Marijuana Policy Project slams ‘booze fortune heir’ P. Kennedy
January 8th, 2013 at 2:31 pm by Ted Nesi under Nesi's Notes, On the Main Site
Patrick Kennedy made news this week by announcing he’s forming a group to lobby against the legalization of marijuana, a stance that’s gotten him in the cross-hairs of the nation’s largest pro-pot group.
“Former Congressman Kennedy’s proposal is the definition of hypocrisy,” Mason Tvert, the Marijuana Policy Project’s communications director, said in a statement issued Tuesday afternoon. “He is living in part off of the fortune his family made by selling alcohol while leading a campaign that makes it seem like marijuana – an objectively less harmful product – is the greatest threat to public health.”
The group’s Twitter feed was more acerbic, describing Kennedy as a “booze fortune heir.” His grandfather, family patriarch Joseph P. Kennedy, made a fortune in part by thanks to alcohol distribution rights (though apparently he wasn’t a bootlegger).
The new national organization Kennedy is chairing, Smart Approaches to Marijuana, is scheduled to release its proposals on Wednesday in Denver. “Let’s not just throw out the baby with the bathwater,” he told Reuters last weekend. Kennedy has been making a number of media appearances promoting the group, which also counts former Bush speechwriter and Republican apostate David Frum among its board members.
The Marijuana Policy Project has also created a Change.org petition calling on Kennedy to “to drop out of SAM or explain why he is working to keep a less harmful alternative to alcohol illegal.”
• Related: Study: More got high in RI after medical marijuana legalization (March 28)
Nesi's Notes covers politics and the economy in and around Rhode Island for WPRI.com. (Twitter: 
Just because Kennedy has made money from alcohol, does that mean he’s supposed to support weed, coke, meth, etc. I think the medical purpose for pot is justified under certain conditions. The terminally ill may benifit from it. These folks who use it for depression and a sore knee are a joke. According to the statistics, pot will keep you high for a couple of hours. People that are depressed should and deserve better treatment than a joint. If your knee is sore, that pain is coming back after a couple of hours.
Uh,Jeff, who said anything about expecting him to “support” “coke meth etc.”?? The discussion is about marijuana, and in this case alcohol. And who is suggesting he is “supposed to support” weed? No one cares whether he “supports” it or not. The issue is he is actively lobbying to maintain legal ramifications for everybody else, for a substance that is, by all accounts, far less harmful than a substance that is legal, and the sale of which has made him wealthy.If he thinks weed should be illegal, then he should be lobbying to outlaw alcohol too. He can also give all that alcohol money to charity and get a job, unless he’s a world class hypocrite. Add to the fact that he admits to using weed himself in the past, along with a quite a few other substances, both legal and illegal, and that hypocrite label starts to fit like a glove. Funny he needed rehab for the legal substances, but not for the weed, huh? And yeah, we know that knee pain will come back in a few hours. Just like it does when you take oxycontin…
the dealers are making a lot of money that cities need
I for once find myself in agreement with Patches. The last thing we need in is more high people in RI. Also the last thing we need is our young people seeing that pot is legal and moving up to other drugs.
Ok Patches goes to NJ to a prearrainged award ceremony gets off his meds gets drunk and gets a typical “Jersey girl ” Preggers has to do the right thing now; he walked away from RI politics, he has had a substance abuse problem for decades and in order to get out of the house since he “has” to travel and get away from the ball and chain as much as possible he has first wanted to start a non-profit to help with brain disorders, then it was to support mental health , then it was to help his friend get elected to the congresstional seat he walked away from now that he is in NJ and powerless[ except that his NJ political buddies can use his name and what little influence left to advance their careers] it is now that he decides to make a stand against the legalization of a harmless medicinal plant used by numerous cancer patients and those with other medical ailments, I suppose he wants China to own America everything but the Kennedy name oh then there is his former staff Kathy Hinckley who can take a JFK qoute and try to make it her own,[not very original]. So what will be the outcome of all of this will Mr. Kennedy huff and puff and bloooowwww his opponents house down, will his friends in New Hampshire put their information all over the internet? or like some will the bodies be found at the bottom of the sound? Mr. Kennedy a word of advice develop a backbone stop being led by others . I am assuming that there is a wonderful pharmacutical company contributing to your “non-profit” which is encouraging the anti-marijauna comments also there is the alcohol lobby. Lastly, it may be better if the “jersey girl” reads a book on class due to the fact that sleeping with a has been former politician does not give one class the stunt at the Democratic convention tasteless then again that was the choice made for you[ and she was quick to spread her legs and seal the deal], when you developed a back bone and learn to make your own decisions you learn the difference between tasteful and tasteless, good luck with that.
Lovey