Pot just makes you dumb, Scarborough says. Of marijuana and ignorance

Pot just makes you dumb.

Oops. I said it again. I repeated that obvious statement I made on “Morning Joe” last week to the horror of stoners everywhere. Many of those gentle souls spent the past few days smoking a fattie and lashing out online at 30 Rock’s answer to Carrie Nation. Rolling Stone’s Matt Taibbi even attacked me while taking the extraordinary step of coming out in defense of pot smoking on the Rolling Stone website.


“My God!” I muttered to myself while reading this historic blog, What possessed Taibbi to ball up and confront those famously prudish Rolling Stone readers with this radical, counterintuitive take on the evil weed? And what would this blogging daredevil attempt next? Perhaps an article blasting Dick Cheney for his role in the Iraq War? Or perhaps more daring exposes on big money in politics starring the Koch brothers!

Such courage is rarely seen these days, and one could not help but be reminded of Martin Luther nailing his 95 Theses to the church house doors or Wilberforce standing alone in the well of Parliament striking out against the immoral British slave trade.

Taibbi let his readers know that unlike David Brooks and myself, he is one with America’s urban poor and the disadvantaged black kids who get caught up in the racist web of drug laws routinely enforced by the Man. This working-class hero righteously lamented the fact that too many poor people’s lives will be “derailed forever by a pointless and intrinsically hypocritical marijuana arrest. But Scarborough wouldn’t know anything about that, apparently.”

God, I’m such an isolated, ignorant spoiled prick. If only I could have been raised in the kind of misery and squalor as Taibbi, perhaps I could connect to the mean streets of inner-city America like him. But how could I ever be as empathetic on such realities as a disadvantaged soul like Taibbi, who was forced to grow up in the affluent suburbs of Boston, attend prep school at Concord Academy, and then go on to Bard College?

Friends, this is apparently how the other half lives. The injustice of it is almost too much to bear.

Why Concord Academy and not St. Paul’s? Would Amherst not take a man of Matt’s limited means? I’m sure my people were responsible and for this, I am truly ashamed. If only I could be as connected to the harsh realities of the downtrodden teenager as Matt Taibbi, perhaps then I might not just be a better reporter. I might actually be a better man.

Thank the good Lord there was gracious plenty in the form of online outrage to humble me. I learned from Twitter and other online commentary that anyone making the statement “Pot makes you dumb” is racist, a supporter of America’s failed drug wars, and a mindless puritanical dweeb. All of this might come as news to countless public defenders who have approached me over the years in airports, on book tours, and in other public venues thanking me for talking about the injustice poor defendants of all colors face because too many jurisdictions give prosecutors all the resources they need while underfunding offices that provide the poorest and most disadvantaged Americans the attorney they are guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution. Perhaps, it also doesn’t matter that I have long believed that our justice system is far more likely to convict our most disadvantaged citizens regardless of race. If I am wrong, then tell me the last millionaire who got the death penalty.

Also, my admission that I never smoked pot somehow disqualified me from speaking out on the issue of just how dumb pot can make you. That might make sense but for the fact I saw firsthand just how stupid pot made my older friends and scores of band members that I grew up with over a few decades. I played in bands from the time I was in sevehth grade and was probably exposed to the use of illegal drugs than most middle-class Americans not writing for Rolling Stone.

I stayed away from pot specifically because of my experience with it.

I spent too many nights dealing with the stupidity and struggles of stoned bandmates in their early teens to want to follow that path. And while I dare not engage on the “gateway drug” argument, I can tell you that too many of my bandmates who smoked pot in their teens moved on to coke, acid, pills, and occasionally heroin later in life. I spent many nights dealing with their struggles, many hours helping with them through rehab, too many early mornings in emergency rooms, and in one tragic case, too many nights mourning the loss of a dear friend. But I am sure all of these life experiences with friends and acquaintances over 30 years pales in comparison of the education of kick-starting a bong in Mom’s basement while cranking up “Do You Feel Like We Do.”

But I remain defiant in my ignorance.

Unlike alcohol, pot rarely makes you an angry stoner. Unlike coke, pot rarely makes you bankrupt. And unlike heroin, pot rarely makes you dead. Nope. In my three decades or so around a multitude of pot smokers, I have found that all too often, pot just makes you dumb.

A guest columnist for POLITICO, Joe Scarborough hosts “Morning Joe” on MSNBC and represented Florida’s 1st Congressional District in the House of Representatives from 1995 to 2001

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