Friday, August 1, 2008

Question to Barack from Balko

In the same vein as my mention of HR 5843, Radley Balko writes a column asking Barack some questions, and one is directly concerned with his stance on decriminalization:
In your autobiography, you admit to using marijuana and cocaine in high school and college. Yet you largely support the federal drug war — a change from several years ago when you said you'd be open to decriminalizing marijuana. Would Barack Obama be where he is today if he had been arrested in college for using drugs? Doesn't the fact that you and our current president (who has all but admitted to prior drug use) have risen to such high stature suggest that the worst thing about illicit drugs is not the drugs themselves, but what the government will do to you if you're caught?
Bingo. The number of people in our country who have at least tried pot is staggeringly high, with at least 15 million people in the US having smoked marijuana within the last month. This while the overwhelming majority of those people go on to lead completely normal lives drug-free later one (I am one). Why ruin their chances to have good jobs and educational opportunities [Federal law prohibits people who've been caught with pot from receiving financial aid]?

It's far past time to decriminalize, for a plethora of reasons.