The John Mason Talk-Walk, May 17, 2024

I speak about the racism behind the "War On Drugs," and the need to decriminalize Marijuana. 

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Hello, hello, hello. How is everybody? This is John Mason. Tomorrow is Mother's Day. And that is the time we pay our respects to all the women in our lives, our mothers and our wives, and our girlfriends, and our sisters, and every other woman that we come across. Happy Mother's Day, ladies. And if we want the best for the women in our lives, we must protect the reproductive rights. There are all these states go around that places the most onerous restrictions on abortions. Like you only have an abortion after so many weeks before you even know the woman even knows that there's a fetus inside of her. And you remembered uh Katie Brett, the senator from Arkansas, who had this very ham bad case of ham acting after Biden's uh State of the Union address. Is that the best Republicans can do? Well, anyway, she has this bright idea of a database. She's proposing this bill that would establish a database for all women who are pregnant. Hello, hello, hello, John Mason. How is everybody? Hope you're all well. Hope things are good for you. I'm getting myself deeper into activism around the decriminalization of cannabis, marijuana. The reason it's illegal in the first place is that back in the 1930s, the the Franklin Roosevelt administration was winding down the uh prohibition, realizing that it served as a disaster. It did no good in preventing people from consuming alcohol. And for during the depression, the federal government needed some tax revenue, and so they lifted a bit a little bit at a time the ban on the sale of alcohol. And the Bureau of Prohibition, now under the command of Harry Anslinger, had nothing to do. It had no purpose, no mission. And a lot of our organized bodies tried to find some sort of mission or excuse to be to exist. So they went after narcotics, however they defined it. And after following a lot of uh false science, so-called, the federal government has has been going after uh mineral marijuana, which we which we now know cannot be remotely considered anything compatible to cocaine or heroin or methamphetamins. It was a way of attacking them. Or either an an opportunity, excuse, what have you. And then in 1972, uh the Nixon administration thought he they jump jumpstart his uh uh his sec his second presidential campaign by his re-election to to the presidency by declaring a war on drugs. That's what they called it. But even Nixon's aid, John Ehrlichman admitted, is a way of getting at uh again, a way of getting at at uh people of color and anti-war activists. The anti-war activist marijuana was associated with hippies, anti-war activists, and any other narcotics were associated with black and brown people. And for the ever since then, I'd say about fifty for over fifty years, fifty years, over fifty years, has been another me excuse to attack uh communities of color. And the drugs are still coming in. You Kensington Avenue is a not out in the open market flea market for narcotics, and the car the Parker administration's has been cleaning that up. And we uh we have to understand that that war on drugs is a sham Sure of course yeah of course you have to take on the drug cartels, but at the same time, don't treat uh don't treat uh addicts as criminals, treat it as a medical problem. I don't know how they got into the drugs. A lot of them got hooked on opioids because they were veterans from activities in military activities in Iraq and Afghanistan, and because of their wounds are in a lot of pain, and they're prescribed these opioids to kill their pain. But they can no but they can no longer afford to purchase the opioids. So they have to go into the street to purchase some. It's the kind of stuff that would kill them. Synthetics stuff like fentanyl or worse, such as the the horse tank equalizers stuff called Trank for short. It has to be they have to be medically treated. Who says you can't do both? The l the FBI and the DEA going after the cartels and drug dealers and medical care for the uh radiatics. And like I said, marijuana cannot be uh cannot be classed is no longer classed alongside of uh heroin cocaine. I myself have a Pennsylvania medical marijuana license, which is I can go to any authorized dispensary and pick up and purchase uh uh a quantity of uh of marijuana that would be good for my my psychological issues, like my autism and my PTSD, depression, all that. And I believe it is an important social justice issue because the jails are full of kids who've whose only crime was smok is lighting up a joint, while real criminals are they're having trouble capturing. I urge you and a full amnesty for people convicted of non-violent uh drug offenses, like just sitting around smoking a joint, and legalize marijuana for both medical and recreational purposes. And just like alcohol was a big uh money maker for the federal government and taxes, states have decriminalized marijuana like Colorado and Alaska, have been raking him millions of dollars in tax revenue from legalized marijuana. And we in Pennsylvania are missing the boat. Call your state rep, your state senator, and urge them to support the decriminalization of marijuana for recreational purposes. Rather than being the the killer narcotic, it's been spouted as. I remember back in the day in school, all the lectures, the health classes about lectures about uh the evil of the wacky tobacky and all. It is healthful. It is healthy, it is good for you in calming you down, elevating your mood. It's work for me. Okay. Okay, that's the last word for now. And now advertisements. All this media work I'm doing, this podcast, my YouTube channel, my my blog, my poetry, my fiction is work. Work, work, work. It's work and I believe I should be compensated for my work like every other worker. And money to move my uh move my career forward. So I ask you all to get on my website, johnomason.com, and click either the buy me a coffee button or the PayPal button. I see I see what you can donate. I greatly, greatly appreciate it. And also, my novel, Soldier of the Cross, is available on Amazon.com. It's the story of David Lucas, who as a young man in the early 60s is a drunk and a whore chaser and a school bully. He gets in trouble in the army, he comes out of the army as a fanatical militant born-again Christian, just wanting to be a manly Christian man. But how he goes about it leads him into disaster. Please look it up. Soldier of the Cross on Amazon.com and also my beloved career and business coach, Michelle Snow. Michelle is excellent in helping you develop your professional career or small business. Let you know what you're doing right where you need work and help you network with other up and coming entrepreneurs and professionals. Please, please, please look her up. Grow with snow dot com. Okay? Alrighty then. I bid you all a nice quiet weekend. I'll be s I'll be doing some important stuff. Stuff I believe in. Take care. Have a good weekend. Shaba. Ah.