Irony legalizing marijuana now

America is ready to discuss the legalization of marijuana. Why now? $$$$ of course! Because it makes fiscal sense. Corporations, banks, and investors (Wall Street) are still asking for more trillion dollar bailouts; Washington continues to operate under deficits and the current administration is planning on adding its own trillions to the national debt. Legalization of drugs would be an enormous profit maker for government. It has always been in America’s economic interests, unless you’re Nino Brown or the CIA (see Mike Ruppert). So let me ask a deeper question, “WHY-NOW?” Maybe because the poor no longer have the monopoly on suffering?
America’s biggest experiment with control of social vices, Prohibition, was a tragedy. Making alcohol illegal did not stop alcohol consumption. It did create an environment of destruction, murder, and profitability for organized crime. Our current “experiment”, the War on Drugs, has been waged unsuccessfully for decades. Unfortunately, from marijuana to crack cocaine, social (sometimes racial) prejudices are behind the demonization and subsequent legal treatment of those involved. And similar to the era of Prohibition, the lure of easy drug money and limited legal employment opportunities creates an atmosphere of desperation and murder. Mothers have cried over young lives cut short and fathers screamed about the destruction of families, neighborhoods, and entire generations. Their pleas have fallen on deaf ears. But when Wall Street whimpers for help; legalizing drugs will miraculously alleviate their pain.
Poor people dying for decades because of oppressive social paradigms isn’t worthy enough to foster debate on drug legalization, but heaven forbid some corporatist loses his billion dollar portfolio gambling on wall street; marijuana please come to the rescue. The irony sickens me. I don’t condone the abuse of psychoactive substances, but if legalization means one less senseless murder, I’m all for it. I pray that this long delayed debate on marijuana leads to its legalization. But I don't want us to ignore the underlying prejudices that underlie our discriminatory drug policy. Unless we honestly address social ills of our culture, the symptoms will reappear somewhere. Where next will America get its oppressive fix. Further neglect and deterioration of our public school system? Invading and colonizing more developing countries? More control of women’s bodies?