Major stresses are harshing cannabis industry’s mellow

California is thus well on its way to becoming Mary Jane’s global capital, and a national model for how to pull cannabis out of the black market shadows and into the legal light.

In California, by one estimate, there are as many as 10,000 cannabis-related businesses — only a couple hundred of which have the proper zoning and licenses to operate a medical marijuana business.

[...] others of you are engulfed in the difficult, expensive process of making your businesses legal quickly — but not so quickly that you run afoul of local police who are still conducting raids on your operations or federal authorities who already making banking and paying taxes so difficult for you.

Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom is trying to build a gubernatorial campaign by backing the ballot initiative to legalize recreational use.

Today politicians and media claim that legal cannabis in California will end the drug war, rationalize our prison and court systems, create new jobs and economic opportunities in poorer and rural areas of the state, save agricultural businesses and lands, and replenish strained local and state budgets with new taxes on weed.

No small number of entertainers — among them Snoop Dogg, the wizard of “weed wellness,” and Tommy Chong, the “godfather of ganja” — seem to think that by licensing their names to marijuana products, they can replace some of the revenue show business used to provide.

The tax system for cannabis should be comprehensible and not so extortionate that it drives out small players (or creates incentives to keep the black market alive).

The regulatory regimes for medical marijuana and recreational use should fit together, and be transparent enough that California cannabis goes forward as a competitive market, not a state monopoly.

To ease the transition, state government needs to do everything it can to help you — the growers, processors, dispensary operators and customers — negotiate these changes, including protecting you from the feds.