LEAP on the Hill: Stories from Week of August 8, 2008

How do we get out of here?: Ending my Thursday in the Rayburn House Office Building, I saw a family of four obviously lost. “Where would you like to go?” I asked. “We want to go to the Capitol South Metro station” the wife responded. “You are in luck. I am going that way. Follow me.” I offered. The woman & I had a running conversation, as we went thru the basement passageways of the three buildings (Note: these corridors, elevators and escalators are confusing). A minute or so later she asked what I did. I responded, “You might believe that because I wear the Gucci cowboy hat, Gucci cowboy boots and the Gucci belt buckle that I am that four letter word -- lobbyist. However, I am not - rather I advocate an end to the War on Drugs/Modern Prohibition. “You mean legalize just marijuana, right?” she asked. “No, all of them.” The next five minutes we = the couple and I (their 15 year old son and 10 year old daughter were listening) had a robust discussion. The first two minutes were tough with the usual resistance to hard drugs being regulated by the government. Then the dad asked, “Would legalizing them take away some of the glamour of being illegal, so use would not necessarily go up?” From that moment until I gave them my card and we separated at the Metro, the product nearly sold itself. Having sold several quarts of snake oil that day and many this week, it was a satisfying end to a good week. I will talk to the Congressman about your ideas: Meeting with the aide from a very conservative, Republican, Southern state, he started out with a serious poker face. He broke a small grin, when I asked him to stop giving the police money to wage the drug war. 25 minutes later, we were having a lively chat. Upon leaving, he thanked me for the new concept, new perspective on this issue and promised to brief the Congressman. Note: These conversations which I have all the time with both tourists and staffers reconfirm my experience that support for prohibition is a mile wide and an inch deep, no matter what one’s world view is on other issues.