Pubdate: Fri, 24 Jan 2014
Source: Arkansas Democrat-Gazette (Little Rock, AR)
Copyright: 2014 Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Inc.
Contact: http://www2.arkansasonline.com/contact/voicesform/
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Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/25
Note: Accepts letters to the editor from Arkansas residents only
Page: 6B

END OF THE BULLY PULPIT

A President Does His Best to Confuse the Issue

OH, FOR the days when a president of the United States only admitted
to trying marijuana in his youth, claimed he didn't like it, and said,
famously or infamously, that he didn't inhale.

This current president's comments to the New Yorker the other day
about marijuana have been, well, selectively edited by some of our
friends on the starboard side of the media. But the president
shouldn't have his words changed. Not at all. What he said was
confused enough, irrelevant enough, unhelpful and even harmful enough.
Just quote him, folks. No need for embellishment.

For example, when asked by a reporter for the New Yorker what he
thought about legalizing marijuana, the president started meandering
off in this direction:

"As has been well documented, I smoked pot as a kid, and I view it as
a bad habit and a vice, not very different from the cigarettes that I
smoked as a young person up through a big chunk of my adult life. I
don't think it is more dangerous than alcohol."

Huh? Not very different from cigarettes? (Sigh.) So when Joey gets
busted with weed, he can always shake his finger at his parents:
Didn't you hear the president? You two smoke Marlboros!

The president's words don't seem to jibe with those out of the
National Institute on Drug Abuse, which says the drug in marijuana can
affect memory, thinking, coordination and sensory and time perception.
To quote the institute's website: "Marijuana overactivates the
endocannabinoid system, causing the high and other effects that users
experience. These include distorted perceptions, impaired
coordination, difficulty with thinking and problem solving, and
disrupted learning and memory."

Anybody who's ever had a cigarette and tried a doobie at a party would
probably tell you there's a marked difference between the two. There's
a reason you go to jail if you're caught driving while high. Whether
on booze or mary jane.

WHEN asked if he thought marijuana was less dangerous than booze (he'd
already said he didn't think it was more), the president said it is
less dangerous "in terms of its impact on the individual consumer.
It's not something I encourage, and I've told my daughters I think
it's a bad idea, a waste of time, not very healthy."

Well, at least he's advising his daughters against smoking pot. As any
good dad would. But what was the point of asking the president to
compare the risks associated with smoking pot and those of getting
drunk on booze? What a dumb question. As if we had to choose one or
the other. Can't both be bad for developing minds? Each drug presents
its own risks.

Do we have to legalize marijuana because alcohol is so much an
accepted part of society? There's something missing here, like common
sense.

Yes, there are a lot of problems with booze. But the effects of
marijuana aren't negligible, either. Once again, according to those
who are supposed to know about such things-the scientists at the NIDA-
"in chronic users, marijuana's adverse impact on learning and memory
persists after the acute effects of the drug wear off; when marijuana
use begins in adolescence, the effects may persist for many years."

NIDA calls it a "fact" that marijuana has long-lasting negative
effects on young people and their brains. And it claims a "number of
studies" have shown a connection between chronic pot smoking and
mental illness.

So who are these hotshots at the National Institute on Drug Abuse
anyway, and who asked them to chime in?

NIDA is a branch of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services,
a cabinet-level department in the executive branch of the federal 
government.

In other words, NIDA is the president's own people. He should listen
to them.

After his comments downplaying the danger of marijuana, the president
almost had to devote the obligatory paragraph or two to the other side
of the question. On the one hand this, on the other hand that. As an
argument, that's an editorial-writing staple. Unfortunately.

The president did warn about the ol' Slippery Slope into other drugs.
Which was welcome. If only he hadn't prefaced that warning by
needlessly comparing pot with cigarettes, booze and so on, then his
comments might have done some good.

Just last week the papers in Arkansas ran with a story about some
teens in Northwest Arkansas who have banded together, like so many
teens in other parts of the state and country, to help prevent drug
abuse by their friends. They're out to combat the permissive attitudes
these days about dangerous drugs. And one of their focus points is
pot.

Then the president of the United States spoke. He didn't help much.
Maybe his people should give him a little talk. The way he did his
girls.

ANY half-mystified, half-appalled observer of this "debate" between
defenders of different toxins has to ask why either the New Yorker's
politics or this president's can be taken seriously. Both seem lost in
a mire of juvenile disputatiousness over an abstract choice that
doesn't matter in actual practice. Choose your poison: Weed or whiskey?

Yet this exchange does reveal, however unintentionally, what's wrong
with American politics today: Both sides are asking questions that
don't really matter, that don't really go to the heart of the issue,
let alone contribute to a solution.

It seems to be happening with unsettling regularity: Voluminous bills
are passed in Congress without their being read, let alone understood
(see Obamacare), and only later must real people deal with their real
consequences. That's when the waivers begin to flow like a Mississippi
of rules, regs, exceptions and general confusions.

Maybe we're short of answers these days because we're not asking the
right questions. Marijuana or alcohol? Why not arsenic or strychnine?
Is this the level of discussion we want to foster in the American dialogue?

What's wrong with that false choice? Mainly its irrelevance disguised
as sophistication. Much like one of the New Yorker's editorials or the
president's speeches, both of which can be laborious exercises in
saying nothing much. Both specimens of today's rhetoric seem just
another irrelevance presented in the guise of moderation-even suave
sophistication. We've certainly come a long way from Lincoln-Douglas-a
long way down.

How wrest a glimpse of perception, even insight and unity, from
today's mix of politicking and nitpicking? Let's begin by talking
about the practical effects of policies lightly adopted, or just
slipped into in an absence of mind. Let's begin by watching the
results of experiments with the legalization of marijuana in state
after state, the better to understand what we're risking and what if
anything we're gaining.

Let's begin, as always, with education. And see where it leads. There
may be no way to avoid the dangers of either prohibition or
permissiveness. But, please, let's not assume we have to choose
between one or the other in some kind of blindfolded taste test, and
pretend we're having a serious discussion.
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MAP posted-by: Matt