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Strategy, timing key to states’ pot legalization

By Gene Johnson
Published December 2, 2012 5:41pm ET
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Strategy, timing key to states’ pot legalization
In this Monday, Nov. 26, 2012 photo, travel guide author and marijuana legalization supporter Rick Steves holds a campaign sign in his office in Edmonds, Wash next to a door covered with marijuana leaf-shaped notes from his staff congratulating him on the passage of a referendum legalizing marijuana in the state. In the late-1980s heyday of the "Just Say No" campaign, a man calling himself “Jerry” appeared on a Seattle radio station’s midday talk show, using a pseudonym because he was a businessman, afraid of what his customers would think if they heard him criticizing U.S. marijuana laws. A quarter century later, "Jerry" had no problem using his real name - Rick Steves - as one of the main forces behind Washington’s successful ballot measure to legalize, regulate and tax marijuana for adults over 21. (AP Photo/Elaine Thompson) | Elaine Thompson

SEATTLE (AP) — In the late-1980s heyday of the anti-drug “Just Say No” campaign, a man calling himself “Jerry” appeared on a Seattle talk radio show to criticize U.S. marijuana laws.

An esteemed businessman, he hid his identity because he didn’t want to offend customers who — like so many in those days — viewed marijuana as a villain in the ever-raging “war on drugs.”

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