no supper tonight

Here in the Gomorrah of the North, where activist judges have enshrined Sodomie as a fundamental human right, thereby leading the Citizens of the Commonweal down the broad way towards sanctifying all manner of abominable relationships, the godless libertines have presented the Legislature with 80,000 signatures supporting an initiative demanding that possession of less than an ounce of marijuana be deemed a non-criminal offense, meaning that the state is that much closer to getting the initative on the ballot for a public referendum in November. At which time the entire Stoner community will rise up as one and smash the manacles forged by their dour and humorless Puritan forbears. Right? 

By the way, the cost to police departments across the state for booking and arresting ‘heads runs in the neighborhood of $29 million (2006); meanwhile, 7,500 citizens were tagged with a CORI for toking up. And despite all this waste of wealth and loss of blood, I assure you, you’d be hard put to a find a high school student in this state who couldn’t tell you where to cop a lid. Except of course that they don’t say that any more. “Score a blunt.” All right, kids, whatever.

Meanwhile, our Congressperson Barney Frank announced on Friday night that he plans to introduce federal legislation  that would accomplish the same.  This is not analogous to Congressman Kucinich’s recent attempt to introduce articles of impeachment against Dick Cheney; Frank isn’t a quixote. In fact, the Congressman currently heads the Financial Services Committee, so when he says, “I finally got to the point where I think I can get away with it,” there’s likely to be substance to this endeavor.   

 Incidentally, earlier this month Frank sent the Mass State Legislature a strongly worded letter of support as the Legistlature considers adding “transgendered people” to groups covered under hate crimes legislation, a short list currently comprising gays, lesbians, and former Archbishops. It’s a good letter, worth reading in its entirety; the only openly gay Congressman, Frank obviously has some strong personal feelings about the matter. Better yet, take five minutes and watch Barney on the ENDA bill on the floor of the Senate. He gets to the real subject at about 2:50 and in a  few short sentences cuts right to very heart of the matter in a  strikingly heartfelt manner. I’m a transplant up here–and I’m in the district adjacent to Congressman Frank’s, represented by the rather less inspirational Stephen Lynch; but I felt kinda proud.

So, this one goes out to Congressman Frank. The immortal Peter Tosh: