Last night, the medical cannabis advocate community defeated a second anti-medical marijuana candidate in a state Attorney General race. In Oregon, Dwight Holton, a former US attorney, lost in a landslide after medical cannabis became a campaign issue. In 2010, we defeated Steve Cooley in a very close race for California Attorney General. And these are not the only recent victories.
Any day now, Connecticut will become the 17th state to adopt medical cannabis laws. Last week, 73% of President Obama's own party in Congress voted against his policy of cracking down on medical marijuana, and the week before, Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi stood up to condemn Drug Enforcement Administration raids in medical cannabis states.
These are pretty exciting times for a movement under attack, but this momentum is no accident.
Following direction from Obama, we focused on our cities and states
After the Ogden Memo was issued in 2009, medical cannabis advocates and elected officials of several states took President Obama at his word, that the "pursuit of [anti-drug] priorities should not focus federal resources in your States on individuals that are in clear and unambiguous compliance with existing state laws providing for the use of medical marijuana." Patients began seeking solutions to safe access locally. State legislatures across the country began developing medical cannabis laws to provide patient relief while avoiding future federal interference -- all in compliance with DOJ policy.
But federal prosecutors didn't like this direction and they began threatening states which had spent thousands of staff and advocate hours drafting, debating, and passing access laws. Realizing it was out of step with its US attorney offices (who are supposed to be accountable to the elected President), the Obama administration issued the Cole memo in July 2011. Under this "new" guidance of the Obama administration, the DEA and US attorneys increased attacks on medical cannabis with paramilitary-style raids, threatening letters to landlords, IRS persecutions, and even criminal charges against patients and caregivers.
Between Fall 2009 and Summer 2011, advocates created strong relationships in their communities. Elected officials and bureaucrats became invested in creating programs that would meet the needs of their constituents. As the population of medical cannabis patients grew, we began meeting each other, organizing with community partners like the United Food and Commercial Workers union, and were emboldened with what felt like the backing of the federal government.
Experience has broken down barriers
There are now over 1 million state-approved medical cannabis patients in this country. Everyone knows someone who knows someone who is medical cannabis patient. Parents suffering from cancer and MS are tired of asking their kids to find marijuana for them for their treatment, families are tired of watching loved ones needlessly suffer from chronic pain and the side effects of cancer treatment because they do not want to break "federal law," and the nation is tired of government misinformation about the medical benefits of cannabis. Even more importantly, elected officials are hearing these discussions at their dinner tables.
We are bigger and better-organized
The medical cannabis community is growing every day. Thousands of physicians feel comfortable in the regulated systems of access and are recommending cannabis therapies. State and local governments are figuring out how to make safe access a win-win for patients and their communities. Throughout the country, thousands of patients work with their partners in labor, medical associations, veterans groups, patients groups, and political organizations to change federal laws and regulate access to a medicine that millions of Americans need.
Wake up, Mr. President
Three years ago, medical cannabis advocates were told to leave D.C. and focus on our home states. Underestimated, we became the target of federal crackdowns on state-licensed caregivers and dispensaries. President Obama has increased enforcement against us even as his reelection looms. But state and federal leaders are pushing back. Yesterday a poll confirmed that access to medical marijuana is overwhelmingly popular, and today New York elected officials will announce a push to make the Empire State the eighteenth to provide for well-regulated access to cannabis.
The next time the Obama campaign decides to pursue politically-motivated charges against state medical marijuana regimes, I suggest his campaign manager Jim Messina call Steve Cooley or Dwight Holton and ask if they regret underestimating the medical cannabis community.
Politicians come and go. But public compassion for suffering patients is here to stay.
Scott Morgan: Would Romney Be Worse for Medical Marijuana Than Obama?
Steph Sherer: Why We Fight for Medical Cannabis - and How Congress Can Help Us Win
Buster Brown: D.C. Patients Struggle From Medical Marijuana Delays
Tamar Todd: Why I Want a Medical Marijuana Dispensary Near My Children's School
Fast forward two years and another bitching out session from my GF I quit AGAIN..In 2009 october I was at work talking with a customer about a set of wheels he wanted to buy..Next thing I know I wake up and there are these strangers hovering over me telling me to stop fighting them that I had had a seizure and they were there to help..AGAIN I was prescribed dilantin and this time I AM CERTAIN that Marijuana is the ONLY medicine my body can tolerate..it has been proven to myself now I have to try to convince my doctor.
I am looking forward to the day when I can tell my doctor and quit lieing to everyone that I use Marijuana for seizure control and I can stop being a "criminal".
The next thing I remember is being wheeled down my front porch and saying "I love you mom and dad"..then the very next thing is waking up in the hospital with my father crying...the man in later years would be under a truck welding when he turned over to grab a tool a piece of molten slag fell on his back..he did not shed a tear.
I had suffered a Grand Mal Seizure.
They prescribed Phenobarbital (This was the late 70's) my childhood is one giant blur.
When I was a teen I was prescribed Tegretol/Dilantin/Depekene, My teen years are also a blur.
When I started smoking pot I had stopped taking my meds because I was dizzy all the time, always nauseous and I sometimes would have very bad acid reflux..It was the valproic acid that my stomach was regurgitating.
I did not start smoking because I thought it would prevent seizures that knowledge came in later years.
In years to come, the attitudes that now prevail towards people that choose cannabis will be as politically incorrect as racism, homophobia or denying women the vote.
Stand up for your rights!
http://marijuana-uses.com/read/
Prohibition has finally run its course; our prisons are full, our economy is in ruins, the lives and livelihoods of tens of millions of Americans have been destroyed or severely disrupted, and what was once a shining beacon of liberty and prosperity has become a toxic, repressive, smoldering heap of hypocrisy and a gross affront to fundamental human decency.
Accordingly, it is now the duty of every last one of us to insure that the people who are responsible for this shameful situation are not simply left in peace to enjoy the wealth and status that their despicable actions have, until now, afforded them. Former and present Prohibitionists must not be allowed to remain untainted and untouched from the unconscionable acts that they have viciously committed on their fellow citizens. - They have provided us with neither safe communities nor safe streets; we will provide them with neither a safe haven to enjoy their ill-gotten gains nor the liberty to repeat such a similar atrocity!
Those responsible for the shameful policy of prohibition shall not go unpunished!
“Suppose you are a corrupt, scum-sucking, prohibitionist parasite. And suppose you are a member of Congress. But I repeat myself….”
– What Mark Twain would have said.
Romney, on the other hand calls drug dealers and users, "Narco-Terrorists" He may very well treat marijuana smokers, growers, and dealers as terrorists and lock them up indefinitely without a trial.
I wish that Gary Johnson would have a chance, but the media will never give him enough exposure and try to drown him out like they did Ron Paul.
Yeah, that gay marriage thing was on the "down low," for sure!
Obama will have to do something, as he's pretty much alienated the substantial numbers of marijuana advocates that were swayed to vote for him based on his earlier statements concerning marijuana and medical marijuana prior to his election.
It will come down to losing those votes not to Romney, but to ANY third party candidate who embraces marijuana, since everybody understands that Obama has basically followed the GW Bush blueprint for (almost) everything important to the general electorate.
In the U.S., more than half of his constituents (Democrats and Independents) want marijuana **fully legalized** (http://www.gallup.com/poll/150149/record-high-americans-favor-legalizing-marijuana.aspx -- see the breakdown by demographic), yet he's strongly opposing it even for medical use.
Being tough on pot is no longer a popular stance with the average American. Even a full 1/3 of conservatives approve of full legalization. It is only popular with the elite who make money off of prohibition. Big pharma, the for-profit prison industry, etc.
Cannabis does none of that. And it actually lets me let go of all the stressors and nightmares that cause panic attacks and meltdowns. Nothing humilates me, a middle-aged veteran of three wars, more than breaking down into racking sobs in the grocery store or the bank. I feel like an out-of-control two-year-old abandoned out in public when this happens. Needless to say, it alarms innocent bystanders. Cannabis is like a wonder drug in addressing these sort of anxiety disorders. It enables me to live a nearly normal life. Yet, I am a criminal because I need it.
It needs to be universally legalized.
For many in California this is not about medical marijuana, but rather whether or not the candidate holds a modern world view, components of which are an acceptance of evolution, of scientific progress, and of the surety of the victory of democracy over totalitarianism. President Obama is apparently asking his supporters to cross the line, and follow him into a realm of backwards, reactionary thinking.