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Medical Marijuana

LA City Council Approves Medical Marijuana Ordinance; Hundreds of Dispensaries Will be Forced to Close, Thousands of Jobs Lost

The Los Angeles City Council voted 9-3 today to approve a medical marijuana dispensary ordinance that, if enforced, will shut down more than 80% of the city's estimated nearly one thousand dispensaries. The ordinance also bars dispensaries from operating within a thousand feet of schools, parks, day care centers, religious institutions, drug treatment centers, or other dispensaries. The ordinance allows for only 70 dispensaries to operate in the city, but grandfathers in 137 dispensaries that were licensed before the council imposed a moratorium on new dispensaries. The number of allowed dispensaries could shrink even further if suitable locations that do not violate the 1,000-foot rule cannot be found. With this vote, the city council will effectively push thousands of dispensary employees onto the unemployment rolls. Look for a feature article on the council vote and its ramifications on Friday.

The Irrationality of Banning Marijuana Offenders From Working at Dispensaries

As the Nation's Capital moves quickly towards implementing our very long-awaited medical marijuana law, we suddenly find ourselves obsessing over the sorts of local regulations many of us have only observed from afar. As one might imagine, the D.C. City Council is less than thoroughly experienced when it comes to regulating the distribution of medical marijuana, resulting in proposed amendments like this one:

No person with a misdemeanor conviction for a drug-related offense or felony conviction shall own or work for a registered dispensary

Whoa, slow down there. Naturally, none of us want to see D.C.'s first dispensaries run by a bunch of thugged-out ex-cons, but let's all just stop and think about this for a second. Would you ban someone from working in the medical marijuana industry because they have an arrest on their record for…medical marijuana?

It just so happens that many people in the patient and caregiver community have been arrested, not because of their own character flaws, but because of long-standing character flaws in the criminal law itself that turn sick people into criminals. We've waited an unbelievable 11 years for Congress to step aside and allow this law to take effect. Certainly, anyone who's accumulated battle scars during that time shouldn't be sanctioned again now that their past actions will finally be protected under the law.  

If the people of the District of Columbia can agree, as they emphatically did back in 1998, that it's wrong to arrest patients for medical marijuana, then we really shouldn’t be closing new doors to those who've had the misfortune of being arrested for their medicine. This is by no means the most significant regulatory hurdle to be overcome in D.C., but I find it noteworthy for the ironic prejudice it exhibits towards the exact people this law is designed to protect.

The Government Conspiracy to Prevent Medical Marijuana Research

It's impossible to rank in order of severity the numerous lies that have long formed the foundation of the federal government's position on medical marijuana. But one of the most calculated and audacious deceptions deployed in this debate is certainly the manufactured myth that insufficient evidence exists to demonstrate the drug's medical efficacy.

That's why this NYT article should be required reading for anyone in the habit of expressing opinions on the scientific merits of medical marijuana:


Marijuana is the only major drug for which the federal government controls the only legal research supply and for which the government requires a special scientific review.
…
But federal officials have repeatedly failed to act on marijuana research requests in a timely manner or have denied them, according to a 2007 ruling by an administrative law judge at the Drug Enforcement Administration.

What an impressively cynical and corrupt political strategy it is to literally block research while simultaneously citing the absence of said research as an excuse for prohibition. The whole situation is so maliciously dishonest that it's disturbing to think how many government agencies were complicit in manufacturing it.

Meanwhile, medical marijuana's enemies condemn state-level reforms by reflexively insisting that the ballot box is not the place to formulate health policy. Our response is pretty straightforward:


"The more it becomes clear to people that the federal government is blocking these studies, the more people are willing to defect by using politics instead of science to legalize medicinal uses at the state level," said Rick Doblin, executive director of a nonprofit group dedicated to researching psychedelics for medical uses.

We did what we had to do, and it reflects well on the American public that this issue has been so well understood despite a massive federal conspiracy to make it confusing.

Medical Marijuana Dispensaries Don't Attract Crime, They Prevent it

Much like every other bad thing that's ever been said about marijuana, complaints about the role of medical dispensaries in creating crime have turned out to be wild exaggerations. If you don't believe me, try asking someone a little more qualified to opine on the matter, like, for example, the frickin' Police Chief of Los Angeles:


Despite neighborhood complaints, most medical marijuana clinics are not typically the magnets for crime that critics often portray, according to Los Angeles police Chief Charlie Beck.

"Banks are more likely to get robbed than medical marijuana dispensaries," Beck said at a recent meeting with editors and reporters of the Los Angeles Daily News.

Opponents of the pot clinics complain that they attract a host of criminal activity to the neighborhoods, including robberies. But a report that Beck recently had the department generate looking at citywide robberies in 2009 found that simply wasn't the case. [LA Daily News]

Well, how do you like that? Banks are robbed constantly by angry gun-wielding assholes, but you've never heard anyone lobbying to keep them 1,000 feet away from schools and parks. Meanwhile, the biggest security threat at the dispensaries has typically been the DEA (and yes, they were routinely grabbing money from dispensaries at gunpoint until the DOJ told them to find something better to do)

The very notion of dispensaries attracting crime is largely illogical on its face, given that the whole purpose of their existence is to remove sick people from the black-market marijuana economy. Legal medical marijuana providers reduce crime on a massive scale simply by opening their doors each day. Even The Washington Post has observed the role of dispensaries in undermining cartel profits, and one couldn’t possibly calculate the cumulative crime-control benefits of millions of marijuana transactions that would otherwise have occurred in the shadows.

Cheap and unfounded claims about dispensaries attracting crime have served only to discredit their authors, while infusing needless controversy and confusion into the regulatory process. As advocates for medical marijuana, we have no opposition to sensible regulations, but policy debates should be aimed at serving the interests of patients and the community, not indulging fictitious fears at the expense of helping real people.

New Poll: 8 in 10 Americans Support Medical Marijuana

Each time we ask the question, more people get it right:

With New Jersey this week poised to become the 14th state to legalize medical marijuana, 81 percent in this national ABC News/Washington Post poll support the idea, up from an already substantial 69 percent in 1997. Indeed the main complaint is with restrictions on access, as in the New Jersey law. [ABC]

Yes, the only controversy that remains with regards to medical marijuana is how best to distribute it. So here's my question: Will we see presidential hopefuls in the 2012 republican primaries still making fools of themselves by supporting a federal war on medical marijuana?

I'm honestly beginning to doubt that we will. Especially if this guy's on stage.

Utah Law Review joins AMA in Call for Marijuana Rescheduling

New York Post Can't Write About Marijuana Without Laughing

Even as medical marijuana's cascading political momentum becomes undeniable, there nevertheless remain a few aspiring comedians in the press who just can't talk about it with a straight face: 

NJ 'joint' vote to legalize medical pot

By ED ROBINSON and MAGGIE HABERMAN

New Jersey moved to the brink of legalizing medical marijuana last night when both houses of the state Legislature voted that it's high time to make the move. [New York Post]

Get it? 'Joint' vote? 'High' time? You're lucky if you saw this story first in the New York Post, because none of the other papers covered yesterday's developments with such irreverence. For example, check out NYT's boring coverage, which completely fails to find any humor in the situation and focuses instead on the seriously ill patients who will soon have legal access to their medicine.

Ed and Maggie were so busy dreaming up clever puns that they got a little sloppy with the facts:

The weed would be doled out by authorized state suppliers under the bill, which would make the Garden State the 14th to allow purchase of pot for medical reasons -- though the home-grown type would still be outlawed.

Actually, most of those states don't permit medical marijuana sales, and it's typical that the reporters who work hardest to make jokes about marijuana policy also have the toughest time getting the details right. Fortunately, New Jersey's lawmakers, as well as the American people and even the White House have come to understand that there's nothing the least bit funny about ending the arrest of seriously ill patients who rely on marijuana for medical treatment.

Whether you're the New York Post, or even the President of the New Jersey Senate, if you think anyone's looking for laughs in the medical marijuana debate, the joke's on you.

New Jersey Legislature Passes Medical Marijuana Bill, Set to Become 14th Medical Marijuana State (Plus DC)

New Jersey is set to become the 14th state to legalize the medicinal use of marijuana after the state Assembly Monday approved the Compassionate Use Medical Marijuana Act" by a vote of 46-14. Later Monday evening, the state Senate, which had already approved its version of the measure, voted final approval by a margin of 25-13. Outgoing Gov. Jon Corzine (D) has said he will sign the bill. The Assembly debated the bill for half an hour Monday afternoon before approving it. The debate took place before galleries backed with bill supporters and opponents. It was a similar scene in the Senate a few hours later. "It does not make sense for many of New Jersey's residents to suffer when there is a viable way to ease their pain," said Assemblyman Reed Gusciora (D-Mercer), one of the sponsors of the bill. "Medical marijuana can alleviate a lot of suffering, and there is no evidence that legalizing it for medical use increases overall drug use." The bill will be one of the most restrictive in the nation. Patients diagnosed by their primary care physician as having a qualifying medical condition would be allowed to obtain—but not grow—medical marijuana through one of at least six "alternative treatment centers," or dispensaries. But patients would be able to register with only one dispensary at a time and would have to use the written recommendation within a month of when it was written. Qualifying medical conditions include severe or chronic pain, severe nausea or vomiting or cachexia brought on by HIV/AIDS or cancer ("or the treatment thereof"), muscular dystrophy, inflammatory bowel diseases, and terminal illnesses where the patient has less than a year to live. Chronic pain was removed from the original bill in an Assembly committee vote last summer, but reinserted last week when the Assembly approved an amendment by Assemblyman Gusciora. Patients could possess up to two ounces and be prescribed up to two ounces per month. That is an increase from the one ounce possession limit in earlier versions of the bill. Patients would be able to name a caregiver, courier, or delivery option to pick up medicine at the dispensary and deliver it to them. "This will be the strictest medical marijuana law in the nation," Gusciora said at a statehouse press conference Monday. "We have a good bill that will be very strict and will not decriminalize marijuana, but will allow doctors to prescribe the best treatment for their patients." Roseanne Scotti, director of the Drug Policy Alliance New Jersey office, who has lobbied tirelessly for passage of a medical marijuana bill, agreed that the final Garden State bill is very tight, but said it was a start. "There will be some patients who will be able to get some relief," she said. "We think once the program's up and running and people see that there aren't problems, we'll be able to go back and get in some more of our patients." Also at the press conference were patients Diane Riportella and Mike Oliveri. Riportella was diagnosed with Lu Gerhrig's Disease in 2007 and given no more than five years to live. Oliveri suffers from muscular dystrophy. "I'm so excited to be able to be alive and to be here for this moment," said Riportella, 53, of Egg Harbor Township. "Within a few seconds, I'm relaxed and I'm smiling and I go to Disneyland just for a few minutes and say 'It's not so bad, I can live another day,'" Riportella said. Oliveri, 25, said he moved from his New Jersey home to California in order to be able to legally access medical marijuana. He said he vaporizes about an ounce a week to ease the pain in his legs and back and calm his digestive tract and that he had used it illegally before leaving for the West Coast. "I took every medication known to man before I took weed," said Oliveri, 25. "I knew it was a risk …but it was a life or death matter." The bill was supported by organizations including the New Jersey State Nurses Association, the New Jersey Academy of Family Physicians, the New Jersey Hospice and Palliative Care Organization, the New Jersey League for Nursing, the American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey and the New Jersey chapters of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. Special credit goes to the Coalition for Medical Marijuana--New Jersey, the patients' and advocates' group that has fought for years to get the bill over the top. New Jersey will now join Alaska, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Montana, Michigan, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington in the list of medical marijuana states. That list also includes the District of Columbia.
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