Smokedot

The Contra Costa Times has word that a medical Marijuana patient in San Bernardino County is suing the police, more accurately the sheriff for his policy of arresting medical Marijuana patients.

A medical marijuana user announced this week that he will file a lawsuit Monday against San Bernardino County to compel the county to issue ID cards to medical marijuana users.

Scott Bledsoe, of Crestline, will also seek a court order halting the Sheriff Department's practice of arresting medical marijuana users for possession even when users present evidence that the drugs are for medical use, according to a news release.

The Gloucester Times posted an interesting story about the new strategy Boston is implementing for their new voter law decriminalizing the possession of an ounce or less of Marijuana.

With the exception of the major thrust of the new law — reducing the penalty for possessing less than an ounce of marijuana from an arrestable offense to a $100 civil fine — police searches, firearms issuances, public school punishments and court proceedings will be largely unchanged.

We want to be able to assure people, through our legal analysis, that there can be an effective implementation of this new law," state Secretary of Public Safety Kevin Burke said in a phone interview.

The Wallstreet Journal posted a blog entry about Massachusetts's new Marijuana law that treats possession of an ounce or less of Marijuana "on par with a traffic violation". Here's a snip:

Proponents of the change - including financier George Soros, who spent more than $400,000 in favor of decriminalizing marijuana - said it would ensure that those caught with small quantities would avoid the taint of a criminal record.

Cape and Islands District Attorney Michael O’Keefe said he believes that proponents of decriminalization cannily crafted a ballot measure with numerous loopholes in hope that it would be impossible to implement and quickly lead to de facto legalization. “They sold the public a pig in a poke, and the public bought it,” he told the Globe.

This is a a step in the right direction, more and more states are passing similar laws.

One of my buddies on Digg sent me this story on the passing of the Compassionate Use Medicinal Marijuana Act in NJ. The story is pretty straight forward, here is a clip:

The Department of Health and Senior Services would register people with debilitating medical conditions, which would include cancer, glaucoma, HIV or AIDS, or other diseases that cause wasting, chronic pain, severe nausea, seizures, severe and persistent muscle spasms. The department then would issue a photo identity card and allow those registered to possess as many as "six marijuana plants and an ounce of usable marijuana," according to the bill.

That is more than enough for a patient to stay medicated, let's just hope that the federal government doesn't come down on NJ like they have in CA.

Marijuana is the most widely used illicit drug on the planet. In most countries, this plant is illegal; some brand it as dangerous; others seem to look the other way. In the U.S. the federal government places it in the same category as heroin. Across the globe, bold growers plant gardens in national forests, national parks and suburban homes converted into greenhouses. Scientists who study this plant consider it among the most complex in the plant kingdom with 400 active chemicals and compounds. And in California alone, the marijuana trade out paces the entire wine industry, placing it among the largest cash crops in the United States.

NBC LA reports that the U.S. supreme court refused to get involved in a California case where 8 grams of Marijuana were confiscated from a medical Marijuana patient in Santa Anna, CA during a traffic stop.

"It's now settled that state law enforcement officers cannot arrest Medical marijuana patients or seize their medicine simply because they prefer the contrary federal law," Elford said.

"Perhaps, in the future local government will think twice about expending significant time and resources to defy a law that is overwhelmingly supported by the people of our state."

Perhaps indeed.

The Chicago Flame is running a story on the most recent state in the USA to allow medical Marijuana; Michigan. Over the November election, Michigan became the 13th state in the United States Of America to allow sick and chronically ill people to seek a doctor's recommendation for Marijuana.

To keep medical marijuana illegal is to be contemptuous of science and our patients. Time and time again, marijuana has been shown to be safe and effective. Yet in 2004 Merck had to pull its anti-inflamatory drug Vioxx from the market after it killed an FDA-estimated 27,000. Surely if we allow such insufficiently tested drugs to be sold to the public, a plant that had been deemed by multiple authorities to be less dangerous than alcohol is safe enough. Our legislation regarding marijuana must have been authored by individuals who were either highly irrational, or let their offense at the youth culture and its attack on their generation's entrenched mores supercede expert medical opinion.

It's time for a change! Right on Michigan!

The L.A. Times reports that the US's War On Drugs is a failure.

Former Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo, who helped supervise the Brookings Institution study, says Washington needs to focus on consumption in addition to targeting traffickers.

Reporting from Mexico City -- The United States' war on drugs has failed and will continue to do so as long as it emphasizes law enforcement and neglects the problem of consumption, a Washington think tank says in a report co-chaired by a former president of Mexico.

It's certainly not news that the war on drugs has been less than successful over the years, but it's time we think and talk about it again. With any luck, as the article mentions, we'll get some sane administration in the USA to get things on the right track again.

George Bush says we are losing the war on drugs. You know what that implies? There's a war being fought, and people on drugs are winning it! Hahahah! What does THAT tell you about drugs? some smart, creative people on that side. They're winning a war, and they're fucked up! Hahahah! Are we winning? It's like, they fight the war on drugs like the colonials fought the Indians, right? They're walking in a straight line in red coats; drug users are like Indians. They're up in the trees, going *puff puff puff* "Are they fighting us? *exhale* I guess we're winning by default! Hah hahah! No combat, we're ahead!

The California Supreme Court has ruled unanimously against compassionate care. This is a serious blow to many medical Marijuana patients in California who are too sick to cultivate their own medicine.

The Court held that, in order to be protected under the Act, a primary caregiver must consistently provide care, independent of any assistance in taking medical marijuana at or before the time he or she assumed responsibility for assisting with medical marijuana. To illustrate some examples of appropriate caregivers under the Act, the Court states: "The spouse or domestic partner caring for his or her ailing companion, the child caring for his or her ailing parent, the hospice nurse caring for his or her ailing patient -- each can point to the many ways in which they, medical marijuana aside, attend to and assume responsibility for the core survival needs of their dependants."

On the other hand, the Court said, a "defendant whose caregiving consisted principally of supplying marijuana and instructing on its use, and who otherwise only sporadically took some patients to medical appointments, cannot qualify as a primary caregiver under [California's Compassionate Use] Act."

Sadly, a lot of medical Marijuana patients don't have a daughter, partner or spouse to help them cultivate and use their medicine. In this reporter's opinion; this is a giant step backwards for California. Update: Here's an article about the change in Ukiah, CA.

The Canadian Press reports that the world's oldest stash of Marijuana has been found in a remote chinese tomb.

"To our knowledge, these investigations provide the oldest documentation of cannabis as a pharmacologically active agent," says the newly published paper, whose lead author was American neurologist Dr. Ethan B. Russo.

Remnants of cannabis have been found in ancient Egypt and other sites, and the substance has been referred to by authors such as the Greek historian Herodotus. But the tomb stash is the oldest so far that could be thoroughly tested for its properties.

The 18 researchers, most of them based in China, subjected the cannabis to a battery of tests, including carbon dating and genetic analysis. Scientists also tried to germinate 100 of the seeds found in the cache, without success.

The cannabis was found to be 2,700 years old and was found near a "light-haired, blue-eyed Caucasian man, likely a shaman of the Gushi culture, near Turpan in northwestern China". It seems humans have been getting stoned for 2,700 years. Right on.