law must be rewritten to make clear that possessing one meth pill will be considered for personal consumption and two or more pills will be regarded as possession for trafficking purposes." Well whoop-dee-doo.

Why are we even being lenient on one of the most deadly drugs in the world to begin with while throwing a book at something that has done nothing but help the Thai economy since the changes to the legal system regarding that product? Then also meanwhile, where does this notion come from that they can just make stuff illegal by amending the Ministerial Regulations? Again a fundamental notion of the Civil Law and let me be clear, I'm a naturalized Thai; I'm an American Attorney; I have some insight into Comparative Law but I'm not a Thai Attorney, I'm not stating it like that. I am just stating it as the average Thai guy on the street who is wondering where the Government got the power to just say unilaterally through "Ministerial Regulations" that plants are narcotics. Where did that authority come from? And by the way, under that authority, can they just can they just come out and say ‘oh this is a narcotic now?’ We are just going to amend the Ministerial Regulations that these flowers, not unlike Cannabis flowers for example, these flowers are just narcotics because we say so. I thought that was what we were trying to move away from; that kind of tactic, that kind of thinking. Beyond even that, I don't even think it's procedurally correct. It's my understanding again, albeit as a lay person when it comes to the way Thai Law is promulgated, you need to make a law to make Cannabis illegal. You can't go in through Ministerial Regulations and just say it's that way "because we say so". Again where does that start and where does that end? Again it starts with Cannabis which everybody is kind of semi used to because at one time it was illegal which is the wrong way to think about this from a legal philosophy standpoint. Rather than talking about it like that, start looking at it from the standpoint of if they can do that with and just unilaterally say something is illegal can they come along and tell florists that "hey, no, no, no, no, sorry due to Ministerial Regulations you got to have a special license that you have got to pay special taxes on in order to sell your flowers.” I know that seems like something of a silly argument but it isn't because if a Government like this can just say this is illegal because we say so while they are also claiming democratic legitimacy - especially when it comes to the promulgation of actual law in Thailand - no, you can't have one and the other. You can't have both at the end of the day. If we are going to do things right, let's promulgate a law correctly. Oh is the problem there that you can't actually get something like that through Parliament perhaps? Is that perhaps the reason you are looking for some way to circumvent the legal procedure? Due process to make this product illegal? A product by the way that has created a number of small businesses, has created a number of jobs, has created a number of economic benefits for the rank and file working class Thai people of this country, but ‘oh no we'll do it with Ministerial Regulations because we say so’. That is just nonsensical to my mind. I don't get where they come up with the idea that they can even do that and again I am not kidding around. If they can just say unilaterally through Ministerial Regulations we can call whatever we want a narcotic. Meanwhile we are not enforcing relevant laws regarding real narcotics, it is just the same as them coming along one day and saying: "oh, we can just say these flowers are narcotics because we say so."