Friday, February 27, 2009

Holder Indicates Federal Raids on Marijuana Dispensaries Will Stop

TalkLeft post here. (My comments below.)

Here is the video of Attorney General Eric Holder's press conference yesterday. At 25 minutes in, he is asked whether DOJ will continue raids on medical marijuana dispensaries (in states that have legalized medical marijuana.)

Holder says "what the president said during the campaign, you'll be surprised to know, will be consistent with what we'll be doing here in law enforcement." He says Obama is "formally and technically and by law my boss now, and so what he said during campaign is now American policy."

Holder said this standing right next to DEA Acting Administrator Michelle Leonhart, who has overseen the most recent federal medical marijuana raids, including those that took place after Obama's inauguration.

The Republicans always talk about "states' rights," but they were raiding these places like crazy. But the hysteria over using marijuana is historically about race and prejudice and immigrants. Using "states' rights" arguments to oppress minorities is OK in their eyes, but it's not OK when the states change their laws in a way that would appear to expand the rights of the minorities they hate (brown people, gays, etc.).

As brown as the Republican party is trying to be these days (viz. Condolleezza Rice and Jindal and the crooked Steele), it still doesn't wash. As long as "the base" is wrapped up in the culture wars and tax cuts for the super well-off (which George H.W. Bush called "voodoo economics"), the Republicans won't be able to get out of the hole they're dug for themselves starting with Ronald Reagan.

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