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Marijuana Patient Will Foster Freed; Once Faced 93 Years In Prison

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on November 25, 2009 Medical, News

MPP.org

Will Foster, victim of the war on medical marijuana patients

Medical marijuana patient Will Foster, who once faced 93 years in prison for growing pot in his closet, is now a free man, according to the Drug War Chronicle.

Foster was released on parole from an Oklahoma prison today, adding a happy note to a saga that stretches back to his bust in the 1990s.

Foster was in the unfortunate position of being a public example of the mindless cruelties of the war on marijuana. The 36-year-old father of two, a computer programmer, had his life changed forever when Tulsa, Okla., officers showed up at his door with a “John Doe” warrant to search for methamphetamines. No meth was found — even after officers tore apart his 5-year-old daughter’s teddy bear.

But behind a locked steel door in his basement, the cops found a 25-square-foot marijuana garden. Foster said he grew the plants to treat the chronic pain of acute rheumatoid arthritis.

San Diego Pot Dispensary Task Force Releases Recommendations

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on November 25, 2009 Dispensaries, Legislation, News

Photo: Laurie Avocado, Wikimedia Commons

A San Diego task force has released its recommendations for the city council regarding medical marijuana dispensaries.

The task force said, among other things, that dispensaries should go through a permitting process, limit hours of operation, abide by zoning restrictions, and should be more than 1,000 feet from schools, libraries, or playgrounds. Dispensaries would also be restricted from bring less than 500 feet away from each other.

Some local marijuana supporters are on board with the proposed regulations. “I think it’s balanced and pretty fair,” Craig Beresh told the local NBC affiliate. “I think it’s going to work for both the medical marijuana community and the city of San Diego.”

Rocky Mountain High: Colorado Could Legalize Marijuana In 2012

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on November 25, 2009 Legislation, News

Courtesy Mason Tvert

Marijuana’s momentum in Colorado is giving Mason Tvert plenty to smile about.

If Mason Tvert and Brian Vicente — along all the marijuana users in Colorado — get their way, weed could become legal in the Rocky Mountain state in 2012.

Tvert and Vicente unveiled their plan Monday for a statewide initiative that will legalize pot for all Coloradans over 21.

If California’s 2010 ballot initiative to legalize fails, Colorado could become the national leader in the marijuana legalization movement.

It’s going to be a challenge. Just three years ago, 60 percent of Colorado voters rejected a much less ambitious initiative that would have decriminalized an ounce or less of weed. But the political winds are shifting so rapidly, the legalization initiative’s chances are looking less like a long shot and more like a dogfight.

CA Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown Says Medical Marijuana Sales Are Illegal

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on November 24, 2009 Dispensaries, Legislation, News

In a bitter disappointment to supporters of regulated sales of medical marijuana, California Attorney General Jerry Brown has said in a radio interview that all sales of marijuana are illegal, “no matter what.”

Brown told KFI News that he supports the efforts of Los Angeles County District Attorney Steve Cooley (who’s grabbed a lot of headlines recently with his hardline anti-dispensary stance, infamously saying “approximately zero” of the dispensaries were legal) and L.A. City Attorney Carmen Trutanich (ditto) in going after marijuana dispensaries selling pot to patients.

Photo: Scott Clarkson

AG Jerry Brown: “The dope business”

”Unfortunately in some communities, Los Angeles in particular, there’s a lot of exploitation and just getting into the, er, drug business, the dope business,” Brown told KFI.

The L.A. City Council, which has seemed disinclined to take the advice of Cooley and Trutanich (much to Cooley’s public chagrin) spent about five hours today hammering out guidelines for their long-awaited, much-amended medical marijuana ordinance.

What, No Zeppelin? New Zealand Woman Plays Classical Music To Cannabis Plants

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on November 24, 2009 Culture, Global, Growing

Photo: Michael W. deBenutzer, Wikimedia Commons

Hitting all the high notes?

A New Zealand woman who played classical musical to her 20 cannabis plants “to encourage them to grow” has been sentenced to community work, according to Kiwi website TVNZ.

Zarah Murphy of New Plymouth, N.Z. cultivated the plants in a room with photos on the wall of healthy palnts as “role models” and played them “nice classical music,” her lawyer told New Plymouth District Court on Monday.

The lawyer, Pamela Jensen, said Murphy was growing the plants for her own medical use, to treat her post-traumatic stress disorder, the Taranaki Daily News reported.

She was undergoing psychotherapy for her condition and could possibly attend drug counseling in the future, according to Jensen.

Judge Allan Roberts, while granting the elaborate grow room was a “pretty good effort,” still sentenced music lover Murphy to 250 hours of community work and $1,235 in unpaid fines.

Kush Is Kosher: Israeli Hospital Gives Patients Marijuana In Pilot Program

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on November 23, 2009 Global, Medical, News

Image: russiatoday.com

Israel is one of the first countries to permit the use of medical marijuana.

Twenty patients in an Israeli hospital have been treated with medical marijuana in the first program of its kind in the Mideast nation.

Head Nurse Ora Shamai of the pain management program at Sheba Medical Center in the town of Tel Hashomer recently drafted a formal protocol for administering cannabis to patients. The document has already been approved by the Health Ministry’s Dr. Yehuda Baruch, and is expected to soon win final approval from the hospital.

According to the protocol, if a patient needs marijuana, the doctor in charge of treatment will help secure the necessary permit from the Health Ministry. Patients who are able to walk will smoke their joints in the hospital’s smoking room, while bedridden patients will be allowed to smoke in private rooms, near an open window.

“We make it clear to the staff that smoking medical marijuana doesn’t endanger the medical staff on the wards,” Shamai said. “It does not harm those in the area via passive smoking.”

No Stopping Us Now: Support For Marijuana Legalization Skyrocketing

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on November 23, 2009 Culture, News

Illustration: Mladifilozof, Wikimedia Commons

Yes we cannabis.

The good thing about a free marketplace of ideas is, despite the best efforts of prohibitionists and their fear-mongering propaganda, the truth eventually prevails.

That’s what we’re witnessing right now, with the tidal change in public perception of marijuana — both as a medicine and palliative, and as a recreational drug.

Within the past months, more and more of the once seemingly insurmountable barriers to widespread acceptance of cannabis have been looking mighty shaky. Nationwide polls show that more and more Americans support legalization across the board.

The latest Gallup poll on the subject found 44 percent approve full legalization of pot, representing a 13-point rise in the past nine years. According to Gallup, if public support continues growing at the present rate of 1 or 2 percent per year, “the majority of Americans could favor legalization of the drug in as little as four years.”

Toke of the Town tends to think majority support could happen even more quickly than that, as more “closet” supporters are emboldened by an increasingly public shift in opinion.

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