Jamie Foxx Talks Prop. 19, Thinks President Obama Must Be Smoking Weed

From: http://www.tvsquad.com/



Now that Conan O'Brien has a new talk show, 'Lopez Tonight' has moved to a different starting time (weeknights, 12AM ET on TBS). 'Lopez' is now more of a late late night experience. In honor of the show's new schedule, actor Jamie Foxx appeared, got George Lopez a little drunk, and then started talking about drugs.

Foxx celebrated the "after hours" time slot by having Lopez do some shots of booze. Once the pair was a little tipsy, Jamie shifted the conversation to the topic of Proposition 19 -- the attempt to legalize marijuana under California law.

The actor discussed his own prodigious pot consumption, then advanced a novel theory -- that Barack Obama is stoned all the time.

Jamie theorized that the president was engaging in some recreational activities. "Barack is so smooth," he said. "He's always cool -- even when 'they' yell at him. ... The president is smoking [pot]!" he yelled.

Foxx continued to argue that Obama must be "baked" to handle the amount of stress he faces. He added that Obama seemed to remain calm no matter what: "Even if they're like, 'Mr. President, you're just so wrong, you're just the worst!'" But even if Obama is always calm, Jamie was pretty loud and animated while discussing his theory. But then, he was drunk(-ish), not stoned, so that's understandable.

Marijuana on the ballot: 6 states moving toward 'legalization'

Calfornia voters aren't the only ones considering loosening their state laws against pot possession next week

From: http://theweek.com/

California's Prop 19 would be the most permissive marijuana law in the nation. A medical marijuana dispensary in L.A. is pictured. Photo: Getty SEE ALL 29 PHOTOS

While the battle to control Congress is getting most of the pre-election ink, voters in several states will also be deciding how to handle the touchy issue of marijuana's legal status. Fourteen states already have medical marijuana laws on the books, and more are likely to vote in doctor-approved pot use this year or in 2012. (Click here to read The Week's latest coverage: "Will California's Proposition 19 pass?") Here are six states that could take a major step down the path toward decriminalization — or even legalization — on Nov. 2:

California
Passage of Proposition 19 by Golden State voters would create by far the most permissive marijuana law in the nation. The ballot measure would legalize — at the state and local level, anyway — recreational amounts of marijuana and allow local goverments to tax and regulate sales of the drug. The contentious battle over Prop 19 is creating some strange political dynamics, says NPR's Mandalit del Barco. For instance, many growers and "stoners" are opposed to the new taxes and government oversight, while some cops and mothers' groups support Prop 19 as a way to take profits out of the hands of drug dealers and Mexican cartels. None of that may matter, says Nate Silver in The New York Times, since support for the measure appears to be "going up in smoke" as the election nears. Today it stands no better than a 50-50 chance of passing.

Oregon
More than one in every 100 Oregonians already smokes marijuana legally for medical purposes, and Measure 74 would let them purchase their pot from state-licensed growers and nonprofit retailers, called dispensaries. (Under current law, card-carrying smokers have to grow their own marijuana, or designate someone to grow it for them.) The problem with the measure, says The Portland Mercury in an editorial, is it has no regulation mechanism to assure "all pot is safe and legal," as with other medicines. Oregon should learn from the mistakes in California and Colorado, "and do ours better." But Oregon has already taken "the main step" of legalizing medical marijuana, says the Albany, Ore., Democrat-Herald in an editorial, and "if something is legal to use — such as liquor and tobacco — it's not unreasonable to authorize places where it may be sold."

Arizona
Proposition 203 would allow Arizonans with a host of diseases to possess up to 2.5 ounces of pot with a doctor's recommendation. They would be allowed to buy medical marijuana from nonprofit, state-licensed dispensaries, or grow it themselves if the nearest outlet is more than 25 miles away. "Opponents worry it will bring more crime, substance abuse, and corruption to our state," says Lori Jane Gliha at ABC News 15. But with polls showing it the most popular measure on the ballot, with 54 percent support, "we'll go out on a limb and say [it] will probably pass" anyway, says Ray Stern in the Phoenix New Times.

South Dakota
Measure 13 is a do-over for South Dakota medical-marijuana proponents, after a similar measure in 2006 fell short by about 15,000 votes, or 4 percentage points. Activists "think they can get over the top this time around," says Phillip Smith in Drug War Chronicle, with restrictions carefully tailored "to win over a skeptical and conservative prairie electorate" — to wit, the proposed law limits people with specific conditions to 1 ounce and only upon the recommendation of a doctor with whom they have "bona fide relationship." But not all skeptics are convinced: "I just think it's a total scam being done by people interested in legalizing marijuana," says Yankton County, S.D., Sheriff Dave Hunhoff. "If they want to legalize marijuana ... they should just stand up and use that argument."

Vermont
The Democratic candidate for governor of the Green Mountain State, Peter Shumlin, publicly advocates the decriminalization of marijuana, says Ron Kampia in The Huffington Post. And if he beats Lt. Gov. Brian Dubie (R), who is "ultra-hostile to decriminalization," Vermont — which already has a medical-marijuana law — "has a good chance of decriminalizing the possession of marijuana," too. But Shumlin can't count on getting every pro-pot vote, says Brad Sylvester in Yahoo News, since he's also facing Liberty Union candidate Ben Mitchell, whose platform calls for making Vermont into the "Amsterdam of the U.S."

Massachusetts
In November, 73 Massachusetts towns and cities will vote on a nonbinding ballot measure instructing state lawmakers "to vote in favor of legislation that would allow the state to regulate the taxation, cultivation, and sale of marijuana to adults" — in short, to legalize pot. Although only 13 percent of the state's voters will see the ballot initiative, its sponsor, the Massachusetts Cannabis Reform Coalition, says majority approval would lay the foundation for a statewide, binding ballot measure in 2012. State voters have already approved decriminalization, says Michael Cutler in Wicked Local, and "the sky hasn't fallen." Full legalization would better limit access to the drug and raise revenue.

Brad Pitt for Mayor: I'm Running on Legalize Pot Platform

Brad Pitt one-on-one in NO with Anne Curry 13Aug09
Source: Today Show

youtube.com — Brad Pitt, are you running for Mayor of New Orleans? "Yeah, I'm running on the gay marriage, no religion, legalization and taxation of marijuana platform. I have no chance."

If Marijuana Was Legal, This Is How It Would Look

- Posted by Evol Jess

Recently, Print Magazine approached four design and packaging firms with a simple brief: If marijuana was legal, how could it be packaged? The following are the ideas and proposals that came from that brief. So… which one would you pick?

Version 1: By The Heads of State

Version 2: By Base Design

Version 3: By Stromme Throndsen

Version 4: By LUST

via 1 (german), 2

Chronic City: Revealed -- California Cops Are Trained 'Marijuana Is Not A Medicine'

By Steve Elliott

Artwork courtesy Jim Wheeler

Can't we all just get along?

​A recent court case in San Diego has revealed some California police officers are basing their sworn court testimony in medical marijuana cases on badly outdated, legally inaccurate information.

This goes a long way towards explaining why it is that so many law enforcement officers in the state still seem to harbor such personal animosity toward medical marijuana and those who use it, even after it's been legal in the state for 13 years. Above and beyond the seemingly eternal cop/pot dichotomy, the cops' own "medical marijuana training materials" tell them that -- contrary to the law -- there's no such thing as medical marijuana, and that all marijuana is illegal!

This misinformation has real-life consequences. Californians who legally use and provide medical marijuana are faced with hostile police and judges who have only heard or choose to believe information which is plainly wrong regarding medicinal pot's legal status here, and inaccurate regarding its effectiveness as medicine, as supported by thousands of doctors and hundreds of studies.

Courtesy eugenedavidovich.com

Eugene Davidovich: Victim of the pot culture wars?

​
Eugene Davidovich, a San Diego medical marijuana provider who was arrested last February as part of Operation Green Rx (aka Operation Endless Summer), told me that the chief investigative officer in his case testified on the stand that he bases his expert testimony, as far as "medical marijuana training," on a handout from something called the Narcotic Educational Foundation of America, "Drug Abuse Education Provider of the California Narcotic Officers' Association."

In this toxic little screed, with the title Use of Marijuana As A "Medicine" (the quotes are theirs), we learn right off the bat -- in the first sentence! -- that "Marijuana, a plant from the cannabis family, is illegal and highly psychoactive." No mention of the fact that medical use of marijuana is legal, mind you -- and this in materials used to educate law enforcement officers.

I'll bet you thought that the issue of medical marijuana was settled when Proposition 215 was voted in back in 1996. Not so fast! You're just a civilian. The cops know better; and guess what? It sure looks as if the cops get to pick which laws they like, and which ones they want to ignore. "MARIJUANA IS NOT A MEDICINE," the "educational" pamphlet screams at its gun-toting, badge-wearing readers.

Screen capture: Reality Catcher

Misinformation has consequences: Inaccurate handout used in officers' court testimony

​
More than a decade after California voters spoke loudly and clearly on the topic, these folks just aren't giving up the pot culture wars. You'd think the "medical marijuana training" of law enforcement officers might include the rather pertinent fact of its legality -- you know, seems like that would merit at least a mention. Reading the sordid little hate-filled pamphlet, you keep expecting to eventually encounter some level-headed caveat for these eager officers, some kind of sensitivity training, some sort of warning that since marijuana is, in fact, legal in this state for medical use, that officers must be careful to protect the rights of patients. But it never comes.

"Many well-intentioned leaders and members of the public have been misled by the well-financed and organized pro-drug legalization lobby, into believing there is merit to their argument that smoking marijuana is a safe and effective medicine," the pamphlet informs officers. "There is no justification for using marijuana as a medicine."

Once the officers have been, er, "trained" as to the illegitimacy of medical marijuana, they are dutifully informed that it is just ever so immoral and icky as well. "We have seen first hand the debilitating and often tragic results, both psychologically and physically, of those who choose intoxication as a part of their lifestyle," the pamphlet laments in one particularly purple passage.

The pamphlet then attempts to cloak its (legally incorrect for California) estimation of marijuana's uselessness as medicine and its enormous moral judgments around the weed in some sort of scientific respectability by citing outdated studies, all of which have been since refuted by more modern findings.

"It is actually scary what goes on in court," Davidovich told me. "I really hope that somehow a stop can be put to this. This is one of the reasons I am so public about these hateful people. There are a lot of patients who are needlessly suffering here in San Diego."

Tags: Chronic City

Breckenridge: One small step closer to legalizing pot

By Joe Tone in Colorado Crimes, News

Small amounts if this could soon be legal in Breckenridge.

​In the battle to become Ski Country's most weed-friendly destination, the town of Breckenridge has moved one step closer to legalizing the possession of small amounts of marijuana.

The town clerk has certified a petition circulated by Sensible Breckenridge, part of the larger advocacy group Sensible Colorado, verifying that at least 500 of the signatures were not signed "Cheech" or "Stoney McStonerton." The town council will now have a chance to vote on the measure, which would "remove local penalties for the private possession of up to one ounce of marijuana by adults twenty-one or older," Sensible Breckenridge said in a release. If the town council gets all high and forgets to vote on August 11, a measure will appear on November's ballot allowing voters to decide.

And no: Just because Breck's totally your favorite place to board and you'd totally go there every weekend if this law takes effect, that doesn't make you eligible to vote. Nice effort though.

Drive to legalize marijuana rolls on in California

By Chuck Conder

OAKLAND, California (CNN) -- Richard Lee greets students, shopkeepers and tourists as he rolls his wheelchair down Broadway at the speed of a brisk jog, hailing them with, "Hi. How ya doin'?"

Marijuana activist Richard Lee is a local celebrity in the small district of Oakland, California, called Oaksterdam.

In this nine-block district of Oakland, California, called Oaksterdam, Lee is a celebrity.

Oaksterdam is Lee's brainchild, a small pocket of urban renewal built on a thriving trade in medical marijuana. The district's name comes from a marriage of Oakland and Amsterdam, a city in the Netherlands renowned for its easy attitude toward sex and drugs.

Lee is the founder of Oaksterdam University, which he describes as a trade school that specializes in all things marijuana: how to grow it, how to market it, how to consume it. The school, which has a curriculum, classes and teachers, claims 3,500 graduates.

Lee owns a medical marijuana dispensary, a coffee house, and an indoor marijuana plantation.

Lee also owns a medical marijuana dispensary, a coffee house, a large indoor marijuana plantation, and a museum/store devoted to the cause of legalizing marijuana.

"I really see this as following the history of alcohol. The way prohibition was repealed there," Lee says, adding that he believes he is close to achieving his mission.

Lee is organizing a petition drive to place a marijuana legalization measure on the ballot in 2010, and he thinks the measure stands a good chance of being approved by voters.

America's High

Can we afford to make pot legal? Can we afford not to? The case for and against legalized pot, an AC 360 special.
Friday 10 p.m.

see full schedule »

A recent California Field Poll showed that more than half the people in the state, where marijuana for medical use was approved more than a decade ago, would approve of decriminalizing pot.

The state's faltering economy is one reason why. If legalized, marijuana could become California's No. 1 cash crop. It could bring in an estimated $1 billion a year in state taxes.

Democratic State Assemblyman Tom Ammiano is spearheading a cannabis legalization bill in the California Assembly. He believes the state's need to increase tax revenues will work in his bill's favor.

"I think it's a seductive part of the equation," he says.

Ammiano says there are a number of ways legalized pot could be marketed, "It could be a Walgreens, it could be a hospital, a medical marijuana facility, whatever could be convenient. Adequate enforcement of the rules. Nobody under 21. No driving under the influence."

Even California's Republican governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, says legalizing marijuana deserves serious consideration.

"I think we ought to study very carefully what other countries are doing that have legalized marijuana," Schwarzenegger says.

But Ammiano says selling a legalized marijuana bill to his fellow legislators remains a delicate matter.

"If we held the vote in the hallway, we'd have it done," Ammiano says. "But people are necessarily cautious. They are up for re-election."

And that is why Lee believes voters will approve a marijuana initiative long before the state Assembly acts. Sitting under grow lights in a warehouse filled with hundreds of marijuana plants, Lee sums it up this way: "For some people cannabis is like a religion. As passionate as some people are about their religions and freedom to think what they want and to worship as they want."

But all of that is baloney to Paul Chabot. He is president of the Coalition for a Drug Free California. He says voters should not be fooled by promises of big bucks flowing to the state from marijuana taxes.

"It's their way of sort of desensitizing our communities, our state and our nation to a drug problem that we clearly need to put our foot down on, and say, 'No more. Enough is enough.' "

Chabot points out that California's medical marijuana law has been poorly regulated, and he expects more of the same if marijuana becomes legalized for everyone.

But a substantial number of Californians seem to believe that no amount of enforcement is going to make pot go away -- and that it's time for the state to begin taking a cut of the action.

Drug czar: Feds won't support legalized pot

The federal government is not going to pull back on its efforts to curtail marijuana farming operations, Gil Kerlikowske, director of the White House's Office of National Drug Control Policy, said Wednesday in Fresno.

The nation's drug czar, who viewed a foothill marijuana farm on U.S. Forest Service land with state and local officials earlier Wednesday, said the federal government will not support legalizing marijuana.

"Legalization is not in the president's vocabulary, and it's not in mine," he said.

Kerlikowske said he can understand why legislators are talking about taxing marijuana cultivation to help cash-strapped government agencies in California. But the federal government views marijuana as a harmful and addictive drug, he said.

"Marijuana is dangerous and has no medicinal benefit," Kerlikowske said in downtown Fresno while discussing Operation SOS -- Save Our Sierra -- a multiagency effort to eradicate marijuana in eastern Fresno County.

CRAIG KOHLRUSS / THE FRESNO BEE
A Fresno County Sheriff's department investigator stands with his AR-15 in front of an illegal marijuana garden found by officers on Monday, July 20, 2009. Officers moving in to shut down such gardens never know what they will be walking in on. Sometimes the suspects are armed and waiting. Other times, the sites are vacated upon arrival.

CRAIG KOHLRUSS / THE FRESNO BEE

A Fresno County Sheriff's Department investigator walks through a forest of marijuana plants growing on public lands west of Shaver Lake on Monday. About 10,000 plants, each with a potential street value of $4,000, were found at the illegal pot garden.

CRAIG KOHLRUSS / THE FRESNO BEE

An investigator guides a Fresno County Sheriff's Office helicopter working to eradicate illegal marijuana gardens on public lands.

CRAIG KOHLRUSS / THE FRESNO BEE

A state Department of Justice investigator sorts through a mountain of illegal marijuana plants chopped out of a garden growing Monday on public lands west of Shaver Lake. The pot was cut down before being destroyed.

CLICK FOR MORE PHOTOS

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• Illegal marijuana farms scar Sierra landscape
• Video: Pot gardens in Fresno County Sierra

Marijuana plants valued at more than $1.26 billion have been confiscated and 82 people arrested over the past 10 days in Fresno County. The operation started last week and is continuing.

By comparison, Tulare County's leading commodity -- milk -- was valued at about $1.8 billion in 2008.

Officials say the marijuana-eradication operation will cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, but the exact amount won't be known until agencies can add up staffing, vehicle and other costs.

In Operation SOS, more than 314,000 plants were uprooted in 70 gardens -- numbers expected to rise as the enforcement action continues. Agents also seized $41,000 in cash, 26 firearms and three vehicles.

Planning for the operation began in February and focused on marijuana crops being backed by Mexican drug cartels, Fresno County Sheriff Margaret Mims said.

Mims said many cartels are involved, but she would not name any because the investigation is still under way. All but one person arrested was from Mexico, officials said.

One hundred growers may still be on the loose, said Fresno County sheriff's Lt. Rick Ko. Many may have gotten rides out of the area, but some could still be in the Sierra, Ko said.

Last year, Fresno County deputies seized 188,000 marijuana plants.

In just one week, nearly twice as many plants were seized, Mims said, "so you can imagine how many we were missing."

Statewide, more than 5.3 million plants were seized in 2008, or two of every three confiscated in the United States, said Bill Ruzzamenti, director of the Central Valley High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area.

"The amount of drugs out there scares most of us," he said.

Volunteers are going into the gardens to clean up trash, dead animals and pesticides to return the land as close to its original condition as possible. But it could take years for the land to recover, because little can be done once fertilizers and pesticides seep into the ground or stream beds.

"For every acre of marijuana grown, 10 acres are damaged," said George Anderson with the California Department of Justice.

The reporter can be reached at mbenjamin@fresnobee.com or (559) 441-6166.

Pot law leaves cops high & dry: Many blow off $100 fines

By Edward Mason and Jessica Van Sack

Photo by Herald file

Thumbing their noses at the state’s lax new pot law, Bay State stoners are brazenly lighting up in front of cops and then refusing to pay fines - leading some frustrated police chiefs to all but give up the fight.

Local police report widespread defiance of the six-month-old law, and a Herald review shows a vast majority of potheads cited by cops blowing off their $100 fines.

Some egregious examples of tokers flaunting the law include:

• In Arlington, a public works employee was cited by the local police chief for smoking a pot pipe as he stood next to his town-issued tractor.

• At bustling Park Street Station, a pair of nonchalant lovers out on the town openly lit up a joint and continued toking even after confronted by off-duty Milton Chief Richard Wells.

• In East Boston, four teens spotted in a “smoke-filled vehicle” unabashedly told a cop they were “just smoking marijuana.”

• A man caught near a Dorchester playground laughed when police said he faced a $100 fine - and then taunted the cops with an expletive-laced tirade.

All told, a staggering 83 percent of 415 tokers cited in Boston since the law took effect in January have refused to pony up the $100, a Herald review shows.

In Braintree, 15 of 28 citations went unpaid, while in Brookline 26 of 33 blew off the fines.

Somerville Deputy Chief Paul Upton said his officers are now writing few if any citations, in part because enforcing the law costs more money than it’s worth.

“If we send an officer to court, it’s going to cost us $250,” Upton said. “We’re not getting a lot of (citations) written.”

In Milton, Chief Wells said the new pot law is unenforceable because there’s nothing encouraging scofflaws to pay fines or even give their real names to police.

Berkshire District Attorney David Capeless, head of the state prosecutors group that fought against relaxing pot sanctions, said, “It’s exactly what we were afraid of, and what we predicted would happen. They’d issue citations, and they’d be ignored.”

Proponents argued pot convictions made youthful indiscretions into lifelong liabilities. But while unpaid parking tickets can cost drivers their licenses, unpaid pot fines carry no repercussions.

“There’s nothing that can happen,” Capeless said.

Thomas Kiley, the Beacon Hill powerbroker who crafted the measure, insisted the law has teeth.

Tucked in the law is language that places pot possession on par with other citations, and police can haul a scofflaw into court, Kiley said. “We did (anticipate) this,” Kiley said.

But Cheryl A. Sibley, chief administrator for the Boston Municipal Court Department, said police are powerless because that provision is neutralized by language clearly stating the only penalty the offender pays is the $100 fine.

Meanwhile, in Braintree on Monday night, police spotted a suspected perv smoking pot in a car filled with coils of rope, a pair of handcuffs and bottles of NyQuil. But they had to let the man go, even though he was awaiting trial on child sexual assault charges.

Said Deputy Chief Russell Jenkins, “Had the law not been changed, he absolutely would have been placed under arrest.”

Article URL: http://www.bostonherald.com/news/regional/view.bg?articleid=1185193

Calif. tax officials: Legal pot would bring $1.4B

Play Video ABC News – Californians Wrestle With Legalizing Marijuana

• Play Video Video:San Diego Now Issuing Medical Marijuana ID Cards News 8 San Diego

By MARCUS WOHLSEN, Associated Press Writer Marcus Wohlsen,

SAN FRANCISCO – A bill to tax and regulate marijuana in California like alcohol would generate nearly $1.4 billion in revenue for the cash-strapped state, according to an official analysis released Wednesday by tax officials.

The State Board of Equalization report estimates marijuana retail sales would bring $990 million from a $50-per-ounce fee and $392 million in sales taxes.

The bill introduced by San Francisco Democratic Assemblyman Tom Ammiano in February would allow adults 21 and older to legally possess, grow and sell marijuana.

Ammiano has promoted the bill as a way to help bridge the state's $26.3 billion budget shortfall.

"It defies reason to propose closing parks and eliminating vital services for the poor while this potential revenue is available," Ammiano said in a statement.

The way the bill is written, the state could not begin collecting taxes until the federal government legalizes marijuana. A spokesman says Ammiano plans to amend the bill to remove that provision.

The legislation requires all revenue generated by the $50-per-ounce fee to be used for drug education and rehabilitation programs. The state's 9 percent sales tax would be applied to retail sales, while the fee would likely be charged at the wholesale level and built into the retail price.

The Equalization Board used law enforcement and academic studies to calculate that about 16 million ounces — or 500 tons — of marijuana are consumed in California each year.

Marijuana use would likely increase by about 30 percent once the law took effect because legalization would lead to falling prices, the board said.

Estimates of marijuana use, cultivation and sales are notoriously difficult to come by because of the drug's status as a black-market substance. Calculations by marijuana advocates and law enforcement officials often differ widely.

"That's one reason why we look at multiple reports from multiple sources — so that no one agenda is considered to be the deciding or determining data," said board spokeswoman Anita Gore.

Advocates and opponents do agree that California is by far the country's top pot-producing state. Last year law enforcement agencies in California seized nearly 5.3 million plants.

If passed, Ammiano's bill could increase the tension between the state and the U.S. government over marijuana, which is banned outright under federal law. The two sides have clashed often since state voters passed a ballot measure in 1996 legalizing marijuana for medical use.

At the same time, some medical marijuana dispensary operators in the state have said they are less fearful of federal raids since U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said the Justice Department would defer to state marijuana regulations.

Advocates pounced on the analysis as ammunition for their claim that the ban on marijuana is obsolete.

"We can't borrow or slash our way out of this deficit," said Stephen Gutwillig, California state director of the Drug Policy Alliance. "The legislature must consider innovative sources of new revenue, and marijuana should be at the top of that list."

Ammiano's bill is still in committee. Hearings on the legislation are expected this fall.

Also Wednesday, three Los Angeles City Council members proposed taxing medical marijuana to help close the city's budget gap.

Council members Janice Hahn, Dennis Zine and Bill Rosendahl backed a motion asking city finance officials to explore taxing the drug.

Hahn said that with more than 400 dispensaries operating in the city, the tax could generate significant revenue. The motion pointed out that a proposed tax increase on medical marijuana in Oakland, which has only four dispensaries, was projected to bring in more than $300,000 in 2010.

Meanwhile, marijuana supporters have taken the first official step toward putting the legalization question directly to California voters.

A trio of Northern California criminal defense attorneys on Wednesday submitted a pot legalization measure to the state attorney general's office, which must provide an official summary before supporters can begin gathering signatures.

About 443,000 signatures are necessary to place The Tax, Regulate and Control Cannabis Act on the November 2010 ballot. The measure would repeal all state and local laws that criminalize marijuana.

He's Not High: Inside Barney Frank's Plan to Legalize Marijuana

Buzz up!

While Congress debates health care, handles the economic downturn, and the quagmire in Afghanistan, Congressman Barney Frank is eyeing America's draconian pot policies. Read our exclusive interview.

PLUS: Why Obama really might decriminalize weed, and what the Bush team knew about legalization

By John H. Richardson

[more from this author]

To my shame, I started my interview with Congressman Barney Frank about the legalization of marijuana by apologizing to my subject. "I know you guys have a lot on your plate these days, so I'm sorry to be calling you about something kind of trivial..."

Then I did a rapid midcourse correction. "But it's not trivial, because people go to jail over it."

"That's exactly right," Frank said.

We were talking about the Personal Use of Marijuana by Responsible Adults Act of 2009, Frank's latest attempt to bring sanity to the federal marijuana laws. Currently, pot is classified as a Schedule I Controlled Dangerous Substance under federal law, which makes it worse than morphine, cocaine, amphetamine, and PCP. Possession of a single joint carries a penalty of $1,000 and a year in prison – a charge faced by about 800,000 American citizens every year. This is the government whose judgment on war and economics we are supposed to respect.

So I started the interview over.

ESQUIRE: Could you tell me why you're doing it at this time? Everybody says you guys have got so much to handle right now.

BARNEY FRANK: Announcing that the government should mind its own business on marijuana is really not that hard. There's not a lot of complexity here. We should stop treating people as criminals because they smoke marijuana. The problem is the political will.

ESQ: That's my second question. There's already been a lot of change in the country. Thirteen states have decriminalized pot. What's holding up Congress?

BF: This is a case where there's cultural lag on the part of my colleagues. If you ask them privately, they don't think it's a terrible thing. But they're afraid of being portrayed as soft on drugs. And by the way, the argument is, nobody ever gets arrested for it. But we have this outrageous case in New York where a cop jammed a baton up a guy's ass when he caught him smoking marijuana.

ESQ: You're kidding.

BF: Actually, I've just been corrected by my partner – it was a radio he jammed up the guy's ass, not his baton.

ESQ: Small radio, I hope.

BF: By the way, the bill is bi-partisan: I've got two Democrats and two Republicans.

ESQ: Who are the Republicans?

BF: Ron Paul. And Dana Rohrabacher from California.

ESQ: Isn't Rohrabacher pretty hard-right?

BF: He's a very conservative guy, but with a libertarian streak.

ESQ: That libertarian streak will help you out once in a while. And who's against it?

BF: Well, Mark Souder from Indiana, who's very much a proponent of the drug war.

ESQ: When you talk to Souder about it, what does he say?

BF: You don't waste your time on people with whom you completely disagree.

ESQ: Okay.

BF: Here's one thing I would say – there's a great intellectual flaw at work here. People say, "Oh, you want the government to approve of smoking marijuana." And the answer is, no, there should be a small number of things that the government makes illegal, but the great bulk of human activity ought to be none of the government's business. People can make their own choices.

ESQ: What about the "public-square" argument that we need to keep prostitutes off the streets and pot-smokers on the run in order to promote a higher level of morality and civic order?

BF: One, I don't think it's immoral to smoke cigarettes or drink alcohol, even though they may make you sick. Morality to me is the way you treat other people, not the way you treat yourself. John Stuart Mill's On Liberty makes a great deal of sense in that regard. I wish more people read him.

ESQ: My father forced me to read On Liberty when I was fourteen years old. I still haven't recovered.

BF: He deals very thoughtfully with some of the objections.

ESQ: Then let me ask you from the other side: Why is the bill so modest? You explicitly say you're not going to overturn state laws.

BF: Because I think it's important, when you're confronting political opinions this way, to make it easier for people. This isn't for drug dealers. Although I do think there's a logic that once you've allowed people to smoke, you're going to go beyond that.

ESQ: So how far do you really want to go? Decriminalize completely? Tax it, like they're talking about out in California?

BF: I don't think that's a debate I should get into right now.

ESQ: So you want to be a cautious centrist, waiting for the country to come around?

BF: [pause] You think this is centrist?

ESQ: [laughs] Okay, sorry.

BF: I must say, I don't have a lot of sympathy with people on the left who say, "Oh, I'm not going to settle for some small step, I'm going to take the big step." I'm doing something I think could be passable. I believe the results of modest beginnings will encourage people to go further. And if the people who disagree with me are right, it won't go further.

ESQ: Realistically, do you think it's going to pass?

BF: Not this year, no.

ESQ: How long do you think it will take?

BF: There's no point in my guessing. Why would I want to guess? We'll have a rational discussion, and we'll see where it goes from there.

While We're Here, One Final Hit on the Topic

Meanwhile, in the wacky world of Republicans who love liberty almost as much as they love prisons, an Illinois congressman named Mark Kirk has proposed a competing law to make selling "this new potent marijuana" punishable by $1 million in fines and 25 years in prison. Apparently Kirk is talking about something called "kush," which I cannot personally evaluate since I am A) not currently a pot-smoker, and B) too crippled by college bills to afford anything that costs $600 an ounce. But for those old-fashioned reality-based types who care about scientific evidence, here's what the guys in white lab coats say.

So, Which One Is Goliath Again?

Jane Hamsher of MSNBC and Jillian Brandes go toe-to-toe last week about health-care reform.

Speaking of reform, last week MSNBC reported the shocking statistic that health-care reformers have spent $15 million on ads, while the enemies of reform have spent a mere $4 million. "It's a David and Goliath situation," whined a right-wing shill named Jillian Bandes.

Well, there are statistics and there are statistics. Behind the scenes, where it really matters, hospitals, doctors, and Big Pharma are spending $1.4 million a day to kill reform. They've hired three-hundred-and-fifty former members of congress and congressional staffers as temporary lobbyists. "Even in a city where lobbying is a part of life, the scale of the effort has drawn attention," the Washington Post reports.

David and Goliath, indeed.

You Like Dislike Me, You Really Like Dislike Me!

Loving a vigorous debate and personal abuse as I do, I have come to rely on my many right-wing critics for my weekly dose of bile. So it was very exciting to open my Web browser yesterday and find myself attacked from the left! My crime was comparing the 19th-century abolitionist John Brown to the "right to life" assassin Scott Roeder. Also, lamenting the 620,000 people who died in the Civil War. According to historian Louis DiCario, that makes me a racist. "What Richardson actually seems to be asking is: "Was ending the enslavement of black people worth a half-million white people's lives?" And I was wrong to call Brown a terrorist too. Although he dragged a farmer and his sons from their beds and watched as his raiding party hacked them to death with swords, he was actually a "counter-terrorist." Check it out!

In DiCario's honor (and Barney Frank's and John Stuart Mill's and all the victims of righteous causes), here's the quote of the day: "There is in most of us an unreconstructed Southerner who will not accept domination as well as a benevolent despot who wants to mold others for their own good, to assemble them in such as way as to produce a comprehensive unit which will satisfy our own ambition by realizing some vision of our own; and the conflict between these two tendencies – which on a larger scale gave rise to the Civil War – may also break the harmony of families and cause a fissure in the individual." – Edmund Wilson, Patriotic Gore

Questions? Comments? Concerns? Click here to e-mail John H. Richardson about his weekly political column at Esquire.com.

http://www.esquire.com/the-side/richardson-report/new-marijuana-laws-071309?src=digg#ixzz0LHXnh2Fh&D

High Stakes: A Call to Legalize Marijuana

California Desperately Needs Tax Revenue, Prompting Some to See Green in Making Grass Legal

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(CBS) A high-stakes political battle is underway in the cash-strapped state of California. At issue is the narrowly-defined liberty people have there to grow and sell a certain plant . . . and the desire of some folks to have the state government TAX it. John Blackstone reports our Cover Story:

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In Oakland, Calif., Richard Lee runs a string of businesses, from coffee shops to glass blowing that are helping revitalize the once-decaying downtown.

But Lee's business empire is built on an unusual foundation: Selling marijuana

In the back of his Blue Sky Coffee Shop there's a steady stream of cash buyers, and not just for coffee.

"In the front you get the coffee and pastries, and in the back you get the cannabis," Lee said.

A salesman told customers, "You're welcome to pull the bags out and smell the herb as you like."

What's going on here is illegal under federal law, but permitted under California law that since 1996 has allowed marijuana for medical use.

A dozen other states have similar laws. One customer named Charles said pot is exactly what his doctor ordered.

"So that's what relieves my anxiety and allows me to cope and feel good," he said.

Lee has dubbed his Oakland neighborhood "Oaksterdam" . . . with a nod to Amsterdam and its liberal drug laws. His goal is to make this a tourist destination, with marijuana its main attraction.

"Does that worry people around here?" asked Blackstone.

"No, people around here love it 'cause they see how much we've improved the neighborhood," Lee said.

Next door to where Lee sells marijuana, Gertha Hays sells clothes. She says the dispensary brings people from all walks of life. "There's no particular pothead," she said, "so everyone comes over there."

"So these aren't just druggies in there?" Blackstone asked.

"No, not at all. If you look and see who comes up and down thethe block you'll see it's so diverse," Hays said.

Part of the Oaksterdam neighborhood is a nursery growing a cash crop: Medical marijuana is now estimated to be a $2 to 3 billion business in California.

"Yeah, there's a lot of people making a lot of money," lee said.

(CBS)

There are now several hundred medical marijuana dispensaries in California . . . and much more marijuana being sold on the street.

"We estimate, overall, [the] California cannabis industry is in the neighborhood of around $15 billion," lee said.

While there is disagreement over the real size of the marijuana market it's big enough to have captured the attention of lawmakers trying to fill a huge hole in the state budget.

Assemblyman Tom Ammiano is pushing legislation to legalize pot so the state can inhale new taxes.

"I thought it was high time, no pun intended, for this to be on the table," Ammiano said. "I'm trying to beat everybody to the punch with the jokes, because I get a lot of 'em," he laughed.

There are many who ridicule the idea, but the state tax board estimates Ammiano's proposed tax of $50 an ounce could bring in $1.5 to 2 billion a year.

"We find that highly unlikely," said Rosalie Pacula, of the Rand Drug Policy Research Center. She says California is likely to be disappointed by the revenue raised on marijuana that now sells for about $150 an ounce.

"If you try to impose a tax that is that high, you have absolutely no incentive for the black market to disappear," she said. "There is complete profit motive for them to actually stay."

The tax proposal, though, has started an unusual political discussion. According to one poll, 56 percent of California voters say marijuana should be legalized and taxed. Even California's Republican governor has not snuffed out talk of legalization.

"No, I think it's not time for that, but I think it's time for debate," Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said. "All of those ideas for creating extra revenues, I'm always for an open debate on it."

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Check out reports on the debate over legalization in CBSNews.com's special section "Marijuana Nation."

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Of course, Governor Schwarzenegger, from his earlier life, does have some experience . . .

. . . as does the president himself.

"I inhaled, frequently," Mr. Obama admitted on the campaign trail, in a nod to President Bill Clinton's earlier quasi-admission. "That was the point."

And while the president says he is opposed to legalizing pot ("No, I don't think that is a good strategy to grow our economy"), his administration has ordered the DEA to stop raiding state-approved medical marijuana dispensaries.

It's a big change from decades of viewing the plant as the indisputable evil portrayed in the 1936 film "Reefer Madness."

But that old image has been going up in smoke for decades.

It was along for the trip in 1969 in the movie "Easy Rider," and on the cover of Life Magazine. On TV today it's just a part of suburban life in the series "Weeds."

And then there's the growing recognition of marijuana as medicine.

Predict: Marijuana Nation
Will any state legalize marijuana by the end of 2009?

"Marijuana has been a medicine for 5,000 years," said Dr. Donald Abrams of San Francisco General Hospital. "It's only for the last 70 years that it hasn't been a medicine in this country."

Dr. Abrams has been studying marijuana for twelve years and is convinced it is both effective and safe.

"I think marijuana is a very good medicine," he said. "I'm a cancer doctor. I take care every day of patients who have loss of appetite, nausea, pain, difficulty sleeping and depression. I have one medicine that can treat all of those symptoms, instead of five different medicines to which they may become addicted.

"And that one is marijuana, and they're not gonna become addicted to it?" Blackstone said.

"That's correct," said Dr. Abrams.

But those who have been fighting the war on drugs say that, just because marijuana may be medicine, that doesn't mean it should be legal.

"There's just no doubt about it that the drug cartels and the drug organizations are very much involved in the production and sale of marijuana, said Roy Wasden, police chief in Modesto, Calif., where a lot of marijuana is grown.

"You can be out walking through the national forest, and if you hike into one of these marijuana grows, you'll be at great risk," he said.

And drug fighters warn aging boomers that marijuana isn't the gentle weed they remember. Today's pot is a whole different kettle of fish

"The marijuana of the 1960s and Woodstock is not what's being sold on the streets in the United States today, said Chief Bernard Melekian, head of the California Police Chiefs Association. "The narcotic portion, the THC of marijuana in the '60s, hovered around one or two percent. THC today is around 27 to 30 percent.

"You have a very significantly different plant."

Teaching people to grow that plant is another one of Richard Lee's businesses.

Lee runs Oaksterdam University, where students also learn how to stay within the state's medical marijuana laws.

"So you can't plant those seeds until you know what the law is?" Blackstone asked.

"Right," said Lee. "Vote today and get high tonight."

Students like Darnell Blackman and Barbara Kramer see an opportunity to do good . . . and to do well . . . by growing marijuana.

"Just like aspirin or ibuprofen or any of those other medications, cannabis is just another way of helping people," said Blackman.

"I thought maybe there was some way that I could get in the ground floor, get ahead of the curve on where this industry might be going," said Kramer.

There are still plenty of obstacles before it's a legal industry. Chief Wasden says this is no time for a surrender in the war on drugs.

"Fewer kids are using drugs today," he said. "We're not losing the war on drugs. Kids are starting to understand the negative, negative consequences of drug abuse. Do we need to introduce another dependency-driven substance into our community when in fact we're making progress?"

But in the community now known as Oaksterdam, the drug warriors are nowhere to be seen . . . as a whole neighborhood goes to pot.


For more info:

Oaksterdam

California Police Chiefs Association

RAND Corporation

USCF Medical Center

© MMIX, CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Marijuana and cocaine should be legalised, says Latin American drugs commission

Duncan Campbell

Marijuana and cocaine for personal use should be decriminalised because the "war on drugs" has been a disaster, according to some of Latin America's most powerful politicians and writers.

The current international policy on drugs encourages corruption and violence that is threatening democracy throughout the continent, according to the former president of Brazil, Fernando Henrique Cardoso, who is a co-president of the Latin American commission on drugs and democracy. As well as politicians, the commission includes the writers Mario Vargas Llosa of Peru, and Paulo Coelho of Brazil.

The election of Barack Obama has opened up the best opportunity for decades to address the failure of the "so-called drugs war", Cardoso told the Guardian today on a visit to London. He said he was hopeful that the international community would acknowledge that the time had come for a "paradigm shift" in the debate on drugs. "The war on drugs has failed in spite of enormous efforts in places like Colombia – the area of coca crops is not reducing," he said.

The current system of prohibition encouraged corruption among police officers, politicians and even judges. "It poisons the whole system, it undermines democracy," Cardoso said. "The war on drugs is based on repression … How can people believe in democracy if the rule of law doesn't work?" Users should be offered treatment rather than jail, he said.

"The starting point has to be the United States," he said. "Now we have a new American administration, which is much more open-minded than before." He said he had held talks with the US state department in the later years of the Bush administration and found that, privately, many of the officials there shared his views.

Cardoso said that the changes would have to be co-ordinated. "We need an international convention, otherwise you will have different countries doing different things," he said. "But the climate is changing for the first time for many years. Even in the US, they recognise we are in deadlock now." Obama had already made it clear that the idea of a "war on drugs" was not workable. The need for change is urgent, said Cardoso, because of what is happening in Latin America. "There is a very grave situation in Mexico," he said. "More people are being killed there (through the drugs war) than in Iraq." He said that it was easier for former presidents who were no longer in office or running for election to speak out on such a controversial issue. He added that ending the war on drugs would be not be a signal that drugs were acceptable but a recognition that current policies had failed.

"You have to show that drugs are harmful, even light drugs, like marijuana - it is better not to use drugs - but tobacco is harmful also yet its use is being reduced by education," said Cardoso. He added that the vast quantities of money being used to enforce "repressive" policies on drugs could be put into treatment and education. Hundreds of thousands of people were being unnecessarily criminalised and sent to prison, "which are schools of crime."

The previous UN drugs policy that aimed to eliminate all drug use by this year was ill-conceived, he said. "You can never stop drugs use," he said, likening it to some of the failed policies in the past over HIV/Aids. "You can't have zero drugs any more than you can have a zero sex policy but you can have a safe sex policy." He said that Brazil's success in halting the HIV/Aids epidemic, which meant promoting the use of condoms in a Catholic country, was an example of how people's behaviour could be changed by education rather than repression.

Cops Bust Bush's Favorite Chinese Guy, Find 24K Pot Plants

Westword.com — The Weeds-like drug ring bust was almost blown after an internal leak, and a prominent Chinese restaurant owner -- his food beloved by President Bush -- was implicated.

click here for this whole Crazy Article... Cops Bust Bush's Favorite Chinese Guy, Find 24K Pot Plants

Congress to consider allowing marijuana possession

by Ben Morris

Congressman Barney Frank (D-Mass.) introduced legislation today to remove criminal penalties for marijuana possession at the federal level. The Personal Use of Marijuana by Responsible Adults Act of 2009 would remove penalties for possession of up to 3.5 ounces of marijuana and the not-for-profit transfer of 1 ounce.

Please take action today to support this important legislation.

Congressman Frank’s legislation seeks to bring federal law in line with reality. 99% of all marijuana arrests occur at the state and local level. In practice, federal laws prohibiting marijuana possession act as a deterrent to states that may want a more sensible policy. Congressman Frank’s bill would remove that deterrent and push U.S. marijuana policy in the right direction.

The bill’s introduction comes amidst unprecedented momentum for reform, but it will still face significant opposition in Congress — so please visit mpp.org/federal-action and take action today!

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Connect on Facebook to help spread the word.

Tagged with: Congressman Barney Frank and decriminalization and Prohibition by the author

'Joint Resolution' Could End Crackdown On Medical Pot in CA

By Joe Eskenaz

Sen. Mark Leno today announced he has introduced a "joint resolution" to end the federal crackdown on medical marijuana use in California. While this is a matter of serious legislation, one can't help but notice the howler of a marijuana-related "joint" resolution. Leno's spokeswoman, Ali Bay, confirmed that this was not an attempt at a cute double-entendre by the senator; "We do not have any choice in the wording." If you're going to introduce legislation simultaneously to both houses, this is what you've got to call it. So there you go.

In addition to calling for an end to Drug Enforcement Agency Raids -- such as the one on San Francisco's Emmalyn's California Cannabis Clinic in late March, Leno's bill (SJR 14) requests the creation of "comprehensive federal policy to ensure safe and legal access to medical marijuana for patients who benefit from its therapeutic use."

The bill will be heard in committees later this month. Our calls to Leno and members of medical marijuana advocacy group Americans for Safe Access have not yet been returned. More as we know more.

UPDATE, 12:35 p.m.: Americans for Safe Access Spokesman Kris Hermes notes that "there will be some people who seize upon the wording" of this "joint resolution" -- but "the real issue is the message the state is sending to the federal government that it's not acceptable to interfere in the implementation of California's medical marijuana law."

Hermes says the votes are there for the resolution to pass the Senate and head to the Assembly, which he he expects will happen sometime in July. Since this is a non-binding resolution, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's signature is not required.

UPDATE, 1:30 p.m.: Leno was less willing to predict success than Hermes -- "I don't presume anything. My experience is dealing with medical marijuana is always a challenge. I've often said legislators are behind their voters on this issue."

He predicts it will first be heard in the Health Committee next month before moving to the floor.