It’s Time To Legalize Marijuana. Judge Napolitano
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h2GG2aM6UII
The judge, as always, makes strong and clear arguments.
FOX: We’ve had such a hard time convincing people not to drink and drive, I think a lot of people would be worried that you start making recreation use of marijuana legal, its gonna make that task to get people to stop from smoking and driving even more difficult.
Judge: The government should be more concerned about people making choices for themselves and about them bearing their own responsibility, than about trying to take care of them. You’re not buying this?
Judge Napolitano hit on the point of people bearing their own responsibility, but didn’t give examples, such as bearing responsibility for your own health and well being, and bearing responsibility for not harming others in public.
Texting, drinking alcohol, putting on makeup, or being sleep deprived are all areas where people should be held accountable for putting others at risk while driving. In the privacy of your own home it is the individual’s responsibility, and not the governments’ responsibility, to decide for themselves if and when they are putting themselves at risk.
Contrary to popular belief, Libertarians are not opposed to traffic regulations. Libertarians believe that you should be free to live your life as you choose, as long as you don’t interfere with someone else’s rights or cause them harm. Just because you might be able to drive on the wrong side of the road for some time and not hurt anyone does not mean there isn’t strong potential to do harm to others.
The problem the judge ran into is there is no quick sound-bite to sum up that when you are in public, regardless of your condition or circumstances, you are responsible for not harming others. It does not matter how one impairs their driving ability, but it does matter that people take responsibility when putting others at risk.
