Posted on 02/06/2009 9:15:57 AM PST by bassmaner
And then President Obama, and then George W. Bush, and then Bill Clinton . . .
Michael Phelps, the aquatic icon who won eight gold medals at the 2008 Olympics, has violated the law. When a photograph of him smoking a bongful of marijuana was published, he admitted the crime. The same crime for which the better part of a million people were arrested last year.
Shouldn’t Phelps be charged? Along with President Obama and his two predecessors, all of whom, it seems, used illegal drugs? If not, perhaps it is time to have a serious debate about the drug laws.
Of course, Michael Phelps immediately apologized for his poor judgment. Attention turned to his sponsors, since their contracts include the usual moral clauses, which protect their investment in celebrities who behave foolishly, if not actually immorally. Happily for Phelps’s bank account, some of his big-money backers, including Speedo, Hilton, and Omega, accepted his apology. Subway and Visa haven’t been talking, but don’t look like they are going to jump. Kellogg’s, so far in the minority, announced it would drop Phelps.
But if marijuana use is so horrid as to warrant criminalization, why are we wasting time discussing whether Phelps will be able to keep his endorsement deals? Shouldn’t he be prosecuted—just like millions of other Americans, whose lives have been ruined by criminal convictions for smoking pot?
In 2007, 872,721 Americans were arrested for marijuana violations, 775,138 of them for possession. Some number of the latter undoubtedly were caught growing or selling and were charged with lesser offenses, but, in any case, hundreds of thousands of Americans ended up in jail for doing precisely what Michael Phelps did: lighting up. Roughly three-quarters of those arrested for marijuana offenses were, like Phelps, under 30. With most of their lives ahead of them, they face the greatest harm from prosecution under the drug laws.
So why shouldn’t Phelps go to jail?
To ask the question is to answer it. While smoking pot may be a stupid thing to do for many reasons—risking adverse health effects, endangering endorsements, undermining Phelps’s status as a celebrity role model—he hurt no one but himself. He could have been photographed while drunk and stumbling out of a party, and it would have been no different. Bad press and angry sponsors would have forced an abject apology, and everyone would have moved on. Just like with his marijuana hit.
Of course, advocates of prohibition argue that illicit drugs are different. And so they are—mostly because their use is illegal, a situation that creates the most serious problems usually associated with drug use.
The arguments are old but clear. Whatever the law might say, the people have voted with their lungs: 95 million Americans over the age of 21 have smoked pot, 20 million have smoked in the last year, and 11 million use the drug regularly. It’s hard to believe that all of them, almost one-third of the U.S. population, are criminals who deserve jail time.
Moreover, the violence associated with drugs is principally from prohibition rather than use. Drunks are far more likely to commit (and be victims of) violent crimes than are users of marijuana. Prohibition-era Chicago offered a dramatic lesson in the impact of banning a widely used drug. That city’s violent era is being played out on a larger scale in Colombia and Mexico, where urban and rural communities have been overwhelmed with drug-gang violence.
The health arguments remain disputed, but the basic question is whether we live in a free society in which people can choose to engage in risky behavior. Cigarette smokers, hang gliders, and rock climbers all take risks that many others view as unacceptable. That’s no reason for arresting them.
And it’s pretty hard to argue that marijuana use will prevent Phelps from being productive. Most all of us probably remember pothead classmates who ended up wildly successful in their chosen careers. Will some people use to excess? Yes, just as some people drink too much, gamble too much, spend too much, and act irresponsibly in a multitude of other ways. Criminal law is not the answer.
Is Michael Phelps likely to go to jail? No, and for good reason. But for the same reason, the rest of us should not be arrested for smoking pot, either. Whether marijuana use is good or bad is not the issue. Short of engaging in behavior that directly threatens others, people should be left alone. That’s what a society grounded in individual liberty is—or at least should be—all about.
—Doug Bandow is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute. A former special assistant to Pres. Ronald Reagan, he is the author of the forthcoming Leviathan Unchained: Washington’s Bipartisan Big Government Consensus.
This "power grab" couldn't have happened without contingents from the Right. Regardless, it's ironic, isn't it, that today it's the nanny-state "progressive" countries of western Europe that lead the way in drug legalization & decriminalization.
Legalization of pot -— or whatever -— would have no more than a marginal increase in use, if done properly.
Do it like cigs. No advertising. Sell in gubmint stores, if need be. Tax the HELL out of it directly, not to mention bringing the entire under-table market above board for taxing employees on all levels of distribution who would suddenly pay income tax, just like everything else.
Don’t get me wrong — I hate drugs.
I just think the drug war is LOST. Indeed, it’s unwinnable.
Our casaulties have been freedom (i.e., seizure of property by over-eager gubmint workers) and our MONEY.
Don’t know about you, but cutting taxes by 1/3 -— or paying down our pork debt -— would work for me.
No, because I’m not a Muslim. I was just kidding too. We would be held hostage by all the stoners and other druggies who’d greatly increase in number. We’d have to have some liberty to maintain a decent way of life.
There you go again...you drug-crazed, porno-loving Liberaltarians. ;}
Ah, we share common ground.
If the State of California, for example, wants MJ to be legalized, then it should be no business of the federal government. Alas, that's not the case, as the DEA routinely raids medipot clinics that are lawful under CA state law.
Brought to you by the worst SCOTUS precedent in history: the Wickard decision of 1942, which basically allowed the feds to interpret the Interstate Commerce Clause of the US Constitution however they wanted.
(Incidentally, there are many posters on FR that defend Wickard: you know who you are).
Sounds like FOB to me, Fear, obfuscation, and Barbara Streisand.
Kinda sounds like Obama, "if we don't pass the Stimulus Bill right now, we may NEVER RECOVER!!!"
No advertising = big government
Sell in gubmint stores = socialism
Tax = big governemtn
pay income tax = big government
So legalize it because the government has no right to regulate it but then let the government regulate it. Sure, it can become our cash cow just like the casinos in Oklahoma. They haven’t done squat for the state budget but have made a lot of people poorer.
Yeah but in my case it’s true.
That's exactly what the "progressive" of western Europe concluded. So they chose the path of anything-goes libertarianism. But they discovered something that runs counterintuitive to this way of thinking: People who are unfettered by government sanction to ruin their lives in the privacy of their homes... don't stay home.
There's a reason I call this sort of capitulation "Amsterdam Libertarianism." Where people are allowed to "enjoy" the freedom of animals, we shouldn't be surprised that our public places become populated by soulless beasts.
OK, sell in 7-Elevens. Vending machines. I don’t care. I was offering a compromise to the right-nannystaters.
The big budget drain is the police state to enforce these silly laws.
A slight distinction: they may lead the way in decriminalization, but not legalization. The distinction becomes important when one considers that production and distribution are still technically illegal, thus rendering it part of the black (or at least "gray") market.
A true legalization scheme, where substances are taxed and regulated like alcohol, and disputes are settled through laws instead of bullets would go a long way towards reducing much of the damage that the drug culture does to society. Irony prevails in this arena as well, as international organizations (ie. the UN) stand in the way ... (what was that about George Soros?)
Baloney. Drugs were legal until the late 1880s. The founding fathers, et al, got along fine.
Europe’s decay has nothing to do with drugs. They’ve chosen a secular, statist, life, devoid of religion (except Islam) and children, with no hope of bettering oneself through work, effort, or entrepenuership.
I’d stay stoned, too.
I have to say, I don’t feel any sympathy or empathy for dope pushers getting raided by the DEA. I’m not really glad it happens I guess but I don’t mind either. I do think California should kick all federal employees out of their sate. We should do the same in Oklahoma.
There is a bunch of stuff that would need to happen in tandem with lifting the ban on drugs in order for this country to be a good place to live after ending the ban.
One reason why Dems are so gung ho about expanding the crime/prison industry is that most corrections officers belong to unions since most are state employees. More crime, more prisons, more union members, more union member dues, more Dem political contributions from left-wing controlled unions. More elections won.
Lie.
The Netherlands is under pressure from the EU to step up enforcement of it's drug laws and to enact more stringent ones.
Which are these western European countries that are legalizing pot? You're making this crap up.
Yes, we do. At last!
I don't recall marijuana being one of the Seven Deadly Sins.
LOL, what are you talking about? Have you even BEEN to Europe?
How so??
This would be a better compromise, I shouldn’t say compromise, I should say prerequisite: Deport all illegals and immigrants who are undesirable, close the borders, leave criminals in jail forever (build skyscraper prisons if we have too), eliminate all government funding, eliminate the EPA, end government protection of unions (other than common civil liberty), no more education department, social security. Okay I’ll stop there, now let’s talk about lifting the ban.
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