With Federal Law Making Possession, Growing or Selling of Marijuana Illegal, It's Likely the Government Will Take Action. If Washington voters approve an initiative legalizing marijuana in November it will set national precedent, ending the decades-long era of drug busts and prosecutions for possessing limited amounts of the drug. The question is: Will voters really decide the issue? Federal law makes it illegal to possess, grow or sell any amount of marijuana. If voters in Colorado and Oregon also approve similar measures this November, it is unlikely the federal government will simply sit on its hands and watch the drug be sold from storefront businesses. [continues 769 words]
If you heard a drug dealer denigrate his competitor's product as unsafe, would you trust his criticism? Or would you think he's a hypocrite with ulterior motives? Last week, thanks to Democratic Gov. John Hickenlooper (CO), these became the central political questions in the fight over whether to continue America's destructive War on Marijuana. The frontline in that war is Colorado, where the federal government has interfered with its system of state-regulated medical marijuana businesses, despite President Obama's promise to refrain from doing so. Countering that crackdown is a 2012 ballot initiative that would make Colorado the first state to fully legalize marijuana and regulate it like alcohol. [continues 532 words]
Legalized Marijuana Might Be a Lucrative Revenue Source for the State - -- If the Federal Government Were to Permit It. OLYMPIA -- If voters pass Initiative 502 this fall allowing adults to legally grow, sell and smoke marijuana, it could spur an economic boon generating a half-billion dollars a year for the state coffers. Or it could wind up a financial bust and not bring in a dime. It all depends on what federal authorities decide to do, because just about everything the measure seeks to achieve will still violate federal law. [continues 655 words]
The Everett City Council voted today to extend a moratorium on medical marijuana gardens until January 20. The city needs more time to figure out how to effectively zone the gardens, assistant city attorney Ramsey Ramerman told the council before the vote. The city also hopes to have additional legal clarification on how to handle the conflicts between state and federal law, he said. He warned the council that allowing the gardens now could get city employees and the council in trouble with the federal government by making them "accomplices to federal drug crimes." [continues 109 words]
MUKILTEO -- Within a few weeks, it might be permanently legal to grow marijuana for medicinal purposes in Mukilteo. City officials are considering removing the temporary label from a law first passed last August allowing medicinal cannabis gardens in the city. A public hearing and possible decision by the council are scheduled for as early as May 7. A state law approved last year allows qualified patients to create community gardens for growing medicinal marijuana. "I believe that what we're trying to do is support state law," City Councilman Randy Lord said. "If we don't do something like this, they can go wherever they want. As far as medicinal gardens are concerned, I look at it as a zoning issue." [continues 310 words]
What you are seeing with Initiative 502 is an attempt to end medical marijuana in Washington. I have been running Green Hope Patient Network in Shoreline for over two years. We still don't have safe access points for patients to get their medicine. Yes, there are some places in King County, but even they are holding their breath. Now, this might sound good to legalize marijuana for those 21 years or older, with DUI provisions. For those who don't understand cannabis, you can ingest it and the active ingredient, THC, can stay in your blood from a week to 30 days. The effects normally last around 1-2 hours. [continues 142 words]
PORTLAND, Ore. -- Twice in the past two years, Gary Storck has boarded Amtrak's Empire Builder outside his hometown of Madison, Wis., and headed west to Oregon. The trip takes about 40 hours and costs more than $1,000 -- all for something that makes the illegal legal. He pays a visit to one of the state's 15 or so medical marijuana clinics, fills out an application and sees a doctor. Storck walks out an hour later, the proud holder of an Oregon-issued medical marijuana card. It's a process he'll have to go through each year to keep the card. [continues 965 words]
Meanwhile, Community Survey Shows Need for Improvement, Education About Civic Center MOUNTLAKE TERRACE -- The City Council voted 7-0 on Feb. 6 to renew a moratorium on collective gardens for medical marijuana. A new state law allows qualified patients to create community gardens for growing medicinal marijuana. But a number of cities, including Mountlake Terrace, are using moratoriums to buy time as they determine how legalizing medical marijuana would affect local laws and zoning, and how state rules might conflict with federal rules. [continues 487 words]
I must respond to the letter concerning marijuana, the last line being "live and let live." (Thursday, "If unsure, be sure to get the facts.") As someone who daily works with and counsels medical marijuana users, drug addicts and alcoholics, I think that I have a realistic understanding of this issue. Addicts (including alcoholics), when trying to clean up, simply shift their addictions from one drug to another. The end result is they are still addicted, still dependent, and still unproductive members of society. Legalizing marijuana will only make it easier for them to stay high all day, every day. Marijuana is now two to three times more potent than it was back in the '60s, and, thus, more addictive. Drug and alcohol treatment centers are now treating people for marijuana addiction. It is my observation, too, that most addicts got to that point through the use of marijuana! [continues 55 words]
In regard to the letter, "Marijuana: Complete lunacy to legalize drug": I must refute, out of frustration toward ignorance. Though I feel sympathy for the writer's losses from those ruined or killed by alcohol and drugs, I beg him to realize that no records show that marijuana was the cause of any death. Whether someone moves on to harder drugs or not is up to them and their individual addictive personality, as with drinking alcohol. [continues 53 words]
The molten glass came alive as it was pulled from the red-hot furnace on the end of a steel pole, oozing like honey from a hive. Gravity pulled it toward the floor, as the air outside the furnace began cooling it, promising to freeze the piece before it could be shaped into what it was meant to be. A young woman's untrained hands, steadied by determination, gently spun the steel pole, changing the shape of the blob with each rotation. Her movements were guided by the words of a teacher she'd just met. She coaxed the glass into a delicate globe. With that, she, too, was transformed. [continues 2032 words]
The legalization of marijuana will probably have its day; corrupt politicians will see to it. In the last 50 years marijuana has become the party drug of middle-class America. Unfortunately, it also became the gateway drug to LSD, mescaline and cocaine. Science is just beginning to document information on its powerfully subtle influence on the human mind, and despite this, we want to legalize it as a recreational drug. Complete, whack-job lunacy! Of course, politicians will smile at the potential for increasing revenue. They will replace the pushers and will line their own pockets, but they will persuade us to reason, "increased revenue will fund education." This will define absolute insanity. [continues 83 words]
In response to the Thursday letter writer who asks for common sense ("Don't replace state booze biz with pot"): This is exactly what we want. We are not asking for it to be legal to drive under the influence or smoke at work or while operating heavy equipment. We are saying that you should not be faced with prison time for possessing or smoking pot. If someone takes a gun and robs someone to support their pot habit it would still be just as illegal as someone robbing someone to support their alcohol habit. It's a lot less likely, and will not become more so if pot is legalized. [continues 71 words]
Recently Washington citizens voted the state out of the sale and promotion of liquor. Many citizens and state legislators are working toward harsher penalties for driving under the influence (DUI) and its consequences. This is commendable. Now comes the insanity. Many citizens now want to legalize marijuana and are working to place the issue on the ballot. Marijuana, with all of its documented controversies, which include damage to the brain and other organs, chemical addiction and as much or more damage to the lungs than cigarettes, is being looked at by many as a way to raise state revenue. The use of marijuana, whether by infrequent or frequent users, has lasting effects which may include hallucinations and can last between 1 1/2 and up to 10 days or more depending on the THC level in the marijuana. Other issues affected are work, social, medical and intellectual and the cost of treatment when the use causes serious life problems. [continues 92 words]
Initiative 502 is an initiative to the Legislature that would legalize, tax and regulate marijuana under Washington state law. It would authorize the Liquor Control Board to license Washington businesses to produce and sell limited quantities of marijuana to adults 21 and over. It would also impose a new excise tax and earmark revenues for substance abuse prevention, research, education, and health care. Retail sales tax, and part of the excise tax, would go to the state general fund and local budgets. [continues 1409 words]
Regarding the editorial, "Industrial hemp: A better way to make paper": The United States is one of the few countries in the world that denies farmers the right to grow industrial hemp. Apparently drug war bureaucrats can't tell the difference between a tall hemp stalk and a squat marijuana bush. Prior to passage of the Marihuana Tax Act of 1937, few Americans had even heard of marijuana, despite widespread cultivation of industrial hemp. The first anti-marijuana laws were a racist reaction to Mexican immigration during the early 1900s. White Americans did not even begin to smoke pot until a soon-to-be entrenched federal bureaucracy began funding reefer madness propaganda. Decades later, marijuana use is now mainstream. [continues 78 words]
It's particularly frustrating that the sale of the Kimberly-Clark paper plant apparently fell through over environmental clean-up concerns, after the company spent $300 million since 1995 upgrading its wastewater and pulp-making systems. Now, the company plans to raze the waterfront site and sell it for development. The Kimberly-Clark website has pages and pages devoted to explaining the company's commitment to sustainable business practices worldwide. The company states, "The wood pulp we use is mainly sourced from forests in the U.S., Canada and Brazil. We buy more than 90 percent of our virgin fiber from external suppliers, and make the rest from purchased wood chips in our two pulp mills in Everett, Washington, U.S., and Tantanoola, Australia." [continues 322 words]
Regarding David Sirota's Sept. 18 online column, "University of Hypocrisy": The drug war is largely a war on marijuana smokers. In 2010, there were 853,839 marijuana arrests in the United States, almost 90 percent for simple possession. At a time when state and local governments are laying off police, firefighters and teachers, this country continues to spend enormous public resources criminalizing Americans who prefer marijuana to martinis. The end result of this ongoing culture war is not necessarily lower rates of use. [continues 84 words]
In the firmament of celebrated Americana, there is Mom, apple pie, football and beer -- but there most certainly is not marijuana. As it relates to drugs, this bizarre culture has us implicitly accepting that people will inevitably use mind-altering substances. But through our statutes, we allow law-abiding citizens to use only one recreational substance -- alcohol -- that just happens to be way more hazardous than pot. Such idiocy is the product of many variables. There's been interest-group maneuvering and temperance-movement hypocrisy. There's been hippie-hating rage and reefer-madness paranoia. And, most invisibly, there's been college. [continues 521 words]
The federal government is a mishmash of belated contradictions when it comes to the regulation of medicine. Its various stances aren't helping prevent drug abuse or overdoses, and they aren't helping ease patients' pain. In April, White House drug czar Gil Kerlikowske unhelpfully suggested Congress require special training for doctors before they can prescribe powerful pain-fighting medication such as OxyContin. People at the forefront of addiction are aware that the rising culprit at the center of overdose deaths, abuse and crime these days is hydrocodone, since oxycodone is more difficult to get. [continues 343 words]
