Obama’s Tact-o-Meter
Marijuana plant
March 29, 2009 – I like Obama. I voted for him. After watching his first 60 days in office, I’m excited that he’s the new President of the United States. Regardless, like many Americans, I cringed over the Special Olympics comment on Leno. Though I was mortified over the incident, I thought that Obama made a mistake that could be rectified through some personal work with the Special Olympic committee. I was sure that he would quickly learn from that incident. I was wrong!
On March 26th, Obama hosted the first ever online Town Hall on whitehouse.gov. The American People were invited to submit and vote on questions related to the economy. In turn, President Obama promised to answer the most popular questions submitted in an online video presentation.
I don’t know about you but I was pretty excited at the prospect of having such direct and potentially influential contact with our President. Obama continues to strike me as an authentic leader, one who is willing to inject a little integrity into the job of President of the United States. The idea of an online Town Hall seemed very promising and in truth, it still does, but it needs to be handled better in the future. I will explain why.
I submitted 5 questions. In general, I asked about space debris, solar energy, hydrogen vehicles, and lastly, marijuana. The top question posed in the green jobs/energy category, which led by a whopping margin: “Will you consider decriminalizing the recreational/medical use of marijuana (hemp) so that the government can regulate it, tax it, put age limits on it, and create millions of new jobs and a multibillion dollar industry right here in the U.S.?”
Even though the marijuana question was voted by far the most popular, the question was not presented to Obama. Why not? If the promise was to answer the most popular questions submitted by the American People for the people, then why did any of the questions get censored? Obama knew it, so he addressed it anyway, and for that I give him some credit. However, my accolades end there. His response toward the majority of Town Hall contributors in the green jobs/energy category was ghastly. “I don’t know what this says about the online audience,” Obama joked. The audience applauded. “The answer is no, I do not think that is a good strategy to grow our economy.”
Notice that Obama questioned the character of the online community. In other words, if you venture to ask a question about legalizing or decriminalizing marijuana, no matter how valid the reasoning behind your question may be, you’re America’s ugly stepchild and you’re not worthy of being given an explanation to a trite answer, let alone respect. His “no” answer without any explanation given is an offense and it’s a cop out. Is Obama an intellectual coward? At this point, my answer is yes. This marijuana question was a tough one but it was a perfect challenge and an opportunity for Obama to demonstrate scholarly grace while being honest and upfront with the American People. His choice to pander to conservatives while making a joke out of the majority of the online community in Town Hall was crass, elitist, and demonstrated an ignorant lack of understanding toward costs of marijuana prohibition. His derisive joking demonstrated his ignorance in thinking that everyone raising the marijuana debate is a stoner without legitimate economic chops.
A flood of online journal articles followed. Some blamed the marijuana proponents for “hijacking” the online Town Hall. Of course, none of those particular articles questioned those Americans who failed to participate in a historic Q & A with the President, if they had more important issues to raise. It’s just too easy to revel in Obama’s diss without addressing the real issues and marijuana is just an excuse to do it.
My comment (below) was featured on UsNews.com:
This really upset me. There are tons of nonviolent marijuana offenders locked up in prison at [a cost of] $35,000 an inmate per year, in prisons that are overcrowded and experiencing increasing violence because there isn’t enough space to house criminals. The marijuana offenders have to be shuffled through law enforcement, the court system, and prisons at great costs. In quipping that he doesn’t know about the online community who ventured to ask that question, he insulted a lot of good Americans that came to the Town Hall Q&A and in trust put forth their earnest questions. His derisive rebuke was offensive.
Comment by Alison, CA
(I corrected their misspelling of my name)
It should be noted that voting during Town Hall was poorly organized in such a way that would encourage popular questions to remain popular throughout voting. The top marijuana question already quoted herein remained on top for the duration of the poll. I think one of the reasons for this was that there were so many questions that only the most popular were displayed at the top of the list. The first thing any voter could see were the most popular questions, so they were the easiest to support. In the future, I would hope that the system was organized in a more efficient way so that newly asked questions could be viewed immediately by those voters looking at the website.
In future Town Hall Q & A’s, Obama needs to give some thought to his answers. If he is going to promise to answer questions that are posed to him, then he needs to face the challenge in which he has set himself up and he needs to face it honestly. If this Town Hall concept is going to work, then the next time around attempted censorship and disrespect toward participants won’t work. Obama needs to give straight answers and he needs to give thorough explanations for his rationale when answering questions. If he is going to answer the American People, then he needs to reason with the American People.