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This weekend on NORML SHOW LIVE, we take a look at the rising influence of women in the movement to end adult marijuana prohibition. In 2009, the Gallup poll found the support for legalization of marijuana among women rose by a whopping 12% in just four years! We’ll examine the trends that are causing women in greater numbers than ever before to support marijuana law reform.

Medical marijuana has certainly been part of the trend. We’ll visit with Dr. Julie Holland, author of the New York Times bestseller “Weekends at Bellevue”, her tale of nine years working in the psychiatric emergency room of the famous New York Hospital.  Dr. Holland has been an effective advocate for medical marijuana recently on the NBC Today show.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Then we speak to Mieko Hester-Perez, a recent guest of Diane Sawyer’s on Good Morning America.  Ms. Hester-Perez talks about the miracle medical marijuana has provided for her severely autistic son and the complications of treating him with a very controversial medicine.

We continue the discussions, looking beyond medical marijuana and into the so-called “Stiletto Stoner” phenomenon of young professional women who prefer marijuana over martinis when it comes to socializing and relaxing.  We also cover the increasing number of mothers who are calling for an end to prohibition as a means of protecting their children from the harms of an unregulated black market.  Our panel of NORML Women from coast to coast includes:

• Tonya Davis – NORML’s 2009 Pauline Sabin Award Winner and Executive Director of Miami Valley NORML in Ohio
• Anne Davis – NORML Legal Committee Attorney and NORML NJ Boardmember
• Cheryl Shuman – Executive Director of Beverly Hills NORML 90210
• Linda Adler – Executive Director of US Virgin Islands NORML
• Tanya Burgess – Georgia NORML Boardmember

These accomplished women will tell us why they’ve decided to join NORML and why other women should, too.

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Hemp Headlines

1. Tennessee medical marijuana grower Bernie Ellis signs away 25 acres to federal government
2. Colorado: Nearly 2/3rds support regulated medical marijuana dispensaries
3. Man busted for hunting while high

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Cannabis Conversations

• Dr. Julie Holland, author of “Weekends at Bellevue”, her account of nine years working at the psychiatric ER in New York’s Bellevue Hospital. Dr. Holland has also been a featured on NBC’s Today Show discussing women and marijuana.

First it was Marie Claire magazine with their “Stiletto Stoners”, followed by a sympathetic follow-up on the NBC Today Show. Now* Elle Magazine prints 2,758 words from another Stiletto Stoner who has discovered that cannabis is a superior medication for her generalized anxiety disorder than the Zoloft and Paxil her doctors had recommended.

(Elle Magazine) A thimbleful is all it takes. After a day’s work, I pinch off a small amount of marijuana and put it in a steel-tooth grinder. The flowers, covered in tiny white diamonds of THC, release a piney scent when crushed. I turn on the TV, and instead of taking a glass of wine with my evening news, I take out my vaporizer and set it on the coffee table.

One could say I diagnosed myself in high school, when I recognized my symptoms in a psychology textbook. Finally, I had “generalized anxiety disorder” to describe the dread I felt of some future event that was overtaking my present. I usually sensed the panic attacks first in my chest. Then my vision would start to go to static, and my body would crumple to the floor. There I’d ride it out until the adrenaline ran its course.

Soon after I started to suffer several of these episodes a day (and so often that fear of another one kept me indoors), I sought out a psychiatrist. I told her about the times I’d be driving and convince myself that I was about to spin off the road—the looping, invented terrors. A little talk therapy and a prescription later, I discovered that Zoloft only exacerbated my panic and depression. I stopped taking the little white pills and cut out caffeine instead; I exercised and practiced meditation. For years I abstained from medication, and aside from the occasional pot smoking with friends, I swore off drugs entirely.

About four years ago, another psychiatrist put me on lithium for what he described as my “Paxil-induced hypomania.” When it made me violently sick, I decided I needed to replace pills altogether and turn to a regimen that relied on what was, to me, the only proven drug. I headed down to the five-block stretch of marijuana advocacy groups known as “Oaksterdam.” There, I explained to an understanding doctor, wearing Lennon glasses and cargo shorts, that marijuana eased the symptoms of what studies showed and I knew to be a genetic disorder. (My two younger brothers have been diagnosed as bipolar, and my grandmother suffered from anxiety and depression.)

The writer continues by explaining how she is able to keep her job and be productive thanks to marijuana, and that her friends that use marijuana are all successful productive people she’s proud to know.  She worries about the legal complexities, especially how the California Ragingwire decision still allows employers to fire people for their medical use.

From a media standpoint, I believe when you’re having women speak favorably of marijuana in Marie Claire, the Today Show, and Elle Magazine, you’re winning the hearts and minds.

*By “now”, of course, I meant July 18, 2008, when this article was written.  I really need to watch the bylines on these stories that I pick up off the Fresh Stash.

We… are… winning!

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

(NBC Today Show) Brad Pitt hasn’t thrown his hat in the ring to be mayor of his adopted hometown, New Orleans. Others have done that for him, launching a grassroots campaign complete with nifty T-shirts touting “Brad Pitt for Mayor.”

But he’s more than willing to serve, the actor told TODAY’s Ann Curry with a self-deprecating laugh.

“If chosen, would you run?” Curry asked in the prerecorded interview that ran Thursday.

“Yeah,” Pitt said.

“Would you serve?”

“Yeah. I’m running on the gay marriage, no religion, legalization and taxation of marijuana platform,” he joked.

Screw mayor of New Orleans, Brad Pitt for President!

Good job, Aaron, and I know how the time constraints are on live national TV, but will somebody, please, anybody, when the prohibitionist says that the taxes on tobacco and alcohol don’t begin to cover the social costs, instead of going with the “marijuana is safer than alcohol and tobacco route”, which is undeniably true, swing it back to the economic argument and say:

“22 million Americans are smoking pot already and we’re taking in zero revenue to cover any social costs, which, since marijuana is safer than alcohol and tobacco, will be much lower. And since the greatest costs from marijuana are from policing people for it and dealing with the crime and violence of a black market, we’ll do much better than break-even on the deal.”