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Marijuana

"Marijuana Is Safer" Book Bomb Set for Tomorrow

"Marijuana is Safer," the brand spanking new book by NORML's Paul Armentano, MPP's Steve Fox, and SAFER's Mason Tvert (who came up with the whole "marijuana is safer than alcohol" trope) is set for book bomb tomorrow. The idea behind a book bomb is to get large numbers of people to buy a book on a designated day, thereby driving it up the best-seller lists on Amazon. If enough people buy "Marijuana is Safer" tomorrow, we could drive it to #1 on Amazon and generate even more publicity for the book--and the message it sends. While we will no doubt offer the book as a premium at some point in the near future, I want to encourage people to participate in tomorrow's book bomb to help get the word out. You can find out more at marijuana book bomb. I'll be reviewing "Marijuana is Safer" for the Chronicle this week, but don't wait for the review. If you've been thinking about buying the book, tomorrow is the day to do it.

More Evidence That Marijuana Prevents Cancer

Paul Armentano at NORML has the details. He rightly points out that we can only imagine how much progress could have made towards developing promising marijuana-derived treatments if the government and the press hadn’t spent the last several decades trying to vilify marijuana instead of examining its potential.

It's a plant, and like other plants, it's here to help us. It's probably just a matter of time until marijuana's full potential as a cancer cure is discovered, and when that happens, the consequences of decades of mindless anti-pot propaganda will be revealed like never before.

Innocent Teenage Girls Forced to "Jump Up and Down" During Marijuana Search

Following the Supreme Court's recent decision that school officials violated the 4th Amendment when they strip-searched a 13-year-old girl, another similar lawsuit has been filed and the story is equally sickening:

According to the complaint, the incident began when the bus arrived at the school and two employees boarded it in order to resolve a dispute in which the girls were not involved. The employees "smelled what they thought was marijuana," the complaint states, and five girls seated at the back of the bus, including Gaither and S.C., were detained and searched.
…
During an interrogation that lasted the entire school day, and after being denied repeated requests to call their parents, the girls were required to "remove their shoes and socks, unbuckle their belts, unbutton their pants, and unzip their pants," the complaint says. They also had their "waistlines physically touched and searched" by a male employee while their pants were undone, and were made to "lift up their bras while their shirts remained on and jump up and down."

The searches were all performed behind closed doors and without the presence of police offices or female staff, the suit says. No marijuana was found. [Courthouse News]


The whole thing is so perverse and disturbing, it really ought to be examined in criminal court as well as civil. By the time a group of teenage girls was ordered lift their bras and hop up and down, it wasn't just a drug search anymore. This was something much sicker than that. But you can thank decades of propaganda-fueled marijuana hysteria for creating the environment in which school officials think they can get away with stuff like this.

Canadian House Passes Anti-Crime Bill With Mandatory Minimums for Pot, Other Drug Offenses

The Canadian House of Commons today passed the Conservative government of Prime Minister Steven Harper' C-15 crime bill, which will institute mandatory minimum sentencing for some marijuana and other drug offenses. The vote, in which after dilly-dallying for days, the opposition Liberals joined in, came despite hearings in which no witnesses favored such a tough on crime approach north of the border. It's not a done deal yet. The bill must still be approved by the Canadian Senate, which issued a report several years ago calling for the government to head in the opposite directoin. But the Senate, which is appointed, is not known for bucking the government and the House of Commons. That the Liberals buckled for fear of being "soft on crime" and supported the Conservatives in this giant step backward is disappointing but not surprising. Oh, Canada! Once we looked to you for a progressive example on drug policy. I will be writing about all this for the Chronicle later this week, as well as focusing on our other border with a feature article on the Obama administration's new initiative to thwart the Mexican so-called drug cartels.

Cool "History of Weed" Video from Showtime "Weeds" Program

A precisely two minute YouTube ad for the Showtime program "Weeds" offers "A Brief History of Weed." The video begins with medical marijuana use documented in China in 2727 BC -- about 2,300 years too early for the Buddha image they use to represent it, but that's nitpicking. Flamethrower imagery at 1:06, representing the beginning of federal marijuana prohibition, is very effective, and post-Prop. 215 marijuana storefront footage is downright exciting. Check it out -- check out the Weeds season premiere on June 8th too. (Via The Daily Dish blog's "Cool Ad Watch.")

New Developments in the Ryan Frederick Case

Ever since Ryan Frederick was charged with murder for killing a police officer who he mistook for a burglar during a botched drug raid, the case against him has become increasingly difficult to believe. Despite finding no evidence of cultivation, prosecutors are now claiming Frederick had been growing marijuana prior to the police raid and that he knew police were coming and planned the murder. It just doesn’t make sense, particularly insofar as a suspect who’s expecting police doesn’t need to shoot them. If he wanted to escape, he could just leave before they came.

Radley Balko has the details here and some additional analysis here.

Smoke a Joint, Get Your Boss Fired

Yikes, it looks like marijuana hysteria in Japan has nearly ruined the sport of sumo wrestling:

Kitanoumi Toshimitsu, head of the Japan Sumo Association and former sumo star of the 1970s, stepped down after two wrestlers were accused of smoking marijuana only weeks after a third was sacked for possession of the same drug. [Telegraph]

I’ve never understood why anyone cares if athletes use marijuana. If you’re concerned about the message it sends, then tell ‘em you won’t test for it as long as they stay off the cover of High Times. Why create opportunities for your athletes to embarrass you? Just don’t test them; it’s that easy. And if they get caught with it, just be glad it wasn’t crack.

Yet in Japan, pot is apparently such a big frickin’ deal that the head of the whole Sumo organization has resigned in shame because a couple wrestlers got stoned. If only the Drug Czar would resign in shame the next time a cop gets high.

Victim’s Rights in the War on Drugs

Pete Guither pointed out the other day that the Republican platform contains this vague statement on victim’s rights:

The innocent have far fewer rights than the accused. We call on Congress to correct this imbalance by sending to the states for ratification a constitutional amendment to protect the rights of crime victims.

I wonder if such a law would protect victims of armed robbery when police search their home, arrest them for marijuana, confiscate even more of their money than the robbers did, and ultimately decline to investigate the initial robbery for which they were called in the first place.

Victim’s rights is an interesting idea. Let’s talk about it after we end the drug war.