While he wasn’t quite pulling an Alex Jones, embattled New Jersey Governor Chris Christie unleashed a tirade against the “crazy liberals” who support marijuana legalization in his state on Monday. The contentious remarks, which the former Republican presidential candidate delivered during an hour-long speech at a conference put on by the New Jersey Hospital Association, echoed similar comments Christie made about legalization back in November.
According to Politico, Christie didn’t hold back while attacking legal pot advocates who want to “poison our kids” for the purpose of attaining additional tax revenue for the state. He was especially concerned with the Democratic candidates for governor, like former United States Ambassador to Germany Phil Murphy, who came out in support of legalization in October:
“They want that blood money? Let them do it,” Christie said sarcastically during an hour-long speech at a conference on substance abuse hosted by the New Jersey Hospital Association in Princeton. “And they will. Let me tell you something — this will be like priority number one come January. I guarantee you, if we have a Democratic governor, it will be priority number one.”
Christie proceeded to call Murphy and his fellow Democratic gubernatorial candidates by name, suggesting that their efforts to legalize marijuana would lead to similar initiatives for heroin and cocaine:
“People like Nick Scutari and Steve Sweeney and Phil Murphy want to bring this poison, legalized, into this state under the premise that, well, it doesn’t matter because people can buy it illegally anyway,” Christie said. “Then why not legalize heroin? I mean, their argument fails just on that basis. Let’s legalize cocaine. Let’s legalize heroin. Let’s legalize angel dust. Let’s legalize all of it. What’s the difference? Let everybody choose.”
Despite the governor’s use of the popular “gateway drug” argument, however, research into the matter isn’t as clear as Christie argues. As gubernatorial candidate Nick Scutari, a municipal prosecutor and lawmaker from Union County, explained to Politico, “One has nothing to do with the other.”
Previously, Christie has used the “blood money” moniker as a rallying cry against marijuana legalization back in November. During his monthly Ask the Governor radio program on local station 101.5-FM, the self-described chief obstacle in the way of the state’s legalization efforts railed against the prospect with equal fervor. Seeing as how a new report indicates Christie’s office “drastically overestimated” how much tax revenue legal gambling would bring in, however, perhaps legal pot isn’t such a bad idea after all.
(Via Politico)