Contact your elected representatives and urge them to 'Stop Arresting Marijuana Smokers'. NORML Blog
"Radical" Russ Belville
Idaho authorities bust a dozen head shops
Idaho has some of the toughest statutes in the nation regarding paraphernalia and simple pot smoking. Merely being in a place where people smoke pot is a misdemeanor worth 3 months in jail. If you are found to be stoned in public, you can get 6 months in jail. Being caught with a pot pipe (with no pot) can get you a year in prison. If you’re caught with some pot, there’s another year in prison. If you do any of this around a child, the crimes rise to a felony with 5 years in prison. Selling pipes, bongs, grinders, and kief boxes in Idaho is a felony worthy of nine years in prison and a $30,000 fine.
NORML SHOW LIVE #907 – Where’d I Put My Softball Mitt
Mitt Romney thinks medical marijuana isn’t “significant”, is “state issue”; Terry Nelson from LEAP on Mexican Drug War; A look at Oregon’s dispensaries; music by The Effinays.
Mitt Romney says medical marijuana, gay marriage are “state issues, right, aren’t they, really?”
Mitt Romney was interviewing with a reporter from Colorado who asked a series of questions, including his opinions on civil unions or marriage equality for gay people, in-state tuition for children of undocumented immigrants, and Colorado’s state recognition of medical marijuana. Frustrated by the questions not leading to his preferred talking points, Gov. Romney, exasperated, asks “Aren’t there issues of significance you’d like to talk about? The economy?…”
Full C-SPAN Coverage of House Debate to Defund DEA Raids in Medical Marijuana States
Debate from sponsors and opponents of an amendment to ban funding of the DEA’s raids into medical marijuana states
NORML SHOW LIVE #906 – The Truth About Pot and Lungs
BREAKING NEWS coverage of House Floor debate on amendment to defund the DEA from raiding medical marijuana states; Lanny Swerdlow interview of Dr. Donald Tashkin; music by Pistol Packin’ Mamas
Colorado per se DUID bill killed by opponents of gay civil unions
A bill proposed and passed by ignorant people who are intolerant of marijuana consumers was left to die because ignorant people who are intolerant of homosexuality had to kill a bill to recognize even a second-class marriage right for gay people.
The Oregonian: Medical Marijuana is Big Business
Yet whether you grow two plants hydroponically under a single 600W lamp in Portland, or you grow 24 plants under massive indoor soil grows with thousands of watts of lights in Eugene, or you grow 96 plants outdoors in the ideal weather of Medford, somehow everybody’s expense reimbursements with no labor costs always tally up to $10 / gram and $200 / ounce. And nobody bothers to check any grower’s power or water bills or garden supply receipts. Weird, huh?
NORML SHOW LIVE #905 – Cheerio to the New NORML UK
More coverage of the Global Cannabis March from Dallas, Texas, and Portland, Oregon; music by Bum Lucky.
Sativex (pharmaceutical marijuana) approved in ten more European countries
If your strategy to legalize the use of plant cannabis by all people for any reason is to preach “All use is medical/wellness”, cannabinoid pharmaceuticals is where you’ll end up. There exists a paradigm for the medical / wellness use of substances, and it lies in the realm of doctors and pharmacists and prescriptions and manufactured drugs. However, there also exists a paradigm for the recreational use of substances, and it lies in the realm of taverns and bartenders and DUI laws and ID checks and home brewing.
Will Obama’s medical marijuana crackdown lose him swing state electoral votes?
The timing is also curious given the upcoming November election. Colorado’s nine electoral college votes are up for grabs, and Obama’s path to reelection gets very steep without the state in his corner. The legalization amendment on the ballot in November could drive otherwise complacent voters to the polls, but they may not end up backing Obama. Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson is not ashamed to tout his support of pot legalization, threatening to syphon protest votes that otherwise would have gone to Obama.