Car salesman in Montana faces community backlash for his anti-pot views

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Steve Zabawa is a partner of the Rimrock Auto Group, and co-owner of Rimrock Subaru and Rimrock KIA, located right smack dab in the middle of Montana. Billings, Montana, to be exact.
His public Facebook page shows his interests ranging from Mormon universities like BYU, to Mormon athletes like Steve Young, to grossly fabricated “reports” of pot use leading to heart disease and death. His anti-pot social media ranting has a small handful of local prohibitionists in his corner, but has apparently turned his own daughter, and a good portion of his hometown, against him.


Among other low-brow headlines, Zabawa’s Facebook profile page features a link to the instantly debunked story about the dude allegedly jumping off of a Denver balcony to his death after eating pot-laced treats.
Zabawa’s own daughter was the first to comment on the link, stating, “If you are trying to educate people about your cause on Facebook it would be more effective to use sources with less political bias, then it is more about the facts and not personal feelings. Maybe then you would appeal to more people that don’t think along the same lines, thus gaining a wider support for your cause rather than appealing to the same people over and over. Just a thought. Mostly because this is an article about one unfortunate person misusing a substance. Very similar sounding to what happens when one misuses alcohol – a legal substance.”
But besides potential conflict at the dinner table at home, Zabawa’s ignorance on the subject of cannabis legalization has painted a bright green target on his place of business, and pro-cannabis activists are taking aim with protests that they hope will make their voices heard.
Over 100 marijuana advocates spent this past Saturday picketing and demonstrating outside of the Rimrock Subaru and KIA dealerships, hoping to sway potential customers and Rimrock employees, if not Zabawa himself, to consider the viability of cannabis legalization in the state of Montana.
Spoken like a true slimeball car salesman, Rimrock’s General Manager, Fred Fowler, mocked the protesters, saying that they give him “free advertising”.
One of the protesters, medical marijuana supporter Jason Smith, called out the shady tactics crossing over from the car lot to the court of public opinion, stating, “[Zabawa’s] using it as a platform to launch his political career on the backs of the sick and the terminal. These are patients, people’s neighbors and family members and here you’re having a car salesman telling what’s best for you. To me that’s criminal, not cannabis.”
Montana’s Secretary of State has already approved a ballot initiative to legalize medical marijuana in the state, but the group behind the proposal says that their intention is to hold out for the 2016 election to put the issue on the ballot for voter approval.
Zabawa has drafted an initiative of his own, which bluntly states that if passed, the Montana state legislature would be bound to uphold federal law in regard to the Controlled Substances Act, keeping all forms of marijuana completely illegal in the state.
If the language in his initiative is approved, he will have until July 20th of this year to collect over 24,000 signatures in order to get his archaic measure placed on the November ballot, opposed only by the common sense of the Montana voters.

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