Eight talking heads debate prohibition

Radley comments:

I have to say, [this video] is really encouraging. Former DEA chief Asa Hutchinson is the only person on CNBC’s (oddly enormous) panel arguing against legalization. These aren’t stoners or activists. They’re financial reporters and pundits. And they seem to be uniformly in favor of legalizing. This debate has come a long, long, way since the 1980s.

I was struck by how quickly Hutchinson conceded the economic argument and said the objective of marijuana prohibition is moral and cultural rather than economic...and thus, in his words, "worth the cost".

That a former DEA chief will admit this just goes to show how drop-dead obvious the economic case for re-legalization is. Yet the White House has portrayed it as laughable and unserious. What gives?