Wow--the public now favors pot legalization (or at least decriminalization)
despite decades of the combined best propaganda efforts of the DEA, ATF, drug companies, etc.
The fact that it is still illegal in the face of the public will shows how little democracy we really have.
Back in the 60's & 70's, I always suspected that the anti-pot hysteria was part of the government's efforts to suppress the anti-war movement.
As one example, at Ft. Hood, TX there was a little antiwar newspaper published via mimeograph (remember those?) on post. The CID could never manage to bust the people putting it out with Army paper & ink, but they had figured out the identity of the most likely culprit and eventually managed to bust him on pot possession. It was an interesting court martial. They claimed to have found a single pot seed in his pocket; and said the seed had been destroyed in the process of analysis. All the evidence they had to present at the court martial was a lab report. Naturally, they secured a conviction and several years in the stockade for the target.
I also think that a lot of young people got their minds expanded by various substances, and the Nixonites saw pot, acid, etc. as substances that twisted young people into Enemies of the State.
The initial pot criminalization campaign began in the 20's & 30's, driven by a cabal of corporate interests and law-enforcement types looking for more criminals to prosecute. Since then, a whole lot more interests got involved. The DEA became an empire unto itself with billions pouring in for guns, helicopters and similar neat toys, the prison industry has grown immensely thanks to pot laws, local Barney Fifes discovered new sources of lucre in confiscating property, the drug companies certainly don't want the public to have unrestricted access to an essentially harmless substance that comes as close to being a panacea as pot does, etc.
There is hardly a more clear-cut example of a conflict between the interest of the public good and the perverse interests of the Corporate State than can be found in the Administration's intransigent pot policies.
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