Who will win Super Bowl 420?

So, who is your pick to win the big “Bowl”?

—Frank the Dank

I predict marijuana will win. And it won’t even be close. The Internet is already abuzz (you heard me) with excitement over the fact that this year’s Super Bowl contenders (the Seattle Seahawks and the Denver Broncos) come from Washington and Colorado. And, of course, weed is legal in Washington and Colorado. Proof once again that marijuana is good for the economy—think of all the T-shirts.

At the beginning of the football season, I wrote a column (see “Are you ready for some football?” SN&R The 420; September 12, 2013) about how the National Football League should allow its players to use medical marijuana. Pot is a natural neuroprotectant, and football is full of concussions. In a recent interview, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell was asked about medical marijuana, and he made a very noncommittal comment: “I don’t know what’s going to develop as far as the next opportunity for medicine to evolve and to help either deal with pain or help deal with injuries, but we will continue to support the evolution of medicine.” And while that may seem like a tepid response, it isn’t a flat-out rejection.

But forget helping players, look at the money! The NFL makes mad bank on merchandise. Who wouldn’t want an official NFL weed-themed snapback hat? I am sure the folks at Grassroots California would love to make one. How about a silicone dab pad that looks like a football field? Who wouldn’t want one of those? The tie-ins are endless.

The universe has a funny way of doing things. Washington and Colorado legalize weed, and now their football teams are in the Super Bowl, and all people can talk about is marijuana. See, if California had legalized weed already, Oakland and San Francisco would have faced each other in 2011’s Super Bowl.

My prediction is that the THC-hawks will beat the team from the Mile High City 26-17. Omaha!

Will President Barack Obama’s recent remarks help the marijuana movement?

—Noel Nothing

Hell yes. When the president of the United States of America comes out and says in an interview with The New Yorker that weed is not more harmful than alcohol, and that marijuana laws are used to oppress poor people (“Middle-class kids don’t get locked up for smoking pot, and poor kids do. And African-American kids and Latino kids are more likely to be poor and less likely to have the resources and the support to avoid unduly harsh penalties”), you can bet it will have an effect on people’s perceptions. Especially when he points out the hypocrisy of folks that think weed should still be illegal, even though they themselves have smoked marijuana: “we should not be locking up kids or individual users for long stretches of jail time when some of the folks who are writing those laws have probably done the same thing.” These are strong words. Now it is up to us to get the rest of the politicians to go along. Legalize weed. Vote.