Once-Secret "Nixon Tapes" Show Why the U.S. Outlawed Pot

March 21, 2002 7:19 PM

Once-Secret "Nixon Tapes" Show Why the U.S. Outlawed Pot
Ok, I'll admit that I was amused by the fact that 420,000 people were arrested in that first year....
posted by ookamaka (8 comments total)

But the Washington Post has excerpts, like my favorite:

"I don't want to see this country to go that way. You know what happened to the Greeks. Homosexuality destroyed them. Sure, Aristotle was a homo, we all know that, so was Socrates."

Ehrlichman interrupts to reassure his boss. Socrates, he says, "never had the influence that television had."
posted by anewc2 at 7:32 PM on March 21, 2002

i like how he didn't want to go "soft on marijuana." and wanted a "Goddamn strong statement about marijuana ... that just tears the ass out of them." that rules! where can you get these tapes? :)
posted by kliuless at 7:51 PM on March 21, 2002

My favorite part:

Nixon's private comments about marijuana showed he was the epitome of misinformation and prejudice. He believed marijuana led to hard drugs, despite the evidence to the contrary. He saw marijuana as tied to "radical demonstrators." He believed that "the Jews," especially "Jewish psychiatrists" were behind advocacy for legalization, asking advisor Bob Haldeman, "What the Christ is the matter with the Jews, Bob?" He made a bizarre distinction between marijuana and alcohol, saying people use marijuana "to get high" while "a person drinks to have fun."

Fucking racist killjoy.
posted by ColdChef at 7:54 PM on March 21, 2002

And we're kidding ourselves if somewhat similar conversations aren't still occuring in the halls of power in this the year 2002. Do you think guys like DeLay and Lott aren't having conversations like these? Not to mention The Shadow president, who can see the evil in the hearts of men...
posted by hincandenza at 8:15 PM on March 21, 2002

Actually, hincandenza, I rather suspect that the Bush administration has something of the opposite problem.

Really, Nixon was a foul-mouth in the land of the foul-mouthed, and perhaps the biggest paranoid in American political history. And a generation ago, it was still socially acceptable here to be a bit of an anti-Semite -- you can't deny that there have been big changes.

Now, maybe if you'd listed Bob Barr instead ....
posted by dhartung at 8:34 PM on March 21, 2002

Nixon was and is a fascinating figure who defined a division between one generation and another. He rose to power under one very rigidly defined set of morals and behaviors, but by the time he achieved the position he sought, another set was rapidly taking over.

With each new insight we see in tape or contemporaneous recollection, we realize that he believed in the "old" standards and accepted them wholeheartedly.

However, he also saw, I believe, the societal changes that were surrounding him and always tried (unsuccessfully) to be a bridge between the old and the new.

In the drug context, this is Exhibit A.
posted by yhbc at 9:23 PM on March 21, 2002

What the hell is the deal with old people blaming the Jews for all their problems?

If I didn't know these tapes were real, it could have been something from a really psychotic SNL sketch.

What a fascist. On homosexuality:
"And let's look at the strong societies. The Russians. Goddamn it, they root them out, they don't let 'em hang around at all. You know what I mean? I don't know what they do with them."

I'm glad he admired that murderous regime so much. Too bad he didn't get another term to make the dream come true.
posted by insomnyuk at 10:03 PM on March 21, 2002

you mean, it was all political?

so, pot isnt worse for you than beer?

or cigarettes?

you mean i was straight edge for nothing!?

aaRRRRRRRGGGGGGG!
posted by tsarfan at 12:57 AM on March 22, 2002