Is marijuana the next DADT?\u00a0 The increasing (state) legality of the otherwise (federally) illegal drug indicates a growing trend of “normalizing” marijuana usage, and it is not going unnoticed by the military.<\/p>\n
An official Air Force news release<\/a> at Schriever Air Force Base, Colorado, notes marijuana is “not welcome here,” despite its sometimes legality in the surrounding state.<\/p>\n Schriever commander Colonel Wayne Montheith wrote a memo noting, among other points,<\/p>\n Marijuana, prescribed or otherwise obtained, may not be used, possessed, distributed, nor introduced on Schriever AFB, a Federal military [installation].<\/p><\/blockquote>\n The presence of marijuana on Schriever AFB [is] a risk to good order and discipline and to the Air Force mission.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n The policy applies to any<\/em> person on Schriever, including civilians — who could be banned from the base for bringing even state-approved marijuana with them.<\/p>\n In a similar vein to the federalist treatment of homosexual marriage, several states have legalized “medicinal” marijuana<\/a>, even while federal law prohibits it.\u00a0 (California recently rejected — by a small margin — a law to\u00a0legalize marijuana outright.)\u00a0 Like the claim homosexuality is a “private” matter, some claim marijuana use is no worse than alcohol, and thus\u00a0irrelevant to the military mission.<\/p>\n So long as a troop isn’t\u00a0high or drunk on duty, is what they do at home “nobody’s business?”\u00a0 Surveys indicate<\/a> in\u00a0the last 15 years the percentage of Americans supporting legalization has nearly doubled to an almost even split with the opposition.\u00a0 The current Administration (while opposing California’s legalization<\/a> measure) has declined to enforce federal law against state-authorized<\/a> “medicinal” marijuana use.\u00a0 With growing acceptance and “evidence” of the benign nature of marijuana, why should the military continue to enforce an antiquated policy based only on moral\/religious underpinnings?<\/p>\n For now, military members are still prohibited by the UCMJ from using marijuana as a controlled substance, and civilians cannot bring it onto military installations.\u00a0 That may yet change.<\/p>\n After all, it will likely only be a matter of time before organizations begin advocating for the rights of marijuana users who want to serve their country openly, rather than hide their (legal) drug use.\u00a0 They will passionately plea\u00a0that for the “integrity” of the troops, marijuana use must be permitted in the military, so American military servicemembers are not forced to “live a lie.”\u00a0 Reports will be “leaked” saying there is little risk to the military’s mission effectiveness from marijuana use.\u00a0 Some may demand the military institute “Don’t Ask, Don’t Pee,” to prevent “legal” users of marijuana from being caught in urinalysis and discharged.<\/p>\n They will note American troops have been working, fighting, and dying alongside marijuana users all along.\u00a0 Marijuana users will have served nobly, even winning accolades.\u00a0 Lists will show the vital skills lost to the ongoing wars — linguists, intel analysts, and more — which impact “national security” because of the otherwise legal use of marijuana.\u00a0 (Currently, drug offenses of all kinds account for more than 6 times as many discharges as homosexuality.)<\/p>\n They’ll note that when the bullets start flying, troops don’t care\u00a0that their wingman smoked marijuana —\u00a0“so long as he doesn’t fly high, he should be able to Aim High.”\u00a0 Anonymous users will note their lifelong desire to serve their country, and how they now “proudly serve a nation that isn’t proud of them.”\u00a0 Critics may even claim America is denying its self-sacrificing combat veterans a key aid<\/a> in the fight against PTSD and suicide.<\/p>\n With all that “evidence,” what sustainable argument\u00a0— what moral<\/em> argument — is there against<\/em> legalizing marijuana?<\/p>\n At best, those who oppose legalizing the drug will be greeted with a collective clucking and a condescending view of their “old fashioned” values.\u00a0 More likely, they will be called “bigots” for their “intolerance” of those who just want to serve their country and occasionally smoke a joint.<\/p>\n Again, what is the moral basis<\/em> for the law on marijuana?\u00a0\u00a0Well, in just a few years, people will<\/p>\n look back on this debate with the same sentiment as any other civil rights debate in history; with awe. How did we deny marijuana-using Americans so many fundamental rights in the year 2010? Relax right wing America…the demographics of this nation will soon change so dramatically that you will have no choice but to tolerate rather than hate.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n The increasingly popular answer to the moral basis<\/em> for laws and military policies?<\/strong><\/p>\n Demographics<\/strong>.\u00a0\u00a0Ever-changing surveys and sentiment dictate\u00a0“right” and “wrong.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Is marijuana the next DADT?\u00a0 The increasing (state) legality of the otherwise (federally) illegal drug indicates a growing trend of “normalizing” marijuana usage, and it is not going unnoticed by the military. An official Air Force news release at Schriever Air Force Base, Colorado, notes marijuana is “not welcome here,” despite its sometimes legality in the surrounding state. Schriever commander […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[219,442,1150,1151,1152],"class_list":["post-8083","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-government-and-religion","tag-dadt","tag-homosexual","tag-marijuana","tag-schriever","tag-wayne-montheith"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8083","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8083"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8083\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8083"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8083"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8083"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}