Katrina vanden Heuval has an excellent OpEd in the Washington Post: Just say yes to common sense on pot policy
Because the reasons to support Prop 19 are so diverse, promising alliances are being formed that might be sustained beyond this election. Libertarians and progressives, civil rights advocates, law enforcement groups, unions and young activists all see the value of ending prohibition. (As editor of the Nation, it’s not often that I find the magazine in a bipartisan alliance with Reason magazine. And the National Review was on board for legalization when William F. Buckley Jr. served as editor a decade ago.)
So Prop 19 is good policy and good politics. States across the country struggling with these same issues are watching with interest, as are Democratic strategists who see the potential for similar ballot initiatives to drive people to the polls in 2012.
It’s interesting that we can have such intelligent OpEd and editorial writing nationally regarding Prop 19, and yet, as Matt Welch has been reporting in detail, practically every single daily newspaper in California has editorialized against Prop 19, usually with a whole lot of stupid. Why is that?
> Why is that?
Secret law.
Naaa… I hope not. I don’t think so. But then, what?
Why is it that the supposedly brain-dead stoners are seeing and predicting this stuff a decade before the the pols and the MSM does?
I’ve been saying for years that cannabists constitute the single largest voting bloc in America. One that has the power to swing elections. And its’ getting noticed:
“Because the reasons to support Prop 19 are so diverse, promising alliances are being formed that might be sustained beyond this election. Libertarians and progressives, civil rights advocates, law enforcement groups, unions and young activists all see the value of ending prohibition.”
“So Prop 19 is good policy and good politics. States across the country struggling with these same issues are watching with interest, as are Democratic strategists who see the potential for similar ballot initiatives to drive people to the polls in 2012.” (Emphasis mine – k.)
Uh, just one problem with that, Dems: you have people like Boxer and Feinstein working for you and against all those swing voters. All those critical swing voters. All those indispensable swing voters…who’ve suffered for so long under the DemoPublican-supported prohibition farce that it normally wouldn’t matter to us if the Dems lose their elections, we’d still keep getting kicked, anyways.
You want our help, Dems? THEN GET YOUR DAMN JACKBOOTS OFF OUR NECKS AND QUIT WORKING AGAINST US AND YOUR OWN BEST INTERESTS!
When we find an outlet for common sense it should sell well in congress,,,by the case,can or bottle.
Saw Obama on Daily show last night and it was a good discussion about the economy and some on health care,
but I would have given anything if Stewart had asked him why he laughed.
Kap,it reminds me of the father of “the Bruce” in Braveheart,,,,You support the revolution with our lands to the north and I will oppose it with our lands to the south.
They are just paying lip service to us while still burying their collective heads in the sand and showing America their ass.
WARNING!!!!!: NSFW, weak stomachs or little kids: from Radley’s site comes a link for pix about what’s happening in Mexico.
Yepper, this is what ‘winning’ looks like. I guess that so far as it’s ‘little brown brother’ getting the chop, the rabiblancos in DeeCee won’t care…
Because..the stupider you are..the more you get paid?
You want our help, Dems? THEN GET YOUR DAMN JACKBOOTS OFF OUR NECKS AND QUIT WORKING AGAINST US AND YOUR OWN BEST INTERESTS!
Thanks Kapt.
Thanks for that link Kaptin!
Prohibition is nothing less than a grotesque dystopian nightmare; if you support it you must be either ignorant, stupid, brainwashed, corrupt or criminally insane.
My take? The newspapers are part of an entire corrupt system based on controlling the agenda and the thoughts and the behavior of the masses. Cannabis prohibition is an integral part of this system, providing the justification for secret police and otherwise unjustifiable arrests and jailings. Take away cannabis prohibition, and you take away a big chunk of their authority.
And don’t doubt that the authoritarian leaders’ experience of the soldiers’ mutiny in Vietnam (that ended the war on the ground), soldiers who were mostly high on something, motivates them to hold fiercely to their prohibitionist stance.
How else can they keep enough people believing their lies and buying their crap but by criminalizing the tree of knowledge?
I disagree that the soldiers on the ground lost the war,,,rules of engagement lost that war. War is not a controlled fire zone with areas you can’t go,or aren’t supposed to go but are sent anyway.
It made Lady Bird Johnson one of the richest women in the world and LBJ listed his net worth at 3 million and by the time he came out of office they were billionaires.
Lady Bird owned Flying Tiger Airlines,it only existed through the war and all they carried were soldiers back and forth to the war,,,dead and alive.
She also owned a large share of PG&E.the Halliburton of the VN war.
That war made many politicians very rich and robbed America 1/2 of a generation.
Nemo. Republicans gave us the “department of homeland security”. Who’s wearing the jackboots?
Why do newspapers speak against Prop 19 by and large? Simple pandering I’m guessing. Old shriveled up conservatives are much more likely to still be buying newspapers than anyone else.
darkcycle, both parties are wearing the jackboots, which is why I will never vote R or D, I just leave the race blank if there is no 3rd party candidate listed.
Clay, Divadab isn’t claiming that “the soldiers on the ground lost the war”, What he said is that they [kind of] mutinied when they became lucid enough to see through all the bullshit.
Fragging was surprisingly common. At least 600 American officers were murdered by their own troops in documented cases, and as many as 1,400 other officers’ deaths could not be explained. As many as 25% of all officer casualties during the war were due to fragging.
http://www.associatepublisher.com/e/f/fr/frag_(military).htm
“Why is that?”
Because prop 19 supporters didn’t enrich the media with pro-prop 19 ads and commercials. If it passes they’ll be enriched by ads and commercials.
The question could be …”Why did they shoot themselves in the foot?”
Gotcha on the rebelling.
I was there in 68 and we were just starting to realize that we were not ever going to be allowed too win that war and everyone kind of lost interest. It kinda went from being mostly good soldiers to fuck the world,,,,,real quick.
The officers,especially the young inexperienced ones would come over all gung ho and would get their butt shot off by their own men.
A second lieutenants life expectancy in an infantry unit was like,18 seconds into the fight.
What the heck is common sense? Everybody that I talked to has a different definition of the phrase.
It kinda went from being mostly good soldiers to fuck the world,,,,,real quick. ..and who would argue with that?!
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