I have to wonder if a few key words in this thread have triggered automatic DEA tracking.
Jhnnn, can you get high without fear of federal prosecution? I know the state isn't going after pot in Colorado but are the feds?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/05/dea-marijuana_n_2810347.html
I get high only rarely. Years ago I got high all the time. It's an interesting topic, one that I've studied for a very long while, particularly in the wake of the passage of A64. I see it as a possible business opportunity, maybe a bit of a moral crusade, too.
The comments by the former DEA head are pure FUD & misdirection, as have been anti-cannabis statutes since their inception.
The Colorado legislature & state govt are stuck with A64, and there's not a damned thing that the DEA can do about it. They may be able to stop retail cannabis, but the personal growing provisions of A64 render local law enforcement powerless in that regard. They are not empowered to enforce federal law, just as it is in immigration matters. There must be corresponding state statutes, and A64 forbids their existence, demands that the state create retail MJ licensing, as well.
The Feds have always depended heavily on the locals for MJ enforcement, and Colorado authorities are now denied that by the will of the people as expressed in a referendum that altered the state constitution, A64. The legislature can't even introduce a counter referendum for the people to vote on w/o a 2/3 majority in both houses of the legislature, and that just won't happen. They can't legislate it away, It must be put to a vote of the people.
The mistake in Washington is that they didn't allow growing for personal consumption, so local law enforcement still has options to enforce, should they choose to do so. They also created a chokepoint for the Feds to attack, medical & retail outlets.
In Colorado, the whole thing is rapidly become so diffuse & so widespread that the DEA would have to drain the rest of the country of agents to make a dent in it, much to the detriment of other enforcement efforts wrt much more dangerous & damaging drugs & the cartels who profit from them.
Indoor Hydro shops are springing up like weeds, along with how-to seminars & classes on how to do it all, from the level of your Colorado allowable plant numbers to industrial production & the investment around it all.
I don't see any going back, and I don't see many Colorado legal home growers getting busted, at all. That's the message- stay Colorado legal, follow some simple rules just in case, and just grow. Only the DEA can bust you. The Fed govt needs to figure out whether they can let states make money from it on taxes or if they want to engage in a losing cause that's become increasingly unpopular in an era of limited resources.
They apparently haven't figured it out.