I have the entire interview from the Dr. Drew show recorded, including John Walters, Paul Armentano, and my call-in segment. Unfortunately I can’t put it here on the Stash, that would be copyright violation.

But I am going to address most of the interview points that the Drug Czar tried to float today… Join me below… in The Rest of the Entry (said in Paul Harvey voice)…

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MyFox Gulf Coast | Landmark bill targeting marijuana grow houses becomes law
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Attorney General Bill McCollum announced Tuesday that the Marijuana Grow House Eradication Act has been signed into law, giving Florida’s prosecutors and law enforcement essential tools to combat for-profit growers of marijuana.

The new law, sponsored by Senator Steve Oelrich (R-Gainesville) and Representative Nick Thompson (R-Ft. Myers), passed as House Bill 173 during the 2008 Legislative Session and was signed into law by Governor Charlie Crist Tuesday. The bill was developed because of the increasing number of grow houses operating in the state and violent crime which tend to be associated with these operations.

The new law makes it a second-degree felony to grow 25 or more plants, targeting for-profit growers who exploit Florida’s previous threshold of 300 plants. The law will also make it a third-degree felony to own a house for the purpose of cultivating, packaging and distributing marijuana and a first-degree felony to grow 25 or more plants in a home with children present.

Other important aspects of the law will provide substantial benefits to Florida’s law enforcement community. Previously, law enforcement around the state were required to store cumbersome grow house equipment in order to preserve it as evidence.

To address this growing storage burden, the new law allows a photograph or video recording of equipment used in the cultivation of a marijuana plant to be considered as evidence in the prosecution of the crime. The law will also allow law enforcement to destroy grow house equipment upon the completion of all investigations and provides immunity from any civil liability to law enforcement for the destruction of the grow house equipment.

The Marijuana Grow House Eradication Act goes into effect on July 1, 2008.

Well, then, that should do it.  Now nobody in Florida will ever exploit the profit potential of owning a suburban marijuana grow house.  Now that it is a second-degree felony, the camouflage of an unassuming suburban home won’t be enticing to a commercial grower who can produce enough profit in one crop to buy the house outright.

And the marijuana smokers in Florida, now that this law has passed, will curb their demand for fine suburban grow house marijuana.  That way, when some of the more timid growers get out of the business, the price won’t increase due to supply and demand, and the growers who do remain won’t earn an even healthier profit.

Certainly, we won’t see any unintended consequences of this bill, like perhaps an increase in violence when grow house owners have nothing to lose and decide to shoot their way out of a raid.  It’s not likely that as competition for grow houses grows that an organized criminal gang finds a way to control that market.  And since Florida doesn’t have medical marijuana, there couldn’t be any patients there growing over 24 plants just to keep themselves alive.

Wow, Paul must have struck a nerve. The Drug Czar’s blog is linking to his debunk of the marijuana potency report:

Setting the Record Straight: Marijuana Potency

Over the past week, the University of Mississippi’s reporting of the highest-ever levels of THC in U.S. marijuana has been picked up by hundreds of media outlets (including some in the UK). We’re pleased that this important health information is getting into the hands of parents. Hopefully, responsible adults will have critical conversations with young people about the serious health consequences associated with today’s pot.

Given the wide reach of the report, it’s no surprise that pro-marijuana lobbyists whose goals are to legalize drugs in the United States have attempted to counter the research-based evidence about increased marijuana potency.

Did you catch how they did that? “Pro-marijuana lobbyists whose goals are to legalize drugs”. They always must tie “cannabis” to “drugs”, because nobody’s that afraid of cannabis, but most everybody fears drugs. Here let me try: It’s no surprise that prohibition-supporting bureaucrats whose goals are to eliminate competition to pharmaceuticals have attempted to propagandize marijuana potency as some sort of health concern. Hey, that’s fun!

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The Irony of Holland’s Smoking Ban: You can Still Have Your Joint, but Only if it’s Pure - International - SPIEGEL ONLINE - News
In July, the Dutch government will introduce a nationwide smoking ban in bars, cafes and restaurants, aimed at protecting workers. But it will also make life a lot harder for the country’s infamous coffee shops, where customers will only be allowed to smoke pure cannabis.

…Dutch Health Minister Ab Klink has no plans to make any exceptions. Coffee shop employees, he argues, also have the right to protection from tobacco smoke.But [a coffee shop owner] claims it’s a specious argument. After all, people who apply for jobs in a coffee shop know that smoking is the company’s core business. “If the boys are old enough to be sent to Afghanistan, then you can’t tell me that people want to protect them from smoke in the workplace. They’re old enough to decide on their own. They can vote, they can go to war — but now they won’t even be allowed to make this decision?”

Perversely, the law, intended to protect workers from smoke, only applies to tobacco. In the Netherlands, that has resulted in a rather bizarre result: Smoking pot or hashish in coffee shops will remain legal; it just can’t be mixed with tobacco. If someone wants to roll their joint with tobacco, then they have to smoke it outside….

Besides, it will be difficult to monitor whether someone has secretly rolled his joint with tobacco or not. [Another coffee shop owner] feels the world has been turned on its head in Holland. “In every other country they do just the opposite — there they check whether there is cannabis inside,” he says with a laugh.

There are exceptions to the ban. If an establishment can set up a separate room or add a glass partition to ensure that employees are not exposed to tobacco smoke, then smoking is permitted in those rooms as long as service is not provided.

It’s also possible that officials will place a low priority on policing the smoking ban in coffee shops and, in a typically Dutch fashion, a situation would be created in which smoking would be officially banned but still tolerated.

I’ve always been leery of the indoor tobacco smoking bans being promulgated in the US and around the world.  I was a musician for many years and would have loved to have sung in a smoke-free room.  I get the point about employees not being subject to dangerous secondhand smoke.

On the other hand, some jobs have risks.  We still let men go into the bowels of the earth and mine coal for thirty years and they’re breathing far worse air than a part-time server would at a smoky tavern.

I can see banning smoking in public buildings, but I wouldn’t have banned smoking from bars (or in this case, coffee houses.)  Instead, I would tell workers that they have the choice whether they wish to work in an environment with dangerous air, but I’d also tell the management that they must cover at 100% any health care costs of their workers (that’s a US argument, obviously, since the rest of the world has some form of national health care.)  You’d see these business owners doing what they could to provide cleaner air, whether that was air scrubbers or banning smoking.

Legal Drugs Kill Far More Than Illegal, Florida Says - NYTimes.com
An analysis of autopsies in 2007 released this week by the Florida Medical Examiners Commission found that the rate of deaths caused by prescription drugs was three times the rate of deaths caused by all illicit drugs combined.

Law enforcement officials said that the shift toward prescription-drug abuse, which began here about eight years ago, showed no sign of letting up and that the state must do more to control it.

The report’s findings track with similar studies by the federal Drug Enforcement Administration, which has found that roughly seven million Americans are abusing prescription drugs. If accurate, that would be an increase of 80 percent in six years and more than the total abusing cocaine, heroin, hallucinogens, Ecstasy and inhalants.

The Florida report analyzed 168,900 deaths statewide. Cocaine, heroin and all methamphetamines caused 989 deaths, it found, while legal opioids — strong painkillers in brand-name drugs like Vicodin and OxyContin — caused 2,328.

Drugs with benzodiazepine, mainly depressants like Valium and Xanax, led to 743 deaths. Alcohol was the most commonly occurring drug, appearing in the bodies of 4,179 of the dead and judged the cause of death of 466 — fewer than cocaine (843) but more than methamphetamine (25) and marijuana (0).

The study also found that while the number of people who died with heroin in their bodies increased 14 percent in 2007, to 110, deaths related to the opioid oxycodone increased 36 percent, to 1,253.

And yet, Floridians can go to their doctor and get a prescription for the opioids or benzodiazepenes that killed more Floridians in 2007 than died in the September 11th attacks.  Floridians can walk down to their local tavern and consume the alcohol that killed more Floridians than soldiers who have died in Iraq.  But that little green plant that didn’t kill any Floridians is still prohibited, even for the desperately sick and disabled.

The Associated Press: Study: Marijuana potency increases in 2007
WASHINGTON (AP) — Marijuana potency increased last year to the highest level in more than 30 years, posing greater health risks to people who may view the drug as harmless, according to a report released Thursday by the White House.

The latest analysis from the University of Mississippi’s Potency Monitoring Project tracked the average amount of THC, the psychoactive ingredient in marijuana, in samples seized by law enforcement agencies from 1975 through 2007. It found that the average amount of THC reached 9.6 percent in 2007, compared with 8.75 percent the previous year.

The 9.6 percent level represents more than a doubling of marijuana potency since 1983, when it averaged just under 4 percent.

When you look under the numbers, though, you find that two-thirds of the samples in this survey are not domestic marijuana. The domestic marijuana potency is at 5%, according to these figures. Plus these cannabis seizure numbers reflect everything from ditchweed and leaf to sinsemilla and hash.

I wonder, then, if these reports are worthless when we talk about the domestic cannabis market. Certainly more of the seized marijuana is going to be foreign, because it’s going to most likely be seized as it travels into and around our country. The Iron Law of Prohibition always makes a smuggler create more potent drugs to smuggle, so it is no surprise that the domestic weed comes in at 5% and the international at 9%.

Marijuana growing, though, is so easily concealed in a home that many people are getting their weed just one or two steps away from a local grower. How many people are smoking much more potent domestic weed that rarely gets seized by the police (like a 37.20% THC seizure that topped their list for the quarter.)

Which is all quite a fascinating argument except for one small detail: marijuana’s potency is irrelevant.

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This last weekend was my first time in Aspen, Colorado.  My flight took me from Portland to Denver, then there was a 90-minute layover, and then onto the prop plane that would jump us from Denver to Aspen.

Problem was that the weather in Aspen was unforgivably rainy and cloudy that day.  We approached the Aspen runway, then pulled up, circled, approached again, pulled up, and then went back to Denver, for the pilot had no safe possible landing in Aspen.  After getting off the plane and back on to it, we flew to Aspen again, approached the airstrip again, pulled up and circled again.  I was beginning to contemplate where I was going to spend the night when we flew back to Denver again when the pilot finally got a clearance and we landed.

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Sometimes I find the most interesting marijuana articles.  This one comes from Bermuda where they are having trouble recruiting players for their national cricket team because of the ban on marijuana.

We need to get players to stop smoking weed
If we really want to increase the number of players available for the national team and get guys into training, we need to do something about the drug problem in this country.

We’ve heard more talk this week about the number of players not turning out for the national squad and as someone who has been around cricket my whole life I can tell you the biggest problem is marijuana.

If we could stop people smoking weed we would have triple the amount of players available.

It’s a serious social issue and it’s something we really need to address. If you can’t give up marijuana to play for your country and reach the pinnacle of your sport then you have a serious, serious problem.

Here’s a thought: how about removing the ban on marijuana?  It’s not as if you could call it a performance-enhancing drug.  If you can’t give up prying into your citizens’ private lives to determine their urine fit to play for your country, then maybe you just don’t get to field a decent cricket team.

Mendocino voters repeal lenient pot policy
Mendocino County relinquished its crown as the nation’s epicenter of pot leniency Tuesday, with voters decisively approving a hotly contested measure to limit residents to six plants apiece under the state’s medicinal pot law.

With 85.5 percent of precincts reporting, Measure B had already locked up an unbeatable 55.5 percent of the vote. The measure - which repealed an initiative approved by county voters eight years ago allowing residents to grow as many as 25 pot plants for personal use - needed majority approval to pass.

Other jurisdictions in the United States allow more plants, but they are generally confined to a specific space and must be used medically. Under the eight-year-old Mendocino regulations, the 25 allowable plants can grow as large and thick as possible, and be used as the owner wishes.

When the county’s regulations passed as Measure G in 2000, proponents said the rules would simply codify what had been happening for decades in the county - massive pot growth that made Mendocino part of Northern California’s renowned “Emerald Triangle.”

The generous standards made it easier for people to grow pot to be used as pain-relief medicine, advocates say. But many residents and law enforcement officials complain that the standards were abused by people growing hundreds of plants at home for commercial sale.

There’s only one problem with the passage of Measure B: it restores the limit of plants for medical users as determined by Senate Bill 420, which is six plants and eight ounces. However, that language has just been ruled unconstitutional by a California appeals court. According to attorney Omar Figueroa, there currently is no official “limit” for California medical marijuana patients; each patient’s reasonable amount of medical marijuana would have to be determined on a case-by-case basis.

Given this development, Measure B is moot regarding medical users. Measure G had also allowed 25 plants for personal (recreational) use; that is now repealed, but it was never legally in force anyway, since both California and United States law ban the growing of cannabis for personal use.

Cannabis increases risk of psychosis in teens - Telegraph
Teenage cannabis users are more likely to suffer psychotic symptoms and have a greater risk of developing schizophrenia in later life, research has found.

Among more than 6,000 youngsters interviewed for the largest study of its kind, users of the drug had a higher average number of symptoms associated with a risk of psychosis.

These included feeling like something strange or inexplicable was taking place, suspecting they were being influenced or followed and difficulty in controlling the speed of thoughts.

Researchers also found that those who took cannabis in adolescence had a greater risk of developing schizophrenia than older users of the drug.

The teenagers, aged 15 and 16, were asked about their drug use before their risk of developing a psychotic disorder was assessed by experts.

More than 5 per cent said they had used cannabis once or more, and one in 100 had used cannabis more than five times. Girls were more likely to take the drug than boys.

The study, carried out by a team at the University of Oulu in Finland, is published on Monday in the British Journal of Psychiatry.

Dr Jouko Miettunen, who led the research said: “These teenagers are likely to be vulnerable to the mental effects, which means they are probably vulnerable to developing psychosis at some point.”

Once again, we have to agree that teenagers shouldn’t use marijuana.  There is evidence that the developing adolescent brain can be negatively affected by cannabis use.

That said, these symptoms that are associated with psychosis risk - that association was discovered in non-drug-using populations, right?  I mean, if you have never used cannabis, and you felt something strange was happening or couldn’t control the speed of your thoughts, then you’d be considered at risk for psychosis.

But what if these “symptoms” are just the natural by-product of what some of us call the “mind expansion” from using cannabis?  What if early cannabis users do have “speedy thoughts” or feelings of being followed, but then that never leads to full-blown psychosis?  Maybe inexplicable feelings and a bit of paranoia are as far as it progresses?

OK, it’s time to announce the winners in this month’s Pass the Stash contest. I asked you to send me your story, in 420 words or less, about the first time you ever got high. The prize is your own copy of the DVD “Totally Baked”, autographed by Brian Johnson, lead singer of AC/DC and executive producer of the film. I received a ton of entries*, thanks everyone who sent me an email.

Our Grand Prize Winner is Tom D.

“Get yourself a can of soda”, Dave said before we rode our bikes out to the railroad tracks. I watched as he turned the empty can into a pipe, which he then “packed”. After a quick lesson in how to use it, we both smoked up. I didn’t feel anything at first, so we smoked another. Still, I didn’t feel much of anything, so we smoked another… and another… and that was all the bud he had. So, we left and I followed him back down the dark, dimly lit street. He was having fun riding all over the street, swerving from one side to the other. Then, I heard the sound of a car behind me, so I shouted out to him, “car!” He pulled over to the right, then looked back and said “There ain’t no car!” I looked back and realized he was right… strange, I must have been hearing things. We rode on, and Dave went back to weaving all over the street, then I heard a car coming up behind us once again. “Car!” I shouted to Dave. He turned around, looked back at me, and said, “Dude, you are so high!” As soon as he said that, at that very moment, I realized for the first time… “whoa, I *AM* high!”

Check out the rest of the top three in the Full Story

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WOODTV.com & WOOD TV8: Grand Rapids news, weather, sports and video | Mich. court lets police use dogs to sniff outside of home
LANSING, Mich. — Police don’t need to obtain a search warrant before using dogs to sniff outside a house for drugs, the Michigan Court of Appeals has ruled.

The 2-1 decision released Wednesday was a setback for Jeffrey Jones of Detroit, who was charged after a police dog detected drugs inside his home by sniffing outside the front door. Police used that information to obtain a search warrant to enter the residence, where they found marijuana and a gun.

A Wayne County judge suppressed the evidence and threw out the case, ruling that the dog sniffing was an illegal search similar to using a thermal-imaging device.

The appeals court disagreed.

Judges E. Thomas Fitzgerald and William Murphy, citing U.S. Supreme Court cases, said a canine sniff is not a search as defined under Fourth Amendment law. They also said there is no reasonable expectation of privacy at the entrance to property that is open to the public, including the front porch of a home.

A dissenting judge said the ruling erodes the privacy protections and the sanctity of the home guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution’s Fourth Amendment.

First of all, it should be noted that drug-sniffing dogs are incredibly unreliable. Second of all, in American justice, we have the right to question our accusers. How exactly do you question a dog?

Another sad erosion of our civil liberties, all in the name of finding out of people are growing a plant in the privacy of their own home, a home our Founders once believed was a man’s castle. We’ve grown accustomed to cameras in every public venue, numerous compulsory demands for our Social Security numbers, and terabytes of personal data instantly accessible on the Internet. Now even our homes aren’t safe from olfactory intrusion by dogs, thermal imaging and sonic imaging that sees right through our walls, and helicopters surveilling our property.

I don’t think that’s what they meant by:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Pot industry ranks second in GDP contribution
A B.C. magazine now places the province’s marijuana industry in second place for its contribution to the B.C. gross domestic project.

BC Business magazine said recently that it now is in second place ahead of the forest sector and behind construction.

Forest Minister Rich Coleman reacted to the announcement by saying, “There’s nothing a ministry can do to change a marketplace.”

BC Business places the provincial marijuana industry at $7.5-billion with a labour force of over 250,000.

Eric Nash of Valley-based cannabis company, Island Harvest, reacted to the news by saying, “More than 156,000 people in British Columbia use marijuana for health purposes. Thousands of unemployed B.C. forest workers could become gainfully employed in the well-established cannabis industry.”

Island Harvest has been distributing and selling medical marijuana to customers for the past six years under federal licensing from Ottawa.

Wendy Little, his partner in Island Harvest, added, “Provincially licensed operations in B.C. have been supplying marijuana to thousands of people for over 10 years now. It’s time to integrate cannabis sensibly into our economy.”

Legally-licenced growers, Little and Nash have called upon the B.C. government to implement provincial policy and declare the cannabis production sector a renewable and sustainable health based industry to create employment and economic growth.

The economics of marijuana and hemp are likely to be the deciding factors in overturning adult marijuana prohibition in North America.  With farmers needing a cash crop, drivers needing biodiesel fuels, people needing affordable medicines, the world needing sustainable food and ecologically-friendly fiber crops, and governments straining to balance budgets, the prohibition of cannabis will soon become a money-losing proposition, even compared to the profits some industries make from prohibition.

Middle class relaxing with marijuana
A variety of middle-class people are making a conscious but careful choice to use marijuana to enhance their leisure activities, a University of Alberta study shows.

A qualitative study of 41 Canadians surveyed in 2005-06 by U of A researchers showed that there is no such thing as a ‘typical’ marijuana user, but that people of all ages are selectively lighting up the drug as a way to enhance activities ranging from watching television and playing sports to having sex, painting or writing.

The study was published recently in the journal Substance Use and Misuse.

The focus was on adult users who were employed, ranging in age from 21 to 61, including 25 men and 16 women from Alberta, Quebec, Ontario and Newfoundland whose use of the drug ranged from daily to once or twice a year. They were predominantly middle class and worked in the retail and service industries, in communications, as white-collar employees, or as health-care and social workers. As well, 68 per cent of the users held post-secondary degrees, while another 11 survey participants had earned their high school diplomas.

The study also found that the participants considered themselves responsible users of the drug, defined by moderate use in an appropriate social setting and not allowing it to cause harm to others.

The findings should open the way for further scientific exploration into widespread use of marijuana, and government policies should move towards decriminalization and eventual legalization of the drug, the study recommends.

The cannabis community is a minority group that spans all social, economic, religious, racial, and national boundaries.  There is no “typical” marijuana user any more than there is a “typical” oxygen breather.

Canadian Majority Would Legalize Marijuana: Angus Reid Global Monitor
Adults in Canada believe the consumption of cannabis should be allowed in their country, according to a poll by Angus Reid Strategies. 53 per cent of respondents support the legalization of marijuana.

Less than 10 per cent of respondents believe other drugs—such as ecstasy, powder cocaine, heroin, crack cocaine and crystal meth—should be legalized.

In July 2002, Canada became the first nation in the world to regulate the consumption of cannabis for medical reasons. In the 2004 federal election, the Marijuana party—which seeks the outright legalization of the substance—received 0.3 per cent of the popular vote.

In November 2004, the Canadian federal government—headed at the time by Liberal prime minister Paul Martin—re-introduced a controversial bill that sought “alternate penalty frameworks” for the possession of small amounts of marijuana. The bill, which would have allowed any person caught with 15 grams of the drug or less to face fines instead of criminal charges, was never put to a vote in the House of Commons.

Earlier this month, Debbie Stultz-Giffin—a member of Maritimers United for Medical Marijuana—urged the current administration to abandon its proposal to authorize a mandatory six-month prison sentence for marijuana growers, adding, “With the federal government talking about pulling exemption holders grow permits and forcing us to buy our marijuana from the government, it’s going to put a lot of medical marijuana patients in a precarious situation.”

I believe we are close to reaching the tipping point where a majority of North Americans favor the legalization, or at least decriminalization, or marijuana.  It looks like Canada is there already, and I know we’re close to that here on the West Coast.  Soon, as more stalwart drug warriors are swept out of Congress and statehouses in the upcoming election, I believe that younger, more liberal officials will take their place.  As our representatives begin to match the population that has come of age with legal medical marijuana and a more relaxed cultural attitude toward cannabis, I believe that we will see the end of adult marijuana prohibition in my lifetime.

I will never say that smoking marijuana makes you stupid.  However, some stupid people do smoke marijuana.  You’d think most people wouldn’t need to be told that you shouldn’t bring your stash to a courtroom, but then again, this is a country where we have to place “dramatization” disclaimers on flying cars in TV ads so people won’t sue when their new ride won’t fly.

It’s only an added bonus that this story comes from one of the seventeen or so places in North America named after my ancestors.

Authorities to courthouse’s visitors: Leave drugs at home — – chicagotribune.com
BELLEVILLE, Ill. - Visitors to St. Clair County’s courthouse are being put on notice that bringing drugs into the building isn’t a bright idea.

Three people have been arrested at the Belleville courthouse in less than a week after they allegedly were found to be carrying drugs at a security checkpoint.

Sheriff’s officials say bailiff Josh Pea arrested a man Monday who was carrying marijuana in one of his pockets. The man was charged with misdemeanor marijuana possession.

Last Wednesday, Pea nabbed a man who swallowed a bag of suspected cocaine he refused to turn over the bailiff. That man was charged with obstructing a peace officer.

The next day, Pea arrested another man at the checkpoint who was also carrying marijuana.

The Marijuana Express Card.  Don’t leave home with it!  And for crying out loud, don’t take it to court with you!  Next week, Damon Stoudamire and Michael Vick explain why marijuana and airports usually don’t mix.

The Associated Press: 75 students arrested in San Diego State University drug bust
SAN DIEGO (AP) — Dozens of San Diego State University students were arrested and six fraternities were suspended after a sweeping drug investigation found that some fraternity members openly dealt drugs and one even sent a mass text message advertising cocaine, authorities said Tuesday.

A five-month investigation prompted by a cocaine overdose death last year led to the arrests of 96 people, 75 of them San Diego State students. A second drug death occurred while the investigation went on.

Twenty-nine people were arrested early Tuesday in raids at nine locations including the Theta Chi fraternity, where agents found cocaine, Ecstasy and three guns. Eighteen of them were wanted on warrants for selling to undercover agents.

Two kilograms of cocaine were seized in all, along with 350 Ecstasy pills, marijuana, psychedelic mushrooms, hash oil, methamphetamine, illicit prescription drugs, several guns and at least $60,000 in cash, authorities said.

The district attorney’s office said search warrants were served in San Diego and suburban La Mesa, including the Theta Chi fraternity house and several apartments.

A member of Theta Chi sent out a mass text message to his “faithful customers” stating that he and his “associates” would be unable to sell cocaine while they were in Las Vegas over one weekend, according to the DEA. The text promoted a cocaine “sale” and listed the reduced prices.

San Diego State suspended Theta Chi and five other fraternities Tuesday pending a hearing on evidence gathered during the investigation. Members of at least three fraternities were arrested, according to law enforcement.

Investigators infiltrated seven fraternities in the course of the probe.

The undercover probe, dubbed Operation Sudden Fall, was sparked by the cocaine overdose death of a student in May 2007, authorities said. As the investigation continued, another student, from Mesa College, died Feb. 26 of a cocaine overdose at an SDSU fraternity house, the DEA said.

OK, first of all, anyone who would send out a mass text message advertising to sell cocaine should have his scholarships and grant money revoked and given to a student with with some sense.  Advertising one’s felonies through traceable mass electronic communication doesn’t sound like the work of someone with stellar SATs.

However, are 75 arrests really required here?  As we know, every one of those students, if convicted, will lose all federal student financial aid.  They will have a drug conviction on their records for life as they enter the job marketplace.  Surely, not all 75 of these arrests are for the kingpins of this enterprise.  There was no violence involved.  Isn’t this a bit of overkill?

Nobody wants college kids dying from cocaine overdoses.  One of the reasons we lobby so hard for the end of adult marijuana prohibition is that it removes marijuana from the cohort of really dangerous illegal drugs and provides young people with the safest choice of recreational intoxicant.  It’s sad that two kids died from cocaine, but how many students every year die from alcohol overdoses?  When are the feds initiating a massive undercover probe to root out underaged drinking on campuses?

Just catching up on some of the reports from the March this weekend:

Close to 500 protesters took to the streets [of Calgary, Alberta, Canada] Saturday in favour of marijuana’s medicinal use and making it more accessible to those suffering debilitating pain.

Amid the incense aromas and reggae beats, several hundred Austinites rallied at the Capitol on Saturday for the legalization of marijuana for personal and medical use.

Rolling out at high noon May 3, the Ninth Annual Million Marijuana March smoked through downtown Portland as part of Oregon NORML’s protest of pot prohibition and to support the use of medicinal marijuana through Oregon’s sometimes controversial Medical Marijuana Act.

“These guys are easy compared to the anarchists,” said Sgt. Voepel of the Portland Police Department, “they’re on time, and they’re orderly.”

According to the Sarge, the only rabble rousers during the march were two drunkards who were pestering people but were unconnected to the peaceful pro-pot gatherers. No pot smokers were spotted.

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Just stopping in for a second… the March in Portland was fantastic.  Police estimated 750 people marching, and we had three local TV stations covering us, with a different member of the Board of Directors of Oregon NORML (myself on the CBS affiliate) quoted in the report.  They gave us favorable coverage, especially of our announcement of the Oregon Cannabis Tax Act (OCTA) for 2010, our initiative to tax and regulate cannabis for adults and sell through Oregon liquor stores.

Audio and video coming soon… but I’m on my way to the after-party concert with Los Marijuanos, Chief Greenbud, and more.

Hollywood gets political with its stoner movies
Pot, stalk and smoking pipe barrels. Devil weed. Mary Jane. Playing twister. Reefer. No matter what you call it, cannabis continues to spark debate in popular culture. More than 70 years into the drug’s prohibition at the hands of U.S. lawmakers, it seems Hollywood is ready to blow smoke in the face of current policy.

The proof can be seen in a new crop of films that don’t just depict glassy-eyed potheads giggling at moronic gags in the tradition of Cheech and Chong, but go much further, suggesting pot as the symbolic cure for personal and cultural oppression.

Cheech and Chong’s Up in Smoke (1978) was the first film to show rampant pot use without exacting a moral price for all that fun, offering an emotional and cultural antidote to overt anti-drug films such as Reefer Madness.

Around the same time Cheech and Chong started their big screen puffing, the American government banned the word “hemp” from all school text books, insisting any mention of the once powerful hemp industry (predicted to be the No. 1 crop in the U.S. by Popular Mechanics in 1938) would only confuse youngsters who didn’t understand the difference between useful hemp fibre and the combustible of choice among teens.

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