Legislation

Attacking Marijuana Patients Is Not A Good Legalization Strategy

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on January 1, 2012 Legislation, News

The Unraveling of Dominic Holden

By Lee Rosenberg

Horses Ass

The New Approach Washington campaign turned in its signatures this week for Initiative 502. This initiative would legalize personal possession of up to one ounce of marijuana and regulate the distribution and sale of the drug to anyone over 21 [in Washington state]. It also introduces a per se DUI limit for “active” THC – in layman’s terms, the amount of “unprocessed” THC in your body.

Over at Slog, Dominic Holden continues to lash out at the folks in the medical marijuana community who oppose it – primarily due to the DUI provisions. I’ve been trying to stay out of this fight for my own sanity, but Holden’s anger is so misdirected (and misinformed), I have to speak up.

Campaign To Legalize Marijuana Ready In Michigan

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on December 29, 2011 Legislation, News

Federaljack.com

The effort to legalize marijuana in Michigan will be officially underway in two weeks.

The 2012 Michigan Ballot Initiative to End Marijuana Prohibition, sponsored by a grassroots group named Repeal Today For A Safer Michigan 2012, hopes to give the voters a chance to decide for themselves next November, reports Ryan J. Stanton at AnnArbor.com.

“We do have language written and petitions getting ready,” said RTFASM supporter T.J. Rice on Wednesday afternoon.

The petition seeks to amend the Michigan state constitution to legalize marijuana for people 21 and older.

Colorado Asks DEA To Reclassify Marijuana

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on December 29, 2011 Legislation, News

Anondora

The head of Colorado’s Department of Revenue has written a letter to the director of the federal Drug Enforcement Administration asking that the U.S. government slightly loosen its strict controls on marijuana due to its “potential medical value.”

Colorado is the fourth state within the past few weeks to ask the DEA to reschedule cannabis from its current, most restrictive classification as Schedule I, which means the government regards pot as having a high potential for abuse and no valid medicinal uses. Heroin and LSD are also considered Schedule I substances under federal law.

R.I. House Speaker To Ask Feds For Marijuana Guidance

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on December 28, 2011 Dispensaries, Legislation, Medical

Steven Senne/AP

Rhode Island Speaker of the House Gordon D. Fox: “I think it’s been too long and there have been too many people waiting”

Rhode Island’s Legislature legalized medical marijuana back in 2006. Three years later, in 2009, the Legislature overrode a gubernatorial veto to allow medicinal cannabis dispensaries in the state with an overwhelming 68-0 vote in the House and 35-3 in the Senate.

That certainly seems clear enough, and it’s been a couple of years now. Haven’t they had time to get that program up and running for seriously ill patients? But, well, you know how silly the federal government can be, when it comes to that oh-so-dangerous boogie bear “marijuana.” It’s still against federal law, doncha know? So please don’t get any wacky ideas about the people trying to run things.

Legalization Measure Splits Cannabis Supporters In Washington

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on December 27, 2011 Culture, Legislation, News

The Weed Blog

Marijuana advocates in Washington state have had a long, hard battle to get as far as they’ve come in the 13 years since voters legalized cannabis for medicinal uses back in 1998. But I-502, a new tax-and-regulate initiative — which appears to have enough signatures to be on the November 2012 ballot — is apparently not a banner under which all legalization proponents are willing to unite.

The widening schism in the Evergreen State’s pot community was on display recently when activists dressed in prison stripes were tossed out of Cataldo Hall at Gonzaga University in Spokane, reports Kevin Graman at The Spokesman-Review.

Travel writer and TV host Rick Steves was there to deliver a speech, and members of the November Coalition, a foundation opposing the Drug War, showed up to express opposition to Steves’ support for I-502.

Marijuana Crackdown Top Story Of The Year In Montana

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on December 26, 2011 Legislation, Medical, News

KTVQ

The collapse of Montana’s once-booming medical marijuana industry after a conservative Republican-controlled Legislature all but shut the program down with tough restrictions — in addition to raids where federal agents hit dozens of providers — was Montana’s top news story of 2011, according to an annual member poll from The Associated Press.

It’s the second straight year medicinal cannabis has been chosen as the state’s top story, reports Matt Volz at the Great Falls Tribune. But a world of change has occurred in Montana’s medical marijuana scene since a year ago.

President Obama: An Unexpected Enemy Of Marijuana

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on December 26, 2011 Dispensaries, Legislation, Medical

As an Illinois state senator, Presidential candidate, and President, Barack Obama has made numerous statements in support of marijuana policy reform, and vowed not to waste Justice Department resources by going after medical marijuana dispensaries.
Obama had called using federal agents to go after patients and providers who are abiding by state laws in states where medical marijuana is legal “is not an efficient use of our resources.”
So when Obama won the Presidential election in 2008, supporters had hoped that patients abiding by state laws could use marijuana for medical purposes without fear of government intrusion.

Cali AG Wants Legislature To Clarify Medical Marijuana Law

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on December 22, 2011 Dispensaries, Legislation, Medical

CowHen.net

California Attorney General Kamala Harris: “Without a substantive change to existing law, these irreconcilable interpretations of the law, and the resulting uncertainty for law enforcement and seriously ill patients, will persist”

California Attorney General Kamala Harris on Wednesday urged state lawmakers to get serious about clarifying the state’s 15-year-old medical marijuana law. According to Harris, gray areas have left law enforcement and patients in a state of perpetual uncertainty.

The attorney general, who was elected with widespread backing from the state’s medical marijuana industry (OK, it wasn’t exactly a ringing endorsement, it was more a case of “Anybody But Cooley“), has been under pressure to defend the state’s medicinal cannabis law since October, when the state’s four U.S. Attorneys announced a statewide crackdown on dispensaries.

Dozens of the shops — which the federal prosecutors claimed were fronts for public drug dealing — have since closed, reports Lisa Leff at the Associated Press.

Cannabis Tolerance Endangered In Netherlands; Protest Planned

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on December 21, 2011 Global, Legislation, News

NL Coffeeshop & Cannabis Nieuws

In a maddening show of spineless backsliding after 35 years of tolerance, the conservative government of the Netherlands seems hellbent on turning the clock back to a darker time in Dutch history — a time when the cannabis trade was driven underground and people had to access the black market for marijuana.

And, of course, in our interconnected world, such a failure of leadership would reverberate internationally, according to expert observers.

“If tolerance ends or gets limited in the Netherlands, then politicians all over the world will say things like ‘Tolerance failed in Holland,’ and use that as an excuse to enforce their anti-cannabis propaganda, opinions and laws,” well-known Dutch cannabis blogger Peter Lunk told Toke of the Town.

WA Marijuana Legalization Measure Likely To Make 2012 Ballot

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on December 20, 2011 Legislation, News

From Our Corner

With 241,153 valid signatures required, it appears very likely marijuana legalization measure I-502 will make the ballot with 355,000 signatures reportedly in the can.

Sponsors of a ballot initiative which would legalize marijuana in Washington state say they have enough signatures — more than 355,000 — to make the ballot in November 2012.

New Approach Washington, sponsors of Initiative 502, said they have made plans to bring in petitions on 10 a.m. on December 29 at the state Elections Division office at 520 Union Sreet near the State Capitol in Olympia, reports David Ammons at From Our Corner, the Washington Secretary of State’s website.

I-502 would authorize the state Liquor Control Board to regulate and tax cannabis for those 21 and older. Licensed production, limited possession, delivery, distribution and sale of marijuana in accordance with the provisions of the law would be allowed.

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