Colbert Smacks Down Statists On Legal Pot

Death at the hands of a SWAT team is for the children
Kurt Nimmo
Infowars
Jan. 08, 2014

Stephen Colbert’s Comedy Central segment the other day on Colorado’s recent legalization of recreational marijuana is worth note. Colbert takes two opponents to task: New York Times columnist David Brooks and Ruth Marcus of the Washington Post. Both oppose legalization.

Brooks, who is fondly referred to as “the liberals’ favorite conservative,” and Marcus, who is married to FTC boss Jon Leibowitz, believe the state should decide what consenting adults put in their bodies. Brooks cites a government-enforced "moral status" on marijuana use.

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"I'd say that in healthy societies government wants to subtly tip the scale to favor temperate, prudent, self-governing citizenship," he writes. "In those societies, government subtly encourages the highest pleasures, like enjoying the arts or being in nature, and discourages lesser pleasures, like being stoned."

"On balance, society will not be better off with another legal mind-altering substance," Marcus writes. "In particular, our kids will not be better off with another legal mind-altering substance," never mind that this government determination resulted in around 750,000 noviolent "offenders" being arrested for possession of marijuana in 2012.

Brooks and Marcus also apparently believe spending $51 billion on a highly ineffectual drug war is a good deal. Maybe this sampling of victims who lost their lives as a result of David Brooks’ less than subtle government enforced "moral ecology" should also be considered a price worth paying. Death at the hands of a SWAT team, after all, is for the children.

In October, a Gallup poll revealed nearly 60 percent of Americans favor the legalization of marijuana. "Whatever the reasons for Americans’ greater acceptance of marijuana, it is likely that this momentum will spur further legalization efforts across the United States," Gallup reports.

Corporatist scribes like David Brooks and Ruth Marcus are losing ground in the effort to defend an immoral and bankrupt war on individual choice by consenting adults. As usual, and shamefully, they drag children into their argument in an effort to justify the state employing its monopoly of violence.