2012 April

Monthly Archives: April, 2012

Summit of the Americas: Drug War Will Be On The Table

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on April 10, 2012 Culture, Global, Legislation

President Obama to Attend Summit of the Americas in Colombia This Weekend: Discussions to Include Drug Decriminalization, Legal Regulation and Other Drug War Alternatives

First Time Ever that Sitting Presidents are Calling for All Options to Be Put on Table to Reduce Drug Prohibition-Related Crime, Violence and Corruption

This week, President Obama will join more than 30 other heads of state from throughout the Americas in Cartagena, Colombia for the Summit of the Americas. For the first time ever, a major focus of the summit – both in official meetings and behind closed doors – will be the need for alternative strategies to the failed war on drugs.

The urgency of the discussion is growing in light of the prohibition-related violence in Mexico that has killed more than 50,000 people since 2006, the growing war zones in Central America, and South American governments worn down by decades of disastrous U.S.-sponsored eradication and interdiction efforts that have bred institutionalized corruption and routine violence.

Local, State Officials Decry Federal Attacks on Medical Marijuana

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on April 9, 2012 Dispensaries, Medical, News

The Weed Blog

San Francisco United for Safe Access campaign compels statement from Mayor Lee and others

A coalition of medical marijuana patients, activists, dispensing centers, and concerned citizens has compelled public officials to stand up to recent federal attacks. Last week, the coalition “San Francisco United for Safe Access” held a press conference with several city supervisors and state officials, decrying the Obama Administration’s aggressive tactics before a crowd of more than 500 supporters.

By Friday, San Francisco United had secured a statement from Mayor Lee, expressing his opposition to “recent federal actions targeting duly permitted Medicinal Cannabis Dispensaries…that aim to limit our citizens’ ability to have safe access to the medicine they need.”

DFW NORML Announces 48-Hour Hemp T-Shirt Design Contest

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on April 9, 2012 Culture, Products

DFW NORML

Calling all creative cannabis consumers! The Dallas-Forth Worth chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (DFW NORML) has announced a 48-Hour Hemp T-Shirt Design Contest.

In the next 48 hours, the group has to decide on its second hemp t-shirt design. The best design wins $50, two copies of the shirt and a free one-year membership to DFW NORML.

The contest is to perfect the first t-shirt design specifically for Texas marijuana activists — but you do NOT have to live in Texas (or even in the United States) to enter.

Medical Marijuana Patient With Cancer Faces Eviction… Again

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on April 9, 2012 Medical, News

Northern Express

A Michigan cancer patient whose eviction from her federally subsidized apartment — for using medical marijuana — was halted after an outcry in 2009 now faces homelessness again.

Lori Montroy, 52, of Elk Rapids, got another eviction notice last month at the apartment where she has lived since 2008, reports Patrick Sullivan at Northern Express.

“It’s just draining the life out of me, these people,” Montroy said. “Why can’t they just leave me be?”

Montroy thought she was safe in her apartment after the last attempted eviction around Christmas 2009. The company that at that time managed the apartment complex called off the eviction in early 2010 after a storm of bad publicity and a plea from attorneys with the American Civil Liberties Union. The attorneys argued that under federal law, landlords are not required to evict tenants for drug use under the Michigan Medical Marihuana Act.

Auto Insurance Site Says Marijuana Users Are Safer Drivers

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on April 9, 2012 Culture, News, Products

4autoinsurancequote.com

There’s yet another study now that concludes marijuana users are better drivers, especially when compared with those who use alcohol behind the wheel. Twenty years of study has concluded that marijuana smokers may actually be getting a bad rap and that they may actually have fewer accidents than other drivers.

The website 4AutoinsuranceQuote.com put a press release on the study, which “looks at statistics regarding accidents, traffic violations, and insurance prices,” and “seeks to dispel the though that ‘driving while stoned’ is dangerous.”

The Great Cannabis/Marijuana Debate: What’s In A Word?

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on April 9, 2012 Culture

The exotic-sounding Mexican Spanish word “marihuana” was used as part of the 1930s scare tactics which led to the plant being declared illegal in 1937. But should that mean we can never use the word again? Not unless we’re willing to forget the counterculture of the 1960s.

I love the cannabis community. Most of the people working in it have the best intentions and laudable goals. And the challenge facing those who wish to re-legalize cannabis is difficult and daunting enough without those in the movement inadvertently placing additional roadblocks in our own path.

One of those roadblocks seems to happen more and more often — and that’s arguing over word etymology and usage, of all things, rather than working to legalize the plant.

Yes, I’m talking about the great “marijuana/cannabis” controversy. Some activists get quite worked up about it, but any pejorative baggage surrounding the term “marijuana” is, at this point, really nothing more than an increasingly irrelevant historical footnote from the distant past.

There are those within the cannabis movement who will tell you with a straight face that the reason the plant is still illegal is because it is called “marijuana.” That’s overreaching wildly.

Feds: Medical Marijuana Patients Not Targeted, But Growers Are

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on April 9, 2012 Growing, Medical

Patrick Whittemore/Boston Herald

U.S. Attorney Carmen Ortiz: “While this office does not intend to focus its limited resources on seriously ill individuals who use marijuana as part of a medically recommended treatment program in compliance with state law, individuals and organizations who are in the business of cultivating, selling or distributing marijuana, and those who knowingly facilitate such activities, will be in violation of federal law and be subject to federal enforcement.”

Medical marijuana advocates in Massachusetts say they’ll take their cause to the ballot if the Legislature won’t pass it, but the usual objections are being raised by law enforcement officials, who say that legalizing medicine cannabis could put the state at odds with the federal government.

The Humanitarian Medical Use of Marijuana bill would protect registered patients, doctors, caregivers and dispensers from local and state marijuana laws, but not from the federal law enforcement like the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). If the Legislature rejects or fails to act on the measure by May 2, certified signatures of 11,485 Massachusetts voters are needed to place a binding question on November’s general election ballot.

Seriously ill patients don’t have to fear a knock on the door from gun-toting feds, according to White House and U.S. Department of Justice officials, but those same officials told the Boston Herald they won’t turn a blind eye to others who break federal laws, including doctors and state-licensed dispensaries, reports Laurel J. Sweet.

Anonymous Announces OpCannabis, Phase 1

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on April 8, 2012 Culture, News

OpCannabis

The online activist organization Anonymous has begun Phase 1 of OpCannabis, its effort to educate the public and work on behalf of cannabis legalization worldwide.

In announcing OpCannabis, which officially launches on April 20, Anonymous released the following statement:

Dear Citizens of the World

For far too long cannabis has been oppressed by big corporations, big pharma and governments when it could be benefiting all of mankind on many different levels. We have heard and we have watched your government lie and deceive you on all the dangers of cannabis. Show support by making your profile pictures green this April 20th on your social network profiles.

OpCannabis phase 1, initiated. We are Anonymous…..Expect us.

Worth Repeating: The Marijuana Exercise Prescription

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on April 6, 2012 Medical

Worth Repeating

By Ron Marczyk, R.N.

Health Education Teacher (Retired)

A new understanding of the neurobiology of cannabis is emerging, namely the “endocannabinoid induced aerobic bliss state,” or simply the “endocannabinoid runners’ high.“

For users of medical marijuana, a new use for this miracle plant is at hand: its ability to produce “the psychology of exercise motivation.”

“Recent findings show that exercise increases serum concentrations of endocannabinoids, a result suggestive of a new possible explanation for a number of these changes. The cannabinoids produce psychological states that closely parallel several experiences described as being related to the runner’s high. Compared with the opioid analgesics, the analgesia produced by the endocannabinoid system is more consistent with exercise induced analgesia. Activation of the endocannabinoid system also produces sedation, anxiolysis, a sense of wellbeing, reduced attentional capacity, impaired working memory ability, and difficulty in time estimation. This behavioural profile is similar to the psychological experiences reported by long distance runners.” ~ From Endocannabinoids and Exercise / Br J Sports Med. 2004 October

New Stoner Movie High School: Official Trailer Released

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on April 6, 2012 Culture, Products

High School

High school buddies Matt Bush and Sean Marquette have a problem: beating the school’s new zero tolerance drug test. So they get the whole school stoned.

A film being billed as “the ultimate stoner comedy,” High School, will be released in theaters nationwide on June 1.

Starring Adrien Brody, Sean Marquette, Matt Bush, Colin Hanks and Michael Chiklis, High School introduces us to soon-to-be valedictorian Henry Burke (Matt Bush). The day after Henry takes a hit of the chronic for the first time, his high school principal (Michael Chiklis) institutes a zero tolerance drug policy and gives a mandatory drug test to all students.

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