Last week, Giants’ ace Tim Lincecum, a kid with one Cy Young Award already and likely to grab a few more, got popped for speeding in Washington State, before seven in the morning and with the distinct aroma of marijuana in his vehicle. Several grams and a pipe.
Timmy, known as “The Freak” in Sports Illustrated, has invited comment by his long hair and his perpetually-relaxed countenance. Other pitchers look grim. They wear a “game face”, a hard stare that does not waver from first pitch to last. Not Lincecum, who can be seen grinning and even laughing between innings. Now we know why.
They’re gonna legalize it pretty soon. Yeah, I know, the Sarah Palins of America will be aflame with indignation and jealousy but they won’t stop it. It’s finally a settled matter that lots and lots of folks, ordinary folks, celebrities, pols, judges, punks, astronauts, Olympic swimmers, and so forth, lots know how much a few grams is, what it looks like, and what happens when you put a pinch in the bowl of Tim Lincecum’s pipe and take a puff.
In the same newspaper which trumpeted Tim’s arrest, a news column on page C4, the juxtaposition of the surge in pot arrests nationwide since Bill Clinton began the crackdown in ‘92, and the increase in the number of those who partake of it. In other words, criminalization is not exactly working.
And nobody much cares. That’s the thing. And there’s the money. Lord, the money! In taxes it would collect from Mendocino and Humboldt Counties alone, California could wipe out the deficit. Legislators could start buying stuff for their districts again. Pressure’s off. Pass that joint, will ya?
