Mike Huckabee speaks during the Western Conservative Summit at the Colorado Convention Center on June 27, 2015 in Denver. (Theo Stroomer, Getty Images)

Presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee talks Colorado pot and munchies

Presidential candidate Mike Huckabee said states are supposed to be the laboratories of government so Colorado and Washington should spend a couple of years seeing how their legalization of marijuana works out before other states follow suit.

“If we’re going to have it, this is the way to do it. Road test it. Find out how it works,” Huckabee said Saturday.

He also talked about being stoned and having the munchies.

The former governor of Arkansas is one of six Republicans eyeing the White House in 2016 who is speaking at the Western Conservative Summit underway in Denver this weekend. After addressing the crowd, he attended a question-and-answer session with the press and others.

“If elected president would you allow states like this that legalized marijuana to continue with that policy or would you prefer to enforce federal rules” against it, Huckabee was asked.

“If after a few years the people of Colorado are making more money, they’re bringing in more jobs, people go to work early, they stay late and they get their jobs done better and they’re all happy — and other than having a bad case of the munchies they’re just doing great — maybe the rest of the country will see how wise it is,” he said.

“If, on the other hand, you have people who don’t show up for work and who stay stoned half the time, if you have kids who end up eating what they thought was just a good nice brownie that their mama made but it makes them sick and puts them in the emergency room, if you have enough of that, then maybe the other states will step back and say, ‘Thanks, Colorado, for protecting us from making the decision that you guys made that didn’t work out real well for you.'”

Huckabee said that strategy is better than having a “50-state mistake,” which is how he described Obamacare. (Wait, I thought Mitt tried a version out on Massachusetts and it worked OK.)

This story was first published on The Spot blog