Now That We've Forgiven Barack Obama's Drug Use, Can We Forgive Everyone Else Too?

Note: I posted this a few weeks ago, but withdrew it so I could use some of the language in a Op-ed which was rejected by The Washington Post (probably for being too awesome). I repost it today in response to Obama's recent rejection of marijuana decriminalization.

One of the most fascinating developments of the '08 presidential primaries has been the rising taboo against criticizing the candidates for their youthful experimentation with drugs. We've come a long way since "I didn't inhale," but is this really an evolving discourse surrounding drug use in American life or merely a truce between the privileged press and political classes?

It began with the resignation of Hillary Clinton's New Hampshire campaign co-chair following barbed remarks about Barack Obama's past drug use. Now, a comment by BET founder and Clinton supporter Robert L. Johnson is drawing similar condemnations:

Johnson said the Clintons have been "deeply and emotionally involved in black issues — when Barack Obama was doin' something in the neighborhood that I won't say what he was doin,' but he said it in his book."

The Clinton campaign later put out statement in which Johnson claimed he was referring not to drug use but to community organizing.

The Obama campaign Monday said that story does not wash. "His tortured explanation doesn’t hold up against his original statement," campaign press secretary Bill Burton said in a statement. [Politico]

Clearly, conventional wisdom now holds that voters don't think past drug use rises to the level of relevance in a presidential campaign. To even mention such a thing is considered so rude and toxic that doing so reflects more poorly on the messenger than the target. And this is the Most Important Job in the World we're interviewing for.

What we're witnessing here is notable to be sure. But is this really a signal that our society is maturing in its attitude about drug use, or just another example of the class-based prejudice that ignores drug experimentation among the educated and upwardly-mobile, while police continue to flatten poor communities with their massive drug war hammers?

As rare and encouraging as it is find the media directing its guile towards the accuser and not the user, we still live in a society that collects urine from millions of blue-collar Americans as a method of assessing their job qualifications. We still live in a society that revokes aid for higher education from students with drug convictions, a society that revokes low-income housing and food stamps from poor people for engaging in the exact same behavior whose mere mention is now off-limits even in the no-holds-barred realm of presidential politics. And, unbelievably, we live in society where felony disenfranchisement is so widespread it can change the outcome of these same elections in which the criminal histories of the candidates are never to be discussed.

Now that our pundits and politicians have elected to shield one another from the consequences of their own indulgence, will they bestow the blessings of this grand enlightenment on the rest of us? Perhaps, but not until the people hold these high offices hostage and demand equal justice from the hypocrites who quibble over the contents of their autobiographies while fathers of four wait for their records to be expunged so they can apply at Home Depot.