Boondocks: Mr. Medicinal..

Y’all know I am not just some pothead either, right?

Yup, I’m sure y’all know that.

I went from schwag smoke to growin some fine ass Princess Diesel . When it comes to marijuana, I could probably run Oaksterdam. They should make me the dean or something.

Anyway, enough self-aggrandizing. I wanted to pay homage to this last Boondocks episode, Mr. Medicinal.

Let me get my beef out of the way first.

They should have put me in it. Instead, they put some ol’ regular stuck up dude in there. They could have had the super laid back, chubby Black Buddha type such as myself. With my mellow flow and superior knowledge, I would have made the perfect Boondocks character to cultivate and distribute high quality marijuana in Woodcrest.

Anyway, without spoiling it too much for others who haven’t seen it, I loved the way the episode went down. It pretty much covered all the bases – first time introduction to weed from Thugnificent, the rabid anti-marijuana knucklehead in Tom, the first smoke, being high, driving while high, trouble with the law, and so on.

But, most importantly, I think it caught a bit of that enchantment that people have with marijuana. We all know Granddad is an uptight ornery ol sumbitch that gets angry at the drop of a hat. But, when Granddad is high on marijuana, he’s a completely laid back and relaxed individual. As he mentions, he isn’t going to let the small things bother him. When you feel like that, you’re not going to want to go back. You gain better perspective because when you can treat the small things like small things, you can concentrate on the bigger picture being your life, friends, and family.

Yes, everything looks better, tastes better, and feels better, especially sex!

Anyway, I tend to get long winded and I wanted to try to keep this short and sweet. But, I can’t just leave it without spreading some knowledge.

“There are 100,000 total marijuana smokers in the US, and most are Negroes, Hispanics, Filipinos and entertainers. Their Satanic music, jazz and swing, result from marijuana usage. This marijuana causes white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes, entertainers and any others.”

– Harry J. Anslinger, testimony to Congress, 1937

After Anslinger’s racist comments to the US Congress, which they ate up, marijuana became illegal through the Marijuana Tax Stamp Act of 1937. Basically, this act dictated that you have to pay taxes on marijuana. The catch-22 is that you had to bring the marijuana to get the stamp. However, you couldn’t have marijuana without the stamp. The act was repealed in 1967 because a judge caught the catch-22 which was conveniently overlooked for three decades.

Everything was good until the US Congress passed the Controlled Substances Act of 1970. What a lot of people don’t know is that the CSA is a response to the United Nation’s Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs Treaty in 1961. This is important because to ban drugs in the United States, there needs to be a Constitutional amendment. The best and only example of this is the 18th Amendment which prohibited alcohol in 1917 and was repealed by the 21st Amendment in 1933.

Now, let’s tie this all together. How is it that the US needs a Constitutional amendment to prohibit alcohol but doesn’t need one to prohibit marijuana use?

Article VI of the US Constitution answers that question.

This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.

In other words, if the US signs a treaty, whatever is in that treaty supersedes any and all laws in the United States including the US Constitution itself. So, there will be no legalization efforts at the federal level because of the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs as well as some other treaties that were signed afterward.

What it all amounts to is someone using Article VI of the US Constitution to tell American citizens what they can and can’t do with their lives.

If you think for a second that there isn’t a racial motivation for this effort, at least in part, just look at marijuana statistics today. 70% of marijuana users are White compared to 15% of those users being African American. However, 60% of those incarcerated are African American compared to 20% White. Yes, there are people who would go through all of that just to get us!!

Check me on it. I always feel good about what I write, when I decide to write, for a reason.