Government Created The Plastic And Oil Pollution Problem By Banning Hemp

 The recent ban of plastic straws  in numerous municipalities throughout California is a striking example  of how the government passes revenue generating laws in a frantic  attempt to solve problems of their own making. There is no doubt that plastic pollution is a serious problem that  needs to be addressed by the people of the planet. 

According to a report published by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, by the year 2050, there will be more plastic in the oceans than there are fish. Right now, one garbage truck of plastic is dumped into the ocean every minute. This disturbing reality is underscored by the recent discovery of another giant patch of plastic—bigger than Mexico—floating  in the South Pacific Sea. It was discovered by Captain Charles Moore,  who found the North Pacific Garbage Patch in 1997. 

The effects of this ocean epidemic are captured in videos of marine life being impaled, trapped or killed by plastic. One distressing video shows researchers in Costa Rica removing an entire plastic straw from the nostril of a sea turtle. In another video,  a whale asks fishermen for help removing a plastic bag from its head  and then appears to flap its fin in appreciation. 

One million seabirds  die each year from ingesting plastic debris, and up to 90 percent have plastic in their guts. However, forcing people to pay fines for using plastic straws is not  the solution. Instead, finding alternatives and cleaning up the existing  mess in the oceans should be the focus. 

Furthermore, the  government should not be entrusted with solving this problem, as they  are largely responsible for fact that plastic, instead of hemp, is used  for most everyday products. 

Although hemp was just officially made illegal in 1970 as a part of  the Controlled Substances Act, it was not considered as a viable source  for most commercial merchandise throughout the 20th century as a result  of cannabis prohibition. Prior to cannabis prohibition, hemp was used  for a surprising number of industrial products, including most paper,  fabric, textiles, and paints. Oddly enough, the first cars were initially built to run on ethanol,  or alcohol, which could also be derived from hemp. 

Henry Ford even  famously designed a car model that ran on hemp fuel and was partially built with hemp as well. Ford was actually not the only early auto inventor who had a vision  of cars running on plant-based fuel. Rudolf Diesel, the inventor of the  Diesel engine, built his original model to run on biofuel, but the  engine was modified to run on gasoline after his untimely and mysterious  death. 

Unfortunately, alcohol and cannabis prohibition made it impossible  for these types of engines to be on the market, so the industry turned  to gas and oil, which has had devastating consequences for the  environment in just a short century. 

The late cannabis activist Jack Herer suggested in his book “The Emperor Wears No Clothes” that  one of the reasons why politicians got behind cannabis and hemp  prohibition so unanimously, was because they were paid off by powerful  lobbyists in industries that could be made obsolete by hemp. 

“If all fossil fuels and their derivatives, as well as trees for  paper and construction, were banned in order to save the planet, reverse  the Greenhouse Effect and stop deforestation; then there is only one  known annually renewable natural resource that is capable of providing  the overall majority of the world’s paper and textiles; meet all of the  world’s transportation, industrial and home energy needs, while  simultaneously reducing pollution, rebuilding the soil, and cleaning the  atmosphere all at the same time… and that substance is—the same one  that did it all before—Cannabis Hemp… Marijuana!” Herer said in his book. 

As the Free Thought Project has reported, hemp production—if it were legalized nationally—could replace a number of products that pollute the environment