So, just to recap: In Republican World…

            Blowing up the U.S. economy is preferable to raising taxes a little bit on the richest Americans to help stabilize the U.S. economy.

                      

  Spending taxpayer money to help the poor and elderly is bad, but spending taxpayer money on subsidies for mega-profitable industries that don’t need them is good.

                        "All men are equated equal" means all men. Except the gay ones.

                        "Our #1 priority is jobs jobs jobs" means "Our #1 priority is anything but jobs jobs jobs."

                        The fact that voter fraud is not a problem means voter fraud is a huge problem.

                      

  The fact that climate change and oil dependence are huge problems means climate change and oil dependence are not problems.

                        George Bush wasn't president for eight years---we went straight from America-destroyer Bill Clinton to America-destroyer Barack Obama.

                       

If Republicans in the House  and Senate vote to end Medicare in favor of health care by coupons, and it turns out to be a blunder of epic proportions, it never happened.

                        Rupert Murdoch is the de facto Minister of Information

        Talk of secession is taken seriously.

                        Everything you need to know about science is in the Bible.

                        Suffering builds character, which is why we need more of it.

                        The prime directive is the destruction of one citizen---the guy in the White House---even if it comes at the expense of the other 311,747,129 citizens.

 

We Could Learn From this Kid

The Tipping Over Point

The writer and social critic, Malcolm Gladwell, defines the ‘Tipping Point’ as the moment of critical mass, the threshold, the boiling point; The point at which the buildup of minor changes or incidents reaches a level that triggers a more significant change or makes someone do something they had formerly resisted. Another way of saying it would be that point in time and space when everything changes and there’s no turning back.

Everyday there’s more encouraging headlines appearing in newspapers and on the Web from California to Maine supporting Medical Marijuana legislation suggesting the tide is turning. Even when the cynics call Medical Marijuana a joke and the real goal of this smokescreen movement is legalization of pot. There are Medi-jane supporters with valid and logical arguments to counter-balance any archaic rhetoric that the anti-pot forces continue to misinform with.

New Jersey passed one of the most constrictive Medical Marijuana rights and benefits program on the books so far. The state with a very conservative governor has medical marijuana. Why? Because the people wanted it.

 It does seem like Time is marching on, but when is it gonna get there?

We’re zeroing in on something but when is the Tipping Point going to kick in fully regarding Medical Marijuana?

What possible signs do we need to see before we believe that it works!

Here are some small recent events that may prove someday to have influenced the way we think, tipping the scales our way towards a bigger picture…

1)    Okay, this guy never ever got high and he’s for Medical Marijuana!

June 12^th-How much straighter do they have to come?

Utah Attorney General Shurtleff approves of medical marijuana after battling cancer. Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff said he would support the legalization of medical marijuana after experiencing months of intensive cancer treatment. Shurtleff said never used marijuana himself, but had talked to other patients who had traveled out-of-state to receive marijuana treatment.

2)    Not innocent enough. Okay, as they say, from the mouth of babes…

June 26^th- Miss America and MM

During the question-and-answer part of the competition, Miss California was asked about her perspective on the medicinal cannabis.

           "Well, I understand why that question would be asked, especially with today's economy, but I also understand that medical marijuana is very important to help those who need it medically," she said. "I'm not sure if it should be legalized, if it would really affect, with the drug war. I mean, it's abused today, unfortunately, so that's the only reason why I would kind of be a little bit against it, but medically it's OK."

When’s the last time you had the crown on the line and you spoke the truth?

I actually can understand why someone could dismiss a beauty queen and a cancer patient as being not scientific enough. They’re just regular people.

3)    What about Big Business. They have scientists? They have economists? They understand the world? Don’t they?

June 13^th-Good Weeds, Bad Weeds

High Hopes at Miracle-Gro In Medical Marijuana Field

Wall Street Journal On-line

          Scotts Miracle-Gro Co. has long sold weed killer. Now, it's hoping to help

people grow killer weed. In an unlikely move for the head of a major company, Scotts Chief Executive Jim Hagedorn said he is exploring targeting medical marijuana as well as other niches to help boost sales at his lawn and garden company.

"I want to target the pot market," Mr. Hagedorn said in an interview.

"There's no good reason we haven't."

4)    We’ve heard from the People, Big Business, and now from across the aisle comes…

          Ron Paul, Barney Frank to jointly offer bill to end war on weed

June 22, 2011 LA Times

Congressmen Ron Paul, Barney Frank and others will introduce legislature Thursday that aims to end a major part of the war on drugs -- namely the battle against marijuana.

Reps. Paul (R-Texas) and Frank (D-Mass.), though technically on opposite sides of the aisle, have often spoken out against the war on drugs and will propose a bill "tomorrow ending the federal war on marijuana and letting states legalize, regulate, tax, and control marijuana without federal interference," according to a statement from the Marijuana Policy Project via Reason.

The bill would allow the individual states to decide how they want to deal with pot.

The legislation, co-sponsored by Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.), Rep. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.), Rep. Jared Polis (D-Colo.), and Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Oakland), is the first of its kind to be proposed in Congress that would end the 73-year-old federal marijuana prohibition that began with the Marijuana Tax Act of 1937.

          These four events that just transpired in the last month couldn’t be more current, more ‘now.’ What is it going to take in order for that cosmic plate to tilt to our side? And stay that way!

          Entrepreneurs and forward thinkers are testing the waters of the Medical Marijuana Industry with venture capitalists abroad throwing dollars into edible research think-tanks and other esoteric ganja-related enterprises. 

          Politicians and law enforcement from all walks and talks of life are coming forward, decrying that the time is now to lose the campaigns that have never worked and to embrace a new way of thinking. To challenge the uncommon wisdom and to end the wars on law abiding citizens who because they ingest a specific weed, they could have their lives ruin because we, as a nation and a society refuse to change.

          Sixteen states support Medical Marijuana. Every poll taken shows public support for Medical Marijuana. GW Pharma (Weed) and Novartis (Ritalin, Excedrin) have become partners in Sativex (Medical Marijuana spray) licensing pact overseas and now, in America.

"My professional view of cannabis as a substance is that it appears to be a remarkably safe substance in comparison to most medicines prescribed today. The more I learn about this plant the more fascinated I become. It has through its various constituents multiple effects of therapeutic interest, many of which are now being validated by the enormous growth in basic cannabinoid research." - Dr Geoffrey Guy, Chairman of GW Pharmaceuticals.

What is it about marijuana that makes us afraid to go forward and embrace a new safer tomorrow? Pharmaceutical giants are moving forward with patents and marketing. You would think that the data from research geeks would be refutable, they’re the same people who give us our aspirin, for gosh sakes.

The data’s coming in like a Haboob through Phoenix. Unstoppable. Marijuana has applications that can help certain people. That’s it. It can’t be changed. Marijuana does some good. It’s proven.

You can’t go backwards with that. Only thing you can do is not open your eyes to what’s in front of them.

The Tea Party started sometime after November 4, 2008 when an angry gaggle of white people said, “Enough!” and later, “They elected who?”

Today, they have a Republican candidate running for president.

Why aren’t we coming together as a nation over this issue when perspectives as different as Miss America to the Mormon Attorney General of Utah support Medical Marijuana? When law enforcement officials and Ex-President Jimmy Carter come forward to say the War on Drugs not only doesn’t work, it’s unwinnable. A waste of money.

Speaking of money. When Wall Street, Main Street and Home Depot all say the time is right to build the future fields of dreams of medical marijuana that only Weed-Gro can protect. What more do we need to hear? Do we need Nancy Reagan in her Chanel housecoat to come forward to say she was wrong? Would that be the final straw? Would that be our national Tipping Point? To have someone other than ourselves say it is okay for us to have this weed? Mommy, please say its okay because in 1937, someone said it was bad.

Right now President Obama has alienated the Ganja Nation with his reversal on leaving the Medical Marijuana community alone. More and more his obtrusive agenda is forcing the hand of Medical Marijuana to take a stand, one way or another in various localities. Howard Zinn said you can’t be neutral on a moving train.

Opinion is sliding to the side where the weed grows green and high. Mendocino County is aggressively constructing a platform that is workable for growers and law enforcement alike. Not perfect, but a start.

Growers are paying taxes in exchange for their right to grow medical marijuana. They pay just like anyone else.

The Tipping Point is already here. Embrace it.

Pot Dogs

Anyone’s who has spent any time behind the Redwood Curtain knows that dogs are a grower’s best friend. Most farmers I know have at least one dog, if not more. When you live in an isolated community cultivating the number one cash crop in the world, it pays to have a security system that you can rely on and for the most part, that can scare away any unwanted guest without firing off…a mean word. Dogs are an invaluable source of protection in lieu of setting up a 50 caliber fox-hole.

Also for the bachelor-farmer, a dog plays therapist, friend and ally when all around you seems hopeless. There’s a saying in Mendocino: If you’re coming to Mendo for a vacation, bring a hat. If you’re coming to Mendo to live, bring a woman. There’s about one woman for every ten thousand guys. You could say, pets keep things sane up there.

For many a walk at the end of the day to check out your babies reaching for the sky with your pooch at your side relieves many a fearful moments.

Without a dog or dogs, life not only becomes harder for you, but without an early advance warning system, the gentleman farmer who is probably already a little stressed being either a partial-survivalist who believes its only a matter of time before the world ends or maybe is a conspiracy freak who’s waits everyday for the arrival of Black Helicopters. These are the types that may get a little skittish and may be apt to pull a trigger at dark shadows if Lassie’s not on the front porch barking hysterically to let him know something out there.

Plus there are bears, cougars and mountain lions, and many other four-legged creepy-crawlers that might mosey by a cabin late at night startling the inhabitants who, on their own without a pooch for protection might send out a few warning shots. With a dog present, the iterant four-legged scavenger just keeps on walking. Just like the other lazy opportunists do in the big city.

Dogs are more than animals in the country. They’re friends, family, and confidants that never lie or betray your words to anyone else. And they hardly ever talk back.

Last year, I wrote in my blog about dogs being routinely shot and killed by police officers when approaching a possible drug house. In my piece dated May 17, ‘More on the War on Drugs, Pt. 109,’ I wrote about the Missouri State police killing three dogs during a botched raid when invading the wrong house by mistake. Being a cop is hard and they never know what they’re getting into. But shooting dogs as part of a protocol is wrong, especially when said bouquet of Whoopsy-daisies is caught on tape.

My friend the gifted writer, Kym Kemp, among a million other things, writes about Humboldt County in her blog, ‘The Red-headed Blackbelt.’ In her column dated, June 30^th, 2011, she wrote about two dogs that were stolen out of the back of a pick-up. At first this sounded like a Rodney Dangerfield joke. “Hey, I tell what bad luck I have. I bought two guard dogs and someone stole them.” Boom! Laughter.

Then I thought, how do you steal dogs without the dogs barking and yelping and snarling? I thought how bummed I be if someone took my cat. I just couldn’t imagine a person doing that to someone else. Then when you factor in that it happen in a small town like Garberville or the like? I wonder how something like that could transpire, particularly in towns that are so animal-friendly and where you depend on your dogs for so much.

That I heard about this from a friend in Mendo…

For years there has been horror stories of Pot Dogs that have been abused in order to protect large grows. Stories of dog’s vocal cords being slashed so there is no warning bark for intruders. The owners feed their canines gunpowder to make them more aggressive and mean. Or what happens on a daily basis, dogs are being tethered and chain to grows and gardens with some food and water in a bucket, unless something happens to that like the wind or the dogs tipping the sustenance over.

Then at the end of the growing season, the dogs are either shot or left to roam the forest in feral packs. These are some of the abuses that we know of.

Barbara Shults, R.N., Founder and Director of the non-profit North Coast Animal Welfare Advocacy Center and host of the radio program Animal Advocate on Northern California Emerald Triangle-based KMUD has started a campaign – Not a Pot Dog, to raise awareness of the cruelty and abuse entailed.

          Ms. Shults tell us what got her started with the Pot Dogs issue. “I’ve been involved with animal welfare issues for over thirteen years now. About eighteen months ago, I found a severely abused dog roaming the neighborhood. It was a dog well known to the community for being tethered for years without shelter on a two foot rope at an outdoor ‘grow’. I took it to our local animal shelter and in thanks; the Humboldt County District Attorney Paul Gallegos is prosecuting me for theft. A man who stated publicly in a D.A. debate in 2010 that it was okay to leave a dog tethered, in violation of state law, to a ‘grow’ 24/7 as long as it had food and water.”

          That’s right. For her efforts, Ms. Shults, was tried and convicted by D.A. Paul Gallegos after a jury trial, by all accounts, that was filled with perjured statements and misleading evidence, found her guilty of Petty Theft misdemeanor.

          At press time, the 13 year- old dog remains in the same location with the same owner and with pounds of dog food and 5 gallons of water by its side, right back in the same place, vulnerable and alone.

          As stated by the noted Civil Rights & Criminal Law attorney Greg Allen, “Basically what the D.A. has said is that anyone who is concerned enough to take a dog to the Humboldt County Animal Shelter can be prosecuted."

          I spoke to some of many of my grower friends about this issue, none of them would go on record with their quotes but they basically said, “If a cop shot my dog, let’s just say, I’m ready to go to prison for what I would have to do.” Another farmer stated that anyone who steals another person’s animal up here, “We’ll settle that score ourselves. The Sheriff’s Department and Animal Abuse won’t have to get involved.”

          From my research and interviews that I’ve done in the last few months, the summer of 2011 is going to get hot up there behind the Redwood Curtain. Homeland Security and the DEA have set-up shop in the Redwoods. Tempers and the hostility between growers and the law enforcement are already piqued. Mendocino Sheriff Tom Allman is courageously trying to change to the environment with his Zip-tie and Mendo’s 9.31 permitted programs.

          We’re at the crossroads of marijuana, medical and recreational. Some call it a movement, while others call it an industry. Bottom line, it is up to us to take care of our own. We’re close to pointing the finger where cartels are growing Titanic-like gardens. People know what’s going. And if you didn’t, you know now.

          It is up to us to stop the negative aspects of marijuana before the corrupt Powers-That-Be turn ourselves against each other. Let’s police ourselves so the Man doesn’t have to.

          When so much is at stake, we, the people need to stop animal abuse. Not only is it a travesty to the animals, which is foremost and paramount, but there is a powder keg that could explode if a man’s animal was hurt, rightly or wrongly.

          Trust me, there’s a couple of guys I’ve met that if one of their dogs were shot or stolen, I wouldn’t want to be around when that guy found the perpetrator, even if that perp’s wearing a uniform or not.

          At press time, Ms. Shults is raising funds for an appeal against this serious miscarriage of justice. You can donate to the North Coast Animal Welfare Advocacy Center, a 501(c) tax exempt organization or donate directly to the legal fund set up by Christine Garcia, Esq., at //www.animalattorney.com/getactive.html. The amount needed for the appeal is $5,000.00.

Top Eleven Reasons America Doesn’t Want Marijuana Legal

11. Wars make money for a few and kill the rest…

The War on Drugs makes money for Cartels, Police, The Government, Prisons, politicians, crooks, and all those other people we can’t see like the Glad Bag people and the Grow-light industry. This hundred-year revenue stream could dry up if Americans couldn’t be arrested for a drug that has been proven to be less destructive than whole milk.

10. Doesn’t Matter What We Do?

Barney Frank and Ron Paul cross the aisle for bi-huggable confabulous (I know, but let me have it) bill supporting the legalization of Marijuana. Lamar Smith (R-Tx, surprise!) drinking buddy of the alcoholic lobbyists everywhere, will single-handily try to stop the demon weed so that beer, wine and booze will never have to suffer like it did for those thirteen long years almost a hundred years ago. Lamar, according to Opensecrets.com, makes around 20 grand a year to ensure that the only bud that the American kids puts to their lips, has an Anheuser-Busch label on it.

9. Drinking went up during prohibition.

I know who cares, but apparently when you can’t get something, you want it more. Per-capita consumption of alcohol had been declining in the U.S. right before Prohibition started. After alcohol consumption in the U.S. hit an all-time low during the depression of 1921, it actually began to increase starting in 1922. Especially alarming is economist Mark Thorton’s research finding that the “homicide rate increased from 6 per 100,000 population in the pre-Prohibition period to nearly 10 per 100,000 in 1933.”

8. In 1937, the guy who started this whole fiasco said…

“No one knows, when he places a marijuana cigarette to his lips, whether he will become a philosopher, a joyous reveler in a musical heaven, a mad insensate, a calm philosopher, or a murderer.” (Harry Anslinger)

And people still believe this…Let me help you out America. You get mellow when you smoke. Whatever was troubling you hurts less now. Harry was right about it making music and stories better, but murderers and insensate? I haven’t insensate since high school. Someone should tell me what insensate means.

7. Where are the doctors? The AMA?

When all the false information was produced to scare America into prohibition against Marijuana in 1937, not one doctor testified before the congressional hearings. All evidence was contrived by a small clique of an American Cartel that wanted to do away with industrial hemp. Where are the doctors now? They’re trying to find a way to market Marijuana so it profits just the Pharmaceutical companies and the doctors who play ball with a health-care industry that is for profit, not for compassion.

6. We do not want to tarnish the memory of Richard Nixon.

The president that had to step down because he lied to America, created a vast network of white, short-sleeved worker bees who hated Marijuana called the Drug Enforcement Administration. As of 2009, the DEA has a budget around 2.6 BILLION with 83 offices, world-wide. For forty years this agency has destroyed lives and families, making criminals out of other-wise law-abiding citizens. Does it work? No! Can we stop it? Not unless we want to rethink our whole, I-Love-Dick-Nixon-and-all-he-stands-for attitude. After Regan, secretively, Nixon is the Right’s favorite son.

5. Prisons, Prisons, Prisons!

In a September 2008 report, the Marijuana Policy Project found that between 1995 and 2008 nearly 9.5 million individuals had been arrested due to connections with marijuana (whether it is cultivation, possession, or distribution). 872,720 marijuana-related arrests occurred in 2007, an all-time record totaling more arrests than those for all violent crimes combined.  This means, on average, that one person is arrested on marijuana charges every 36 seconds. Cultivating as little as one marijuana plant is a federal felony. Several states have interjected and slightly decriminalized certain aspects of marijuana policy, but the majority of U.S. states continue to enforce federal marijuana laws.

            It doesn’t matter that Arizona State Senator Russell Pearce was working with the FOR-PROFIT prison industry, Corrections Corporation of America, when composing the Anti-immigration bill that Arizona put into law. The bill was about putting butts in the beds and all Russell and his friends were doing was to make sure that before they build those big new prisons, Sheriff Joe and others would make sure they came. But please, only your browns and blacks.

            Every year as pro-medical marijuana legislation and other progressive measures are trying to be reached throughout the country, along with the liquor lobby, the Correctional Officers unions are the major contributors to squashing any pro-pot laws.

Why? Cause it ain’t any good for business.

4. Hemp.

Sorry but the silent sister of Weed is always at the dance but hardly ever asked to dance. There is so much money to be SAVED with Hemp, meaning,  there are so many fearful industries that could lose money if there was a cheap alternative available: they’re scared shitless.

A fascinating exploration into the possibilities of hemp can be seen in two issues of Popular Mechanics in 1938 and 1941. An interesting side note is that these issues, which contain extensive praise for the possibilities of hemp production, were written after cannabis was already criminalized in 1937 with The Marihuana Tax Act. It’s hard to believe that even after a year of cannabis being outlawed in America; Popular Mechanics was still praising the value of hemp. Popular Mechanics confidently proclaims “hemp will produce every grade of paper and government figures estimate that 10,000 acres devoted to hemp will produce as much paper as 40,000 acres of average pulp land.

Hemp is the standard fiber of the world. It has great tensile strength and durability. It is used to produce more than 5,000 textile products, ranging from rope to fine laces, and the woody “hurds” remaining after the fiber has been removed contain more than 77 percent cellulose, which can be used to produce more than 25,000 products, ranging from dynamite to Cellophane.

3. Too many Americans still have access to Marijuana.

Even though I am an activists fighting for the right for patients to get the medication they need, with that being said, I still know about 40, 000 people growing it. It is America’s number one cash crop. Someone’s got to be growing it. This pisses off the Powers That Be. Until they can figure out how to stop unregulated growers (in their eyes) from trying to do their thing, Big Money, Big Pharma won’t rest. It’s never been about the Weed, it’s about Freedom.

2. Big Pharma wants to own Marijuana.

A study over five years old from Mohamed Ben Amar in the Journal of Ethnopharmacology researched the therapeutic effects of cannabinoids,(CBD’s) in marijuana. The study monitored the contact cannabinoids had on patients in several countries with diseases and health problems such as spinal cord injuries, Parkinson’s disease, Multiple sclerosis, and epilepsy, and more. In this study, Amar concluded:

[I]t [is] possible to affirm that cannabinoids exhibit an interesting therapeutic potential as stopping vomiting and nausea, an appetite stimulant in debilitating diseases (cancer and AIDS), analgesics, as well as in the treatment of multiple sclerosis, spinal cord injuries, Tourette’s syndrome, epilepsy and glaucoma.

It works and they know it!

1. The chief reason Marijuana is still illegal in this country?

Because Big Pharma, even with all their money, scientists and resources, still can’t figure out how to grow the Diggity-Dank like those stoners do!