Obama Courts Old Republican Church Ladies

Although President Obama thinks the very idea is hilarious, recent polls pretty consistently find that more than two-fifths of Americans support marijuana legalization. Last month's Reason-Rupe Public Opinion Survey fits that pattern, finding that 41 percent of Americans favor "the legalization of small amounts of marijuana for personal use," compared to 44 percent who oppose that policy. Support was stronger among independents and Democrats (48 percent for both) than it was among Republicans (32 percent) or Tea Party supporters (35 percent). Not surprisingly, self-identified "libertarians" were more than twice as likely to support legalization as self-identified "conservatives," with "moderates," "liberals," and "progressives" falling in between. There was not much variation between income groups or groups with different levels of education (except for those without high school diplomas, only one-third of whom favored legalization). But the gender gap on this question is striking: Forty-nine percent of men supported legalization vs. 34 percent of women. Likewise the generation gap: Only 23 percent of those 65 and older supported legalization; support was twice as high among respondents younger than 55. Religious attendance also was inversely related to support for legalization: Fifty-seven percent of respondents reporting "low" attendance were pot-tolerant, compared to 26 percent of those reporting "high" attendance. I suspect old Republican women who go to church a lot are the group least sympathetic to this cause…Continue reading this post…