Photo by David Sygall
The spring of 2011 has brought tension to the air for everyone involved with cannabis in the United States. Federal authorities have unleashed a coordinated attack on political efforts to tax marijuana and they have made war on medical marijuana programs. This has been matched by additional states changing local laws, putting more skin into the game than ever.
The bets are now in for the biggest cannabis policy showdown in our generation – right in Washington DC. The Schedule I status of marijuana in the federal Controlled Substances Act will either be re-affirmed or changed, likely over the next 24 months.
Marijuana prohibition has become the most refined and serious states’ rights issue of the 21st Century. Millions of Americans are now participating in a multi-billion dollar medical cannabis economy.
States are taking greater pains to regulate this fast-moving industry. Why? To recognize the will of their residents but also to gain badly needed tax dollars. In some cases, they are getting that money.
At the same time, Michele Leonhart has led the Drug Enforcement Administration to conduct a major escalation of raids that bring automatic weapons into peaceful marijuana centers.
If marijuana were moved to Schedule II, III, or IV or even removed from the schedule (that is an option), it would end the conflict of state vs. federal law on all related matters. That means whatever marijuana industry that states decide to authorize (medical, recreational or hemp) could be protected, regulated and taxed.
When the Controlled Substances Act was created in 1970 a blue-ribbon commission was chartered by President Nixon to study marijuana’s proper placement. The recommendation in 1972 was that personal cannabis use should be decriminalized and it should not appear in the scheduling. Obviously Nixon ignored those suggestions.
Forty years later we live in the ‘Just Say Drug War’ era. Still, the status of marijuana has always been overseen by Congress and the President. They have been the quiet players at the poker game thus far. But the increase in aggression by the DEA and US Attorneys has produced an interesting result.
When the Washington state Legislature recently passed a bill to regulate a dispensary system for patients the fed came down like a ton of bricks on the political process. Governor Chris Gregoire (a former US Attorney in her own right) vetoed the bill. But then she turned around to announce plans to bring together the now 16 medical marijuana Governors in a unified lobby for re-scheduling to category II.
Gregoire currently leads the National Governors Association. Having the elected leaders of these states actively seek an end to federal cannabis prohibition could be a significant pressure point on Senators and Representatives in Washington DC.
We are also just beginning to see federal lawsuits filed in Montana by the victims of these DEA raids over illegal search and seizure. Cannabis and money are stolen, bank accounts cleared out; but no one is arrested. Not exactly by-the-books due-process.
The IRS has now appeared at the table as a major player, staked by the Fed against individual entrepreneurs. Financial investigations of successful cannabis business like Harborside Health Services in Oakland are underway.
At the same time the city of San Jose California began raking in $290,000 in monthly taxes from local medical cannabis sales!
The effect of these simultaneous actions has just forced everyone in the game to go all-in. Congress and President Obama are being positioned to make their bets and address the issue…during an election season. And that may be the plan.
However, supporting the move to Schedule II in the CSA is a safe position, politically. Ever growing majorities of American voters, of all parties, support their local medical cannabis laws. So, re-scheduling is backed by tremendous public support, but groups such as the American Medial Association (AMA) have also recommended the change.
Moving to Schedule II is a good quick-fix for the current medical cannabis industry as well as programs like Rhode Island and New Jersey that remain on hold. Even the Internal Revenue Service would be mollified.
Still, there should be a modern congressional commission designated to study full cannabis legalization if re-scheduling is adopted.
A more disturbing outcome is possible. The current Schedule I status could ultimately be upheld by Congress and President Obama. That would likely signal another significant increase in federal aggression towards the existing medical cannabis industry. This sends everyone down a terrible path. Battles will rage in the courts and in the faces of seriously ill patients just trying to follow their state laws.
Would some Governors then mobilize their Attorneys General, their police or even the National Guard to protect their state employees, medical cannabis centers and patients?
We are experiencing the Cuban Missile Crisis in the cold war between the States and the US Federal Government on medical marijuana laws. Moving to Schedule II would pull authorities on both sides back from the brink of violence.
The move would allow everyone to split the pot. Of paramount importance, it would directly help the millions of seriously ill residents who access this proven therapy every day.
Marijuana prohibition has seen windows for reform in the past; none have been open this wide.
Public support must be channeled because taking the game to Congress is also where the marijuana reform movement has traditionally been the weakest.
Just a handful of federal legislators are there to champion this cause: Ron Paul (R-TX), Barney Frank (D-MA), Jared Polis (D-CO), Maurice Hinchey (D-NY) and Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) to name the most vocal.
However there is one place that the marijuana legalization movement is stronger than everyone else, including the Fed: Online. Within the modern Matrix cannabis reform is Neo.
This could be the end-game. Everyone online is at the table too, so don’t sit this one out.
Marijuana prohibition deserves a peaceful solution, for all Americans.
Commentary from Editor Chris Goldstein
Get involved:
NORML- www.norml.org
Students for Sensible Drug Policy – www.ssdp.org
The Drug Policy Alliance - www.drugpolicy.org
The Marijuana Policy Project – www.mpp.org
NORML Women’s Alliance - http://norml.org/index.cfm?Group_ID=8059
Willie Nelson’s Teapot Party – www.teapotparty.org
Read more at Freedomisgreen
- How To Talk to an Undercover Cop at a Marijuana Rally
- Second Committee Passes Marijuana Decrim in Connecticut
- Legislation Would Stop New York City Marijuana Arrests
- Delaware Medical Marijuana Bill Clears Final Vote
Questions? chris@freedomisgreen.com
Chris Goldstein is a respected marijuana reform advocate. As a writer and radio broadcaster he has been covering cannabis news for over a decade. He volunteers with local groups to change prohibition laws including PhillyNORML and The Coalition for Medical Marijuana New Jersey.
It should be a states right to not only practice “No victim no crime.” but also to protect their citizens from the fed creating victims by making personal freedoms into crimes just to create monopoly [contracts] awarded through nepotism.
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To whom it may concern,
I have had multiple sclerosis for eight years now, in seven of those years I tried nearly all legal and available “disease modifying” drugs with little or no success. In the last year with the use of canibis my disease progression has halted. I know this doesn’t meet the “criteria” we all need to see but I do not see the major accumulation of severe disability that had become my certin demis. Please refrain from continuing to promot propaganda that been completely proven as false. If you already know it’s is the most egregious assault on civil libertys since the sixties when we had to recognize how horrid the nation treated minorities. Once again our lawmakers need to step up and return our freedom.
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I think they should just take it off the list all together.If a commission has already recommended this once, then why bother with another study, when one has already been done.Simply follow the recommendations of the last commission and take it off the list entirely
we do not need any more regulating look at what happened with tobacco regulation we might as well have ask them to add so many chemicals in it that it gave any one who consumed it cancer .I do not think we need this kind of regulation in fact i don’t think we need any regulation we just need to be able to raise it.sell it and consume it with out arrest . just like salad .
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Great write-up, Chris! We hope you wil all join us for our next Overgrow The Government protest on DC in September! Follow us on our Facebook Media Page or at overgrowthegovt.com! Peace!
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Yes Indeed!!!! Great Article !!!! For God’s Sake, It grows Wild….. But This plant needs no ‘additives or preservatives ‘ Like what government did to ciggerettes. There are finally places to go buy just PLAIN TOBACCO and you put in the ‘rolling machine yourself. So what you see IS what you get. But i would really just love to get it legalized or decriminalized. It’s My Right and My Choice, See the TRUTH, Hear My VOICE. Peace
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I am a cannabis patient… I wont go into to much detail on how I became a patient however, I will tell you this: I have been in 4 car wrecks that were severe, 5 that were mild (not all by my fault), then I had a radical nephrectomy in order to remove my left kidney due to a 11 and ½ centimeter tumor growing on it (they removed my adrenal gland and lymph node as well), then I had a heart attack on Halloween 2006, after which I came down with diabetes with the resulting side effect of neuropathy developing in both of my hands and both of my feet and lower legs… as a side effect there is a situation that has taken place from my cancer surgery; when my lymph nodes were removed it in effect made my ability to drain fluids from my legs very difficult. This resulted in something called lymphdemia (? Not sure of spelling) when fluids build up in my legs I get blisters. Thus develops only where the neuropathy has developed because my skin there is very thin and weak. The blisters then open and form ulcers that don’t heal properly because my of my broken lymph system. As a result, I have additional pain.
So, as you can see; I am never out of pain… it is with me on a 24 hour ¾ seven days a week, week after week cycle. My pain surpasses all my prior pain from accidents and operations (this includes a severed tongue taking 25 stitches to reattach) by leaps and bounds… As a result I take as much opiates as I can tolerate as well as other drugs that supposedly help relieve my pain… never the less, if it was not for cannabis I would not be able to write this note to you and or to enjoy time with my two boys.
Cannabis helps me each and every day of each and every week, cannabis helps mostly with my break-thru pain: this is the pain that develops between doses of my opiates. The effect of drugs does not stay even throughout its entire cycle… it gets weaker as it wears off so what happens is my pain goes up and down that same ladder… my pain surpasses a scale of 1 to 10 often used when asking “how bad is your pain today”. My pain never goes below 10 and at times exceeds 20 on that scale of 10. The relief I receive from cannabis is instantaneous. And it is amazing in how effective it is… I just wish the pain I experience each and every day could be experienced by both of our legislative branches of government (Congress and Senate). I think that if they were to experience what I as well as many others have experienced with regard to pain as well as other situations; they might stop being selfish and provide compassion for those in need. I wrote a poem for cannabis and the patients it helps on my first visit to a cannabis club. The poem is called “Just a Little Seed”.
“Just a Little Seed”
It a medicinal plant
There are many kinds
Some just reg
Then there’s the kind
Roll some up
And take us down
Smoke some up
Then wonder around
Eat you will
And watch it heal
A plant from the ages
Used in many stages
“A wacky Weed, Just a Little Seed”
“A wacky Weed, Just a Little Seed”
“A wacky Weed, Just a Little Seed”
From far down south
or up the coast
If it gets you by
You wont cry
Give the people this wonder weed
A lot of people have this need
Take us back to a grand new age
Don’t keep us locked in a great big cage
“A wacky Weed, Just a Little Seed”
“A wacky Weed, Just a Little Seed”
“A wacky Weed, Just a Little Seed”
I wrote this poem
For all of you
To make you think
About the few
Their pain is very real
Come on Feds lets make a deal
The people will win
In time you will see
For you know
We hold the key
“A wacky Weed, Just a Little Seed”
“A wacky Weed, Just a Little Seed”
“A wacky Weed, Just a Little Seed”
Thank you for reading my poem…
Peace
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Marijuana is the safest drug with actual benefits for the user as opposed to alcohol which is dangerous, causes addiction, birth defects, and affects literally every organ in the body. Groups are organizing all over the country to speak their minds on reforming pot laws. I drew up a very cool poster featuring Willie for the cause which you can check out on my artist’s blog at http://dregstudiosart.blogspot.com/2011/01/vote-teapot-2011.html Drop in and let me know what you think!
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It is time to “Change the Schedule of Cannabis, Cannabis Laws, and Drug Czar Laws”
Read and sign the petition at
http://www.change.org/petitions/change-the-schedule-of-cannabis-cannabis-laws-and-drug-czar-laws
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Jesus said to do unto others as we would have them to do unto us. None of us would want to see our parent or other loved one thrown in jail for using marijuana to ease the pain, depression, or nausea of a life-threatening illness. It’s time to stop putting our own families in jail. It’s very sad when our young people are arrested for marijuana, so let’s ask ourselves what is hurting the kids more: the marijuana or the arrest, the police record, the loss of financial aid, the jail time… Are they being hurt by the marijuana, or are they being hurt by the law?
Also, check out http://www.northpoint.org/ if you’d like to see some more very positive material about Jesus at work in people’s lives.
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How about an annual permit, maybe $100 to grow a dozen plants, kind of like a fishing license?
It would put the drug gangs out of business and allow people to grow for themselves something that’s milder than alcohol, safer than aspirin, and less addictive than coffee, and it would take a chunk out of our national debt; It’s a win-win-win!
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Moving cannabis to schedule II will make it illegal to grow in the U.S.
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June 13, STOP / Block Senate Bill 423 Petition Drive to Begin, Montana Cannabis Industry Association ( MTCIA ), Sign Up to Help!
Get involved! Make sure YOUR voice is heard on medical marijuana in Montana!
http://tinyurl.com/5vyjxb3
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