[UPDATE from Russ Belville: NORML Deputy Director Paul Armentano and MPP's California director Aaron Smith join me this afternoon's NORML SHOW LIVE, airing at 1pm Pacific / 4pm Eastern, to discuss this historic vote in California.  Call in with your questions to 347-994-1810]

Tuesday’s vote will mark the first time since 1913, when California became one of the first states in the nation to enact cannabis prohibition, that lawmakers have reassessed this failed policy.

If a majority of the Public Safety Committee votes ‘yes’ on AB 390, the bill will immediately face a separate vote in the California State Assembly Committee on Health. (I have been tentatively invited to testify before this committee; you can read my prepared testimony here.) In short, members of both committees will likely be voting on this historic measure next week. That is why we need your support in contacting the members of these legislative committees today!

To date, over 8,000 of you have contacted your California Assemblymembers via NORML’s Capwiz ‘Take Action’ Center. This is a tremendous outpouring of public support, but we need to ramp up our advocacy before next week’s vote.

If you reside in California please click here to find a list of Assembly members who sit on the key committees overseeing AB 390. Constituents in their districts are urged to phone or fax support their for AB 390 today. Lawmakers’ district phone numbers, fax numbers, and e-mail contact information appears here.

If your member of the Assembly does not appear on this list, please take a moment this week to call and leave a polite, concise phone message voicing your support for AB 390 with the Assembly Committees of Public Safety and Health. You can find the direct line for these committees, as well as for their Chair and Vice-Chairs, here and here.

Finally, Californians can also send a letter of support directly to their individual member of the Assembly by using NORML’s pre-written letter service here.

Let’s begin 2010 by letting California’s politicians know that the time to end the state’s nearly 100-year failed experiment with marijuana prohibition is now!

Ken Wolski from Coalition for Medical Marijuana New Jersey joins us to discuss trying to get medical marijuana passed before Gov. Corzine leaves office next week.

Call in with your comments and questions to 347-994-1810

NORML’s Cannabis Café

By George Rohrbacher, NORML board of directors, medical marijuana patient

The first time I met Madeline Martinez, the executive director of Oregon NORML, she told me about her dream…a meeting place for medical marijuana patients, some space to hold classes, a very different vision of healthcare. I took a drive to Portland last week to see this dream come true; to Oregon NORML’s World Famous-Cannabis Café, a trip to a Future of our own making.

Set in an older blue-collar neighborhood in North East Portland, NORML’s Cannabis Café, occupies a building that was reputed to be a ‘speakeasy’ during Prohibition, alcohol Prohibition, that is. It includes a meeting/concert space upstairs for about 200+ people, in addition to the Café downstairs. Oregon NORML signed a lease this fall with the onsite restaurant operator and took over the business in November. NORML volunteers have been working there non-stop ever since, turning the building into the Cannabis Café. Its opening last month became a world-wide press event…apparently a lot more people than Madeline thought the NORML’s Cannabis Café was an idea whose time had come.

America is currently a crazy-quilt of regulation with the 13 states and counting that have legal medical marijuana. Think what it will look like when all 50 states finally have it! In July, a front page article in the Wall Street Journal announced to the world that the Feds were standing down from enforcement in states with medical marijuana laws, and that MEDICAL MARIJUANA IS NOW OPEN FOR BUSINESS. As I read this, I could imagine entrepreneurs from coast to coast starting to draft their own plans for the medical marijuana businesses, the Next New Thing.

Stephen DeAngelo, the founder of Oakland’s Harborside Health Center, the Bay Area’s largest medical marijuana dispensary, gave one of the most thought provoking speeches at NORML’s 2009 Annual Conference on this very important topic: When marijuana is finally legalized (and new polls indicate America has finally reached the tipping point on this political issue) and the dust has settled, what will the business end of marijuana eventually come to look like? Remember, we are talking about taking an underground multi-billion dollar business and bringing it above ground. This is BIG. There will be huge long-term societal consequences of legalization far beyond the river of tax revenues it will create, many of which will be determined by what physical form legalization takes. So, what will the legal marijuana business in America come to look like? Something big and corporate? Something along the lines of Pepsi, RJ Reynolds, Starbucks, Pfizer, or Budweiser companies that market similar kinds of products??? Big profits, huge advertising budgets and lots of political cash….OR…should legal marijuana be something very different?

Stephen challenged his listeners to see that right now we have the opportunity to shape that marijuana business future, to get something different than the standard corporate outcome …right now, we have the opportunity to create a different cannabis delivery system that isn’t just about the performance on the quarterly bottom line, like it is in the ‘Pepsi’ paradigm, we can create a system that serves the public while at the same time it provides community service…something more along the business lines of Newman’s Own Salad Dressings from whose revenues have come donations of  almost $300 million to charities… Just think of that! The outcome for legal cannabis America could be vastly different, if we choose it…

Pain management is one of the places where the rubber truly meets the road in healthcare, a multi-billion dollar business. Non-toxic cannabinoid therapy has a very real place there. And non-toxic is good, as the very first rule of medicine should always be ‘to do no harm’. So, shouldn’t cannabis, from the get-go, do it differently than the Vicodin/Oxycodone ‘take these pills by yourself’ delivery model? After all, cannabis and all its users, medicinal or not, have been long defined by society as ‘counterculture’, so shouldn’t we be expected to do it differently, when we got our turn to create legal marijuana??? How about creating a non-profit medical cannabis delivery system whose central focus was on the patients, not profits for starters? Patients will have better results in chronic pain relief in the social setting of a Cannabis Café, where having people to talk to makes one’s problems feel lighter and one’s pain (medicated or not) easier to bear. Classes will be starting soon at the Cannabis Café on everything from aerobics, yoga, and weight management to plant propagation. Figuring out ways to provide free medicine to the indigent has been part of the design of the Oregon NORML’s Cannabis Café since its very inception. (Imagine that, the poor thought of first in the NORML model, not dead-last like in the standard corporate model.)  Perhaps a “Buds on Wheels” program for shut-in medical marijuana patients, too…A hemp products emporium, you get it, a place for everything cannabis, and you, too.

At NORML’s Cannabis Café, feel better…get better And then…What if… patients could meet at NORML Cannabis Cafés all over the country and the revenues generated driving a host of programs, in the area of healthcare and post drug war reparations, like freeing the thousands in jail today on pot charges? Think about it. Is that the kind of future you want? We can have it.

About two years ago, to better understand medical marijuana from the patient’s viewpoint, I interviewed the first 45 people waiting to get into one of the bi-monthly Oregon NORML Medical Marijuana meetings. Virtually everyone I asked that morning willingly volunteered his or her medical history. I heard a long litany of construction, car, and motorcycle accidents, of broken bones, dislocated joints, failed surgeries, and cancer… people who made me wonder, “How in the world does this guy/gal sleep at night?” Then it would occur to me, “Oh yes, of course, the cannabis.” For them NORML’s Cannabis Café puts dealing with serious medical issues in social setting…and shows it can be fun, as well. No wonder it’s a raging success.

NORML’s Cannabis Café is getting better by the day, as this new evolving healthcare paradigm kicks in. America can definitely learn something from the good folks who are blazing the Oregon Trail with medical marijuana; the future IS ours for the molding.

I’ve seen it.

-Letters From The Victims Of Marijuana Prohibition

-NORML’s Reefer Madness Du Jour

-Who Do I Want To Smoke A Joint With And Why?

NORML is in constant contact with thousands of victims of cannabis prohibition on a weekly basis. The organization is flooded with calls, letters and emails from citizens ill-effected by cannabis prohibition laws, from getting arrested and going to prison to civil forfeiture, child custody, revocation of drivers license, removal of student loans and workplace drug testing.

Below is a prime, firsthand account of how what appears to be a minor cannabis offense can seriously impair a person’s ability to live the most productive and prosperous life possible because they chose to relax with cannabis, as compared to alcohol.

The soldier below, who got busted in what is technically speaking a decriminalized state for cannabis possession, aptly points out the hypocrisy of the government to hire him into the National Guard and Army, but, because of a minor cannabis bust years ago, he still can’t get a minimum wage job in corporate retail big box stores. These same corporate brand names often claim to support and honor the men and women who serve in the military.

It would be one thing if the government’s war on cannabis consumers was actually effective, or that when citizens were busted in the prohibition they’d repent, defer to the government’s rationale for the prohibition laws and necessarily feel good about the taxing and stressful experience. There is no correlation to greater number of arrests equating to less cannabis use. Instead, since 1965, 20 million citizens in America come out on the backside of an interaction with prohibition laws and typically develop less respect for authority and the government, and perceive police as adversaries rather than public servants. It makes them jaded about the words and promise of the US Constitution and Bill of Rights. It makes some citizens on the fringes developing an anti-government attitude so strident that they advocate violent revolt.

Why is any of this good in a democracy that relies on trust, respect and fidelity to basic institutions, institutions founded in America’s basic values, largely rationality and reason?

NORML thanks SPC Hunt, and hundreds of thousands of men and women in America’s armed forces, for making great sacrifice and taking risks to keep the country as safe as it can be.

Cannabem liberemus and godspeed Specialist Hunt!

To whom it may concern:

My name is SPC L. D. Hunt.  I am 28 years old, a loving husband, and very proud father of an amazingly smart little boy.  I am also currently in Iraq.  I am writing to you in hopes that maybe my story can help motivate some of you to continue the fight you are bravely acting out in on behalf of the American people.

In May 2002 I was arrested in Brunswick county, NC for possession of less than one half ounce of marijuana.  At the time I was in my care in a private area but I was unaware of laws at the time dealing with search warrants, etc.  The police officer who arrested me drilled the hell out of me. Questioning me and making subtle threats against myself and my occupants, I agreed for him to search me personally. I told him of the bags and the bowl in my pockets and he promptly put me in cuffs and began to tear my car apart.  After the search I was taken to the magistrates office and booked.  I was given a court date and told to return.  The cute part about that was when I was getting out of the police car, the bags were on the center console and when the officer got out, his elbow knocked one of the bags down into the floor between the seat and the console.  When I informed him of what happened, he told me “not to worry about it”…

A few weeks later came my court date.  I went to court to represent myself, ready to accept whatever punishment they were going to give me.  I told the judge in a very professional manner of my mistake and my willingness to go along with the sentencing.  I was given a $100.00 fine and 1 year of unsupervised probation.  When I received the judgement I breathed a sigh of relief thinking that the worst part was over, when in fact, it was just beginning.

I consider myself a good worker, especially in terms of customer relations in sales positions.  I was also working on getting back into college and moving on with my life.  But it became quickly apparent that nearly all employers would not hire me. Target, Walmart, and many other places wanted nothing to do with me, all while I watched them hire people with felonies and much harsher police records on them.  I couldn’t figure out for the life of me how minding my own business and using such a small amount of plant material could cost me worse treatment than a car thief or someone with an assault record.  To this day I still can’t figure the logic in it. Needless to say this affected my finances very quickly.

The next few years proved to be extremely trying as the only work I could get were at construction and jobs I had no experience in and I was not good in.  I felt like I was forced into a position that made me constantly searching for new work as with that industry in NC the amount of work available was dependent on my employer’s success at acquiring new contracts.  This did not bode well for trying to pay bills, go to college, and keep a healthy relationship with my wife.

In 2005 things came to an extremely bad climax and I was without work, none was available, and there was nowhere among the dozens of job applications I put in that would give me a second thought due to my conviction.  All but one.  And it was the one place I laughed at the thought of being hired:  The North Carolina National Guard.  The decision to join wasn’t very hard when I found out that with a simple letter I could be approved to put my life at risk for my country. Once again I wondered about the ethical and moral stance that places like Walmart, Target, and the other giant companies took when it came to hiring.  How could I be rejected at a Walmart or a McDonalds and be hired in an instant by the US government?  When the paperwork was over I was among the newest of the NCNG’s medics.  I chose that job since I figured it would be a great career path and it allowed me to help stop my brothers and sisters from dying.  As a medic I knew I could make a difference.

After I completed my training and returned home I was immediately put on the Katrina relief duty and worked extremely hard, trying to earn the respect of my fellow soldiers, which I can proudly say I did. I recieved an award for my service there and I still work with that ethic in mind.  I thought once again that due to my hard efforts to make myself into a better person, those put in a position to judge me would see those efforts and be proud to hire a US soldier.  I was wrong.  Very wrong.

I was thrust back into the same position I was in before I joined. I almost regretted joining the Guard since it was temporary, I talked with my superiors about going into active service but talk of a deployment was in the air.  And the lady who stood beside me and supported me through all this was hesitant to see me join as she did not want me to go off like this, but she knew it was something I had to do.  So I held onto the thought of being deployed with my unit and the men and women who became like a second family to me.  Weeks turned into months, and they in turn, into years.  I fought extremely hard to get whatever work I could until I ran into a manager who worked at a local Pizza Hut who did not do background checks and just ignored it when I told her of my record.  So there I was, a US soldier, now working part time at a fast food chain.  I couldn’t get a job as an EMT with the Brunswick county government due to my record either.  The government’s double standards were hurting me indeed.

Fast forward to 2008.  I was finally being deployed.  I had months before hand to keep working so I decided I needed a second job.  I figured it had been 6 years and I was in great standing with the national guard so an employer would understand and hopefully have a spot for me.  I went to a local Walmart again that was having trouble keeping employees, I went in dressed in a full business suit and told them directly, I wanted a managers position.  I know I could drive sales, I know I could be an extremely valuable asset to a company like that.  The store manager was eager to hire me.  That is, until the corporate level called and told them absolutely not, that there was no chance they would hire me.  So here I was, a medic with the Army, with a wife and a child on the way, forced into a spot to work whatever odd jobs I could find and forced to move in with my parents because I simply could not do anything working for $7.00 an hour part time.  I was not allowed to go active because of stop loss for my unit.  With the help of my family I finally made it to active status when our time to train was here.

Now at the end of 2009 I have confirmed that my conviction should be off my record by now and it should not pose a problem with any more hiring.  I don’t count on that one.  I have moved to Rhode Island with my wife where I plan on using my training to join an EMT unit while I go to school for an RN degree, and eventually a PA as I have been told by several Drs now that my talent for health care is extremely good.

To this day I still laugh that these vicious groups attacking marijuana have done so much damage.  I hope they are proud that the have helped to make a US soldier out to be a monster despite being the man responsible for the medical supplies of 1000 troops, has ran dozens of missions outside our base in support of Iraqi Freedom, has helped to save the lives of soldiers and Iraqis, and has time and time again earned awards from the Army due to my service.  I am proud of my service.  I love my country.  I am extremely blessed to have the chance to do what I do.  But despite all the support my country says it has, it casts a blind eye on me at the same time.  It worries me, it keeps me up at night.  But I can’t help it.  My life was ruined because of a $10.00 bag of marijuana that I was going to use and then watch a movie in the privacy of my own home.

Please continue to do the great work you do.  Maybe one day we can prevent cases like mine and others.  These insane groups think they are doing the country a favor and yet they are doing nothing short of alienating people and forcing them to lead lives that they should not be forced into.  Big companies such as Walmart, Target, Dillards, and many others preach constantly about how much they support our soldiers and yet would not give me the time of day because I stood up and admitted to having a very small bag of pot in my pocket.  Not a selling charge, not doing anything reckless, just minding my own business and trying to enjoy myself.  To me, that is a disgusting way of doing business.  I feel they should remove their constant statements of support for the troops until they realize what their policies actually DO to some of the soldiers.  I know I am not the only soldier in the military with past drug charges. In fact, I know most of my medical platoon at some point has done drugs, and we avidly support the legalization of marijuana.  If it was legal we would still do it, but when we relax and hang out together the only thing we have is alcohol and we see what that does to a person’s body and mind…

It’s a shame.

In closing, thank you for your time, if you feel like sharing my story with others, that’s fine.  I can only pray that it helps to prevent these things from happening again.  I love my country but I hate the fact that so many feel it’s necessary to take away our freedoms and lie to keep up their efforts at turning innocent people and soldiers into outcasts.  Please keep up the good fight, I will continue to pray for NORML and all those involved with it.

God Bless,
SPC L. D. Hunt
1-120th Archangel Medics
FOB Mahmudiyah, Iraq

Join us for the last show of the 2000’s! It’s our New Year’s Eve Celebration of 2009, the best year ever in marijuana law reform!

TONIGHT ALL ACROSS AMERICA – SHOW BEGINS AT MIDNIGHT EASTERN AND RUNS TO MIDNIGHT PACIFIC

Dear NORML Supporter:

It is not often that I feel compelled to write to NORML’s membership and supporters regarding the day-to-day operations of America’s leading marijuana lobby group. Then again, in my tenure as Executive Director of NORML and the NORML Foundation, there’s never been a time like right now.

Over the past several months NORML’s public prominence and political influence has grown by leaps and bounds. As I write you today I’m reflecting upon two of the most significant – and productive – weeks in NORML history.  As we close the year 2009 I am proud to say that NORML has galvanized its position as the leading marijuana law reform organization. Why do I say this?  Take a look at the events of these two weeks late this fall, and decide for yourself:

• Marijuana legalization in Massachusetts? NORML testifies ‘Yes!’
  On Wednesday, October 14, NORML’s Legal Counsel Keith Stroup and NORML Advisory Board Member Dr. Lester Grinspoon testified before the Massachusetts Joint Committee on Revenue in favor of House Bill 2929, ‘An Act to Regulate and Tax the Cannabis Industry.’ Members of NORML’s state affiliate, MassCann, also spoke on behalf of the measure, which was drafted by former NORML Board Member Richard Evans. The well-attended legislative hearing marked the first time that Massachusetts state legislators had ever publicly discussed legalizing marijuana, and the debate earned prominent media coverage throughout the state. 

• California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger requests marijuana legalization debate
  In May Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger publicly called for a debate on the merits of marijuana regulation. This October NORML Deputy Director Paul Armentano and CalNORML Coordinator Dale Gieringer obliged the Governor’s request, and provided his office with a comprehensive action plan for regulating marijuana production and distribution in California.

• Obama to Justice Department: Back off on medi-pot prosecutions
  On Monday, October 19, U.S. Deputy Attorney General David Ogden issued a historic memorandum to federal prosecutors advising them to no longer "focus federal resources … [on those] whose actions are in … compliance with existing state laws providing for the medical use of marijuana." The directive upheld a campaign promise by President Obama, who had pledged that he would not use "Justice Department resources to try to circumvent state laws." Ever since the President took office NORML and other drug policy reform groups had lobbied the administration to follow through, in writing, with this sensible policy. Tellingly, the administration’s decision was hailed by the mainstream media as a major step toward the enactment of marijuana liberalization in America. Not surprisingly, NORML representatives spent the days immediately following the administration’s announcement speaking with dozens of mainstream media outlets, including CNN, MSNBC, The Associated Press, and The Christian Science Monitor, urging Congress to move expeditiously to make the administration’s policy changes into permanent law.

• Mainstream media just can’t get enough pot
  Over the past month NORML has fielded multiple requests from producers at mainstream media, radio, and television outlets throughout the nation and the world. Notably, NORML’s staff participated in the production of Fox Business News weeklong series on the cannabis industry (air date October 19-23), Newsweek’s five-part series on present and past marijuana policy (published October 16), and the October 14 edition of PBS’ News Hour with Jim Leher.  NORML has also recently received prominent coverage in periodicals such as the BBC, The Wall Street Journal, and Fortune Magazine. Unlike in past years – or even past months – the overall tone of all of these high profile features was favorable to marijuana law reform.  The underlying media message: marijuana is a commodity, not a moral threat, and it’s about time for America’s laws to start treating it that way.

• The Drug Czar’s office comes calling
  On Monday, October 24 – at the request of the White House – I participated in a strategic conference call with Drug Czar Gil Kerlikowske to discuss the drafting of the administration’s 2010 National Drug Control Strategy. You read that right: the Office of National Drug Control Policy reached out to NORML and requested NORML’s participation in crafting the administration’s future drug reform strategies. Yes, the same office that just one year ago inflicted the cannabis community with John Walters is now making house calls to NORML.

  My friends, the times are most definitely changing.

• NORML testifies at California Assembly hearings on legalization
  Finally, to conclude two of my busiest weeks ever as NORML and NORML Foundation Director, on Wednesday, October 28, NORML’s Paul Armentano and Dale Gieringer traveled to Sacramento to testify before the California Assembly on Public Safety to urge legislators to stop arresting responsible marijuana smokers.  "The criminal prohibition of marijuana has not dissuaded anyone from using marijuana or reduced its availability; however, the strict enforcement of this policy has adversely impacted the lives and careers of millions of people who simply elected to use a substance to relax that is objectively safer than alcohol," Armentano told the Committee. "NORML believes that the state of California ought to amend criminal prohibition and replace it with a system of legalization, taxation, regulation, and education." Like in Massachusetts two weeks earlier, the day-long hearing and was the first of its kind to take place before the California legislature.

So there you have it: two weeks in the life of NORML and the NORML Foundation.  Thank you for being there for us – so we can be there for you.

As we conclude this momentous year I rest assured knowing that with your continued financial contributions, NORML and the NORML Foundation will be able to maintain its position as the most trusted and respected marijuana law reform organizations in the United States.  That remains our commitment to you – the cannabis consumer – as we look ahead to the success and victories that await us in 2010.

With your generous support, we are ending marijuana prohibition. With your continued generous support, we’ll end marijuana prohibition once and for all.

Cannabem liberemus,

Allen St. Pierre
Executive Director

P.S. Please make your tax-deductible donation to the NORML Foundation in support of our national outreach and educational programs.

If you’d rather your donation be employed for state and federal lobbying purposes, please make sure that the donation is directed to ‘NORML‘, where donations are not tax deductible.

P.P.S. Donate $50 or more to either NORML Foundation (or NORML) and receive a copy of the new book ‘Marijuana is Safer, so why are we driving people to drink?‘ co-authored by NORML deputy director Paul Armentano.

A strong social indicator of governmental laws that do not enjoy mass public support–along with jury nullification–is when supposed ‘criminals’ are embraced and heralded as heroes.

NORML salutes the activists who not only slavishly work for cannabis law reforms but who also never forget about the tens of thousands of cannabis consumers, cultivators and sellers incarcerated in the United States.

Our brothers and sisters.

Christmas protest targets marijuana laws

SEATTLE – Protesters outside the King County Jail say non-violent drug offenders should be home this Christmas.

Vivian McPeak organized the pro-marijuana vigil.

“Hopefully it lets them know that they’re not languishing in there without attention,” said McPeak.

The past nine years on Christmas day, 5th Avenue and James Street in Seattle has been at the crossroads of marijuana legalization controversy.

Check out the video here.

Protestors held signs and waved down traffic. They say those staring down from county jail cells serving time for non-violent marijuana offenses should be with family.

“We just think that otherwise law abiding American should find alternatives to incarceration for marijuana use,” said McPeak.

****************

Inspired By American Citizen Activism To Reform Marijuana Laws, Brazilians Start Publicly Protesting Prohibition

I recently met William Lantelme at the Drug Policy Alliance’s conference in New Mexico and he has a popular cannabis-related webpage in Brazil (growroom.net) that he is starting to convert to a non-governmental organization to rally Brazilians to reform their American-like cannabis laws. He acknowledged being blown away at how organized, active and funded law cannabis advocates are in the US.

Inspired upon his return to Brazil, William organized the first of many planned pro-reform protests and public rallies where fans of Growroom.net recently came out to support a cannabis consumer who was busted for cultivating 10 cannabis plants.

“We must, indeed, all hang together, or most assuredly we shall all hang separately.”
-Ben Franklin, In the Continental Congress just before signing the Declaration of Independence, 1776

(Courthouse News Service) – Two North Dakota farmers failed to convince the 8th Circuit that cannabis grown for industrial hemp is not technically marijuana and should not be regulated under federal law.

The court in St. Louis upheld dismissal of the farmers’ lawsuit seeking a declaration that the Controlled Substances Act (CSA) does not apply to industrial-use cannabis.

The appeals court pointed out that the Act defines marijuana to include all cannabis plants, regardless of the THC concentration.

“The CSA likewise makes no distinction between cannabis grown for drug use and that grown for industrial use,” Judge Pasco Bowman wrote.

The three-judge panel rejected the notion that industrial hemp is not marijuana under the Act, or that Congress has no authority to regulate their state-sanctioned cultivation of cannabis.

Judge Bowman said Congress had a “rational basis” for regulating the cultivation of all cannabis plants in order to effectively regulate marijuana.

The “rational basis” here is that North Dakota farmers can’t grow tall, reedy hemp plants that could never ever get anyone high, because that will confuse the law enforcement officials who are working to eradicate short bushy cannabis plants that are grown to get people high. Somehow, in Australia, Canada, and China to name a few countries, police who are tasked with eradicating illegal cannabis in those countries that have legal hemp have no difficulty whatsoever distinguishing the two crops, but American police are just baffled by basic agriculture.

Silly as it sounds, that’s the court’s argument. We’d never be able to “effectively regulate marijuana” if farmers were growing hemp. Not that we’re actually “effectively regulating marijuana” now. Prohibition of marijuana is the absence of regulation — no regulations on who can buy it, who can sell it, where it can be sold, what age you must be to purchase it, where it can be used, what THC potency is allowed, whether the crop can be grown with certain pesticides and fertilizers, and what penalties should be leveled for failure to follow the regulations. Yes, there are laws against marijuana that makes all of those actions a crime, but by definition you can only regulate something that is legal.

Prohibition doesn’t make those actions go away, it just makes them crimes. Therefore, those actions are occurring in an unregulated manner. So how is it, again, that growing an industrial hemp plant is preventing the government from regulating something that prohibition made unregulated?

#2 Public Support For Legalizing Pot Hits All-Time High
A majority of U.S. voters now support legalizing marijuana, according to a national poll of 1,004 likely voters published in December by Angus Reid. The Angus Reid Public Opinion poll results echo those of separate national polls conducted this year by Gallup, Zogby, ABC News, CBS News, Rasmussen Reports, and the California Field Poll, each of which reported greater public support for marijuana legalization than ever before. Read the full story here.

#3 Lifetime Marijuana Use Associated With Reduced Cancer Risk
The moderate long-term use of cannabis is associated with a reduced risk of head and neck cancer, according to the results of a population-based control study published in August by the journal Cancer Prevention Research. Authors reported, “After adjusting for potential confounders (including smoking and alcohol drinking), 10 to 20 years of marijuana use was associated with a significantly reduced risk of head and neck squamous cell carcinoma.” Read the full story here.

#4 AMA Calls For Review Of Marijuana’s Prohibitive Status
In November, the American Medical Association resolved that marijuana should longer be classified as a Schedule I prohibited substance. Drugs classified in Schedule I are defined as possessing “no currently accepted use in treatment in the United States.” In a separate action, the AMA also determined, “Results of short term controlled trials indicate that smoked cannabis reduces neuropathic pain, improves appetite and caloric intake especially in patients with reduced muscle mass, and may relieve spasticity and pain in patients with multiple sclerosis.” Read the full story here.

#5 California: Lawmakers Hold Historic Hearing On Marijuana Legalization
State lawmakers heard testimony in October in support of taxing and regulating the commercial production and distribution of cannabis for adults age 21 and older. Additional hearings, as well as a vote on Assembly Bill 390: the Marijuana Control, Regulation, and Education Act, are scheduled for January 12, 2010. Read the full story here.

#6 Maine Voters Approve Medical Marijuana Dispensaries Measure; Dispensaries Coming To Rhode Island, Washington, DC In 2010
Voters in November decided in favor of a statewide measure that allows for the state to license non-profit facilities to distribute medical cannabis to qualified patients. The vote marked the first time that citizens ever approved a statewide ballot proposal authorizing the creation of dispensaries. In June, Rhode Island lawmakers enacted a similar measure. In December, Congress lifted federal restrictions to allow for the DC City Council to implement provisions of a ten-year-old medical marijuana law that would allow for the use and distribution of medicinal cannabis in the District of Columbia. Read the full story here.

#7 Oakland: Voters Approve First-In-The-Nation Medical Marijuana Business Tax
In July 80 percent of municipal voters approved Ballot Measure F, the nation’s first ever business tax on the retail sales of cannabis. The tax, which takes effect on January 1, imposes an exclusive tax for “cannabis businesses” of $18 for every $1,000 of gross receipts. Read the full story here.

#8 Rasmussen Poll: Majority Of Americans Say Marijuana Is Safer Than Alcohol
More than half of American adults believe that alcohol is “more dangerous” than marijuana, according to the results of a national telephone poll of 1,000 likely voters published in September by Rasmussen Reports. Fifty-one percent of respondents, including a majority of women, rated the use of marijuana to be less dangerous than alcohol. Only 19 percent of those polled said that cannabis is the more dangerous of the two substances. Read the full story here.

#9 Many Teens See Medical Cannabis As Alternative Treatment Option
Some one-third of adolescents view their use of marijuana as therapeutic rather than recreational, according to survey data published in May by the journal Substance Abuse, Treatment, Prevention and Policy. Teens most commonly reported using cannabis therapeutically to counter symptoms of depression, stress and anxiety, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), physical pain, and sleeplessness. In November several mainstream media outlets, including The New York Times and Good Morning America, featured stories on adolescents using marijuana as a medicine. Read the full story here.

#10 Oregon NORML Opens ‘Cannabis Café,’ Media Frenzy Follows
In November Oregon NORML opened the state’s first café catering to state-authorized medical marijuana patients. Unlike conventional marijuana dispensaries that operate in states like California and Colorado, medical cannabis is not sold on the premises, nor is the primary function of the café to dispense marijuana. “This is not a medical marijuana dispensary with a café; this is a café for medical marijuana patients,” said Madeline Martinez, Oregon NORML Executive Director. The Associated Press, Reuters, USA Today, The New York Times, and Democracy Now were among the hundreds of media outlets that covered the story. Read the full story here.

For anyone who missed the worldwide corporate media’s hysterical anti-pot headlines last week, here’s a sampling:

Cannabis more damaging to adolescent brains than previously known
via Emax Health
“New research shows that teens who consume cannabis daily can suffer anxiety and depression. Smoking marijuana can have long-term irreversible effects on adolescent brains, and is more harmful to teens than previously known.”

Teen marijuana use affects brain permanently: study
via CBC News
“The findings suggest daily marijuana use by teens can cause depression and anxiety, and have an irreversible effect on the brain.”

Pot damage on teens worse than thought
via UPI wire services
“Daily consumption of marijuana in teens can cause depression and anxiety, and have irreversible long-term effect on the brain, Canadian researchers say.”

Cannabis brain damage worse in teens than thought: study
via The Canadian Press
“The effects of daily cannabis use on teenage brains is worse than originally thought, and the long-term effects appear to be irreversible, new research from McGill University suggests.”

Sounds scary, huh? It’s meant to. Only there’s three serious problems with the mainstream media’s alarmist coverage.

1) No adolescents — or for that matter, any human beings whatsoever — actually participated in the study.

2) No actual cannabis was consumed in the study.

3) No permanent brain damage was reported in the study.

Don’t believe me? Well then, check out the actual source of the headlines yourself.

Chronic exposure to cannabinoids during adolescence but not during adulthood impairs emotional behaviour and monoaminergic neurotransmission
via PubMed

“We tested this hypothesis by administering the CB(1) receptor agonist WIN55,212-2, once daily for 20 days to adolescent and adult rats. … Chronic adolescent exposure but not adult exposure to low (0.2 mg/kg) and high (1.0 mg/kg) doses led to depression-like behaviour in the forced swim and sucrose preference test, while the high dose also induced anxiety-like consequences in the novelty-suppressed feeding test. … These (findings) suggest that long-term exposure to cannabinoids during adolescence induces anxiety-like and depression-like behaviours in adulthood and that this may be instigated by serotonergic hypoactivity and noradrenergic hyperactivity.”

To summarize: Investigators administered daily doses of a highly potent synthetic cannabinoid receptor agonist WIN,55,212-2 to both adolescent rats and adult rats for 20 days. Days following their exposure, researchers documented altered serotonin production in younger rats. (Why investigators presumed that the change in serotonin production would be permanent I have no idea. After the initial 20-day waiting period, researchers do not appear to have tested the rats’ serotonin levels ever again.) Researchers also documented supposed depression-like and anxiety-like behavior in certain rats, based on various elaborate animal models and preference tests.

Yet somehow based on this speculative preclinical evidence, the mainstream media — in unison — proclaimed:

Reefer badness
via San Diego Tribune

“A study of Canadian teenagers … found that smoking the illicit drug is harder on young brains than originally thought. Writing in the journal Neurobiology of Disease, researchers at McGill University in Montreal said daily consumption of cannabis in teens can cause significant depression and anxiety and have an irreversible long-term effect on the brain.”

In truth, the purported ’study’ never said anything of the sort!

So why the does the MSM consistently get the story wrong when it comes to pot? You can check out my previous thoughts on the issue here.