Don’t Let Kerlikowske’s Comments Send Your Analysis to Pot

Politics, perhaps depressingly at its best, is about strategic compromise, the “art of the possible,” as was once so famously put by German-Prussian politician Otto Von Bismarck. A goodly proportion of that art, then, is the fine skill of knowing what is and what is not possible at any given time. Because, to borrow from another socio-political prophet: you can achieve some things some times, but you can’t achieve all the things all the time.

So while I understand that recent(ish) commentary by President Obama’s Drug Czar Gil Kerlikowske might frustrate some pro-marijuana advocates and libertarians beyond belief alike, I’m not sure how any respectable political junkie can see it as anything other than wholly predictable and not to be taken as gospel.

I mean, let’s consider for a second that Obama currently finds himself pitted hip deep in what is perhaps the most epic of all American political battles: health care reform. To make matters even more interesting, not only is Obama getting push back to his administration’s plan from Republicans, but now also from fiscally conservative Democrats. So would coming out and making statements other than those made by Kerlikowske around the legalizing marijuana use garner Obama any more support on the much larger and, arguably, more important issue of reforming the American health care system than he already has?

If your answer is yes, then, as was recently said to me, I’ve got a prime piece of Floridian swampland real estate you should look at.

Deciding to come out and make statements about legalizing marijuana right now would be akin to wrestling a grizzly bear with one arm tied behind your back. A reasonable individual may not have gotten into a fight with the grizzly bear in the first place, but you have to be insane to handicap yourself any further.

So, my pot smoking and libertarian friends (not that the two are necessarily or even generally separate designations), now is probably not the time to get up and stand up about passing the dutchie to the left hand side. I know you’re dying to fight for your right to smoke the “chron”, but let me go out on a limb and say that extending health care insurance to the millions of Americans without ranks higher on Obama’s list, presently.