U.S. EFFORT TO SHUTTER POT CENTER QUESTIONED

A federal appeals court questioned the government's move to seize and
shut down the huge Harborside medical marijuana dispensary, but
showed no support Tuesday for Oakland's attempt to preserve the pot
supplier and its bounty of tax revenue.

Despite the Obama administration's repeated assertions that it would
not target medical marijuana operations that comply with state laws,
U.S. Attorney Melinda Haag filed suit in July 2012 to close down the
city-licensed Harborside Health Center, which supplies marijuana to
108,000 patients along the Oakland Estuary at 1840 Embarcadero. City
officials sued to block the forfeiture, but a federal magistrate
ruled in 2013 that Oakland had no rights of its own at stake in the case.

Harborside, which is challenging the forfeiture in a separate case,
remains open while Oakland appeals the dismissal of its suit. The
appeal drew a plague-on-both-your-houses reaction Tuesday from a
conservative panel of the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San
Francisco, which seemed scornful of both the federal government's
actions and the city's effort to block them.

"Why have you picked this fight?" Stephen Murphy, a federal judge
from Detroit temporarily assigned to the panel, asked the Justice
Department's attorney, Adam Jed. Murphy said the forfeiture action
appears to conflict with President Obama's and Attorney General Eric
Holder's declared policy of "legally looking the other way with
respect to medical marijuana facilities."

Jed said he didn't know why Haag had gone to court, and stressed that
the administration's policy statements weren't legally enforceable.
Judge Richard Tallman said he'd be surprised if Haag hadn't consulted
with Holder's Justice Department in advance, and observed that if
Obama had objected to her forfeiture case, he could have asked for
her resignation.

But the judges showed no inclination to reinstate Oakland's lawsuit.

"You're challenging the discretionary decision by the attorney
general and his U.S. attorney to bring a forfeiture action. Isn't
that the end of our inquiry?" asked Tallman, noting that courts lack
authority to overrule prosecutors' discretionary acts.

Murphy, a former U.S. attorney, said the city would have no right to
intervene if Haag had filed criminal charges against Harborside for
violating federal narcotics laws, and suggested the same barriers
exist in a civil forfeiture suit.

Oakland's attorney, Cedric Chao, said the city has multiple interests
at stake: its system of regulating pot dispensaries, the taxes from
more than $20 million in annual sales, and the health and safety of
patients who obtain marijuana from a licensed business rather than
street dealers.

Under federal law, Chao argued, the city can sue the federal
government for disregarding its own stated policies and a five-year
statute of limitations by filing the forfeiture claim six years after
Harborside began dispensing marijuana, giving Oakland "a basis to
believe that its program would be allowed." He also said the
forfeiture action conflicts with a new federal spending law that
prohibits the government from interfering with states' medical marijuana laws.

But Tallman questioned whether the city had any tangible interests at
stake. If the federal government seizes Harborside, he said, it will
also control the dispensary's property and funds, and Oakland's
taxing authorities will have "no claim to the money."
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom

xxx
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Pubdate: Wed, 04 Feb 2015
Source: San Francisco Chronicle (CA)
Webpage: http://drugsense.org/url/9puwPQWg
Copyright: 2015 Associated Press
Contact: http://www.sfgate.com/chronicle/submissions/#1
Website: http://www.sfgate.com/chronicle/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/388

BILL WOULD TIGHTEN WARNINGS ABOUT MARIJUANA USE

DENVER (AP) - Marijuana use by pregnant or nursing women might seem
like a no-brainer of a bad idea, but a proposal in Colorado to step
up such warnings is raising concern because of limited or
inconclusive research on the dangers.

Pot users in Colorado and Washington already receive warnings that
the drug shouldn't be used by pregnant and nursing women. But a
Colorado bill proposes going further by requiring pot shops to post
signs saying that maternal marijuana use poses risks to unborn children.

"It's important to have notification that there is risk," said
Republican state Rep. Jack Tate, sponsor of the bill.

The proposal is controversial. Some pregnant women use marijuana to
ease nausea, and a marijuana industry group fears the warnings don't
acknowledge limited research on pot use by mothers-to-be.

Tyler Henson, president of the Colorado Cannabis Chamber of Commerce,
called the proposal "another attempt to discredit and ignore the
popular public opinion of marijuana's medicinal use."

A Colorado health report issued this week notes that marijuana's
psychoactive ingredient, THC, is passed to children through the
placenta and breast milk. But the doctors who compiled the survey of
existing research also noted that the health consequences of that THC
exposure aren't fully understood.

The report's authors found:

"Mixed" evidence for pot's link to birth defects.

"Insufficient" evidence that marijuana use during pregnancy makes
offspring more likely to use pot themselves as adolescents.

"Moderate" evidence that maternal use of marijuana during pregnancy
is associated with attention problems, cognitive impairment or low IQ
in offspring.

"Mixed" evidence that marijuana use during pregnancy is associated
with low birth weight.

Still, the doctors concluded, "There is no known safe amount of
marijuana use during pregnancy."

The report, released Monday, reflected national conclusions on
marijuana's health risks.

An American Academy of Pediatrics report in 2013 listed marijuana
among the most common drugs involved in prenatal exposure that may
pose important health risks, including possible behavior and
attention problems in childhood.

Colorado, one of four states that have legalized recreational use of
pot, requires marijuana to carry labels.
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom

xxx
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Pubdate: Wed, 04 Feb 2015
Source: Washington Times (DC)
Copyright: 2015 The Washington Times, LLC.
Contact: yourletters@washingtontimes.com
Website: http://www.washingtontimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/492
Author: Cheryl Wetzstein, the Washington Times

DRUG CZARS BLAME ABUSE ON A LACK OF NATIONAL LEADERSHIP

Local and State Officials at Fault

America's drug abuse woes have been exacerbated by a lack of
leadership from above and at the local level, four former drug czars
told a gathering of some 2,500 anti-drug activists Tuesday.

Still, they said, the nation has repelled other illegal drug crises,
such as crack cocaine and methamphetamine, and can do it again, even
with marijuana. The keys are national leadership, public education
and support for frontline opponents of drug abuse.

"Without national leadership, I can't imagine how we are going to
pull this thing together," said Gen. Barry McCaffrey, a drug czar who
served under President Bill Clinton.

Although many presidents have clearly stood against drug abuse,
President Obama, "to my knowledge, has not given a single speech on
drugs," said William J. Bennett, the nation's first drug czar, who
served under President George H.W. Bush in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

"We see now what happens when people walk away [from fighting drugs]
at the national level - it destroys the foundation of all the work we
did," said John P. Walters, drug czar under President George W. Bush.

These men and Lee P. Brown, who also served as drug czar under Mr.
Clinton, urged leadership at national, state and local levels.

It's not just national politicians who are on the line, Mr. Brown
told the national conference of Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of
America (CADCA), which is meeting this week at Gaylord National Hotel
and Convention Center at the National Harbor in Maryland.

In all communities, and especially ones with drug-related gangs and
violence, the police and community leaders have to work together -
neither can deal with the problems by themselves, Mr. Brown said.

Also, there has to be public education, including education for the
local legislators, the panelists said.

Already, "overwhelming" research points to risks and adverse effects
of illegal drug use, including a portion of pot smokers who become
addicted to daily use. Additional factors are the exorbitant levels
of hallucinogenic properties in some dispensed marijuana; the loss of
motivation, focus and attention common to pot smokers; and loss of as
many as eight IQ points with some kinds of marijuana use.

"You have to have a screw loose to think it's not a danger to your
business to have your employees on drugs," said Gen. McCaffrey.

It's true that not all marijuana users go on to do hard drugs; it's
also true that people who do go onto harder drugs almost always start
with marijuana, said Mr. Bennett, who has just released a book with
co-author Robert A. White, called "Going to Pot: Why the Rush to
Legalize Marijuana is Harming America."

Mr. Walters told the audience that they were "the end of the line" -
the people "who are trying to help kids avoid death and the path of
destruction" - and that they and their allies must fight an array of
opponents, including pro-drug messages on social media and in the
press, and wealthy backers of the new "drug industry."

Mr. Walters suggested three ideas to experiment with:

Routine testing of marijuana samples in communities. The public
should know if there is mold, pesticides and herbicides laced into
their cannabis, he said.

Work with the legal profession to bring class-action lawsuits against
drug industry on behalf of victims harmed by drug use. "Let's use the
sharks to kill the wolves," he suggested.

Random drug testing in schools. This not only identifies children and
teens who need treatment, but exposes gangs, and backs up the
non-drug-using students who are saying no to illegal substances. "You
can create enclaves of safety for young people," Mr. Walters said.
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom

xxx
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Pubdate: Wed, 04 Feb 2015
Source: San Diego Union Tribune (CA)
Webpage: http://drugsense.org/url/d3wAQ62C
Copyright: 2015 Associated Press
Contact: letters@utsandiego.com
Website: http://www.utsandiego.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/386
Note: Seldom prints LTEs from outside it's circulation area.

MAN SOLD FAKE URINE TO PASS DRUG TESTS

PITTSBURGH (AP) - An Ohio man who sold fake urine and other products
meant to help people pass workplace drug tests has pleaded guilty
before a federal judge in Pennsylvania.

David Neal, 61, of Middletown, Ohio, pleaded guilty Monday to
conspiracy to defraud the United States and introduction of
misbranded drugs into interstate commerce. He faces up to six years
in prison when he returns for sentencing May 13.

U.S. Attorney David Hickton said Neal sold illegal substances online
beginning in 2006 through his company, ACS Herbal Tea.

Some of Neal's products, including "Magnum Unisex Synthetic Urine"
and "Urine Luck," were designed to thwart tests overseen by the
Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.

Such tests are used by the U.S. Department of Transportation to
screen airline pilots, truck drivers and train engineers, as well as
some federal employees, including FBI agents. Court records indicate
undercover agents bought some of the products in 2010 and 2012 as
part of the investigation into Neal's company.

Neal's case is similar to that of Stephen Sharp, a former US Airways
Express pilot who pleaded guilty in 2010 to selling a powdered drink
mix he claimed was 100 percent effective in helping pilots and others
pass the federally mandated drug tests.
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom

xxx
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Pubdate: Thu, 05 Feb 2015
Source: Denver Post (CO)
Webpage: http://drugsense.org/url/qg23enna
Copyright: 2015 The Denver Post Corp
Contact: openforum@denverpost.com
Website: http://www.denverpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/122
Author: Jon Murray

4/20 FEST MAY GET 3RD DAY WITH SMALLER POT EVENTS

When Denver denied the 4/ 20 Rally festival's request to expand to a
third day this year, sought because the annual pot holiday falls on a
Monday, it looked like disorganization would rule Civic Center during
the traditional afternoon pot smoke-out. But no longer. Well, maybe.
Two other organizers have stepped into the void, applying for public
assembly permits for simpler April 20 political rallies that likely
would be exempt from a new event moratorium at the park. Those await
city approval.

And a third potential stripped-down pro-marijuana political rally-
planned by the huge 4/ 20 fest's main organizer - is shaping up that
afternoon across Broadway, on state Capitol grounds.

Along with the potential cluster of competing rallies on state and
city property, planning for April 20 comes with intra-movement
politics, including some jockeying for position.

The 4/ 20 fest's Miguel Lopez is close with Anthony Marquez II, who
applied Jan. 22 for one of the Civic Center assembly permits. That
was just one day after the first application was submitted by
marijuana activist Robert Chase.

Chase, who rails against state legislators' proposals for further
marijuana regulation, says he wants to encourage attendees to take
direct political action.

He says he wants "to direct the attention of the people present in
the park to the authors of prohibition who now are making bad
policy," exhorting them to speak up. He sees Coloradans' legal access
to marijuana as far from safeguarded.

But Lopez and Marquez say Chase's approach is caustic and could drive
people away from his megaphone.

"He's great for what he does," Marquez said about Chase, "but I feel
- and I know from my experience working in the community - that I can
connect with a lot more people here."

Marquez's and Lopez's events are more likely to mix music and other
entertainment with a broader political message about the need to
legalize marijuana elsewhere, they say. They say they're talking
about coordinating.

It's possible the city could approve both Civic Center events,
dividing up the park.

City officials planned to meet Thursday to begin considering the two
permit requests, said Katy Strascina, executive director of the
Denver Office of Special Events.

"We're not in a position to deny First Amendment ( assemblies),"
Strascina said. But officials may consider whether Civic Center can
accommodate both events.

Chase's application says he expects 5,000 attendees, while Marquez,
who also proposes a stage for bands and food and non- alcoholic
beverage sales, expects 25,000.

Lopez's April 20 rally would take place in the park between Broadway
and Lincoln Street. He says he already has cleared most hurdles to
secure a Capitol permit, because the weekend 4/ 20 fest also uses the
same area, in addition to Civic Center.

Last month, Lopez bristled at the city's decision to deny his request
to add Monday as a third day of the 4/ 20 festival, which brings at
least tens of thousands to Civic Center each day for big-name music
acts and advocacy.

He declined an option to keep the festival at two days but shift it
to Sunday/ Monday.

Now Lopez says the potential hodgepodge of smaller rallies on April
20, with a more overtly political focus, "works out perfectly for us."

"They forced us to think of something even better," he said about
city officials.

Police have told The Denver Post that they will arrange to have
enough officers on hand April 20 to keep watch on any gatherings.
They typically focus more on safety than on issuing citations for
public pot smoking, banned by ordinance.
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom

xxx
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Pubdate: Thu, 05 Feb 2015
Source: Sacramento News & Review (CA)
Copyright: 2015 Chico Community Publishing, Inc.
Contact: sactoletters@newsreview.com
Website: http://newsreview.com/sacto/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/540
Author: Ngaio Bealum

INEVITABLE GROWTH

Hey can I get an update on what's been happening in the Wide Wide
World of Weed?

-Jeff

Yes, you can! So much has happened in the last week. It's been
incredible. And away we go.

In legalization news, Jamaica is proceeding with plans to
decriminalize and regulate marijuana. This is incredible news.
Everyone thinks of Jamaica as a bastion of ganja freedom, but weed
has been illegal there seemingly forever. The bill to decriminalize,
which also contains language to permit the growing and selling of
marijuana, has passed the cabinet and went to the Jamaican Senate last week.

Over here in the states, medical marijuana is booming. Nevada is set
to open 65 medical cannabis dispensaries throughout the state, and
the Legislature is most likely going to address a recreational
marijuana law submitted by an initiative this year. If the Nevada
Legislature doesn't approve the measure, the law goes to a vote of
the people. Yes.

Illinois is having problems getting its medical marijuana program
into gear. The new governor, Republican Bruce Rauner, is asking for
more studies, but really he's just being an ass by delaying the inevitable.

Some state senators in Nebraska just introduced legislation to allow
medical marijuana use. Yes, the same Nebraska that is suing the state
of Colorado over recreational marijuana is looking to have its own
marijuana law. Embrace your dichotomies, I guess. Good luck.

In South Carolina, where they already have a law allowing some
patients to use cannabis-derived medicines containing high amounts of
CBD (Cannabidiol, a compound found in marijuana that has been shown
to be very effective at treating certain forms of epilepsy), state
Senator Tom Davis and Representative Jenny Horne plan to introduce a
bill to allow broader use of the cannabis plant.

The American Academy of Pediatrics just released a position paper
asking for marijuana to be rescheduled from Schedule 1 to Schedule 2
to allow for more research. "A Schedule 1 listing means there's no
medical use or helpful indications, but we know that's not true
because there has been limited evidence showing [marijuana] may be
helpful for certain conditions in adults," said Seth Ammerman,
clinical professor in pediatrics at Stanford University, member of
the AAP and co-author of the position paper, in a recent interview.

And in our The-DEA-is-Still-Acting-Like-a-Bunch-of-Asshats file, we
have the story of the Kettle Falls Five. Long story short: The DEA
has brought marijuana cultivation and distribution charges against
five people in Eastern Washington. All five people are clearly
medical marijuana patients. If convicted, they face a mandatory 10
years in federal prison. The feds have a good chance in this case,
mostly because the defendants are not allowed to mention their
compliance with Washington's medical marijuana laws in federal court.
Jacob Sullum has a good article at www.forbes.com about the case
called "Eager to Imprison Medical Marijuana Users, Prosecutors Hide
The Truth From Jurors." Give it a read. This trial is a waste of
resources and more proof that the DEA needs to step into the future
and quit behaving like assholes.
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom

xxx
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Pubdate: Wed, 04 Feb 2015
Source: Anderson Valley Advertiser (CA)
Copyright: 2015 Anderson Valley Advertiser
Contact: editor@theava.com
Website: http://www.theava.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2667
Author: Fred Gardner

ZIMMERMAN'S VICTORY LAPSE

Professional reformers, longtime activists, and stakeholders in the
marijuana industry attended an invitation-only meeting at the
Waterfront Hotel in Oakland January 9 to discuss plans for a
marijuana 'legalization' initiative to be on the ballot in California in 2016.

The invitations came from the Coalition for Cannabis Policy Reform
(CCPR), a group led by Dale Sky Jones that was formed after the
defeat of a legalization measure in 2010, and the Drug Policy
Alliance, represented by lobbyist Jim Gonzales

The keynote speaker was Bill Zimmerman, a Los Angeles campaign
consultant who is widely credited with masterminding the 1996
Proposition 215 campaign, which legalized marijuana for medical use
in California.

Gonzales introduced Zimmerman by praising his autobiography,
"Troublemaker," and his courageous support for "the protesters at
Wound Knee." Gonzales actually said of Zimmerman, "He is a man who
has found the secret of life, which is: do good things."

Zimmerman seemed oblivious to the presence in the crowd of grassroots
organizers who considered him and the Drug Policy Alliance usurpers
who weakened Prop 215 and provided no help in the fight for implementation.

"I first took marijuana legalization seriously in 1995," said
Zimmerman, reading from a prepared speech, "at a meeting that George
Zimmer hosted at Francesca's Restaurant at the Oakland airport. At
the time, I was not a marijuana activist, but I was an experienced
ballot initiative campaign manager. So later that year, when the
signature drive to qualify Proposition 215 began to collapse, I was
asked to take over the campaign." [Zimmer, who was in the audience,
was then CEO of the Men's Wearhouse. The meeting at Francesca's was
in January, '96, according to others who were there.]

The Relevant Background

Zimmerman was hired for the campaign-manager job by Ethan Nadelmann,
director of an NGO that is now called the Drug Policy Alliance.
Nadelmann had the backing of enlightened billionaires -George Soros,
Peter Lewis, John Sperling, and Laurence Rockefeller- and could write
a check to get California's medical marijuana initiative on the
ballot. Most of the million Nadelmann raised went to the professional
signature drive (which paid $1/per). Zimmerman becoming campaign
manager was Nadelmann's price for writing the check.

Note that Zimmerman and Nadelmann had nothing to do with writing
California's medical marijuana initiative, which had been drafted by
Dennis Peron, William G. Panzer, Dale Gieringer, and Tod Mikuriya,
with input from a broad entourage that had been meeting at the San
Francisco Cannabis Buyers Club in the summer and fall of 1995.
Nadelzimm never would have called for legalizing marijuana to treat
any condition for which it provides relief. Fortunately, by the time
they took over, it was too late to change the wording.

Gieringer and Panzer were among the Prop 215 proponents listening to
Zimmerman's version of 1996. Others included Mike and Michele
Aldrich, Ellen Komp, Rob Raich, Jeff Jones, Marsha Rosenbaum and the
aforementioned Zimmer.

"When I took the Prop 215 job," Zimmerman recounted, "I commissioned
a public opinion poll, and I asked the pollsters to add a question
that was new to such polling. And the question was, 'Are you
personally acquainted with anyone who has used marijuana for medical
purposes?' I was amazed at the result: 33% of likely voters in 1996
answered yes to that question. That's when I understood that medical
marijuana was a winnable issue. And that it could be used as an
opening argument for the eventual legalization of recreational use."

It was honest of Zimmerman to admit that a third of "the people" knew
more about marijuana than he did. And that he -running campaigns in
California since the 1970s-didn't understand the political
significance of marijuana. And that he considered "legalization" the
ultimate goal of the Prop 215 campaign.

Zimmerman went on: "Working with the Drug Policy Alliance, DPA, we
sought two goals; legalizing medical marijuana in the short run, but
preparing for a broader effort in the long run. The 215 campaign
taught me about the many medical conditions that marijuana could
alleviate, the many hundreds of thousands of patients who had been
helped, the needless human suffering it could relieve, and when I
finally understood all of this, and how important it was, I wanted to do more."

And funding just happened to be available.

"So three days after the Prop 215 victory, with DPA's support, we
launched medical marijuana initiative campaigns in six other states.
And the modern marijuana reform movement was born."

A Credit Grab

That is a credit grab. "The modern marijuana reform movement was
born" -to use Zimmerman's silly image-in San Francisco in 1990-91,
when Dennis Peron launched the Cannabis Buyers Club in response to
the AIDS epidemic. The club enabled the Prop 215 campaign in 1995-96.
DPA's post-215 efforts to push weaker initiatives in other states
represented the beginning of the cooling off of the super-nova that
had exploded in California. It looked like expansion, but...

As Nadelmann funded Zimmerman to promote electoral initiatives in
other states, California activists were denied resources needed in
the crucial fight for implementation of Prop 215. In vain Dr. Tod
Mikuriya asked DPA and the Marijuana Policy Project to underwrite
what he called an "audit to promote compliance" on the part of all
the agencies that would have to change their policies -Probation,
Sheriffs, Police, Child Protective Services, etc. Tod finally
undertook the project himself with the help of John Trapp, his
assistant in running a very busy medical practice. For several years
after 215 passed, Mikuriya was the only doctor in California known to
readily approve cannabis in treating any condition for which it
provides relief.

John Trapp wrote about the audit plan for O'Shaughnessy's (Spring
2008). Tod rightly expected resistance to implementing Prop 215 from
law enforcement, the medical establishment (especially addiction
specialists), and inert government bureaucrats. With every passing
year I realize how politically astute his audit scheme was. The idea
was to have a young lawyer and/or an intern pressing all the relevant
government agencies to rewrite their protocols in accordance with the
new law, and using the media to publicize acts of noncompliance. The
audit would have kept the drug warriors on the defensive.

Momentum is crucial in politics, and we, the people, had it when Prop
215 passed in November, 1996. The vote had been a huge rebuke to law
enforcement -56 to 44 YES! -over the opposition of every sheriff,
police chief and DA in the state (except Terence Hallinan of San
Francisco). But California Attorney General Dan Lungren immediately
announced a "narrow interpretation" that encouraged cops to keep
arresting and DAs to keep prosecuting people for cultivation, etc.
Dennis Peron's club was closed down (as "a nuisance" on seedy Market
Street) and Tod Mikuriya prosecuted by the AG's office. Law
enforcement and government bureaucrats regrouped and pursued plans
for a rollback, jurisdiction by jurisdiction. To this day they have
blocked the full implementation of Prop 215.

DPA did not entirely pull the rug out from under California after the
Prop 215 victory. In response to a threat by the Clinton
Administration to revoke the licenses of doctors who approved
marijuana use by patients, DPA filed suit to block any such action.
Although the government's threat had been made against Dr. Mikuriya,
specifically, by Clinton's Four-Star Drug Czar Barry McCaffrey, the
DPA strategists did not include Tod among the many co-plaintiffs in
their lawsuit.

The Conant v. McCaffrey suit was crucial to our movement's advance.
(When your mission is to end the war on drugs, you can't help but do
right 90 percent of the time.) But excluding Mikuriya as a
co-plaintiff was "pot baiting" (his term) on the part of DPA. Perhaps
if Tod had been a co-plaintiff in Conant v. McCaffrey, the state
attorney general might not have prosecuted him.

But back to Bill Zimmerman in 2015: "Our success has now altered the
playing field. "Now the looming possibility of full legalization has
attracted many people to our movement. They are welcomed, even though
they may not share our original public interest commitment...

"As you know, political campaigns target persuadable voters. And
generally ignore those already committed to voting for or against.
Our situation is no different. Speaking in very rough terms, polling
indicates that about one third of likely voters strongly favor
legalization. One third strongly oppose. And about one third tilt in
our favor, but only halfheartedly. Our audience is that last third,
not the third that already supports us...

Unity Good, Factions Bad

Zimmerman read on: "CCPR asked me to speak today about how we can win
this ballot initiative fight. Instead, I want to talk briefly about
how we can lose it. I see three ways to do that: First, we can demand
too much. Second, we can divide into opposing factions. Third we draw
a heavily funded opposition.

"The first way we can lose in 2016 is to go too far, to demand too
much in the text of our initiative. Remember who we are speaking to,
that last third of the voters, who are unhappy about marijuana, but
reluctantly willing to legalize it... Our beliefs about what is right
have to be put aside in the interest of what is possible.

"The second way we can lose is to divide our effort and break up into
two or more factions."

You may have noticed: it's always the dominant faction that calls for
unity and denounces factions.

Zimmerman: "Our differences must be governed [sic] by what is best
for California, and must be determined by scientific data, not our
own unsupported wishes and hopes."

By "scientific data," he means feedback from a pollster whose
questions can be framed to provide answers that DPA wants. I once
wrote an analysis of such a poll. See how easy it is to give the
client the answer s/he wants by wording the questions appropriately.

Zimmerman warned that "new players with their own money" might back
initiatives, resulting in more than one making the ballot. This would
be "disastrous," he claimed.

"Our opponents would jump at the chance to advertise our
disagreements, and argue that we are so confused as to how to
structure legalization, that we are unable to even agree among
ourselves about how this dangerous move should be managed. That
argument would be devastating to the voters that we need to target."

Reform honchos always emphasize the importance of a unified message.
This may be because they're control freaks, personally, and/or
because they don't want to split the campaign funds with other reform
honchos. In reality, two initiatives would give voters perspective.
For example, an initiative legalizing marijuana for adults 18 and
over would make another one legalizing the herb for adults 21 and
over appear more "centrist."

Zimmerman also expressed fear about getting outspent, although he
didn't explain how an initiative could be crafted to minimize that
possibility. He said: "Statewide TV advertisement has often defeated
popular ballot initiatives in California. I can tell you that from
first-hand experience, having managed a single-payer healthcare
initiative in 1974 that started with 70% support and got 27% on
Election Day because of opposition advertising by health insurance companies.

"I have personally managed 17 drug reform ballot initiatives in ten
states, losing only four. None of the thirteen victories had
opposition TV advertising. All of the four defeats did."

He only wins when he can outspend the opposition.

"The most damaging argument will come if we end up with more than one
legalization initiative," Zimmerman repeated. "That argument will go
something like, 'We support marijuana legalization just as much as
many Californians do, but protecting kids and maintaining public
safety is so complicated and difficult that even the legalization
activists can't agree on how to do it.' There's no effective response
to that strategy if there are multiple initiatives on the ballot...

"If any of these very effective arguments are made by opponents on a
multimillion dollar advertising campaign, my guess is that we will
have to spend as much as four times as much as they do to neutralize
them. Dramatic lies sit in one's memory far longer than any hopeful truths."

A great point to make to prospective donors -but it makes no sense
when you think about it, Why should our truth costs four times more
to get across than their lie?

Only DPA Can Save Us

Zimmerman: "While each of us should pursue what he or she thinks
best, and do so vigorously, we will all have to compromise. Politics
is in the end, the art of the possible. And to determine what is
possible, we need to rely on scientific public opinion data."

Which my company can provide. (Note the repeat of "scientific.")

"In the next few months, we have to unify around a single initiative,
and prepare to wage a unified campaign on its behalf. While many
organizations represented in this room and elsewhere will contribute
to that effort, only the Drug Policy Alliance is capable of leading
it. The time has come to put aside past differences, and recognize
this essential fact.

"The DPA has a large and centrally located operation in California.
They are the only organization that has handled successful ballot
initiatives here. They come with the experience and the financial
resources that give us all the best chance we have. The logic is
simple: to win, we have to unite. To unite, we need strong and
capable leadership. Nobody has it to the extent the DPA does. The
conclusion therefore is inescapable. I hope all of you, after pushing
as hard as possible for everything you believe in, in the end will
join with me in a unified and goal driven organization campaign
managed by our friends in the Drug Policy Alliance. That is simply
the best, and very likely the only way to succeed. Thank you."

Audience Response

First up to the question mike was Ellen Komp, who worked hard on the
Prop 215 campaign in '95-'96, and is now deputy director of
California NORML. "I'd like to ask DPA to join the coalition, CCPR,
which we've all been working so hard for," she began.

"And second, because your organization, Americans for Medical Rights
brought about the six-plant limit in the other states you ran the
initiatives in... Can you think of a way that we can protect the
cottage industry in California? How are we going to legalize it in a
way that isn't warehouse weed that costs $200,000 for a license like
other states are doing?" (A reference to New York state.)

"Good question," said Zimmerman, who had no answer and went on to
blither irrelevantly, "What I said in my remarks about being goal
driven I think is the way to answer the question... When we got that
33% 'Yes' response to the question 'Do you know someone who has used
marijuana medically?' if you asked about legalization at that time,
you would have gotten a very low number of people in favor of
recreational distribution."

Doesn't this veteran campaign professional know that 33% of
Californians voted for full legalization of marijuana in 1971? His
surprise that one in three Californians knew a medical user in 1996
was equally revealing, given that AIDS patients were using en masse
and that Dr. Mikuriya, Dennis Peron, Valerie Corral, and hundreds of
grassroots activists had been carrying the message for many years.
Bill Zimmerman was the beneficiary of a social movement and mass
action (on the part of AIDS patients). An electoral campaign is only
the tip of an iceberg. The public education campaign that precedes it
is crucial to success.

The usually mild-mannered Dale Gieringer, a co-author of Prop 215,
was next up to the mike. "You were wrong about the DPA having led
every successful marijuana initiative," he said. "May I remind you
about Prop 215, organized by a grassroots group here in California
with a lot less talent and a lot less experience than we have now. So
I cordially suggest that the entire community of California be
involved in the writing and the devising of this initiative. We can
collaborate and work together on the polling and the writing, and
everything else, but to say at this time that there's one particular
organization with an unblemished record in this is inaccurate."

Zimmerman (gentlemanly): "No question, you're right about how Prop
215 got off the ground. It was definitely a grassroots effort, it was
written by grassroots people here in the Bay Area, and the first
campaigning done on its behalf was certainly conducted by what can be
described as a grassroots coalition. However, that coalition was
unable to qualify the initiative for the ballot... We had to hire
professional signature gatherers to qualify. That took money that the
grassroots didn't have. We then had to defend Prop 215 with
advertising in order to build an electoral victory, and we did that
with money that DPA organized."

Ellen Komp put in, "But if you had just given that money to the
grassroots, we could have done it!" Zimmerman cut off our Pasionaria
with a brazen assertion: "I don't think there are more than two
people in the room that believe that. But to finish what I was saying..."

It was smart of Zimmerman not to ask for a show of hands or deal with
Komp's point -which is a relevant point, when it comes to evaluating
DPA's usefulness. How valid is their claim to credit for the victory
of Prop 215?

As some in the room knew, support for medical marijuana was 60-40 in
a poll taken by the reputable David Binder before Zimmerman became
campaign manager. The lead went down after he took over, and was
going down until the bust of the San Francisco Buyers' Club in August
attracted the attention of Gary Trudeau, who devoted a week of
Doonesbury strips to the club's martyrdom. Attorney General Lungren
went apeshit and called a press conference to denounce Doonesbury!
Every political cartoonist in the state aimed one at Lungren. Trudeau
did another week's worth of 'toons in October.

"But to finish what I was saying," Zimmerman huffed, "the
recommendation that I made, that DPA lead the campaign, was not a
recommendation that DPA is the only organization that play a role in
that campaign.... I'm only arguing that DPA is the most qualified manager."

Panzer: we can find other friends

Attorney Bill Panzer, who also helped draft Prop 215, told Zimmerman:
"Back in 1996, we didn't have the money. George Soros had the
money... This time, there's going to be other people with money. And
you should talk to Ethan [Nadelmann] and let him know that what's
going to happen this time, if you guys don't work with us: there's
going to be an initiative on the ballot that DPA has nothing to do with."

Zimmerman smoothly shifted gears: "First of all, it's not 'you guys."
I'm not DPA, I'm not part of DPA, I have been a consultant to DPA
over the years and at present I have no role in the upcoming
campaign, and no role in the Drug Policy Alliance."

Goldsberry: Who is to benefit?

Debby Goldsberry, a widely respected veteran activist, challenged
Zimmerman's contention that the initiative should be written with the
undecided third of voters in mind. "To us," she said, confident that
she was speaking for many in the room, "the most important third is
our third, because you are talking about my ability to feed my
family, and that is the most important thing to me. I need a job and
I need to feed my family. I'm not sure that DPA is going to create
something that's going to support me and my needs and we're talking
about a third of your voters. Now you're asking if you can lead us,
and you think you're the best. I'm not convinced, and that's why you
need to join with CCPR. Because I really feel like they care about
the third of the people that's us."

At last someone had gotten real. The wording of the winning
initiative will determine the fate of thousands of mom-and-pop
growers and chocolatiers and the dispensaries that distribute their wares.
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom

xxx
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Pubdate: Thu, 05 Feb 2015
Source: Star, The (South Africa)
Copyright: Independent Newspapers 2015
Contact: starnews@inl.co.za
Website: http://www.thestar.co.za/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/423

ZUMA'S REMOVAL, LEGAL DAGGA TREND

IF SOUTH Africans are not asking President Jacob Zuma to resign, they
are calling for dagga to be legalised.

These requests made up the majority of the recommendations made to
Zuma on social networking sites following an invitation by the
Presidency for people to send suggestions for the president's State
of the Nation Address.

A thread of people on Twitter repeated: "@PresidencyZA: Why not
legalise cannabis to increase revenue & save tax rands by freeing up
crowded prisons & courts? #DaggaDebate #SONA2015."

"Free marijuana," others wrote.

IFP MP Mario OrianiAmbrosini, who died last year of cancer, had
lobbied for the use of alternative cancer therapies, including
medical marijuana.

Calls for Zuma to resign were also high on Twitter users' request lists.

User @CJSteyl wrote: "Before I go to bed I'd just like to remind the
good folk at @PresidencyZA to include Jacob Zuma's resignation in his
#SONA2015. Thanks."

Another user, @mzukisij, wrote: "Zuma must resign before the motion
and #SONA2015 maybe sober people of this country will forgive him."

@Matheb_Ohms wrote: "@PresidencyZA on your #SONA2015 please address
us about when you will #PayBackTheMoney and about when you will
resign as President. #MyInput."

On the Presidency's official Facebook page, 1 277 people posted their
suggestions.

The majority of people were asking Zuma to resign and pay back the
money spent on non-security upgrades to his private home in Nkandla,
KwaZuluNatal.

Comrade Kamogelo Ramoloto wrote on Facebook: "Mr President, tell us
whether you are going to pay cash, EFT or through Shoprite money
market... I am talking about Nkandla money, and what would my best
Valentine's present before the one my girlfriend gives me would be
your resignation letter."

Ditshepiso Promise Mapaila wrote: "I ask for him to become a born
again Christian and to ask God for forgiveness, and the nation, and
then he can explain where the money went and how he's going to pay it
back. And then he may resign."

Some citizens decided to write their own little script for Zuma.

Craig Edmund Fitz Eustace said he would like to hear Zuma say: "I am
so ashamed of what I have done, said and not done as your leader,
that I wish to fall on my sword like any real loser of a leader would
do. I am sorry."

Motlatsi Mfanakithi requested that the president say: "I hereby
tender my resignation and I ask for South Africans to forgive me for
my actions, and propose e-tolls to be scrapped, tighten security of
all South Africans and lastly, any Mzansi citizen that wishes to
serve their country to be admitted into the army without any red
tape. Furthermore, I thank you all for making me aware my leadership
has divided this wonderful country."

However, not everyone wants to see Zuma go.

Tsiane Dithebe asked South Africans to have respect for the president.

"Please please please... let us respect the president of the Republic
of South Africa. I don't want to comment on what he must say. Just
want to request fellow South Africans to respect the old man," he
wrote on the Presidency website.

On Twitter, Rethabilem said: "President Jacob Zuma must use the State
of the Nation Address to win the hearts & soul of South Africans #SoNA2015."

Others asked that issues such as unemployment, housing and corruption
be addressed.  Sapa
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom

xxx
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Pubdate: Fri, 06 Feb 2015
Source: Palm Beach Post, The (FL)
Copyright: 2015 The Palm Beach Post
Contact: letters@pbpost.com
Website: http://www.palmbeachpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/333
Author: Rob Hotakainen, Tribune News Service

SENATE PANEL OKS OBAMA'S CHOICE FOR U.S. DRUG CZAR

Michael Botticelli's Anti-Pot Legalization Stand Worries Some.

WASHINGTON - Michael Botticelli is not like drug czars of the past.

He's not a cop, a military general or a governor. His specialty is
treatment; he rose to prominence as the head of the Massachusetts
Bureau of Substance Abuse Services.

And Botticelli, who's served as the acting drug czar since last
March, is a recovering alcoholic who has been sober for more than a
quarter of a century, after a 1988 drunken-driving accident left him
handcuffed to a hospital bed.

On Thursday, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted unanimously to
approve President Barack Obama's recommendation to make Botticelli,
57, the nation's seventh drug czar, a big jump for a man who had
various part-time jobs in the 1990s, including one as a Pottery Barn
supervisor.

The full Senate still must vote on whether to approve Botticelli for
the job, formally called the director of the Office of National Drug
Control Policy.

Botticelli already has found himself in the middle of the nation's pot wars.

Those who support marijuana legalization note Botticelli's opposition
and say he should back off and take a cue from the president, who's
made it clear that he's comfortable allowing states to experiment
with selling pot.

Legalization opponents, meanwhile, say Botticelli talks tough but
should be doing more to get the Justice Department and Obama to
enforce the federal law that criminalizes marijuana.

Tom Angell, chairman of Marijuana Majority, a pro-legalization group,
said Botticelli was "clearly in a tough place," with states moving
quickly to legalize marijuana and polls showing most Americans
supporting an end to criminal penalties.

"His best bet, and probably preference, would be to just shut up
about the issue," Angell said. "Unluckily for him, though, people
keep asking him about it."

Responding to questions from senators in a written statement,
Botticelli said that marijuana posed serious health risks and that he
was concerned about the cross-border trafficking of the drug outside
Colorado, where its use is legal under state law.

Many members of Congress, including Senate Judiciary Committee
Chairman Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, complain that the Obama
administration has sent too many mixed messages on the subject.

Critics had urged the president not to appoint another drug czar,
saying the office had become irrelevant.
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom

xxx
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Pubdate: Fri, 06 Feb 2015
Source: Nation, The (Thailand)
Copyright: 2015 Nation Multimedia Group
Contact: letters@nationgroup.com
Website: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1963
Author: Valerie Hamilton, Deutsche Presse-Agentur

ONE YEAR ON, IS AMERICA'S EXPERIMENT WITH LEGAL MARIJUANA WORKING?

Denver's pedestrian mall is the city's busiest shopping district, an
all-American high street where crowds bustle between glass-fronted
rows of popular retailers. Stores here offer shoppers a high-end
array of merchandise from children's toys to cowboy boots  and since
April, legal marijuana, displayed like so many strains of exotic tea
in a mood-lit storefront across from the Sheraton hotel.

Euflora Cannabis Dispensary's owner describes its look as "Starbucks
meets Apple".

The shop has three locations and a Twitter account.

When Colorado's voters took the historic decision in 2012 to legalise
marijuana for recreational use, prognosticators on both sides
predicted it would transform the state. Supporters said it would fuel
economic development by taxing millions in marijuana sales.
Detractors said it would fuel youth consumption, traffic accidents
and crime. But more than a year into what Colorado governor John
Hickenlooper has called "one of the great social experiments of this
century", the state's marijuana business feels like business as usual.

"I haven't noticed a difference in the culture," says Ashley Kilroy,
executive director of marijuana policy for the city of Denver.

"I think for the people who live and work here ... it's not that big
of a deal."

The smattering of data produced in the first year of legal sales of
recreational marijuana is hard to parse.

Crime was up slightly in Denver compared to 2013, but traffic
fatalities were down. The main problems authorities faced were ones
no one had predicted: overdoses of edible marijuana products and home
explosions from cannabis extraction accidents. Kilroy says Denver's
fire department are now "world experts on cannabis extraction safety".

Through October 2014, the state took in more than $60 million (Bt1.9
billion) in taxes on recreational marijuana and fees related to
business operations  just over half of the $100 million proponents
had projected. Economists differ on where those numbers could go.
What's clear is, Colorado's marijuana business is growing into the mainstream.

Although consumption in public is illegal, adults over 21 can now buy
marijuana at more than 380 shops across the state. In Denver, there
are more than four times as many marijuana sellers  205  as there are
Starbucks coffee outlets. One in four Coloradans uses marijuana,
according to a December 2014 poll by the Denver Post, which has a
fulltime marijuana editor and a website, The Cannabist, with
marijuana-related news and lifestyle articles, including recipes for
marijuana mayonnaise.

But the very normality of Colorado's cannabis sector has a
through-the-looking-glass quality, in the context of a country where
marijuana remains illegal under federal and most state drug laws.

According to the Drug Policy Alliance, a reform advocacy group,
609,423 people were arrested for marijuana possession in the US in
2013  the year Colorado was processing its first retail licences.
While federal law gives states wide leeway in setting their own
rules, the vast distance between Colorado's legal pot and drug laws
elsewhere is uncharted territory. And the neighbouring states of
Nebraska and Oklahoma are unhappy with pot illegally crossing over
the border and in December 2014 sued Colorado to stop it.

The Obama administration has directed federal prosecutors to leave
state-legal marijuana alone. But banks have still shied away from
marijuana business clients, fearing they could violate money
laundering laws. As a result, many marijuana businesses operate
entirely in cash, even paying monthly taxes with shopping bags full
of bills, Kilroy says.

"It's an unstable environment," says Michael Elliott, director of the
Marijuana Industry Group, a trade organisation.

"It's creating a bunch of safety, accountability and transparency problems."

As the marijuana sector grows, these problems may become more
pressing. The legal marijuana business in the US, including
recreational and medical marijuana sales, grew 74 per cent in 2014,
to $2.7 billion, according to ArcView Market Research, a marijuana
research and investment group. Recreational marijuana use and sales
are legal in Colorado and Washington states. Alaska, Oregon and
Washington passed recreational marijuana laws in 2014. Twenty-eight
additional states allow marijuana for medical use, with varying restrictions.

A Gallup poll in November 2014 showed 51 per cent of Americans
supported legalising marijuana entirely. But Loretta Lynch, Obama's
nominee to head the Department of Justice, responsible for enforcing
federal drug laws, told a Senate confirmation hearing in January that
she does not. Asked what advice she would give a state considering
marijuana legalisation, she said they should be informed that federal
narcotics laws will still be enforced by the Department of Justice.
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom

xxx
Newshawk: Herb Couch
Pubdate: Thu, 05 Feb 2015
Source: Coast, The (CN NS)
Copyright: 2015 Coast Publishing
Contact: letters@thecoast.ca
Website: http://www.thecoast.ca/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/3170
Author: Hilary Beaumont
Pages: 5-6

POT PROMOS GET NIPPED IN THE BUD BY HEALTH CANADA

Selling marijuana just got more difficult.

Haligonians who buy their pot legally probably noticed changes to
their dealers' websites last month. On January 12, it became more
difficult for medical marijuana users to figure out what they're
inhaling, extracting or otherwise consuming.

Over the last year or so, Health Canada has cracked the whip on these
private companies' advertisements, telling them to comply with
federal guidelines by January 12 or risk losing their licenses.
Health Canada takes issue with any information on a medical pot
website that crosses the line into promotional material, or asserts
health claims without evidence.

Those lines aren't crystal clear, though, according to two of
Canada's 16 licensed producers that sell directly to customers.

Nova Scotia doesn't have any legal dispensaries yet. A few local
companies are awaiting approval, but right now licensed Nova Scotians
buy their weed online from big box sellers, mostly in Ontario and
British Columbia.

Tweed, an Ontario cannabis producer that sells medical weed to
patients in Nova Scotia, used to tell patients what their different
strains smelled and tasted like, and which were best for specific
ailments-chronic pain, for example. All that information is gone from
their website now, says Tweed vice-president Mark Zekulin, and Health
Canada seems happy.

"They've taken our name off the non-compliance list, so I
reverse-infer that yes, they have told us we're in the clear," he
says with a chuckle.

They can tell customers what THC and CBD are good for, based on
medical research and studies, but when it comes to a specific
product, he recommends that customers order five grams each of a few
strains to see what best treats their symptoms. Any recommendation
from Tweed's call centre about specific strains will come with the
big disclaimer that everyone is different and it's not medical advice.

Tweed has put together some information their call centre can give to
customers, but they can't say anything that could be viewed as a
"medical claim," including giving out anecdotal information.

It's more difficult to draw the line on non-medical information,
including how the product tastes or smells. "There will always be
some area of question between, you know, is this informational or is
this promotional, and the regulator can't predict every one of those
situations," Zekulin says.

Medreleaf is an Ontario dealer that mails pot in discreet packaging.
To comply with Health Canada's advertising guidelines, CEO Neil
Closner says Medreleaf removed all photos of plants and buds from
their public website, all text that spoke to the quality of their
product and all anecdotal information about which strains might work
for certain ailments. They also had to quit linking to external
cannabis sites on social media. "For patients of ours, once they've
been registered, they can have access to a little bit more
information including pictures," Closner says. "We've heard from some
of those people and they're not happy, but this is a new regime, and
we're all trying to find the right balance."

But after adapting to Health Canada's guidelines, Medreleaf heard
"pointed" criticism from prospective customers who are surfing the
various legal pot websites trying to pick a supplier.

"They are the ones who are in many cases lacking sufficient
information," Closner says. "We simply explain that we're abiding by
the regulations, and there's not much we can do."

One of Medreleaf's customers, Emily (who only wanted her first name
used) logged in recently and realized the information she needed was
missing from their site.

Emily is a new mother who uses medical cannabis to treat her
postpartum depression, anxiety and ADHD. Because she has a handful of
ailments, she is trying a number of strains to figure out what works
best for her. The Medreleaf site previously included anecdotal
information about which strains might be best for ADHD, but now that
information is gone. "They used to have a lot more information and
now it's just a couple lines," she says, looking at the website. "I
swear I remember pictures of the flowers, or the plants. ... They
took out all the smells and tastes too."

The smell and taste aren't important to her, but she wants to know
how it will affect her before she orders it. Otherwise, "that's a lot
of money."

Federal guidelines including the latest advertising crack down are
discouraging some licensed users from going the legal route,
according to a few licensed patients who spoke to The Coast off the record.

Greg Chaisson, a Nova Scotian who uses medical pot for his colitis
(bowel inflammation similar to Crohn's) previously bought from a
legal producer, but says he was put off by the lack of information
about what he was smoking, and the producer's inability to meet demand.

He buys pot with high myrcene levels because it's been shown to
reduce inflammation in rats. The producer was unable to give him
information about myrcene levels, so he experimented with different
strains, which made the process "an expensive guessing game," he says.

He began buying his weed from a non-licensed grower out in BC, where
business is booming in the "grey" market.

Closner of Medreleaf believes the ad restrictions put companies like
his at a disadvantage when competing with "grey area" producers.

"Grey market producers frankly have a lot of advantages over the
licensed producers, which creates quite a concern to all of us," he
says. "They are clearly not held anywhere near to the same standards."

Zekulin of Tweed decided to spin those standards to his company's
advantage. They can't promote their product, so Tweed re-launched
their website to focus on quality standards and customer trust.

Zekulin and Closner say there's ongoing dialogue between licensed
producers and the federal government.

"What we hope to achieve is better mutual understanding of each
other's challenges so that we can streamline the process," Closner
says. "If we can work with them to make their lives easier and ours
easier, then we all win and ultimately the patients win."
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom

xxx
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Pubdate: Fri, 06 Feb 2015
Source: Independent  (UK)
Copyright: 2015 Independent Newspapers (UK) Ltd.
Contact: letters@independent.co.uk
Website: http://www.independent.co.uk/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/209
Author: Tim Walker, US Correspondent

TOP US DOCTOR BACKS MARIJUANA USE

The top doctor in the US has acknowledged for the first time that
marijuana has legitimate medical applications, potentially signalling
a change in Washington's attitude to the drug. Speaking to CBS this
week, the new US Surgeon General, Dr Vivek Murthy, said: "We have
some preliminary data that for certain medical conditions and
symptoms, marijuana can be helpful."

The 37-year-old, British-born physician took up the office of Surgeon
General in December. Though he did not explicitly endorse legalising
cannabis for medical purposes, he did suggest US drug policy ought to
be science-led. "I think we have to use that data to drive
policymaking, and I'm very interested to see where that data takes
us," he said.

Marijuana remains illegal under US federal law, but Dr Murthy's
remarks will likely amplify calls for the Justice Department to
downgrade its designation for the drug, which it currently classifies
as a Schedule I Controlled Substance - alongside heroin and LSD -
meaning it has "no currently accepted medical use and a high
potential for abuse".

Despite the federal ban, 23 states and the District of Columbia have
already legalised medical marijuana, while the drug is now also legal
for recreational use in Colorado, Alaska, Oregon and Washington state.

Dr Murthy may be the first surgeon general to publicly acknowledge
the medical benefits of marijuana while in office, but Joycelyn
Elders, Surgeon General under the Clinton administration, suggested
in 1993 that legalising drugs would significantly reduce crime in the
US. Dr Elders was later ousted from her post following criticism from
conservatives of her views.

Last year, in an interview with The New Yorker, President Barack
Obama said he believed marijuana was less dangerous than alcohol "in
terms of its impact on the individual consumer".
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom
xxx
Newshawk: Herb Couch
Pubdate: Fri, 06 Feb 2015
Source: National Post (Canada)
Copyright: 2015 Canwest Publishing Inc.
Contact: http://drugsense.org/url/wEtbT4yU
Website: http://www.nationalpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/286
Author: Adam Miron
Page: A9
Referenced: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v15/n074/a05.html

POT SELLERS FACE A CATCH-22

Re: The Not-So-Free Market In Medical Marijuana, editorial, Feb. 3.

Your editorial accurately reflects the curious marketing issues
facing this nascent industry. As licensed producers, the
Hydropothecary cultivates four strains of medical marijuana in highly
controlled, state-of-the-art facilities and yet we can't say much
about our product.

And that's a challenge, especially for the 30%-40% of Canadians who
suffer from insomnia, along with the 8% with depression and 5% with
anxiety. All three are candidates for using medical marijuana, not
just the illnesses the media commonly associates with medical
marijuana, such as cancer and glaucoma. How many patients want to
stop taking over-the-counter or prescription sedatives, but know
little of the alternatives? The medical marijuana strains used for
insomnia or anxiety can vary greatly, but how will the doctor or the
patient know which to choose?

While we can't talk to potential customers about important scientific
information regarding specific strains, what we can talk about are
two other customers service issues: suppliers who run out and limited
access. Patients should never run out of their medicine. Nor should
they have to take a day off work to receive a package and sign for
it. From the moment people register with the Hydropothecary, we
guarantee they will never run out because we won't oversubscribe. And
we deliver any time, including after-hours and on weekends.

So, yes, there are inherent issues with marketing a product we can't
discuss. But differentiating a company in this environment isn't just
about product: it's also about paying attention to what customers
really need. like.

Adam Miron, The Hydropothecary, Gatineau, Que.
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom

xxx
Pubdate: Sat, 07 Feb 2015
Source: Alaska Dispatch News (AK)
Webpage: http://drugsense.org/url/EIs7k58a
Copyright: 2015 Alaska Dispatch Publishing
Contact: letters@adn.com
Website: http://www.adn.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/18
Note: Anchorage Daily News until July '14
Author: Scott Woodham

CAN I SELL CANNABIS CLONES TO HOME GROWERS AFTER ALASKA'S LEGALIZATION DATE?

A reader wonders if he'll be able to make a little green on the side
once Ballot Measure 2 takes effect on Feb. 24, the day personal
gardens containing six cannabis plants, three mature, will be allowed
for Alaskans over 21 years of age.

Larry asks, "I am wondering after the law takes effect, will I be
able to grow and sell clones to those folks who won't be able to get
seeds or plants of their own?"

For folks who may not know the lingo, a "clone" is a cutting taken
from a larger marijuana plant, known as the "mother." The cutting
then goes through a process to make it grow roots and eventually
become its own plant, a genetic duplicate of mom. Among other
advantages, it's a way to accelerate the growing process because it
gives a head-start compared to starting from seed.

Unfortunately for you or your potential customers, Larry, the answer
is no. Because the law allows personal gardens, you will be able to
grow a small number of clones for personal purposes, but you won't be
able to sell them. You also won't have a way to legally purchase
starters for any mother plants.

Sales of marijuana plants or buds or anything else will not be
permitted until the state sets up a regulatory framework for retail
sales. State officials have said that commercial transactions
involving marijuana will remain illegal until the system is set up
and permitted stores open their doors, which regulators say should be
before May 24, 2016. But between Feb. 24 and then, it will be illegal
to purchase or sell marijuana, including clones, even though limited
possession and personal growing will be legal.
xxx
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Pubdate: Mon, 09 Feb 2015
Source: Los Angeles Times (CA)
Copyright: 2015 Los Angeles Times
Contact: letters@latimes.com
Website: http://www.latimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/248
Author: Josh Rottenberg

MARY JANE IS A REGULAR GUEST

Comic Doug Benson Has Turned a Fondness for Marijuana into a Career
Move With His Stoner Web Series.

It's 1:30 on a Monday afternoon, and on a quiet dead-end street in
Culver City, three comedians are getting stoned and debating whether
astronauts are, on average, handsomer than most people.

"No astronauts look like George Clooney," one of them, Ari Shaffir,
says flatly.

"I don't know," counters Adam Carolla, who hosts a popular daily
podcast. "Buzz Aldrin and those guys - they were pretty good back in the day."

Doug Benson smiles, his eyelids heavy, and bites the head off a
gummy-bear-shaped marijuana edible.

This in itself might not sound remarkable - at this moment across the
entertainment industry, a not insignificant number of people are
probably getting high and having similarly random conversations.

But they don't have a camera crew filming them. They don't have a
medic in the next room in case anyone has a marijuana-related
emergency (a panic attack, a coughing fit). And they don't have
thousands of people around the world watching them live on YouTube -
many, if not most, stoned themselves.

Some people dream of getting an Academy Award or singing "The
Star-Spangled Banner" at the Super Bowl. Benson, 50, a standup comic
who has carved a successful career around his boundless enthusiasm
for marijuana, dreamed of hosting a talk show in which he and his
celebrity guests could get really, really stoned.

And for a little over a year, he's been living out that dream with
his weekly Web series, "Getting Doug with High."

Unlike conventional talk shows, full of prepared comedy bits and
rehearsed anecdotes, "Getting Doug with High" - which has featured
comedians, actors and filmmakers of varying degrees of fame as guests
since its launch in the fall 2013 - is loose and freeform. There are
a few recurring segments, like a discussion of pot-related current
events, but Benson doesn't always get around to them. (The only real
rule is that guests must either state that they have a medical
marijuana card or sign a legal waiver.)

Under the influence, some of Benson's guests get extremely talkative.
Some get quiet and self-conscious. Conversations wander with their
own nonlinear stoner logic - over 45 minutes, today's topics will
bounce from astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson to texting and driving
to obnoxious T-shirt slogans to nostalgia for old pornography.

"Going off and telling random stories and jokes is welcomed," Benson
explained later, "just like in a pot circle at a party or in a smelly alley."

Think "The Dick Cavett Show" with bong hits and more giggling.

Benson came to the stoner life relatively late. Born and raised in
San Diego, he didn't try pot until he was in his late 20s. He took to
it like a duck to water, though, and, defying the lazy-pothead
stereotype, was soon balancing a busy comedy career with a level of
marijuana intake that would render most people perpetually couchbound.

"Doug somehow has it all figured out," said comedian Sarah Silverman,
a longtime friend of Benson and a two-time guest on the show. "He can
somehow smoke all the pot in the world and still be sharp as a tack.
There are a handful of people like that, and I'm in awe of them."

In mid-2013, Daniel Kellison, a former producer of David Letterman
and Jimmy Kimmel's late-night talk shows, met with Benson to see if
he was interested in doing an on-camera version of his film-centric
comedy podcast "Doug Loves Movies."

Benson, though, had something different in mind.

"I spitballed an idea, telling Daniel, 'I want to do a talk show
where we get high on camera and just see what happens,'" said the
comic, who starred in the pro-pot 2007 documentary "Super High Me."
"I wanted to show people that weed smoking is fairly harmless and
have some fun at the same time. He didn't hesitate to say yes."

Kellison's only real concern: Even in generally pot-tolerant
Hollywood, getting celebrities who aren't named Cheech Marin or Tommy
Chong to partake in what is still a federal Schedule 1 drug on camera
would be no easy feat.

"It's a different time - smoking pot isn't that scandalous or
shocking," Kellison said. "But any publicist worth their salt would
probably discourage their talent from doing this show."

Still, since "Getting Doug with High" first aired on Kellison's newly
launched YouTube channel, Video Podcast Network, in October 2013,
Benson has managed to wrangle an array of prominent guests, including
Silverman, Kevin Smith, Margaret Cho, Jack Black - and, yes, Cheech and Chong.

Silverman said she's had no real hesitation about appearing on the show.

"I don't think twice, because I can't seem to actually believe that
anyone sits and watches people getting stoned," she said. "But people
eat it up! Who knew?"

 From the outset, "Getting Doug with High" has been a fairly stripped
down affair. The commercials, which help cover the modest production
budget, are mainly for pot-smoking paraphernalia, like a
ketchup-bottle-shaped device called the Buddy Power Hitter. The
show's set - nicknamed "the spacement" - consists of a simple
celestial backdrop, a small table piled with pipes and bongs (mostly
Benson's own) and a couple of chairs. Benson owns a stake in the
rights to the show but, otherwise, does it for almost nothing.

"We splurge at Trader Joe's for the craft-service table," Kellison
said, "but that's about the extent of our luxuries."

Whenever possible, in observance of long-held stoner tradition,
Benson likes to start the show promptly at 4:20 p.m. Cabs are offered
so that no one needs to drive while high, and the aforementioned
medic is on hand, primarily to offer peace of mind to any nervous guests.

"He has throat lozenges," producer Brent Butler said dryly. "He has
forestalled a number of very serious, almost show-stopping coughing fits."

"Getting Doug with High" has amassed more than almost 300,000
subscribers on YouTube (the audience is predominantly male). Episodes
frequently get 500,000 or more views, and a handful have received
more than a million - numbers that would be considered respectable on
some basic-cable late-night shows.

Booking guests is still a challenge. Some people turn the show down
because they're forbidden by network-TV contracts from using drugs in
public. Some don't want their kids or other family members to see
them getting high.

Some potential guests are simply worried they'll become paranoid.
Appearing on the show in September, Jack Black, who has laid off pot
in recent years since having kids, warned Benson he might leave early
if he started to spiral into "a bad trip."

Less than 15 minutes after taking his first hit off a vapor pen,
obviously struggling with mounting anxiety, Black said his
pre-arranged safe word ("cantaloupe") - but then managed to hang on,
if in an almost catatonic state, for the rest of the show. That
episode has been watched roughly a million times.

"I felt sorry for Jack," Benson said. "He's kind of a stoner icon, so
I thought viewers might be pissed that he's such a lightweight these
days. But there has been little backlash, so now I say, 'Bring on
more lightweights!'" (The show's commenters often pass strict
judgment on whether Benson's guests are getting high enough.)

As marijuana laws continue to ease and use in the open becomes
increasingly normalized, Benson and the show's producers believe
lining up celebrity guests will gradually get easier. (Snoop Dogg,
Willie Nelson and Seth Rogen are three of the most requested.)

Kellison thinks the show could even end up on TV at some point: "If
you look at something like [Comedy Central's series] 'Drunk History,'
where people are getting drunk and vomiting on camera - I mean, why not?"

Benson himself, perhaps not surprisingly, has a laidback attitude
about the show's future.

"Any former or current president of the United States would be
great," he said of his dream guests. "Other than that, I'm just happy
that anyone is willing to do it."

He does have one more serious wish, though.

"I hope that a person who is anti-weed stumbles onto the show from
time to time and maybe changes their mind," he said. "It's a silly
show, so I doubt it happens often. We might be preaching to the
converted, but at least we're out there - and getting away with it."
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom

xxx
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Pubdate: Sun, 08 Feb 2015
Source: Ukiah Daily Journal, The (CA)
Webpage: http://drugsense.org/url/v6nn5HUb
Copyright: 2015 The Ukiah Daily Journal
Contact: http://www.ukiahdailyjournal.com/feedback
Website: http://www.ukiahdailyjournal.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/581

SHERIFF HAS IT RIGHT

We are glad to hear that Sheriff Tom Allman has politely but firmly
put his foot down over local tribes starting up marijuana growing businesses.

Allman has made it clear to the marijuana entrepreneurs from Kansas
and Colorado who want to partner with the Pinoleville tribe in Ukiah
to open a 2.5-acre marijuana farm, that there are no laws that allow
them to do that.

It appears that a new sort of "urban myth" has grown around a memo
sent out by the U.S. Department of Justice about its priorities for
prosecuting marijuana growing in states that have legalized it to
some extent. The memo, known as the "Cole Memo" which dates back to
early 2014, does not mention Indian lands among the eight priorities
for prosecution. Those priorities include keeping pot away from
minors, keeping criminal enterprises out of the marijuana business,
preventing marijuana grown legally in some states from traveling to
other states where it remains illegal, on so on.

Another DOJ memo released in late 2014 discussed requests from tribes
in states where marijuana has been legalized for guidance about what
they can do on tribal lands. That memo referred back to the Cole memo
but added that nothing in the Cole memo means that federal marijuana
laws are no longer going to be enforced on tribal lands.

Nonetheless, enthusiastic marijuana proponents interpreted the memo
as permission for tribes to get started and spread the word.

Beyond the DOJ's clear assertion that no laws have changed, Allman
points out that in California the federal government has transferred
its criminal law enforcement on tribal lands to the state (PL-280),
which means the sheriff has that responsibility.

As Allman says, there are no laws that allow tribes to simply go into
the marijuana business in California. We appreciate his making his
point explicitly before any such project got started.
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom

xxx
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Pubdate: Mon, 09 Feb 2015
Source: San Diego Union Tribune (CA)
Webpage: http://drugsense.org/url/2ZYAHvy7
Copyright: 2015 Union-Tribune Publishing Co.
Contact: letters@utsandiego.com
Website: http://www.utsandiego.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/386
Note: Seldom prints LTEs from outside it's circulation area.

STILL MORE MIXED MESSAGES ON MARIJUANA

The federal government's war against itself over marijuana policy
continues. Three new fronts have opened, involving the military, the
Congress and, of all places, the Securities and Exchange Commission.
The result is an even greater mishmash of mixed signals.

In Washington state, where voters approved the use of recreational
marijuana in 2012, the military brass at Joint Base Lewis-McChord
south of Seattle sent out letters warning retail pot shops that
military personnel are prohibited from entering the shops and buying
marijuana products. "The use, possession, manufacture or distribution
of marijuana remains illegal for all service members, at all times
and locations," said a spokesman for the base.

But back across the country in Washington, D.C., a group of House
members, Democrats and Republicans, have introduced the Veterans
Equal Access Act. It would reverse a policy adopted in 2011 and allow
Veterans Affairs physicians in states where medical marijuana is
legal to issue medical marijuana recommendations to their patients.

Meanwhile, over at the SEC, regulators recently gave approval for an
Irvine, Calif., company to use nearly $7 million the company raised
to build and operate medical marijuana operations in Nevada, which
prompted the Judicial Watch blog to opine, "For a federal agency to
approve [marijuana's] official sale is downright insane."

We couldn't agree more.
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom

xxx
Newshawk: Herb Couch
Pubdate: Sat, 07 Feb 2015
Source: Glenwood Springs Post Independent (CO)
Copyright: 2015 Glenwood Springs Post Independent
Contact: http://drugsense.org/url/ys97xJAX
Website: http://www.postindependent.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/821
Author: Phil Lindeman

BRECKENRIDGE HOTELS TRAIN EMPLOYEES ABOUT MARIJUANA EDIBLES AFTER
ACCIDENTAL OVERDOSES

It's a tradition as old as timeshares: When guests pack up to head
home after a ski vacation, they often bid adieu by leaving unused
food, wine and beer in their room for the housekeeping staff.

Then legal marijuana entered the picture.

In the past year, employees from a handful of Summit County lodges
have visited the hospital after accidentally eating marijuana
edibles, according to the Breckenridge Police Department. The
department does not yet track individual cases, but marijuana
resource officer Caitlin Kontak says "at least several" employees or
their family members have sought medical help for edibles. When
paired with concerns over youth abuse and prevention, they have fast
become one of the cannabis industry's most controversial and
polarizing products.

For hotel management and law enforcement, the edibles issue comes
down to familiarity. Infused products can look and taste like nearly
anything - brownies, chocolate bars, hard candy, soda - and according
to Kontak, those innocent similarities are often enough to catch
employees off-guard. The state tightened packaging requirements in
November, but the changes only affected potency, dosage and
childproof packaging, not the name or appearance of a product.

"If you've seen some of the labels on these candy bars, the writing
that says it contains THC is microscopic and they're all very
similarly packaged," Kontak says. "The main problem with hotels is
that people know they can't take marijuana home. That's one of the
few rules everyone is aware of, so instead of taking it back, they
leave it as a tip, just as they would with any kind of food in a hotel."

The edibles-as-tips cases tend to follow a pattern: A hotel employee
finds the leftover edibles in an empty guest room and eats them like
any other sweets. But recreational products contain up to 100
milligrams of THC, which is roughly the potency of 64 joints made
with pre-legalization marijuana, Kontak says. Without knowing the
dosage - first-time users shouldn't eat more than 5 to 10 milligrams
at a time - the employee can take upwards of 10 times the recommended
amount of THC.

On occasion, employees unknowingly bring edibles home to share with
their families, as was the case last June in Basalt when a 7-year-old
girl ate infused chocolate her mother brought back from an Aspen hotel.

Since taking over as Breckenridge PD's marijuana officer, Kontak has
worked closely with lodges, schools and other groups to parse through
the facts and myths about edibles. She's visited almost every lodge
and hotel in Breckenridge, along with the Wyndham Vacation Resorts
team and a number of local HOAs. At the informal meetings, she
supplied fact sheets, images of various edibles and a Powerpoint
presentation with details on their effects.

"They don't want to outlaw any edibles because it's hard to enforce,
but they want to be cautionary," Kontak says. "They want people to
know that the effects can be very different, that people may not know
what to expect when they eat an edible."

 From there, Kontak says most lodges use her materials to build
in-house training programs.

At Beaver Run Resort, assistant general manager Chris Pappas has
revamped hotel policy to clarify marijuana rules - and concerns - for
both employees and guests. The staff is still allowed to take
leftover food, but the hotel's marijuana policy is now part of the
registration process. If a guest violates the policy, which includes
no smoking marijuana anywhere on the property, they are fined $500.
The policy does not mention edibles.

"For us, the biggest issue is the smoke," says Pappas, who says his
staff handles one case "every few weeks" involving marijuana use.
"That's what permeates down the hallway and can affect other people.
Quite frankly, this isn't a revenue-generating thing with the fines.
I can tell you that whatever we've gained in fines, we've had to give
way more back for unhappy guests."

INFUSION EDUCATION

The hotel edibles cases are the latest revolving around infused
products, which Summit County dispensary owners say are increasingly
popular with the out-of-state guests who stay at local lodges.

Yet neighboring resort communities have seen few - if any -
incidents. In Pitkin County, home to Aspen, the June scare is the
only recorded case of accidental edible ingestion, while officials
with Vail Police Department and Eagle County Sheriff's Office say
there have been no reported cases in Vail, EagleVail or Edwards.

Thanks to legalization, Kontak believes marijuana users are more
likely to report medical issues. She says about half of people who
call 911 admit to eating edibles, while the other half tend to share
that information with medical personnel only.

"People don't really tell cops a lot, but they'll tell medics
everything," Kontak says. To get a better grasp on edibles and
accidental consumption, she is working closely with Red, White and
Blue Fire Protection District to keep track of every case involving
typical side effects: shortness of breath, anxiety, hallucinations,
elevated heart rate.

For parents, the possibility that their child will accidentally eat
an edible is a major concern. In the weeks leading up to Halloween,
Kontak distributed an edibles fact sheet to schools and recreation
centers. It complemented education efforts by other Summit County
groups, including an edibles labeling campaign supported by the
Healthy Futures Initiative.

"If an adult eats an infused product, it's much easier to explain to
them what's happening," Kontak says. "If a child eats a product, the
only thing they know is that it feels like they're dying."

At Beaver Run Resort, education efforts begin in the staff room.
Pappas has posted PSA-style information about edibles, and marijuana
is a regular topic during daily meetings. He tweaked Kontak's
information to give his staff the basics, such as where to find THC
content on labels, and his employees were grateful.

"They appreciate the fact we took the time to make them aware of
these issues and let them know our position," Pappas says. "There has
been no negative feedback from our employees."

[sidebar]

Edibles 101

The state's Marijuana Enforcement Division set new rules for edibles
last November following a rash of accidental overdoses. A glimpse at
the tighter regulations:

- The maximum THC content of any marijuana edible, recreational or
medical, is 100 milligrams.

- The serving size for a first-time user is 5 to 10 milligrams.

- Edibles must be easily broken into single servings.

- All edibles, including liquids like Keef Cola, must come in
child-resistant containers.

- Packaging and containers must clearly list the THC content.

- Edibles from second-party manufacturers must come pre-packaged.
Dispensaries can no longer separate and package edibles individually
at the counter.
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom

xxx
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Pubdate: Mon, 09 Feb 2015
Source: Alaska Dispatch News (AK)
Webpage: http://drugsense.org/url/WVRC7Qfx
Copyright: 2015 Alaska Dispatch Publishing
Contact: letters@adn.com
Website: http://www.adn.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/18
Note: Anchorage Daily News until July '14
Author: Matt Richtel, The New York Times

FIRST BANK OF BUD: COLORADO CANNA-BUSINESS OWNERS WAIT FOR THEIR OWN BANK

It was zero degrees in Denver on a late December morning, and the
ice-covered streets were mostly empty. Mark Mason, wearing a
full-length black coat, green wool hat and sunglasses, sat in a white
Buick LaCrosse, eyeing the squat building across the street. It was
the local branch of the Federal Reserve Bank.

"Behind that gate, that's where the armored cars come in," he said,
pointing to a parking lot. "They've got a bunch of money in the
basement -- a bunch."

For some months, Mason, 54, has been thinking about the bank and how,
he said, "to break in." Not to take money, but to leave it. Mason and
a group of other entrepreneurs in Colorado want to start the
first-ever financial institution established specifically to serve
the pot industry. To do that, they need to make deposits in a Federal
Reserve account, and the agency hasn't let them. Such humdrum
administrative decisions are made all the time by federal banking
officials, but this one raises big political and legal issues between
the federal government and the state of Colorado over the
legalization of marijuana.

Mason and his business partners have already received a license from
the state of Colorado for their Fourth Corner Credit Union. They have
leased a building in downtown Denver, put up a Facebook page and
generated predictable jokes on late-night TV. Jimmy Fallon: "If you
think the line is slow at your bank ..."

Medical marijuana has been legal in Colorado since 2001, and
recreational marijuana use became legal a year ago. But marijuana
businesses have had limited, if any, access to banking services. The
federal government considers marijuana illegal and so traditional
banks, fearing prosecution for aiding and abetting illegal drug
dealers, have shut down pot-business accounts and declined to give
loans. Some banks have ferreted out pot entrepreneurs by sniffing
their bills, leading to a countermove: bills sprayed with air freshener.

Without a bank account, pot businesses deal in cash, lots of it, held
in safes, handed out in clipped bundles on payday, carried in brown
paper bags and cardboard boxes to the tax office and the utility
company, ferried around the state by armored vehicles and armed
guards. And without access to essential banking services - from
credit cards to electronic transfers to loans - those businesses pay
a huge premium. The reality in Colorado is that it is legal to grow
pot but extremely hard to grow a pot business.

The Fourth Corner partners saw a need and a business opportunity.
State accreditation in hand, the partners took a step this November
that typically goes off without a hitch: they applied to the Federal
Reserve Bank for a "master account." This is the account they would
use to deposit funds and transfer them electronically with other
banks - the lifeblood of commerce.

Mason could not find a case of a state accredited financial
institution being denied a master account. Usually, approval comes in
days, he noted. But it has been nearly three months since the
application was filed and there has been no answer, just a letter in
early January saying the request was under review. Mason said the
application was on the desk of a specialist in bank risk, a guy named
Ryan Harwell in Kansas City, Missouri, the Fed's Midwest regional
office that oversees the Denver branch.

While the Federal Reserve declined to comment - as a matter of
policy, its officials don't comment on pending applications -- Mason
suggested a reason the Fed may be wary of granting the account.

"This legitimizes the marijuana industry to the extent it's never
been legitimized before," he said. If Fourth Corner gets approval,
businesses would have a place to deposit and to borrow. Other
institutions might well follow, and the federal government "would
become complicit, and the walls start tumbling down."

At the same time, Mason argued that the Federal Reserve Bank was not
only within its rights to approve the credit union but was also
obliged to do so.

Peter Conti-Brown, a banking expert at the Stanford Law School,
agreed that the credit union application set up a quandary, one that,
as policy questions go, is "delicious" and "awesome." Yes, in theory,
he said, the Fed could approve this credit union. But the
implications are unclear, and potentially staggering, he said, given
that this pen stroke by Harwell could let the cannabis industry
blossom. And then what happens to the federal government's power over pot?

"I can almost see his green shaded visor and glasses," said
Conti-Brown, imagining Harwell in Kansas City. "All of a sudden on
the desk of this midlevel bureaucrat comes an extraordinary question
of federal policy and constitutional law."

A Crack in the Door?

The possible future home of the Fourth Corner Credit Union is seven
blocks from the Federal Reserve's Denver branch in a ranch style,
2,100-square-foot building that once housed an office of the Colorado
Business Bank. It has four teller windows, one of them drive-through,
a convenient side alley for armored cars to pick up the cash to take
it to the Fed, and a collection of neighbors that, as Mason likes to
say, represents "the whole universe" - the U.S. Mint, the state
courthouse and the Diamond Cabaret strip club.

Mason only recently moved to Denver. He rents a condo with his wife
downtown, but his permanent home is in Charleston, South Carolina,
where he practices law. He grew interested in the whole bank-for-pot
idea after getting a call from his son, Alex. A recent college
graduate with a degree in criminal justice, the younger Mason was
living in Denver and told his father that friends in the marijuana
industry were struggling to find banks to take their money. Mason
stayed up all night, inspired, writing a 20-page position paper on
banking law, and then started making local contacts, first with
high-powered Denver lawyers. He said he was captivated by the
"opportunity to work on one of the great political, social and
constitutional issues of the day," one that made his day job "pale by
comparison."

On the same freezing day that he cased the Fed, Mason gave a tour of
the credit union to one of the credit union's founding board members,
Kristi Kelly, owner of Good Meds, which grows and sells medical
marijuana. Since 2009, Kelly has had 23 bank accounts canceled.

Now Kelly relies on what she calls the "Bank of Kristi" - the
proceeds of Good Meds are kept in a safe and delivered to the tax
man, employees, lenders, trade associations and utilities in whatever
is discreet and handy, paper bags included.

Touring the credit union, she seemed gleeful. "This is great!" she
gushed. "I can't believe how perfect this is." She paused, looking
over at an imposing safe with two dial locks on the front. "Is that a
bulletproof lock safe? I've written about that in state applications,
but I've never seen it!"

Mason and a lawyer named Martin Kenney, who specializes in fraud law,
have put $600,000 into the management company that organized the
credit union, Mason said. They have recruited nine credit union board
members including a local urology surgeon and a Denver city
councilman. A local lawyer, Douglas Friednash, who provided the group
legal counsel, on Feb. 2 took the post of chief of staff to Gov. John
Hickenlooper.

There are 1,200 licensed marijuana businesses in the state, and the
credit union expects to get a "significant share," but it cannot sign
anyone up until it opens its doors. Its chief obstacle is not
financial, but legal. The Controlled Substances Act defines marijuana
as a Schedule 1 drug, along with the likes of heroin. It says that
these drugs, so easily carried across state lines, can only be
controlled through federal oversight. But in 2012, Colorado voters
legalized the sale of recreational marijuana by state-licensed
businesses, and the state Constitution was amended at the beginning
of 2014. Twenty-two other states and the District of Columbia allow
some form of legal marijuana. So does federal or state law prevail?

In a 2005 California case, the Supreme Court sided with the federal
government. Makers and users of medical marijuana had sought an
injunction to prevent federal law enforcement from interfering with
their California trade. But the court ruled that federal law
prevailed because the business of marijuana in one state could impact
supply and demand across state lines.

To banks, the pre-eminence of federal law has been a powerful
deterrent to allowing pot businesses to set up accounts. In fact, Don
Childears, chief executive of the Colorado Bankers Association, said
his reading of the federal law was that "the very receipt of a
deposit is the definition of money laundering." His train of logic:
Marijuana is illegal at the federal level; banks that take money from
illegal drug operations are guilty of money laundering; therefore,
the banks that take pot money face serious criminal and civil liability.

On Feb. 14, 2014, the Justice Department and the Treasury introduced
a wrinkle. They each sent out guidelines that seemed to crack open
the door for banks to engage with marijuana businesses. The Justice
guidelines, known as the "Cole Memo," didn't foreclose the
possibility that banks taking marijuana money could be prosecuted for
financial crimes, but directed prosecutors to go after significant
cases, which it defined using eight priorities. For example, a bank
that provided services to a marijuana business that distributed to
minors or sold in states where the drug was illegal or used gun
violence might be subject to prosecution, but when such aggravating
factors were absent, prosecution "may not be appropriate," the guidelines said.

Under the Treasury guidelines, banks are urged to file "suspicious
activity reports" when a new pot business opens or closes an account
or when such businesses exhibit activities that violate the Cole
guidelines. Treasury characterized the efforts in part as a way to
get money into the banking system, where it - and its actors - could
be more easily tracked. In sum, the guidance was advertised by many
as a "green light" to banks.

Childears of the Colorado Bankers Association doesn't see it that
way. "They were a yellow light at best," he said of the guidelines.
In fact, he argued, "They raised the liability for the banks." The
costs of filing suspicious activity reports, he said, are
considerable and raise all kinds of questions. For example, he asked,
what if such a report actually becomes an admission that the bank is
participating in an illegal enterprise?

Plus, Childears said, the guidelines are not law. In other words,
they don't preclude a federal prosecutor or state attorney general
from going after a bank. In fact, two state attorneys general, from
Nebraska and Oklahoma, sued the state of Colorado in December, asking
that the Colorado law that legalized pot be struck down because it
violates federal law and "creates a dangerous gap in the federal drug
control program."

Most banks are wary of stepping into this mire, Childears said,
estimating that perhaps 5 percent of Colorado's marijuana businesses
use a financial institution. (Others put the figure higher, but still
below half the pot business in the state.)

Enter the credit union, which state officials see as critical, partly
to solve crime and safety risks they see created by all-cash
businesses. "It is the first very public marker that this is a place
to be banked," said Andrew Freedman, director of marijuana
coordination for Colorado. The credit union, he predicted, will see a
surge of business "in a quick amount of time."

What happens with its application goes to the very fate of the new
marijuana industry, argued Chris Myklebust, commissioner of
Colorado's division of financial services. If the feds don't grant
the application and really open up banking, Myklebust said, they
create a life-threatening chokehold on the businesses, cutting off
their ability to profit and survive.

"Without banking," he said, "the industry is not sustainable in the long run."

The Cost of Not Banking

Dylan Donaldson, 30, knows the hidden costs of a bank-challenged
business. He has nine 1,000-pound safes bolted to the floor in the
back of Karing Kind, his dispensary North Boulder. At any given time,
they hold $80,000 to $100,000 in cash.

The safes didn't help, though, when thieves busted through the wall
of an adjoining business one June night and took $250,000 in marijuana plants.

Now he pays $100,000 a year for armed guards provided by Iron
Protection Group, a business owned and operated by vets from Iraq and
Afghanistan, who watch the place at night. They also deliver money to
the tax office and vendors, from makers of THC concentrate to
suppliers of computer paper. At present, the business has no bank
account, having lost more than a dozen, Donaldson said.

Another big cost for Donaldson: loans. He wanted to buy the land
beneath his dispensary, but couldn't get a bank loan. The best he
could do was a 17 percent interest-only loan from four local businessmen.

And then there's his father, who owns the building, and leases it to
his son for above-market rates. The younger Donaldson said this was
frustrating but fair, given that the nature of the enterprise
requires his dad to take on risk.

These are not the only ways that the clash between the federal
government and the state costs marijuana businesses. For instance,
federal tax rules prevent cannabis businesses from writing off
expenses under a law meant to keep illegal drug cartels from
exploiting tax advantages. Donaldson estimates that the taxes and
other expenses mean he pays 30 percent to 35 percent more in costs
than a non-pot business of the same size.

On Dec. 31, Donaldson watched a steady stream of customers pour in to
stock up for New Year's Eve - bud for smoking, THC baked into candy
bars, stirred into drinks, frozen into ice cream. But rising
competition and the extra costs mean profits don't come easily.
"December was our worst month all year," he said.

At the same time, he is skeptical a credit union is the solution.
Maybe he'd put a little money into it, he said, but what if the
credit union fails or gets hit by the feds, its own doors kicked
down? He would be worse off. Besides, he said: "I think it'll be
challenging for them to get approved."

A week later, on Jan. 7, the credit union organizers got a letter
from Esther George, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas
City. The letter stated that issuance of a master account was "within
the Reserve Bank's discretion" and required the Fed to identify the
risks "posed by such a financial institution." The potential risks
she referred to might explain how the application wound up on the
desk of Harwell, who is a risk specialist.

Earlier, Mason had sat in on several conference calls with Harwell
and said the risk specialist asserted the decision was "above my pay
grade," but declined to specify in whose pay grade it was. (Harwell
did not return emails, and a spokesman declined to comment about the
application.)

There is also the issue of deposit insurance, which a financial
institution needs in order to operate. The Fourth Corner Credit Union
has applied to the National Credit Union Administration, a federal
regulator that provides insurance for most of the nation's 2,500 or
so state-chartered credit unions. If it isn't approved, the fledgling
credit union plans to apply for private insurance with Lloyd's of London.

As for the Federal Reserve, Conti-Brown of Stanford said the granting
of a master account by the Federal Reserve had usually been routine.
"It's been so prosaic," he said.

On one level, this application is no less routine. But there is
another level on which the granting of a master account to the credit
union can fairly be seen as undercutting the authority of the federal
government to easily regulate marijuana through the traditional banking system.

Right now, traditional banks would rather not risk prosecution or
regulatory trouble to get a few million dollars from marijuana
businesses. And so to keep the industry on a low throttle, the
federal government need only threaten tighter enforcement, and
already skittish banks might get out entirely. In this way,
restricting banking limits the size of the industry without directly
challenging the states that have legalized it.

With the credit union, Conti-Brown said, "the dam breaks." The credit
union is not looking to marijuana businesses for "small deposits," he
said. "It's their raison d'etre."

If the federal government goes after such an institution, Mason
argued further, it will no longer be just a banking issue. "If they
come after me, it represents an attack on the industry itself," he
said, and, by extension, the voters who approved it. "They're
attacking the will of the people," he said.
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom

xxx
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Pubdate: Mon, 09 Feb 2015
Source: Denver Post (CO)
Webpage: http://drugsense.org/url/Hgdnk39u
Copyright: 2015 The Denver Post Corp
Contact: openforum@denverpost.com
Website: http://www.denverpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/122
Author: Joey Bunch

POT MEASURES SLOW DOWN

Marijuana Industry Sees Less Legislative Regulation in This Year's Session

The strides in regulating Colorado's burgeoning marijuana industry
look more like baby steps through the first quarter of the legislative session.

In 2014, legislators took up 31 bills that dealt directly with
marijuana. Last year's session produced a law that authorized a
banking services cooperative for pot businesses that big banks won't
serve, and another that created sweeping changes on howpotent edible
pot products can be and how they are labeled. moves this session.

Legislators and lobbyists who most often deal with marijuana issues
say regulation has hit a plateau that requires more time and data to
see which are the real problems and which are conjecture.

"I don't know if there are any really big bills coming," said Michael
Elliott, executive director of the Marijuana Industry Group, an
influential lobbying arm for many of the state's pot businesses. "I
think we're down to the nuanced stuff."

The most watched bill so far appears to be the reauthorization of
Colorado's medical marijuana rules, which have a sunset provision
that would cause them to expire in July.

While it's unlikely the rules would go away, legislators could use
the opportunity to make other changes.

Lawmakers have voiced concerns in hearings that some people are
getting medical marijuana licenses to avoid taxes that apply to
recreational pot, but no one has yet unveiled a remedy for tax evaders.

Another bill would toughen registration requirements on marijuana
caregivers - those who grow pot for patients. Supporters say the
legislation would help law enforcement more easily spot those who
might be growing for the black market using the camouflage of caring
for patients.

Jeanne Pratt, a medical marijuana activist from Lakewood, has been
attending legislative hearings on pot for six years and said this
session, so far, seemed to be the "most boring."

"They've picked all the low-hanging fruit the past two years, and now
they're trying to figure out what to meddle in next," she said.

Jonathan Singer, D- Longmont, who has been the Democratic point man
on pot, said the slowdown represented a more thoughtful approach.

Singer sponsored legislation last year that resulted in the
restrictions on edibles-cookies, candies and other products that
could have been mistaken for the sober version - that took effect Feb. 1.

Singer and pot lobbyists were concerned last week about a bill Sen.
Owen Hill, R- Colorado Springs, has introduced to move authority over
labeling from the Department of Revenue to the legislature.

Pros and cons

Opponents say it would nullify the rules that were passed last year,
since they are overseen by the Department of Revenue, and would make
managing the future labeling issues cumbersome because they could be
shaped only during the busy four months of the legislative session.

Hill called that "hyperbole and an inappropriate reading of the bill."

He said the Department of Revenue faces a Jan. 1 deadline for new
rules and that moving rule-making back to the legislature buys more time.

A Republican bill to warn women that using pot while pregnant could
endanger their babies was scrapped during a House committee this
week, when it was evident it didn't have the votes to pass as it was
written. Democrats vowed to work with the bill's sponsor, Rep. Jack
Tate, R-Centennial, to make it more specific.

"It was really opening the door to relitigate even things like
abortion," said Singer, who opposed it. "Well, it had the word fetus in there."

Rep. Tim Dore of Elizabeth, viewed as pot's hawk for the Republicans,
said marijuana isn't a true partisan issue, and lobbyists say there
are nearly as many Democrats who take a stern view as those who are
more liberal, while there are libertarian leaning Republicans who see
it as a free market issue.

Dore saw his bill to create a grant program with 30 percent of the
pot revenue to help 46 rural counties killed in committee.

Representatives of larger, urban counties wanted their districts to
get a cut of the grant money, too, while state agencies testified
that losing 30 percent off the top would cripple current and future
statewide programs.

"We've been given the task as a legislative body to address this,"
Dore said of pot's impacts. "How we address it? That takes a healthy debate."
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom

xxx
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Pubdate: Mon, 09 Feb 2015
Source: Washington Times (DC)
Copyright: 2015 Associated Press
Contact: yourletters@washingtontimes.com
Website: http://www.washingtontimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/492

ACTING U.S. DRUG CZAR SAYS D.C. SHOULD DECIDE OWN POT LAWS

(AP) - The acting U.S. drug czar says the federal government
shouldn't interfere with the District's move to legalize possession
of marijuana for recreational use.

Michael Botticelli said Friday that while he doesn't agree with
legalization, he believes the District "should stick to its home rule."

City voters approved legalization in November by a nearly 2-to-1
margin. But in December Congress passed a spending bill that included
language intended to block legalization. D.C. leaders argue that they
can still make pot legal because the language of the bill wasn't clear.

The bill blocks the District from spending money to change its
marijuana laws. Mr. Botticelli said during a question-and-answer
session on Friday that the District government should be able to
spend local tax dollars as it sees fit.
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom

xxx
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Pubdate: Sat, 07 Feb 2015
Source: Detroit News (MI)
Webpage: http://drugsense.org/url/ySSlZrjJ
Copyright: 2015 The Detroit News
Contact: letters@detnews.com
Website: http://www.detroitnews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/126
Author: David Shepardson

POT USE DOESN'T INCREASE CRASH RISK

NHTSA Study Comes As States Legalize Marijuana

Washington - A government study released late Friday found no
evidence that marijuana use leads to a higher risk of getting into a
traffic crash.

But safety advocates believe it is still dangerous to drive after
smoking significant amounts of marijuana, and the government plans
more testing.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said a 20-month
survey of drivers in 2013 and 2014 found that while drinking
dramatically raises the chance of a crash, there was no evidence that
marijuana use is statistically significant in boosting wreck rates.

The agency said the issue is of growing importance in the wake of
marijuana being legalized in Colorado, Oregon, Alaska and Washington
state for recreational use.

In Michigan, eight cities approved decriminalization measures last
year for marijuana: Berkley, Huntington Woods, Mount Pleasant,
Pleasant Ridge, Port Huron, Saginaw, Oak Park and Hazel Park.

The report's findings were based on two surveys. The National
Roadside Survey, which collected information from volunteer drivers
at 300 research checkpoints across the U.S., and a second study - the
largest of its kind ever conducted - that assessed whether marijuana
use by drivers is associated with greater risk of crashes. That
study, in Virginia, gathered data over 20 months from more than 3,000
drivers who were in crashes, as well as a comparison group of 6,000
drivers who did not crash.

The percentage of drivers with evidence of marijuana in their system
increased from 8.6 percent in 2007 to 12.6 percent in the study, NHTSA said

Marijuana users were about 25 percent more likely to be involved in a
crash than drivers with no evidence of marijuana use. But that's
because other factors - especially that more younger men are involved
in crashes, NHTSA said - rather than marijuana use itself.

By comparing marijuana use among those in crashes and those who
weren't, the safety agency said "other factors, such as age and
gender, appear to account for the increased crash risk among marijuana users."

Former Acting NHTSA Administrator David Kelly said the study results
shouldn't be interpreted as a flat declaration that driving after
smoking pot use is safe. Further research is needed, NHTSA said,
"before more definitive conclusions about drug use and crash risk can
be reached."

"You can't say that driving while stoned is not a risk. We know it
debilitates the ability to drive safely," he said.

Mason Tvert, director of communications for the Marijuana Policy
Project in Denver, added that the group doesn't want people driving
after significant marijuana use.

The United States doesn't good a good job of testing for marijuana
use among drivers, Kelley said. Police, he noted, often don't bother
to test for marijuana if a driver already has tested positive for
drunken driving.

It's difficult to determine at what level marijuana use may impair
driving, the government said, because - unlike with alcohol testing -
there aren't precise levels of chemicals from marijuana proven to
correlate with impairment.

Drugged drivers

Michigan had the 12th highest rate of drugged drivers in the country
from 2006-09, says the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services
Administration.

While all states prohibit driving under the influence of drugs,
there's significant variation in the minimum acceptable levels of
marijuana or its traces in a driver's system.

Sixteen states, including Michigan, forbid any presence of prohibited
drugs, while five others have specific limits for marijuana. In
October, Gov. Rick Snyder signed legislation allowing police to
conduct a roadside analysis for drugs, in addition to alcohol.

Mothers Against Drunk Driving has made drug use behind the wheel a
bigger focus. MADD this year changed its mission statement to include
"help fight drugged driving."

"MADD hopes to bring awareness to the growing threat of drugged
driving on our roadways, much in the same way we have with drunk
driving since our founding in 1980," the group says on its website.

"While the substances are different, the results are the same -
needless deaths and injuries."

NHTSA is conducting additional studies to further understand the risk
of driving after drug use, including the Washington State Roadside
Survey, "which will assess risk in a state where marijuana has
recently been legalized."

It also is on board with the National Institute on Drug Abuse for a
simulator study to assess how drivers under the influence of drugs
behave behind the wheel, the agency said. Ongoing research, it said,
"will refine our understanding of when marijuana use by drivers"
increases the effect it has on driving.

"Researchers have developed a deep body of knowledge about the link
between drinking, driving and risk. We know drunk driving kills,"
added NHTSA Administrator Mark Rosekind.

"The combined message of these two surveys is that our work to
understand and combat drunk driving is paying off, but that we have
much to learn about how illegal drugs and prescription medicines
affect highway safety - and that developing that knowledge is urgent,
because more and more drivers have these drugs in their systems."

Weekend numbers fall

As marijuana use behind the wheel is rising, the incidence of driving
on weekends after drinking has fallen sharply.

The study said the proportion of drunken drivers on the roads has
fallen by 80 percent since 1973. The study found about 1.5 percent of
weekend drivers had blood-alcohol concentrations equal to being
legally intoxicated, 0.08 percent or above.

The proportion of drivers with any alcohol in their system declined
by about 30 percent from 2007 to 2014.

Drivers with a breath alcohol level of 0.08 percent were about four
times more likely to crash than sober drivers, NHTSA said, while
drivers with an alcohol level of 0.15 percent were 12 times more
likely to crash than sober drivers.
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom

xxx
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Pubdate: Mon, 09 Feb 2015
Source: Buffalo News (NY)
Copyright: 2015 The Buffalo News
Contact: http://drugsense.org/url/GXIzebQL
Website: http://www.buffalonews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/61
Author: Teresa Wiltz, Stateline.Org

THE CHANGING FACE OF HEROIN ADDICTION

WASHINGTON - On Super Bowl Sunday, most football fans watched ads for
Victoria's Secret, the lost Budweiser dog and a deadpan Kim
Kardashian extolling the virtues of T-Mobile. But in St. Louis, those
national ads were supplemented with a different kind of Super Bowl commercial.

On screen, the camera focused on the face of a white, middle-class
teenager as he died of a heroin overdose. Off screen, a singer
crooned along to perky guitar music: "First you stole prescription
pills from your mom/You threw back a few and then they were gone/So
you're jonesing real bad and you need some more. ... And that's how,
how you got addicted to heroin."

Beginning in the 1920s, when heroin became illegal, people tended to
think of heroin abuse as a problem plaguing people of color in the
big cities. But in the past decade, heroin abuse has exploded - and
it is hitting white people in suburbs and rural areas particularly
hard. As the demographics of heroin use have changed, so have states'
efforts to combat the problem.

"People have recognized that (heroin addiction) is a problem facing
folks they know as well as groups that are distant from them. That
certainly affects the way you view the problem," said Kurt Schmoke,
who as Baltimore mayor from 1987 to 1999 was harshly criticized for
his efforts to decriminalize drug use.

Twenty-seven states and the District of Columbia now have laws
designed to make naloxone, a heroin antidote that is 99 percent
effective, more easily accessible to overdose victims, according to
the Network for Public Health Law. Since 2007, 21 states and the
District adopted so-called "Good Samaritan laws" that provide some
type of immunity for people calling 911 to report or seek help for an overdose.

Last year, Vermont Gov. Peter Shumlin, a Democrat, devoted his entire
State of the State speech to his state's heroin crisis. Last month,
Republican Gov. Larry Hogan of Maryland declared a "state of
emergency" and pledged to dedicate resources to combat the heroin
scourge in his state. And Democratic Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe
has introduced six heroin-related bills.

"In some states, now that budgets are generally looking better,
states are looking at this as a different problem than in the
previous decade," said Karmen Hanson, program manager for the
National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL). "It's not just an
urban problem; it's a rural problem. It's not just under the viaduct
in the big cities. It's also a suburban problem. It's widespread
culturally and ethnographically."

Between 2006 and 2013, the number of first-time heroin users nearly
doubled, from 90,000 to 169,000, according to the U.S. Substance
Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). Ninety
percent of the people who tried the drug for the first time in the
past decade are white, compared with an equal number of white and
nonwhite users who got their start before the 1980s, according to a
study published last year in JAMA Psychiatry.

"Heroin use has changed from an inner-city, minority-centered problem
to one that has a more widespread geographical distribution,
involving primarily white men and women in their late 20s living
outside of large urban areas," researchers concluded.

Perhaps not coincidentally, the past two years have seen a remarkable
uptick in "harm reduction" laws that focus on saving lives, rather
than incarcerating users.

"With the changing demographics, there is the ability to frame this
as a public health issue because many policymakers and law
enforcement folks seem to relate to white users who are experiencing
heroin use disorders more than people of color," said Kathie
Kane-Willis, director of the Illinois Consortium on Drug Policy at
Roosevelt University. Kane-Willis is a former heroin user who was
introduced to the drug as a college student at Sarah Lawrence College
in the late 1980s.

Ted Cicero, a psychiatry professor at Washington University Medical
School and a co-author of the JAMA study, agreed that "when heroin
became a white problem of middle-class kids," that got lawmakers'
attention. "Now that it's hit home (for some legislators), it's
become a major, major issue. No question the epidemic is growing. The
demand is growing for it. And as long as there is that demand, the
need will be met."

The shifting attitude fits a historical pattern, according to Marc
Mauer, executive director of The Sentencing Project, a nonprofit that
promotes sentencing reforms. In the 1930s, he said, the popular
perception of marijuana was that it was "used in the racy part of
town, in jazz clubs. The public perception was the users were
Mexicans and African-Americans." As a result, Mauer said, marijuana
was viewed as "the demon drug" and penalties for its use were harsh.

But by the 1960s, white, middle-class youth had started smoking pot
and perceptions changed. Several decades later, Washington state and
Colorado have legalized recreational marijuana use and other states
are poised to follow suit.

The 21st-century heroin epidemic has its roots in the crackdown on
the abuse of OxyContin, Vicodin and other opioid pain medications.
According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, nearly
80 percent of heroin users say that they previously abused
prescription opioids. When, for example, the formula for OxyContin
was tweaked to make it more difficult to grind up to snort or inject,
many abusers switched to heroin.
__________________________________________________________________________
Distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom