Pubdate: Thu, 19 Mar 2015
Source: North Coast Journal (Arcata, CA)
Copyright: 2015 North Coast Journal
Contact:  http://www.northcoastjournal.com
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2833
Author: Grant Scott-Goforth

WEED-MART

Local Planned Parenthood employees got a bit of a scare recently, 
when a suspicious package prompted a call to the bomb squad and an 
evacuation of the Cutten clinic.

A little before noon on March 16, the U.S. Postal Service dropped a 
2-foot by 2-foot package at the Planned Parenthood Northern 
California office. The package had been sent to an undeliverable 
address in Georgia and bore a return address - the Planned Parenthood 
clinic on Timber Falls Court - and a name: J. Black.

Employees became alarmed and contacted the sheriff's office, which, 
after a deputy inspected the box, called the county's bomb squad to 
the scene, according to a press release. The package was returned 
amid the ongoing 40 Days for Life campaign, which has brought 
abortion protesters to the Cutten clinic in recent weeks.

 From the scene, the Lost Coast Outpost snapped a picture of the 
sheriff's remote-driven bomb robot apparently handling the package in 
the parking lot of the clinic.

At the end of the day, Lt. Wayne Hanson sent a brief conclusion:

"[The robot] opened the packaged and it contained about 4 pounds of 
marijuana ... Was not an explosive device."

Phew, right? Well, for everyone except the original sender, who 
thought it was clever to put Planned Parenthood's clinic as the 
return address. The postal service, struggling in the era of digital 
communications, stands by its lofty creed: "Neither snow nor rain nor 
heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift 
completion of their appointed rounds."

But if you're sending valuables, it's best to double check your 
recipient's address and, for goodness' sake, print neatly.

A recent report shows that marijuana use around the nation is most 
prevalent among people who've never attended college. That result 
comes as a surprise to some, because of the college-educated 
hipster-stoner stereotype, a Vox columnist suggests. As German Lopez 
points out, people studying and writing about marijuana issues - 
reporters, politicians, professors - tend to be college-educated, and 
tend to conflate their own experiences with those of society at 
large. That could be furthered by the misguided belief, I would 
suspect, that people's first pot experience comes in the experimental 
college years.

But according to survey data analyzed by Carnegie Mellon University 
Professor Jonathan Caulkins, only one-sixth of today's marijuana 
market is comprised of college graduates. The largest segment of 
smokers - hovering around 50 percent of the market for the last 
decade - is people with no college education. Around one-quarter of 
smokers reported having attended some college. Teenagers seem to be 
the only group with steadily declining use between 2002 and 2013, 
from 13 percent to 6 percent of the marijuana market share.

As Lopez suggests, the data presents an argument for 
decriminalization, as current marijuana laws disproportionately 
target poor and minority communities - who are also pot's biggest 
users. But it also presents an argument against commercialization 
that could lead to targeted community marketing (think more liquor 
stores in poor neighborhoods), increasing marijuana-related 
addiction, intoxication and health issues, which are thought to make 
it more difficult for people to rise out of impoverished situations.

One solution that policy analysts are suggesting is a state-run 
marijuana dispensary system. That, and the survey results, poke a bit 
of a hole in the much-touted Northern California paradise of boutique 
buds slung out of upscale markets to scenesters from Humboldt to 
Silver Lake. Those customers certainly exist, but, as Caulkins puts 
it, "Most of the marijuana market is more Wal-Mart than Whole Foods."

A marijuana activist who successfully fought for decriminalization in 
Washington, D.C. recently got a thank you, of sorts, from the city's 
mayor. In a letter to pot advocate Adam Eidinger, the mayor of the 
nation's capital approved a specialized license plate that reads, yep, "420."
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom