President Obama's puzzling silence on marijuana policy

[grantcart]

98. lol well if you really really really really believe it, it must be true

Except of course none of it is.

In the midst of the depression there was wide bipartisan support for the repeal of Prohibition but no one party was all for it or all against it. Neither party had it as a part of the platform, they both avoided the issue. In the end the effort to get it passed on the floor of the Republican convention failed by majority vote and the fight on the florr of the Democratic floor passed by a majority vote.

Roosevelt was concerned about more important issues and avoided the issue. In the end he made exactly one speech endorsing it. At the convention he made it seem that he was for the repeal because the delegates voted for it. He never endorsed the policy until the delegates at the convention had already voted in favor of it.

For those interested in facts here it is:

Repeal was initiated by a wide spread action of lawyers across the country that even involved the American Bar Association. No similar effort exists now and it would be a highly partisan issue.



http://www.druglibrary.org/think/~jnr/endprohb.htm

The sitution was much different with the Democrats. Governor Franklin D. Roosevelt of New York, who led in the delegate count, had carefully avoided taking a position on repeal. At the convention, a successful floor fight produced a pro-repeal plank- drafted and defended by the VCL- in the Democratic platform, which FDR unambiguously endorsed in his acceptance speech. "This convention wants repeal," he declared. "Your candidate wants repeal."

During the election campaign, FDR made one unequivocal speech endorsing repeal. Otherwise, both candidates successfully avoided the issue, despite- or perhaps because of- their having takin opposite positions. "Politics is the art of changing the subject," observed Walter Mondale many years later.



FDR was the greatest President in US history. Part of that greatness was keeping his eye on the ball and not getting squandering politcal power on issues outside of the mainstream. It took him more than 12 years but by not getting involved in every issue he was able to consolidate opinion on the ones that mattered most.

You are now free to make up more stuff that sounds good and supports your personal point of view.