What Michael Phelps Should Have Said; Smoking pot shouldn't be a crime. Or the public's business.

REASON Magazine ^ | February 2, 2009 | Radley Balko

[Eric Blair 2084]

Dear America,

I take it back. I don’t apologize.

Because you know what? It’s none of your goddamned business. I work my ass off 10 months a year. It’s that hard work that gave you all those gooey feelings of patriotism last summer. If during my brief window of down time I want to relax, enjoy myself, and partake of a substance that’s a hell of a lot less bad for me than alcohol, tobacco, or, frankly, most of the prescription drugs most of you are taking, well, you can spare me the lecture.

I put myself through hell. I make my body do things nature never really intended us to endure. All world-class athletes do. We do it because you love to watch us push ourselves as far as we can possibly go. Some of us get hurt. Sometimes permanently. You’re watching the Super Bowl tonight. You’re watching 300 pound men smash each while running at full speed, in full pads. You know what the average life expectancy of an NFL player is? Fifty-five. That’s about 20 years shorter than your average non-NFL player. Yet you watch. And cheer. And you jump up spill your beer when a linebacker lays out a wide receiver on a crossing route across the middle. The harder he gets hit, the louder and more enthusiastically you scream.

Yet you all get bent out of shape when Ricky Williams, or I, or Josh Howard smoke a little dope to relax. Why? Because the idiots you’ve elected to make your laws have, without a shred of evidence, beat it into your head that smoking marijuana is something akin to drinking antifreeze, and done only by dirty hippies and sex offenders.

You’ll have to pardon my cynicism. But I call bullshit. You don’t give a damn about my health. You just get a voyeuristic thrill from watching an elite athlete fall from grace–all the better if you get to exercise a little moral righteousness in the process. And it’s hypocritical righteousness at that, given that 40 percent of you have tried pot at least once in your lives.

Here’s a crazy thought: If I can smoke a little dope and go on to win 14 Olympic gold medals, maybe pot smokers aren’t doomed to lives of couch surfing and video games, as our moronic government would have us believe. In fact, the list of successful pot smokers includes not just world class athletes like me, Howard, Williams, and others, it includes Nobel Prize winners, Pulitzer Prize winners, the last three U.S. presidents, several Supreme Court justices, and luminaries and success stories from all sectors of business and the arts, sciences, and humanities.

[Eric Blair 2084]

I feel compelled in the name of political correctness to note that....

I have not smoked pot since the Reagan administration in college.

The crap just never agreed with me. It made me more paranoid than I already am. I had scary thoughts of a Marxist revolution taking over America and I felt like I was about to die. But I love the idea of somebody, anybody telling the world.....whoa, wait a minute, let's go to the video replay booth. I'm throwing a challenge flag on everything you have ever been taught in public service announcements.

The apology is being reviewed.

Upon further review, there has been a reversal. There will be no apology.

[Eric Blair 2084]

Ping. Thought you would get a kick out of this.

Nobody posted Radley Balko’s piece yet. I like my addendum better. :-) Than again, I am so vain I like the smell of my own farts. :-)

[Perdogg]

He should have blamed turbo-tax.

[Eric Blair 2084]

In fairness, Daschle and Geithner didn’t inhale their turbo tax bogus printouts. They just suck.

[Mr. Blonde]

That is way more articulate than I’ve ever seen the real Michael Phelps. Still I’m sure that is closer than what he wanted to say than what was said.

[bamahead]

Libertarian ping! Click here to get added or here to be removed or post a message here!

[Moonman62]

Phelps makes a fortune from his image. Being a pothead isn’t a good image.

[Moonman62]

The crap just never agreed with me. It made me more paranoid than I already am. I had scary thoughts of a Marxist revolution taking over America and I felt like I was about to die.

I think it did permanent brain damage in your case.

[Hillarys Gate Cult]

He should have said that he looked around, realized he was in Columbia and needed something to make what he saw go away. I’d agree with that.

[SoCalPol]

He has already been stopped for drunk driving,
drugs doesn’t make a person’s drive any better.

IF a person has to take something to change their mind set,
time to see what your problem is that you can’t face life and the real world.

[an amused spectator]

Radley Balko clearly doesn't what OCD legal types with a blank checkbook could do to a defiant young lad like Phelps.

Ask the young lads from Duke - they could tell him.

[Jolla]

I have smoked and inhaled a time or two, made me kind of quite and I felt like a step or two behind in the conversation, thats about it, never really saw the point in it.

[Eric Blair 2084]

I think it did permanent brain damage in your case.

I don't have any drain bamage.

[Mr. Blonde]

Did he drive after he smoked?

I take it you have never taken any kind of stimulant or depressant? No alcohol? Nothing?

[bamahead]

It would take huge guts on Michael Phelps behalf to do that, but I think the applause he'd win could far outweigh the number of lilly livers he'd offend. The first sentence of the last paragraph pretty much says it :)

Here’s a crazy thought: If I can smoke a little dope and go on to win 14 Olympic gold medals, maybe pot smokers aren’t doomed to lives of couch surfing and video games, as our moronic government would have us believe.

[John W]

Phelps probably weighed being the poster boy for legalizing pot versus a billion dollars in endorsements and made the right call for him and his family.

[dalereed]

More Libertarian crap!

[org.whodat]

LOL, the pot head is a pot head, he will always be labeled as such. Makes no difference. The moron blew millions on a little weed. Proving to the world he was truly learning disabled.

[Eric Blair 2084]

That actually wasn’t the last paragraph. There’s more to Radley’s rant.

See post above. My drain bamage from smoking pot in 1988 led me to forget to click the “this is an excerpt” button.

[Rebelbase]

My neighbor’s pothead kids say they want to become Olympic athletes now.