Wednesday, October 22, 2008: the cross-country political rallies were going strong as elections grew closer. Some surprising components were coming together that would almost certainly have an impact on the voters' choices.
The Patrick-Patrick team had gathered more than one million signatures, demanding a referendum be put on the November 4th ballots to legalize all recreational drugs. Lynn Patrick and Patrick Hamilton had successfully argued that if alcohol was legal, all other mind-altering drugs should also be legal. It was not an endorsement of drugs; it was a matter of equality. Drug users had been demeaned as the scourge of American society. Now they would get traditional treatment for their rehabilitation, just as alcoholics did. Legalizing the sale of drugs would dramatically minimize the profitability that criminal elements now enjoyed from the drug trade. Government licenses, taxes, and control over the sale and distribution would provide funds with which to combat the serious side effects that drug use had on citizens and society-at-large.
Ron "Doc" Doctor had started his campaign late, but it quickly gained momentum. The hypocrisies of local, state and federal governments toward smoking and gambling had obviously formed an undercurrent of resentment among the populace. If tobacco farmers were allowed to grow tobacco with subsidized funds from the government - and if cigarette manufacturers were allowed to market a product that was known to shorten their customers' lives, then no government should have the right to take away an individual's freedom to ingest that legal product. The government leaders who outlawed cigarette smoking without outlawing the sale and manufacture of cigarettes only showed themselves to be nothing more than political whores who happily took the billions of dollars in tax revenues from the tobacco industry and artificially pretended to be protectors of public health by trying to enforce a ban on the use of that industry's merchandise.
Gambling addicts were victims of similar hypocritical laws. It was illegal - in most states - to gamble in a bar, or even play a friendly game of dice in an alley or in a parking lot. "Cherry Masters" and other gaming devices were banned from taverns, American Legion halls, and other public venues as holier-than-thou politicians decried the evils of such activity. In many locales, VFW posts and other fraternal organizations had been run out of business because os assinine anti-gaming laws, and - in a bizarre result - caused many communities to lose millions of dollars raised by these benevolent organizations for public needs projects. But, of course, the cowardly politicians looked the other way when the state wanted to sell lottery tickets, or when plans for a new casino were announced by some multi-billion-dollar gaming conglomerate. As 'Doc" sermonized while rumbling through the countryside, "We just believe in an equal playing field. If some gamlbing is illegal, than ALL gambling should be illegal, even gambling that's supported by the state!"
Petitions were being signed faster than water could run through a sieve. This referendum would definitely be added to the ballots on Election Day.
Jil Adams, Bob Ryan, Ron Oetting and Phil Baker (aka the AROB group) had had an exhaustive schedule, bussing from one state to another in an attempt to boost morale among O.U.T.R.A.G.E. volunteers and gather support for the revolutionary movement. As Baker commented at one stop in the middle of Missouri, "Hell, even partyin' can get to be hard work if you do it often enough!" This, coming from a robust man who'd been known to down an average of six Jim Beams-on-the-rocks, two Wild Turkeys, and a six-pack of Bud Light in almost any given evening at his local watering hole. Baker, who only had one kidney, was the perfect portrayal of that hard-drinkin' American good-ole-boy who, when he ordered "a six-pack to go", guzzled it on the premises, fully intent on using his Bunyanesque belly as the carry-out vessel.
The road crews worked hard, but always found time for fun. Now, as the elections drew near, O.U.T.R.A.G.E. volunteers from all over the country were starting to head home so they could cast their votes.
For the first time in generations, voters were expected to outnumber non-voters 3-to-1. Pollsters in many regions of the country (especially those hit hardest by the O.U.T.R.A.G.E. bombings and the natural disasters) were predicting upwards of 90% voter turn-out!