Breaking: As a teen, Obama REALLY smoked pot.

[No Elephants]

We all knew Obama smoked pot because he was smart enough to put it in his 1995 book, before he ran for the Illinois Senate.

However, a new book is coming out that explains that high schooler Obama was REALLY a pot smoker. And ABC news chose to do a story on that part of the book--and only that part.

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/05/obama-and-his-pot-smoking-choom-gang/

Guess it's swiftboating season.

Here's the thing, though. Been there, done that, won the election.

We've heard it all before (thanks largely to his 2008 primary opponents) And, hello, he is running for his SECOND term. What might have been concerning, even damning, the first time around is not a problem this time: We no longer have to wonder if pot will affect his Presidency. At this point, we've seen his Presidency for almost four years. Pot is not an issue. Neither is Wright.

I think trying to dredge up stuff that did not keep him from winning in 2008 is going to backfire.

[KoKo]

1. Agree...it's dredging up stuff that's "so old news" that it's not important.

It's ridiculous...but, then that's what the RW does. It's amazing how they manage to be successful with it that they keep pulling out that old dead horse! (apologies to my animal friends for trashing them)...but..."Beating a Dead Horse" is a meme that's gone into our lexicon.

:-(

The Repugs have nothing but TIRED ...but we Dems seem to focus on THEM...and NOT on Our OWN HOUSE.

That's the pity of it all...not the tired dead horse argument. sigh....

[No Elephants]

2. Obama can no longer run on hope and change--though he has been

trying to (which I find gobsmacking) and the Republicans can no longer attack him with things that were vetted in the primaries. He has to run on his first term and Republicans have to attack him on his first term.

Per your Stoller thread, I think both mmajor Parties do little but focus on reelection and on defeating the other major Party.

What is best for Americans has been out the window for a long time. Maybe it was never really in. After all, even the Constitutional Convention protected a lot of "special interests," like private shippers (man of whom, perhaps not so coincidentally, were engaged in the slave trade).

Hence, for example, dealing with piracy on the high seas was mentioned in the Constitution, while not mentioned were things like providing for soldiers who had become disabled while winning this the country's ability to adopt a Constitution in the first place.

[sabrina 1]

3. What's wrong with smoking pot? If they think this will

destroy him, they are really, really living in the past. Polls show a majority of Americans think pot should be legal.

How childish to do this when what people really care about are serious issues, and Democrats should handle it that way. They should point out that Republicans do not want to talk about issues, and are up to their old tricks of trying to make something out of nothing, since the president already revealed this himself.

So sick of the games when people are starving, and I would feel the same way if it was Democrats stooping to these kinds of worthless, meaningless tactics when real problems are ignored.

[No Elephants]

6. Apparently, the thrust of this "news" story is that,

while Obama's high school friends smoked pot, Obama REALLY smoked pot--carried it to a degree the others did not.

Even still, yawn.

And, if I wanted to get all speculative, I might say that the behavior described could possibly be attributed to someone who may have felt all his life that he did not quite belong anywhere or with anyone, trying to make the most of something he had in common for the moment with everyone around him.

[sabrina 1]

7. Could be. But why does anyone smoke pot? I wonder how

many Americans at this point time, DIDN'T smoke pot? Lol, I think this will backfire on them spectacularly. It's more likely to bring up fond memories of the average American's own teenage years.

“When they were chooming in a car all the windows had to be rolled up so no smoke blew out and went to waste; when the pot was gone, they tilted their heads back and sucked in the last bit of smoke from the ceiling.”

Lol, if they think this is likely to evoke outrage, I think the exact opposite is going to happen. Millions of Americans wistfully recollecting those fun days, even Republicans if they are to be honest. A big 'yawn', imo as far as a 'swift-boating' tactic.

I have criticized Obama on policies many times, but if this what the Repubs are going to use against him, he has nothing to worry about.

[No Elephants]

8. I was not speculating about why Obama and his classmates smoked pot.

I am guessing they smoked pot in high school because it was there and they were teenagers, just like everyone else.

It's the "REALLY" part of the thread headline that I was speculating about, not the "smoked pot" part. I am speculating only about why the high school Obama was {allegedly} so much more obsessive about it than his companions.

Supposedly, his taking it to a whole different level than his classmates is the new wrinkle to the story, the only gloss on his pot smoking revelation that justifies publishing a news story in 2012 about pot smoking that Obama had disclosed in 1995 and that was beyond thoroughly ventilated in 2008.

I agree that even this new factoid (if it is factual) is not enough to render Obama's high school pot smoking newsworthy again in 2012, simply because he is running for re-election now.

The Republicans and AP, one of their propaganda arms, are clutching at straws, probably more in an attempt to energize Romney's religious right base than anything else. And hence my facetious thread headline. And I doubt it will work with even very many of them.

I have thought, though, about going from infant to college without being around many who look much like you, including your own mother and your father and sister.

Hard to imagine how that would feel, what that would do.

He wrote of hanging out at a military base so that he could be around African Americans, but I don't know if he felt that he totally belonged with them, either.

He was brought up by mid-Western whites among whites and islanders or among Indonesians in Indonesia. How much does that mirror the experience of the typical African American troop member or military brat?

[MADem]

9. I thought his grampa enjoyed a bit of herb, himself. Who cares?

Anyone who says they didn't smoke weed is as likely as not to be lying. And anyone who gets all excited about someone else's herbal enjoyments needs to get a frigging life.

[No Elephants]

10. No one cares, which is the point of the OP.

Whether Tutu Kane smoked weed or not, however, is not relevant, unless someone claims pot smoking is hereditary.

[ellisonz]

4. Breaking: Barack Obama Stole Don Ho's Pakalolo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IS1vBb4AAZQ

[No Elephants]

5. LOL! (Are you saying Obama is loco?)

How about surfjim1's comment on a thread about a cute, totally harmless little video.

Maybe jim should switch to decaf!

[dtexdem]

11. Owmygod! Did he inhale?

;-)