At root, the debate about legalizing marijuana is a philosophical one dating to the Enlightenment. It pits the individual natural rights philosophy of John Locke (16321704) against the utilitarianism of Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832). Locke believed that individuals had an innate right to liberty, which was the building block of civil society. Individuals entered into a social contract to form governments and give them power. But power to protect their liberty against the predations of others. From the Lockean perspective in the modern era, getting high by ingesting weed isn't predatory behavior against anyone else. So, government has no right to deprive a person of liberty for using marijuana. [continues 591 words]
Ruben Gallego, the Democratic House assistant minority leader, would like for his Republican colleagues to listen to his pitch for marijuana to be legalized by legislative action rather than wait for a ballot initiative. Republican lawmakers will roll their eyes. They won't listen. But they should. In politics, some things are all but inevitable. Most political observers think civil sanction for gay marriages is one of them. I think legalization of marijuana is another. The World War II generation is quickly being replaced by the Baby Boomers as America's retirement cohort. Baby Boomers have, shall we say, a history with the use of marijuana. [continues 578 words]
From the Political Notebook: - - I don't know whether the legal action Gov. Jan Brewer and Attorney General Tom Horne took seeking declaratory judgment about the legality of Arizona's medical marijuana law will result in any clarity. But I do know this: The ambiguity of the federal government regarding its enforcement policies about medical marijuana is grossly irresponsible. The Obama administration has said that it probably won't prosecute patients using medical marijuana under state laws for possession under federal law. But even that isn't for sure. [continues 705 words]
I have always been a supporter of medical marijuana. There are two reasons for this. The first is a personal experience many years ago. A son in a family very close to ours came down with cancer. He was having a real tough time with the treatments. A doctor told his parents that marijuana would provide the most effective amelioration for his extreme side effects. His father was in law enforcement. Nevertheless, he secured some pot for his son. The son died from the cancer, but substantially more peaceably than otherwise would have been the case. [continues 532 words]
The sense that Mexico may lose its battle with the drug cartels has ignited a discussion of drug policy in the United States. I have mixed emotions about this. I have long believed that making the use of recreational drugs a criminal offense was wrongheaded on philosophical grounds. The United States should be a country dedicated, in part, to the protection of individual liberty. Such a society should be highly circumspect about the behaviors it deems criminal and thus worthy of depriving those who engage in them of their liberty. [continues 548 words]
A recent Government Accountability Office report on drug interdiction in Mexico is so bleak you have to wonder, what's the point? From 2000 to 2005, the GAO says, the amount of marijuana flowing into the United States from Mexico increased 44 percent. Cocaine shipments to the United States increased 64 percent. Heroin production for U.S. consumption nearly doubled. The National Drug Intelligence Center estimates that the total value of the illegal drug trade between Mexico and the United States at between $8 billion and $23 billion. [continues 543 words]
A recent Government Accountability Office report on drug interdiction in Mexico is so bleak you have to wonder, what's the point? From 2000 to 2005, according to the GAO, the amount of marijuana flowing into the United States from Mexico increased 44 percent. Cocaine shipments to the United States increased 64 percent. Heroin production for U.S. consumption nearly doubled. The National Drug Intelligence Center estimates that the total value of the illegal drug trade between Mexico and the United States at between $8 billion and $23 billion. [continues 613 words]
As legislators consider what to do about prison overcrowding, they should be guided by one central truth: Increased reliance on incarceration has resulted in improved public safety. There was a sea change in the way most states approach crime in the late 1970s and early 1980s, following a couple of decades of rapidly rising crime rates. Most states changed their criminal codes to better reflect the "incapacitation" approach to crime. Political scientist James Q. Wilson provided the intellectual framework for this approach in his influential book, Thinking About Crime. [continues 560 words]
Last week, Maricopa County Attorney Rick Romley challenged University of Phoenix founder John Sperling, one of the chief financiers of the drug decriminalization movement, to a debate over competing drug policy measures on the November ballot. Romley's frustration over shadowboxing the decriminalization forces two of the last three elections is understandable. Their modus operandi in 1996 and 1998 was to control the public debate through big-dollar campaigns. But Romley might not fare any better in a more even-handed fight. I don't know how good a debater Sperling is, but Romley's position on drug policy is intellectually unsustainable. [continues 555 words]
