In a recent interview, Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee blasted liberals for supporting states rights on marijuana sales but not on gay marriage.

Appearing on KCCI, the Des Moines, Iowa CBS affiliate, Huckabee compared states that allow people to buy pot and Kim Davis, the Kentucky county clerk who is fighting to keep her office from issuing marriage licenses to gay and lesbian couples because to do so would violate her conscience.

“Let me ask you this,” Huckabee said. “How come it's that liberals are okay with not keeping the federal law when it comes to the marijuana laws and it's okay for the states to ignore it, but if it comes to a county clerk in Kentucky who doesn't believe that she can abide by a federal court ruling, not even a law, then she goes to jail?”

“Do you see where conservatives sometimes their heads explode because they say, 'Boy, there's one set of rules for people on the left and a total different set of rules for people on the right?'”

Writing at Reason.com, Jacob Sullum noted the problems with Huckabee's analogy.

“[T]he inconsistency that Huckabee perceives evaporates once you realize that legalizing marijuana at the state level is perfectly consistent with the Constitution, while Davis's refusal to do her job was not – at least, not according to the way the Supreme Court has interpreted the 14th Amendment's guarantee of equal protection,” Sullum wrote. “I realize that Huckabee disagrees with that interpretation, but the order he dismisses as a mere 'court ruling,' worthy of less respect than a statute, was aimed at enforcing a constitutional requirement.”