Job Openings

Now that I have completed the first draft of my play, done my familial duties and withdrawn seasonally from the baseball arena I have more than the usual amount of time on my hands, so I'm considering job opportunities out there. Something exciting and profitable, hopefully, with a professional edge. I've noticed that if I'm willing to go overseas there are some major openings available in Iraq. Wanted: courageous defense lawyers. High pay, major international exposure. Moderate danger of assassination.

I guess I'd first have to try a paralegal school, and if that's not to my liking, embark on a full-fledged bar application, which could take five to six years. And even with that, the job opening in the trial of Saddam Hussein would still be available. Serving in that Baghdad courtroom has become so dangerous it makes those guys driving nitro-laden trucks in "The Wages of Fear" seem as intrepid as telemarketers. A day in court has a body count similar to a day on "24." What a shame this doesn't have gavel-to-gavel TV coverage. As they say, when it bleeds it leads.

It's part of our national self-delusion to assume that, in the harrowing process of trying to make over an alien culture to resemble our popular democracy, the legal system there can handle so high-octane a trial as that of a powerful dictator who still has a significant, if scattered, support base. Saddam continues to act imperiously in the trial, behaving as though he is still the Head of State. This is cagey on his part, playing both sides of the plea. Either he is insane or still the Head of State, overthrown temporarily by a foreign invasion. He of course wil never admit he made mistakes (just like another Head of State with a vested interest in the dispositon of Iraq). In accordance with his presumed role he derides the legitimacy of a trial, even as the great majority of Iraqis would like to see him condemned (and a small minority would prefer he be restored so that they can have full-time electricity again).

Of course he has been a brutal dictator and a warmonger, if not the architect of 9/11 as President Cheney would insist. (Oops, I mean vice-president. Sure). Saddam's ego would never allow him to admit wrong-doing in the pursuit of stability and security in his country. Common sense would tell us that a few testimonies would prove his bloodthirsty guilt, and a sensible jury or tribunal could condemn him justifiably. But not if the attorneys and judges keep getting picked off, one by one. This is going to be a difficult conviction if we stipulate that the trial be conducted with all the checks and balances that you find in an honest American non-military court. Every week, with threats and counter-threats and intense security measures and fearful witnesses, there could be grounds for a mistrial. And you know that no one who has suffered under Saddam would accept his release or even an abbreviated prison sentence. He has to vanish from the scene, and I don't mean like Idi Amin or Lon Nol.

So the show must go on. Johnnie Cochran should consider himself lucky he's dead, or he'd be on first call. If the scimitar doesn't hit, you must acquit. Ramsey Clark is doing his damndest to help, traveling to Iraq to consult with the defendant himself. Hey, Ramsey, it's one thing to oppose an ill-considered war, another to coddle a megalomaniac. Don't consider running for office for a while--unless it's Mayor of Fallouja.

I hate to sound like Pat Robertson, but perhaps the only way to wiggle out of an endless fear and corruption-ridden trial would be for someone to whack Super Saddam. I mean, if security is so lame that you can't tell a Baathist sympathizer from an Iraqi policeman, someone ought to be able to sneak in a weapon to pop the putz. I mean, who would really complain? We have no international sympathizers anyway, the elements of a fair trial are impossible to sustain, and it would certainly cut the head off the snake of the Insurgency. Plus eliminate the nightmare forever from the neoCons that if we withdraw quickly from the morass of Iraq the populace may clamor for the strong leadership of the only person who could hold the three competing factions of Iraqi society in thrall. Hey, let's not forget the return of Juan Peron.

Okay, I'm only kidding, sorta, maybe. But why is it only the good leaders get assassinated? Gandhi, Lincoln, Kennedy, Rabin, Sadat? Life is so unfair. And Baghdad is not Nuremburg.

Traditions

As I contemplate the fourth night out of the last five when I'll be dining on turkey, it's interesting to consider the stranglehold that Thanksgiving tradition has on all Americans. Other holidays have their detractors, especially Christmas with its combination of inordinate commercialism and familial conflicts. But we mostly tolerate Thanksgiving, or even relish it, despite its relentless logistical awkwardness.

Despite its origins in religious observance, I've never really objected to the quasi-spiritual nature of the holiday; I always thought its ecumenical nature lifted it above other more sectarian and exclusionary observances like Christmas or Easter (or for that matter, Rosh Hashanah and Passover). It was something all Americans could celebrate, and without any required acknowledgement of the contributions of a particular deity. Maybe that's not what Lincoln intended when he codified the Thanksgiving event--or the Pilgrims when they first laid out the Thanksgiving spread (which is likely an apocryphal story). Sure, I've been to one or two dinners where "Grace" was uttered, and even more embarrassingly, when the participants were asked to specify what it is they felt thankful about. But that was just lip service.

Thanksgiving is about Excess, and that's why it is so unquestioningly celebrated throughout the land, the nation of the obese and the SUV. It's not enough to chew the tough tendons of the stupid overgrown fowl; one has to indulge like a goose being prepared for a slaughter. The traditional Thanksgiving meal is a dietician's horror movie. What body can adequately absorb all those starches--the biscuits and the yams and the potatoes and the stuffing and the pumpkin pie? There's no greater time for another country to attack us than while we are all lolling around, tryptophaned out, unbuckling our belts and staring glazed-eyed at the millionth televising of "The Wizard of Oz."

Of course there is something charmingly human about celebrating the excess bounty of such a feast, and it's a practice that goes back eons, I am sure, in some form or other, as a signal to other animals that we are better hunters and gatherers than they are. What is less charming is the other form of excess this holiday entails, which is the appalling volume of weekend travel. It boggles my mind how so often and so many people are willing to deal with the congestion and time consumption that Thanksgiving pilgrimages entail. I learned my lesson early, after a five-hour slog down to San Diego, to plan my entire year so I can to stay at home. Fortunately I have generous and ambitious neighbors who enjoy hosting the event; and if they don't come through, I'm not above inviting folks over to test my culinary skills (news flash: turkeys are easy! It's cleaning up that's hard).

We have other local holiday traditions that make the holiday even more burdensome. The "Holywood Christmas Parade," a lame West Coast version of Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade in New York, clogs up this area impossibly on Sunday. No cool balloons with Sponge Bob and Bart Simpson and other American folkloric figures. We only get convertibles carrying C-level TV celebrities and the Mayor. Meanwhile the traffic restrictions and the freeway ramp closingsforce those who live here to cloister themselves for the day. After three days of feasting and forced merriment, though, that's not an unattractive fate.

The downside of the holiday weekend, of course, is that it officially signals the beginning of the Christmas shopping season and the unending drone of Christmas carols in every commerical venue. I was getting haircut today and had to listen to some '50s crooner sing the lyrics "Woop-de-doo and Dickery Dock/Don't forget to hang your sock."

It's going to be a long December.

The Old Guard

Life is largely about transitions, or trying to avoid them and clinging to the comfortably familiar. This year I've been shaken out of my complacency not so much by personal upheavals but by a changing of the guard on network TV news. Just a year ago one could channel surf and still find the reassuring faces on the classic broadcasting networks of Tom Brokaw, Dan Rather, and Peter Jennings. No more. In what seems flash these icons have disappeared serially, like the wives of Henry VIII. But instead of "divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, behaded, survived" we have "retired, quit, died..."

And tonight, adding to the dearly departing is Ted Koppel of "Nightline." Sure he will be active producing the show and other projects, but his stalwart presence on "Nightline" will be sorely missed. This despite the fact that I hardly ever watch "Nightline" any more, given all the bad news since 2001, and when I do most often the host has been Chris Wallace or George Stephanopolos. These guys are pros, but simply don't convey the gravitas of Koppel. Since he guided us through the tortuous Iran hostage crisis (remember "America Under Siege"? Those were the good old days) he has always been a reliable father figure, exuding trustworthiness despite his Howdy Doody face and Donald Trump hairdo.

Maybe he got tired of ruminating over all the bad news, or keeping a straight face while the current Administration prevaricated its way into an unwinnable war, or even duelling with fatuous toadies like FEMA Chief "Helluva Job" Brownie. He certainly has earned the right to move on to something original or at least different. But what about me? Who am I supposed to trust now? None of the replacement anchors has persuaded me to hang around at 6:30. The folks at CNN have some promising newcomers like Anderson Cooper, who feels the news as much as he reports it. Fox News has hired some quality people, but it's still Fox News. The balkanization of news reportage that has accompanied the expansion of TV networks makes news watching less habitual and more sporadic. Not to mention news radio and the Internet, with its streaming up-to-the-minute videos.

It was very nice to turn on an interview program (Charlie Rose? Chris Matthews? Can't remember which) and hear the most reassuring news voice of all, Walter Cronkite, opining about current events. He's still articulate, thoghtful and mellow-voiced, and engenders trust as much as he ever did in his glory days. Like Jimmy Carter, he transitioned into elder statesman status with great style, and remains the only former newsman who had some links to Edward R. Murrow, a contemporary who has recently been lionized in the admirable film "Good Night and Good Luck." One hopes Cronkite survives as long as his voice and body allow, but he would also be a worthy subject for a biopic, to be entitled obviously "And That's the Way It Is."

Of course change and transition is inevitable as it is regrettable, and nearly all the cions of my youth are moving on, so I'd best deal with it. There is one individual, though, who is absolutely irreplaceable in his field and whose departure would be a locally tragic event. That person is Vin Sculley, the non-pareil of baseball announcers, who has been announcing the Dodger games for over fifty years now with a dulcet glibness that always amazes me. When he goes, maybe it will be time for me as well.

Murtha Most Foul

This blog and I have been on a short-term vacation, as I leapt across the country and back for a family visit, experiencing surprisingly good weather on both coasts. This is not an easy trick; the window for clement atmospheric conditions back east is growing smaller as global warming increases, and the hurricane season is still not over. But we can count on our Chief Executive and his cronies to continue to blow ill winds all year round.

President Bush has also been on the road, trying to persuade other heads of state that there is a grain of sanity in his foreign policy. Just recently his barnstorming took him to Beijing for a chat with President Hu. I presume the "Hu's on First" jokes cascaded back and forth on Air Force 1 beforehand. This meeting was extremely problematic for Bush, since he had to toe the line on Chinese human rights abuses--just like Google and Bill Gates--so as not to offend the country that so far is bailing us out budgetarily, while trying to justify his "spread Democracy" policies in other parts of the world. It probably galls him that China will eventually pass us as the major world power, and even he can't do a shit's worth of anything about it (except maybe nuke 'em).

All this confusion probably dogged him yesterday as he tried to escape from journalists by exiting through a pair of double-doors--which turned out to be locked. Granted, the moment did not have the classic hilarity of his father's barfing on the Japanese Prime Minister's lap, but it was sufficiently sitcomy of Dubya to remind me that in his first year of office there actually was a Comedy Central series about the First Family, starring Timothy Bottoms as a confused Commander-in-Chief. It says a lot about the turn of history that three years later Bottoms starred in deadly earnest biopic of Bush, celebrating his stalwart behavior after 9/11.

Meanwhile, back home, the biggest news was the demand by Democratic representative John Murtha, a former marine and major hawk, that we start pulling our troops out of Iraq because it just isn't working. The howls of outrage from Bush supporters could probably be heard in outer space (well, if there weren't a vacuum there). One representative labeled Murtha a coward, which was so shocking in context that she had to retract it. I seriously doubt that she had any children stationed in Baghdad. Murtha's credentials as the first Viet vet serving in Congress humble even John McCain, so the Republicans needed more than vitriol to deal with this rebellion. Cleverly, more or less, they fell back on their superior numbers, and put up the resolution to a quickie vote, an easy straw man to defeat (which they did). Even Murtha voted against it since it was not a well-reasoned resolution. And most moderates (myself included) see that a total declared withdrawal would be a regrettable policy. We made this mess, we have to rectify it sufficiently so that withdrawal would not equate to total defeat, a la Vietnam in 1975.
We owe our Iraqi supporters that much, since they don't have water or electricity.

Bush and Cheney attempted in the past few weeks the ad hominem approach to criticism, labeling war opponents as unpatriotic, but this doesn't fly as well today as it did in the psychological aftermath of 9/11. Public approval of the Iraq situation lies between 35 and 40%, so the adminstration needs some really good news to be more persuasive. Cheney, who has been even more sequestered than Bush, and who is busy sidestepping the Plame investigation, has been more vituperative in defense of the policy (since it was largely his policy), while Bush has backtracked a tad and acknowledged that the situation is at least worthy of debate. I'd suggest that Cheney's attack dog role be totally minimized. Here is a guy whose latest frenzy has been trying to assail the anti-torture provisions in McCain's amendment to the military spending bill. This amendment has passed 90-10 in the Senate. Internationally Cheney has become known as the "Vice President of Torture." Gee, that should really make his mother proud.

Now I don't know how far we are allowed to follow the Goldwater tenet that "Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice," but the Veep's outspoken support for cruelty in prisoner abuse is not only ill-considered diplomatically, but practically as well. McCain, who ought to know, wrote convincingly in a recent Newsweek that torture rarely extracts the necessary information, and often results in erroneous intelligence--something that could cause us to shift defenses to the wrong place and end up producing more calamity. When McCain was tortured by his Vietnamese guards in order to get the roster of his flight squadron, he eventually obliged by reciting the names of the offensive line of the Green Bay Packers. I can imagine how much this has occurred in those secret CIA gulags spread out over Europe and Asia, as semi-drowning Al Qaeda suspects (who probably don't know the names of most of their co-conspirators) spew out Ibn Al-Faqua and Muhammad El-Alamein and other non-existent but credible names of fictional terrorists. The result is international disgust for our heavy-handedness and moral hypocrisy, and bogus terrorist alerts based on fantasies, like the one that closed down Grand Central Station a month ago.

Cheney probably has watched too many episodes of "24," in which hero-torturer Jack Bauer wheedles just the right information every hour or so out of a very compliant terrorist to keep a nuclear bomb from going off. Now if only the Iraq war were over in 24 hours. But it seems more likely to last as long as "The Days of Our Lives."

Stormy Weather

Sweeps Month is not what it used to be, when miniseries ruled the airwaves and stunt casting skewed the storylines of all episodic shows. Perhaps the de-emphasis has to do with the balkanization of TV networks, or the decline of sex stories on local news shows in response to a national neo-Victorianism. Whatever, despite some interesting NBC experiments like the live West Wing debate and an upcoming 3-D "Medium," there's not a lot of stand-out specials from which to choose this month. Which is why I had room on my soon-to-be obsolete VHS tape for two hours of CBS's November "event," "Category 7: End of the World."

As you probably know if you've been reading my blog since January, Armageddon depictions are a guilty pleasure of mine, and this one, though astoundingly dumb, is also a hoot. It is apparently a sequel to last year's "Category 6: Day of Destruction," and even includes a crossover character played by Randy Quaid. He's a tornado hunter whose SUV got carried away by a supertwister last season and taking him to his supposed doom, a la Slim Pickens in "Dr. Strangelove." Only we learn, on his reappearance this time, that he survived that mishap by exiting his car and being wafted by the surprisingly cooperative tornado and dropped into Lake Michigan. Randy Quaid must have a very good agent.

The destruction from last season, which included the leveling of Las Vegas and Chicago, is repeated here, as more Category 6 events lay waste to Paris, Egypt, New York and Mount Rushmore. I am very impressed by the precision of these storms, aiming squarely at major human monuments and toppling them like so many tinker toys. The Eiffel Tower wobbled like a a jello mold before succumbing, as did the Statue of Liberty, the Great Pyramid, and Thomas Jefferson's face, sliced off neatly as by a humongous ginzu knife. Just to show that Mother Nature is not totally a star-fucker, some tornadoes also wiped out Buffalo and a trailer park in Indiana. The latter event produced my favorite line in the movie, when a pilot in a supersonic jet tracking the storm announced "We are right above the trailer park now!" As he was zipping along at Mach 2 one would think that by the time that sentence was completed he was probably over the Grand Canyon.

I may or may not bother to tape the second half of this epic, when the supercells combine over Washington DC to produce the aforementioned Category 7 End-of-the-World event. I'm not sure how this can out-spectacle cinematic cataclysms from "The Day After Tomorrow" or "Deep Impact," but the TV mavens keep trying, hoping perhaps that at least HD viewing can enhance the experience. That may explain the upcoming TV rendition of "The Poseidon Adventure," which is not exactly a must-see, but I probably will anyway, just to find out who plays the Shelly Winters role. (Camryn Manheim? Kirstie Alley? Winters herself?)

If that's not enough wetness, there was also a rerun of Stephen King's "Storm of the Century" on a cable station, not to mention the water-logged mystery episodics "Surface," about an underwater species; "Threshold," about a subterranean alien threat; and "Invasion," whose story began with a hurricane. Since these entertainments were all conceived before the horrendous spate of hurricanes that decimated the Southeast this year, it may not be valid to tie in this cultural phenomenon with the headlines. But there may have been some impetus from the Tsunami in Southeast Asia (remember that?) and even from the waterlogged winter endured by Los Angelenos early in 2005.

So has Global Warming had more of an effect on our entertainment venues than it has on our landscape? Who knows, since according to the Sages in Washington, Global Warming is a myth and the Kyoto Accords a declalaration of foolish alarmism. It seems the only scientists that Bush is willing to listen to are those in that wacky Seattle institute who propose Intelligent Design. Oh, and to be fair, those who say we could very well be on the brink of an influenza pandemic.

Which would likely lead to a production for next year's Sweeps entitled "One Flu Over the Cuckoo's Nest."

Other Arenas

The 2005 baseball seaosn came to its personally official end last night with the annual Showbiz League banquet, where I sat between Jesus and Elvis and good-naturedly reviewed the wise choices and occasional flubs that enabled us to finish 1-2-3 in the standings. I indulged in a large margarita while my companions limited themselves to cokes, although Jesus also took a glass of water which perhaps he surreptitiously changed to wine. This was already my 17th Rotisserie banquet, and I'm proud to say I haven't paid for one in 12 years, since that required finishing in the bottom six. Good for me. Kevin couldn't make it, which was a shame, because I think our team's success this year was due mainly to his savvy pitching selections.

Now I'm seemingly left bereft of interesting competitions to monitor for the rest of the year. My interest in pro sports, with three of them bubbling at the moment, is minimal. I do tend to follow the NFL when one of my New York teams is performing well, and this year it is the Giants, though they don't seem to have the balance to overcome the strengths of such AFC powers as Indianapolis or New England. They could still make it to the Super Bowl, laboring in a weak conference without any standout teams, where even the Seattle Seahawks are contending (and when did they migrate over to the NFC? I must have missed that). I know that by the time the next Superbowl is played I will be otherwise engaged, prepping my early draft sheets for Showbiz League 2006.

Meanwhile I'll have to resort to couch potato rooting for artificial contests concocted by television producers. My two favorite reality shows, Mark Burnett's "Survivor" and the Trump "Apprentice", continue to engage me, even as they fall into familiar routines and backbiting. Like the NFL, each program is in its mid-season, with half the contestants already sidelined and the remainder easier to distinguish. "Survivor" has already quashed one of my expectations when practical nurse Margaret was ousted by the vituperation of the surly New York doorman Judd.

Judd reminds me of Boston Rob and one wonders how long his intimidation will keep him alive. The editing have been focusing on him lately, which means either he will be exiting soon or not at all. He's apparently this year's chosen villain. No chance for him to win, though, since he is so damn surly. It might be worth it to see him at the climactic tribal council for the chance to see him blow his gasket. Another subplot involves former quarterback Gary Hogeboom, who's trying to hide his identity with a soft paternal attitude. One of the survivors, sports addict Danni, has already ID'd him, but the show's editors have chosen to downplay this story line. That he has remained untouched surprises me because he reminds one most of last season's winner Tom, and two similar types rarely repeat. The continued presence of Stephenie, last year's favorite and something of a mother figure, is heartening, though I don't think the group will be inclined to vote her a big share. I'm amused by the "fishmonger" Lydia (shouldn't she be Molly Malone? I thought fishmongers have gone the way of stenographers and blacksmiths). She has snuck through and if savvy enough can wiggle into a finalist slot, since she is so unthreatening. There's no clear favorite; I project a final four of Gary, Stephenie, Lydia and Judd.

On Trump's "Apprentice" there is, seeming deliberately, a clear favorite, and it is the African American doctor-Rhodes scholar Randal. I believe Trump is well aware of demographic significance in his choice of apprentices, and after having selected two Wasps and a woman, a black man would look very good. Trump needn't feel obliged to demonstrate Affirmative Action thinking, as he almost selected qualified black candidate Kwame in the first season. But Randal, charming, popular, and incisively smart, will have to struggle to lose. It's possible, to guarantee a black apprentice, that Randal may end up facing his distaff version Marshawn, also bright and articulate, but not nearly as dynamic. The program has had an odd history of black women freaking out, so Marshawn is a nice palliative. No other candidates seen very strong, though the vertically challenged but confidently composed Chris will probably last a while, as will exotic Alla, who apparently has some racy positions in her curriculum vita.

Of course the problem still remains that Trump and Burnett have literalized the term "commercial television," in that each episode is essentially an infomercial clothed as a competition. The contestants shill for large corporate campaigns, the whole mess is tied into some marketing promotion with internet ties, and Trump et al collect huge fees to compensate for future lack of residuals. It's all in the bottom line, Trump would remind us, and fire us if we disagree.

Of Martha Stewart's "Apprentice" there little to say except it is a pallid and uninventive imitation of Trump's, with the male candidates--all deliberately heterosexual--showing much more dynamism than the women, whose skills seem mostly culinary. I do check into this show once in a while, but it's hardly appointment viewing.

But that term "appointment viewing" can be reapplied to the energetic "West Wing," whose resurgence this year seems to coincide with the population's disgust and ennui with the current White House occupant. Last night's stunt Presidential Debate, presented live, was both stimulating and depressing. Stimulating in that it eschewed the standard boring format of real-world Presidential debates, and depressing because it reminds us just how limited and unrevealing that format actually is. Fiction and reality merged impressively in this mostly scripted debate, with candidates Santos and Vinick (Jimmy Smits and Alan Alda) trading barbs and stepping on each other's lines. I thought that Alda availed himself somewhat better, perhaps because he was more used to performing before live audiences than the TV-bred Smits. Smits stammered a bit, though showed great passion defending the "liberal" label so villfied by knee-jerk Republicans. Alda was very smooth reciting the mantra of "lower taxes" and not refusing to waffle on certain points. The script did not allow him to show his more moderate side, nor Smits to say anything to woo the right.

But I believed that Alda/Vinick articulated his positions convincingly, unlike the current president Bush, who bungled his way frighteningly through last fall's debates. Alda is still likely to lose the fictional election, though that's hardly a done deal; the intellectually challenged Bush was able to squeak by, thanks to the Lord (and the Swift Boat Liars Club). Truth, while perhaps stranger than fiction, is certainly not as gratifying.

Smile High City

We are having an election in California on Tuesday that has been so demonized that the Governator is counting on a low voter turnout to push through certain self-serving reforms. The Proposition system, which once seemed such a progressive experiment in popular democracy, has degenerated into an expensive exercise in special-interest advocacy and personal ego gratification for Arnold. I have yet to decide whether to participate; if I do, I'll vote no across the board. At least that will give some meaning to the votes I cast for the state legislature.

But occasionally, in some state or other, a proposition is passed that does properly put the interests of the people against those of the calcified establishment. Such an event happened in the city of Denver yesterday, when the locals decided to legalize marijuana possession. Yep, not decriminalize, legalize (albeit for amounts of an ounce or less). There were still loopholes (one's tempted to call them potholes) in the new law that would allow the Federal idiots to prosecute if they felt obligated to do so, but at least the City Fathers can lean back, light up their bongs and tell their cops to worry about real problems.

It's a bit of a surprise to hear this coming from one of the reddest of states, where anti-semitism reigns in the Air Force Academy and homophobia in its backwater suburbs like Columbine. On the other hand, a similiar pot-toleration law was passed in Telluride, where toking up after a day on the slopes--or before an Independent Film from Uzbekistan--is as rife as drinking cocoa at sunset in a Swiss chalet. I guess that a strain of libertarianism runs through the blood of Coloradans. I was amused to read some of the points of advocacy by the legalization proponents, such as pot potentially saving lives because some folks would choose its use over that of liquor and not go off driving drunk on weekends. Though I personally prefer the effects of pot over those of alcohol, I'm not sure that most people would ever bother to choose; they might smoke a joint as a chaser to a Black Russian and get really fucked up. I've been there, too.

Small issues aside, this is at least a hopeful sign that islands of sanity are popping up regarding our utterly wrongheaded and destructive Federal drug policy. It will be a slow process for intelligence and thoughtfulness to prevail over narrowminded hysteria and misinformation--I mean, look at Iraq. And no politician I'm aware of has had the courage or gumption to state unequivocally that the Emperor has no clothes on this issue. The ingrained power of the liquor lobby and decades of erroneous propaganda defining pot as a "gateway drug" still hold sway.

But meanwhile suffering will continue. The Feds continue to pour borrowed funds into drug interdiction programs, not to mention feeding and housing thousands of prisoners whose offense was lighting up, and whose lives have been ruined by their unfair incarceration. Cancer victims and others wracked by wretched pain, whose agony can be greatly alleviated with medicinal pot, have to elude the DEA watchdogs or simply put up with their discomfort.

It would be interesting for once to hear one rational of the drug enforcers that would actually justify the Draconian prosecution of the marijuana users. Maybe something to do with keeping pot out of the hands of children. I don't disagree--kids and teenagers have enough hormonal problems without getting buzzed by THC and zoning out of their studies. But regulation and provision of pot, say, in state stores, like liquor, may actually reduce pot use among kids, because they would be denied sales, and street vendors would become scarce when there is no profitable black market. I'm not so naive to say that kids won't occasionally sneak some grass from their parents' stashes--but that happens now anyway.

I still maintain that of all our screwed-up national policies, the War on Drugs is perhaps the most pointless and wasteful. At least one can cynically point out economic advantages to our Mideast incursions, however short-term they may be. But our drug legislation laws are inane, utterly arbitrary and--given the "legal" alcohol's nefarious effects on our nation's health--mind-bogglingly hypocritical.