Up in Smoke
Scrapbook Up in Smoke Republicans weren't the only losers Tuesday night. The permanent adolescents agitating for marijuana legalization also took a "thumpin'" at the polls. The folks at the...
...If the two men were placed side by side, nine out of ten objective observers would say Pastor Ted was the gay activist and Whitworth the evangelical pastor...
...In that sense, Wolf's East German career, and his skirmishes with a unified German judicial system, were emblematic...
...Initially, he was charged with treason, convicted, and sentenced to six years in prison...
...Every single statewide pro-pot ballot measure failed to pass by a substantial margin...
...The Nevada measure would have also permitted the over-the-counter sale of pot, subject (of course) to state taxes...
...The folks at the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) and their allies campaigned across the country for statewide referenda permitting the use of "medical" marijuana and in some cases legalizing the weed outright...
...So there's no reason to get too excited over the fact that as of noon on Friday, 315,108 people had voted, and 87 percent said that impeachment was justifiable...
...In fact we were more than a little amused when the National Republican Senatorial Committee ran television advertisements attacking Webb for statements he made in his essay "The War on the Military Culture" from our January 20, 1997, issue...
...Poll Position To usher in the new Democratic Congress, MSNBC's website offered an Internet poll late last week...
...While press attention was focused on the elections here in America, the longtime head of East Germany's foreign intelligence section—the legendary "Man Without a Face," reputedly the model for John Le Carre's Karla—died peacefully, and very nearly anonymously, in his Berlin apartment...
...Perhaps Markus Wolf didn't deserve to be punished as a traitor to the Federal Republic of Germany...
...It failed, too, 52 percent to 48 percent...
...If they're going to pin lefty conspiracies on Bush in their "poll," why not also include "causing Hurricane Katrina" and "profiteering in Iraq with Halliburton...
...When one of them, Gunter Guillaume, rose to become a senior aide to Chancellor Willy Brandt, and was ultimately exposed, the sensation toppled Brandt's government...
...Finally, a South Dakota referendum would have allowed individuals with a "debilitating medical condition," including children who obtained "parental consent," to possess marijuana for medicinal use...
...It means a majority of the voters in Colorado, Nevada, and South Dakota must have been aware of the evidence showing that marijuana use provides no health benefits, especially for sick people...
...But why would MSNBC be so coy...
...What does this all mean...
...A Nevada measure would have allowed adults 21 years and older to buy, keep, or use up to 1 ounce of cannabis...
...Michael Lewis, in the New Republic, July 8,1996 Ripped from the Headlines And finally, some news from the What-On-God's-Earth-Were-You-Thinking Department: A 22-year-old male was hospitalized last week in northern England after sustaining severe internal injuries from a firework accident...
...But this was no ordinary mishap as the rocket did not go off in the man's hand...
...CCT am met by Frank Whitworth, the head of the local gay activist organization Ground Zero and this year's parade marshal...
...The measure failed, 56 percent to 44 percent...
...These exercises are more parlor game than poll, of course...
...And that the people most likely to go vote for legalizing pot must have stayed at home on Election Day, watching Cheech and Chong movies and dealing with a serious case of the munchies...
...What Did He Know & When Did He Know It...
...For the record, we still agree with Webb's piece, which highlighted the problems posed by the "assimilation of females into the military," even though he seems to have backed away from such ideas during the campaign...
...Apparently, this man decided to provide his own form of entertainment by playing what he thought was a harmless prank on himself...
...By winning, Webb, a former Republican who (briefly) served as secretary of the Navy for Ronald Reagan, becomes the first-ever Weekly Standard contributor to leave private life for national political office...
...It was Wolf who perfected the "Romeo method" of dispatching agents to romance lonely clerks and secretaries in West German government ministries...
...As the man who ran East Germany's espionage rings, Wolf was not head of the dreaded Stasi, but he certainly personified the moral ambiguity, and Stalinist character, of the German Communist state...
...The question was, straightforwardly enough, "Do you believe President Bush's actions justify impeachment...
...The one garnering the most support read, "Yes, between the secret spying, the deceptions leading to war and more, there is plenty to justify putting him on trial...
...But the verdict was overturned on appeal because Wolf, as the Stasi intelligence chief, had been employed by a "sovereign state," and he was ultimately convicted of ordering kidnappings...
...The other half of the money would go to the "state general fund...
...Indeed, as the Daily Mail pointed out, "Safety experts today warned that misusing the explosives in such a senseless way can have serious consequences...
...1923-2006 It is fitting that the death of Markus Wolf should have passed nearly unnoticed last week...
...Voters rejected the measure 60 percent to 40 percent...
...What is worth noting, however, is MSNBC's wording of the possible responses...
...He is nearly twenty years older than Pastor Ted [Haggard] and about twenty degrees rounder...
...He spent a half-century successfully oppressing his fellow (East) Germans, subverting the democracy of his (West German) neighbors, in the service of a foreign tyranny (the Soviet Union...
...A two-year prison sentence was suspended...
...According to CNN.com, "fifty percent of tax revenue from the sale of marijuana would be used to fund voluntary programs for the prevention and treatment of the abuse of alcohol, tobacco, or controlled substances...
...A few days before German reunification, Wolf fled to Moscow, where he lived for a year before returning to Germany to face prosecution...
...In Colorado, a ballot referendum would have eliminated all criminal and civil penalties for marijuana possession...
...Markus Wolf...
...Contributing Senator We didn't vote for him, but The Scrapbook would still like to congratulate James Webb on his victory in the Virginia Senate election...
...But the fact that the Germans never quite concluded what to do about his case, and that he died unrepentant in bed, suggests that Germany still has some reckoning to do with history...
...Where would we be without safety experts...
...He was sorely mistaken—scorching one's colon is no laughing matter...
...Looks like the state will have to find other sources of "revenue," however...
...Nor was it fired at him...
...According to the Guardian, "The man is reported to have got down on all fours, lowered his trousers and fixed a Black Cat Thunderbolt rocket to himself in front of a group of friends at the end of a firework display in the Monkwearmouth area of Sunderland on Sunday...
Vol. 12 • November 2006 • No. 10
