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Editorial Board: Conflict between DEA, Camera on anti-pot campaign

Stoners beware.

There’s $10,000 worth of anti-pot propaganda heading your way. And it’s none of that after-school-special shwag, either. This stuff is the real deal. The whole state, you might soon believe, is about to go to pot.

According to the Daily Camera, an agent from the Drug Enforcement Administration is looking to drop some kind nuggets of stinky-green wisdom on Colorado residents. The agent’s campaign is meant to fight a new ballot measure that, if passed, would allow citizens 21 and up to possess small amounts of marijuana for personal use.

SAFER Colorado, the group supporting the legalization effort, discovered the DEA’s plans and feels, rightly, that the U.S. government should not involve itself in local policymaking.

The Denver DEA told The Metropolitan that the allegations were false and that the Camera story had taken its words out of context. The DEA denied any official involvement in the campaign.
It is surprising the U.S. government, despite other problems this country has, still cares about people smoking pot. Does the local hub of the nation’s largest drug-fighting network really have the time and resources to fight such a mundane issue? Aren’t there local meth labs operating unchecked? Don’t cocaine, heroin and ecstasy funnel their way through Colorado’s convenient and relatively unregulated highway system every day?

Regarding the agency’s role in politics, special agent Jeff Sweetin of the DEA’s Denver office told the Camera, “We’re in favor of the democratic process. But as a caveat, we’re in favor of it working based on all the facts.”

No doubt one of the “facts” the anti-pot effort will try to inundate voters with is the recent assertion by the Bush administration that drug use supports terrorism. This bit of mania is on par with the assertion that illegal immigration has something to do with unemployment: both are distortions of the truth.

Though the DEA spokesman who spoke with The Metropolitan claims there is no money, in the Camera’s article, agent Sweetin said the money for the effort comes mostly from private donations and agents’ personal accounts. SAFER Colorado believes this puts the DEA in violation of the Hatch Act, a law passed in 1939 and amended in 1993, which governs the political speech of government employees.

According to the Daily Camera, the U.S. Office of Special Counsel, who investigated the supposed breach, doesn’t believe the DEA has done anything wrong.

We hope Colorado voters will realize the inanity in continuing to prosecute small-time possessors of pot. This fall, just say no to executive branch politicking putting its stamp on local legislation. And when you get to the ballot box, say yes to allowing personal possession of a drug that long ago should have disappeared from our list of priorities.