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    An Open Letter to Richard, and Other Young Black People

    BENEATH THE SPIN • ERIC L. WATTREE

     

    An Open Letter to Richard, and Other Young Black People
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    I want to thank you so much for taking the time to write me. Nothing is more gratifying to a writer than knowing that his message is being received.
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    As I read your email I couldn't help but think how much you remind me of myself. When I was younger I too felt misunderstood. Then as I got older I began to understand the reason why - because I WAS misunderstood. Fortunately, I had been cursed with the blessing of functional intelligence, just as you clearly are, but unfortunately, gross ignorance is the coin of America's realm. The powers that be have a vested interest in promoting stupidity as cute in this country, and we are bombarded with that message from the time we open our eyes in the morning, until the time we close them at night.
    .
    How many times have you seen the image of the young intellectual portrayed as a Steve-Urkel-type character to be ridiculed, while the dim-witted captain of the football team is portrayed as a lady-killing macho man to be admired? Then think about John Wayne. I don’t know what John was really like in life, but the character that he portrayed was undoubtedly one of the biggest dummies who ever rode across the Texas plains. Yet, he's presented as the quintessential American male. There's a good reason for that - because a nation filled with citizens who worship ignorance is much easier to control. So whenever there's a person with your level of intelligence who can see through the mass manipulation of the people, the very people who you are trying to enlighten will bring tremendous group pressure down on you to shut you up.
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    It’s a simple matter of cognitive dissonance. In most cases your peers know you’re right, but they have so much invested in forging their images to conform to what’s defined as "impressive" by the status quo, that to admit you’re right, is also to admit that they’ve been hoodwinked and manipulated. It also suggests that they need to rethink who they are from the ground up, and that’s unacceptable to most people. So the misguided are content to simply play-out the role that they’ve been assigned by society, and they have no interest in a person like yourself revealing the fact that they’re allowing themselves to be played like idiots.
    .
    But as bad as that is for society as a whole, the pressure to remain ignorant is even more pronounced in the Black community. Within our community we are held to what amounts to a moral obligation to be stupid in order to maintain our credibility as loyal to the Black race. Think about that. It’s not only unbelievable, but it virtually ensures a self-perpetuating mode of behavior, and view of life, that’s certain to keep us at the very bottom of society.

    Our attitude comes from our experience under slavery. During slavery the only Black people that the average field slave knew who spoke anything close to proper English was the house slave, and many house slaves tended to look down upon those who worked in the fields. So Black people came to associate other Black people who spoke proper English, or who they perceived to have knowledge and intelligence, with Uncle Tomism, or as "trying to be White." In addition, that also created a mind-set that led to the syllogistic conclusion that knowledge was the White man's domain.
    .
    That's why you have young hip hoppers walking around purposely trying to destroy the English language by saying things like, "What it be like?" - because they see ignorance as cool, and a defining characteristic of what it means to be Black - and many of these young people are brilliant, but they’d die before they’d let that get out into the world. As a result, the very quality that’s required for the Black community to move forward, we’re trying our best to stifle. These are the issues that our so-call Black intellectuals should be addressing, instead of constantly chasing television sound bytes in an attempt to profit from our misery.
    .
    The irony of ironies is, we’re currently living under a system of Urkel’s revenge. The Steve Urkels of yesterday have now morphed into the Iceberg Slims of today, because it’s the Steve Urkels of yesterday who are now controlling Wall Street and pimping us - and the macho captain of the football team is now their chauffeurs. So, yet, once again, Urkel has proven that knowledge is power. Ignorance is only bliss until reality sets in.
    .
    So Richard, a young brother like yourself, who is fortunate enough to have the innate intelligence to see through this, have the closest thing to a moral obligation to combat this kind of ignorance. But you don't have to run your head up against a brick wall, or face the ire and condemnation of your peers to address this situation. Simply use your intelligence, class, and behavior, to find ways to send the message that knowledge is cool. Become the kind of Black man that if a bigot points at you and tell his young son, "that’s a nigga," his son will look at you, and then look back at his dad and say, "Daddy, I want to be a nigga when I grow up."
    .
    I noticed that you're a very good writer. That’s one area in our community where knowledge and intelligence is tolerated. Since writers appear in newspapers, magazines, and in the electronic media, we’re looked upon much like artists, or ‘blingless’ celebrities of a sort, so we’re given a pass. So take the time to hone that skill. You can not only help the community by helping to educate our people, but you can also gain both notoriety and independence if you become good at it, and I’m sure you will.
    .
    And, continue your education at all cost, but don't wait for the schools to educate you. Obtaining a receipt from a university is very important; it adds to your credibility. But knowledge is free, and in the final analysis, the only one who can educate you is yourself. So begin right now, and start educating yourself, because once knowledge is obtained, it doesn’t matter where it came from, and your water is just as wet as the water at Harvard. Some of the greatest minds I've ever known held court while sitting on empty milk crates in the parking lots of ghetto liquor stores, and they are directly responsible for whatever I said that captured your imagination.
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    In that regard, the internet is a repository of all of man's collective knowledge, so use it to explore those areas of knowledge that interest you as an individual, because you are unique. No one alive, or no one who has ever lived, sees, or have seen, reality in exactly the same way that you do. So for all you know, you could be that one individual who can connect the dots like no one ever has before.
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    Finally, I want to thank you again for taking the time to write me. I’m not getting rich doing what I do, so hearing from people like yourself makes it all worthwhile. So I want you to stay in touch, and let me know what you’re doing. I want to see where you go with this. If I've helped to create a monster, I want to know about it. Because while I’m not a very religious person, there’s much wisdom in religion, and as my grandmother used to say, "God works in mysterious ways." So for all I know, my birth, life, and everything I’ve done up until this point, might just have been to prepare me to write one sentence that would ignite a passion in you, which would allow you to go out and save mankind. That’s the way life works. We must never forget, the chances are, some nameless person probably inspired Martin Luther King. Thus, you should never discount the fact that you may be one of those people who are destined for greatness, so always take your thoughts, and your view of reality, seriously.
    .
    So keep this email, and re-read it from time to time, and then go out and give ‘em hell.
    .
    Exploding the Myth: The Impact Of the Black Experience on This Black Man
    http://wattree.blogspot.com/2014/03/exploding-myth-impact-of-black.html

    Eric
    .
    Eric L. Wattree
    Http://wattree.blogspot.com
    [email protected]
    Citizens Against Reckless Middle-Class Abuse (CARMA)
     

    Religious bigotry: It's not that I hate everyone who doesn't look, think, and act like me - it's just that God does.

    Comments

    One of the great things about being a young Black man today is that there are more Black scholars and several White and other ethnic historians exposing the contributions of Black People. The sad thing about being a young Black male is that you are considered a thug.

    When I was young, finding a book that dealt in detail with Black life was a rare, joyful experience. A downside of Black History Month's focus on educating primary and secondary school children is that many biographies of Black historical events and personalities are in the form of children's books. Google "Juneteenth" for example looking for books and you will find mostly children's books.

    Today, I am amazed by the number of books that are available to experience Black life. Their are biographies of Rosa Parks, Al Sharpton, John Lewis, Bayard Rustin, Malcolm X and Stokely Carmichael to name a few. There are biographies of entertainers like Denzel Washington, ballerina Misty Copeland and Mavis Staples. There are tales of inspiration all around.

    We live in the time of the greatest Black historian, Henry Louis Gates. We have weekly podcast access to astronomer Neil deGrasse Tyson who now has a television show "Cosmos a Spacetime Odyssey". It is marvelous time.

    On the other hand, we see a Black President who had to present his birth certificate. We saw a finger wagging Arizona Governor. We have had monkey/ape references from a second rate guitar player and today from a former Secretary of Defense who was so incompetent that it boggles the mind.

    We saw a crippled Harvard University Professor handcuffed and hauled of his own porch. We saw a murderer who has domestic abuse in his background and is now ready to box young men for money claim that he was defenseless against an unarmed teen. We saw a racist escape conviction for the murder of an unarmed teen  despite fleeing the scene of his crime.

    There are highs and there are lows. Actions of groups like the Dream Defenders and the actions taken in Moral Mondays tell me that the fight will go on and the upcoming generations will be up to the task. Both groups are multiracial another sign of hope for the future.

    Young people need our encouragement. Congratulations.

     


    Thank you, RM,

    In this short comment you’ve just written a very comprehensive outline of a very interesting book. I think this is a keeper. Thanks.


    One of the great things about being a young Black person today is you can go to college and people don't just assume you're an Affirmative Action case or on the basketball team; you can be a computer hacker or a marketer and people don't wonder "how unusual"; you can have white or Asian S.O. and it's not a major political statement or crude sexual stereotype.

    I don't know why you think black experience in America in 2014 has to be defined by one of the worst days in the life of a major successful black academic, or by a young doper who had a fighting and authority issue. I imagine most blacks haven't had to break into their own homes or felt it necessary to confront a neighborhood watch guy. Try looking on the positive side now and then. There's a black president, but you give a shit about what a retired 70's rock guitarist says - let's talk inconsequential and picayune, eh? And spare the tears on "crippled", how about it? the guy limps - he's not confined to a wheelchair or some other serious affliction.


    You are so predictable. This is hilarious. Just for starters, Google broken cookie sales or Affirmative Action cookie sales.

    Who was Rosa Parks lawyer?

    BWAHAHAHAHA

    I can't stop laughing.I'll respond from home this evening

    You can't resist the urge to turn a beautiful post by Wattree into a negative.


    "Affirmative Action cookie sales" -  once again you pick some silly/stupid minor infrequent behavior as somehow reflecting huge problems confronting Black America.

    Wattree's posts are crap - your comments are much the same. Plant a tree or do something positive - this tail-gating negative cheerleading is hardly "beautiful".


    Rosa Parks' lawyer was................

    Still laughing 


    Here are some current Black UCLA law students talking about their experiences. You need top stop your ignorant commentary


    How awful - they have to talk about things from a black perspective, when normally blacks like Wattree and rmrd0000 hate talking about racial issues. I'm sure they sympathized with students at Michigan asking for more places where black students can gather and talk about racial issues.

    Okay, you got me - I just don't fucking understand. And frankly don't care to.


    Here are some of the comments from the students

     

    “I am so tired of being on this campus everyday and having to plead my humanity, essentially, to other students. I feel like an outsider constantly. I don’t feel like at my own school I can solely focus on being a student," one woman explained.
     
    "It feels isolating. It feels horrible. It feels like there is a lot of pressure, a lot of weight. It feels like I don't belong. It feels unwelcoming and hostile,” another woman shared.
     
    The students expanded upon their feelings of isolation, and feeling like they have to represent their entire community.
     
    “It’s a constant burden of pressure. I’m constantly policing myself, just being aware of what I say and how it can be interpreted because I essentially am the representation of the black community.”
     
    One woman felt she had been automatically characterized as an "angry black woman" after she disagreed with the views of a particular professor and openly vocalized her thoughts.
     
    "The fact that I was a black woman played a lot into why people stopped listening to me. I felt like if there were maybe more black women in the class, maybe just five of us, people could have seen more of a variation in our responses to what was going on in class and what I felt like was sexism in the classroom."
     
    You missed the entire point of their complaints. They feel isolated and ignored I am not surprised. Your dismissal is par for the course. You are no big loss.

    Wow, every day everyone around me looks at me as the token American representing what typical Americans would think or do and ask my opinion about it, when I'm not correcting their English or explaining how to pronounce Rihanna. So terrible, will commit sapuku.


    You can do whatever you wish. I don't care I'll return to the original intent of the post encouraging  Black youth.

    There was some tension after release of the video. One student received an e-mail suggesting that she stop being such a sensitive B****. Interestingly there is one White UCLA professor who has expressed views that led the school to make sure that no Black students took is first year law course. The situation made for an interesting display at a law school softball game. The students have reason to feel isolated.


    You were the one who responded to this post on encouraging Black youth by pointing out all the bad stuff happening to blacks. Sorry if I put a bit of sun in your cloudy day.


    I began with the pluses. There are a multitude of stories of successes. Libraries are filled with them. You overlooked that part. You put no sunshine in my day. You of course can be as sunny as ever,  you literally have no skin in the game.The opinions I express about Trayvon Martin, Michael Dunn, etc are pretty common in the Black community, on Black media, and on Black websites. You just haven't been around enough Black people for them to open up to you. Thus you are shocked.


    "You just haven't been around enough Black people for them to open up to you. Thus you are shocked." Truly bizarre comment, and rather inaccurate, though won't bother you with my life story. A small hint - just because someone disagrees with you doesn't mean they don't understand black people, but an interesting if not unexpected pretense.


    You simply dismissed those students

    Ted Nugent has Black friends too

     


    Yes, I dismiss those students. Tough titty. I know enough people who'd cut off their left nut for an opportunity that they have, and as I said, every day I'm a token American to give the "official" view of what a token American thinks. Sure it gets old to have the 2nd question of every conversation be, "oh, what state are you from", but it's exciting to meet new people, and it's also pleasant that they're curious and somehow I'm interesting to them. Simple tradeoffs of life - otherwise I could go crawl under a rock. Don't these budding lawyers think their perspective as blacks, females, other personal traits are going to be important for creating a diversity of opinion as there's more embedded diversity in the makeup of courts? Is the idea of having a black or Asian or women on the Supreme Court to have them then start thinking and writing like a standard white male like every other court opinion for the last 230 years? It's petty and absurd.


    I've seen your response to Gates, Trayvon and Jordan, Ron Paul is as bad if not worse than Rand Paul, you are unaware of why the man is not respected in the Black community. It is your pretense that is showing. It is just not believe,able that someone aware of the communities' sentiments would offer up Ron or Rand Paul.


    Fine, have your idealism. Meanwhile enemies like Jane Hamsher and Grover Norquist get together to fight nationwide mortgage fraud, or the ACLU teamed up with conservative Bob Barr to fight for privacy issues. If you're trying to get a majority, you just might have to hold your nose and build consensus.


    RM,

    This guy, Pericles(sic), is a joke. I don’t see why you even bother to respond to him. I started ignoring him last year. The guy says everything I say is crap, yet, he never misses a post. Go figure it. Lol!!! But I love this guy. He gives me the same sense of pleasure that I get when I watch John Boehner, Sarah Palin, or Joe Barton on television. It gives me a sense of superiority.

    But this is what I had to say about such people in a post to Ramona on another thread:

    Ramona,

    "Much of what you’ve said is true. The only problem is, you’re not taking my audience into account. Much of what I write is directed at Black youth. So the impact is entirely different. I wasn’t the least bit interested in Kat. I just used him, and what he said, as a springboard to send a message to Black youth suggesting how they should view such encounters, and people. If you get the chance, read "An Open Letter to Richard, and Other Black Youth," that I’ve posted subsequent to this piece. I attached this piece to the bottom of it.

    "What you don’t seem to get about me, Ramona, is I don’t concern myself with what other people think. Group-think is one of the major problems that we suffer from in this world. Now, that isn’t to say that I don’t care about other people, or don’t have any empathy for their feelings, but when it comes to thinking, I think for myself, and what other people think is meaningless to me. It’s called being an independent thinker. I draw wisdom from other people by what they DO, not what they say, because 99% of the time, people’s words are calculated to reflect who they want you to THINK they are, instead of who they ACTUALLY are, and what they want you to THINK they believe, rather than what they ACTUALLY believe.

    "Even when I read the debates on this site. Most of the debates have absolutely nothing to do with the issues being discussed. There’s generally an underlying dispute that’s going on beneath the surface. That’s why with certain people, one can say the Sun is hot, and the other will come back with, "Well, not necessarily . . . Hot is a relative term." At times it gets absolutely silly. If I still smoked weed, I'd get high just to come online to be entertained and get my giggle on.

    "So that’s what I look at when I read the comments, and I was doing exactly the same thing in my post to Kat, but in my case it went even farther - I wasn’t even speaking to the person that I was directing the piece toward. I was speaking to an entirely different audience. My family background didn’t have anything whatsoever to do with what Kat had said. In fact, I had to engage in intellectual contortions just to try to make it fit without it being so obvious. What I was actually doing was presenting my background to another audience so they would have some perspective on how to assess my words and opinion.

    "You see, when Reagan flooded the inner cities with crack during his illegal war in Nicaragua, he effectively destroyed an entire generation of Black people. So many in the current generation are completely disconnected from their Black roots, culture, and wisdom. So I’ve dedicated much of my writings to filling in that gap. So for the most part, when I write, I’m not writing to White people. I’m trying to educate Black youth."

     
     
     

    Perhaps you don't understand the meaning of "ignore" - you're obviously reading it, even if you don't respond.

    But I don't mind if you keep your feeling of superiority - actually, my comments are almost always to counter some nasty stuff you say about someone in particular or a class of people - the rest is your business. Okay, occasionally you get a response out of me with your sweeping claims about music.


    When I'm not busy, he does serve as good entertainment.

    The downside is that serious racial discussion is stunted. If you challenge a statement made about an issue, say that Black students are not still tainted as"Affirmative Action babies", you are dismissed. You saw up close and personally the way he ridiculed the UCLA law students.

    He has no clue why Blacks didn't jump on the Rand Paul change the drug law bandwagon. There was no one close who could explain the lack of trust for a man who opposed the Civil Rights Act and couldn't remember the Republican Negro when he came to Howard.

    Today, was a slow day, so he did provide entertainment in the form of humor. People can be pointed to the books detailing well lived lives, he never brings anything of value to the table.


    Ron Paul, dammit - not Rand Paul. But with hundreds of thousands of blacks in jail for marijuana and the the large increase in arrests since 2000, I guess it's important to keep up the solid front against Ron Paul - no black issue could be more important, unless it's ranting against Cornel West.



    I said Ron Paul. Rand Paul's too much of a shark to trust easily and not risk betrayal - Ron Paul's very straight forward, love him or hate him.


    Stop saying that people don't care about Black drug offenders if they don't support Ron Paul. It is a bald-faced lie. Ron Paul was worthless. Eric Holder is doing a better job  of decreasing drug sentences and mandatory minimums than Ron Paul ever did. If you don't support Eric Holder then you must hate Black people.


    Holder only did this after people like Ron Paul and Dem. John Conyers among other Dems joined efforts to push for revising the sentencing procedures.

    http://sentencing.typepad.com/sentencing_law_and_policy/2011/06/ron-paul-and-barney-frank-introduce-bill-to-let-states-set-pot-policy.html

    Paul's special role is that he was the only presidential candidate out of the bunch, so gave it visibility.

    Obama & Holder are just as interested in busting medical marijuana facilities, as inconsistent as they are.


    See below


    Libertarian liberty in action.


    The meme is that if you don't agree with Ron Paul because of his stance on drugs, you don't care a bout Black people. That is so condescending that there are no words. We are supposed to forget his stance on Civil Rights issues. We are supposed to believe there are no alternatives, despite the fact that we see drug laws changing at the Federal before our eyes.


    No, the meme is "if you don't support the ONLY CANDIDATE IN THE ELECTION on the *SINGLE ISSUE* of decriminalizing marijuana, you probably don't give a shit (in any useful practical sense) about the hundreds of thousands of blacks incarcerated for simply smoking or dealing marijuana." 

    "We are supposed to believe there are no alternatives, despite the fact that we see drug laws changing at the Federal before our eyes." There were no other alternatives - these were the groups that Ron Paul was working with, and they're getting results, and you were too proud and obsessed with some vote 50 years ago to do anything about real problems now. So watch from the sidelines and preach "coulda shoulda woulda"


    If you care enough about an issue, you make it the single issue, because that's what works. Ask the NRA. Furthermore, the temporizing and hypocrisy of the Dem coalition, so "virtuous" regarding civil rights, so "efficacious" in feeding the poor, so "assertive" making court and regulatory nominations is really just a measure of their zeal in hustling the rubes.


    The rubes are the ones who stayed at home and helped usher in the Tea Party in Congress.

    Regarding court nominations, do you thing that Obama's Supreme Court nominees will vote that the religious beliefs of corporations can prevent them paying for employee birth control in health care plans? I've been pleased with most of the votes of Sotomayor and Kagan. I have seen good nominees like those to the DC district court blocked by the GOP. Did you have a problem with the nominee to lead the Civil Rights Division of the DOJ or Surgeon General? The majority of Democrats  were in favor of both. It seems the bigger problem is that the Republicans were going to block vote against both candidates.

    (BTW: I stand by my words about Ron Paul in your linked blog post. He is a disaster)


    Key word "the majority of Democrats"---they needed ALL of them, and that's why those two appointments fairled--and, btw, I could list the disappointing nominations including Kagan and Sotomayor--Obama is a timid and weak standar bearer for progressives, or he is simply a phony.


    I see the solution to the problem as working out a strategy to replace Republicans with Democrats rather than working to replace Democrats with Republicans.


    Again a crap argument. It wasn't Ron Paul of old that I objected to it was Ron Paul of today. I was not Ron Paul's problem., I'm a Democrat, he was running as a Republican. I could not influence whether he was going to be a nominee.

    Did you get out and vote for Ron Paul?


    A heartfully endorsed his view on legalizing marijuana and lowering incarceration of blacks, and let that view be known in a number of venues.

    That I think is better than calling him a kook and a racist and ignore him.

    And _ _ _ _ ***  with your voting thing - I told you I don't live in the US, and it's mostly completely meaningless in our post-Citizen's United/post-Florida-black-disenfranchising/8 states actually contested running. There are 


    PS - it's "Per-a-clés", something of a hybrid pun in French, "pair of keys" (or "father of keys" peut-etre), which if you spell it with "i" doesn't sound right.

    So please keep the orthographics intact. Besides, the Greeks are bankrupt, so I can buy any ancient figure's name and adapt it to my own pleasure - such is the seductive pleasure of the Eurozone.


    Response to Peracles above

    You state that just because you disagree with Black people doesn't mean that you don't understand them. It does mean that you are not supportive. Trayvon was a thug and Zimmerman was justified. Black people should be satisfied with the Dunn verdict. Black people should comply with the GOP voter suppress effort and not point out that requiring specific forms of ID, never required before. The UCLA law students should go along to get along, even in 2014. The Civil War would have ended if Lincoln just paid off the slave-owners,

    I understand but disagree with the Tea Party just as you understand but disagree with Black people. In other words, I'll be working against the desires of the Tea Party.


    No, I said "just because I disagree with you" - "you" are not "Black people" - you are an individual that does not represent a race except an opinion and anecdotal evidence of 1 out of millions. So I can disagree with *you* and still agree with millions of black people, and understand them (to whatever limit we have of understanding millions of individuals in aggregate).

    Ron Paul is not part of the Tea Party - his ideals might have helped drive the creation, but he only got 3% of a Tea Party poll, and frankly his views - agree or disagree - are on the whole much more principled and less craven/opportunistic than the vast majority of Tea Partiers. For example, Ron Paul said to stop talking about birth certificates and talk about real issues - hardly the Tea Party you're looking for. He also was for bringing the troops home as part of "support the troops" - quite the opposite of Sarah Palin's concept of Iraq as a "task from God" and lust over uniforms.

    Re: UCLA students - should we get them a pillow?


    Another crap argument. Do you have any polling that indicates majority Black support before your positions. On Ron Paul, here is the best number I could find for him. Do you believe that the majority of Blacks would agree that the slaves should have waited for freedom?

    At one point, I remember you saying that you were voting. Next you said you didn't because your vote wouldn't make a difference. 


    Huh? I'm supposed to consult mass polls before speaking on any black issue? Trés loony.

    On Ron Paul, I said *ONE SINGLE ISSUE*. actually 3 - get out of all our wars and stop busting & imprisoning people for stupid drugs, and stop snooping on everyone.

    Re: voting, I don't need to repeat, and it doesn't much matter - there are enough cattle to feed the polls - we're still getting cameras and datameters up our butts nonetheless, and still have troops in Afghanistan, and people are still getting tased for no reason.


    No, you don't have to take polling but since you know Black people so well ,you might realize where your positions stand with the Black community in general. Thus on those UCLA students you ridicule, it is good that you are not in charge. At least the school administration is taking some steps to address the issue. 

    On the Ron Paul drug issue, as I understand he accomplished nothing whereas Holder is making some progress. Why do you hate Black people so much that you don't support Holder? 

    I now realize that you know and associate with Black people just like I know and associate with Conservatives. Support is an entirely different issue.


    Gee, should I support Holder for raiding marijuana dispensaries or get Chiquita out of paying damages for its Colombian death squads? Cause he's an asshole, who finally got pushed into being on the right side of an issue, after Ron Paul, John Conyers and others worked to get it on the agenda, as well as after states had passed their own legalization & decriminalization laws. Of course Holder could have done this back in 2010 all on his lonesome, rather than being a blister who shows up when the work's done.

    Re: the rest, ibid and etc.

     


    I've got very little to say on this issue (I just don't care much about drug policy) other than I like that expression "being a blister who shows up when the work's done." Very clever. Where'd you pick it up?


    My brothers... :-(


    Yes, should thank Holder because unlike previous Attorneys General and your Congressmen, something actually got done. And if we are name-calling, Ron Paul is a racist prick who couldn't convince his own party to make him the candidate. Again, why do you hate Black people so much that you credit the racist who did nothing effective for all those Blacks that you care about?


    "Something actually got done" - no, *SOMEONE DID SOMETHING*. For Holder it's in the passive - oh my, something got dropped in my lap - now that it's popular, let me claim credit for it. For Paul & Conyers and others, it's in the active - "we worked to make this a campaign issue and put referenda on the ballot back when we lost votes and were called crazy for doing this"

    But you like the guy who carries the baton across the finish line, even if his jog lasted 10 feet for a photo-op. Everyone else is just worthless trash. Quite the elitist.


    Hey, I'm supporting Holder on this ONE issue, just like you support Paul. Nothing got done until Holder came along. Did other people in his position make a move? Compared to the previous folks in his office, Holder is a standout. The others had an opportunity to make an identical choice.

    I didn't call Conyers worthless trash, although I do remember some individuals suggesting that he was when his wife faced legal issues. I said Congress didn't make a big move on the issue.

    Holder was more effective than Ron Paul.


    PP is totally right on this one. Paul and William F Buckley were extreme influential, especially Buckley, by speaking out as conservatives for marijuana legalization and other prohibition related issues. By speaking first and loudly they gave others cover to join them. Before laws can be changed minds have to be changed. They and others were leaders on drug prohibition issues when it was risky to take such a stand.

    What you're saying is that all the black men, like Booker T Washington, who lived after the civil war but died long before Martin Luther king did nothing. In fact they were counter productive if they lived during the Reconstruction era and when the Jim Crow era began since things got worse. Or that Elizabeth Stanton did nothing because she died before women got the right to vote.

    The time is right for the end of marijuana prohibition and liberalization of drug laws and sentencing. Obama and Holder could be bold or timid. They're moving as slowly and timidly as possible. They're being pushed forward by the energy of the times rather than leading into the future.


    This is an interesting point of view. Nothing was being done. Holder does something and he is the one moving at a snail's pace. How much are you willing to bet that Congress is revving up it's jets to do something? 

    I'll return to this later.


    Here is what that snail Eric Holder is doing so far and the response of state AGs

    http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/03/21/federal-prosecutors-balk-at-h...

    What do you expect in the House?


    Holder has nearly double the number of Bush's medical marijuana prosecutions of legitimate businesses operating legally under state law. And you expect me to praise him for it? Given his past rhetoric and the behavior that contradicted it I don't trust at all his claim that state  legal marijuana businesses in Colorado and Washington won't be targeted.

    Its disheartening when the democrat is nearly twice as bad on this issue than the republican that preceded him.


    I look forward to your condemnation of Fredrick Douglas and Booker T Washington. Since the KKK and other vigilante groups took over the south and southern governments passed laws enforcing segregation and disfranchisement I'm sure you would contend they did nothing. I would disagree. Even though they were unsuccessful in stopping passage of Jim Crow legislation their very vocal public stand laid the groundwork for those who followed. Just as Ron Paul and William F Buckley's vocal public stand laid the ground for the legislative changes we're beginning to see today.


    You are confused. Let me help. Douglas helped encourage Lincoln to allow Blacks to enlist in the Union Army.He also played a role in encouraging Lincoln to support the 14th and 15th Amendments. Booker T Washington founded a great institution of higher learning. Ron Paul got one bill passed during his time in Congress.

    One problem I have here is that Ron Paul is being judged by you and PP on a single issue basis. Eric Holder is being viewed for his entire record. If I am being asked to support Holder's entire record , will you state that you support and defend Ron Paul's entire record?


    You're confused. I was discussing their contributions during the Jim Crow era. Let me explain, the Jim Crow era occurred after the Civil War was won. You really need to study history more. By your standards Both failed during the Jim Crow era since laws were passed that actually made things worse. While I think their brilliant oratory changed minds and laid the ground work for advances in later years. If you judged Booker Washington and Douglas by the same standards you use for Buckley and Paul you would reject every speech they made during the Jim Crow era as meaningless since nothing was being done about those laws.

    I disagree with most of Paul and Buckley's views but I do admire them for coming out early in support of liberalising drug policies. I don't think we'd be where we are now if they hadn't had the courage to disagree with all their conservative colleagues and take that principled stand. They were ahead of their time and  led on the issue when it was risky.

    While I do support Holder's baby steps forward in the fifth year of Obama's presidency I have to weigh it against his prosecutions of nearly twice as many state legal medical marijuana businesses as Bush. I don't see him leading on drug related issues but being reluctantly pushed forward by the energy of the times.

    I'm only discussing drug policies here. Of course I don't support Ron Paul's entire record. Nor do I support everything Buckley has said. I don't support all of Obama's policies and I didn't support everything Bill Clinton did. I didn't support everything Bush, Bush, and Reagan did. Its a silly question.

     

     


    See response below


    I guess we cattle and rubes will have to muddle through the choices we are given at the time of an election. We don't have the luxury of creating the one from column A, one from column B candidate.


    I'm more worried about the "on the left the A candidate, and on the right... the A candidate", otherwise known as "heads I win, tails you lose".


    I see differences between candidates that you do not.


    If I have to accept Eric Holder with all his warts, then you must do the same for Ron Paul. Here is Paul's record

    http://dneiwert.blogspot.com/2007/11/ron-pauls-record-in-congress.html

    Do you still stand beside him?


    Response to ocean-kat from above

    A great deal of Frederick Douglass' efforts were directed at gaining the vote for Africa-Americans and women. Douglass actually worked with Elizabeth Cady Stanton and was the only African-American at Seneca Falls. He lived to see the 13-15th amendments passed. The Jim Crow era began after Reconstruction (1877-1955) During the period 1877-1890 or so Douglass remained active. He spoke out against the Black to Africa movement and the move to settle separate Black townships. Douglas saw his major goal accomplished.

    Booker T Washington's major goal was education. He developed the Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute into a fine institution. He advised Presidents he accomplished his goal.

    Ron Paul passed one bill in Congress and talked a good game. I realize that since I view Paul as a racist prick, my view is somewhat biased. I went looking for data on acceptance of legalizing marijuana by the public. I found data from Pew Center that suggests acceptance of legalization became a majority opinion only recently.

    I note that acceptance seems to be a Lefty and Indie thing with Republicans bringing up the rear. Given a choice between a racist like Ron Paul who has done nothing of substance and the quiet, steady work done on the Left and with Indies, I'll go looking for those men and womem


    A great deal of Frederick Douglass' efforts were directed at gaining the vote for Africa-Americans

    Well he certainly failed at that. Jim Crow disfranchised virtually all African Americans across the south. By the standards you apply to Ron Paul and William F Buckley he did nothing.

    I can agree with Paul and Buckley and admire them for their principled stand on drug policy and reject their conservative ideology. I can agree and admire Obama for his policy on torture and disagree with his prosecution of medical marijuana businesses. I can say that Bush was actually better than Obama with nearly half the  prosecutions of medical marijuana businesses and disagree with his tax cut policies and his attempt to privatize SS.

    That's the difference between being issue oriented rather than being a partisan hack.


    I can see that the crotchety racist got nothing done. The heavy lifting was done by the dirty unwashed hippies on the Left and by people with personal experience that told them marijuana was not as scary as promoted. Frederick Douglas helped engineer Constitutional amendments. Aside from serving as props for failed Presidential campaigns, you have no data to suggest that Paul influenced the change in attitudes. Republicans lag in acceptance of legalizing marijuana. Ron Paul is not influencing them. Show the partisan hack data that Ron Paul was a factor

    From the NYT from 02/26/2014

    A narrow majority of Americans — 51 percent — believe marijuana should be legal, according to a New York Times/CBS News poll conducted last week, matching the result in a CBS News poll the previous month. In 1979, when The Times and CBS first asked the question, only 27 percent wanted cannabis legalized.

    There were stark differences in the new poll, though. While 72 percent of people under 30 favored legalization, only 29 percent of those over 65 agreed. And while about a third of Republicans now favored legalization, this was far below the 60 percent of Democrats and 54 percent of independents who did so.

     

    Here is Paul's dodge on what he would do in office during a January 2012 GOP debate. The article includes suggestions that single-issue voters should vote for Paul.


    WILLIAMS: Congressman Paul. An analysis by the Prison Policy Initiative finds that blacks who are jailed at four times the rate of whites in South Carolina are most often convicted on drug offenses. Do you see racial disparities in drug-related arrests and convictions as a problem? And if so, how would you fix it?

    PAUL: Yes. Definitely. There is a disparity. It's not that it is my opinion, it is very clear. Blacks and minorities who are involved with drugs, are arrested disproportionately. They are tried and imprisoned disproportionately. They suffer the consequence of the death penalty disproportionately. Rich white people don't get the death penalty very often.
    And most of these are victimless crimes. Sometimes, people can use drugs and [are] arrested three times and never committed a violent act, and they can go to prison for life. And yet we see times just recently we heard where actually murders get out of prison in shorter periods of time. So I think it's way -- way disproportionate.
    I don't think we can do a whole lot about it. I think there's discrimination in the system, but you have to address the drug war. You know, the drug war is -- is very violent on our borders. We have the immigration problem, and I'm all for having, you know, tight immigration policies, but we can't ignore the border without looking at the drug war.
    In the last five years, 47,500 people died in the drug war down there. This is a major thing going on. And it unfairly hits the minorities.
    This is one thing I am quite sure that Martin Luther King would be in agreement with me on this. As a matter of fact, Martin Luther King he would be in agreement with me on the wars, as well, because he was a strong opponent to the Vietnam War.
    So I -- I -- I would say, yes, the judicial system is probably one of the worst places where -- where prejudice and -- and discrimination still exists in this country.

    The partisan hack asks "What would President Ron Paul have done?"

     

     

     


    The partisan hack found another poll from Gallup suggesting public acceptance of legalizing marijuana. From the Gallup website

    It has been a long path toward majority acceptance of marijuana over the past 44 years, but Americans' support for legalization accelerated as the new millennium began. This acceptance of a substance that most people might have considered forbidden in the late 1960s and 1970s may be attributed to changing social mores and growing social acceptance. The increasing prevalence of medical marijuana as a socially acceptable way to alleviate symptoms of diseases such as arthritis, and as a way to mitigate side effects of chemotherapy, may have also contributed to Americans' growing support.

    Buckley and Paul aren't mentioned as factors.

    If detesting the prick Ron Paul because he is a racist makes me a political hack, then I am proud to be a hack. I see no evidence that Paul or Buckley played a major role in the shift in opinions. It is likely that they were a sideshow. They definitely did not play a major role in changing Republicans.


    Well I can see you're data driven. Unless you see some polling you won't believe Buckley or Paul or Cronkite or any others had any influence on the debate. All just a side show. I'll admit I'm not so data driven. I guess I'm just a wishy washy thinker, or should I say feeler, sometimes. When a conservative icon like Buckley, or a widely respected journalist like Cronkite, or a nationally know politician like Paul speak out against drug prohibition I think its self evident that they will influence the views of their audience and be a part of changing people's minds.

    Its just like my support of liberal news network MSNBC. There is no data that I can offer as evidence that it has any influence in changing the minds of its viewers. Yet I believe that its self evident that MSNBC does influence the minds of its viewers and is helping to change minds in a more liberal direction.

    You of course must see some data driven evidence and, since you're not a hypocrite, consider MSNBC just a side show until you see that evidence.

     

     


    You love personal attacks. 

    I think that people realized that the fear of marijuana was unfounded.  Veterans returned from Vietnam having used the drug and contrary to Hollywood depictions ,  most adjusted to life. College students had personal experiences with the drug. Sports figures and entertainers were known to use the drug. Medical marijuana became common. The incarceration of Black youth was called into question.All of these things would have occurred without Ron Paul or William F Buckley.

    Regarding the influence of MSNBC, Al Sharpton and Melissa Harris-Perry were important points of information in the voter suppression drive undertaken by the GOP. Rachel Maddow focused on the Moral Mondays program and it has spread across the nation. Ed Scultz played a major role in health care fairs around the country. There is data that MSNBC helped.

    You are upset that I can't forgive Ron Paul's racism. I am appalled that you overlook it. In another post I mention that Louis Farrakhan preaches about stable family life, but can never be someone quotable on the issue because he is an anti-Semite and a racist. You giveRon Paul a pass, I don't. If Farrakhan is too harsh as a Ron Paul equivalent, substitute Rev. Jeremiah Wright.


    Regarding the influence of MSNBC, Al Sharpton and Melissa Harris-Perry were important points of information in the voter suppression drive undertaken by the GOP.

    Yes absolutely. Just as Buckley and others were important points of information about the ineffective war on drugs and the need for legalization.

    There is data that MSNBC helped.

    I should have know you would have actually data to prove MSNBC helped.  I'm just going on my feelings and would love to back up my claims with hard data. Please provide a link.


    Just off the top of my head, here is Ed Shultz using his show to sponsor a Free Clinic in New Orleans. He worked on several. The clinics had a direct impact providing health to the uninsured. Referrals for more definitive care was made when needed.

    Shultz had a direct impact on people's lives 


    I'm not sure what this proves. While I admire those who give their time and money to help others I'm not convinced that changes their minds and they will for example start supporting the ACA or vote for democrats or Obama. Do you have any hard data, like a Gallup poll, that shows this changed anyone's views?

    Ron Paul has frequently given free health care to hundreds of people which also had a direct impact on people's lives. I'm not convinced that made anyone a libertarian. Buckley has also given large sums of money to Catholic charities. I haven't seen any data that shows it moved people toward conservative policy positions or caused them to convert to Catholicism.

    I'm having trouble seeing how Shultz, Buckley, Paul or anyone's charitable giving changes anyone's mind. But if you think Shulz's charitable giving somehow proves his influence than you must believe Paul's and Buckley's charitable giving proves their influence as well.


    Hilarious! The racist has you completely bamboozled. Ed Schultz did the free clinics as a stop-gap measure to help people without access to health care. Ron Paul feels that people should not be "forced" to support those unable to care for themselves. Ron Paul says that charities and churches will care for the uninsured. He has made this very clear. The head of a group that Schultz worked with the National Association of Free Clinics debated Paul on this issue. During a CNN/Tea Party Express Republican primary debate there were cheers when it was suggested that an uninsured comatose man be "allowed" to die rather than spending taxpayer dollars. Ron Paul did not disagree arguing some charity would come to the rescue. This is the evil you support. Ron Paul free clinics indeed.

    There are tons of people on the Left who spent time and effort facing ridicule voicing their support, even facing jail for supporting people with medical  need for marijuana. Why are you willing to be a dupe for Ron Paul while ignoring those on the Left who made sacrifices?


    Hilarious indeed.  I don't have to agree with Paul's crazy libertarian views on anything to say that his stand on drug legalization had a positive effect on the debate. I certainly wouldn't vote for him on that single issue but I'm glad he took a stand on it. I don't have to agree with any of Buckley's views to acknowledge his principled stand on drugs. The numerous interviews and articles from a highly respected conservative in conservative and mainstream media shifted the debate.

    I found it so amusing watching you twist and squirm rather than admit that a conservative might have actually done something good that I couldn't resist pushing it. I have never seen a partisan hack so deep into the bullshit as you. Not even those who are paid to do it.


    At least I'm not supporting an ineffective White racist.


    You must be smoking something if you sense that I am twisting and squirming. I am simply saddened. 

    It's not about Conservative. It's about racist.


    I know you believe Ron Paul is racist but I have consistently referred to William F Buckley as well as Ron Paul. I have also frequently mentioned Cronkite. You have dismissed them all as nothing but a side show. If its not about conservatism and just about racism please post some link showing Buckley's and Cronkite's racism.


    I don't follow you every word  are you talking about Walter Cronkite?

    Regarding William F Buckley, you really need a history lesson. Here is a little tidbit of Buckley's view of Blacks and Martin Luther King Jr. Here is a snippet of Buckley from a Playboy interview.

    I have provided links for you. You can provide links for me on Cronkite. None of this takes away from your willingness to support not a Conservative, but a Libertarian racist without ever mentioning anyone on the Left. You seem to be the partisan on this issue.


    Though I don't agree with all of Buckley's opinions I don't see anything racist in the Buckley interview you linked. Would you care to explain.

    Here's a link to Walter Cronkite & America's Disastrous Drug War Pt 1 of 6

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XfZgzTpZFac

    Once again I'm not supporting anyone here. I'm simply stating that there are several conservatives who took a principled stance on drug policy when it was risky. They influenced people, changed minds and helped to get us to the place we are today. Before laws can be changed minds must be changed.


    See below


      That doesn't seem to me to be a dodge. It's clear he wants to legalize drugs.


    So do many others who have been much more effective. Why are people falling over to give this racist a break and ignoring those who fought on the Left.Seems pretty pathetic to me.


    Perhaps you can answer this question if I praised a position of Louis Farrakhan or Jeremiah Wright, I would expect to be reminded of their entire political portfolio. Why are people supporting Paul without batting an eye? It seems like a double standard.


      Well, my only point was that he didn't dodge the question. Anyway, I guess some leftists feel that the good things he says--stop making war; legalize drugs; stop violating our civil liberties--outweigh the other stuff.  I imagine it would be hard to find African-Americans who support him, given his opposition to the Civil Rights Act and(presumably) all subsequent civil rights legislation.


    Thanks for responding honestly. I think Farrakhan and Wright would be on the same page. I doubt they would get a pass.


    There may be some who feel that way but I've been clear that I don't. I simply said that there are a few conservatives, Buckley, Paul, and Cronkite, that have taken a principled stand on drug legalization when it was a risky thing to do and that has been a positive influence in changing people's mind and one of the precursors to the legal changes we're beginning to see now.


    Response to ocean-kat from above

    You leveled an insult at me, suggesting that I needed to study history. You demonstrate that you have glaring lack of knowledge and you want me to track down information that you should already have. First, Walter Cronkite is considered Patient Zero in the Liberal media assault according to Conservatives. Cronkite called Fox a far Right outfit.

    Regarding Buckley, here is how his National Review responded to the killing of four little girls in a church bombing in a Birmingham, Alabama. Here more from Buckley and the National Review.

    Now that I've done all these links for you, you can bring me links on racism in Ron Paul's newsletters and his support for businesses being "forced" to serve Black customers. Then tell me why you aren't mentioning Liberals.


    You leveled an insult at me, suggesting that I needed to study history.

    lol I certainly did. You posted, "You're confused. Let me help." I responded, "You're confused. You need to study history." Look dude. If you're going to snipe at people you can't whine like a 3 year old baby when people snipe back. Try not insulting people you don't like and they might not insult you return. Or you can cry like a baby when you get treated like you treat people. I find that tremendously amusing.

    Opinions vary. I've always found CBS to be the most conservative of the 3 major mainstream networks. But if you consider Cronkite a liberal why are you whining that I'm only listing conservatives? By your standards I have been totally non partisan. In just one comment you're telling me I'm wrong because Cronkite is a liberal and in the next breath you're telling me I'm wrong for not mentioning any liberals. Its funny stuff like this that keeps me responding.

    I don't tell myself pious lies about my supposed virtue. Buying and selling is a voluntary association and people do have a right to discriminate. I've done it as a handyman. Not against certain races, genders, or sexual orientation but I have refused to do any more work for a couple people who annoyed me on a previous job. They have all been older white men. I simply tell them I'm too busy to take  on any more work. I wouldn't bake a cake for a KKK party or photograph a KKK wedding.

    I live near the border and once a border control militia group wanted to rent space for their group to camp on the land I caretake. Luckily the owners are liberals too and they turned them down. It would have been hell for me to have to deal with those racist gun nuts for a weekend.

    Discrimination? Absolutely! And I will hold onto my right to discriminate against those I don't like. Yet I support all the Civil Rights legislation. Yes I'm sometimes inconsistent.

    Sometimes the rights of the many out way the rights of the few. Sometimes we're even depriving the majority of their rights to protect the rights of the minority. Sometimes to do what's right you have to do something a little wrong. Hopefully in the end we'll get to a better place. But I'm not going to pretend to some pious bullshit that we're not weighing rights and deciding to deprive a few of their rights for the betterment of society as a whole.

     


    I know you believe Ron Paul is racist but I have consistently referred to William F Buckley as well as Ron Paul. I have also frequently mentioned Cronkite. 

    You lumped Ron Paul, Buckley and Cronkite together. Given the fact that you appear to be clueless about Ron Paul and William F Buckley, I figured that you were ignorant enough to label Cronkite a Conservative.Your sentence was not clear. You could have noted that you were clearly separating Cronkite by "On the other hand" or another signal of a direction change.

    Buckley and the National Review hadhave a reputation for racial bias. Buckley attacked Martin Luther King 's tactics. Buckley's view of King is well known, but you were unaware. Cheech and Chong movies probably had more impact on changing opinions as Ron Paul. The idea that marijuana had medicinal value prolly did more than Paul and Cheech and Chong. Heck Cheech was accepted enough to play a detective on a TV series "Nash Bridges" Marijuana use was less of a stigma. I have the same amount of data to praise Cheech Marin as you have to support Ron Paul.

    The paragraphs above are a dodge. You asked for information about both Buckley and Wright. You did not know about Buckley, Paul, Paul's newsletters or the National Review, did you?

     

     


    Let's look at where this all began. I posted:

    Paul and William F Buckley were extreme influential, especially Buckley, by speaking out as conservatives for marijuana legalization and other prohibition related issues. By speaking first and loudly they gave others cover to join them. Before laws can be changed minds have to be changed. They and others were leaders on drug prohibition issues when it was risky to take such a stand.

    Its a pretty uncontroversial statement. Most of those "hippies" that you claim did all the work changing drug laws would be the first to  cite Buckley when trying to convince people to accept legalization.

    But I broke one of your two commandments. Thou shall not ever praise a conservative. You've tried to side track this dialog to anything but whether they might have had some influence.

    Now you want to talk about whether Cronkite is a conservative or a liberal. A discussion I don't see any value in. Your link to Bill O'Reilly and Faux news doesn't convinced me Cronkite is liberal. What is so amusing is that in any other context you would laugh at anyone citing Faux news as a valid source. Here you are rolling in the mud with the ultra right Faux pundits and grunting out their talking points for them. Its amazing that you would sink so low to embrace them just so you can avoid a topic or "win" an "argument."

    You should be embarrassed to display your lack of integrity in public in such a fashion. But I'm rotflmao. I never expected you would show your true colors so clearly.


    I think medical marijuana had the major impact. The difference between how White college students and Black teens smoking marijuana were treated legally played the major roles in changing opinion. 

    I will respond regarding Walter Cronkite when I get home this evening. For grins, please Google Cronkite and New Deal Liberal. I don't have time to find the exact reference now but I will later. It was from one one of his producers on the occasion of Cronkite's death. Also Google Cronkite quotes and liberal. Cronkite felt journalists had to be liberal in the Classic sense. You brought Cronkite into the discussion. Now you are saying that he is unimportant?

    You are supporting racists and I'm rolling in the mud? Thanks for bringing humor to my day again.


    Eric Holder was busting medical marijuana dispensaries - tell us about how major an impact it had and how your enlightened hero *considering* a reduction in sentencing that would reduce prison population by an estimated 6500 inmates is so much better than the work of Ron Paul and others in actually passing legislation that was copied by the Senate and passed into law?

    "The Sentencing Commission won't vote on the move until April, but in the meantime Holder will be instructing federal prosecutors not to oppose defense motions seeking lower sentences for drug charges - as per his proposal."

    Versus:

    Proposal and passage of the bill

    President Barack Obama at the signing ceremony for the Act.

    On July 29, 2009, the United States House Committee on the Judiciary passed proposed legislation, the Fairness in Cocaine Sentencing Act (H.R.3245), a bill sponsored by Bobby Scott. Co-sponsored by a group of 62 members of the U.S. House of Representatives, including Dennis Kucinich and Ron Paul, the bill would have completely eliminated the sentencing disparity.[25] The Fair Sentencing Act was introduced as compromise legislation to get bipartisan and unanimous support, amended to merely reduce the 100:1 disparity to 18:1.[26]

    The Fair Sentencing Act (S. 1789) was authored by Assistant Senate Majority Leader Dick Durbin (D-IL) and cosponsored by Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and ranking member Jeff Sessions (R-AL).[3] The bill passed the U.S. Senate on March 17, 2010 and passed the U.S. House of Representatives on July 27, 2010,[1] with House Majority Whip James E. Clyburn (D-SC) and Bobby Scott (D-VA) as key supporters.[4] The bill was then sent to President Obama and signed into law on August 3, 2010.[27]

    And how did this law do under Holder's DoJ?

    Second, the Act does not address the enforcement prerogatives of federal criminal justice agencies: while African-American defendants account for roughly 80% of those arrested for crack-related offenses, public health data has found that two-thirds of crack cocaine users are white or Hispanic.[35]

    Well ain't that grand - Congress mandated reducing the discrepancy in sentencing, but Holder's DoJ can still arrest 80% blacks when 70% of users are white - give the man an "F" for "Effort"


    There is no question that drug laws need to change. An adviser to  the state Washington's marijuana bill notes that only the University of Mississippi is allowed to research marijuana. He points out the changing marijuana from Schedule to Schedule II or III requires safety studies. Even with change in schedule class, the drugs would be illegal. Holder is somewhat obligated to work states regarding local drug laws.

    I know that half of federal drug arrests are drug related. I'm trying to determine the current percentages of arrests for possession versus distribution in the federal system. The annual FBI Crime report is taking some time to find the specific numbers. If you have them at hand I'd appreciate it. I will keep digging. 


    You brought Cronkite into the discussion. Now you are saying that he is unimportant?

    This is how you lie. What I said was that I don't see much value in discussing whether Cronkite is conservative or liberal. As I've pointed out numerous times I see Cronkite and others as influential in changing people's minds and getting us to the place where laws can be changed. I linked to some of the work he's done in this area that I think was very important.

    This is how you play your game of obfuscation. Lie, side track, change the topic, anything to waste people's time. Clearly you're smart enough to know I didn't say Cronkite was unimportant. Clearly you're smart enough to know I said he was very important in influencing the debate over the drug war. Clearly you're smart enough to know I only said that I didn't consider a discussion of his political affiliation valuable. It clearly wasn't stupidity. You  are clearly lying.

    So why did post this lie?


    You include Cronkite as a Conservative. I point out that is incorrect, You say nothing to see here.  You pointed out  your imagined political affiliation  I corrected it.

    You want the main point to be that Ron Paul and Buckley risked something. What exactly did they risk politically or financially by taking their stance on marijuana? 


    You include Cronkite as a Conservative. I point out that is incorrect, You say nothing to see here.  You pointed out  your imagined political affiliation  I corrected it.

    Well, you offered a link to what you consider a knowledgeable, authoritative and trusted source.  You consider your source definitive and I don't. I don't trust O'Reilly as a knowledgeable or authoritative source.

    I do think Paul, Buckley, Cronkite, and others, like Carl Sagan, risked something but that wasn't my main point. My main point was that they took a stand early in the fight and given their popularity and large numbers of readers and followers they influenced minds and began the shift that led to laws beginning to be changed today. As I said, before laws can be changed minds must be changed.

    You keep telling the lie that I support Paul and Buckley even though I've repeatedly explained that I do not support them. I merely note the influence they had on the debate over drug prohibition. I understand that you cannot consider anything they've said or done as influential because you see them as racist. I can disagree with most everything they're said and done and still see how they changed minds with their stand of drug legalization.

    For example, I consider Bill O'Reilly as an influential pundit who has used that influence in many negative ways. I see him as influential even though I consider him a racist. You of course would disagree since you would never trust a racist or use him as a authoritative source.

    http://www.mediaite.com/tv/chris-hayes-blasts-bill-oreillys-super-racist...

     

    Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

     

     


    It seems important to you to find Conservatives who wanted to legalize marijuana. Enjoy.

    I pointed you to the link because it reflected how Conservatives viewed Cronkite. I provided means you could use to find Cronkite's own words and the words of one of Cronkite's producers. Cronkite felt that journalists were liberals. The producer said Cronkite was a New Deal Liberal. You did not avail yourself of these sources. You satisfied yourself with the single link.

    George Soros donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to the marijuana legalization program in California and Arizona. Both Soros and Progressive Peter Lewis helped fund efforts that aided passing legislation in Washington state and Colorado. 

    You keep looking for the Conservatives who got nothing passed. I'll look to the Left where some success occurred. 

    Can you provide a a link showing Buckley's monetary contributions to legalization programs?


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