Pat Robertson thinks marijuana should be legal

>“It’s completely out of control,” Mr. Robertson said. “Prisons are being overcrowded with juvenile offenders having to do with drugs. And the penalties, the maximums, some of them could get 10 years for possession of a joint of marijuana. It makes no sense at all.”

I never thought I'd agree with anything Pat Robertson said, but this is an extremely sensible position. California's (and the US in general) prison population and associated expenditure has exploded, while we cut spending in places like education.

Look at this picture: [0]. Has this huge runup in the prison population made us any safer?

I realize I'm probably preaching to the choir -- that HN tends to be younger and liberal on social issues -- but the needless imprisonment of thousands has ruined many lives.

>He attributed much of the problem of overpopulated jails to a “liberal mindset to have an all-encompassing government.”

Didn't the War on Drugs start under Reagan? The huge runup in the prison population began in the 1980s. Whatever. As long as more people support changing our current prison system, they can give whatever reasons they want.

[0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:US_incarceration_timeline-...

Hasn't succeeded... that's one way to frame the extraordinary disaster of death and mayhem that the 'war on drugs' has been.

If we had to tally the financial toll, the community toll, the prison toll, the fiscal toll, the death toll --- you'd have to break out the Korean and Vietnam wars to find a good comparison.