Pot Legalization Looms

 

Congressional Democrats are responding positively to a call from the Biden White House to legalize and reschedule marijuana and to expunge all non-violent federal pot-possession convictions.

It's about time.  This has been a plank of the Libertarian Party Platform for 49 years — a tad shorter than the lifespan of the actual 'War On Drugs'.  How nice that someone in D.C. seems to still have a shred of common sense.

This, of course, is bad news for the Republican Party.  Most legacy Republicans still think of pot as 'the Devil's lettuce' or 'demon weed'.  Well, they better get religion pretty fast or they're going to be left in the dust of the Democrats when all those former felons suddenly discover that they can now vote.  And who, pray tell, do you think those former felons will vote for?  Hmm...?  Will it be, do you think, the party of Richard Nixon who started the brutal and ill-fated War On Drugs and began shipping Hippies off to the Graybar Hotel?  Will it be, do you think, the party of George W. Bush who ramped up that war (along with a few others)?  The GOP might save themselves — somewhat — if they're able to successfully get out the word that William Jefferson Clinton (who didn't inhale, let us recall) put more pot smokers in federal slam than any other President before or since.

No, the GOP's single chance will be to publicly congratulate Senator Charles ("Chuck is also a verb") Schumer on a courageous position and then get foursquare behind the effort such that Pot Legalization and Rescheduling passes the Senate 100-0 and the House 435-0.  Anything short of that is going to label the GOP as 'stuck in the past' (which is true, but they don't have to prove it every day, do they?)

 

Nosing Around

 

Various members of my family are getting a chuckle out of one of my peculiar physical disabilities.  "That's shocking!" I can hear you bellow.  Indeed, but I'm tough;  I can take it.

The particular disability is that I cannot smell marijuana.  I first began to suspect something was wrong when we lived in Brookfield, CT back in the late 70s.  Norene and I attended a "drug awareness seminar" hosted by the local sheriff at a neighborhood church.  A deputy with a squeeze bottle inside of which burned a quantity of MJ walked among us puffing clouds of smoke so that we parents could recognize what I'm told is a quite-distinctive odor, the better to detect when our children were engaging in "reefer madness", I suppose.

"What are we supposed to be smelling?" I asked the person next to me.  She looked at me like I was crazy.  "You can't smell that?"

No, I couldn't.  It didn't smell like anything I could recognize other than burning paper.  "No, no... it's kind of a sweet smell... very flowery."  That's not how I describe a paper fire.

Since then I've deliberately placed myself — several times — in situations where I knew or suspected I was surrounded by people puffing away on joints.  Nothing.  I know it's not the aroma they're after, and I no longer smoke anything, but I am feeling a little... deprived, I guess, is the right term.  It's said to be a very pleasant aroma but since I quit smoking, that means I'll never get a Rocky Mountain High, so all this legalization going on hither and yon is likely to do absolutely nothing for me.

So don't bother trying to describe the aroma to me.  Its a waste of time.  I suspect that if someone were to synthesize "attar of marijuana" I might be unable to smell that either.