Déjà Vu All Over Again

Lotta bloggers talking about SCROTUS ratcheting up tyranny another notch in their medical marijuana decision.

A lifetime ago, an earlier generation used similar arguments in an attempt to ease restrictions against another controlled substance:

"And in the early months of 1921, a dedicated group of brewers, physicians and imbibers attempted to convince the U.S. Congress that beer was nothing less than vital medicine. Whatever craven thirsts might have inspired its advocates, the right of physicians to prescribe 'medical beer' was the subject of intense national debate, drawing the attention of officials at the highest levels of government and provoking arguments within the American Medical Association and other professional groups."

I've never been comfortable with the "medical marijuana" exceptions. It seems to me the argument aknowledges the legitimacy of government coercion when other substances are involved.

Interesting and all too predicatable what our rulers have done with the commerce clause. Time was, "the court construed the clause so narrowly...it ruled that not even so vast an industry as coal mining fell within the commerce power."

That's when FDR rolled up his sleeves and got to work on the last vestiges of federalism.

I find it intriguing that the polar flip in interpretation of the Constitution came about "because one justice, Owen Roberts, switched his vote. Ever since, historians have argued about why he did so."

Sounds like somebody protecting his butt at the expense of everything else to me. Hopefully somebody can tell us more about this character who helped doom the Republic--I'll have to look around.

Finally, anybody thinking Bush really wants strict constructionists on the court needs to square that fantasy with his support of the War on (Some) Drugs and Guns. As if such a jurist would make it through "advise and consent" anyway.