Brian Howey - Howey Politics

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Tuesday, April 24, 2018

Brian Howey: Power moving from Washington to our cities

Thursday, July 11, 2013 1:28 PM

ANGOLA, Ind. – These past few weeks, we’ve seen yet another example of sclerosis in Washington, this time with the farm bill. On a topic that begged for compromise, everyone dug in, and there was celebration in some quarters even as they were spitting the ashes out of their mouths.

Next up comes the immigration package, with House Republicans overwhelmingly balking Wednesday at the Senate passed bill despite warnings from Speaker John Boehner about the political consequences.
Later this year, we’ll get another debt limit faux crisis.

It is a city of gangs who can’t shoot straight, of rhetoric akin to methane gas seeping out of a melting tundra. Gallup has congressional approval at 10 percent, yet another historic low.

LaPorte Mayor Blair Milo’s column on page 1 hits a number of points that are resonating. And it underscores a recent piece by conservative New York Times columnist David Brooks on what he calls the “power inversion,” the rise of city states and regional governments that fill the void left by the partisan polarization in Washington.

Brian Howey: Pence returning to Indiana in Trumpian turbulence

INDIANAPOLIS – Vice President Mike Pence returns to Indianapolis on April 26 to tout President Trump and the Republican tax reforms. But this visit comes as his boss heads into what will likely be one of the most turbulent periods of his life. President Trump appears to be heading into the homestretch of Robert Mueller’s Russian collusion probe, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York is investigating payments to porn star Stormy Daniels and another Playmate from his attorney and fixer Michael Cohen, whose office was recently raided by the FBI. Investigators have recovered a trove of recorded conversations that seem to involve the President’s closest friends and advisers, prompting Trump to insist that “client/attorney privilege is dead.” And on top of all that drama, Trump is also poised to meet with North Korean despot Kim Jong Un in a summit with truly scary nuclear ramifications. Folks, this is epic stuff. An additional subplot arose over the weekend: For the first time in their fascinating relationship, Pence found himself sideways with his boss, who has a penchant for firing subordinates via Twitter.
Brian Howey: Messer begins turning up the INSen heat

SCHERERVILLE, Ind. – In the next three weeks, Hoosier Republican primary voters will have a fateful decision to make: Who will be their next U.S. Senate nominee, U.S. Reps. Luke Messer, Todd Rokita or Jasper businessman Mike Braun? And the race just heated up on Friday as Messer began airing two TV ads assaulting his two opponents. Republican primary voters are batting .500 on this crucial decision in the past two Senate races. In 2016, they chose Rep. Todd Young over Rep. Marlin Stutzman, and the Bloomington Republican did the almost unfathomable, which was to drub former governor and senator Evan Bayh. In 2012, Republicans decided to cast off U.S. Sen. Richard Lugar, Indiana’s leading vote getter in history, for Indiana Treasurer Richard Mourdock, who was an arrogant nominee as his campaign alienated Lugar voters in the weeks following his landslide primary victory. He refused most joint appearances with Democrat Joe Donnelly, while Republican leaders imposed handlers in an attempt to limit his incendiary rhetoric. His October debate fiasco is often cited for his defeat to Donnelly, but Howey Politics Indiana polling had Donnelly leading all fall and I believe he would have won without Mourdock’s blunder.
Brian Howey: The confluence of Kennedy and King in Indianapolis

INDIANAPOLIS – The breaking news around 7 p.m. April 4, 1968 hit our home like a stab. Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., had been gunned down on a Memphis hotel balcony. The civil rights leader and pioneer was dead. We didn’t know it at the time, but this was only the middle act of a tumultuous year. The Tet Offensive, Sen. Eugene McCarthy’s surprising New Hampshire primary campaign, President Lyndon Johnson’s stunning announcement he wouldn’t run again, and Sen. Robert F. Kennedy’s entry into the Democratic presidential race and the Indiana primary set the stage for the King assassination. Two months hence, it was Kennedy lying in a pool of blood dying, and further, the riotous Democratic National Convention with a police mob in Chicago’s Grant Park and, finally, Richard Nixon’s razor thin victory over Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey in November that laid bare the cornerstone of western civilization convulsing in turmoil with the whole world watching. Absorbing the King assassination that April night a half century ago, we immediately fixated on what was to come.
Brian Howey: Mayor Pete channels JFK's passage of the torch

GREENFIELD, Ind. – I suspect that deep in the mind of South Bend Mayor Peter Buttigieg rings the sounds of Jan. 20, 1961, and the voice the President John F. Kennedy on a cold and snowy day: “We dare not forget today that we are the heirs of that first revolution. Let the word go forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, that the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans – born in this century, tempered by war, disciplined by a hard and bitter peace, proud of our ancient heritage – and unwilling to witness or permit the slow undoing of those human rights to which this nation has always been committed, and to which we are committed today at home and around the world.” The torch, in Buttigieg’s mind, is ready for passage once again. For the past 15 months, Buttigieg has aspired to the national stage. He’s run statewide in Indiana, losing a 2010 race for treasurer against incumbent Republican Richard Mourdock. He has since won races in South Bend, the last two general elections by landslides. He looks to Indianapolis and, while not ruling out a run for governor, sees a very popular Gov. Eric Holcomb, with no other Democrat taking steps for such a challenge.
Brian Howey: Hoosier rural broadband proponents forge ahead

NASHVILLE, Ind. – A decade ago, Democratic gubernatorial nominee Jill Long Thompson ran on a platform vowing to save every Indiana city and town. But there was skepticism. Indiana is pockmarked with communities that died when we transformed from an agrarian to a manufacturing economy a century ago. Dozens of Hoosier cities and towns face the same dilemma two decades deep into the 21st Century. Those which innovate will survive. In my home of Brown County, survival means expanding rural broadband internet. Last Wednesday afternoon before bedlam overtook the Indiana General Assembly, Nashville Town Manager Scott Rudd sounded the alarm. He had been working with Advance Indiana Municipalities and the Office of Community and Rural Affairs on House Bill 1065, which would create a grant program to bring broadband to the “last mile.” It was floundering. What should I do? Then I thought, “What would President Trump do?”
Brian Howey: President Trump forging an administration of one

INDIANAPOLIS – Last Friday, White House Chief of Staff John Kelly contacted Secretary of State Rex Tillerson traveling in one of those African “shithole” countries. “You may get a tweet,” Kelly advised, according to the New York Times. It took an additional four days, but President Trump fired his top diplomat via Twitter. A day later, we’re learning that national security adviser H.R. McMaster and Kelly himself will probably be the next to go. President Trump is setting up an administration of one. Perhaps two, when you consider that he can’t fire Vice President Mike Pence. The turnover in the upper echelons of this White House is approaching 50%. Pence is the only original inner circle member left. Just 14 months into this administration, the new reality is that it may come down to Pence, National Intelligence Director Dan Coats and Defense Secretary Jim Mattis to keep this wild president, once described by Tillerson as a “f——ing moron” within the rails. The true danger is when Coats and Mattis have had enough and split. Or are fired… via Twitter. The longer they stay, the more their sheer patriotism grows.
Brian Howey: Trump's tariffs raising alarms in rural Indiana

NASHVILLE, Ind. – Trump Country in Indiana is the country, the rural areas that former radio host Mike Pence used to describe as the land of the “amber waves of grain.” In Adams County Donald Trump won with 73.9 percent of the vote in 2016, in Benton County it was 70.6 percent, Clinton County 71.7 percent, DeKalb County 71.7 percent, LaGrange County 74.9 percent, Whitley County 73 percent and Daviess County, a whopping 79.6 percent. And it was that way across most rural counties without a city of more than 15,000 population. While Mitt Romney won rural Indiana by a two-to-one margin in 2012 against President Obama, Trump won it by a three-to-one margin. Part of that uptick was Gov. Pence on the ticket. The other was a loathing of Hillary Clinton. Patrick Pfingsten, then with the Corydon Group, noted in a November 2016 column for Hoosier Ag Today that “Trump is no force on agriculture policy. He made a statement in favor of ethanol prior to the Iowa caucus, that he read from a prepared text. He’s also made no mention of how he would approach a Farm Bill, which will likely be negotiated during his term. The most striking thing may truly be his fierce opposition to trade. Agricultural trade is essential for farmers from Indiana and the entire U.S. We simply grow more than we can use, so it has to go somewhere. That’s why so many farm groups work so hard to grow trade markets around the world, and why many were so quick to support the Trans Pacific Partnership.”
Brian Howey: The 'reality TV' GOP Senate primary

NASHVILLE, Ind. - The three Republican U.S. Senate candidates have spent the last six months building the foundations for their campaigns and preparing for this very moment. It is the final nine week homestretch of what will likely be a donnybrook primary race for the right to challenge U.S. Sen. Joe Donnelly. What will be fascinating is that the pilings these candidate have attempted to establish can be compromised by a single Tweet or White House reality TV show by President Trump, who is absolutely dominating the political landscape on a daily basis. Former Republican congressman Mark Souder, observed, “The biggest thing is this: Nobody cares except for hardcore political types right now. It’s just stunning. Trump is sucking out all the oxygen. On my Facebook and LinkedIn I have politically skewed friends and participants from all over the state. Nothing on anything but Trump.” So the Senate candidates are going to have to throw the proverbial red meat out to that very conservative primary voter to break through the Trumpian ether. Last week, Jasper businessman Mike Braun used the deaths of Indianapolis Colts linebacker Edwin Jackson and Uber driver Jeff Monroe to stake a position on immigration.
Brian Howey: The coming costs of unfettered rights and security

NASHVILLE, Ind. - After the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks that killed more than 3,000 Americans, the United States responded with an array of security upgrades that we all endure today. We walk through metal detectors at airports and government buildings, have our bags (and even shoes) scanned before flights. There are stanchion barriers at gates to stop car bombers. In 2011, the National Priorities Project estimated the costs of these security upgrades for defense and homeland security at $7.6 trillion. The homeland security cost an estimated $636 billion, footed, of course, by U.S. taxpayers. As I wrote last week, in 2018 we are enduring a spate of school atrocities. I cited a figure of 18 incidents from the Everytown organization, that included any gun incident on or adjacent to a school campus. Out of that number we’ve had five resulting in injury or death. In the wake of the Douglas High School massacre in which 14 students and three teachers were murdered, we are witnessing an array of responses. In Indiana, we’ve watched 20 students arrested in Griffith, Rushville, Kokomo, Columbus, Loogootee, Evansville, Bloomington, Muncie and Carmel for making violent threats aimed a school, mostly through social media portals such as Facebook and Snapchat.
Brian Howey: Time for our leaders to take a profile in courage

INDIANAPOLIS – In the tragic wake of the 18th American school shooting so far in 2018, with five resulting in injury and death, at this writing my email inbox had yet to receive one of those trite “thoughts and prayers” press release from the Indiana congressional delegation and Vice President Mike Pence. Progress comes in baby steps. President Trump did fall into briefly into this trap, tweeting, “My prayers and condolences to the families of the victims of the terrible Florida shooting. No child, teacher or anyone else should ever feel unsafe in an American school.” At least he got the second sentence right. But in nationally-televised remarks Thursday morning, Trump said, “Our entire nation, with one heavy heart, is praying for victims and their families. To every parent, teacher and child who is hurting so badly, we are here for you whatever you need." Trump later said he plans to work with state and local leaders to “tackle the difficult issue of mental health.” But he made no reference to guns. Remember John F. Kennedy’s “Profiles in Courage”? In 21st Century America, an inert Congress unable to lift a finger in the wake of domestic terror campaign for fear of attracting National Rifle Association campaign opposition funding, this is an on-going profile in cowardice.
Brian Howey: A new law crimps local meth production

INDIANAPOLIS – The dreary reality for the transformation of the Crossroads of America to “Indiana: The Methamphetamine State!” reached its low point in February 2014 when a Washington Post headline stated: “Congrats Missouri, you’re no longer the nation’s meth-bust capital.” That dubious distinction belonged to Indiana where 1,808 clandestine meth labs had been busted. For every one discovered, another three or four existed in the shadows. Even more appalling were the 458 Hoosier kids found living in these toxic cesspools and hovels. It begged questions internally at Howey Politics Indiana: How is it OK that Indiana continually leads the nation in clandestine meth labs? Why are hundreds of municipal and state employees being injured at meth labs as firefighters, cops and code enforcers? Why is it OK that in 2013, 458 Hoosier kids were found in contaminated meth labs? Why is it OK that cities and towns are having to mitigate thousands of contaminated homes, cars and hotel rooms? Why, why, why? And are there solutions to be found in other states? Howey Politics reporter Matthew Butler, now working as a policy analyst for House Republicans, learned that Mississippi, Oregon, Missouri and Tennessee restricted pseudoephedrine sales at pharmacies for people who are not “patients of record.” The impacts were dramatic. Mississippi saw meth lab busts decline from 692 in 2009 to eight in 2013. Why shouldn’t Indiana follow this lead?
Brian Howey: Braun makes Senate race a three-way tossup

INDIANAPOLIS – For the third time in six years, Hoosier Republicans face a critical decision, which is to choose a U.S. Senate nominee. Over the past six years, these voters have batted .500. In 2012, they chose Richard Mourdock over U.S. Sen. Richard Lugar, who not only held this Senate seat for 36 years, but was Indiana’s all-time leading vote-getter. A plethora of Mourdock blunders after his landslide primary win booted this safe Republican seat to U.S. Sen. Joe Donnelly. In 2016, Republicans chose Todd Young, and he did what was almost unfathomable, which was to drub former senator and governor Evan Bayh. There are six candidates in the current field, with U.S. Reps. Luke Messer, Todd Rokita and former legislator Mike Braun from Jasper the leading contenders. The conventional wisdom was this was a race between the two congressmen. But an Economist/You Gov Poll this week reveals congressional approval at 9 percent. On Wednesday, we learned that Braun posted $2.3 million cash on hand with $2 million raised in the fourth quarter, including about $1.75 million of his own money. Messer reported $430,000 raised and $2.4 million in cash. Rokita posted $459,000 in his 4th Quarter FEC report and has $2.4 million cash on hand.
Brian Howey: Donnelly navigates shutdown and Dreamers

INDIANAPOLIS – There is little doubt that U.S. Sen. Joe Donnelly is one of the more endangered incumbent Democrats in 2018, representing a state that gave President Trump a 19 percent plurality in 2016. So it was intriguing to watch him navigate the government shutdown demolition derby this past week. In a conference call with Indiana reporters Tuesday, Donnelly affirmed his membership in the “Common Sense Caucus” or the “Mod Squad” of moderate bipartisan senators that emerged during the three-day government shutdown. He succinctly summed up what he believes to be his marching orders from Indiana voters: “I was elected for work every day on the behalf of Hoosiers to do my job as a U.S. senator. Keeping the government running is our job. Over the past month I have voted consistently to keep the government open. I approached this job with the common sense we have as Hoosiers and I pledged to bring that to the Senate. That means working with Republicans and with Democrats to get things done and to solve problems.” So there in a nutshell is Donnelly’s modus operandi, both in office and in the upcoming campaign.
Brian Howey: President Trump, the truth and the American press

INDIANAPOLIS - Last Saturday in Nuevo Laredo, columnist and investigative reporter Carlos Dominguez was waiting at a traffic light with his son, his daughter-in-law and his grandchildren when men armed with knives flung open the car door. The Los Angeles Times reports that Dominguez was stabbed 21 times. He joined the 11 Mexican journalists slain in 2017 fighting drug cartels and public corruption, attempting to do what may be impossible now, which is to prevent a failed state from existing on America’s southern flank. Worldwide, 80 journalists were murdered in 2017 and another 326 were detained by authorities for doing their jobs. Both those numbers are down, mostly because a number of failed states like Syria are too dangerous and the press has pulled back. When that happens, it’s hard for us to know what is actually happening there. I write about this today because two Arizona Republicans had the courage to call out President Trump for branding the American press “enemies of the people.” As a journalist, an American and a patriot, I’ve conveyed to my friends who support President Trump how utterly offensive to us it is for an American president to so recklessly brand one of the key pillars of democracy. We could play the fill-in-the-blank game: How would you feel if someone called lobbyists “enemies of the American people”? Or cops? Or Republicans? Or Sikhs? Or Jews? You get the point. Some in Trump's base won't.
Brian Howey: Fame, fortune and Oprah

INDIANAPOLIS – Covering Richard Lugar’s presidential campaign in 1995-96, reporters in Iowa and New Hampshire would ask the Hoosier senator what it would take for him to evolve from darkhorse to victor. Lugar would respond with the word “fame.” Or, as my memory serves me, Lugar would matter of factly state the obvious: “Well, you have to be famous.” We’ve had famous presidents before, namely generals like George Washington, Andrew Jackson, Zachary Taylor, U.S. Grant, James Garfield and Dwight David Eisenhower. And we’ve had celebrity in President Ronald Reagan, though it took him three tries between 1968 and 1980 to turn fame into White House paydirt. Donald Trump converted fame into a one-cycle genius quotient. He did it over a mere 18 months in 2015 and 2016, brilliantly turning himself into the blue collar billionaire. He didn’t like to shake hands with the middle class (he’s a germaphobe), but he was their whisperer up on the stage and out of sneeze range. He said what they were thinking, and turned their resentments into Electoral College votes. But 16 years before the genius Trump figured it all out, when he flirted with a 2000 presidential bid, he was asked about a potential running mate, and it wasn’t Mike Pence.
Brian Howey: An epic year poised for 'Importantville, Ind.'

IMPORTANTVILLE, Ind. – During the sensational 2016 presidential race, Republican Donald Trump barnstormed our state and in one impromptu moment, deemed himself to be in a fictitious city that becomes this column’s dateline. Our president doesn’t always adhere to the normal conventions of truth, but I borrow his imaginary city to pose the Indiana of 2018 as stationed at the center of the political universe, just as it was two years ago. As we head into 2018, this state stands at a nexus that eclipses the nation and world. Indiana is poised for what I’ve been calling the $100 million U.S. Senate race that could determine which party controls the upper chamber. U.S. Sen. Joe Donnelly is seeking a second term and will likely face either U.S. Reps. Todd Rokita, Luke Messer, or former legislator Mike Braun of Jasper. Many observers rate Donnelly one of the most vulnerable Democrats, but he has cris-crossed this state over the past five years and felt comfortable enough to vote against the Republican tax reforms last month. Rokita and Messer, who once consistently warned of saddling their children with towering national debt, just voted to add $1.5 trillion more. But, if in the coming months, Hoosiers deem the tax cut worthy and jobs and wages grow, it may prove to be good politics. Braun is the “outsider” who built a big corporation in his hometown and may provide the best contrast to Donnelly, given that the approval of Congress stands below 20 percent. We watch in fascination Vice President Mike Pence and Director of National Security Dan Coats attempt to keep President Trump within the guardrails, as his volatility via Twitter rattles everywhere from Congress to capitals around the world. This surfaced once again this past week when Trump goaded North Korea tyrant Kim Jong Un via tweet, bragging that the size of his nuclear “button” (Trump has a fixation on size) is bigger than the despot’s.
Brian Howey: Trump can go out on top, doing it his way

BLOOMINGTON – This is an open letter to President Trump. Dear Mr. President: You da man. I mean, you DA MAN! You have achieved historic tax reform. You, Mr. President, have achieved something no other POTUS has forged since Ronald Reagan in 1986. Clinton and Carter and Obama and those wretched Bushes never even had a clue. And like Ol’ Blue Eyes always put it, you did it your way. You insulted Jeff Flakey, and those miserable Mississippians, and they came around. They actually ignored your insults and voted for the thing. As for Liddle Bob Corker, you didn’t need his volunteer ass anyway and even he came around. He can drag his butt back to Tennessee where he besmirches the honor and integrity of President Andrew Jackson, who did things his way, too. You know what I’m going to tell you next, Mr. President; you and Andy Jackson are winners. You won! Who knew that that tax reform could be so easy? Add this to Justice Gorsuch despite his whiney defense of the concept of justice, and the rolling back of all those pesky EPA regulations, the six-nation travel ban that keeps all those radical Islamacists out of America, and the fact that we’re all celebrating a truly Merry Christmas that never would have occurred without you. You’ve done more in 11 months than some monarchs and despots do in a lifetime.
Brian Howey: A Trump-induced disaster builds for GOP

INDIANAPOLIS – Republicans are staring at a mid-term electoral disaster in 2018, both here in Indiana and across America’s amber waves of grain. After a hostile takeover by Donald Trump in 2016, this president has spent the year assaulting an array of institutions ranging from the Republican Party, congressional leadership, U.S. intelligence agencies, American allies abroad, to the judiciary and the news media. On Tuesday, the voters of crimson-red Alabama rebuked him and top political adviser Steve Bannon by sending Democrat Doug Jones to the U.S. Senate. It came in the most Republican state in the nation where Trump won with a 28 percent plurality in 2016, even more than the 19 percent plurality he rolled up in Indiana. Trump had backed Roy Moore despite allegations ranging from pedophilia to sexual assault and harassment. The Republican National Committee also backed Moore. We watched as U.S. Rep. Todd Rokita, a Republican U.S. Senate candidate, tell Fox59 last weekend, “I’d be comfortable with Roy Moore.” The rationale? A number of Republicans, evangelicals and Rokita cited abortion. “This is a man who’s 100 percent pro-life like myself,” Rokita said. Moore just dated 14-year-old girls as a 32-year-old man.
Brian Howey: Pence's excellent adventure flutters close to flame

MUNCIE – Mike Pence’s excellent adventure has now entered a stretch of rocky road. Joining Team Trump always promised to be a wild ride, but now Vice President Pence has found himself within the scope of Special Counsel Robert Mueller, while serving with the current imprimatur of history’s most volatile president. What comes next will be fascinating. For the past year, Pence appeared to have successfully straddled the percolating controversies engulfing Donald Trump. In February, President Trump fired national security advisor Michael Flynn for lying to Pence after just 25 days on the job. In late November, Flynn pled guilty to one count of lying to the FBI on two occasions. There is rampant speculation that Flynn cut a deal with Mueller and the events of Friday bring the Mueller probe deeper into the Trump White House inner circle and the transition team. ABC News reported that Flynn has promised special counsel “full cooperation” in Russia probe, noting that Flynn felt “abandoned” by Trump in recent weeks. If Flynn has an axe to grind, it may be with Pence as the sourced cause of his firing. A Trump tweet last Saturday created a sensation: “I had to fire General Flynn because he lied to the Vice President and the FBI.” Almost all of Trump’s legal and political problems began on the Twitter Machine. On Nov. 11, 2016, Pence replaced New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie as head of the transition team.
Brian Howey: A cultural revolution sweeps America (with toast)

INDIANAPOLIS – You had to think that at Thanksgiving dinner tables across Indiana and the nation for that matter, a number of women were pondering the notion of running for the General Assembly or Congress. The reasons emanate from Alabama, Congress and the White House. The nation is in the midst of a social upheaval, or to put it in more stark and dangerous terms, a cultural revolution, fueled by an array of sexual harassment allegations that began in Hollywood with perv mogul Harvey Weinstein and have radiated out across newsrooms, boardrooms, Congress and even 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. In the latter stages of the 2016 presidential race more than a dozen women accused President Trump of sexual harassment or assault. It has claimed the careers of news anchors Matt Lauer and Charlie Rose, actor Kevin Spacey, comedian Louis C.K., and others. It is threatening the political careers of U.S. Sen. Al Franken and U.S. Rep. John Conyers. In Alabama, there is Judge Roy Moore, the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate, who has been accused of either sexual assault or harassment years ago, with at least one of them just 14 years old at the time.

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Former Sen. Coburn endorses Mike Braun

"I am pleased to support and endorse Mike Braun, Indiana Republican candidate for U.S. Senate. Like myself, Mike is a social & fiscal conservative who supports term limits. As a successful businessman, Mike brings the very knowledge and background that is badly needed in our U.S. Senate today. Mike's opposition to deficit spending and pork barrel projects together with his proven leadership abilities will make him a highly effective U.S. Senator." - Former Sen. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma, endorsing Mike Braun for the U.S. Senate Republican nomination. Braun said, "I'm beyond honored to have earned the support of one of my idols in the U.S. Senate, Tom Coburn.”

A changing tide on medicinal marijuana

CNN medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta has changed his mind on medical marijuana. He writes Attorney General Jeff Sessions, a hardliner against pot, saying, “I feel obligated to share the results of my five-year-long investigation into the medical benefits of the cannabis plant. Before I started this worldwide, in-depth investigation, I was not particularly impressed by the results of medical marijuana research, but a few years later, as I started to dedicate time with patients and scientists in various countries, I came to a different conclusion.”

And that conclusion? “Not only can cannabis work for a variety of conditions such as epilepsy, multiple sclerosis and pain, sometimes, it is the only thing that works. I changed my mind, and I am certain you can, as well. It is time for safe and regulated medical marijuana to be made available nationally. I realize this is an unconventional way to reach you, but your office declined numerous requests for an interview, and as a journalist, a doctor and a citizen, I felt it imperative to make sure you had access to our findings.”

Gupta’s special report on “Weed 4: Pot vs. Pill” airs at 8 p.m. Sunday. It comes as James Higdon writes about “Legal Marijuana’s Big Moment” coming when former Republican House Speaker John Boehner “flipped” on the topic and became an adviser to a medicinal marijuana group. As the late John Lennon might have put it, strange days, indeed. - Brian A. Howey, publisher

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