B'Man's Revolt
NORML
The South’s Gonna Do It Again
Maybe us dumb ole southern rednecks are smarter than you think we are. Mississippi, long ago, decriminalized mara-gee-wana. Many people do not know this. I even pointed out what a tremendous draw it would be for Mississippi tourism, making the state the Number One Tourist destination in America. I also pointed out a Hero in Mississippi who wanted to legalize medical marijuana in Mississippi… State Senator Deborah Dawkins. Which is fitting because Ole Miss actually grows what little marijuana is authorized by the Federal Government for years.
I wrote:
It appears that one redneck Mississippi woman, State Senator Deborah Dawkins, understands what ole Jefferson meant, and wants medical marijuana legalized in Mississippi. She is a hero, since there aren’t many, if any (in Mississippi), ready to address the obvious. Any sane person knows. Any person that has a relative who hurts knows. The only people that don’t know are the ignorant or the ones that profit from its illegality. There are no more in-betweens.
Who Profits From Prohibition?
I recently shared with you just who is truly against the legalization initiatives. They pour money in to fight it… and guess what? They are the very ones that PROFIT the most from its continued illegality. Imagine that.
1.) Police Unions: Police departments across the country have become dependent on federal drug war grants to finance their budget. In March, we published a story revealing that a police union lobbyist in California coordinated the effort to defeat Prop 19, a ballot measure in 2010 to legalize marijuana, while helping his police department clients collect tens of millions in federal marijuana-eradication grants. And it’s not just in California. Federal lobbying disclosures show that other police union lobbyists have pushed for stiffer penalties for marijuana-related crimes nationwide.
2.) Private Prisons Corporations: Private prison corporations make millions by incarcerating people who have been imprisoned for drug crimes, including marijuana. As Republic Report’s Matt Stoller noted last year, Corrections Corporation of America, one of the largest for-profit prison companies, revealed in a regulatory filing that continuing the drug war is part in parcel to their business strategy. Prison companies have spent millions bankrolling pro-drug war politicians and have used secretive front groups, like the American Legislative Exchange Council, to pass harsh sentencing requirements for drug crimes.
3.) Alcohol and Beer Companies: Fearing competition for the dollars Americans spend on leisure, alcohol and tobacco interests have lobbied to keep marijuana out of reach. For instance, the California Beer & Beverage Distributors contributed campaign contributions to a committee set up to prevent marijuana from being legalized and taxed.
4.) Pharmaceutical Corporations: Like the sin industries listed above, pharmaceutical interests would like to keep marijuana illegal so American don’t have the option of cheap medical alternatives to their products. Howard Wooldridge, a retired police officer who now lobbies the government to relax marijuana prohibition laws, told Republic Report that next to police unions, the “second biggest opponent on Capitol Hill is big PhRMA” because marijuana can replace “everything from Advil to Vicodin and other expensive pills.”
5.) Prison Guard Unions: Prison guard unions have a vested interest in keeping people behind bars just like for-profit prison companies. In 2008, the California Correctional Peace Officers Association spent a whopping $1 million to defeat a measure that would have “reduced sentences and parole times for nonviolent drug offenders while emphasizing drug treatment over prison.”
I have pointed you to the many law enforcement officials that recognize that the system is rigged AND the Liar-In-Chief that says one thing campaigning, but does another when elected.
But that is nothing new, is it?
A States’ Rights Issue
The Federal Government will force its brutish self over the state’s rights that places like Washington showed recently.
Did you hear the arguments against made in the video, which rely on issues that have nothing to do with the ballot initiatives (no one is suggesting that children will be allowed to partake)? That “sleight-of-hand”, in and of itself, is telling. As a Doctor told me a few years ago, kids have easy access now and suggested that if one wanted to find marijuana for one’s own healing, just ask a teenager.
No matter, when states vote and pass this type of legislation, there is an almost immediate relief that locals feel.
King County (Washington) dropping misdemeanor marijuana cases
The King County Prosecutor’s Office says it’ll immediately dismiss all of its misdemeanor marijuana possession cases because of the passage of I-502, legalizing marijuana possession of one ounce or less.
So, this will likely be a Federal Government versus State’s Rights showdown. GOOD! About time!
And this doesn’t address all the cities that are passing their own laws of decriminalization (as the above video points out), which includes 90+ in Illinois alone.
Who benefits from legalization?
My God! Can you imagine the lives saved, the money saved, the lives unharmed by the Police State, the taxes earned, etc. if they would simply stop feeding their prohibition profiteers? It truly is a no-brainer when one considers all the harm created by prohibition.
I have covered this subject for years now and if you are new to the blog, you might want to take some time reading thru the many posts I have published regarding it. I promise you will learn something.
Other Southern States Initiatives
Arkansas voted on legalizing the Devil Weed for medical purposes and barely lost. In 2007, Eureka Springs took it to the brink of legalization:
In November 2007, Eureka Springs voters passed an ordinance directing police and prosecutors to make possession of less than an ounce of marijuana a low law-enforcement priority. Under Arkansas law, such possession is a Class A misdemeanor, which is punishable by up to a year in jail and a $1,000 fine.
In Tennessee this past summer, medical marijuana got a legislative hearing (I pointed this out here), but failed, in spite of some of the most stringently atrocious and antiquated laws against its use in the nation:
Did you know that in Tennessee possession of any amount of marijuana — even as little as a single gram — can land you in prison for up to a year, with a mandatory fine of between $250 and $2,500? Or that there were over 23,000 marijuana-related arrests in Tennessee in 2007, and over 82% of these arrests were for simple possession of small amounts of marijuana? That’s almost 20,000 families impacted by arrest, prosecution, fines, and related effects such as denial of employment or public benefits.
You can read more about the negative consequences of Tennessee’s marijuana laws in this excellent profile by Jon Gettman, Ph.D.
This is particularly offensive when one understands All The Reasons Pot Is Good For You (which include):
- Preventing blindness from glaucoma
- Better for your lungs than tobacco
- Controlling epileptic seizures
- Stops CANCER from spreading
- Decreasing anxiety
- Slows the progression of Alzheimer’s
- Eases the pain of Multiple Sclerosis
- Lessens side-effects from treating hepatitis C
- Treats inflammatory bowel diseases
- Relieves arthritis discomfort
Even the National Cancer Institute recognizes its huge benefits for treating the symptoms of cancer.
The southern cake-taker
Will we hear all the other Mississippi Kids start saying they are Alabami-bound?
h/t norml, jack herer, MPP, Business Insider, National Cancer Institute & Patients for Medical Marijuana
Did I rub you the wrong way or stroke you just right? Let me know below in the comments section or Email me at buelahman {AT} g m a i l {DOT} com
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A little stirring of the hornets nest.
Been doing some reading. Visited Petes blog at Drug WarRant. A guy that goes by malcolmkyle left a comment about stirring the hornet’s nest. It’s over at NewsBusters about Arianna Huffington: Drug War a ‘War on Our Own People’
Heres a snippet of the comments going on there:
Some simple facts:
Submitted by malcolmkyle on Wed, 02/15/2012 – 8:04am.
* Colombia, Peru, Mexico or Afghanistan with their coca leaves, marijuana buds or poppy sap are not igniting temptation in the minds of our weak, innocent citizens. These countries are duly responding to the enormous demand that comes from within our own borders. Invading or destroying these countries, thus creating more hate, violence, instability, injustice and corruption, will not fix our problem.
* A rather large majority of people will always feel the need to use drugs such as heroin, opium, nicotine, amphetamines, alcohol, sugar, or caffeine.
* The massive majority of adults who use drugs do so recreationally – getting high at the weekend then up for work on a Monday morning.
* Apart from the huge percentage of people addicted to both sugar and caffeine, a small minority of adults (nearly 5%) will always experience the use of drugs as problematic. – approx. 3% are dependent on alcohol and approx. 1.5% are dependent on other drugs such as methamphetamine, cocaine, heroine etc.
* Just as it was impossible to prevent alcohol from being produced and used in the U.S. in the 1920s, so too, it is equally impossible to prevent any of the aforementioned drugs from being produced, distributed and widely used by those who desire to do so.
* Prohibition kills more people and ruins more lives than the drugs it prohibits.
* Prescription drugs kill over 200,000 Americans every year– even when taken as directed and not abused.
* Due to Prohibition (historically proven to be an utter failure at every level), the availability of most of these mood-altering drugs has become so universal and unfettered that in any city of the civilized world, any one of us would be able to procure practically any drug we wish within an hour.
* Throughout history, the prohibition of any mind-altering substance has always exploded usage rates, overcrowded jails, fueled organized crime, created rampant corruption of law-enforcement – even whole governments, while inducing an incalculable amount of suffering and death.
* Apart from the fact that the DEA is the de facto enforcement wing of the pharmaceutical industry, the involvement of the CIA in running Heroin from Vietnam, Southeast Asia and Afghanistan and Cocaine from Central America has been well documented by the 1989 Kerry Committee report, academic researchers Alfred McCoy and Peter Dale Scott, and the late journalist Gary Webb.
* It’s not even possible to keep drugs out of prisons, but prohibitionists wish to waste trillions of dollars in an utterly futile attempt to keep them off our streets.
* The United States jails a larger percentage of its own citizens than any other country in the world, including those run by the worst totalitarian regimes, yet it has far higher use/addiction rates than most other countries.
* Prohibition is the “Goose that laid the golden egg” and the lifeblood of terrorists as well as drug cartels. Both the Taliban and the terrorists of al Qaeda derive their main income from the prohibition-inflated value of the opium poppy. An estimated 44 % of the heroin produced in Afghanistan, with an estimated annual destination value of US $ 27 Billion, transits through Pakistan. Prohibition has essentially destroyed Pakistan’s legal economy and social fabric. – We may be about to witness the planet’s first civil war in a nation with nuclear capabilities. – Kindly Google: ‘A GLOBAL OVERVIEW OF NARCOTICS-FUNDED TERRORIST GROUPS’ Only those opposed, or willing to ignore these facts, want things the way they are.
* The future depends on whether or not enough of us are willing to take a long look at the tragic results of prohibition. If we continue to skirt the primary issue while refusing to address the root problem then we can expect no other result than a worsening of the current dire situation. – Good intentions, wishful thinking and pseudoscience are no match for the immutable realities of human nature.
Never have so many been endangered and impoverished by so few so quickly!
* The urge to save humanity is almost always a false-face for the urge to rule it. – H. L. Mencken (1880-1956) American editor, essayist and philologist.
⇒ Thank you Arianna
Submitted by Cool Arrow on Mon, 02/13/2012 – 4:45pm.
On the contrary, Arianna, Whitney seems to have lived exactly the life of legalized drugs.
Exactly. Essentially, drugs
Submitted by robert108 on Mon, 02/13/2012 – 5:22pm.
Exactly. Essentially, drugs are as if they were legal in the entertainment industry and the music business. If you want to see what would happen to the general population under drug legalization, just look at those two industries.
Last time I checked these industries were both very successful!
Submitted by malcolmkyle on Wed, 02/15/2012 – 8:11am.
You Prohibitionists dance hand in hand with every possible type of criminal one can imagine.
An unholy alliance of ignorance, greed and hate which works to destroy all our hard fought freedoms, wealth and security.
We will always have adults who are too immature to responsibly deal with tobacco alcohol, heroin amphetamines, cocaine, various prescription drugs and even food. Our answer to them should always be: “Get a Nanny, and stop turning the government into one for the rest of us!”
Nobody wants to see an end to prohibition because they want to use drugs. They wish to see proper legalized regulation because they are witnessing, on a daily basis, the dangers and futility of prohibition. ‘Legalized Regulation’ won’t be the complete answer to all our drug problems, but it’ll greatly ameliorate the crime and violence on our streets, and only then can we provide effective education and treatment.
The whole nonsense of ‘a disaster will happen if we end prohibition’ sentiment sums up the delusional ‘chicken little’ stance of those who foolishly insist on continuing down this blind alley. As if a disaster isn’t already happening. As if prohibition has ever worked.
To support prohibition is such a strange mind-set. In fact, It’s outrageous insanity! –Literally not one prohibitionist argument survives scrutiny. Not one!
The only people that believe prohibition is working are the ones making a living by enforcing laws in it’s name, and those amassing huge fortunes on the black market profits. This situation is wholly unsustainable, and as history has shown us, conditions will continue to deteriorate until we finally, just like our forefathers, see sense and revert back to tried and tested methods of regulation. None of these substances, legal or illegal, are ever going to go away, but we CAN decide to implement policies that do far more good than harm.
During alcohol prohibition in the 1920s, all profits went to enrich thugs and criminals. Young men died every day on inner-city streets while battling over turf. A fortune was wasted on enforcement that could have gone on treatment. On top of the budget-busting prosecution and incarceration costs, billions in taxes were lost. Finally the economy collapsed. Sound familiar?
So should the safety and freedom of the rest of us be compromised because of the few who cannot control themselves?
Many of us no longer think it should!
If a vast majority of the public were aware of these facts, the drug war( and much more) would be over in a hurry. Thats the reason it’s not. TPTB depend on ignorance and poor information to continue their little Empire games.
Time to put an end to it all. Get the information out there, inform your self, inform those around you.
The owner of this blog does not advocate violence in any manner. Any allusions to this course of action by any user or commenter is not the responsibility nor the opinion of the administrator.
All posts are opinions meant to foster comment, reporting, teaching & study under the “fair use doctrine” in Sec. 107 of U.S. Code Title 17. No statement of fact is made or should be implied. Ads appearing on this blog are solely the product of the advertiser and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of BuehlahMan’s Revolt or WordPress.com
Going To California… or Colorado… or Michigan… or Missouri… or Montana… or Nebraska… or Oregon… or Washington
It should be Mississippi and then we could have the Amsterdam of the US in my home state, which would make it the Number 1 Vacation Spot in the USA. However, I admit that Oregon is one of my favorite places in the US to visit. So, let’s see which state implements this first and then I’ll decide. I doubt it will be Michigan…
Sanity raises its beautiful head.
Spent my days with a woman unkind, Smoked my stuff and drank all my wine.
Did I rub you the wrong way or stroke you just right? Let me know below in the comments section or Email me at buelahman {AT} g m a i l {DOT} com
If for some reason you actually liked this post, click the “Like” button below. If you feel like someone else needs to see this (or you just want to ruin someone’s day), click the Share Button at the bottom of the post and heap this upon some undeserving soul. And as sad as this thought may be, it may be remotely possible that us rednecks here at The Revolt please you enough (or more than likely, you are just a glutton for punishment??), that you feel an overwhelming desire to subscribe via the Email subscription and/or RSS Feed buttons found on the upper right hand corner of this page (may the Lord have mercy on your soul).
All posts are opinions meant to foster comment, reporting, teaching & study under the “fair use doctrine” in Sec. 107 of U.S. Code Title 17. No statement of fact is made or should be implied. Ads appearing on this blog are solely the product of the advertiser and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of BuehlahMan’s Revolt or WordPress.com
B’Man’s Marijuana Watch: The Myth Is A Lie
Image via Wikipedia
I recently wrote that I am living proof that the myth is a lie:
‘Stoner Stupid’ Myth Goes Up In Smoke
July 27th, 2011 By: Paul Armentano, NORML Deputy Director
…”Therefore, the adverse impacts of cannabis use on cognitive functions either appear to be related to pre-existing factors or are reversible in this community cohort even after potentially extended periods of use.”
I spent a good part of my life using cannabis for a variety of reasons, mainly as a calming sedative, but also as a pain reliever and migraine headache killer. I also found out early on that it helped me concentrate and I actually did extremely well in college (having been on the President’s List every semester but one and then was on the Dean’s List). This means I held a 4.0 average virtually the entire time I was in college and I used every day, several times a day.
As with anything deemed healthy and could be used as a healing agent for a mass of humanity, the government knows this and will protect its Corporate Controllers (in this case, Big Meds
and Big Prison) by continuing the lies and assault against this miracle drug and its obviously more intelligent users. This is evident by the fact that our government has taken the steps to patent some of the constituents found within. Why would they do this if they didn’t see the benefits? But keep researching. Keep believing your own experiences and for the life of me, don’t accept advice from people who have never even tried the stuff, yet will tell you how bad it is for you.
But even more importantly, be able to discern those that are paid to shill for these maniacs that profit from keeping us sick and dying. If someone tells you they have used and experienced all sorts of adverse reactions, etc, consider the source and determine if they are real. Sure, I have known people who didn’t “like” the feeling they got from the stuff. Yes, I have known people who actually had a bad experience with it and were scared (perhaps by using too much of quality grade). None of this can take away from the fact that this is a medicine. Perhaps the world’s greatest medicine. As with many medicines, it is not always the best thing for every person. And many manufactured medicines, btw, have adverse affects, including death, which CAN NOT be attributed to cannabis.
However, when I compare those people that I know used/still use to those who claim they had some sort of problem or adverse situation, the numbers are really incomparable. The vast majority of folks I ever knew, enjoyed it and used it for its intended purpose with no issues whatsoever.
The point of this post is to say that we, AGAIN, have found that they have been lying to us our entire lives about this stuff. Its time we change this one aspect of our tainted existence as a nation and get rid of this bogus War on Drugs.
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All posts are opinions meant to foster comment, reporting, teaching & study under the “fair use doctrine” in Sec. 107 of U.S. Code Title 17. No statement of fact is made or should be implied. Ads appearing on this blog are solely the product of the advertiser and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of BuehlahMan’s Revolt or WordPress.com
WTF Thursday: The Danger of Weed Vs The Danger of Booze
Cate from The Phlebotomist shared the following graphic and a link to her site (well worth the visit).
I know from vast personal experience (7 DUI charges before 1986) that alcohol is far more debilitating than weed when driving (or doing ANYTHING else, for that matter). I won’t get into tall the details of my DUI’s, but suffice it to say that it makes me far more careless and unable to drive in a safe method.
Compare that to weed and the thousands of miles I have traveled under that influence and not only do I not have a DUI for it, I have not had an accident in many years because it ENHANCES my driving abilities. This isn’t a dream or a wish… it is imperative fact proven after years and many hundreds of thousands of miles of driving. When someone tells you that it limits or hinders your response times, you are being fed a line of heavy duty shit.
There simply is NO comparison in the effects of these two substances. Period. If you have tried it, you know what I say is true.
Now, I am not here telling you to get high and drive. I am telling you that in my case, the lies are obvious. It is possible that I am some sort of exceptional person who handles the substance differently than every other human on earth (Kelso believes that certain ethnic backgrounds can lead a person to be able to tolerate the stuff or not). I am not convinced, but I won’t argue. He claims that cocaine is metabolized differently in S Americans than N Americans and that the “war on drugs” is about fighting something that many S Americans have no addictive issues with.
IF this is true, then it only stands to reason that THC may act differently, as well.
I don’t know, so I can only speak for myself and the many others I know who partake. Of all the friends I have who partake (or once did), I cannot find a single one that agrees that weed is as bad as alcohol in effect. (There is one caveat to this statement, I know of a couple of folks who have since become extremely religious who won’t make the claim about it being as bad as alcohol, but suggest that ANY mind-altering substance is a sin, so they won’t use. To this, I say, “To each his own”. But, do not, even for a second, think that you can debate me on this subject with that as your sole informational source. (Do so at your verbal-spanking peril)
The media puts a quick bag over the head of ugly news (anything that goes against the government controlled meme), hoping to keep the truth from an ever-increasingly learned public. But the truth of the matter is that marijuana is one of the MOST-Studied substances on the face of the earth. Paul Armentano, NORML‘s Deputy Director, explains that even as the talking heads and other government asswipes call for more investigations and study into this plant, there is ample evidence to disprove nearly each and every bogus “war on drugs” scare tactic claims there are.
I have mentioned the FACT that marijuana inhibits and KILLS cancer cell growth in a variety of cancers (see here, here and here, as just a few examples). But Paul points out that all the talking heads up in arms about more research conveniently disregard all the information and studies already done. Its as if as long as the news doesn’t fit the lie, do not repeat it and call for even more studies in hopes of finding one that will agree with the lie those who profit from the war on drugs gain from.
For example, researchers at the State University of New York (SUNY), Upstate Medical University in Syracuse published data in the June issue of the journal Pharmacology concluding that the administration of the plant cannabinoids delta-8-THC and delta-9-THC halted cellular respiration and tumor growth in human oral cancer cells. Specifically, investigators reported that cannabinoids were a “potent inhibitor” of Tu183 human cancer cells, a notoriously difficult to treat type of oral cancer.
Of course, this is hardly the first time that pot’s compounds have been demonstrated to possess anti-cancer properties. As has been widely reported here and elsewhere, US government researchers were first aware of this finding over 35 years ago, and today there exist published scientific studies demonstrating that cannabinoids can inhibit the proliferation of a wide range of cancers — including brain cancer, prostate cancer, breast cancer, lung cancer, skin cancer, pancreatic cancer, biliary tract cancer, and lymphoma. Nonetheless, abstract prohibitionist concerns regarding marijuana’s supposed cancer risk continue to dominate the headlines while actual scientific studies debunking these allegations tend to go unnoticed.
Similarly, preclinical data published online last week in the journal Cell Communication and Signaling reported that the administration of the non-psychoactive cannabinoid cannabidiol (CBD) increases adult neurogenesis (the active production of new neurons) in laboratory animals. Authors speculated that cannabis’ pro-neurogenic effects may explain why the plant appears to be useful in the treatment of certain neurodegenerative disorders like Alzheimer’s disease or ALS.
As I wrote last week, to date there are now over 20,000 published studies or reviews in the scientific literature pertaining to marijuana and its active compounds — making marijuana the most studied plant on Earth. But what’s the point in further research if nobody even bothers to pay attention to the research that’s already been done?
