“As perplexing as the current legal environment is for medical marijuana patients, one thing is quite clear: despite administration statements, little has changed with regard to federal enforcement of marijuana laws, even in states where it has been decriminalized.”

[From my latest Huffington Post piece: Task Force Raids LA Marijuana Dispensaries, Shoots Dog.]

I am going to a fundraiser for the Marijuana Policy Project tomorrow night at the Playboy Mansion.  It should be interesting.  In thinking tonight about the more serious issues surrounding marijuana prohibition, it occurred to me that there’s one rather proactive medical recommendation that (I assume) anyone ought to qualify for.  Here’s my attempt at a first draft:

“I, Doctor Whomever X. Wherever, have thoroughly evaluated and assessed Patient Doe.  In light of this assessment, and my solemn duty to protect the privacy, dignity, and best interests of my patients, I hereby affirm that, in my best professional judgment, my patient’s physical and psychological health are best served by her never spending a single day in prison.”

Who wants to try first?

ZOMG, this product contains cannabis!

Does anybody alive even remember why it was outlawed?  No, of course you don’t – but you’ll do yourself well to look over the historical – and hysterical – record.

Let’s take a few choice quotes from the era of marijuana criminalization, shall we?

“Marihuana influences Negroes to look at white people in the eye, step on white men’s shadows and look at a white woman twice.”
[1934 newspaper editorial in favor of criminalization]

“All Mexicans are crazy, and this stuff is what makes them crazy.”
[Texas legislator arguing for criminalization]

These weren’t just morons on the street.  In fact, Harry Anslinger, our nation’s first drug czar (under President Hoover), offered these ominous warnings for young Americans tempted by the evil weed:

“Colored students at the University of Minnesota were partying with white female students, smoking marijuana and getting their sympathy with stories of racial persecution. Result: pregnancy.”

“Two Negroes took a girl fourteen years old and kept her for two days under the influence of hemp. Upon recovery she was found to be suffering from syphilis.”

“An entire family was murdered by a youthful addict in Florida. When officers arrived at the home, they found the youth staggering about in a human slaughterhouse. With an axe he had killed his father, mother, two brothers, and a sister. He seemed to be in a daze… He had no recollection of having committed the multiple crime. The officers knew him ordinarily as a sane, rather quiet young man; now he was pitifully crazed. They sought the reason. The boy said that he had been in the habit of smoking something which youthful friends called “muggles” a childish name for marijuana.”

And today, we laugh at those old quotes – and movies like “Reefer Madness” – as if we’re soooo much smarter now.  But we’re not.  The current crop of “Drugs Are For Losers” public disinformation ads are hardly better.  I saw one recently with a teenage kid smoking pot, and somehow because of this – inside of 30 seconds – his little brother ended up drowning in the pool.  Boy did he feel stupid!  He didn’t know they meant “killer bud” literally!

The reason the ads are dumb, of course, is because they are tasked with the impossible – defending an indefensible policy.  There is absolutely no rational, cogent argument in support of the status quo with regard to marijuana.  None.  Well, at least there is no intellectually consistent argument for its criminalization that does not necessarily take with it alcohol, tobacco, cheesecake, and even sex (or at least sex with hot chicks.)

Since there is no actual, just, sensible reason to keep marijuana illegal (at least not for those who are non-authoritarian and non-idiot) we make stuff up.  There’s no science to support it; just dogma, so we must write very creatively.  From the heart to the heart, as it were.  I suppose the only truly “good” reasons are self-interest; say, if you work for a corporation or a big-budget government agency that benefits from the status quo – well, then, you’ll just have to make scary, dumb shit up.  Some people will even believe it.

The crux of it is that we need to deeply and seriously consider our assumptions on this issue and actually do something about it.  This is not a matter of a few hippies who want to get high.  We have created a colossal social disaster with our drug policies and spend billions of dollars every year punishing people for politically incorrect vices.  And the real tragedy is that most kids are not as lucky as Phelps.  Millions of supposedly free Americans – a vast majority of them poor black Americans – have been stopped, searched, arrested, imprisoned, separated from their families, stripped of eligibility for student aid, and eternally exiled from the world of gainful employment and upward mobility.  If that is not racism – if that is not consciously and deliberately knocking the socioeconomic wind out of millions – then please tell me what is.

Yet we build more prisons.  We sign the checks.  We assent – however tacitly – to these policies.  It’s not happening because of some bad people far away.  It is happening because of us.

Legalness does not automatically confer moralness nor justness.  This is especially true when the laws are based entirely on racism, ignorance, lies, hate, and fear – and completely unsupported by the facts.

We know there are plenty of immoral things that are totally legal.  It is likewise also true that all illegal things are not immoral.  To go further, some laws are immoral.  Thus, laws are sometimes wrong (hence the concept in legal philosophy of “natural law”).  And unjust laws do not deserve the same respect as laws that are just.  Our society has not evolved into a Utopia where every good and just thing has reached a state of permanent, beautiful, codified perfection while every dumb, bad thing has been rinsed cleanly away from our social fabric.  (One need only tune to prime time reality television to know this.)  On the contrary; there is legal laundry to do.  Many great thinkers have spoken eloquently at great length about the difficult social and legal work required to evolve a great, healthy nation.  To evolve, we must ask tough questions and be we willing to – however uncomfortable – face our brokenness and fix things when they are wrong.  And our drug laws are absolutely, totally wrong.  To borrow from Saint Augustine: unjust law is no law at all.

Now, back to Phelps.  Today, Kellogg said they would not renew their sponsorship deal with him because his behavior was “not consistent with the image of Kellogg.”

Wow – you’ve really got to love the delicious, high-fructose-corn-syrup-encrusted irony of Kellogg’s slamming Phelps’ private behavior while they market marshmallow Fruit Loops and chocolate banana Pop Tarts to millions of kids.

Are we a serious country?

A few months ago – for some reason – that book popped back into my mind.  Who was that guy?  What was that book?  And off I went to figure it out.

The book was perfect for beginners – of course, almost everyone was a beginner to personal computing back then – but this guy’s way of narrating the strange world really opened it up for me.  His language was so colorful, his explanations so accessible, that I found myself glued to the book and returning to it again and again.  The pictures and jokes made me laugh, and his voice was so authentic that the book really touched and affected me.   He turned me on to the idea of phone-connected “data banks” like CompuServe, and I started a BBS a few years later.

I knew this guy had played a pivotal role in my engagement with technology at such a young age.  So, I decided I wanted to find him and reach out to him, see what he was up to, and send him a note of heartfelt thanks and gratitude.

I racked my brain for more clues, took to Google, and my research finally led me to Peter McWilliams.  Turns out the book was the modestly-named Personal Computer Book and first went to print in September 1982.  I ordered an old copy from a bookseller and spent some time with it this weekend.

I’m sorry to tell you that Peter is dead.  And if he had to be dead, I wish I could tell you it was something vaguely sensible and worthy of this guy’s place in my heart, like a high speed car crash in a Bugatti or a heart attack while having sex with two Russian models.  But on the contrary.  Eight years ago, Peter choked to death on his own vomit on his bathroom floor, after a federal judge told him that he could no longer smoke marijuana to keep his nausea at bay long enough to keep down his AIDS medication.  The judge (George King) even ordered Peter, as a condition of his freedom, to undergo mandatory urine testing to ensure his compliance.  Who among us feels this is justice?

We are all guilty in his death.  Some, of course, more than others.  But these barbarian policies are upheld and enforced with our money, our assent, and our power.  We could change them if we cared enough.  To that end, when was the last time you contacted your Congressperson or state legislator and told them what you think about federal and state drug laws?  When was the last time you contributed – time or money – to an organization committed to bringing an end to these draconian policies?  This shit – and make no mistake about it, we are signing the checks and the death warrants – will continue until we choose to end it.

Initially I just wanted to tell him how he affected me and thank him.  But now I want to say: thanks, Peter – you changed my life, and I’m dreadfully sorry about what we did to you.

The criminalization of marijuana was pure foolishness driven by racism, hysteria and corporate special interests.

These laws – in place now for nearly a century – have caused enough tragedy. And all of the laws’ damage is our fault because we’ve allowed them to stand unchallenged. Before us is a new opportunity to change that.

Congressmen Barney Frank and Ron Paul have introduced the first marijuana decriminalization legislation in a generation – H.R. 5843, the “Personal Use of Marijuana by Responsible Adults Act of 2008.”

So, take a couple of minutes to express your support for this bill to your Congressperson. It will make a difference.