USA: GOING UP IN SMOKE? I HOPE SO!

58% now support legalizing marijuana! Maybe Obama will have another "epiphany" about weed like the one he had when polls supported gay marriage. Not to suggest that he's out of touch or refuses to do with what the majority of us want, but this former pot-smoker has waged the war on drugs more aggressively than George Bush. His hypocrisy is right out front in this, hurting men of color most for offenses involving tiny amounts of marijuana, but we still refuse to acknowledge even an obvious failure like this one. Of course, his "leadership" can't follow opinion polls if you don't even have an opinion as to whether or not his policies make any sense. And this one doesn't. This is from 2012, by the director of the Drug Policy Alliance. "But the president has been losing lots of hearts and minds, especially those of young voters, with his striking silence on marijuana issues since he became president -- apart from providing lame excuses for the federal government's aggressive undermining of state medical marijuana laws. Most disappointing is his failure to say a word as president about the fact that half of all drug arrests each year are for nothing more than possessing a small amount of marijuana, which is something Barack Obama did lots of in his younger days, or to offer any critical comments about the stunning racial disproportionality in marijuana arrests around the country. Roughly twice as many people are arrested for marijuana possession now as were arrested in the early 1980s, even though the number of people consuming marijuana is no greater now than then. If police had been as keen on making marijuana arrests back then, it's quite possible that a young man named Barry Obama would have landed up with a criminal record -- and even more likely that he would not have his current job. With 50 percent of Americans -- and 57 percent of Democrats -- now in favor of legalizing marijuana use, according to Gallup's most recent poll, President Obama needs to come clean once again about marijuana -- but this time he needs to speak not of his own youthful use but rather of the harmful consequences of today's punitive marijuana policies for young Americans today." MORE: HUFFPO