CBS Polls Finds Majority Of Western Voters, Californians, Back Legalization

[Update: A version of this post is now live online at The Hill.com's Congress blog. Please take a moment to leave some feedback for your members of Congress about the rising popularity of marijuana legalization by going here. PS: And thanks to all of you who helped make my 4/20 Hill.com post the most read, most e-mailed, and most discussed story on The Hill's Congress blog!]

A majority of west coast voters, and Californians specifically, believe that the adult use of marijuana should be legal, according to the results of a pair of polls conducted on behalf of CBS News.

Fifty-six percent of Californians believe that “the state of California (should) legalize the use of marijuana,” according to a SurveyUSA poll of 500 adults conducted for CBS. The survey results come less than a month after state election officials certified the Regulate, Control, and Tax Cannabis Act of 2010 for the November ballot.

The measure would allow adults 21 years or older to possess, share or transport up to one ounce of cannabis for personal consumption, and/or cultivate the plant in an area of not more than twenty-five square feet per private residence. It would also permit local governments the option to authorize the retail sale of marijuana and/or commercial cultivation of cannabis to adults and to impose taxes on such sales. Personal marijuana cultivation or not-for-profit sales of marijuana would not be taxed under the measure, nor would it amend any aspect of the California Health and Safety code pertaining to the use of marijuana for medical purposes.

Among poll respondents, support for the proposal was strongest among males (65 percent), ‘liberals’ (77 percent), and those between the ages of 18 and 34 (74 percent). Support was weakest among self-identified ‘conservatives’ (39 percent) and those 65 years of age or older (39 percent).

In a separate national CBS poll of 858 adults, 55 percent of respondents residing in the west coast said that they back legalization, and only 41 percent oppose the idea.

Nationwide, the poll reported that 44 percent of Americans favor legalizing the use of cannabis, and 51 percent oppose it. Among respondents in the northeast, 44 percent said that they back legalization, versus 40 percent in the south and only 36 percent in the midwest.

A majority of those Americans under age 35 said that they support legalization. Those respondents over age 65 expressed the strongest opposition to legalization (61 percent).

A previous poll by Zogby International reported that 58 percent of west coast voters believe that cannabis should be “taxed and legally regulated like alcohol and cigarettes.”

In December, a national poll of 1,004 likely voters by Angus Reid reported for the first time that just over half of all Americans endorse marijuana legalization.

By contrast, a separate poll published this week by the Associated Press and CNBC reported that 55 percent of Americans opposed the “complete legalization of the use of marijuana for any purpose.” However, 56 percent of respondents also stated that they believed that “the regulations on marijuana (should) be the same … or less strict … (than) those for alcohol.”

NORML’s Chris Goldstein debates medical marijuana on CBS

Watch CBS News Videos Online

As a longtime media observer, I’m beginning to see a shift in the way mainstream media are covering the medical marijuana issue. Back in the day, these sort of talking-head segments used to feature the host in-studio with the official-looking spokesperson for prohibition getting the opening and closing questions and being allowed by the host to dominate the discussion. The guest representing the reform position is then brought in for conflict and balance, but usually in a remote shot. The sober and serious prohib would be given open-ended questions and allowed to speak at length to make the point. The marginalized reformer would be given leading questions on some inane fallacy about “legalization” and then be forced to defend themselves against the implied frivolity of their position.

In this interview, the roles are reversed. Chris Goldstein comes off as the sober and serious one in-studio, with the host hanging on his every word and eager to give him opportunity to advance the agenda. The fellow from Heritage Foundation comes off as the fringe defender of an unwelcome position, with the host’s leading questions that could almost be completed with “tell us why you believe that nonsense?”

It’s getting to the point where mainstream media organizations are having difficulty booking guests to take an anti-medical marijuana position. Even those they find can only bring themselves to criticize the smoking of cannabis and even they are being rebutted by interviewers who are increasingly aware of vaporization, tinctures, and edibles.

This is how NORML is working to end adult marijuana prohibition – by winning the hearts and minds of the American people through honest education about cannabis and through responsible intelligent spokespeople appearing in local and national news media. Chris Goldstein is but one of the hundreds of activists in our nationwide chapter network who are making a difference by stepping up to be the face and voice of the responsible adult cannabis consumer… won’t you join us?

CBS rejects NORML legalization billboard, but accepts “Black Children are an Endangered Species” anti-abortion billboard

This fifteen second Flash animation from NORML touting the economic benefit of marijuana legalization was too objectionable to CBS, who canceled NORML’s contract to place the following on the giant “Super Billboard” in Times Square:

We also noted the hypocrisy of telling us that NORML’s ad was too contentious an issue ad for the billboard while running – on Super Bowl Sunday – the controversial Focus on the Family anti-abortion ad featuring college QB Tim Tebow and his mother:

Now courtesy of Huffington Post we can show you another acceptable advertisement for CBS Billboards in Atlanta:

...but this billboard in Atlanta is perfectly acceptable

It does not matter which side of the abortion debate you lie, you can certainly agree that abortion is one of the most contentious and controversial issues of our times. NORML, Focus on the Family, and the African-American anti-abortion outreach group Life Education and Research Network that funded these latest Atlanta billboards are all non-profit advocacy organizations lobbying for very controversial issues.

However, the anti-abortion groups seem to have no trouble getting their message out on CBS airwaves and billboards, while NORML is denied four times in two years the opportunity to pay to use the same airwaves and billboards.

I also find it interesting that the groups whose messages are accepted by CBS are trying to criminalize a legal activity (abortion), a policy position only supported by 42% of the American people surveyed in the latest Quinnipiac University poll; whereas NORML’s message of legalization rejected by CBS is a policy position supported by 44% to 53% of the American people surveyed lately by Gallup and Angus Reid. Even more interesting when CBS itself polled support for legalization at 41%.

Tell CBS That It’s Time That They “Change Their Morals!”

As NORML has previously reported, representatives from the CBS Corporation and Neutron Media Screen Marketing recently rejected a paid advertisement from the NORML Foundation, the educational arm of the National Organization of Marijuana Laws (NORML), that was intended to appear on the CBS Super Screen billboard in New York City’s Times Square.

The fifteen-second ad (Watch it here.) asserts that taxing and regulating the adult use and sale of marijuana would raise ‘billions of dollars in national revenue. It was scheduled to appear on CBS’s 42nd Street digital billboard beginning on Monday, February 1, 2010, where it would have been viewed by 1.5 million people a day.

Earlier today NORML’s friends at the online advocacy website Change.org established an online petition targeting the CBS Corporation and demanding the network to reverse their decision.

You can sign the petition here.

Change.org intends to present the CBS brass with your petitions next week. It’s up to us to make sure that they get the message. (For those keeping track, this is the second time in six months that NORML has negotiated a paid contract with the network, only to have CBS abruptly and arbitrarily cancel the deal in the final hours.)

Major media corporations like CBS have no problem airing programming that allows them to profit off the public’s interest in marijuana and marijuana law reform, such as Showtime’s hit series Weeds and the CBSnews.com online series ‘Marijuana Nation.’ Yet these same corporate entities balk at airing media that calls on reforming America’s criminal marijuana policies – policies that have led directly to the arrest of over 20 million Americans since 1965.

Tell CBS that it’s time they, and not NORML, “change their morals.”

Times Square Billboard From NORML Denied By CBS

With great regret and chagrin to report, CBS has rejected a contract deal with NORML to place a pro-cannabis law reform advertisement on the biggest electronic billboard in Times Square (The CBS ‘Super Screen’ at 42nd St) claiming that the advertisement is too political. NORML had a contract for the 15 second spot below on the giant billboard (and a second one featuring President Obama and New York City’s high cannabis arrest rate with its shocking racial disparity in enforcement).

High Times breaks the story tonight here.

This of course makes no sense to have CBS reject a non-profit organization like NORML’s pro-cannabis law reform advertisement, when, during the Super Bowl on Sunday–the most watched TV event annually in the United States–CBS is scheduled to air a controversial anti-abortion television advertisement produced by the socially conservative non-profit group Focus on the Family (who, like apparently CBS, is anti-cannabis). Last year, CBS rejected an advertisement from the liberal advocacy group MoveOn.org claiming it was too political as well.

The hypocrisy and double standard here is appalling. NORML and MoveOn.org ads are deemed ‘political’ and can’t be purchased and broadcast by CBS, but Focus on the Family can roll a political hand grenade in the form of an anti-abortion TV ad into American households on no less than Super Bowl Sunday for the full and desired effect of creating public discussion.

Worse, beyond the fact that CBS censors political speech, the company has no apparent problems making money off the general public’s strong interest in ‘marijuana’ as the network has established Marijuana Nation, an eye-ball sucking, archive-rich, comprehensive and well done webpage relating to cannabis found on the Internet (Ironically, CBS’ site competes with NORML and High Times’ general content for readers…).

There are numerous reasons why cannabis prohibition has lasted over 72-years, and when huge, mainstream media outlets (who control bill boards, radio and TV, etc…) pick and choose what organization’s free speech they support and those they don’t–recognizing that absent a vibrant and informed public discussion about needed public policy changes, like ending cannabis prohibition, those needed public policy changes take so much longer than they would organically absent the filter of mainstream, corporate-leaning mega media outlets.

Personally, I can only wonder what public discourse, with now even more corporate influence, is going to look like in America post the SCOTUS decision two weeks ago in Citizens United vs. Federal Election Commission.