It's hard to know how serious Cory Booker is when he says that the war on drugs has reached a level of absurdity so great that "I'm going to battle on [it]. We're going to start doing it the gentlemanly way. And then we're going to do the civil disobedience way. Because this is absurd ... I'm talking about marches. I'm talking about sit-ins at the state capital. I'm talking about whatever it takes." Booker's a helluva rising star, and it's hard to imagine any rising star actually ratcheting down the war on drugs, but if his experience watching Newark continue to disintegrate has sufficiently radicalized him for the task, then godspeed. The war on drugs is one of those policy areas where every sentient creature who's ever been briefed on the policy's outcomes knows we have to end it yesterday, but every sentient politician who's even been briefed on the voter's preferences knows we need to make it more punitive by tomorrow. It's not exactly a recipe for enlightened governance.
