The Top Federal Corporate Sponsors Who Don’t Want Marijuana Legalized

Marijuanaphonebomb

Mother Jones Magazine published last year an article detailing “Capitol Hill’s Top 75 Corporate Sponsors” based on their campaign contributions and lobbying expenditures in Washington DC from 1989-2010. I thought it might be interesting to review the list with an eye toward which ones could be pushing Washington hardest to hold the line on marijuana prohibition vs. which ones seek its end.

Big Banking & Finance: 3 Goldman Sachs, 5 Citigroup, 10 American Bankers Association, 14 JPMorgan Chase, 16 Morgan Stanley, 23 Bank of America, 24 Ernst & Young, 28Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu, 29 Pricewaterhouse Coopers, 30 UBS,35 Merrill Lynch, 40 Credit Suisse, 44 American Financial Group, 51MBNA, 63 Securities Industry and Financial Market Association

Who knows if the titans of big finance are strong-arming politicians to maintain marijuana prohibition?  With so many other issues important to their industry, from regulation to bail outs, why would they care if the herb is verboten?  When you read The Guardian’s piece on $378 billion money-laundered by Wachovia for Mexican drug traffickers or Bloomberg’s report on Bank of America’s financing of three planes for traffickers to transport 10 tons of cocaine into America, you begin to see the motivation to keep that steady flow of illicit cash into the world finance system.

Big Pharma & Healthcare: 6 American Medical Association, 20 Pfizer,25 Blue Cross/Blue Shield, 27 American Hospital Association, 31 Aflac,45 GlaxoSmithKline, 62 American Health Care Association, 66 Eli Lilly, 74Bristol-Myers Squibb

Despite the AMA’s recent call to remove cannabis from Schedule I, they make the list because their reason for the call is to allow study of cannabis for its eventual pharmaceuticalization.  It’s obvious why most of these companies would not wish to see patients growing their own medicine that reduces their need for prescription meds and leads to fewer doctor visits?

Big Alcohol & Tobacco: 9 Altria, 12 National Beer Wholesalers Association, 36 Reynolds American, 41 Anheuser-Busch, 52 UST

The motivations are transparent for the purveyors of legal recreational substances.  While you can grow your own tobacco and brew your own beer, it’s time and labor intensive.  Why would they wish to compete with a recreational substance the customer can grow on their own?  They don’t, so much so that they were among the initial funders, along with Big Pharma, for the Partnership for a Drug-Free America.

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