Medical Marijuana

This story is the most perfect example possible of how not to behave if you want people to sympathize with our cause:

The battle to keep medical marijuana collectives from expanding in Mission Square on Bechelli Lane in Redding took a bizarre turn this week.

Moments before Wednesday's Mission Square property owners meeting, someone dressed in a green Grinch costume with a giant imitation penis attached stepped out of a limousine and walked into Giff's Steakburger - the site of the meeting.

The Grinch announced to Mission Square owners that a new cannabis shop - Hampton Collective - would open in the former Humor Shop space on the north side of the shopping center.
…

"I don't know, I was just trying to be funny. I guess it didn't work out," Bobby Martin, who dressed up as the Grinch, said by phone Thursday. [Redding.com]

I find the whole thing simultaneously hilarious and infuriating. But mostly infuriating. This kind of behavior makes a mockery of everything the medical marijuana movement has fought so hard to achieve.

Pete Guither responds brilliantly by making a point I've raised repeatedly in other contexts. To paraphrase: it's not about doing or saying what feels good to you, it's about impressing and persuading other people. Admittedly, it's often very difficult to fully understand what our opponents are thinking, but you have to at least try. You might not get it right every time, but you sure as hell won't show up in a Grinch costume with a dildo strapped between your legs.

Our goal is neither to shock nor intimidate our opposition. The goal is to change the minds of those who've previously opposed us. We'll win when we convince enough people that drug policy reform is in everyone's best interests not just our own.

I just read this USA Today article, Booming medical pot sales concern officials, and there's something missing. I get that there's lots of marijuana being sold in California and that the cops don’t like it, but so what? The article never actually explains why any of this is a bad thing. If the author thinks I can figure that out for myself, he screwed up, because the whole thing sounds great to me.

The last line quotes a cop complaining about people who look "very healthy" buying marijuana. I'm still trying to figure out what the problem is. Healthy people are a sign that the medicine works and everything is going well. Quit spying on healthy people and go help someone in need. This is ridiculous.

I like this post from Pete Guither about a small group of Californians plotting to fight back against the medical marijuana movement. The odds are stacked against them in that the public opposes them, they keep losing in court and they don’t have any money to fund their advocacy efforts.

I can't help but think that this is how drug policy reformers must have felt during the Reagan years. It's amazing that we've come so far now, our opponents are the ones bunkered down trying to figure out a way to stop the momentum of marijuana reform.

New York City is the marijuana arrest capital of the world, which makes it harsh terrain for seriously ill patients who rely on medical marijuana for relief. An effort is under way to legalize medical marijuana in New York and remove sick people from the drug war battlefield.

Unfortunately, three of the biggest TV stations in New York City don't want you to know about it. ABC, FOX, and CBS affiliates all refused to run ads in support of protecting medical marijuana patients. This is the message they don't want you to hear:




These are seriously ill patients fighting for compassion and equality. To silence them is an act of appalling cruelty and ignorance. Whatever petty political considerations might motivate these TV stations to censor the medical marijuana debate are trivial compared to the real human suffering that will continue if patients are denied the opportunity to speak up.

Medical marijuana is supported by 76% of New Yorkers, so to suggest that there's anything inherently offensive about airing that viewpoint is just pure fiction. According to MPP's Bruce Mirken, CBS stated that they rejected the ad because they're "concerned about viewer reaction." Really, CBS? Is there anything objectionable about the idea of not arresting people with auto-immune disease? The most likely "viewer reaction" is that people will agree to support legislation that protects patients from arrest.

Please help us show these TV stations that their censorship is what's offensive, not the effort to protect seriously ill patients. Click to contact ABC, FOX, and CBS and let them know that silencing patients is both politically and morally wrong.

This is so out-of-control, I just don't know where to begin. If you watch one video this year of a seriously ill medical marijuana patient getting tortured by idiots, make it this one:



Someone should remind these people they live in Canada. The guy gets his marijuana sent to him by the government. He's not some punk kid partying behind the dumpster.

As far as we've come in the fight for medical marijuana, there remain countless individual battles that must be overcome before patients who need this medicine can count on being treated with fairness, compassion, and equality. Anyone who would deny medicine to the sick is a monster, to be sure. But the responsibility for this doesn't end there. We've endured decades of deliberate lies and propaganda about marijuana spread by our own public servants and it's no surprise that many among us have had their humanity and common sense compromised. It will take just as long to correct it all and events like this, disturbing as they may be, are an important part of the process.

In the meantime, here's a Google page for the Brook Haven Care Centre in Kelowna, BC, where this incident took place. You can write them a review, send a letter, or even give them a call. The patient's name is Nyle Nagy and the manager who punished him is named Adrien Vaughan. Feel free to share your concerns. I'm sure Nyle would also appreciate receiving personal letters of support.

Update: This link offers a different perspective on the situation from someone claiming to a member of Nyle Nagy's family. If this additional information is true, and it sounds authentic to me, then the Brookhaven Care Home doesn't deserve as much criticism as they've received. If I had seen this prior to writing the post, I would have approached it differently.

Will Foster’s nightmarish saga continues. Foster, you may recall, is the medical marijuana patient who was sentenced to 93 years in prison for growing a few plants in 1997. Thanks in no small part to a publicity campaign by Stopthedrugwar.org, Foster’s sentence was eventually reduced to 20 years, and he was paroled to California. After three years on parole, California officials decided Foster no longer needed supervision, but Oklahoma officials disagreed. When Foster was arrested in California for driving on an Oklahoma drivers’ license, Oklahoma issued a parole violation extradition warrant, but Foster filed a successful writ of habeas corpus to quash that warrant. Then, last year, Foster was arrested on bogus marijuana cultivation charges--those California charges were dropped after he spent a year in jail--and Oklahoma again sought his extradition as a parole violator. Oklahoma officials took Foster from the Sonoma County Jail in California, and he is now residing in prison in Oklahoma until 2011--or 2015, as Oklahoma parole officials are now claiming. In Oklahoma, the governor ultimately decides on whether to revoke parole or not. Foster had an administrative hearing Tuesday, which unsurprisingly found he had indeed violated his parole (by refusing to sign paperwork agreeing that his sentence had been extended). An executive hearing will take place sometime in the next one to three months, then that decision goes to the governor for approval or rejection. Foster and his supporters are urging the public to write to the parole board to ask it to recommend pardoning him or commuting his sentence, and to write or call the governor asking for the same thing. Key points: * Foster is a non-violent medical marijuana patient seriously ill with rheumatoid arthritis; * Foster plans to return to California and never set foot in Oklahoma again; * The after-the-fact extension of his sentence from 2011 to 2015 is unfair and unwarranted; * It does not make fiscal or budgetary sense for the state of Oklahoma to spend thousands of scarce public dollars to incarcerate Foster again for this non-violent offense. I just spoke to the parole office in Oklahoma, and they don’t yet have the information in their system required to send letters to parole board members, so instead, fax your concise, respectful letters to the Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board at (405) 602-6437. Mention Foster’s full name, William Joseph Foster, and his prisoner number, ODOC #252271. Fax your letter to Oklahoma Gov. Brad Henry at (405) 521-3353 or, better yet, call his office at (405) 521-2342. In either case, mention Foster’s full name and prisoner number, and be polite. Drug War Chronicle will continue following Foster’s saga. Look for a feature article on the latest twists and turns on Friday.

John English at The Examiner has penned an impressive archive of unhinged anti-drug angriness, and although there's a strong case to be made for ignoring him, his piece "The law and the end of medical marijuana" was just too cute to pass up. He really believes medical marijuana is going to go away:

Another issue is that physicians who recommend marijuana as "medicinal" have recently become at risk of lawsuits. This is the issue that will, no doubt, bring doctors' recommendation of "medical marijuana" to an end. It will come as "medical marijuana patients" understand that they have been injured due to marijuana use and seek out lawyers.

Isn't that precious? People "injured" by one of the safest drugs on the planet. I'm afraid if you want someone to get "injured" by medical marijuana and sue their doctor, you might have to do it yourself. In the process, you may inadvertently find a cure for obsessive drug war zealotry.

Medical marijuana makes people healthier and happier, as the massive and growing number of patients will eagerly attest. If it didn't work, they wouldn't use it. You see, medical marijuana laws don't mandate that sick people ingest potent cannabis against their will. The whole point here is that patients want this option and they've fought, sometimes literally from their deathbeds, to get it. The failure of medical marijuana's opponents to understand or care what patients want is their central fault and it explains perfectly why their arguments and calculations have served them so poorly.

Anyone in Maryland who thinks the problem is solved should read this. This isn't about politics and it isn’t about pot. These are real people who need the freedom to treat their illnesses in the way that works for them, without having to worry about the cops getting involved.

Even people who still don’t understand medical marijuana should be opposed to spending tax dollars dragging cancer patients through the court system.

The Atlantic has an interesting story about the evolving medical marijuana economy in Colorado. The new administration's stated policy of respecting medical marijuana laws is beginning to have a visible – and very positive – impact:

Most of the farmers Kathleen works with have been cultivating their product illegally for many years--the oldest has been in the illicit business for 35, more than half have grown marijuana for over two decades. Now that they sell their product to a legal commercial enterprise, weed farmers will have to register their income and pay taxes on it, just like anyone growing tomatoes or tobacco. "To have these people coming out of the closet after so many years, that's the really heartening thing about what's happening right now," Kathleen says.

Pretty cool, huh? Just watch as the introduction of a more tolerant marijuana policy completely fails to destroy society and instead becomes the driving force behind a more responsible and accountable marijuana industry. These are nice people who don't want to be criminals and if you give them a chance to pay taxes and operate legally, that's exactly what they'll do.

All of this perfectly illustrates the absurdity of our opposition's frequent insistence that reforming marijuana policies will create more marijuana activity. Clearly, marijuana has long been part of Colorado's economy and the only big difference here is that more people will be paying taxes and patients won’t have to buy their medicine on the black market.

The closer you look, the better it gets:

Since marijuana farmers have begun selling exclusively to legitimate dispensaries, the underground market for illegal weed has been quashed, putting drug dealers out of business for lack of available stock. One such dealer I talked to in Boulder, who I will call Quark at his request, told me that with the supply of high-quality Colorado hydroponic weed redirected to dispensaries, he has only been able to procure cheap Mexican schwag for the past few months. Since the implications of indirect association with brutal Mexican cartels unsettles him, Quark is currently seeking a regular job so he will have money to pay tuition this year.

There you have it, ladies and gentlemen. Simply legitimizing one sector of the state's marijuana economy is all it takes to send shockwaves throughout the black market. Medical marijuana laws have done more to restore law and order than decades of aggressive drug war policing. It really is that simple.

A massive DEA operation featuring dozens of heavily armed agents and at least four helicopters ended with the arrests of five people in California's Lake County last week. According to California NORML, the arrests are believed to be the first since the Obama administration announced it would not persecute medical marijuana providers in states where it is legal unless they violated both state and federal law. The DEA seized 154 marijuana plants from Upper Lake resident Tom Carter, and arrested him, former UMCC dispensary operator Scott Feil and his wife, Steven Swanson, and Brett Bassignani. Carter is a registered medical marijuana patient and provider, and his wife, Jamie Ceridono, told the Lake County News he was growing for several patients and his grow was legal under state law. The genesis of the bust appears to lie with an alleged May deal between a DEA informant and Bassignani to purchase marijuana. According to documents filed by Carter's federal defenders late last week, the informant claimed to have arranged to buy marijuana from Carter and to have left a voicemail message for Carter to set up the deal. That same informant allegedly made a deal to buy marijuana from Bassignani. In the document, the federal defenders said prosecutors made no claim that Carter ever heard the phone message the informant allegedly called and that they set out no evidence linking Carter and the informant. "All the complaint says is that another individual, Mr. Bassignani, called the informant, claimed he worked for 'Carter Construction,' and arranged a marijuana deal," Carter's defense attorneys wrote. "The deal later took place, and the only other reference to Mr. Carter is the conclusory claim that the informant 'had agreed on the price with Carter.' No context, no specifics, and no other information is provided in the complaint which indicates that Mr. Carter in fact talked to the informant, arranged a marijuana deal, and indicated that he (Carter) was knowingly involved in a marijuana transaction." Moving that the two felony counts of marijuana trafficking against Carter be dismissed, the attorneys added: "This complaint is sadly deficient with regard to whether Mr. Carter has done anything to indicate that he conspired to break the law. It should be dismissed accordingly." It is unclear why Feil and his wife were arrested. They are neighbors of Carter and his wife. Carter and Feil are being held in Oakland, where they are set to have initial detention hearings today and tomorrow. Federal prosecutors have asked that Carter be held pending trial "on the basis of flight risk and danger to the community." Carter is a long-time resident of Upper Lake, prominent construction contractor, and community benefactor. "California already has enough federal marijuana criminals," said CANORML coordinator Dale Gieringer, "It's time for concrete changes in federal law." While the Obama administration has announced it would no go after law-abiding medical marijuana providers, the DEA has conducted at least two raids against providers in San Francisco and Los Angeles, although there have been no arrests in those cases. The administration has not announced any changes in federal laws or regulations around medical marijuana, and Bush appointees continue to serve in the DEA and the US Attorney's Office of Northern California, which is prosecuting the case.