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  Where There's Smoke

Posted by CN Staff on August 29, 2002 at 10:17:20 PT
By Karen Bridson-Boyczuk 
Source: Eye Magazine  

Following two major setbacks in the fight for access to medicinal marijuana, some fear the federal government has swung from offering to supply cannabis and rethinking possession laws to declaring a war on the drug.Health minister Anne McLellan backed off of the government's medicinal marijuana program in a speech to the Canadian Medical Association on Aug. 19, just days after police stormed the Toronto Compassion Centre (TCC). The confluence of those events has raised suspicions that the feds ordered the raid. 
"Something stinks in Canada," says Alan Young, the lawyer representing the four people arrested at the centre Aug. 13. "We want to find out who gave the marching orders. We can't have politics interfering in police decisions."Young suspects the federal government is bowing to anti-marijuana pressures from south of the border and is not only stalling its own pot project, but is now cracking down on those helping sick people get the drug. "I know when the police arrived, to deflect criticism, they said not to get mad at them and that the orders came from high above," he says. "I want to find out how high that is."The Bathurst and St. Clair-area centre distributed medicinal marijuana to more than 1,300 sick people regularly for more than three years, making it one of the largest centres of its kind in this part of the world, Young says.McLellan told the Canadian Medical Association she had "a certain degree of discomfort" with distributing the pot grown for the experimental government program in an abandoned copper mine in Flin Flon, Manitoba.She said she wants to wait until scientific trials prove pot is safe before giving the green light to the project, something pot advocates say could take years. McLellan's position stands in contrast to previous positions taken by her cabinet colleagues, justice minister Martin Cauchon and Allan Rock, who as a former health minister, enacted regulations in 2001 to allow qualified patients, -- known as federal exemptees -- to use marijuana. Those regulations were required by a landmark 2000 court ruling recognizing the right to access medicinal marijuana, but Rock insists he intended to supply the drug even while clinical trials were taking place. It was just over a month ago, on July 15, that Cauchon said Canada may follow Britain's lead and decriminalize marijuana by making simple possession of small amounts of the drug punishable by tickets and fines, rather than jail time and a criminal record. Cauchon also told the press that he "of course" smoked the drug in his youth.Cauchon repeated those indications as recently as Aug. 12, when he told an annual meeting of the Canadian Bar Association that the country needs to rethink crime and punishment, particularly with respect to prosecuting minor crimes like marijuana possession: "For example, as a society we must question our motivation when we devote so many of our precious legal resources to the prosecution of cannabis offences," he said.However, pot advocates have also been aware of U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) unhappiness with marijuana-liberalization talk in Canada. In June, U.S. drug czar John Walters warned that it's time to step up the war on marijuana, not to decriminalize it or move further along the road to facilitating its use for medicinal purposes."McLellan is being intimidated by American authorities," says Young. "The message has been very clear: 'Do not go down this path.' If Canada begins distributing this marijuana they will implement very stringent controls at the border, which could be devastating for our trucking industry."Det. Courtland Booth, of the Toronto Police Service's major drugs unit, says the police act independently of government and that he's not aware of any direction coming from outside the police department on the TCC bust. "We continue to do what we do, nothing really has changed for us," he says. "The marijuana issue has pretty much been the same since the CDSA (Controlled Drugs and Substances Act) and the Ministry of Health issued the exemptions for some medicinal marijuana users."Only people with exemptions are legally allowed to possess, grow and distribute marijuana, he says. Booth says he's also not aware of any Toronto police projects aimed at cracking down on medicinal marijuana clinics. "We're not doing anything more than we normally do."Patrick Charette, spokesperson for the justice department, says that while the department's federal prosecutors do work closely with police on drug cases, he's "not aware" of a special mandate coming down in this case."There's a big debate going on right now and there are two parliamentary committees looking into [marijuana]," he says. "The minister is undertaking to wait and see the results of these reports."But Charette could not rule out the possibility that federal prosecutors were consulted on the TCC bust before it occurred. "They could have been involved, but the police are the ones enforcing the legislation, we're the ones doing the prosecution," he says. "I'm not aware of any communication between the two. It's always their decision to bust."Warren Hitzig, founder of the TCC and one of the four charged, says his former clients have been suffering since the bust."Now, instead of these people being able to have a clean, reliable source, they are having to go back to the street," he says. While Hitzig says the health minister has some "very, very good points" about smoking not being healthy, he says she has to remember many of those asking for access are AIDS and cancer patients. "They're extremely frustrated and frantic," he says. "This impacts on the quality of their lives."Young says the minister's concerns about smoking are an insult to terminally ill patients, and notes that while scientists in England are in the third stage of trials with a marijuana aerosol spray, Health Canada has shown no interest in exploring the product.Suffering the many side effects of full-blown AIDS, including nausea and severe weight loss, Jim Bridges says he doesn't know what he's going to do without the TCC."I am a federal exemptee, and now the government is not supporting this," says the 38-year-old. "And now they are also stopping me from having the access I had at the Toronto Compassion Centre." Bridges said another AIDS victim he knows lost 15 pounds in the days following the bust at the centre. "This may be one of the last fights I've got," he says. "It just makes me want to cry."Venturing out to the streets at night in hopes of scoring some pot, meanwhile, has Bridges terrified. "I'm an obviously homosexual man and I'm scared," he says. Bridges says, given his situation, he's offended by the health minister's comments. "Being in a terminal situation [as I am], she would have little knowledge of the sense of despair," he says. "I understand her concern because of the carcinogens; however, there must be a way around this."He says he'd be willing to sign a legal document absolving the government of any guilt if the pot smoking caused him further health problems.Bridges is also suspicious about the timing of the health minister's comments and the Compassion Centre bust. "It's an interesting coincidence," he says. "I think there's been pressure from the DEA.... We're so close to Buffalo and on a Great Lake."Meanwhile, a second Toronto centre, called CALM (Cannabis as a Living Medicine), continues to help the people they can, Hitzig says. "I hope they won't be shut down too," he says.Philippe Lucas, director of the Vancouver Island Compassion Society, says he was dismayed to hear about the Toronto raid. But he says he's not worried about his society being the next target. "We were busted 20 months ago," he says. "We were charged with three counts of trafficking and the judge gave us an absolute discharge. He said what we were doing was helpful to society and urged Health Canada to act in good speed to make marijuana available to those that need it."Lucas hopes these kinds of forward-thinking verdicts in the courts will help medicinal marijuana supporters in their fight against the government. As for the Toronto bust being a result of decisions made at the federal level, Lucas says he doubts it. "I think it's more linked to an overreaction to the whole cannabis issue in Ontario," he says.But he too was offended by McLellan's comments. "It irks me to hear her talk about her 'discomfort' when I see the discomfort of patients with AIDS and cancer and other things. I don't think her discomfort measures up."Ottawa's current regulations spelling out the conditions under which the use of medicinal marijuana is allowed are impossible to fulfill, says Young, because doctors have been warned by their insurers not to sign required medical forms for people wanting the drug.Young says he will be in the Ontario Superior Court of Justice Sept. 19 representing a group of seven people who are suing the federal government over its medicinal marijuana regulatory regime. "We're seeking to compel the government to distribute what they've cultivated," Young says. Has the federal government just done a complete about-face on weed liberalization? Source: Eye Magazine (CN ON)Author: Karen Bridson-BoyczukPublished: August 29, 2002Copyright: 2002 Eye Communications Ltd.Contact: eye eye.netWebsite: http://www.eye.net/DL: http://www.eye.net/eye/issue/issue_08.29.02/news/weed.htmlRelated Articles & Web Sites:CALMhttp://www.cannabisclub.ca/Toronto Compassion Centre http://www.torontocompassioncentre.org/Medicinal Pot Users Protest Club Closurehttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread13854.shtmlReefer Sadness - Now Magazinehttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread13845.shtmlCompassion Centre's Future Unclear http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread13766.shtmlRaid Hurt The Sick: Pot Activisthttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread13752.shtml 

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Comment #5 posted by kaptinemo on September 03, 2002 at 08:26:22 PT:
And I am not the only person asking this question
either I suggest our two largest groups of readers, Canuck and Amie, read the following:New World Anschluss 
http://www.americaheldhostile.com/ed090302.shtmlfrom the article:The biggest news up here in up The Great White North is that Canada and the United States have reached an agreement that would allow American and Canadian soldiers to cross each other's borders in the event of a terrorist attack. To say that this bit of information is going over like a lead balloon would be kind. The onslaught of criticism from across the political spectrum has been most edifying. Whether a Canadian be right wing or left wing, the distrust of our giant neighbor's to the south is inbred into us. Defence Minister John McCallum, barely wet behind his ears since the sacking of former Defence Minister Art Eggleton, says that the troops deal was to swing both ways - but according to most observers the ultimate aim will be to have Canadian soldiers, under the command of Americans, going after "terrorist cells" inside Canadian borders.Yes...and who will be riding herd on Canuck soldiers, here? The same kind of people who ran illegal US drug sting operations in Canada?I repeat: is Canada a sovereign nation? 
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Comment #2 posted by CannabisMan on August 29, 2002 at 11:32:31 PT:

Anne McLellan, you idiot!
Give the people their medicine you moron!
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Comment #1 posted by kaptinemo on August 29, 2002 at 11:18:25 PT:

It comes down to a simple question, really:
Is Canada a sovereign nation?I know what the map says. I've crossed the border plenty of times in my life, and God and Canux willing, will do so again. I know better to think that Canadians lack a distict culture; anyone who hasn't spent any time there would easily make that mistake. And deserve censure for it. Canux even have a form of English which diverges subtely from American English in some very interesting ways. (For example: I had no idea in 1976 when I first traveled there, what the flipping H a 'serviette' was; the revelation was as much humorous as well as thought provoking: I had encountered a new word in English for something I had thought couldn't have had any other moniker than 'napkin'.) Even the speech of Canadians is different; the accent of my Torontonian friend when she's excited about something has a slightly undulating cadence like a gentle sea which is delightful to hear. In short, Canux aren't 'unarmed Americans' as I heard one TO resident proclaim while standing in a movie theater line.So why act like it?I've known many Canux, and most of them, after they realized my mind wasn't hermetically sealed, told me of their points of view without reservation. Some of them concerning the US, rightly or wrongly (sadly, mostly rightly) weren't very salutory. But they often reserved their harshest criticisms for their own governments.Governments. Plural. Fed and Provincial. Which still rocks me back, sometimes.Down here, because of creeping Federalism, (too) many Americans have become conditioned to think of State governments as being irrelevent. In the beginning, the US was comprised of de facto sovereign countries forming a weak federation for mutual protection against inimical foreign powers, hence the correct and official name of the Republic of the United States of America.But Canadians have not allowed their Federal government to become quite so overweening as we have. I've often heard on more than one occasion that they wished their Federal government was much stronger. In such cases, I tried to explain what happens when that happens. You get the kind of arrogance on the part of ostensible civil servants and pols that we currently suffer from.If Canadians wish to define themselves, not just as a collection of Provinces but as the distinct nation which they truly are then here's a fine opportunity to do so. And incidentally, send a pernicious foreign influence - the DEA - packing. Re-legalization of cannabis sends not one, but two messages. First, Canadians are demonstrably more concerned with the welfare of their own by passing re-legalization than their nosy and mischief-causing neighbor is of his.Sceondly, that they are indeed a nation...and don't need any meddling by a Nosy Parker named Uncle and his bully boys.It's up to you.
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