No, New York Times, you can't blame Gary Johnson's Aleppo ignorance on weed

The New York Times reports that Gary Johnson, the former governor of New Mexico and Libertarian Party presidential nominee, “revealed a surprising lack of foreign policy knowledge” when earlier today he “could not answer a basic question about the crisis in Aleppo, Syria.”

This article was originally published by The Influence, a news site that covers the full spectrum of human relationships with drugs. Follow The Influence on Facebook or Twitter.

“And what is Aleppo?” Johnson politely wondered when asked on MSNBC how, as president, he would address the refugee crisis there.

“I’m incredibly frustrated with myself,” Johnson later said. “I have to get smarter.”

The Times, naturally, went with the pot angle. “Some even attributed the flub to Mr. Johnson’s acknowledged use of marijuana,” read its piece, employing some politician-worthy apophasis. “He is a proponent of legalizing the drug and he was previously the chief executive of a business that marketed and sold recreational marijuana products.”

The authors of the article should probably be careful before they link ignorance about Syria to marijuana consumption, given that studies tend to show pot use does not decrease intelligence.

Unless, given the corrections that followed the article, they want everyone to think they’ve been hitting the ol’ bong with Gary. As you can see, the paper had to issue not one, but two, corrections for errors demonstrating a “surprising” ignorance of Syria.

This article was originally published by The Influence, a news site that covers the full spectrum of human relationships with drugs. Follow The Influence on Facebook or Twitter.