TIME’s Joe Klein: Legalize it, already
Wednesday, February 4th, 2009 at 5:29 pm | By: Radical Russ
Kathleen Parker has the precisely correct reaction to the Michael Phelps flap. Marijuana should be legalized and taxed. It’s costing the society way too much in terms of law enforcement and hypocrisy.
Update: Some interesting reactions from early commenters. Sacredh notes that the combination of marijuana and power tools is not advisable, to which I say: as opposed to the combination of alcohol and power tools? Wbrain notes that the combination of marijuana and schizophrenia is not advisable, to which I say: ditto on the alcohol and we have to talk about relative costs and benefits here. No sane person can argue that legalization would be cost free. But, is the cost to society of criminalizing a relatively benign drug–certainly no more harmful than alcohol, and arguably less so–greater than the benefit of denying said drug to potential schizophenics?
When stodgy old mainstream media like the Washington Post and TIME Magazine start talking about legalization, that’s like the animals disappearing for the hills right before the landfall of a tsunami. I’m telling you Stashers, this is our time. The combination of economic disaster, environmental need, and the internet which acts as a worldwide reefer madness vaccine will prove prohibition’s ultimate demise.
Joe Klein wrote THE definitive ’90s political roman à clef, the book Primary Colors.
Homeboy is mainstream as a motherfucker. Do you smell that? It smells like progress.
Keep standing up. Keep speaking out. No fear. No retreat. No surrender.
We are not criminals.
We won’t back down. The dudes with the guns, and gavels and batons and badges, and manacles who traffick in fear and cruelty and threats and violence and repression…THEY will back down. Eventually.
Why? Because ultimately we’ll force them. Because ultimately we are stronger. Because the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends towards justice.
I can’t agree with you more, Listening to the daily audio stash and looking for news on my own has been making be very excited over the past few weeks. Things seems right.