Kinky: Legalize "IT"
Kinky Friedman is either very bold, very stupid, or both. I'm inclined to believe the first. Here's why ...
For a better intro to this issue, read this article I wrote about the problem. Then check out Building-BLOCK, one of the most compelling child safety activist groups I have ever come across.
I think Kinky is speaking the simple, honest, down-to-earth truth on this issue. Marijuana is less harmful than alcohol, and you cannot overdose on it. We've stigmatized citizens arrested for possession of the substance to the point where re-entry into society is damn near impossible, dooming them to poverty and potentially future criminal endeavors. Our taxes are through the roof because of how many of these non-violent offenders we are forced to support in our prisons, and the child molesters are getting off easy.
IN DENTON COUNTY ALONE, OVER 70 CONVICTED CHILD MOLESTERS RUN FREE, HAVING SERVED NO TIME IN PRISON. And that's only counting molesters who's victims were under the age of 12.
Yet when a college kid blows out a tire on Interstate 35 and a cop stops to help him, he panics, realizing he has marijuana in his pocket, and chokes to death after trying to swallow it. All for fear of arrest and the inevitable loss of education funding. Sen. Hutchison claims that education funding is pulled because the state doesn't want to pay for the user's addiction. Okay. Fair enough. But convicted child rapists are not excluded from that. So according to the state of Texas, it isn't okay for the taxpayers to pay for drugs like marijuana, but it is perfectly fine to pay for a pedophile's duct tape and video cassettes?
Where's the justice in that?
Society will not crumble to dust if we legalize pot. But we as a state and nation suffer tremendously by letting fixated predators run free, even after conviction. Let's make some room in our overcrowded jails for the pedophiles. What is worse - some guy smoking a joint and discovering a powerful lust for Cheetos, or your child being brutally raped by a sick, degenerate freak? According to the criminal justice system, the guy smoking a joint is a bigger threat than the pedophile.
Our priorities are out of whack, and it took a lot of guts for Kinky to say exactly what must be done to fix the problem.
Bravo, Kinky Friedman. Bravo.
**Update ...
I completely forgot about Washington Post Writer's Group columnist Neal Peirce's excellent article on how our justice system focuses on drug abusers and not child molesters. Here's a profound argument that may change your mind on the issue ...
Justice Focuses on Drug Abuse, Ignores Child Predators
Kinky Friedman says he favors legalizing marijuana to keep nonviolent users out of prison. If Texas elects him governor, he says, he'll try to get locked-up pot users released to make room for more violent criminals.I'm stepping out on a limb here, but I think it is a good idea. No petty insults can shake the reality of our present situation: more and more, sexual predators are being given probation while non-violent drug offenders, mostly marijuana users, are getting the book thrown at them. Our prison system is so clogged up with potheads, it makes me sick to my soul sometimes.
"I think that's long overdue," Friedman told The Associated Press in an interview Wednesday. "I think everybody knows what (U.S. Sen.) John McCain said is right: We've pretty well lost the war on drugs doing it the way we're doing it. Drugs are more available and cheaper than ever before. What we're doing is not working."
For a better intro to this issue, read this article I wrote about the problem. Then check out Building-BLOCK, one of the most compelling child safety activist groups I have ever come across.
I think Kinky is speaking the simple, honest, down-to-earth truth on this issue. Marijuana is less harmful than alcohol, and you cannot overdose on it. We've stigmatized citizens arrested for possession of the substance to the point where re-entry into society is damn near impossible, dooming them to poverty and potentially future criminal endeavors. Our taxes are through the roof because of how many of these non-violent offenders we are forced to support in our prisons, and the child molesters are getting off easy.
IN DENTON COUNTY ALONE, OVER 70 CONVICTED CHILD MOLESTERS RUN FREE, HAVING SERVED NO TIME IN PRISON. And that's only counting molesters who's victims were under the age of 12.
Yet when a college kid blows out a tire on Interstate 35 and a cop stops to help him, he panics, realizing he has marijuana in his pocket, and chokes to death after trying to swallow it. All for fear of arrest and the inevitable loss of education funding. Sen. Hutchison claims that education funding is pulled because the state doesn't want to pay for the user's addiction. Okay. Fair enough. But convicted child rapists are not excluded from that. So according to the state of Texas, it isn't okay for the taxpayers to pay for drugs like marijuana, but it is perfectly fine to pay for a pedophile's duct tape and video cassettes?
Where's the justice in that?
Society will not crumble to dust if we legalize pot. But we as a state and nation suffer tremendously by letting fixated predators run free, even after conviction. Let's make some room in our overcrowded jails for the pedophiles. What is worse - some guy smoking a joint and discovering a powerful lust for Cheetos, or your child being brutally raped by a sick, degenerate freak? According to the criminal justice system, the guy smoking a joint is a bigger threat than the pedophile.
Our priorities are out of whack, and it took a lot of guts for Kinky to say exactly what must be done to fix the problem.
Bravo, Kinky Friedman. Bravo.
**Update ...
I completely forgot about Washington Post Writer's Group columnist Neal Peirce's excellent article on how our justice system focuses on drug abusers and not child molesters. Here's a profound argument that may change your mind on the issue ...
Justice Focuses on Drug Abuse, Ignores Child Predators
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