O the times, they are a changin'.
Andrew Cohen @ CBS News, a very major mainstream media outlet, writes about how the economy is causing states to think about shedding non-violent prisoners from the prison rolls, as a cost-saving maneuver.
This lead, naturally, to the discussion of legalizing and regulating marijuana.
The "news" is that this discussion is on something like "CBS".
This trend toward releasing non-violent offenders naturally begs the question: what about legalizing marijuana possession and lowering the drinking age? A California lawmaker Monday introduced legislation that would legalize (and tax) pot there. In Colorado, as seen this past Sunday on 60 Minutes, the police chief in Boulder (which houses a raucous University of Colorado) made a compelling case for saving money by reducing the drinking age from 21. Better to have police officers tracking violent crime, the argument goes, than writing tickets for college kids who are going to drink no matter what.
These declarations, from the political and legal arena, are not just isolated voices shouting into the wilderness. Consider the late, great Milton Friedman, the Nobel Laureate, former Reagan advisor, and esteemed scholar associated with the very conservative Hoover Institution. He was among hundreds of important economists who argue that pot should be legalized and taxed - and that the income from such taxation could generate billions in new revenues and billions more in enforcement savings. If you live in California, what would you rather have? Pot smokers whose cases are tying up the legal system? Or better health care and roads thanks to a marijuana tax. I’m just asking the question-and others are too.
I don't have the time to explore and expound on the whole law focus that Cohen has. The important thing is that Cohen is a relative stick-in-the-mud when it comes to talking about marijuana. This is important because, now, even sticks-in-the-mud are questioning the sanity and efficiency of arresting hundreds of thousands of people for "something they are going to do anyway".
It’s not my place to advocate anything - so please don’t write and accuse me of being Cheech or Chong.
See what 40 years of high-powered reefer madness propaganda has done?
One cannot even MENTION "marijuana reform" without having to kowtow to the stupidity of anti-marijuana propaganda. He feels he has to "excuse" himself for suggesting this.
All I am saying is that the economic case for legalizing marijuana, and for lower the drinking rate, is as compelling as it has ever been and that, in a time of great changes in the interaction between government and the governed, it would not be the worst thing in the world to have a serious national debate on the topic. If we are going to lower state and federal budgets for criminal justice, if we are going to be emptying our prisons anyway to save costs, let’s make sure we do it in a way that maximizes the opportunities available to us.
So it has officially begun. We have needed to have this discussion since the late 1960's, at the very least.
YOU, dear reader, are now OFFICIALLY empowered to discuss this important issue more freely.
1 suggestion: don't be apologetic or waste time in caveats like Cohen did. He wasted nearly a paragraph of prime media space sucking up to the stupidity of marijuana propaganda.
We don't have to do that any more. Say what you want to say and don't apologize.
We're mainstream now.