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“You want to know what this was really all about?” he asked with the bluntness of a man who, after public disgrace and a stretch in federal prison, had little l

“You want to know what this was really all about?” he asked with the bluntness of a man who, after public disgrace and a stretch in federal prison, had little left to protect. “The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.” John Erlichman, via Dam Baum

cmurf 9y ago
This was a part of the Nixon southern strategy, Lee Atwater discussed it with some detail. https://www.thenation.com/article/exclusive-lee-atwaters-infamous-1981-interview-southern-strategy/ https://www.thenation.com/article/exclusive-lee-atwaters-inf... And in my view the current Attorney General is carrying out the same old ideas and policy effects, which is why he's so neurotically anti-weed, conflating it at every turn with opioid addiction.
- knieveltech 9y ago
  Seems obvious on all points, not sure why this is getting downvoted.
  - adventured 9y ago
    I agree, not sure why the downvotes. The only thing that I see, is that the current AG is not in fact following a Nixonian anti-weed script at all. Which is why the present administration is not going militaristically crazy trying to politically attack states that are legalizing / have legalized. Trump is crazy right? Sessions is a fascist right? Why haven't they unleashed the US Government very aggressively to raid and abuse the states? Who can stop them from doing that? Nobody. They aren't doing it. As far as comparing versus past AG behavior, Sessions is acting like a libertarian (again, by contrast to how things used to be during peak drug war). When California legalized pot for medicinal use, people all up and down the liberal Clinton Administration tried to argue / fight against it. I don't see the Trump Admin doing much of anything toward California (and the rest, DC, Washington, Colorado, et al) on this legalization front.
    - SapphireSun 9y ago
      Yea, Jeff Sessions is a libertarian. /s https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/07/20/jeff-sessions-just-revived-a-policy-nobody-supports-215395 https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/07/20/jeff-sess...
    - cmurf 9y ago
      This is a deeply ignorant comment, not least of which is the idea Sessions is a libertarian. That's ridiculous, as in worthy of ridicule. Sessions once said that he considered the Klan to be OK guys until he found out they smoked weed. He can't go fully anti-weed until Rohrabacher-Farr is undone by Congress, and he has been vigorously asking Congress to do so. Why would he campaign against it, unless he intended to immediately instruct DoJ and DEA to act against states who have made it legal? He has made it absolutely clear that he doesn't just intend to go after recreational weed, but medical as well. Libertarian? I do not want whatever you're smoking.
- gozur88 9y ago
  What is Sessions doing that Lynch didn't?
  - dragonwriter 9y ago
    Well, even in the absence of more substantive action, browbeating Congress to lift the prohibition on federal enforcement that (on its face, though the Administration has implied that it views it as unconstitutional) interferes medical cannabis laws.
    - gozur88 9y ago
      Sessions is, after a year in office, looking "very hard right now" at marijuana enforcement policy, which is bureaucratese for "don't hold your breath". He also said he thought the idea some people have put forward suggesting legal pot would solve the heroin problem is stupid. And... he's right. That is stupid. He hasn't done anything, even things that were in his power to do.
- dragonwriter 9y ago
  > And in my view the current Attorney General is carrying out the same old ideas and policy effects, which is why he's so neurotically anti-weed, conflating it at every turn with opioid addiction Sessions has made statements in line with that description, but as yet they don't seem to have manifested in substantive DoJ action. Of course, part of it may be that while posturing is supported by the administration, a major new FBI law enforcement initiative would be incompatible with the Administration’s propaganda war on the FBI, making it hard for it to get the green light.
  - cmurf 9y ago
    They can't manifest into substantive action, Rohrabacher-Farr prohibits it. That's why Sessions keeps harassing Congress to withdraw the prohibition, so he can use DoJ funds to prosecute both recreational and medical marijuana possession, distribution, production.
    - dragonwriter 9y ago
      > They can't manifest into substantive action, Rohrabacher-Farr prohibits it. Rohrabacher-Farr only applies on its face to state medical cannabis laws, and in any case Trump's signing statement on the spending bill containing the first renewal during his administration implied that the administration views the provision as unconstitutional. So, there's certainly action that the DoJ could take consistent with the administration rhetoric, from a couple different angles. It would hardly be the only example of this administration aggressively probing the limits of its power until and unless explicitly constrained by the courts.
njarboe 9y ago
I have seen this quote come up a few times here and in other places. It is a very powerful quote. It is too bad that it was first published[1] 12 years after Erlichman told it to Baum and after Erlichman died. Is there an earlier publication of this quote? It would have been great for us, here in the present, and for future generations for Erlichman to have confirmed he said this. [1]https://harpers.org/archive/2016/04/legalize-it-all/ https://harpers.org/archive/2016/04/legalize-it-all/
- QAPereo 9y ago
  As far as I know you either believe Baum, or believe that he fabricated the quote. While that’s possible, given his standing as a journalist and the fact that he hardly needed such a quote to make a career, you can draw your own conclusions. I would add that the quote is certainly consistent with what’s known about Nixon’s racism, caught on tape, and that his administration would share that view is hardly surprising.

cmurf 9y ago

This was a part of the Nixon southern strategy, Lee Atwater discussed it with some detail. https://www.thenation.com/article/exclusive-lee-atwaters-infamous-1981-interview-southern-strategy/ https://www.thenation.com/article/exclusive-lee-atwaters-inf... And in my view the current Attorney General is carrying out the same old ideas and policy effects, which is why he's so neurotically anti-weed, conflating it at every turn with opioid addiction.

knieveltech 9y ago
Seems obvious on all points, not sure why this is getting downvoted.
- adventured 9y ago
  I agree, not sure why the downvotes. The only thing that I see, is that the current AG is not in fact following a Nixonian anti-weed script at all. Which is why the present administration is not going militaristically crazy trying to politically attack states that are legalizing / have legalized. Trump is crazy right? Sessions is a fascist right? Why haven't they unleashed the US Government very aggressively to raid and abuse the states? Who can stop them from doing that? Nobody. They aren't doing it. As far as comparing versus past AG behavior, Sessions is acting like a libertarian (again, by contrast to how things used to be during peak drug war). When California legalized pot for medicinal use, people all up and down the liberal Clinton Administration tried to argue / fight against it. I don't see the Trump Admin doing much of anything toward California (and the rest, DC, Washington, Colorado, et al) on this legalization front.
  - SapphireSun 9y ago
    Yea, Jeff Sessions is a libertarian. /s https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/07/20/jeff-sessions-just-revived-a-policy-nobody-supports-215395 https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/07/20/jeff-sess...
  - cmurf 9y ago
    This is a deeply ignorant comment, not least of which is the idea Sessions is a libertarian. That's ridiculous, as in worthy of ridicule. Sessions once said that he considered the Klan to be OK guys until he found out they smoked weed. He can't go fully anti-weed until Rohrabacher-Farr is undone by Congress, and he has been vigorously asking Congress to do so. Why would he campaign against it, unless he intended to immediately instruct DoJ and DEA to act against states who have made it legal? He has made it absolutely clear that he doesn't just intend to go after recreational weed, but medical as well. Libertarian? I do not want whatever you're smoking.
gozur88 9y ago
What is Sessions doing that Lynch didn't?
- dragonwriter 9y ago
  Well, even in the absence of more substantive action, browbeating Congress to lift the prohibition on federal enforcement that (on its face, though the Administration has implied that it views it as unconstitutional) interferes medical cannabis laws.
  - gozur88 9y ago
    Sessions is, after a year in office, looking "very hard right now" at marijuana enforcement policy, which is bureaucratese for "don't hold your breath". He also said he thought the idea some people have put forward suggesting legal pot would solve the heroin problem is stupid. And... he's right. That is stupid. He hasn't done anything, even things that were in his power to do.
dragonwriter 9y ago
> And in my view the current Attorney General is carrying out the same old ideas and policy effects, which is why he's so neurotically anti-weed, conflating it at every turn with opioid addiction Sessions has made statements in line with that description, but as yet they don't seem to have manifested in substantive DoJ action. Of course, part of it may be that while posturing is supported by the administration, a major new FBI law enforcement initiative would be incompatible with the Administration’s propaganda war on the FBI, making it hard for it to get the green light.
- cmurf 9y ago
  They can't manifest into substantive action, Rohrabacher-Farr prohibits it. That's why Sessions keeps harassing Congress to withdraw the prohibition, so he can use DoJ funds to prosecute both recreational and medical marijuana possession, distribution, production.
  - dragonwriter 9y ago
    > They can't manifest into substantive action, Rohrabacher-Farr prohibits it. Rohrabacher-Farr only applies on its face to state medical cannabis laws, and in any case Trump's signing statement on the spending bill containing the first renewal during his administration implied that the administration views the provision as unconstitutional. So, there's certainly action that the DoJ could take consistent with the administration rhetoric, from a couple different angles. It would hardly be the only example of this administration aggressively probing the limits of its power until and unless explicitly constrained by the courts.

njarboe 9y ago

I have seen this quote come up a few times here and in other places. It is a very powerful quote. It is too bad that it was first published[1] 12 years after Erlichman told it to Baum and after Erlichman died. Is there an earlier publication of this quote? It would have been great for us, here in the present, and for future generations for Erlichman to have confirmed he said this. [1]https://harpers.org/archive/2016/04/legalize-it-all/ https://harpers.org/archive/2016/04/legalize-it-all/

QAPereo 9y ago
As far as I know you either believe Baum, or believe that he fabricated the quote. While that’s possible, given his standing as a journalist and the fact that he hardly needed such a quote to make a career, you can draw your own conclusions. I would add that the quote is certainly consistent with what’s known about Nixon’s racism, caught on tape, and that his administration would share that view is hardly surprising.