Farce or Habit

I was never much on the use of drugs. I've tried marijuana, though not in a very long time, and it generally just made me sleepy. Most other things I was too scared to do at all.

So, I was fascinated to find in my spring 1982 journal's back cover this short exhortation:

As we all know, most cartoonists (as well as other creative people) often consume mass quantities of dope.
This stimulates the free flow of ideas which would otherwise remain untapped in the subconscious -
Some of the ideas are even good.
Unfortunately, most drugs are illegal.
This seems petty, arbitrary, and unfair, particularly for the cartoonist, since he or she, unlike the business person at a 3 martini lunch, is unable to deduct this purchase as a business expense for income tax purposes.
Why such discrimination? we'd like to see it stopped!
Write to your Congressperson today.

Seriously, I have no recollection of writing it, but it's in my hand, complete with a correction - I changed the word expenditure to purchase because later in that sentence, I wrote expense.

I mention this as a defense for Barack Obama over this issue. Sometimes, you DO just forget.

ROG