David Frum Blames AZ Shooting on Reefer Madness
The former Bush speechwriter who coined the term “Axis of Evil” claims a link between Jared Loughner, schizophrenia and pot smoking. Forget guns, “The Tucson shooting should remind us why we regulate marijuana.” Much of our culture’s historic intolerance of marijuana grew out of racism and the quack science used to justify it. Frum acknowledges in his blog post that “The connection between marijuana and schizophrenia is both controversial and complicated.” But, he writes, “The raw association is strong.” That’s like saying “I can’t prove anything conclusively, but I’ve got a gut feeling.” According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, 42.6 percent of Americans have consumed marijuana by the time they graduate high school. If Frum is correct, we’re going to have a lot more dangerous schizophrenics to deal with. Perhaps we should get on top of the situation by drastically increasing funding for mental health services and amending the Constitution to ban guns. Whether pot makes you crazy, lazy or fat, you can’t shoot someone without a gun.
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on January 12, 2011. Filed under