( – promoted by buhdydharma )
In the ending minutes of the Democratic Presidential Debate on MSNBC two weeks ago, Tim Russert asked the candidates if any of them disagreed with Sen. Chris Dodd’s recent statement that he supports the decriminalization of marijuana. Sen. Barack Obama and former Sen. John Edwards both raised their hands. Edwards gave his reasons for his opposition:
“I think it sends the wrong signal to young people. And I think the president of the United States has a responsibility to ensure that we’re sending the right signals to young people.”
This is a very interesting statement on the part of John Edwards, and on the part of Barack Obama. Because John Edwards admitted to having used marijuana during the 2003 Democratic Presidential debate sponsored by “Rock the Vote”. Obama has gone even further; in his book “Dreams From My Father”, Obama wrote:
“I blew a few smoke rings, remembering those years. Pot had helped, and booze; maybe a little blow when you could afford it. Not smack, though.”
What is particularly fascinating about these statements by these candidates for the Presidency is that they are supporting criminal penalties which they themselves admit having avoided, which in many cases would not only prevent them from being viable candidates for their current and previous elected offices, but would prevent them from even having the opportunity to vote for themselves. Nationwide, an estimated 5.3 million Americans are denied the right to vote for current or former felony convictions. Over two million of those Americans are denied the right to vote after having completed their sentence and parole or probation, for the rest of their lives.
That Obama and Edwards have both used marijuana is not surprising. A 2002 Time/CNN poll found that 47% of Americans have used marijuana in the past. What is surprising is that in 2006, 738,916 Americans were arrested for marijuana possession. For the fourth year in a row, marijuana possession arrests outnumbered violent crime arrests nationwide.
However, both Obama and Edwards are pinning much of their Presidential hopes on their fortunes in the upcoming Iowa caucuses. Because Iowa is one of only three states in the nation which still prohibits felons from voting for the rest of their lives (the other two are Kentucky and Virginia). Iowa is remarkable for still prohibiting felons from voting for life despite a 2005 executive order issued by Governor Tom Vilsack.
In Iowa, possession of marijuana is a misdemeanor, although distribution of any amount is a felony. The possession of cocaine in any amount is a Class C Felony. It is easily imaginable that if either Edwards or Obama had spent their youth in Iowa, either one of them would be prohibited by law today from casting a vote for themselves in the Iowa caucus. What is even more imaginable is that there are many people not too unlike Edwards or Obama, who are going to be prohibited by law from voting for them. The latter, sadly, is not only imaginable, but all too real.
Also all too real is that John Edwards, first in his family to go to college, and Barack Obama, the first black to be President of the Harvard Law Review, had they been convicted of the criminal penalties for the drugs they admit having used, would be denied Federal Student Aid. Both candidates are champions of Federal Student Aid, pledging to expand the programs it encompasses should they be elected. The marijuana prohibition laws that Edwards believes send the “right messages to young people” are ones that he himself could not heed, yet he believes that this form of punishment on like-minded high schoolers ought to be continued? Indeed, as Congress this past week chose not to revise these restrictions on student aid, neither Obama or Edwards rushed out to condemn this choice.
This begs the question of why do Edwards and Obama believe that Americans should be denied Federal Student Aid for crimes both of them have admitted committing? Why can they be silent over the denial of the right to vote in the Iowa caucus for those whose only difference from themselves is the bad luck of having been caught and convicted?
America deserves an answer.
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…perhaps it would set a good example to young people if Edwards and Obama turned themselves in.
Of course the real signal that they are sending is one of the most pervasive signals of American Culture. Anything is ok….as long as you don’t get caught.
And that includes getting caught pandering to American culture…as you have just caught them, doing.
No President will get elected by saying it is ok for kids to use drugs….and it will always come down to that level. It is the same thing with sex. No one will ever get elected President saying teens should have sex, but we have progressed to the point that it is ALMOST ok to say that teens should use condoms….while NOT having sex, apparently.
criminal prosecution on account of possesion (consumption) of controlled substance, given your own citation of plurality of self-reported incrimination. The meaning is pot consumption, at least, is socially acceptable, ergo antithetical in praxis to application US criminal Code and state laws.
Consequently, the remainder of your debate prompt a is misdirected fusilage against representations of probity vested in an public symbols of law enforcement by the walking dead … excuse me … “high-performance” actors of mental disorder.
Get a goddam grip and focus on either (i) epidemiology of mental disorder or (ii) commercial factors of “American” political economy that characterize these candidates.
Jesus.
Because I think this subject should be discussed
over the war on drugs: it’s targeted towards people who either can’t defend themselves or belong outside the official channels of power. I’m surprised at how low the marijuana figures are: MOST people I know (myself excluded) have tried pot at least one time. But for some people, being caught with pot means a slap on the wrist, and for others it’s potentially career-ending. The ones in the first category are usually better positioned to make laws that affect people in the second category. Which is the essence of the problem.
…while she probably did try “Mary Jane” back in “the day,” she probably…uh…didn’t inhale.
And talk about kowtowing to “special interests”. I often think that the bogus “War on Drugs” drags on simply because it feeds so many mouths in government and law enforcement. There’s DEA, Customs, FBI – all the way down to that stupid DARE program, drug-testing, etc., etc.
Buhdy’s right that no prez candidate dare speak the truth because he/she won’t get elected if they do. I wonder too how much pressure there is from within the government to keep this charade going as well because Edwards and Obama sure caved to something that makes no sense. I strongly suspect they know that too.
It doesn’t take Einstein to see that the prohibition of drugs is ruining way more lives than the drugs themselves ever could – even if they were as harmful as the government would like you to believe.
Meanwhile drink plenty of alcohol and smoke that nicotine. They never killed anybody and aren’t drugs anyway, right?
Oh… wait…
Obama takes bribes from Antoin Rezko
Guiliani is connected and acutally was raised by Mobsters his dad being a hitman for the mob….
Let’s see who else is running for president…
but then again I think most rich, powerful and influential people should be in prison.