Marijuana and assault weapons: Obama giveth and taketh away

Attorney General Eric Holder weighed in on two
contentious issues: liberalizing marijuana policy while
making gun laws more intrusive.
(AP Photo/Lawrence Jackson)

Perhaps there's some unholy law of the conservation of government intrusiveness. This week, in the same press conference in which Attorney General Eric Holder assured the public that the administration of President Barack Obama will keep its promise to rein-in DEA raids on medical marijuana growers and distributors in states where voters have legalized marijuana as medicine, he also threatened to impose new restrictions on the private ownership of those scary-looking semi-automatic rifles known as "assault weapons."

Holder's comments about gun control came during a February 25 press conference in response to a reporter's question about violence in Mexico and the supposed flow of arms from the United States to drug producers in that country. Holder was specifically asked about regulation of so-called "assault weapons."

Mexico does, in fact, have a problem with violence fueled by conflict over the drug trade between illegal producers and government forces. A February travel alert from the State Department cautioned that "Some recent Mexican army and police confrontations with drug cartels have resembled small-unit combat, with cartels employing automatic weapons and grenades." Former Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo recently joined with former presidents of Colombia and Brazil to blame that violence on U.S.-style prohibition, which they called a failure.

Specifically, Eric Holder said:

As President Obama indicated during the campaign, there are just a few gun-related changes that we would like to make, and among them would be to reinstitute the ban on the sale of assault weapons."

It's important to note that the "automatic weapons and grenades" referred to by the State Department are not available on the open market in the United States, but must be purchased on the international black market -- with which the drug cartels already have ample contact because of their own illicit business. The "assault weapons" targeted by Holder are just regular semi-automatic rifles that fire one cartridge with each squeeze of the trigger, but are often based on and physically resemble military weapons.

On the positive side, when asked about recent DEA raids on California medical marijuana dispensaries that were at odds with President Obama's promises about reform of some elements of drug policy, Attorney General Holder replied:

What the president said during the campaign, you will be surprised to know, will be consistent with what we'll be doing here in law enforcement. He was my boss during the campaign, he is formally and technically and by law my boss now, and so what he said during campaign is now American policy."

The raids in question came in the days immediately after Obama's inauguration and there's been speculation that they were staged by DEA administrators as a last hurrah of the old regime.

Policy hasn't actually changed yet with regards to either marijuana or firearms. Perhaps remembering her party's past difficulties with voters angered over intrusive gun laws, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has already voiced doubt about such a move. “On that score, I think we need to enforce the laws we have right now,” she said.

Similar sentiments prevail in the Senate.

"Sen. Reid would oppose an effort [to] reinstate the ban if the Senate were to vote on it in the future," Jim Manley, spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, told The Hill in an email.

Fortunately for the Obama administration, federal drug agents can be reined-in by the executive branch on its own, so Holder has nobody but himself and his boss to blame if the marijuana raids continue.

email J.D.: civilliberties (at) tuccille.com