Five of the last eight people to get the major party nomination for president have been admitted pot smokers (Clinton, Gore, Kerry, Bush, & Obama)

Hey, Stashers, join me in giving a warm welcome to our new intern here at the Stash, Amanda.  She will be handling the “Politicians on Pot” series here at the Stash.  That’s where we take the constituent letters our congressmembers and senators send to cannabis consumers when we ask for their support of marijuana regulation, decriminalization, or medical use.

If you’d like to do your part to end prohibition, write three letters: one for both of your senators and one for your elected representative.  When they reply to you, send us that reply to stash@norml.org and we’ll post it on the Stash so everyone in the nation knows where your reps stand on marijuana issues.

And yes, Amanda is earning college credit while helping end marijuana prohibition.  You can, too!  Just send me an email with the subject “Intern Application” to learn how you can earn credit while devoting time to something you love.  (Warning: We do have a drug test… but the good news is, it’s multiple choice.)

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Thank you for contacting me regarding our nation’s criminal justice system. I appreciate hearing from you, and I welcome the chance to respond. As a former prosecutor, I fought to appropriately punish those who violated our laws. The fact is, however, that more than seven million Americans are currently under criminal justice supervision, and many of these offenders are guilty of only nonviolent drug crimes. The rate of incarcerated drug offenders has soared by 1200% since 1980. Too many of these former offenders reenter our communities without the substance abuse treatment and basic life skills needed to contribute to society, and two-thirds are rearrested for a felony or serious misdemeanor within three years of their release. This pace is unsustainable; it is destroying our communities and wasting taxpayer dollars. We need to create a judicial system that provides equal and fair verdicts, as well as a humane incarnation and reentry system that truly emphasizes the rehabilitation of those who will be released.

Last year Congress passed, and the President signed into law, the Second Chance Act. This law created programs that combine intensive parole supervision with job training, substance abuse treatment, and other support services to help high-risk offenders become productive citizens. Now we need to follow through by funding the Second Chance Act’s programs and ensuring they are properly implemented.

The Second Chance Act was an important step in the right direction, but more reform is needed. That is why I am cosponsoring the National Criminal Justice Commission Act of 2009 (S.714). This legislation would create and authorize a commission to conduct a top-to-bottom review of our nation’s criminal justice system and offer concrete recommendations for reform. S.714 has been referred to the Committee on Judiciary. White I do not serve on this committee, I will bear your comments in mind should it be considered by the Senate.

Again, thank you for sharing your concerns with me. It is a privilege to represent you. Please do not hesitate to contact me in the future regarding other matters of interest or concern.

All best,
Senator Claire McCaskill

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Thank you for contacting me with your views on marijuana. I appreciate your comments, and I welcome this opportunity to update you on the status of this legislation.

According to the National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH), marijuana remains the most commonly used illicit drug in the United States. While marijuana use is generally unhealthy and has negative social repercussions, it also serves as a gateway drug to more dangerous substance abuse. For these reasons, I remain concerned by the prevalence of drug abuse in our culture and the harmful consequences that are the result of this behavior.

As a career law enforcement officer, I saw firsthand the devastating effects that illicit drug use can have on both individuals and communities. While a member of the Vanderburgh County Sheriff’s Office, I initiated the Drug Abuse Resistance Effort (DARE) program to make children aware of the dangers posed by drug use. I made fighting drugs a top priority within the department and I will continue to do so in the United States Congress.

As you know, Congressman Barney Frank of Massachusetts introduced legislation regarding marijuana use, H.R. 2835, on June 6, 2009. This legislation would limit the penalties for possessing small amounts of marijuana. Specifically, it would prohibit federal penalties for the possession of marijuana for personal use or for any not-for-profit transfer of marijuana. Possession of more than 100 grams of marijuana, or the transfer of more than 1 gram, would remain illegal. Shortly after its introduction, H.R. 2835 was referred to the House Judiciary Committee and House Energy and Commerce Committee. While I am not a member of either committee, be assured I will keep your views in mind should this legislation come before the House for consideration.

Thanks again for taking the time to share your views with me. If you would like to learn more about my positions on issues important to you or receive regular updates on developments in Congress, please visit my Online Office at www.ellsworth.house.gov and sign up for my e-Newsletter.

Sincerely,
Brad Ellsworth

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Thank you for contacting me to share your support for legalizing marijuana. I appreciate hearing from you on this important issue.

I have given much thought to this matter over the years. I do not support the decriminalization if marijuana or any other controlled substance. I have been open to considering changes to the Controlled Substance Act which would permit the dispensing of tetrahydrocannabinols (THC) to assist individuals in chronic pain or with other medical conditions, and I have been supportive of research to do just that. I believe this position strikes a careful balance between Oregonians’ decision to allow the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes while maintaining control over a substance which I believe is ultimately harmful to our society.

Over the years, I have been called upon to vote on measures that would affect the legal status of marijuana. One such vote was on an amendment to the Commerce, Justice, and Science Appropriations bill of 2007, popularly called the Hinchey Amendment. This amendment would have prohibited the federal government from prosecuting individuals who use marijuana for medicinal purposes in states where such use is legal under state law, including Oregon. Not only do such federal actions apply to Oregonians’ decision to allow limited medicinal use of this drug, they may also have an impact on Oregon’s death with dignity law, which I strongly support. I have done my best to make sure Congress does not trample on Oregonians’ rights. For this reason, while I remain concerned with the potential for abuse in the distribution of this controlled substance, I did vote for the Hinchey Amendment. However, the amendment failed by a vote of 165-262. I maintain my support for this effort and will vote for such an amendment again should it be offered.

While you and I may disagree on the overarching matter of marijuana legalization, I appreciate you sharing your thoughts with me and I will keep them in mind when considering future legislation.

Again, thank you for contacting me. Should you have further questions or comments, please call my Oregon office at 503-326-2901 or 800-422-4003. If you would like to receive my email newsletter, visit www.house.gov/wu to sign up.

With warm regards,
David Wu
Member of Congress

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Thank you for contacting me about the Act to Remove Federal Penalties for the Personal Use of Marijuana by Responsible Adults. As you know, this bill would prohibit any imposition of penalties for the possession of marijuana for personal use or for the not-for-profit transfer between adults of marijuana for personal use and deems personal possession as 100 grams or less of the substance.

This bill would effectively legalize marijuana at the federal level. We all know the painful consequences of drug abuse on our society. For that reason alone I will not support such a measure and I will vote against it should it reach the House floor.

I do take your views into consideration as I decide how to vote in the House. Please feel free to express those views; even if we may occasionally disagree, it is important to me to know your thoughts. Do be aware that because of mail security measures for Congress, your letters can be delayed for up to two weeks. If you wish to offer an immediate comment or suggestion, you can e-mail my office at by going directly to my website at www.fallin.house.gov. While you are there, feel free to sign up for my regular e-newsletter.

Rep. Mary Fallin

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I am so excited to break the news that we have four new contributors to help bring you the Daily Audio Stash!  In response to my call for volunteer music editors I received a lot of applications and picked from the best of them to give you our new lineup:

These fine Stashers will be finding the best 420-friendly music on the web and bringing it to us each week.  You already know me and Cannabis Karri.  Sahra Kant joins us from Massachusetts; I met her up at the Boston Freedom Rally this year.  Johnny Reeferseed’s music has been featured on the Stash before.  And John Doe is the man behind John Doe Radio, another fine internet podcast.

But just because we have music editors that doesn’t mean you can’t still be involved.  If you have a band or have found a tune that you think should be on the Stash, just email it to me at stash@norml.org and I’ll pass it along to our editors.

Also join me in welcoming Amanda Bannon to our lienup of contributors.  Amanda is getting college credit as an intern working for me in NORML Chapter Outreach.  She will begin by reviving our dormant “Politicians on Pot” series, where you send us the replies you get from your elected officials when you write to them about ending marijuana prohibition.  If you haven’t written to your elected officials, visit our Take Action center and get started.  Now that the AMA has reversed its position on smoked cannabis as medicine, many of these congresspeople will need to update their form letter!  Write your congressperson and send that reply back to us at stash@norml.org.

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By DUANE SCHRAG/Salina Journal

Allowing the use of marijuana (or cannabis), even for medicinal purposes, doesn’t appear to have much support among public officials in Kansas. Locally, Saline County Sheriff Glen Kochanowski said he believes relaxing the rules would be ill-advised. Saline County Attorney Ellen Mitchell, who was deep into preparing for the third murder trial of Cameron Nelson, expressed skepticism. Salina Police Chief Jim Hill didn’t return a call seeking comment.

And Kansas Attorney General Steven Six said he would oppose it if the Legislature ever brought it up.

“The use of marijuana can lead to the use of other harder, more serious, drugs,” he said in an e-mail, via a spokesperson.

Ah, the old Gateway Theory.  Somebody send Attorney General Six a copy of the 1999 Institute of Medicine report, please, which found concluded that marijuana was not a “gateway drug to the extent that it is a cause or even that it is the most significant predictor of serious drug abuse,” a finding which has been echoed by a 2001 American Journal of Public Health report, a 2002 study by RAND, a 2002 Canadian Senate study, and a 2006 University of Pittsburgh study.

Or just offer the common sense observation that while nearly every heroin and cocaine user first tried pot, nearly every pot user doesn’t try heroin or cocaine.  There are now 102 million Americans age 12 and older who have tried marijuana, yet there are only 2 million active cocaine users and 350,000 active heroin users.

Read the rest of this entry by clicking here

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NORML Board's George Rohrbacher speaks from Main Stage at Seattle Hempfest

(Seattle Times) ONCE again, the Seattle Hempfest drew tens of thousands to parks along the waterfront this weekend. In its mission statement, the all-volunteer organization that produces the event says, “The public is better served when citizens and public officials work cooperatively in order to successfully accomplish common goals.”

We agree. That is why we, as a Democratic state senator and former Republican state representative, support state Senate Bill 5615. This bill would reclassify adult possession of marijuana from a crime carrying a mandatory day in jail to a civil infraction imposing a $100 penalty payable by mail. The bill was voted out of committee with a bipartisan “do pass” recommendation and will be considered by legislators in 2010.

The bill makes a lot of sense, especially in this time of severely strapped budgets. Our state Office of Financial Management reported annual savings of $16 million and $1 million in new revenue if SB 5615 passes. Of that $1 million, $590,000 would be earmarked for the Washington State Criminal Justice Treatment Account to increase support of our underfunded drug-treatment and drug-prevention services….

What?  Two politicians are mentioning Hempfest in their opening to support marijuana decriminalization?  I thought all those tie-dyes onstage turned those kinds of people off.

Still, decriminalization must be just an incremental step toward full legalization.  With decrim, you are just legalizing the end consumer, but not the producer and distributor of the marijuana.  While law enforcement and court resources may be saved from no longer busting personal use, there will still be raids on those who grow and sell, which still keeps the prices high, still keeps the Mexican cartels in business, still promotes clandestine grows on public land, and still promotes violence.

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Here is the letter one Stasher sent to Rep. Tommy Benton of Georgia regarding his remarks that we should resort to Singapore-style caning of marijuana users and execution of marijuana dealers:

Representative Benton,

I am concerned with a comment you recently made to a constituent about your opposition to legalizing marijuana. If correct, while you state that you oppose the legalization of marijuana, you were quoted as adding that you “think we should go to caning for people caught using and maybe execute dealers.”

As a resident of Georgia for 24 years, I find your statement extremely troubling. I would hope that as a representative of this great state, you would understand that the Constitution of the United States explicitly forbids “Cruel and Unusual Punishment”, which surely caning and execution for marijuana dealing would be considered as such. Furthermore, in Singapore, a country whose drug laws you referenced, anybody found in the locale of drug activity is guilty until proven innocent, which is in stark contrast to the Constitutional protection afforded to American citizens which makes this country so great. It is my hope that you will reconsider and recant such an un-American statement.

I support marijuana legalization, mainly because my conservative values refuse the idea that the government of the United States or the government of Georgia should claim sovereignty over any citizen’s mind or body. I support individual freedom and minimal government intervention into people’s personal lives, even though such freedom allows my fellow Georgians to reach conclusions I do not agree with and make choices that I would not make myself.

As a proud Republican of this state, I would hope that you too could analyze your conservative values and renew your support for individual freedom and small government by supporting marijuana legalization.

Respectfully,

J___ C___

DeKalb County

Representative Benton’s thoughtful and considered response?

no can do!!!!!

Tommy Benton

HD31

I’m not certain if Rep. Benton “no can do!!!!!” applies to recanting the caning statement, analyzing his conservative values, or supporting marijuana legalization.  I do know that in addition to not understanding the Constitution, Rep. Benton doesn’t understand basic English composition.

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This just in from a Georgia Stasher as part of our ongoing series called Politicians on Pot, where listeners send in replies from their elected officials regarding marijuana law reform.

Thanks for the email. We will have to agree to disagree on this and whether or not money is wasted. I am opposed to the legalization of marijuana. I think we should go to caning for people caught using and maybe execute dealers. That would solve the problem as well. That is what they do in Singapore and they don’t have a drug problem, but then they have less liberty than we do here.

Rep. Tommy Benton
tommy.benton@house.ga.gov

Isn’t it amazing how much of the Constitution an elected official is willing to throw away for the Drug War Exception?  Here’s the Wikipedia entry on Singapore’s drug laws:

The law creates a presumption of trafficking for certain threshold amounts, e.g. 30 grams of cannabis. It also creates a presumption that a person possesses drugs if he possesses the keys to a premises containing the drugs, and that “Any person found in or escaping from any place or premises which is proved or presumed to be used for the purpose of smoking or administering a controlled drug shall, until the contrary is proved, be presumed to have been smoking or administering a controlled drug in that place or premises.” Thus, one runs the risk of arrest for drug use by simply being in the company of drug users. The law also allows officers to search premises and individuals, without a search warrant, if he “reasonably suspects that there is to be found a controlled drug or article liable to seizure”.

So if you don’t mind sacrificing essential liberty, if you’re cool with cops searching you and your property on mere suspicion or being considered guilty because you happened to be in a night club where someone unknown to you got caught sniffing coke in the restroom, or if you think it’s reasonable to execute someone for possessing 1.06 ounces of pot, you can have a relatively drug-free society.

The United States per-capita rate of drug crimes is 41st out of 60 countries surveyed by NationMaster.com at 560.1 per 100,000.  Singapore ranks near the bottom at #53 with a rate almost 1/12th that of America, or 46.8 per 100,000.  Yet Spain, with its fairly liberal drug laws, ranks #56 in the survey with only 27.9 drug offenses per 100,000.  That 30 grams of cannabis that gets you the hangman’s noose in Singapore isn’t even a crime in Spain and neither is buying and selling of seeds and cultivating up to five plants.

Now, certainly you’re going to have a lower rate when many of the “crimes” aren’t being counted (Spain has similar personal possession decriminalization for other drugs as well), but does anyone think Spain has descended into chaos?  By all accounts it seems to be at least as nice a place as Singapore, even though they lock up in prisons 2.6 times fewer citizens for all crimes (per capita prisoners: Spain 146/100k (#61); Singapore 388/100k (#12)).  It is tough to compare, as Singapore is a city-state on an island and Spain and America are larger continental countries with both urban and rural areas.  However, regardless of crime rate, it is simply un-American to suggest that we should be whipping people to punish them for smoking a joint.

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