[UPDATE: Sorry, test over. It only took us a half hour to find out how bad my connection sounded. However, it was with this cheapo headset I use for Skype. I will be back tomorrow early with the full pro setup to see if it will pass. If not, we'll be back at the home studio. Thanks everyone who helped us test. -- "R"R]

I’m down here in North Portland at the World Famous Oregon NORML Cannabis Café. I’ve got the new 4G wireless connection which has been stellar in tests so far. But tonight I need to run a 2.5 hour test and I need to test multiple callers, just to put the system through a stress test.

So I’m here, at the café, testing the BlogTalkRadio platform from 7pm to 9:30pm tonight (Pacific Time, of course). It’s a test show, so nobody can hear it over the intertubes, but you can call in if you know the secret number (347-994-1810). Cannabis Karri should be along sometime as well. It won’t be a real “show”, we’ll just be hanging out and doing what you do at a cannabis café.

If you want to just sit and listen to the sounds of cannabis café and my rambling, go ahead and call in. If you want to chat, just press 1 at any time and it will signal me on the switchboard.

For extra good measure to test the wireless, I’m also streaming the gamecast of my beloved Boise State Broncos. So don’t be surprised if I suddenly yell “Touchdown!”

Download Link: Secret Stash - Register to access

Download audio file (NORML_Daily_AudioStash_2009-11-13.mp3)

Special: “Marijuana’s Cultural Moment” panel at Drug Policy Alliance Int’l Drug Policy Reform Conference

1. Moderated by “Radical” Russ Belville
2. Deborah Small – Break the Chains Executive Director
3. Rubin Whitmore – Flex Your Rights Filmmaker
4. William Lantelme – GrowRoom.net Brazil
5. Allen St. Pierre – NORML Executive Director

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Plenty more videos from Hempstalk 2009, including Jack Herer’s last speech before his heart attack, available from CRRH’s Restore Hemp channel.

It looks like it is a “go” for me to appear at the Drug Policy Alliance’s International Drug Policy Reform Conference in Albuquerque, New Mexico. It runs from Thursday, Nov. 12 through Saturday, Nov. 14, and my panel on “Marijuana’s Cultural Moment” takes place on Friday afternoon.

I still have yet to work out all the details. I’d love to set up a road trip where I give my presentations at stops along the way. I think a Boise – Salt Lake – Denver – Albuquerque – Vegas – Reno – Medford trip sounds like a lot of fun, and there are few NORML chapters along the way that could help with the organization. Would be a lot of fun… much more than flying again!

Marijuana’s Cultural Moment [Roundtable]

From Showtime’s “Weeds” to the cover of Fortune magazine, marijuana is being normalized and embraced by mainstream culture as never before. It is also an intimate part of various subcultures, artist communities, and political movements. Marijuana’s legitimacy is booming – but so are prohibitionist policies. Why is there such a schism in our society? What does American marijuana culture look like today? Where does pot culture meet pop culture? Who benefits from marijuana’s growing mainstream acceptance?

Facilitator: Russ Belville, National Outreach Coordinator, National Organization for Reform of Marijuana Laws

* Allen St. Pierre, Executive Director, National Organization for Reform of Marijuana Laws
* Deborah Small, Founder and Executive Director, Breaks the Chains, New York, NY
* Steve Bloom (invited)
* Ruben Whitmore (invited)

I love that you guys love the Stash so much that you go through withdrawals when I cannot produce them daily.  I’ve received a few emails and seen some comments to the tune of “you need more help” and “why can’t you get someone to do the Stash while you’re out of the studio”?

Really, they warm my heart, even if a couple of you get a bit demanding for your free podcast.  (You know other radio hosts require subscriptions as high at $5.95/month, right?)  It lets me know how important this part of my outreach work is.  For example, I got an email from “CMoney” who was bummed that I haven’t had many daily episodes lately and that he couldn’t catch the live shows from the conference and Boston.  Then he discovered that when he misses NORML SHOW LIVE, he doesn’t really miss it, because there is a podcast feed available through iTunes.  To date there have been 12,000+ downloads of our live feed.

More help is coming.  As we raise revenue through advertising, I will be able to bring on my LIVE co-host, Karri, to help handle some of the secretarial work of NORML Outreach to free me up for more online media work.  Please be patient and understand that we work entirely through donations and NORML’s budget is pretty tight.  Also understand that as a non-profit public advocacy organization, we can’t offer competitive salaries to acquire the talent necessary to pull off some of the stuff I’m doing; my skills would garner me twice to thrice what I’m paid now in the commercial radio / podcasting world.

I do it out of love and duty and dedication to the cause of ending adult marijuana prohibition.  I’ve made more money before but I had to be miserable to do it.  Money’s tight for your house-renting, 11-year-old-beater-car-driving podcast producer, but smiles are plentiful.

The last thing "Radical" Russ ever did...

That’s Toby “Tigerheart” Grear, 155 lb. mixed martial arts champion and me backstage on the Boston Common at the Freedom Rally September 19.  I wrote in my previous post that I was back from the NORML CON, but really, I’m back from Boston Freedom Rally, two days of working in DC and crashing at Keith Stroup’s guest bedroom, and five days of San Francisco NORML Conference.

Plenty of photos are now uploaded and face-tagged at http://picasaweb.google.com/radicalruss. It’s been good not to talk for a day.  Heading over to Urb’s place to watch the DVR of my #5 Boise State Broncos (Go Big Blue!)… Holy shit, did I read that right? #5!?! What a mensch to record my college’s game while I’m on the road?

Tomorrow, Fresh Stash with highlights from Boston and San Francisco.  Plenty of budly nugs of audio for your listening pleasure over the next two days.  Then Thursday I’m back in the air (ugh) to Madison for the Harvest Fest, so no Stash, and off to Lambeau Field on Friday, so no Stash then, either.  But on Saturday you get live audio from Madison at a time to be announced with the benefit of me figuring out some of the audio difficulties.

Any budding activists (pun intended) who would like to meet up to discuss forming NORML Chapters around N. Virginia, Washington DC, Maryland, and Delaware can meet with me tonight in the business center at the Best Western Dulles Airport at 8pm.  It is located at 45440 Holiday Drive, Sterling, VA 20166-9411.  Sorry about the late notice and the strange location, but it is the only time and place I can possibly meet people before flying out to San Francisco.

If you’ll RSVP me either by comments here or a tweet to @RadicalRuss or a txt to 888-7RADICAL before 4pm Eastern, I’ll grab you a retro NORML t-shirt just for showing up (yes… it’s a bribe! ) – just tell me your size.

Show 004: Three special episodes live from NORML National Conference!

NORML’s new talk radio program, NORML SHOW LIVE, will be streaming for three days at the 2009 NORML National Conference, “Yes We Cannabis”, live from the Grand Hyatt Hotel in San Francisco. These special three-hour episodes will be available at live.norml.org at the following special times and archived for download later just fifteen minutes after broadcast:

1. Thursday, September 24
   11:00am – 2:00pm Pacific Time
2. Friday, September 25
   11:00am – 2:00pm Pacific Time
3. Saturday, September 26
   3:00pm – 6:00pm Pacific Time

The show will be hosted by “Radical” Russ Belville, but with very limited commercial interruption and the occasional narration.  After the shows broadcast remotely in the difficult wireless environment of Portland’s Kelley Point Park and the noisy backstage of the Boston Freedom Rally, Russ is excited to present an indoor event that will take its audio directly from the conference PA system.

Thursday’s show will begin with a presentation by Dr Brooks J Kelly, Ph.D, Chief science officer for Genovations Laboratory, Cannabis Therapeutics, and then will feature panels on Individual Patients, Caregivers, and Small Patient Collectives in California and other medical marijuana states, including:

Patient and Caregiver rights under 215/SB420

• Possession: current caselaw and statutory law
• Cultivation: current caselaw and statutory law
• Transportation: current caselaw and statutory law
• Obtaining Cannabis: where and how to get it
• Patients Not Authorized to:
  distribute to other patients
  distribute “excess” to clubs
  engage in conduct harmful to others

Cannabis Patient rights (or lack thereof):

• No right to protection from employment discrimination
• No protection from Feds or other states
• Student loans
• Section 8 housing
• Small collectives: formation, cultivating, obtaining of medicine, money considerations
• Interaction with Law Enforcement

Your panelists will include Dr. David Bearman, Chris Conrad, Omar Figueroa, Esq., Zenia Gilg, Esq., Dr. Frank Lucido, and your moderator is William Panzer, Esq.

Friday’s show will begin with a panel on Pot Politics 2009 and Beyond.  A record number of state legislatures debated marijuana law reform in 2009; a nationwide panel of experts discusses our progress.  Our moderator is Keith Stroup, Esq., NORML, speaking on Federal Legislation, and also includes:

• Chris Goldstein, Director, Penn. For Medical Marijuana
• Rob Kampia, Executive Director, Marijuana Policy Project
• Dan Linn, Executive Director, Illinois NORML
• Madeline Martinez, Director, Oregon NORML, member of NORML’s board of directors
• Jesse Stout, former Director of RIPAC
• Ken Wolski, RN, Director, Coalition for Medical Marijuana NJ

We follow with a luncheon with travel author and NORML advisory board member Rick Steves presenting the ACLU DVD: ‘Marijuana: Its Time for a Conversation’, and close by asking “Has support for legalization reached a critical mass/tipping point?”  According to national polls, public support for legalizing marijuana has never been higher. Why now? And how do we mobilize this public support into political change? Leaders in the drug law reform movement discuss these trends, and what they portend for future reform efforts.  Our moderator is Dave Fratello, Coast Campaign Group, and the panel includes:

• Dale Gieringer, Ph.D, Director, CA NORML; member of NORML’s board of directors
• Rich Lee, Proprietor of ‘Oaksterdam University’ and Campaigner for ‘The Regulate, Control, and Tax Cannabis Act of 2010′
• Harry Levine, Ph.D, Queens College

Saturday’s closing show will feature a look at Marijuana Legalization As a Local, State, Federal Revenue Stream. In today’s sagging economy national, state and local leaders are looking for alternative streams of revenue. They should look no further than to America’s #1 cash crop: cannabis.  Our moderator is Dale Gieringer, Ph.D, Director, CA NORML, and the panelists include:

• Jon Gettman, Ph.D
• Rebecca Kaplan, Oakland City Council
• Mark Kleiman, Ph.D, UCLA

We follow with a panel on Cannabis and Athleticism. Some of the nation’s top athletes discuss why today’s pros are turning to cannabis — and away from alcohol and painkillers — off the field, and question why pro sports leagues are continuing to sanction those who do.  Our moderator is Steve Bloom, Author, Pot Culture; editor, celebstoner.com and the panelists include:

• Toby Grear, MMA fighter,
• Sean Neumann, Documentary Filmmaker; former ESPN producer
• Mark Stepnoski, Former All-Star NFL football player, NORML Advisory Board
• Rob Van Dam, Professional wrestler

Our three-part special show concludes with a talk from Rick Steves, TV host/best-selling travel author, NORML Advisory Board

Please join us for unparalleled access to the heart of marijuana law reform, nine total hours of content from the best and brightest minds in the movement, all absolutely free for you on the internet, courtesy of the donations of stakeholder cannabis consumers and liberty lovers all across this country who donate to and volunteer with NORML.  Mark us as a favorite on BlogTalkRadio and post us on your Twitter and Facebook with the tag #NORML.

I don’t mean to keep leading you on, really. I was all packed and ready to go with a podcast recording tonight. Just one last task – to create the photo wall backdrop for our NORML Conference media room. Had to be turned in tonight, so fix that up real quick…

…and of course, this would be the time my computer goes on the fritz. The studio PC, that is, which is the only machine where I have my Adobe CS3 software that includes Illustrator for making that huge 8′ x 10′ graphic. So I troubleshoot and fix the problem and get the machine booted up and build the graphic and FTP it off to San Francisco. Great. Now just sync up my BlackBerry one last time before I record the show…

…and of course, the BlackBerry Desktop Manager picks this time to crash in the middle of a sync operation, wiping out the data in my BlackBerry address book. This requires a reinstall of the program and moving my Outlook file back to its previous location. Now that’s fixed and my BlackBerry is back…

…which leaves me just enough time to schedule a NORML SHOW LIVE test so that Karri and I can practice her call screening in Astoria while I’m on the road, and then maybe get six hours of sleep before catching the 7:30am flight from PDX to Logan, during which I’ll go through my over 1,200 unread emails from the past two weeks.

But I will have to set up NORML SHOW LIVE in my hotel room in Cambridge, so that will allow me to record a podcast tomorrow for a Boston Freedom Rally preview. I’ll get some of the MassCann guys on the show to tell you all about it. Plenty of tweets, pics, and vids will show up all these next few days, so watch the sidebar.