UN calls for Obama to overturn marijuana legalisation

Amid the celebrations for the victories for marijuana legalisation in Washington State and Colorado there were those of us who had doubts that the federal government would allow them to stand.  The current Administration has after all, been more extreme in its determination to stamp out even medical marijuana than any previous one.  The idea of legalising recreational usage was likely to convince the Feds that a jackboot on the throat was needed.

Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper has asked for a response twice so far but with no joy.  Now the UN has asked for federal action to prevent the measures being implemented: 

The head of the U.N. drug watchdog agency is urging U.S. federal officials to challenge ballot measures in Colorado and Washington that decriminalized possession of small amounts of marijuana for adults 21 and over. 

Raymond Yans says the approvals send "a wrong message to the rest of the nation and it sends a wrong message abroad." 

Yans heads the International Narcotics Control Board. He told The Associated Press on Tuesday he hopes Attorney General Eric Holder "will take all the necessary measures" to ensure that marijuana possession and use remains illegal throughout the U.S. 

Both states are holding off on plans to regulate and tax the drug while waiting to see whether the Justice Department will assert federal authority over drug law. …

The claim by the UN to overturn the democratic will of voters in two states is questionable at best.  As far as any right to moral authority is concerned, the UN has none whatsoever, being composed of tin pot dictatorships, regimes of dubious moral authority, assorted nasties, interspersed with a sprinkling of legitimate governments.

The UN busybodies are claiming legitimacy over a treaty on narcotics that is more than fifty years old but which was signed by the US.  It is an absolute nonsense to suggest that what was considered a ‘good idea at the time’ that long ago should be frozen in time till today.  Drug policy is a classic area for a fifty state solution, where each has its own legislation (or not) with the best results gradually being adopted by others in a way that improves results nationwide.