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Obama: Marijuana Is Less Dangerous Than Alcohol

Ben Yakas

Published Jan 19, 2014

Modified Jan 19, 2014

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Ben Yakas

Published Jan 19, 2014

Modified Jan 19, 2014

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While Gov. Cuomo has been disappointingly back-and-forth on his stance regarding legislation to decriminalize small amounts of marijuana, President Obama was more forthright about his feelings on the topic in a massive New Yorker profile coming next week. “As has been well documented, I smoked pot as a kid, and I view it as a bad habit and a vice, not very different from the cigarettes that I smoked as a young person up through a big chunk of my adult life," Obama told David Remnick. "I don’t think it is more dangerous than alcohol."

Remnick asked Obama, who has been criticized for his frustratingly vague (and often downright hypocritical) views of marijuana legalization, whether he thinks it's less dangerous than alcohol, to which Obama gave a measured but still significant response.

Less dangerous, he said, “in terms of its impact on the individual consumer. It’s not something I encourage, and I’ve told my daughters I think it’s a bad idea, a waste of time, not very healthy.” What clearly does trouble him is the radically disproportionate arrests and incarcerations for marijuana among minorities. “Middle-class kids don’t get locked up for smoking pot, and poor kids do,” he said. “And African-American kids and Latino kids are more likely to be poor and less likely to have the resources and the support to avoid unduly harsh penalties.” But, he said, “we should not be locking up kids or individual users for long stretches of jail time when some of the folks who are writing those laws have probably done the same thing.” Accordingly, he said of the legalization of marijuana in Colorado and Washington that “it’s important for it to go forward because it’s important for society not to have a situation in which a large portion of people have at one time or another broken the law and only a select few get punished.”

To give some context (which you are perhaps already familiar with) to his point about marijuana arrests among minorities, NY state is the marijuana arrest capital of America, with more than 103,000 arrests in 2010 alone (via the most recent data available). New York City saw 444,000 of the 500,000 marijuana arrests since 2002 [PDF], arrests that cost taxpayers more than $600 million—all while possession of 25 grams of marijuana out of public view has been decriminalized since 1977.

Nearly 90% of those arrested in NY state for weed are black or Latino. A poll last year showed that 52% of Americans support legalizing marijuana, before the historic legislation in Colorado and Washington passed. So Obama acknowledging the disparity amongst who is being punished is a good step. Yet in he same breath he proceeds to give credence to the dubious "marijuana is a slippery-slope" argument.

As is his habit, he nimbly argued the other side. “Having said all that, those who argue that legalizing marijuana is a panacea and it solves all these social problems I think are probably overstating the case. There is a lot of hair on that policy. And the experiment that’s going to be taking place in Colorado and Washington is going to be, I think, a challenge.” He noted the slippery-slope arguments that might arise. “I also think that, when it comes to harder drugs, the harm done to the user is profound and the social costs are profound. And you do start getting into some difficult line-drawing issues. If marijuana is fully legalized and at some point folks say, Well, we can come up with a negotiated dose of cocaine that we can show is not any more harmful than vodka, are we open to that? If somebody says, We’ve got a finely calibrated dose of meth, it isn’t going to kill you or rot your teeth, are we O.K. with that?”

This was far from the slam dunk endorsement of legalized marijuana as some have suggested, but the fact that the Drug War's failures are being acknowledged is...well, it's better than what he's said in the past.

"What’s most important about President Obama’s comments is that he called the new laws in Colorado and Washington ‘important’,” said Ethan Nadelmann, executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance. “This really puts the wind in the sails of the movement to end marijuana prohibition both around the country and abroad. It will undoubtedly open the door for other elected officials in the United States and around the world to say the same, and to move forward with ending marijuana prohibition in their own states and countries.”

Go here to read the full article, which includes references to Obama's love for martinis, sports (though he notes he wouldn't let his son play pro football), healthcare and Abraham Lincoln.

Tagged

alcohol

drugs

marijuana

marijuana reform

new yorker

obama

pot

president obama

weed

Ben Yakas

Ben Yakas is a former Gothamist reporter.

Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations

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