Maybe those efforts to fully legalize marijuana in California are a waste of time.

It looks like President Obama will have to officially respond to requests to legalize it nationwide.

That's because someone's bright idea (a White House intern?) to allow Americans to petition the administration online for a surefire response to any issue that gets 5,000 signatures in 30 days has put pot on the president's desk.

Can't wait to see what he says.

The online petition effort, We the People, was only recently launched.

Pot backers started the top-ranking petition (it had more than 35,000 signatures) Thursday and by the weekend it was ready for the POTUS' response.

The “Legalize and Regulate Marijuana in a Manner Similar to Alcohol” petition (a title familiar to those in California who almost passed full legalization in November) asks the prez:

Isn't it time to legalize and regulate marijuana in a manner similar to alcohol? If not, please explain why you feel that the continued criminalization of cannabis will achieve the results in the future that it has never achieved in the past?

Legitimate questions, those. Not questions Obama probably wants to answer as he vies for reelection against ravenous a pack of GOP hopefuls that makes Dick Cheney look like a hippie.

While he's in L.A. today Obama can have a look at how quasi-legalization is going via our omnipresent pot shops.

[@dennisjromero/djromero@laweekly.com]

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