How MUCH Do You Love State's Rights?

I'm dying to see how this plays out.

Congressmen Ron Paul, Barney Frank and others will introduce legislature Thursday that aims to end a major part of the war on drugs -- namely the battle against marijuana.

Reps. Paul (R-Texas) and Frank (D-Mass.), though technically on opposite sides of the aisle, have often spoken out against the war on drugs and will propose a bill "tomorrow ending the federal war on marijuana and letting states legalize, regulate, tax, and control marijuana without federal interference," according to a statement from the Marijuana Policy Project via Reason.

The bill would allow the individual states to decide how they want to deal with pot. Currently the federal government bogarts U.S. law, oftentimes arresting owners and employees of medical marijuana facilities, for example, who thought they were operating legally under city, county and/or state laws.

"The legislation would limit the federal government’s role in marijuana enforcement to cross-border or inter-state smuggling, allowing people to legally grow, use or sell marijuana in states where it is legal," according to the MPP statement.

So in summary, pot would still be illegal if your state lawmakers deem it so but this keeps the Feds out of it.

I know that the right of states to regulate themselves is cherished by Republicans, unless it involves choosing reproductive rights (they want a federal law forbidding it) or insurance regulation (they want to stop states from blocking competition) so this one could go either way. I'm predicting that the pundits on the right will ignore this one, because it's too difficult to navigate. So will it pass? Probably not. Who wants to be labeled the pro-joint candidate?

By the way, for the record, I'm for it. I never touch the stuff myself but I also don't drink Rye, and I don't see any reason to Federally regulate that.