Ganja generate more than $132 billion in Federal tax revenue

Study: Legal marijuana could generate more than $132 billion in federal tax revenue and 1 million jobs (Source Washington Post) Legalizing marijuana nationwide would create at least $132 billion in tax revenue and more than a million new jobs across the United States in the next decade, according to a new study. New Frontier Data, a data analytics firm focused on the cannabis industry, forecasts that if legalized on the federal level, the marijuana industry could create an entirely new tax revenue stream for the government, generating millions of dollars in sales tax and payroll deductions.

“When there are budget deficits and the like, everybody wants to know where is there an additional revenue stream, and one of the most logical places is to go after cannabis and cannabis taxes,” said Beau Whitney, a senior economist at New Frontier Data. The analysis shows that if marijuana were fully legal in all 50 states, it would create at least a combined $131.8 billion in in federal tax revenue between 2017 and 2025. That is based on an estimated 15 percent retail sales tax, payroll tax deductions and business tax revenue. The business tax rate for the study was calculated at 35 percent. The corporate tax rate was lowered to 21 percent in a sweeping tax bill President Trump signed last month. “If cannabis businesses were legalized tomorrow and taxed as normal businesses with a standard 35 percent tax rate, cannabis businesses would infuse the U.S. economy with an additional $12.6 billion this year,” said Giadha Aguirre De Carcer, the CEO of New Frontier.

The study also calculates that there would be 782,000 additional jobs nationwide if cannabis were legalized today, a number that would increase to 1.1 million by 2025. That includes workers at all ends of the marijuana supply chain, from farmers to transporters to sellers.

The study estimates that about 25 percent of the marijuana market will continue to be illicit, and will shrink if the legal marketplace is not overly taxed or expensive.

Marijuana is legal for adult recreational use in eight states. California, the world’s largest market, started its recreational sales on Jan. 1. Twenty-nine states allow the use of medical marijuana. In the three states where adult use has been legal for the longest period of time – Colorado, Washington and Oregon – there had been a combined total of $1.3 billion in tax receipts, according to the study.

Trump to attend World Economic Forum In Switzerland

Trump to attend World Economic Forum in Switzerland, a gathering synonymous with wealth and power (Source Washington Post) President Trump will address the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, this month, the White House said Tuesday, a startling decision that will bring the unorthodox U.S. leader face to face with global elites who have been Trump’s fierce critics and frequent foils.

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Trump will use the forum to talk about his “America First” worldview. Trump has described the approach as the sensible prioritizing of American interests over those of other nations. His critics inside the United States and abroad call it a retreat from an American global leadership based on democratic principles. “He welcomes the opportunity to go there and advance his America First agenda with world leaders,” Sanders told reporters. She said details of the president’s attendance at the Jan. 23-to-26 gathering are being worked out, and it is not yet clear whether he will hold separate meetings with world leaders there. He does not expect to visit any other countries apart from Switzerland, Sanders said. The surprise engagement, first reported by the New York Times, will place Trump among many of the world’s richest and most influential leaders in government, business and foreign policy. The Davos announcement comes as Trump faces crucial decisions about where to take his economic agenda in the second year of his presidency. The $1.5 trillion tax overhaul package Congress passed last month has just gone into effect, something that he has promised will lead to an expansion of the U.S. economy and higher wages. But he is also mulling a number of controversial trade decisions, including whether to rework or withdraw from the North American Free Trade Agreement, a potential move that has many world leaders on edge.

 

 

Tillerson and Mattis are reportedly trying to hold Trump back from N.Korea

Tillerson and Mattis are reportedly trying to hold Trump back from striking North Korea (Source businessinsider.com)

President Donald Trump’s secretaries of state and defense are trying to persuade him not to strike North Korea, while his national security adviser is pushing for a “bloody nose” attack. Rex Tillerson, the secretary of state, has reportedly been key in pushing for peace, but he may be on his way out. A US strike would mean it implicitly trusts that North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong Un, wouldn’t escalate it into an all-out war that could kill millions. The Trump administration is debating a “bloody nose” attack on North Korea, recent reports say, with the president’s inner circle split and apparently teetering between endorsing a strike and holding out hope for diplomacy. Both The Telegraph and The Wall Street Journal have portrayed Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Secretary of Defense James Mattis as trying to caution President Donald Trump against a strike, and the national security adviser, H.R. McMaster, as advocating it.

The reports come after months of mixed messages and dozens of shifts in the US’s stance on North Korea.

The bloody-nose strategy, which calls for a sharp, violent response to some North Korean provocation, puts a lot of weight on the US’s properly calibrating an attack on North Korea and Pyongyang’s reading the limited strike as anything other than the opening salvo of an all-out war.

 

U.S. Military sends Warplanes to Guam U.S. Territory North Korea

U.S. Military Sends Warplanes to Guam, U.S. Territory North Korea’s Kim Jong Un Threatened to Blow Up (Source Newsweek) The U.S. military has deployed three B-2 nuclear-capable stealth bombers to Andersen Air Force Base in the U.S. territory of Guam, a move that comes as North and South Korea have cautiously re-established dialogue.

“During this short-term deployment, the B-2s will conduct local and regional training sorties and will integrate capabilities with key regional partners, ensuring bomber crews maintain a high state of readiness and crew proficiency,” the U.S. Pacific Air Forces said on its website. North Korea could potentially be antagonized by the deployment of these bombers to Guam, which the rogue state has repeatedly threatened.

In August, not long after President Trump’s infamous “fire and fury” remarks directed at Kim Jong Un’s regime, North Korea said it was considering Guam as a target for a nuclear strike. Pyongyang reiterated this threat in October: “We have already warned several times that we will take counteractions for self-defense, including a salvo of missiles into waters near the U.S. territory of Guam, an advance base for invading the DPRK [Democratic People’s Republic of Korea],” an article published by North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency, warned at the time. That same month, the U.S. flew a B-2 bomber over the Pacific, which was viewed as a warning to North Korea.

 

 

China Tests Hypersonic Weapon, Rendering US THAAD Powerless

China Tests Hypersonic Weapon, Rendering US THAAD Powerless (Source Zero Hedge)

The art of (future) war is rapidly evolving with Beijing spearheading the push into the firust modern operational hypersonic glide vehicle (HGV). According to The Diplomat, the weapon, known as the Dong Feng (“East Wind”), DF-17 for short, is designed to challenge existing missile defense systems, such as America’s anti-ballistic missile defense system called: Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD).

An unnamed U.S. government source, who has studied recent intelligence reports on the People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force (PLARF), said China conducted two separate tests of the hypersonic missile back in November. The first test was conducted on November 01 and the second test took place on November 15. The Diplomat signals, that the November 01 test was the first Chinese ballistic missile launch to take place after the Communist Party of China’s 19th Party Congress in October. Following half-dozen development tests between 2014 and 2016, the most recent tests were launched from the Jiuquan Space Launcher Center in Inner Mongolia. The Diplomat then explains that the November 01 test was widely viewed as successful after the hypersonic weapon hit its intended target “within meters.”

How Russia is helping N. Korea build the bombs?

HOW RUSSIA IS HELPING NORTH KOREA BUILD THE BOMBS THAT COULD START WORLD WAR III (Source Newsweek)

Some of the more advanced missile technology recently put on display for the wider world by North Korea was acquired by the rogue state with the help of Russia, according to new documents acquired by The Washington Post from one of the top Soviet-era missile manufacturers.

In the early 1990s, after the fall of the Soviet Union, U.S. investors reportedly attempted to work with Russian scientists, who were largely unemployed and desperate for money, to acquire advanced Soviet military technology. But the investors ran into a number of legal hurdles, which reportedly provided an opportunity for North Korea to swoop in. Pyongyang apparently was willing to pay some of the scientists who’d previously worked for Makeyev Rocket Design Bureau more than 200 times what they made at home to provide it with Soviet missile designs.

Some of the Russian scientists were prevented from going to North Korea to provide it with Soviet military technology. But U.S. and South Korean intelligence officials have confirmed that Makeyev scientists ultimately did obtain employment as consultants to North Korea, The Washington Post reported.

 

 

 

 

US, North Korea closer to war than ever: former US military chief

US, North Korea closer to war than ever: former US military chief (Source AFP) The United States is now closer than it has ever been to a nuclear war with North Korea, a former top US military officer warned Sunday, saying he saw little prospect of a diplomatic solution. Mike Mullen, a former chairman of the US joint chiefs of staff, attributed the rising danger to Donald Trump’s “incredibly disruptive” presidency.

“And in my view, an incredibly dangerous climate exists out there in that uncertainty with how this all ends up,” he said on ABC’s “This Week.” “One in particular that is top of the list is North Korea.” “We’re actually closer, in my view, to a nuclear war with North Korea and in that region than we have ever been,” he said, adding, “I don’t see the opportunities to solve this diplomatically at this particular point.” Mullen, who served as the top US military adviser to both presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama, questioned whether Trump can be constrained by US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster or White House chief of staff John Kelly.

“Will he follow through on his rhetoric? Or will we actually be able to get to a situation where it could be solved peacefully?” Mullen asked. “I’m just more inclined to see over time that the rhetoric seems to be where the president is, and that will limit the constraining ability that both Jim Mattis and H.R. McMaster and John Kelly have,” he said. Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, who warned Sunday of a sharp increase in the risk of pre-emptive attack if North Korea conducts any more tests, said Trump had decided early on to deny North Korea the capability to strike the United States with a nuclear-tipped missile.