Notes & asides.

Memo to: WFB 

From: McF

Bill, I can't imagine you missed this (from the Washington Post, October 13), but here's another copy. I'm sure our readers would be interested.

ISN'T IT TIME FOR AMNESTY

ON YOUTHFUL INDISCRETIONS?

MONDAY morning I was a guest on C-SPAN, and two interesting things happened. A woman called in to say she wanted to shoot Whitewater prosecutor Kenneth Starr. Then host Brian Lamb turned to me and said, "So Chris, what do you make of the story in this morning's Washington Times about your cousin John Buckley, Dole's communications director, alleging he used marijuana when he was at college?"

As Bertie Wooster would say, that's not the sort of thing to spring on a lad with a hangover early in the morning. But one takes these opportunities as they come, and so it seemed as good a time as any to suggest that we all might save ourselves a great deal of misplaced indignation if we declared here and now a general amnesty for anyone who did what so many in my generation did when we were young -- namely, smoke pot.

Jimmy Carter pardoned draft resisters on his first full day in office in 1977. Isn't it time President Clinton put his signature to a piece of paper that declares, "Enough is enough: No public or semi-public official shall be deemed unfit for public or semi-public life for having smoked pot when they were young." That doesn't sound so outrageous, really. He could use some help with this from the other side of the aisle. He ought to be joined in this declaration by Bob Dole and other prominent Republicans.

In any given year throughout the 1970s and 1980s, about one-third of college-age Americans said they smoked pot, and in some years the number was close to half. That's a lot of people. And I knew most of them.

To paraphrase Allen Ginsberg, the angel-headed hipster of an earlier era, I saw the best minds of my generation giggle hysterically and empty the refrigerator of chocolate ice cream late at night. The pot-heads I went to high school and college with have gone on to: perform open-heart surgery, start new businesses, raise families, win Pulitzer Prizes, pay taxes, and pilot fighter jets in time of war. They have contributed to the health and prosperity of our country.

The only career avenue they were not able to pursue was working for the CIA, whose polygraphs they flunked, unlike such reliable American intelligence operatives as, say, Philip Agee, Edward Howard, and Aldrich Ames. The CIA's sticklishness about pot smoking always struck me as ironic, for we pot-heads trained ourselves to become adept at sneaky techniques that surely come in handy in intelligence work. My father-in-law, a distinguished veteran of the CIA, told me of his dismay over the agency's turning down so many promising candidates he had recommended to them because somewhere along the line they had smoked a joint or two.

LET me come clean or, if you will, dirty. In my misguided youth, I smoked so much pot that you can still get a contact high from shaking my hand. I moved on to more reputable pleasures -- like martinis. For a while, I worked at the White House. I had a security clearance. I was privy to TOP SECRET/CODEWORD documents, and this was during the Cold War, when all those Russian missiles were aimed at us. One document was a real lulu. It said -- well, none of your business. See, even former pot-heads can keep a secret.

On one occasion, a military aide asked me to watch the football, the briefcase containing the nuclear codes to start World War III. It was at a baseball game, and he needed to go to the bathroom and didn't want to walk through crowds alone with the briefcase. For ten minutes I had the power to destroy the world! Good thing I was mellowed out from all those years of pot smoking.

Am I condoning youthful drug use? No. Was it illegal and hedonistic? Yes. Might I have helped enrich some very, very bad people south of the border who settle their differences with chainsaws? I answer shamefacedly, yes. Was it fun? You bet it was. Did it give me interesting insights into William Blake, Beethoven, and Van Gogh? Yes. (Are they worth sharing with you? You probably had to be there.) Did I see some amazing sunsets? Oh, yes. Did it go well with sex? I'd probably better stop this particular line of inquiry.

As I write this, the front page of the New York Times carries the headline: "Marijuana Popular Among Teenagers." All I can say is, it must have been a slow news day.

Someday, these teenagers are going to be running the country. These are good and bright kids, many of them. The smart ones will follow the advice of St. Paul and eventually put aside childish things and go on to become doctors and fighter pilots and Presidents, despite the fact that polls now deplorably show that the majority of kids no longer aspire to be President. A general amnesty would benefit their generation as well as mine.

My cousin John called the story about him "pharmacological McCarthyism." He's a witty fellow, my cousin; whatever pot he smoked hasn't dulled his senses. His boss, Mr. Dole, has made illegal drug use a centerpiece of his campaign. In John's capacity as an articulator of the Dole message, he is now doing his part to encourage kids to say no. But that is different from branding them as criminals who forever forfeit the opportunity to serve their country.

By the end of the week, his opposite number, White House press secretary Mike McCurry, told reporters that John had "been done an injustice." It's the only time this year I've wanted to kiss a Democrat. I don't know if his boss is planning to issue pardons after the November election, but a general amnesty for acts of youthful indiscretion would be a courageous and healing act that would allow us to refocus our indignation on more urgent venalities.

-- CHRISTOPHER BUCKLEY

Dear Jim: So Christopher is asking for amnesty? Manifestly, he forgets that charity begins at home! Warmest, Bill

-- WFB