Politics

8 Things We Won't Miss When Pot is Finally Legal Everywhere

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According to a new Gallup Poll, 58 percent of Americans think marijuana should be legal. That's the latest indication that the federal war on weed, which got started in 1937, if finally drawing to a close. My latest column in Time lays out "8 Things We Won't Miss When Pot is Finally Legal Everywhere."

Snippets:

2. Ritual apologies by world-class athletes such as swimmer Michael Phelps for smoking dope at a private party. Despite winning 14 Olympic gold medals and completely rewriting his sport's record books, in 2009 Phelps promised his "fans and the public it will not happen again."

3. Breath-taking personal hypocrisy by politicians such as Barack Obama who laugh about their own pot smoking (he's not the only one, the last three presidents have tried it) while increasing funding for the Office of National Drug Control Policy and other drug-war operations. As a presidential candidate, he joked to a gathering of fawning journalists, "When I was a kid, I inhaled….That was the point."

4. Long federal prison sentences for legitimate business owners like Aaron Sandusky.  He ran a medical marijuana dispensary in California that was in full compliance with state laws, but he still got busted by the Obama administration's Justice Department and is now serving a 10-year stint.

Read the whole thing. Add more things in the comments.