From our good friend, Chris Goldstein, creator of “The Norml Daily Audio Stash”, here is some good news about my home state.
examiner Because of the two-year cycle of the Pennsylvania General Assembly the medical marijuana bills are expected to be re-introduced soon. Advocates and legislators are also talking about some interesting changes.
PA saw medical marijuana legislation introduced for the first time in 2009 by Rep. Mark B. Cohen of Philadelphia. In 2010 Senator Daylin Leach introduced the concurrent bill in upper chamber.
The PA House Health and Human Services Committee held two important public hearings in Harrisburg and in Pittsburgh. Patients, physicians, advocates, religious leaders and even former law enforcement officers testified in favor of medical marijuana.
This week the Board of Directors at the non-profit advocacy group Pennsylvanians for Medical Marijuana (PA4MMJ) held a conference call with Rep. Cohen to look at the effort for 2011.
During the call Rep. Cohen emphasized his commitment to re-introducing the bill this year and the group also discussed some alterations to the language.
Cohen continues to be a strong champion for the issue in PA, commenting on his Facebook page today:
“Changes in the bill will include naming the act after former Pennsylvania Governor Raymond P. Shafer, a leading critic of federal drug policies…”
Shafer, a Republican, was appointed by President Nixon to oversee a blue-ribbon commission to study marijuana. In 1972 the panel of experts concluded that personal marijuana use and possession should not be criminal. They also found that marijuana did not belong in Schedule I of the federal Controlled Substances Act. *
President Nixon ignored his own commission’s recommendation. Marijuana has remained in Schedule I since 1970. Each state has a drug scheduling system to match the federal code. Two states, Iowa and Oregon, have moved marijuana to Schedule II.
There are also suggestions that provisions to re-schedule marijuana, at the state level, be included into the Pennsylvania medical cannabis legislation.
A major shift for the issue in PA is the change in Governor. Ed Rendell would have likely signed a medical marijuana bill if it passed. But the newly elected Tom Corbett (the former state Attorney General) has voiced opposition to the issue.
When Frankin&Marshall University conducted the most recent polling on the topic last year that showed a whopping 80% of state residents support the medical marijuana bill.
It took over five years to pass legislation in New Jersey. Patients and advocates are striving for a less protracted fight in the Keystone State.
Further updates on the status of medical marijuana in PA are expected soon – more info at www.pa4mmj.org
Rep. Cohen’s medical marijuana page - http://www.pahouse.com/Cohen/med_marijuana_info.asp
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Hey what you doing in about 45minutes?….
I have lost both legs and one eye to diabetes and cannot drink alcohol but smoking hasn’t hurt me yet. Legalize it and make my life a whole lot easier.
It’s time to give the people of Pennsylvania real medicine.
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[...] the direction that they are just now starting talks. This article is from 2 days ago, March 2nd. PA: Medical marijuana bill warming up for 2011 | The NORML Stash Blog examiner Because of the two-year cycle of the Pennsylvania General Assembly the medical marijuana [...]
Alcohol prohibition in the US run from 1919 to 1933 – Now google ‘The Great Wall Street Crash’ and see when that happened!
During alcohol prohibition, all profits went to enrich thugs and criminals. Young men died every day on inner-city streets while battling over turf. A fortune was wasted on enforcement that could have gone on education etc. On top of the budget-busting prosecution and incarceration costs, billions in taxes were lost. Finally the economy collapsed. Sound familiar?
http://1929crash.com/
China has recently been in negotiation with a number of countries, asking them to replace the Dollar with the Chinese Yuan as their reserve currency. This, when it happens, will remove the Federal Government’s ability to keep printing cash to cover the trillions it costs to fund prohibition. It’ll mean true freedom but the transition period may well bring consequences that are far more horrific than a slasher movie. — It never had to be this way; we should have learned our lesson from studying the mayhem that alcohol prohibition wreaked on us.
We all have our victories and defeats as regards fear, but most of us strive not to let fear rule our hearts or our minds. Being free means being free to live and love as if death and fear had no power over us. Freedom also means that we have an ethical and moral responsibility to expose blind hate, lies and ignorance by shining eternal light, truth and love, sending such dark forces fleeing to the shadows from whence they came.
We explore outer space with various forms of space craft, but many choose to explore inner space via nature’s abundant chemistry – an infinite journey into the heart of God. Whatever, we are here to explore this glorious universe. The Prohibitionist’s brand of hateful, choking pseudo-Conservatism is the antithesis of all that. Like a lion who cannot grasp that he can do more than walk in a circle the size of the cage he’s recently been freed from, the prohibitionist is incapable of exploration beyond the boundaries of his own fear, prejudice and loathing. We are all free to choose how we walk our own path, but when we choose to go beyond this by supporting drug-war demagoguery, to the point of even threatening others with imprisonment and physical violence, we loose the right to expect any form of respect from the once free and prosperous society that we are helping to totally destroy.
Thanks to prohibition we’re about to lose all semblance of that once ordered, prosperous and safe society. Myself, along with many others, have been debating prohibitionists on this for many years. We have shown what destruction prohibition has wrought on all the civil institutions of this once great nation, -we’ve always provided facts and statistics – they, the prohibitionists, have countered with either lies, personal abuse or even serious threats of violence.
Ending the insanity of drug prohibition by legalized regulation, respecting the rights of the responsible users and focusing on addiction as a sickness, like we do with alcohol and tobacco, may save what remains of our economy and civil institutions along with countless lives and livelihoods. Prohibition continues unabated for shameful political reasons. It cannot, and never will, reduce drug use or addiction.
Prohibition has permanently scarred our national character as well as our individual psyches. Our national policies and cultural practices have become pervaded by the fascistic, prohibitionist mind-set which has turned our domestic police force into a bunch of paramilitary thugs who often commit extra-judicial beatings and executions while running roughshod over our rights in order to “protect us from ourselves”.
When we eventually manage to put the horrors of this toxic moronothon behind us, we’ll need to engage in some very deep and honest soul-searching as to what we want to be as a nation. Many of our freedoms have been severely circumscribed or lost altogether, our economy has been trashed and our international reputation for being “free and fair” has been dragged through a putrid sewer by vicious narrow-minded drug warrior zealots who are ignorant of abstract concepts such as truth, justice and decency. We’ll need to make sure that such a catastrophe is never ever repeated. This may mean that public hearings or tribunals will be held where those who’ve been the instigators and cheerleaders of this abomination will have to answer for their serious crimes against our once prosperous and proud nation.
Each day you remain silent, you help to destroy the Constitution, fill the prisons with our children, and empower terrorists and criminals worldwide while wasting hundreds of billions of your own tax dollars. Prohibition bears many strong and startling similarities to Torquemada’s inquisition, it’s supporters are servants of tyranny and hate. If you’re aware of but not enraged by it’s shear waste and cruel atrocities then both your heart and soul must surely be dead.
Prohibition engendered black market profits are obscenely huge. Remove this and you remove the ability to bribe or threaten any government official or even whole governments. The argument that legalized regulation won’t severely cripple organized crime is truly bizarre. Of course, the bad guys won’t just disappear, but if you severely diminish their income, you also severely diminish their power. The proceeds from theft, extortion, pirated goods etc. are a drop in the ocean compared to what can be earned by selling prohibited/unregulated drugs in a black market estimated to be worth 400,000 million dollars. Without the lure and power of so much easy capital, it’s also very unlikely that new criminal enterprises will ever fill the void left by those you successfully disrupt or entirely eradicate.
Millions of fearless North Africans have recently shown us that recognizing oppression also carries the weight of responsibility to act upon and oppose that oppression. Prohibition is a vicious anti-constitutional assault on ALL American citizens by a criminally insane and dysfunctional government, which left unchallenged will end with the destruction of the entire nation.
“I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country… Corporations have bee enthroned, an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money-power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until the wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed.”
– Abraham Lincoln, November 12, 1864
Marijuana is the safest drug with actual benefits for the user as opposed to alcohol which is dangerous, causes addiction, birth defects, and affects literally every organ in the body. Groups are organizing all over the country to speak their minds on reforming pot laws. I drew up a very cool poster for the cause which you can check out on my artist’s blog at http://dregstudiosart.blogspot.com/2011/01/vote-teapot-2011.html Drop in and let me know what you think!
Yeah Bob!
Good Luck!