Californnia Medical Marijuana… Not all are so lucky!

As emotions over medical marijuana and the locations, and numbers of the dispensaries allowed heats up in every city across the state of California… There is still no greater place to live. In one afternoon a properly documented marijuana patients can visit a marijuana doctor, be evaluated, and with 30 min be on his or her way looking for their new favorite medical cannabis club. Of which there are more than a few to choose from.

Medical Cannabis: Edibles vs. Inhalation – Why is it so different?

Cannabis experts now discourage smoking the plant as the only real downside to its use is the damage of the smoke to the lining of your lungs. Both methods of inhalation put the active compounds in cannabis directly into your bloodstream, which carries them to your brain where they attach to receptors and cause the well known effects.

You can also eat cannabis in the form of what is called edibles: cookies, brownies, and other food products. When you ingest cannabis, it goes into your intestines, then passes through your liver. Your liver processes THC into a by product called 11-hydroxy-THC, which then travels to the bloodstream and then to your brain.

Actually, hemp, and hemp seed in particular, has been used as a highly nutritious food source for thousands of years. Food source hemp comes from the plant Cannabis, the same plant species as marijuana. Hemp is used in making clothing, is a premium source for paper products. The finished product can be worn, written on, and you can eat it. Hemp is a high quality source of protein.

Edible hemp comes from a special variety of cannabis that contains only small trace amounts of the chemical THC (tetrahydrocannabinol) that causes marijuana's intoxicating effects. So don't need to worry about it giving you a high any more than a poppy seed muffin will. Poppy seeds contain trace amounts of opiates.

The Chinese have been cultivating hemp as a high quality and nutritional, food source for more than 6,000 years. Hemp seeds were used as food even before soy foods. The seed eventually found its way to Europe and India. In India it's called “bhang,” and the dried leaves are used to treat colds, fevers, diarrhea and used in religious ceremonies. Hemp seed is high in quality protein, essential amino acids, vitamin E, iron, magnesium, manganese, potassium, and calcium. Hemp seed tastes like pine nuts or sunflower seeds. A tablespoon of hemp seed contains about three grams of protein, no cholesterol, one gram of fiber, only fifty-six calories, four grams of omega-6 and some omega-3 essential fatty acids.

Five decades of scientific research have shown that insufficient essential fatty acids raise the risk of heart disease, diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, and skin conditions like eczema and psoriasis. Essential fatty acids, in a healthful balance, affect brain function, immune system responses, and infant development. Most people who eat the Standard American Diet (SAD) consume a highly disproportionate amount of Omega-6s, usually 11 to 30 times more omega-6s than omega-3s. Optimum balance is between 3 to 1 and 6 to 1, depending on age and sex.

Omega-3 EFA's help reduce inflammation and omega-6s increase it. Both are essential for proper immune system response. When there are too many omega-6s, we're more likely to develop diseases which are related to inflammation, like heart disease and rheumatoid arthritis. The main culprit is baked goods and highly processed foods that are made with refined vegetable oils, particularly hydrogenated and partially hydrogenated oils.

Medical Cannabis and Insomnia

Medical marijuana patients usually find that sleep is a wonderful benefit of cannabis. Many chronic pain patients experience insomnia due to their pain and find excellent relief and sleep when using cannabis.

In my life I have had firsthand experience with a number of psychoactive substances and for better or worse they truly are what you make of them. Every few years the news will cover a story of a teenager who jumps off a building under the influence of a psychoactive drug. For the purposes of this article I am only referring to the more powerful drugs in phenethylamine and tryptamine families and not the more common drugs such as marijuana, nicotine, and caffeine.

Drugs have a certain negative stigma today that did not exist as recently as a few hundred years ago and because of this those who use them are often lumped together and labeled drug addicts. Like automobiles, all drugs are not created equal and it's unfortunate that society today has lumped phenethylamine's and tryptamine's into the same categories as harmful and addicting drugs such as cocaine, heroin, and methamphetamine. With the United States government placing LSD, psilocybin, and mescaline in the highest level of the controlled substance act its not possible for even legitimate medical research to be done with these substances on US soil and following suite nearly every country in the world has similar laws in place. Experiment at your peril and at the risk of your freedom for the next 20 years.

So we've established that the general public has little working knowledge of psychedelics and that law enforcement deals with them in the same way as they do those which cause addiction and lead to crime and death. The government's stand on all controlled substances is to punish harshly in the hopes that lengthy prison sentences will dissuade the public from trying them. As history has now proven, this policy has failed and hundreds of thousands of people are right now unable to read this because they are sitting in a jail cell for what our bodies tell us is a biologically satisfying activity.

Now, let's talk about psychedelics. They don't fit the mold that most 'hard drugs' fit into. They are by and large the most powerful of all drugs produced on or by this planet and they are nothing less than profound. Let's examine the one that everyone knows right off the bat, LSD, Lysergic acid diethylamide. In terms of potency its one of the single most potent chemicals on the planet, it's so powerful that if it was table salt, 1 teaspoon would be 60 thousand doses. Its production is difficult and outside the realm of the kitchen chemist, but 50 years ago a lab could produce millions of doses in a single batch. Today the precursor chemicals in its production are watched with the same scrutiny as uranium. Where did this substance go so wrong? I'm going to tell you.

If someone asks you what LSD is like the best answer you could give is magical. The walls jiggle and dance, sound ripples the air, the depth of music is dramatic and engulfing, words jump out of grass, colors change, you become highly empathetic to those around you, and its easy to discover the most fascinating things about the simplest objects such as rocks and trees. If this was all LSD did it might very well be legal today but its got one side effect which doomed its existence. LSD can and would absolutely destroy capitalism as we know it. For about 1-2 weeks after a strong acid trip its typical to see the relative stupidity of our current government, its petty laws, and usually capitalism in general. The empathy after a trip is wonderful but lsd seriously makes you question the United States in general. I'm confident this is the sole reason this substance is at the highest levels of prohibition. I never lived in the 60's but I wished I had a movement to stand behind, it was empowering and I'm sure that LSD fueled most of that movement.

Aside from civil unrest, LSD is otherwise harmless. Its dose vs. lethal dose is one of the highest of any substances on earth where by comparison, aspirin can destroy your liver and kill you at as low as 5 times the normal dose. LSD has a number of other benefits outside of its recreational value. Prior to its prohibition it was demonstrated to treat other drug addiction with great effectiveness and it itself has no risk of addiction. For that matter, no psychedelic tryptamines have addiction potential due to the powerful nature of the experience and the extremely rapid building tolerance after taking them. LSD has been referred to as the reset button for what ails you and I would generally agree. LSD is only a very recent invention of man and as such its nothing but a drug, there can be no recorded history of it as a sacrament or being used therapeutically but let's talk about a close relative that exist in nature.

Psilocybe species of mushrooms are mushrooms which contain psilocybin (and psilocin). The psychoactive compound psilocybin is about 1/4000th as potent as LSD but the experience is no less breathtaking. Psychoactive mushrooms have a history which dates to the earliest records of man. They have been used for thousands of years in Mexico to help shamans heal the sick. The effectiveness of their treatments has never been disputed, especially by those who get treated, but in the United States treatments of this sort in which the doctor and patient take psychedelics and work through their problems receives the same reception as voodoo. They work on most of the same receptors in your brain and the effects are similar.

The mushroom experience is similar to the LSD experience with some important differences. Mushrooms cause much the same hallucinations, off color walls, patterns form out of nowhere, your perspective of objects is distorted, sounds are received different, and the true beauty of nature is something only seen behind a trippers eyes. Mushrooms something that LSD doesn't though and that's the fractal. I've been lost in never ending fractals before that were just fascinating beyond believe, LSD doesn't do this, there's some patterning with your eyes shut but the fractals seem to be specific to psilocybin. Mushrooms do have a very important difference when compared to LSD though, mushrooms do not cause empathy, they do not cause you to sit around questioning capitalism and the government, and they don't cause you to spend day's afterword pondering how to implement a trade society and disband the US Government. To put an analogy to the mushroom experience, I would say Keep it Simple Stupid. Mushrooms cause you to enjoy the simpler things and not waste time trying to figure out what's wrong with society. It's as if someone shut off the judgmental part of your brain and replaced it with flower power.

As a medical tool psilocybin has a unique property, it has a nearly perfect track record for the prevention and treatment of cluster headaches. While my research on this subject is limited, what I know is that for the time psilocybin is present in the body the receptors in the brain which get out of sync and cause cluster headaches are either not receptive to the same headache signals, or simply the synaptic chain of events is set askew for weeks at a time after a psilocybin trip. The end result is that there have been some clinical trials of psilocybin therapy for cluster headache treatments. It's one of the oldest psychoactive substances we know about and despite it being completely illegal. It's therapeutic and fun all at the same time and I myself have used it to treat my insomnia and it works fantastic.

There's many left to talk about but this editorial is becoming quite long so I'll cover just 1 more substance which I know will be gaining more and more coverage in the news as more and more young people create YouTube videos using it. I'm talking about the little sage Salvia Divinorum related to the mint plant. This little plant produces salvinorin A, a substance that is nearly as potent as LSD and when smoked can completely dissolve your perception of reality in as few as 15 seconds.

It is my opinion that this plant has a great deal to teach us but not in the smoked form. When smoked it overpowers you and drags you off to a place where gravity has no apparent meaning and the scenarios that play are too weird to be worth describing. In most people this amounts to them sitting in a lump on the couch for 10 minutes and then having little or no memory of the experience. This is what is bombarding YouTube right now. A small percentage of users do not detach from their body during the experience but rather run around hurting themselves and bumping into things. These are the users most likely to lead to salvia's ultimate prohibition as its only a matter of time till someone jumps off a building and is found with salvinorin A in their blood. It's the eventual fate of all psychedelics whether deserved or not.

The story doesn't end there though, Salvia, the divine sage has an extremely long history as a healing tool too, it's been used by Mazatec shamans for visionary healing sessions. The Mazatec shamans would produce a quid of even pairs of leaves which would be rolled and chewed in order to let the juice be absorbed by the glands in the mouth. This produces a very gradual and controllable come up and a real meaningful and controllable experience that lasts for several hours. There's a lot to learn from this little sage but not as a recreational drug and certainly not as the subject of thousands of YouTube videos, that can only end badly.

That covers the scope of my topic today. There are a great number of other equally powerful psychoactive compounds that have thousands of years of history behind them. The peyote cactus contains mescaline, a psychoactive phenethylamine which is characterized with vivid hallucinations including the sky changing colors and seeing people who aren't there. Peyote itself has a history of use with man that predates Christ by over 3500 years and was a very necessary part of the rite of passage of manhood for the Native Americans and for this reason its use by them is protected by law.

DMT (Dimethyltryptamine) is the most powerful psychoactive on earth today. Its use is characterized with a complete detachment from reality and a lengthy visit to a magical land where nearly anything is possible. Not a great deal has been done to study the therapeutic value of DMT but nobody will argue that its effect on the human psyche is anything less than profound. Its described as a trip to your dreams, and in fact when a human does dream its speculated this is caused by the release of natural DMT reserves in our brain. DMT is produced in many plants on earth and has been used by the indigenous people of Peru with the b. caapi vine to produce Ayahuasca, a mix of the MAOI properties of the vine and the DMT in the plant Psychotria Viridis to produce one of the most profound spiritual experiences known to mankind. The shaman provides a bowl of the Ayahuasca brew to the patient and after a short time it upsets the stomach and the subject purges and his trip begins. Western medicine does not acknowledge the therapeutic value of Ayahuasca but its users predate 'the west' and the way things are looking, may outlive us.

I hope this article helps the uninitiated understand psychoactive drugs a little better and change the bad stigma that users receive. There are no psychedelic drug addicts, the nature of psychedelics themselves make sure of that, just people who enjoy a trip from the normal way of thinking for a short period of time. There are a great number of powerful substance I did not cover in this article and if I've sparked your interest I encourage you to pick up the book The Encyclopedia of Psychoactive Plants: Ethnopharmacology and Its Applications by Christian Ratsch. It covers nearly every psychoactive planet we know of today and it's a great read.

I am not encouraging drug use, but drug education and as importantly, the proper treatment of users. If a police officer read this and decided just once not to call in the Drug Recognition Expert to prosecute someone tripping in the park that was not hurting anyone I would be satisfied. Your body should be your temple, but it's not, so be smart out there.

Thanks for reading.

Medical Marijuana … Controversial ?

Are you one of the millions of Americans that is suffering from sleeplessness or insomnia? It is estimated that one-third of all adults have insomnia.

Medical marijuana patients usually find that sleep is a wonderful benefit of cannabis. Many chronic pain patients experience insomnia due to their pain and find excellent relief and sleep when using cannabis.

As one of the provisions of the 1970 Controlled Substances Act, marijuana was placed into the category of a Schedule I substance. What does that mean? It means that the potential for abuse of marijuana was considered to be prohibitively elevated while affording little evidence of having any useful medicinal properties. It was this categorization that resulted in marijuana in becoming even more restricted than such “harder” drugs as cocaine or morphine. While it is certainly true that both cocaine and morphine have been equally criminalized, it is also true that both are regularly prescribed by doctors and used by patients in one form or another. In the 1980s part of Reagan's “Just Say No” approach to the massive drug problem in America was the passage of more stringent legislation and penalties for growing or possessing marijuana. Since then, there has been a boiling controversy-some might even describe it as a frying controversy-over whether marijuana does or does not actually have any legitimate medicinal properties. As a result, support is more widespread than ever for a refashioning of the laws that prohibit the use of marijuana so that its medical benefits can be of use for those with no other outlet. Proponents often point to a reactionary government and a not so stealthy campaign against them as the biggest obstacles to their goal. In fact, the proponents of medical marijuana legalization should probably look in the mirror to find the biggest hindrance to their plans.

Marijuana as a medicine has been used for in the U.S. since at least the 19th century. Perfectly legal for much of America's existence, marijuana was incredibly popular as a management for pain ranging form headaches to menstrual cramps. That is not to imply, of course, that simply because a drug has been used to treat pain that is the same thing as evidence that it actually accomplishes that task. Those supporting the legalization of marijuana for medical use point to evidence that marijuana has been effective in the treatment of nearly every ailment from glaucoma to cancer. Marijuana has also been touted as a substance that can prolong the life of an Aids patient. The problem with these claims isn't that they aren't necessarily valid, but rather that they are too subject scrutiny. It is far too easy to point the finger at medical marijuana proponents and make the claim they are trying to slip one past you.

For instance, take Dr. Lester Grinspoon, an associate professor of psychiatry at Harvard. Grinspoon is like the Moses of the medical marijuana movement, trying to get to the promised land of getting marijuana reclassified so that it can be treated like a medicine. Grinspoon affectionately uses 1990 survey of oncologists in which 44% of the doctors admitted that they have at one time or another advised a patient to smoke marijuana in order to bring some relief to post-chemotherapy nausea. His conclusion: “if marijuana were actually unsafe for use under medical supervision, as its Schedule I status explicitly affirms, this recommendation would be unthinkable.” Grinspoon is all too keen to ignore the historical record in which an actual majority-rather than the minority he relies upon-has occasionally been fully committed to the belief that one crackpot cure after another held promise. Indeed, the very fact that Grinspoon would hang his legacy on the fact that a minority view strengthens his case would cause the average person to question the very validity of the idea he forwards. If 44% said they would recommend marijuana treatment, doesn't that by definition mean that 56% of doctors would advise against it? What would be Grinspoon's view if 44% said that they had recommended bathing in elephant urine?

The credibility of the pro-medicinal marijuana movement, as you can see, is a primary issue in what actually is a rather argumentative debate. Opponents to legalizing medical marijuana are fond of arguing that the movement only exists as the first step in a plan to decriminalize marijuana entirely. Proponents point to this as more evidence of a reactionary agenda, but the sad fact is that it does ring true. Keith Stroup, former director of Director of National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML), addressed the issue of the push to legalize marijuana for medicinal use as far back as 1979 during a speech at Emory University in which-probably while under the influence of weed-he said “medicinal marijuana would be used as a red herring to give marijuana a good name”. Richard Cowan, a writer for the pro-marijuana High Times Magazine, was even more explicit, suggesting he may have been on more than marijuana when he wrote how the pro-legalization movement has used the “medical model as spearheading a strategy for the legalization of marijuana by 1997″.

The medical marijuana drive suffered a dramatic setback in that year that pot was suppose to be legal for all when it failed to get a ballot initiative passed in Washington. This loss was made all the more distressing to proponents coming as it did directly on the on the heels of promising victories in both California and Arizona. The Washington initiative, known as I-685 was roundly defeated by a 60-40 margin in part because its backers-apparently under the influence-for some bizarre reason attempted to legalize not just marijuana but also harder drugs such as cocaine and heroin. In contrast, the victorious California referendum of a year earlier was successful mostly due to the fact that it focused on the specific contention that marijuana is helpful in easing symptoms of various medical conditions. This contention was based primarily not on scientific studies, but on anecdotal evidence courtesy of patients who suggest that marijuana is effective in everything from restoring the appetite of cancer patients to relieving nausea, and cancer patients who have smoked it to combat nausea. Proposition 215 in California was touted as legislation designed expressly to legalize marijuana for the sick or dying when in fact it called for the legalization of marijuana under exceptionally vague descriptions of alleged medical relief.

The biggest obstacle in place of legalizing medicinal marijuana seems to be not that the evidence in favor of it is particularly lacking-though, in fact, it does tend to rely far too much on anecdotal evidence-but rather that the brains behind it have been so fried on habitual pot use that they have no idea how to handle such a delicate issue. It's kind of like putting the syphilis-ravaged brain of George W. Bush in charge of handling such delicate issues as…anything. The best thing the proponents of medical marijuana could do would to utilize the talents of people like me who've never used any illegal drug, but who recognize that the continued criminalization of illegal substances is as pointless as trying to battle fundamentalist Islam with guns and bombs.

Medical Cannabis Vs. Western Medicine

Marijuana Medicine has a long history of helping. Marijuana is not physically addictive despite what many anti-marijuana people want us to believe|Marijuana users can use it regularly, even multiple times daily, without any problem giving it up} A very small minority of people who use marijuana can find that they have developed a psychological addiction.| Since most people who use marijuana are not heavy chronic users statistically speaking very unlikely If you are concerned about any possibility of psychological addiction it is very easily avoided by taking time off from regular use. For instance, if you use medical Cannabis every day, you should take one day off per week or take one week off every three months.

Marinol is a synthetically-produced medication to mimic the effects of marijuana in cancer and glaucoma patients. The drug has been marketed as a safe alternative to medical marijuana, and is completely legal to purchase. However, the question remains whether or not Marinol is up to par with medical marijuana in terms of health benefits.

Why would a drug be synthetically produced in order to create the same effects of something that occurs naturally in nature and can be taken just as easily? Well, in this particular case since it is illegal to sell, possess, or use marijuana in the United States, a country that has seen marijuana used medically, then it seems obvious that to avoid decriminalizing marijuana a viable alternative should be created. In order for a synthetically-produced substance to be superior to a naturally-occurring substance, it has to pass certain tests. The first test is that it has to pose less side-and adverse effects when compared to the naturally-occurring substance. The second is that it has to produce comparable beneficial effects compared to the naturally-occurring substance. And finally, it has to be cost-effective for the consumer. In this particular case the final test is quite important because both Marinol and medical marijuana are used by patients with a terminal illness whose medical bills are already very high.

Hard data has been hard to come by for comparing medical marijuana with Marinol in terms of their use within the patient community. The legality of marijuana in California and wholesale production of Marinol are both relatively recent phenomena. Therefore I have provided several sources of estimates for the forthcoming figures.

First, we will examine whether or not Marinol poses fewer side-effects than medical marijuana. According to Rxlist.com and Drugs.com, Marinol produces few side effects that are not experienced by medical marijuana users. Shared side-effects include tachycardia, giddiness, and trouble walking. Since adverse reactions have been documented only in 1% of the population, Marinol appears to be relatively safe to take as an alternative to medical marijuana. The biggest problem with using medical marijuana is that harmful substances can be absorbed into the lungs when smoked. Since Marinol is taken in capsule form and does not contain many of the problematic compounds found in marijuana smoke, it has been deemed a safer alternative. However, since THC in marijuana can also be released in the digestive tract when it is prepared in baked goods and fats, the damaging respiratory effects are bypassed. Therefore, Marinol's superiority in terms of potential side effects is contingent on the way in which medical marijuana is consumed.

The second test concerns whether or not Marinol has comparable benefits to medical marijuana. Marijuana contains nearly sixty cannabinoids, some of which have potential in killing pain and reducing inflammation. Marinol contains only one active cannabinoid, dronabinol, which is responsible for its pain-killing, nausea-reducing, and appetite-regaining effects. More research has to be done into the viability of medical marijuana's numerous cannabinoids, yet there has been a markedly mixed reaction within the patient community concerning the preferred substance. In terms of the amount of time it takes to feel the effects, Marinol takes markedly longer than smoked medical marijuana. Since it requires absorption in the digestive tract, Marinol capsules take around an hour to take effect. Conversely, users of smoked medical marijuana feel the effects within five to ten minutes. Of course, if patients wish to smoke the medical marijuana instead of ingesting it (which takes a comparable amount of time to Marinol), they run the risk of respiratory damage.

The final test involves a cost comparison of Marinol and medical marijuana. According to a comparison on medicalmarijuanaprocon.org, an average yearly use of medical marijuana of 336 grams would cost the patient $3,964.80. Using an estimated ratio of comparable use, the yearly cost of 4,562.5 mg of Marinol would cost the patient $8,258.13. If these figures are accurate, then a patient would be paying over twice as much for a comparable yearly dose of Marinol than for medical marijuana. Medicalmarijuanaprocon.org used data from 2002 for its findings, but it is safe to say that price inflation and availability has not significantly altered these price figures over the past four years. In terms of cost, marijuana takes less resources and energy to produce than synthetic drugs, which require petroleum products, refining, and use of many more inactive ingredients.

So, which is preferable to use? It's hard to say. Marinol does not contain many active cannabinoids that medical marijuana does, so it might not offer the same benefits. However, Marinol does not need to be smoked and thus does not pose the same kinds of risks to the lungs as smoked marijuana. But, as has been discussed, medical marijuana can also be consumed orally, which reduces its damaging effects on the respiratory system. But once again, this comes at a price. If consumed orally, medical marijuana takes as long as Marinol to take effect in comparison to smoked marijuana's much quicker absorption rate. Finally, medical marijuana is much cheaper to both produce and to purchase than synthetically-produced Marinol.

Marijuana as Medicine

Marijuana Medicine has a long history of helping, With the recent death of Michael Jackson due to over the counter drugs| more and more patients are examining their pill bottles and cannot help but be curious as to what their future holds. Doctors are so swift to write prescriptions for anti-depressants, painkillers, sleeping pills and tranquilizers. Most medical cannabis patients feel that they cannot function on the medications that they have been prescribed for pain, insomnia, depression, etc. and find that they function very well on medical marijuana.

Tom Ammiano, a San Francisco democrat, has authored the California marijuana bill and is hoping to usher in a marijuana tax. Does $50 per ounce or $1 a joint make you want to light up?

Whose Idea is the California Marijuana Tax?

The California marijuana tax is the brainchild of Tom Ammiano who believes the State of California to be at a fork in the road, necessitating a batch of progressive - as opposed to traditional - leaders in the California legislature. He reports having spent 30 years as a teacher and also civil rights leader for gay and lesbian rights.

It was on 02-23-09 that Tom Ammiano introduced California Assembly Bill 390, entitled the “Marijuana Control, Regulation, and Education Act.” It legalizes pot for those 21 and older, sells commercial growers' licenses at $5,000 a pop, and places a $50 marijuana tax on each ounce of Mary Jane.

California Marijuana Tax Selling Points

Joe Eskenazi from the San Francisco Weekly reports on the press conference held by Ammiano, during which he heavily touted the fiscal sense his proposed marijuana bill would make. This more or less equates Mary Jane with alcohol, making it a taxed narcotic. What is more, because of legalization, the actual cost of the reefer is supposed to go down.

Quoting the chairwoman of the Board of Equalization, Betty Yee, the fiscal impact on the state of California is nothing to spit at: there would be a $1.3 billion influx into the woefully bare coffers of the state, while the tax itself would only translate to about $1 per joint. Another quoted estimate is the 40% increase of marijuana users legalization would create, while at the same time it would empty the jails of the petty offenders nabbed for drug charges.

Seeing that 1/3 of California prison inmates were handed get out of jail free cards by federal judges, some Californians can now be found vigorously nodding their heads in agreement.

Are Taxpayers Buying into the Marijuana Tax Argument?

Polling Report states that a CBS News/New York Times poll finds 41% in favor legalization while 52% oppose legalization of marijuana. The sample size was 1,112 adults. Comparing this to a 2002 CNN/Time poll, which found 34% in favor and 59% opposed, it would appear that public perception of a California marijuana bill is changing.

Responsibility sure is a heavy responsibility — to paraphrase the indomitable Cheech.

Sources

http://www.tomammiano.com/; http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/09-10/bill/asm/ab_0351-0400/ab_390_bill_20090223_introduced.pdf; http://blogs.sfweekly.com/thesnitch/2009/02/get_up_stand_up_ammiano_introd.php; http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/1462677/one_third_of_california_prison_inmates.html?cat=8; http://www.pollingreport.com/drugs.htm

Central Coast Cities Pass Emergency Ordinance

It looks like the central coast is still on its right wing horse. The Hollister and Monterey City Council's have both approved different versions of an emergency moratorium…Monterey's city manager stated that its simply to give the city the time to develop a policy on medical marijuana collectives.

I'm not sure how many medical marijuana card patients their are on the central coast…but I'm sure its far more than the two marijuana collectives that currently exist and are now being closed could handle.

The state of California needs to get its act and together protect the medical marijuana patients rights…

With Chief Justice John Roberts and Samuel Alito both beginning their lifelong appointments to the Supreme Court, liberals and left-leaning moderates throughout the country are rushing to prepare their Canadian citizenship applications. However justified liberals' fear may be, there is at least one silver lining to an overtly conservative court: it may just be a step forward for the medical marijuana movement, an issue that has really only taken ground in blue states. 

Perhaps this may be a pipe-dream (excuse the pun), but let me explain. Conservative jurists tend to value states' rights and generally disagree with the overuse of the Commerce Clause, which is the part of the Constitution that gives Congress the broad power to make federal regulations. The Commerce Clause allows Congress to regulate virtually anything in the United States that affects inter-state, commercial activity. In 1970, Congress used this authority to pass the Controlled Substance Act and it placed marijuana into the most prohibitive classification, Schedule One. Schedule One basically states that the substance has no medical value and is unacceptably dangerous and addictive (though cocaine and PCP are both Schedule Two drugs because they have certain medical applications). Until this law is changed, the federal government will not recognize medical marijuana, even in states like California that have passed laws in favor of it. In fact, federal agents regularly arrest terminally ill patients who reside in such states, a policy that famously contributed to the death of writer Peter McWilliams in 2000.

The last big medical marijuana case, Gonzales v. Raich, contested the federal government's ability to override state laws regarding medical marijuana. Specifically, Angela Raich, a terminally ill resident of California, argued that the federal government had no right to regulate her use of marijuana since her plants were grown and consumed wholly within California and there was no commercial exchange. In other words, if commerce had not been involved, then the Commerce Clause could not reasonably be applied. Unfortunately, the Supreme Court voted her down, 6-3. The court held that the federal government has a legitimate interest in preventing illegal drug use and that the Controlled Substance Act clearly prohibits the medical use of marijuana. Surprisingly, the three dissenting judges were some of the most conservative judges on the court! That's right, the dissenting judges were William Rehnquist, Clarence Thomas and Sandra Day O'Connor; Scalia sided with the federal government on this one. 

Justice O'Connor described the decision as, “…tantamount to removing meaningful limits on the Commerce Clause.” Justice Thomas' dissent was more surprising, considering that he is a pro-life conservative who was appointed to the court by Bush the Elder. Yet, Justice Thomas was scathing in his dissent:

The majority is not interpreting the Commerce Clause, but rewriting it…. To evade even the modest restriction on federal power, the majority defines economic activity in the broadest  possible terms as the “production, distribution, and consumption of commodities.” This carves out a vast swath of activities that are subject to regulation. If the majority is to be taken seriously,  the federal government may now regulate quilting bees, clothes drives, and potluck suppers throughout the 50 States.

To which Thomas adds:

One searches the Court's opinion in vain for any hint of what aspect of American life is reserved to the States.

It is rather interesting that in Gonzalez v. Raich, the most sensible voices on this matter - one that is typically associated with hippies and tree-hugging leftists - were actually some of the most conservative judges on the bench. More liberal judges on the Court argued for the status quo, claiming that, “…by characterizing marijuana as a Schedule I drug, Congress expressly found that the drug has no acceptable medical uses.” Except, there are accepted medical uses in twelve states (Rhode Island most recently enacted legislation protecting patients' rights) and I find it hard to believe that all of the people who use pot medicinally are actually using a placebo. 

It is worth noting that the Drug Enforcement Agency also actively rejects any applications to study the drug in private, unbiased, scientific environments. Professor Lyle Craker of the University of Massachusetts, with help from the ACLU, is currently challenging this matter in the Supreme Court. In a personal interview, Prof. Craker was very frank with me about his research: “Why don't we just study and if it works, we can help people. If it doesn't, we can drop the issue and move on.” The DEA's stated problem with Craker's research was the security of his facilities: if someone hypothetically broke into the laboratory, “there would be marijuana all over the streets of Amherst.” This is obviously a somewhat dubious claim.

Interestingly, established medicinal uses of marijuana frequently align with common stereotypes of the drug's effects on its users. For example, many people are aware of “the munchies,” a state of insatiable hunger that results from smoking marijuana. Well, individuals who have lost the ability to eat either from a disease or medical treatment, use marijuana to stimulate their appetites, diminish nausea, and gain weight. And the stereotype of forgetfulness among pot smokers? Recent studies have suggested that cannabinoids (the active ingredients) could be used to treat post-traumatic stress disorder as well as other anxiety conditions by blunting one's memory faculties. The drug offers many other therapeutic benefits, from pain relief to reducing intraocular pressure for glaucoma patients. Queen Victoria is said to have used cannabis to relieve menstrual cramps. Regarding the plant's general safety, it is “less toxic than many foods that we commonly consume.” 

In other words, the majority decision ignored a great deal of medical and anthropological evidence that suggests that there are indeed legitimate uses for marijuana. Why, then, does the Court maintain such myopic opposition to the concept of medical marijuana? After all, Congress is not a medical body, nor is it infallible. Legislation is at times incorrect, immoral or improper. That is precisely why we have a third branch of unelected legal umpires who, to use John Roberts' analogy, “calls balls and strikes.” Congress may be a body of elected officials who supposedly carry out the will of the people, but occasionally people vote for things that are not in their best interest, like a police state that fuels itself with drug money. 

Despite what many on the left have come to believe, an increasingly conservative Supreme Court is probably not the end of American liberties. Rather, it is an opportunity to further certain blue-state initiatives by chipping away at the paternalistic elements of the federal government. This has already been demonstrated by the recent decision regarding Oregon's “Death with Dignity” law. So, now we have a curious set of circumstances in which physicians in Oregon can prescribe lethal doses of barbiturates to terminally ill individuals, but those same patients cannot obtain any amount of marijuana for personal relief. That might be a bad message to kids, or a “slippery slope” as we are led to believe. Well, that is a losing argument. As a term, “states' rights” used to be clouded with racist overtones, but now with issues such as gay marriage, physician-assisted suicide and drug policy reform, the term has taken on a new meaning for liberals. Medical marijuana will eventually be the first victory in the grander scope of reforming drug policy; the public is already behind this commonsense policy. In fact, decriminalizing marijuana in general is a position supported by the American Medical Association, the American Psychiatric Association, the American Bar Association, and the National Council of Churches. Ironically, it may just take a more conservative court to get it done.

L.A. Marijuana Collectives …

Well it looks like there will be a thinning of the heard regarding the medical marijuana collectives in L.A. County…1/19/2010 the L.A. City Council has just voted to give preliminary approval to shut down hundreds of legal marijuana collectives in L.A. County. The upside is that while there may be fewer places to go get your medicine, at least if you have your medical marijuana card you will to still have 70 places to choose from in L.A. County

It was bound to happen, especially in California! We have vending machines for almost everything these days–coffee, soda, chips, sandwiches, ice cream, bubble gum, postage stamps, condoms, newspapers, and marijuana. Marijuana??? (That's correct–according to a CBS News Report, aired January, 2008, there are now medical marijuana vending machines.) I recently wrote an article for Associated Content about the abuse of medical marijuana in California. (Please see the link at the end of this article.) I wrote about the legal, quaint little pot shops on the corner, known as dispensaries (or marijuana clubs). All that is required to obtain the drug legally, is a doctor's note. The vague wording of California's Proposition 215, a law passed over 10 years ago, not only allows those suffering from the pain and nausea of AIDS or cancer to legally acquire the cannabis, but also includes “any other illness for which marijuana provides relief.” (That could include almost anyone in pain.)

Now, in addition to the storefront pot shops, there are going to be medical marijuana vending machines. Anytime Vending Machines will be available 24/7 in standalone rooms, with ever-present security guards. The machines resemble ordinary soda vending machines, with numbers to press for the product of your choice-wild cherry, OG Kush, Purple Haze, White Widow, Indica, Grandaddy Purple and many other brands and flavors. There's also a place for the money, and a slot at the bottom to pick up the purchase. (It is vacuum sealed for freshness.)

Herbal Nutrition Center, a medical marijuana dispensary in Los Angeles, will be entering uncharted territory, beginning this week. Patients will be allowed to purchase their prescriptions from a vending machine. And it won't just be medical marijuana. They can also purchase pain medication, antidepressants, and even Viagra. All patients will go to the dispensary first, present their prescriptions, and then pick out their favorite pot, or other medically necessary drug. As part of the procedure, patients will be fingerprinted and given a special access card. If they need to access the store after hours, they will simply scan their prepaid credit card, containing their profile and dosage, to get into the store, (similar to the new hotel key cards), and will then be greeted by a security guard, and fingerprinted with a scan, to make sure that they are the owner of the card. As they move toward the medical marijuana vending machine, a camera photographs them, they choose the drug they want, and off they go. The owners claim that use of the machine will make purchases safer, more convenient, and most importantly, a great deal cheaper. Because of lower overhead, savings are passed on to the patients. There will be two of the PVMs (prescription vending machines-also known as AVMs) opening in the Los Angeles area at this time, but it is likely that very soon there will be many more available in California.

However, as mentioned in my previous article, it is still illegal to purchase medical marijuana under federal law, and as a result, the feds often raid the medical dispensaries, tearing the place upside down, and sometimes arrest the owners. (Most often they just seize the assets.) For the law to be helpful to those who really need the drug, the federal and state laws need to match. Also, as in any business involving drugs, there is a criminal element. Unfortunately, instead of growing the cannabis themselves, many vendors are actually buying it off the black market, providing millions to criminals.

All forms of medical marijuana are being hawked, from cookies, to brownies, to pizza, to medicated BBQ chicken breasts, and even chocolate milk. The sale of medical marijuana has become a lucrative commercial endeavor for many. The dispensaries look like old apothecaries, with glass showcases of the generally high quality prescription weed. Additional offerings are hash, muffins, pot lollipops, pot candy bars, pot peanut butter, pot ice cream, and pot sodas. There are even “breath strips” with pot on them.

Medical marijuana use is beneficial to many people suffering from constant pain, nausea, etc. It is legal for medical marijuana patients in Calilfornia, to possess a half-pound of weed. Special agent, Sarah Pullen, of the Los Angeles DEA explains, “We don't differentiate between those who use state law to dispense marijuana, and those who traffic in marijuana on the street. Marijuana is marijuana is marijuana.”

It is evident that a great deal of abuse takes place, and some people just want to get high. Obliging doctors have made getting a prescription note a very easy task. Because marijuana is still a controlled substance, and not legal, even in a medicinal form under federal law, the doctors are hesitant to write the prescriptions on their personalized pads. Some medical advisory boards have threatened to suspend the doctors' licenses, so this is risky business, in relation to their careers. They will often use a Word document, and print it out on the computer. The evaluation and note are good for one year, and costs about $150.00. The estimated number of statewide medical marijuana users in California is about 250,000. And wouldn't you know it–the visit isn't covered by medical insurance. But not to worry-some doctors often run a special money back deal. If they don't approve you-your visit is free!

Sources: http://www.cbsnews.com/sections/i_video/main500251.shtml?id=3752777n
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/13390669/the_great_california_weed_rush/2
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/556293/the_abuse_of_medical_marijuana_in_california.html?page=3

Medical Marijuana Cards Are Helping Patients in California

New Mexico's Governor Richardson has now made history by becoming the first presidential candidate to enact a medical marijuana law while trying to become the Democratic Party's nominee. Along with Hawaii, Rhode Island and Vermont, New Mexico passed its medical marijuana law by a bill in its legislature. This makes New Mexico the 12th state to let people who are seriously ill to get the marijuana without being arrested and/or jailed as long as they have their doctor's prescription for it. The new law went into effect July 1, 2007.

The New Mexico bill authorizes the state government to distribute the medical marijuana to qualifying patients. There are 12 other state level medical marijuana laws. This also has the state government trying to figure out how to license the makers of medical marijuana and when and how it will be given out.

California enacted its medical marijuana law in 1996 and made some changes in 2003. It lets patients and/or caregivers to grow the medical marijuana. This has created a problem locally. Some counties have banned the dispensing of medical marijuana all the way to some issuing their own regulations.

Oregon and Maine are in the process of expanding their state's medical marijuana law by opening dispensaries. Colorado, Alaska, Montana, Nevada and Washington have medical marijuana laws that were placed on the ballots in their states and enacted into law.

This continues to be a controversial area. Just in the last few days, a “candy store” that sold marijuana in the form of candy, cookies and other materials was raided in California where medicinal marijuana can be grown and sold. It was supplying the supposed medical marijuana through the mail. This is still against the law according to the DEA.

Many of the states that have enacted the medical marijuana laws are having a lot of trouble policing the stores. They are finding that they are not just selling the marijuana to sick people. Many are wrestling with other ways of providing the relief that the marijuana gives to patients that are terminally ill and in great pain. Some of the ideas include making it available only through a doctor with a prescription. The problem with this is who is going to grow the marijuana and how do you make sure that only the pharmacies get the crop. And of course we know that there are doctors who will give patients a prescription for anything.

There has been no questions ask about these laws in the current debates. No one wants to tackle this important concept to the legalizing of marijuana. Maybe it is in one of the candidates programs with their universal health care.

It seems that if the news media is aware of Governor Richardson's stand on this they are ignoring it. If he will push for this in his home state, it would seem he would try to make it a national referendum.

Marijuana compound THC treatment for Brain Tumors

The term medical marijuana took on dramatic new meaning in February 2000, when researchers in Madrid announced they had destroyed incurable brain tumors in rats by injecting them with THC, the active ingredient in cannabis. This report shows the medicinal value of marijuana and cancer treatment.
The Madrid study marks only the second time that THC has been administered to tumor-bearing animals. In 1974, researchers at the Medical College of Virginia, who had been funded by the National Institutes of Health to find evidence that marijuana damages the immune system, found instead the medicinal value of marijuana and cancer treatment. THC slowed the growth of three kinds of cancer in mice — lung and breast cancer, and a virus-induced leukemia.

The DEA however, quickly shut down the Virginia study and all further marijuana and cancer treatment studies, according to Jack Herer, who reports on the events in his book, The Emperor Wears No Clothes. In 1976, President Gerald Ford put an end to all public marijuana and cancer research and granted exclusive research rights to major pharmaceutical companies, who set out — unsuccessfully — to develop synthetic forms of THC that would deliver all the medical benefits without the “high.”

The Madrid researchers reported in the March issue of Nature Medicine that they injected the brains of 45 rats with cancer cells, producing tumors whose presence they confirmed through magnetic resonance imaging ( MRI ). On the 12th day they injected 15 of the rats with THC and 15 with Win-55,212-2, a synthetic compound similar to THC. “All the rats left untreated uniformly died 12-18 days after glioma ( brain cancer ) cell inoculation … Cannabinoid ( THC )-treated rats survived significantly longer than control rats. THC administration was ineffective in three rats, which died by days 16-18. Nine of the THC-treated rats surpassed the time of death of untreated rats, and survived up to 19-35 days. Moreover, the tumor was completely eradicated in three of the treated rats.” The rats treated with Win-55,212-2 showed similar results.

The Spanish researchers, led by Dr. Manuel Guzman of Complutense University, also irrigated healthy rats’ brains with large doses of THC for seven days, to test for harmful biochemical or neurological effects. They found none.

“Careful MRI analysis of all those tumor-free rats showed no sign of damage related to necrosis, edema, infection or trauma … We also examined other potential side effects of cannabinoid administration. In both tumor-free and tumor-bearing rats, cannabinoid administration induced no substantial change in behavioral parameters such as motor coordination or physical activity. Food and water intake, as well as body weight gain, were unaffected during and after cannabinoid delivery. Likewise, the general hematological profiles of cannabinoid-treated rats were normal. Thus, neither biochemical parameters nor markers of tissue damage changed substantially during the seven-day delivery period or for at least two months after cannabinoid treatment ended.”

Another piece of valuable information in the use of the active ingredients in marijuana and cancer treatment.