Is Obama Planning to Ramp Up the War on Drugs?

Nick Gillespie | April 9, 2009

That's what the folks at Aid & Comfort fear, and with some good reason. They point to a recent New York Times report in which Attorney General Eric "Holder said he was exploring ways to lower the minimum amount required for the federal prosecution of possession cases."

|4.9.09 @ 9:11AM|#

Judiciary taking a wait and see approach to hear from the Executive really pisses me off.

Kyle Jordan|4.9.09 @ 9:11AM|#

I'm stealing LoneWacko's thunder here...

So, to all you libertarians/liberals/dullards who voted for Obama in hoping that he and his administration would actually do something fruitful in the war on the War on Drugs, pat yourselves on the back.

Morons.

Naga Sadow|4.9.09 @ 9:11AM|#

Kyle Jordan!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

*shakes fist in air*

|4.9.09 @ 9:19AM|#

Dear Reason Powers That Be,

I like reason.tv I never miss an episode of the talk show. However, the little short propaganda pieces are stupid. Really REALLY stupid. I don't mind that you make them. Maybe they'll get better. But for now I have one question. Why are you pushing them so hard. Why do these really stupid things keep showing up again and again at the top of Hit and Run?

Look, you make the thing, you host it on reason.tv, and you post a link on H&R. Then you should move on. Why do you insist on pushing the stupid??? WHY? I'd appreciate an answer.

thank you
Warren

Naga Sadow|4.9.09 @ 9:21AM|#

Warren,

Farewell. I'm sure that the dreaded ban hammer is even now being deployed against you. But before you go, you should check out the bailout spoofs!

squarooticus|4.9.09 @ 9:27AM|#

I didn't think I'd so quickly get to say "I told you so" to all supposed libertarians who voted for Obama. But, to be fair, it was a no-lose scenario for me: I would eventually have said the same thing to McCain supporters had McCain won.

Day by day, my decision not to vote for president is vindicated by ever more evidence. Unfortunately, I need a lot more people to realize what a sham democracy is, at least at the national level. The critical mass of you who continue to buy into this system, hoping somehow that it will suddenly start working and start producing libertarian outcomes, are effectively enslaving me... and I don't like that.

Kyle Jordan|4.9.09 @ 9:34AM|#

"I didn't think I'd so quickly get to say "I told you so" to all supposed libertarians who voted for Obama. But, to be fair, it was a no-lose scenario for me: I would eventually have said the same thing to McCain supporters had McCain won."

Very true. It just seemed as though on this particular issue that some people truly thought Obama was going to be different.

And I too sat this last one out. Feels good not having chosen between shitty and shittier.

T|4.9.09 @ 9:34AM|#

The critical mass of you who continue to buy into this system, hoping somehow that it will suddenly start working and start producing libertarian outcomes, are effectively enslaving me... and I don't like that.

If you're effectively enslaved, my lawn needs mowed. Get on it.

|4.9.09 @ 9:38AM|#

Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos.

|4.9.09 @ 9:39AM|#

Naga Sadow,

What, you mean like "3 reasons to pay your taxes" or "DMV auto repair"? Blech :P

The mini series on Social Security wasn't too bad. Mildly humorous and got some good points in.

|4.9.09 @ 9:47AM|#

Hey, humor isn't easy, and it's not Reason's principal purpose for existing, either. Give them some time. I've liked some of what they've done so far. A running gimmick might help give a framework--maybe a top ten list or something like that. They they can focus on the jokes/jabs more than on the overall format. They could also put up some money to get readers to submit videos for a prize. Lots of talent out there, these days.

Mockery is an excellent way of spreading the too-much-government-sucks message, in my opinion. Why, all 20 readers of Urkobold are now dyed-in-the-wool libertarians! And to think they were originally Illinois Nazis!

creech|4.9.09 @ 9:53AM|#

Until libertarian ideas are accepted on the grassroots level, politicians will not listen.
So libertarian groups need to find a way to translate their thousands of financial supporters into thousands of grassroot groups working for libertarian ideas in their community.

Sal Paradise|4.9.09 @ 9:54AM|#

Hey, c'mon he's only been in office less than 100 days.

It's not fair to criticize him until his second term.

|4.9.09 @ 9:55AM|#

Not everybody (meaning me) has unlimited bandwidth. Those video posts bog my connection down something awful, so I have to use a video-disabled browser.

Where's my bailout?

Pat Rogers|4.9.09 @ 9:55AM|#

First I want to thank Hit & Run for picking up my thread. I am honored.

Second, for those blaming the folks who honestly thought that Obama would be different and so voted for him, it was not their fault. They were led by commentators in the reform community who idealistically rephrased and misrepresented everything that Obama actually said leading reformers by their hopes rather than informing them of the reality. And this continues today. I got the Holder quote from Pete Guither's Drug WarRant where Pete and Eric Sterling dissect the Holder quote, deny what he actually said. And then proceed to fantasize about what they think he really said. "Sometimes, I'm clueless"

|4.9.09 @ 10:00AM|#

Hey, humor isn't easy, and it's not Reason's principal purpose for existing, either. Give them some time. I've liked some of what they've done so far.

I understand that. I support that. I'm not saying they should stop what their doing. I'm just saying, once I watch a stupid video, I'd rather not have to be reminded of how stupid it is over and over.

|4.9.09 @ 10:10AM|#

Warren,

If it's done as a standalone, reappearing top post, I might agree. I'm less bothered when it's appended to a post on a related topic.

|4.9.09 @ 10:19AM|#

I can just see Warren, on the gallows, bitching that they're going to hang him with a new rope.

|4.9.09 @ 10:23AM|#

squarooticus nails it, once again. ProLib, learned counsel that you are, I am sure that you agree that democracy itself is incompatible with the rule of law.

Ben|4.9.09 @ 10:26AM|#

Pat Rogers--I'm sorry but you're wrong, they were major fucking idiots for thinking Obama would be different. Anyone with half a brain and not wearing ideological blinders could tell that Obama was just another politician and not some messiah.

|4.9.09 @ 10:27AM|#

I didn't think I'd so quickly get to say "I told you so" to all supposed libertarians who voted for Obama. But, to be fair, it was a no-lose scenario for me: I would eventually have said the same thing to McCain supporters had McCain won.

This is fair enough. However, most libertarians like to console themselves with the idea that, even if both major party candidates are bad, that usually both of them at least have an issue or two that they're okay at, and better than the other one at.

But on what issue has Obama turned out to be better than McCain from a libertarian perspective? There's certainly the fact that Obama didn't write McCain-Feingold, he only supports the idea. The drug war was one of those areas where we could hope that Obama would be better than McCain. What other areas? Don't say "the defense budget" without thinking. McCain approves of the recently released budget, and cutting major expensive defense programs. (Dems like Sen. Webb, not so much, as they say.)

Jack|4.9.09 @ 10:29AM|#

Sarah Palin was the true libertarian on the ticket.

|4.9.09 @ 10:31AM|#

Libertymike,

No, I don't agree with that. What I agree with is that unrestricted democracy can lead to tyranny and destroy the rule of law. We've always had democratic components in our system; they were just (intentionally) offset by what were supposed to be countervailing interests--like the old Senate (elected by state legislators), federalism, the presidency, the Electoral College, and the courts.

Also, the Constitution itself, by limiting government, further encapsulates the idea that even the majority can't make certain kinds of laws. The natural rights argument inherent in most of the founding documents also supports the notion that democracy isn't the goal--liberty is.

Not to overstate the comparison, but the end of the Roman Republic came in large part because of the power of populist causes. . .and those willing to champion them for their own interests.

T|4.9.09 @ 10:37AM|#

I got the Holder quote from Pete Guither's Drug WarRant where Pete and Eric Sterling dissect the Holder quote, deny what he actually said. And then proceed to fantasize about what they think he really said.

I see this a lot with the Obamarama fan club. Plain and simple statements are parsed as if some Delphic utterance was painstakingly translated from Attic Greek and must be decoded in light of modern revelations or some crap. Bottom line, Barry has never been upfront about his policy intentions and isn't going to be now.

Pat Rogers|4.9.09 @ 10:41AM|#

Well Ben most social justice supporters wanted desperately to be able to vote for the first black president. They looked for any excuse to do so. Lots of folks, who otherwise would have been rationally cynical about a Democrat, were lured/lulled by an ideal. It took me some hard thinking to bring myself to Martin Luther King's admonition and judge Obama by the content of his character rather than by the color of his skin. And for that I took a lot of shit from liberals. Go figure.

I reserve my anger though for the reform minded commentators who consistently took everything Obama said and recast it to what they wanted to hear. Then they spewed that crap at drug policy reform minded Americans giving them the false hope they needed to support Obama. If I were to list all of the reform commentators who basically ignored their own knowledge and experience just to support the Obama false hope delusion I would be the biggest pariah in the reform movement.

|4.9.09 @ 10:42AM|#

Same thing happened under Clinton. At least with Bush's blind supporters, they actually defended what he was doing, as opposed to twisting everything around to mean something else. The end result was the same--we got screwed--but at least we weren't scratching our collective heads wondering whether we're wrong about gravity somehow.

I hate lawyers in politics.

Pat Rogers|4.9.09 @ 10:44AM|#

T:

Yup!

The audacity of false hope.

BakedPenguin|4.9.09 @ 10:50AM|#

All I was looking for on this issue when he got elected (I voted Barr, btw) was that he'd keep his promise on medical marijuana. So much for that.

Anyone who thought there would be any real change in the WoD was fooling themselves after his Berlin speech where he compared drug dealers to terrorists.

BakedPenguin|4.9.09 @ 11:09AM|#

This is all the sadder, given the Portuguese experience reported in the thread below.

Jack|4.9.09 @ 11:10AM|#

All Obama does is make guilty white liberals feel better about themselves. How irresponsible to vote based upon that in an age of nuclear terrorism.

More proof that liberals are emotional children at heart.

squarooticus|4.9.09 @ 11:16AM|#

Second, for those blaming the folks who honestly thought that Obama would be different and so voted for him, it was not their fault. They were led by commentators in the reform community who idealistically rephrased and misrepresented everything that Obama actually said leading reformers by their hopes rather than informing them of the reality.

In other words they were naïve/blind/dumb. Thanks for clearing that up.

squarooticus|4.9.09 @ 11:22AM|#

But on what issue has Obama turned out to be better than McCain from a libertarian perspective?

Hence why I have chosen no longer to participate in this farce.

Were a truly libertarian government a possible outcome of democracy, I might be able to be convinced to join the party again... but as Hoppe has shown, this is simply impossible on a large scale as a result of the incentives present in democratic systems.

As a result, I have to submit to my principles, and one of those is: I will no longer vote to oppress my neighbor with my choice of ruler.

alan|4.9.09 @ 12:00PM|#

I reserve my anger though for the reform minded commentators who consistently took everything Obama said and recast it to what they wanted to hear. Then they spewed that crap at drug policy reform minded Americans giving them the false hope they needed to support Obama.

You would think that the Biden pick for VP would have clued them in to Obama's insincerity in this matter.

Art-P.O.G.|4.9.09 @ 12:03PM|#

I will no longer vote to oppress my neighbor with my choice of ruler.

You might as well vote 3rd-Party. Your odds of actually causing oppression this way are pretty low.

Mike Laursen|4.9.09 @ 12:07PM|#

It's inevitable that pot is going to be legalized someday. I'll bet it will be accompanied by toughening up of enforcement against harder drugs, so that the politicians can deflect criticism that they are soft on drugs.

squarooticus|4.9.09 @ 12:07PM|#

Voting third party is functionally equivalent to not voting from the perspective of the outcome of a particular election, but the third-party voter is saying, "I accept the outcome of this election as legitimate even though I know my candidate has zero chance of winning." I don't want my vote to say that.

Pat Rogers|4.9.09 @ 12:18PM|#

TO alan | April 9, 2009, 12:00pm

They might have been clued in by Obama's proud co-sponsorship of the 2005 Combat Meth Act that actually gave the Mexican cartels the meth market that they have used to grow their control of U.S. drug markets since 2005. The 2007 National Drug Threat Assessment of the U.S. Justice Department actually described the outcome of the Combat Meth Act as causing the problem of Mexican control of the meth markets.

I wrote about this outcome repeatedly during the campaign and have repeated it again here:

IMPEACH OBAMA, BIDEN & CLINTON!

For the record, I firmly believe that as long as any drug remains illegal it is a tax free subsidy program for anarchistic criminals, cartels and terrorists. The illicit drug black market maintained by drug war prohibition provides "aid and comfort" for America's enemies, both foreign and domestic. Support for the war on drugs amounts to an act of treason against the United States of America.

Pat Rogers|4.9.09 @ 12:37PM|#

The ultimate purpose of voting is the exercise of political free speech and free expression. By not voting you simply shove a gag into your own mouth and give authoritarians free reign over America without any valid expression of opposition at all.

Voting to win is the mind-control programming of the party hack system meant to deny the validity of free political speech and expression.

Voting to express your values is how democracy truly can and should work. That means, win or lose, voting for the candidates who best reflect and respect your political values. Since the 1990's this perspective has gained ground in America thanks mostly to the Libertarians, Ross Perot and Ralph Nader. The Green Party is learning and growing in their advocacy of alternative political perspective as opposed to being the liberal wing of the DNC and that too has helped to grow the third party and Independent culture in America.

The drug policy reform movement has been instrumental at licensing this newly emerging political culture in America. Until the early 1990's drug policy reformers groveled at the feet of the DNC only to be pissed upon election after election. But Prop-215 in 1996 had reformers going independent of the Democratic Party nay-sayers and gain a win by joining forces with Libertarians and Nader Independents. This gave both reform and the third party culture a boost it had never before gotten in America. As the third party/Independent movement has grown since 1996 so too has support for drug policy reform both among the electorate and even with politicians in the two dominance parties.

Americans voting their values, WIN OR LOSE, has empowered these great changes in America.

Not voting is acceptance of powerlessness. Voting your values is the only way to assert personal control over your most vital and important constitutional right, your right to free political speech.

squarooticus|4.9.09 @ 12:40PM|#

Not voting is acceptance of powerlessness.

You keep telling yourself that. Or you could read this and educate yourself on why people refuse to vote on principle.

Pat Rogers|4.9.09 @ 12:51PM|#

TO squarooticus:

You can play sycophant to whom ever you choose to. I, as an Independent individual, follow my own council.

Menstrual Retardation|4.9.09 @ 12:53PM|#

"And I too sat this last one out. Feels good not having chosen between shitty and shittier."

I yake great pride in the fact that I voted for Hillary the Shittiest.

She couldn't win,
So I wrote her in.

squarooticus|4.9.09 @ 12:59PM|#

You can play sycophant to whom ever you choose to. I, as an Independent individual, follow my own council.

You can accuse me of anything you like, but that doesn't make it true.

Bippy, Seet Bippy|4.9.09 @ 1:00PM|#

@ anyone

Who is this Pat Rogers faggot? Where'd he suddenly crawl out of?

Pat Rogers|4.9.09 @ 1:13PM|#

Typical of attempting to reason among Libertarians, some with devolve into rude personal attacks while some others will simply meander off the topic into ideologically extreme inanities.

The only hope is that, eventually, reason will prevail among the majority of libertarian free thinkers.

squarooticus|4.9.09 @ 1:17PM|#

eventually, reason will prevail

Do we drink for this?

Pat Rogers|4.9.09 @ 1:25PM|#

TO Bippy, Seet Bippy | April 9, 2009, 1:00pm:

I participate on threads that provide interesting discourse which is why you probably do not see me on many threads that you frequent.

|4.9.09 @ 1:25PM|#

I accept the outcome of this election as legitimate even though I know my candidate has zero chance of winning." I don't want my vote to say that.

√icus,

why does not voting say you don't accept the outcome as legitimate? as opposed to other things such as apathy? Moreover, if you truely dont accept the result as legitimate, isn't the only acceptable recourse refusal to acknowledge the legitimacy through protest, refusal to pay taxes, armed rebellion, etc?

squarooticus|4.9.09 @ 1:43PM|#

why does not voting say you don't accept the outcome as legitimate?

It doesn't necessarily: the interpretation is in the eye of the beholder. But voting clearly says I think the system is legitimate, while not voting can be interpreted otherwise.

Moreover, if you truely dont accept the result as legitimate, isn't the only acceptable recourse refusal to acknowledge the legitimacy through protest, refusal to pay taxes, armed rebellion, etc?

I am not an army of one, and I would prefer to admire Irwin Schiff from afar, i.e., without sharing his prison cell.

I don't think you understand how I view my relationship with the state. Essentially, the US government is the most powerful mafia crime family that ever existed, whereas I am the proprietor of a café in one of the outlying suburbs: does it therefore make sense to stop paying the protection money, go to war with my limited resources, or otherwise poke fingers in the eyes of the local captains? What exactly is that going to achieve?

I get away with ignoring the feds wherever possible, and I advocate against them at every opportunity. Until more people start to see the federal government for what it really is, my effort is better spent on advocacy than on noble but futile gestures of rebellion.

|4.9.09 @ 1:47PM|#

Is Obama Planning to Ramp Up the War on Drugs?

After the Joe Biden selection, only a retard would have expected anything else.

squarooticus|4.9.09 @ 1:57PM|#

only a retard would have expected anything else

Like these guys?

(I wasn't able to get the font quite right in the 5 minutes I had to spare for this. ;-) )

Pat Rogers|4.9.09 @ 2:08PM|#

TO J sub D;

The more obdurate liberal thinkers might have gotten a cue when the Obama "stimulus" package included $3-billion in Byrne Criminal Justice Grant money to stimulate more drug task forces, more arrests, more drug courts and more prisons.

T|4.9.09 @ 2:40PM|#

the interpretation is in the eye of the beholder

Yay! We can make up our own reasons for why you don't vote! I'm going with you have an abnormal fear and hatred of the color purple and are concerned you might encounter it in the polling place.

The more obdurate liberal thinkers might have gotten a cue

Yeah, because we just had a post the other day where some twunt at The Nation finally discovered unintended consequences and it never occurred to him that passing more laws can't help. The "more obdurate liberal thinkers" are the ones that give us more of the same failing policies. You ain't waking them up short of gunshot wound.

jtuf|4.9.09 @ 3:00PM|#

So, will liberals reject Obama for this reversal on marijuana attitudes the way conservatives rejected Bush Sr. for breaking his no new taxes pledge?

Paul|4.9.09 @ 3:08PM|#

Wow, lot of I-told-you-so's today.

Paul|4.9.09 @ 3:09PM|#

So, will liberals reject Obama for this reversal on marijuana attitudes the way conservatives rejected Bush Sr. for breaking his no new taxes pledge?

No, the drug war is very popular with liberals. They will embrace him harder.

Paul|4.9.09 @ 3:15PM|#

Oh, and by the way, lemme whisper this little ditty into y'all's ears:

With a national health care plan (call it whatever you want, single payer, socialized medicine, etc.) a relaxation of the drug war will NEVER occur. Ever. Not ever. Nnnnnnever. They're incompatible with eachother. And to the liberal, the chimeric "universal access" trumps everything. EVERYTHING. Freedom of speech, freedom of choice. That's why there are so many Castro supporters on the left. "Hey, who cares if the regime is oppressive, at least they have universal health care!"

Paul|4.9.09 @ 3:26PM|#

my effort is better spent on advocacy than on noble but futile gestures of rebellion.

I still talk on my cell phone while driving in the car... without the stupid ear bud.

REVOLUTION!!!!!!

Pat Rogers|4.9.09 @ 3:26PM|#

The only chance there is of ending the war on drugs in our lifetime is to push the 535 a-holes in congress to end it. Support their members who are sane, regardless of party. And attacking with bare teeth those who support the treasonous war on drugs.

Just think a February Rasmussen poll found that 40% of Americans support pot legalization. 46% oppose and 14% were undecided.

Most favorability polls of the U.S. congress give them between 30-39% favorable ranking and 53-67% unfavorable.

This means that marijuana legalization is more popular than the congress that actually prohibits the legalization of marijuana.

If America had real drug reform organizations that were actually activist organizations instead of being full employment liberal party hack lawyers sipping cocktails with prosecutor politicians we would be out in the streets of Washington, D.C. and our state capitals screaming at the elected idiots:

NO MORE DRUG WAR!

NO MORE DRUG WAR!

NO MORE DRUG WAR!

NO MORE DRUG WAR!

squarooticus|4.9.09 @ 3:39PM|#

Paul: LOL. :-)

|4.9.09 @ 3:43PM|#

"[W]hy does not voting say you don't accept the outcome as legitimate? as opposed to other things such as apathy?"

I respect apathy as an equally admirable reason for not voting. Say what you will against them, apathetes at least don't bother to deprive their neighbor of liberties. And they don't commit atrocities.

Pat Rogers|4.9.09 @ 4:11PM|#

TO Axman | April 9, 2009, 3:43pm;

They simply ignore the atrocities committed in their name by the government and just as uncritically pay for it with their tax payments.

When your apathy renders you silent in the polling booth you have accepted the authoritarian status quo. No matter what you claim to the contrary outside the curtain.

Sitting silent while your neighbor is beaten into the ground by people acting as YOUR government funded with your tax dollars IS depriving your neighbor of their liberties. Cynically, callously and dishonestly depriving them of their liberties.

Oat Willie|4.9.09 @ 4:18PM|#

"And they don't commit atrocities."

Except when they stand by and allow atrocities to happen to other people.

squarooticus|4.9.09 @ 4:26PM|#

Sitting silent while your neighbor is beaten into the ground by people acting as YOUR government funded with your tax dollars IS depriving your neighbor of their liberties. Cynically, callously and dishonestly depriving them of their liberties.

In that case, you should be advocating anywhere from the peaceful refusal to pay taxes to open rebellion and revolution. But you aren't.

Instead, you're advocating an act that has no practical effect on what the government does---really, no national election will ever be decided by one vote. At least by not voting I have a clear conscience that I had nothing to do with putting these crooks in power, and instead spent that time and effort advocating real freedom.

squarooticus|4.9.09 @ 4:29PM|#

Except when they stand by and allow atrocities to happen to other people.

Scenario 1: You don't vote. Barack Obama wins. The US military continues to bomb brown people.

Scenario 2: You vote for Ron Paul. Barack Obama wins. The US military continues to bomb brown people.

Congratulations! Barack Obama still gets elected and brown people still get bombed. Operationally, the two scenarios are equivalent; but in the second you are morally responsible for the outcome because you have implicitly accepted the legitimacy of the system by participating in it.

|4.9.09 @ 4:40PM|#

Look at the Nolan Chart. On the left is a quadrant labeled "liberal". If you read the fine print, it says, "liberals usually embrace freedom of choice in personal matters,
but tend to support significant government control of the economy."

Bullshit! Liberals heartily embrace government control over all areas of your lives! The left side of the Nolan Chart is a myth, liberals fall to the bottom "authoritarian" quadrant. Libertarians who think liberal presidents will get rid of the war on drug need a swift hard kick to the 'nads.

Pat Rogers|4.9.09 @ 4:47PM|#

TO: squarooticus | April 9, 2009, 4:29pm:

Wrong! 100% dead Wrong!

Vote for Ron Paul and the Democrats and Republicans know that there are people who will not vote for them based on the issues and values that Ron Paul represents.

The Democrats and Obama would not today be doing a dance around the medical pot issue had it not been for third party candidates raising the threat of taking votes from the Democrats and Republicans based on the medical pot issue.

People and politicians in the states would not be as brave about supporting pot decrim and medical pot legalization but for the support they see that third party and Independent candidates get when they support these issues.

Whatever the issues are that you strongly believe in they go nowhere with the public and politicians of the two dominance parties when those people do not see growing support for candidates, initiatives, referenda and legislation that advance those issues.

Your apathy says that you don't really give a shit about anything enough to stand up for it. So why should anyone else care about what you so lamely claim is important to you?

Your belligerent and willful ignorance of the political system is astounding. Why don't you shove your head down a toilet and not bother the rest of us with your inane shit.

squarooticus|4.9.09 @ 4:55PM|#

Your apathy says that you don't really give a shit about anything enough to stand up for it.

I give up: not even approaching the point of being able to disagree with what I actually think, you are willfully misrepresenting my viewpoint. So, just get bent.

squarooticus|4.9.09 @ 5:00PM|#

By the way, as far as liberty is concerned, you are a worthless piece of shit, Pat: I don't honestly see how anyone with your level of belligerence can possibly convince anyone of anything. Simply from our brief interaction here, I suspect you are nothing but an albatross around the necks of whatever causes you support.

Frankly, you remind me of Eric Dondero.

Pat Rogers|4.9.09 @ 5:15PM|#

TO squarooticus | April 9, 2009, 5:00pm

You give me no reason to care what you think. If, by accident, you ever really do think about anything.

squarooticus|4.9.09 @ 5:17PM|#

Are you still speaking?

Paul|4.9.09 @ 5:28PM|#

Wrong! 100% dead Wrong!

Vote for Ron Paul and the Democrats and Republicans know that there are people who will not vote for them based on the issues and values that Ron Paul represents.

Pat, I appreciate your optimism. No, really I do. However, I don't appreciate your perspective on the reality of the situation. We have a winner-take-all political system. This, in my opinion is the biggest problem. It allows the two parties to completely ignore the third party perspective that you seem to have so much faith in.

The only reason the parties pay any lip service to third party ideals is when they fear a loss due to a split. Ie, the third party candidate doesn't win... and never will, but they need to draw the votes away from the third party candidate to keep the other major party candidate from winning. Ie, for the Democrats, it's not about the Green Party, or the Libertarian Party, it's about the Republicans. It's merely strategic vote gathering and nothing more.

Now, with a parlimentary system, this would be different. Because if a libertarian party were to get a percentage of seats, then their legislative voting block (depending on its size) could create real interference. With our current system, however, once the major party candidate wins and the election is over, the third party ceases to exist. It literally evaporates before the winning candidates eyes, and we're all back to square one again.

</|4.9.09 @ 5:30PM|#

Fuck you dirty hippies!

Paul|4.9.09 @ 5:55PM|#

In fact, come to think of it, the third parties had exactly the opposite problem. Especially during the last couple of presidential elections. Liberals, feeling so stung by the Al Gore loss due to the very real but very slim margin of votes that Ralph Nader was able to abscond with, felt that they had to temper their votes of principle and vote for the major party-- because of the fear that their principled vote would result in a candidate that's such an anathema to what they believe. This left third party candidates even more marginalized than before.

Pat Rogers|4.9.09 @ 7:07PM|#

TO Paul | April 9, 2009, 5:28pm:

I understand and even sometimes share your pessimism. But this is the system we have. Not a parliamentary system or any other system. This is it.

There would not be thirteen states with medical pot laws and others with decriminalized pot if the party politicians didn't see gathering support over the years that compel them to adopt aspects of reform policies. This, I know, is due to the political changes in the third party/Independent profile of American politics since 1992. Its not instant gratification but change does happen. Is happening.

If the potential for a voter mutiny among drug policy reformers were not such a threat Obama, in early February, would not have come out to declare there would be no more medical pot raids. He caved in because the hell that was raised online forced him to capitulate. Or risk masses of young people abandoning his audacious false hope campaign. He is as afraid of these voters going third party as he is for them giving up politics. I would bet he would prefer that they give up politics than go third party. People who give up on voting are no threat at all to the status quo. They are supporting it by simplistically not opposing it.

Virginia Sen. Jim Webb has a bill up for a commission to re-evaluate the entirety of the war on drugs policy and American criminal justice. My REPUBLICAN senator, Arlen Specter is one of the sponsors. I know from long correspondence with Specter that he would not support even the commission if not for the strong arguments that I and others in my state have leveled on Specter in letters and online with blogging.

Paul | April 9, 2009, 5:55pm

I don't care what the Democrats and Republicans rant and rationalize they are doing their party damage control by demonizing and marginalizing third parties and Independents. The louder they rant simply proves the growing impact we are having on them. The volume of their screeching is an indicator of our success.

On the Gore loss in particular I love to see them raise the issue. Some 273,000 Florida Democrats voted for Bush. While 83,000 Greens and Independents voted for Nader. The Democrats need to get their own right-wing in order before they point fingers at Nader and the third party movement.

Medic|4.9.09 @ 8:03PM|#

And another one bites the dust.

I already have my "Impeach Obama" sticker on my truck.

Right next to my Ron Paul for President.

|4.9.09 @ 10:09PM|#

"Sarah Palin was the true libertarian on the ticket."

Objectively speaking, she would have sucked too from a libertarian standpoint - such is the crap the two parties offer. But she was better than the other three.

Unfortunately, libertarians let the press lead them around on a leash by playing to their anti-religious prejudices. Never admit it, though.

Obama was the worst we've had in decades. You really had to be an idiot to think he had libertarian tendencies.

hotsauce|4.10.09 @ 12:13AM|#

Just scoring from home:

squarooticus > Pat Rogers

DdC|4.10.09 @ 6:29AM|#

Nothing as discouraging as a whiny redneck.

Corporate Welrare Rats

Blind faith allegiance and ignorance goes without saying, but never such cowardice as hiding behind kids, to make some rich damn Yankee richer? (If I recall a damn yankee is one who moves to the south.) Or old school Yankee, you know, those who go out of their way to help us all the time. Let the seniors freeze to death because giving them heating oil wouldn't be fair to the oil market.

They shut down the southern textile mills because slave labor through Klintoon's NAFTA is more profitable. America first with their off shore bank accounts. Importing China's cheap-goods cause we can't afford quality US brands No money except a Trillion to the Banksters, a Trillion for Haliburdon and DynCorps and Chevron in Iraq. Another Trillion spent busting stoners. No money for pot holes.

Canada grows hemp, but US farmers sell out to developers or chemical Ag corporations. Aborting more babies than Roe vs Wade. Hemp is non psychoactive yet it comprises 98% of the drug czar's "marijuana" eradication figures. Making it look like he's really doing something with all those billions of dollars.

Protecting the kids from stronger softer blue jeans? Maybe it's the Omega 3 essential fatty acids in the seed and the oil they don't want the kids to get. Canvas and burlap growing wild as small game hunters know, pheasant habitat.

Now a schedule#1 narcotic because of the lies of a crooked California politician. You bite the hook and swallowed the line and sinker. Then when the gibberish hogwash falls through you start whining. Geeesh, how pitiful. How ashamed I am of full growd citizens acting like school kids sucking up to a bully.

For what, more abortions from the mandatory cotton or Middle Eastern crude oil poly fiber? Cotton's 90 million pounds of chemical poisons sprayed each year running off into the streams and lakes and the bass you just reeled in. Kids playing in the dirt among the carcinogens and radio activity.

Sprayed on the tobacco crops, not the Hemp or Ganja plants. Chemicals added to "cigarettes" for your smoking pleasure as Ronnie used to say. Tobacco "products" that can be taxed, unlike raw vegetation that can't.

Making the poor most vulnerable to the greatest amount of chemicals used on the cheaper generic brands, getting the lower grades and floor sweepings. Comparing these chemical waste dump "cigarettes" to organic cannabis is silly, and even if people are afraid to speak out they know when someone is gibbering nonsense.

Reality doesn't exist in Reefer Madness. Yet politicians don't care, they pass the laws and the lobby's reap the profits for their corporate boards.

While our kids breath the foul air and the pregnant women feed their unborn the same contaminated nutrients. For the kids? You send these kids to die for oil that is unnecessary. Except to Exxon and Busheney's Carlyle Group and Gore's Occidental in Plan Colombia.

4000+ of those kid soldiers won't see home again. Hundreds of thousands won't ever be the same and millions are trying to get over the trauma and told their is no help. Told they will go to jail if they use what the Israeli soldiers use, Cannabis.

PTSD effects all people suffering trauma, not just soldiers. Car wrecks and even court appearances can cause trauma that causes long term damage far worse than toking a bong that relieves the stress as ole Willie says. Now there's a true blue American redneck.

Not whiny urban cowsheople that let the hobgoblins govern. Just picturing these big bad ass foul mouth rednecks crying in their ole Milwaukee and Lone Stars about the heathern devil weed and those hippies trying to give their children a cleaner environment at the expense of JR's portfolio. Pitifuckinful.

Oblamo choose bLIEden and Sir Hillary mouse of slick will and czarbarry's DEAth wrestling WAMM polio patients to the floor. Telling Mexamericanada ito get the potheads, goulianna fascism, bust the kingpin and turn him lose for his client list. Rainbow Farm sheriff retirements. Confiscation christmas presents. Bail out Wallmart Street and whine about the poor.

Such inbred trailer trash actually believing in unequal rights. OiNkDeCePtion going straight for the patient list past the kynd bud in the jerry brownose buyers clubs. Cowards waiting for the trickle me Ronnie doll to shower them with legislated morals, Barrbarian is as loony as Hairy Browne rivers used to be, RIP. Lou Dobb Birtch Society or Boosheney enterprises. DARE SWAT Gates perverting children, pissstasting their urine. Selling the rednecks another hobgoblin. Lapdogs for the war brokers and banksters sending their jobs overseas. Blame the fill in the blank, like mikey, they'll eat anything. Chumps. Idiots afraid of clean water and air damaging foreign G-20 profits - are volunteer slaves and traitors to the country.

MARIJUANA made illegal, illegally!!!!

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