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Medical Marijuana Has Nothing to do with Teenage Pot Smoking
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The drug czar's shameful attempt to blame increased teenage pot use on the medical marijuana debate has already been ripped to confetti by almost
Latest News
Mexican Lawmaker Denied Immunity in Drug Trafficking Organization Case
Mexico's Congress has voted to strip a lawmaker of his immunity, allowing for the prosecution of a sitting congressman with alleged ties to the country's powerful drug trafficking organizations for the first time ever in the country. Lawmakers voted 382-2 to let federal prosecutors move forward with a criminal case against Julio Cesar Godoy, a representative from the state of Michoacan accused of laundering money for the notorious La Familia.
Latest News
Importing the Portuguese Model of Drug Policy Reform
After overseeing a comprehensive review of drug policy in Portugal, where possession of everything from marijuana to heroin has been decriminalized since 2001, Alex Stevens, a professor of criminal justice at the University of Kent in Britain, has a blunt rebuttal to the classic "Think of the children" line of thinking. "Criminalization of drugs is not protecting our children," he says. "In fact, it's harming our children." By any conceivable empirical metric, Portugalâs vastly liberalized drug policy has succeeded. And as Stevens argues, the most potent lesson to be learned is that the "decriminalization of drugs does not necessarily lead to increases in drug use."
In The Trenches
Thursday Press Teleconference: Clinton Commutation Beneficiaries Call on President Obama to Expedite Clemency for Crack Cocaine Prisoners (Press Advisory)
For Immediate Release: December 15, 2010
Contact: Nkechi Taifa (202-641-6605) or Tony Newman (646-335-5384)
THURSDAY PRESS TELECONFERENCE: Clinton Commutation Beneficiaries Call on President Obama to Expedite Clemency for Crack Cocaine Prisoners
Recent federal legislation reducing the 100-to-1 cocaine sentencing disparity will not benefitthose in prison
Advocates will fast and pray for justice on December 22, 10-year anniversary of Clinton crack cocaine commutations
WASHINGTON, DC—Advocates for presidential clemency will join together for a press teleconference on Thursday, December 16 to urge President Obama to expedite clemency for people serving excessive terms under the now-reformed federal crack cocaine sentencing laws. Participants will be commemorating the 10-year anniversary of President Clinton’s commutation of Kemba Smith and Dorothy Gaines, two women sent to federal prison for 24 and 19 years, respectively, for playing peripheral roles in their boyfriends’ drug operations. Joining the women on the press teleconference will be members of the Crack the Disparity Coalition, a broad coalition of civil rights, faith-based, drug policy, criminal justice reform advocacy groups, and formerly incarcerated people.
Recent changes under the Fair Sentencing Act, signed in August, reduce the sentencing disparity between crack cocaine and powder cocaine from 100-to-1 to 18-to-1 but do not provide relief to thousands of individuals who are already serving time for crack cocaine offenses. Prior to the law’s passage, an individual in possession of 5 grams of crack cocaine (roughly the amount of sugar in a couple of sugar packets) would be sentenced to a federal 5-year mandatory minimum sentence. It took 500 grams of powder cocaine to receive the same 5-year sentence.
The campaign has set up a site (http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/pres_obama-useyourpowertocorrectinjustice/) and a Facebook page, “Holiday Fast and Prayer for Justice,”(http://www.facebook.com/#!/event.php?eid=173873379301719) where others can commit to fasting and prayer and sign a petition to President Obama on behalf of those behind bars under the old crack cocaine sentencing structure.
WHAT: Press Teleconference to urge President Obama to expedite clemency
WHEN: Thursday, December 16, 1 p.m. ET
CALL IN #: 1-800-311-9402 Passcode: Fairness
WHO:
Kemba Smith Pradia was sentenced as a first time non-violent drug offender to 24.5 years in federal prison even though the prosecutor handling her case said she never handled, used or sold any of the drugs involved. Currently, she is a national public speaker, advocate and founder of the Kemba Smith Foundation.
Dorothy Gaines is a single mother of three who was convicted of minor involvement in her boyfriends’ small-scale crack distribution and served 6 years of a 19 ½ year sentence before she was granted commutation. She currently works with at-risk youth in Mobile, AL.
Hilary O. Shelton is the Director of the NAACP’s Washington Bureau and Senior Vice President for Advocacy and Policy. He played an integral role in the Civil Rights Act of 1991 and other policy measures affecting equality in our society.
Margaret Love was the former U.S. Pardon attorney under Presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton. She now represents people applying for executive clemency and advocates for sentencing and corrections reform.
Moderated by: Nkechi Taifa, the Senior Policy Analyst for the Open Society Foundations and Open Society Policy Center, focusing on issues of criminal justice and racial equality. She also convenes the Crack the Disparity Working Group of the Justice Roundtable, and has worked for over 17 years to eliminate the crack/powder disparity.
Chronicle
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Warrantless GPS Not a Shortcut for Drug Investigators, Judge Panel Finds [FEATURE]
Can the cops put a GPS device on your car and track you for weeks without a warrant? That's what they did to DC club owner Antoine Jones. Now, after a federal appeals court sided with Jones, his case could be headed for the Supreme Court.
Chronicle
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This Week's Corrupt Cops Stories
A narc who admits he's corrupt, a narc accused of serial theft, an auxiliary cop busted for peddling pills, and a deputy who thought he was protecting dealers all made the roll of dishonor this week.
Chronicle
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This Week in History
Events and quotes of note from this week's drug policy events of years past.
Latest News
Arizona Medical Marijuana Act Goes Into Effect Today
Prop. 203, the Arizona Medical Marijuana Act, goes into effect today. This means the state health department has until April 16 to finish its rule-making process, two weeks more than it had expected. The Arizona Department of Health Services will publish the first draft of its rules Friday, kicking off a public-comment period.
Latest News
Ciudad Juárez Prohibition War Death Toll Now at 3,000 for 2010
With still two weeks left in 2010, Ciudad Juárez is setting a new record in the number of drug prohibition war killings.
Latest News
Cocaine Smuggling Increase in New Zealand
Exemplifying the failure of prohibition, New Zealand has seen a dramatic increase in cocaine smuggling in recent months, Customs says, and it looks like an attempt by figures in South America to establish a syndicate there.
Latest News
Why Willie Nelson Needs to Host a Benefit Concert for Marijuana
Willie Nelson has long been an outspoken activist, so it was no big surprise that soon after his recent arrest for marijuana possession the country music legend and pot aficionado was calling for a national movement to end the U.S. governmentâs destructive crusade against cannabis. But if Nelson wants to help end pot prohibition, he can do more than inspire the push for reform -- he can help lead it. And one relatively easy way he can do so is by hosting a benefit concert next year to draw attention to the evils of the drug war, using his iconic pop culture status to raise money for those organizations and people that are working to make the dream of reform a reality. A benefit concert next year would be particularly well timed, with the question of whether to legalize pot possibly being put to Washingtonians as soon as next fall and with California and Colorado voters likely weighing in on ballot initiatives of their own in 2012.
Latest News
Official: Mexico Drug War Imagery Popping Up in US
Dark imagery associated with the Mexican drug prohibition war, including images of the unofficial patron saints of death and smuggling, are showing up north of the border, a sign of the drug trafficking organizations' growing influence among American smuggling networks, a U.S. marshal said. Images of the skeletal black-robed figure of Santa Muerte, the Death Saint, are showing up in areas that don't have large Mexican populations, said Robert Almonte. He is traveling the country instructing law enforcement officials about Mexican folk icons associated with the drug prohibition war, hoping to raise "red flags so they will know that if they see some of this, they will be more cautious."
Blog
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A Revealing Conversation with the Drug Czar
In case you haven't seen it yet, the latest issue of The Nation is loaded with enough excellent drug policy coverage to keep you busy for hours. There's a heavy focus on the case for reform, but Drug Czar Gil Kerlikowske also stops in for a long interview that I might find encouraging if we hadn't heard all of this stuff from him before.
Latest News
Washington State Tries to Collect Medical Marijuana Sales Tax
The Washington Department of Revenue has launched a statewide effort to collect sales tax from medical marijuana dispensaries - even as some prosecutors and the Health Department maintain such dispensaries are illegal. Spokesman Mike Gowrylow said that the Revenue Department mailed letters to 90 dispensaries and related organizations on Friday, insisting that medical marijuana is not exempt from state sales tax and that dispensaries must collect that money and turn it over to the state. The letter said dispensaries must also pay the state business and occupation tax.
Chronicle
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Despite Pot Prohibition, Teen Marijuana Use Continues Slight Upward Trend
The annual Monitoring the Future survey of teen drug use is out. Teen pot smoking is up slightly, but in line with most of the past 15 years.
Latest News
Poland: Unconsititutional and Costly Drugs Laws Infringe on Human Rights (Opinion)
"Criminalisation of drug possession does not help to decrease illicit drug consumption. Instead, it distracts the attention and energy of the police from the real originators of the problem: mass producers and major and minor drug dealers" â write the signatories of a letter of support for liberalizing drug policy in Poland. Among them are former President of Poland Aleksander Kwasniewski and a world-famous sociologist, Zygmunt Bauman. Other signatories include writers, artists and respected public figures.
Latest News
High Fees Hobble California Medical Marijuana ID Card Program
California, by some estimates, has as many as 350,000 medical marijuana patients -- yet only a tiny fraction has signed on to a state ID card program meant to protect them from arrest or seizure of their medicine. That doesn't appear likely to change, say marijuana advocates, patients and some county health officials who administer the program locally, as the cost of the cards can't compete with privately issued cards or even doctors' recommendations. When the state created the program in 2003 and launched it two years later, officials figured 100,000 patients would sign on for the optional cards, but the state issued just 12,659 to patients and caregivers last fiscal year.
Latest News
America's Third War: U.S. Secretly Trains Guatemalan Forces to Battle Drug Traffickers
In a sign that Mexico's prohibitionist war on drugs continues to fail and spread havoc in the region: About 150 miles north of Guatemala City, deep in the jungle, is a military base where Guatemalan Special Forces are being trained secretly by U.S. Green Berets. The U.S. officers say the Guatemalan troops are committed to the task of defeating the Mexican drug trafficking organizations. Guatemalaâs murder rate is now twice that of Mexico where more than 11,000 people have been killed just this year.
Latest News
Inquirer Editorial: Sell Drugs Or Go Jobless (Opinion)
The Philadelphia Inquirer's editorial board opines that many government officials are finally admitting the prohibitionist war on drugs is a costly failure, and that the United States has spent at least $1 trillion on the war on drugs, but the streets of Kensington prove it hasn't worked.
In The Trenches
MarijuanaDoctors.com Announces Innovative New Features for the Medical Marijuana Industry (Press Release)
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: December 14, 2010
CONTACT: 1-888-392-9772
MarijuanaDoctors.com Announces Innovative New Features for the Medical Marijuana Industry
Nation’s largest network of marijuana doctors rolls out new features and functionality to help patients get safe and legal access to medical cannabis in all legal states
MarijuanaDoctors.com -- the medical marijuana industry’s first online search and booking platform for medical marijuana evaluations—today announced the addition of innovative new features to its website. MarijuanaDoctors.com connects patients with the highest quality network of medical marijuana doctors in the industry, and now also offers new services that streamline and secure the process of gaining legal access to medical cannabis and help physicians expand their practices to serve this growing medical need.
Key New features of MarijuanaDoctors.com’s Latest Release:
* Patient Pre-Qualification System: MarijuanaDoctors.com prequalifies patients based on the specific guidelines of each state prior to their marijuana evaluation appointments, ensuring that the doctors in its network only see patients that are qualified to become medical marijuana patients in that state.
* 24-Hour Patient Verification: MarijuanaDoctors.com now offers verification services round the clock to verify patients’ status as a qualified and legal medical marijuana patient. This service is essential for patients and saves time and money for physicians by eliminating the need to hire their own staff to handle verifications of their patients’ recommendations.
* See Your Own Doctor: MarijuanaDoctors.com now offers “do it yourself” packages that empower patients with the information and resources needed to obtain medical marijuana recommendations from their primary care physicians. These packages include the patient’s prequalification data from the site’s prequalification system, state-specific legal information for the physicians, a pre-filled stat-specific recommendation letter, and more.
* Recommendation Letter Generator: MarijaunaDoctors.com provides state-compliant, pre-filled recommendation letters for physicians to easily print and sign for each of their patients. This system is available in all twelve states where recommendation letter guidelines exist.
“Our goal has always been to legitimize the medical marijuana industry, and these new features and functionalities will help streamline the process for patients to get safe, legal access to the medicine they need,” said Jason Draizin, CEO of MarijuanaDoctors.com. “Each medical marijuana state has set up a system for patients to qualify for cannabis, and we have developed services to simplify that process for physicians, which ultimately helps the patients and helps add a new revenue stream for professionals in the ever-diminishing medical industry.”
MarijuanaDoctors.com offers monthly subscriptions to physicians that are looking to expand their practices into the promising medical marijuana industry. Thousands of patients in every medical marijuana state turn to MarijuanaDoctors.com every month for quality physicians who recommend medical cannabis to their patients. The company holds high standards for the doctors allowed to join the site, and individually verifies each medical marijuana clinic and physician in its network.
About MarijuanaDoctors.com
MarijuanaDoctors.com was founded to act as the trusted gateway for patients searching for medical marijuana treatment in all legal medical marijuana states. MarijuanaDoctors.com supplies patients with the latest medical marijuana information and provides detailed physician profile and schedule information—giving patients full visibility into the process of obtaining medical marijuana. Patients can browse, rate and review medical marijuana doctors, or learn how to obtain a medical marijuana card.
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