JUDGE JIM GRAY

Judge Jim Gray will be the first to tell you that libertarians, and the
Libertarian Party, don't have all the answers. Not yet. But what they do
have are principles - the Goldwater principles of less government, fewer
taxes, and less infringements upon the Bill of Rights and in a Senate
race loaded with compromises and cynicism regarding corporate and special
interest power in government, Newport Beach Superior Court Judge Gray
believes that will matter. A Gov. Deukmejian appointee, he left the
Republican Party when the GOP-controlled Congress passed the USA Patriot
Act, incensed at the further erosion of Americans' privacy and civil rights.

He has also seen the negative effects of the Drug War up close, having
adjudicated drug cases since 1983, and is the author of a scathing attack,
Why Our Drug Laws Have Failed and What We Can Do About It - A Judicial
Indictment of the War on Drugs.

These are radical stances for a judge, and will be hell to implement in the
terror-and-drugs-fixated U.S. Senate, but Gray says he's up for the fight.
Even if incumbent Barbara Boxer takes on some of his issues, he says, he
will have won the election. "Can you imagine the impact it would have upon
not only the state of California but the nation if I were to win this
race?" he says. "It would give a backbone to so many legislators around the
country - both with regard to our civil liberties, the war on drugs, and
the increased size and cost of government. This could be a truly positive
revolution in the making."

CityBeat: It's not an easy or cheap thing to run for senator. Why do that
if you're really less likely to win than a Republican or Democrat?

Jim Gray: Because our country is off the track. I was a lifelong Republican
until a little less than two years ago, when I could no longer be a part of
any group that would give force or credence to the Patriot Act. The Patriot
Act is a direct frontal assault on our civil liberties. It does not make us
more secure, but circumvents the entire judicial review process so that the
federal police can snoop into so many private areas of our lives. And they
can use whatever they find for any type of prosecution
whatsoever terrorism or anything else.

How do you roll that back?

It always takes vigilance to protect liberty. Right now I am talking with
Rotary Clubs, political groups, and religious groups and trying to
inoculate them by saying it may very well be that we suffer another attack
on our land and there will be an enormous movement to declare martial law
or the equivalent and we must resist that. Because to destroy our civil
liberties in order to save them is an unacceptable course.

Where do you think your opponent, Sen. Barbara Boxer, is vulnerable?

An almost complete lack of leadership. She's been in the Senate for 12
years and was in the House for 10 years before that. Think of any area at
all on which she has been a real leader, and I will be surprised. I have a
postcard in her name, from about a year and a half ago, that says if she
receives 10,000 signed postcards saying that 10,000 voters favor medical
marijuana, only then will she vote for it. That is not leadership. It is
the obligation of a leader to investigate the right way to go and then
exercise that leadership to the people.

The federal government has pretty much ignored states' rights in terms of
Proposition 215, busting medical marijuana facilities at will. As a
senator, how could you change that?

Two weeks ago, my campaign was endorsed by the sheriff of Mendocino County
and the District Attorney of Mendocino County. The message was, "Look:
these are the popularly elected local law enforcement officials. They are
reflecting the will of the people. That will expressly was to make the
prosecution of marijuana the lowest-priority offense." So the message to
the federal government is, "Leave us alone." No one in the federal
government that tries to act contrary to the express will of the people in
Prop. 215 is exercising conservative principles. Barry Goldwater would take
up arms against what is happening in the federal government on that issue.
Barry Goldwater would be a libertarian. Of course, so would Thomas Jefferson.

But it seems there would be heavy political costs for taking that stance in
Washington.

I have been told by two sitting congressmen in Orange County that many
folks in Washington realize the war on drugs is not winnable, but it's
eminently fundable. They are addicted to the money. If Judge Jim Gray were
to be elected to the United States Senate from California, having been very
straightforward with regard to where I stand on the drug war, it would be
such a revolution that that alone would get the federal government out of
the marijuana prohibition business. And believe me, it's a big business.
It's institutionally corrupting.

As regards energy policy in California, you would favor deregulation. We've
seen where that gets us rigged markets quickly draining almost $9 billion
out of the state.

I do believe in more limited government. Energy policy is difficult,
because you have such a huge fiscal investment in hard assets. So I would
attack that one later. Transportation, taxi service, bus service, that sort
of thing, should be deregulated as long as safety concerns are met. The
hardest one I can think of is energy. I'm not a purist. I have yet to be
able to justify a complete deregulation. I'd love to, but this is one I'd
go to more hesitantly.

President Bush is a deregulator, and he has earned himself a reputation as
the worst environmental president in history. What would your approach be
to environmental regulation?

The government is the biggest polluter in the United States today by a
factor of three. So don't look to the government for leadership in the
environmental area. The answer is to bring more private control over the
resources.

Just last week we were in Atlanta [for] the Libertarian convention. Carl
Pope, head of the Sierra Club, addressed us. Very well received. He brought
up one area: What if you have a pond, and the pond is a stop for migratory
birds? And you pour DDT into your pond. Is it your pond to mess up if you
want to? Yes, under libertarian thought. But all of the birds that stop
there die. So, who owns the migratory birds? That's one that I cannot
answer. I don't think libertarian philosophy particularly addresses that,
and that's disturbing. So, to some degree we have to have government. To
what degree? I guess we'll all kind of fret about it.

That's a tough place to run from. People assume there's always an answer.

Well, I have settled cases now for years, and I try to impress upon people
that in many things dealing with human conduct there's no solution. You
can't solve a problem. You can only resolve it. And that's the way it is
with the Palestinian and Israeli issue. There are people on both sides
there who have deep, historic, legitimate grievances. They have biblical
claims to the area. But there's only so much land, and all you can do is
resolve this.

I have three centerpiece issues in my campaign: One, to get the federal
government out of marijuana prohibition. Then we revert to a concept of
federalism, to allow each state to decide how best to address this. And the
state of California will treat marijuana like alcohol. We will tax it and
generate about a billion-and-a-half dollars of revenue. We will save about
a billion dollars a year of taxpayer money that we now spend to try to
eradicate marijuana and prosecute and incarcerate marijuana offenders.

Number two is to repeal the excesses of the Patriot Act.

Number three, I support Israel. I support their right to exist and
flourish, to thrive and be secure. And the best way that our country can
accomplish that goal is to give justice to the frequently legitimate claims
of the Palestinians. We will never have peace in that land until we give
justice to all of the people.

Do you have a plan for encouraging the use of alternative energies?

The biggest security threat to the United States of America today is our
dependence upon foreign oil. It puts us in bed with some really bad people,
and we do that in order to promote a steady source of cheap oil. If we
would have turned the private economy loose on this issue without
government supports, we would have alternative sources now. And this is
hard to say, as I'm running for office, but if we had paid the freight
throughout these past years, paid the full market price for oil, at this
point we'd be in good shape because we would have already developed
alternative sources. The world would be a safer place, our economy would be
stronger. The free market is the answer.

Your proposal is to bring the troops home by Christmas '04. What are our
responsibilities there?

We have made promises to the people of Iraq, and the United States of
America should keep its promises. I do believe that the United States has
made a promise to turn over control to a government of Iraq by the 30th of
June. I am pleased to say that we are making rather substantial progress in
doing that. The second thing that I would do is to give the responsibility
for that matter to the world body. This is not a United States of America
issue, or at least should not have been. We should announce to the world
that we will depart this country by Christmas if [the U.N.] takes it
over which they should because there will be a potential bloodbath and
other violent upheavals there unless they do. But it is not our issue. That
includes the military bases. We'll give up the keys to the bases as soon as
the last Globemaster flies out of Iraq. So, to some degree, our troops will
have to change hats. But the United States troops, per se, will be gone
except with regard to our commitment to the world body.

How would characterize the Senate race right now?

The Republicans really don't care if they elect Bill Jones or not. They
just don't want Barbara Boxer to be reelected. And the Democrats are pretty
much the same. They're very light on their support for Barbara Boxer. So I
tell both sides: I will not be a partisan. How can I be? I'll be the only
one. I'm a judge. I act in keeping with the public interest. I am looking
to Democrats for their open support. I'm looking to Republicans for their
open support, as well as others. If they realize that and they see what is
happening, I will win this election.