cannabisnews.com: Cannabis Crusades: MMJ and The Recall Election Cannabis Crusades: MMJ and The Recall Election Posted by CN Staff on September 26, 2003 at 08:05:32 PT By Ed Rosenthal Source: San Francisco Chronicle The California gubernatorial recall is the first election in which I will not be voting since I turned 18, 40 years ago. It's not my disgust with what I consider a "coup attempt" by the extreme right that keeps me from the polls. It's my three felony convictions related to cultivating medicinal marijuana. Although I was spared prison time, the loss of my voting rights is cruel punishment for me, because I have always been politically and civically active. It is remarkable that I ended up with the felonies, since I had been deputized by the city of Oakland and promised immunity from prosecution for providing medicine to qualified patients. Still, I feel a certain satisfaction about the recall campaign. I watched one of my daydreams come true in the first debate. Medical marijuana was the only issue that all the candidates agreed upon: all pledged to uphold California's marijuana laws. State Sen. Tom McClintock, R-Northridge, the most conservative, was the most ardent -- stating that the federal government should stay out of the state's business. When Dennis Peron opened San Francisco's first medical marijuana dispensary nearly 10 years ago, there was virtually unanimous agreement among politicians and the criminal justice community that marijuana wasn't a medicine. Furthermore, the risk was too great for the medicine to be permitted. What a difference a decade makes. In 1994, no reporter would have asked the question, but if they had, every candidate would have pledged to redouble efforts to eliminate "the assassin of youth." All the candidates agreed that medical marijuana should be "legal," but there are definite differences in their attitudes toward what legal means and who should decide. This is significant, because some California state agencies are still at war against this popular medicine. The California attorney general's Medical Board is prosecuting doctors based on complaints. Neither patients, their caregivers, nor their loved ones are complaining. No, all the complaints are being filed by officers or prosecutors thwarted when they attempt to arrest or prosecute a patient. Police and prosecutors in some counties have declared war on medical patients, spending an inordinate amount of time and taxpayers' money to harass people whose only crime is that they are ill. Snipped: Complete Article: http://www.freedomtoexhale.com/crusade.htm Source: San Francisco Chronicle (CA)Author: Ed RosenthalPublished: Friday, September 26, 2003 Copyright: 2003 San Francisco Chronicle - Page A - 27 Contact: letters sfchronicle.comWebsite: http://www.sfgate.com/chronicle/Related Articles & Web Site:Ed Rosenthal's Pictures & Articles http://freedomtoexhale.com/trialpics.htmGuru of Ganja Sees Cracks Developing in Laws http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread16597.shtmlReefer Madness: Our Current Prohibitionhttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread16587.shtml Home Comment Email Register Recent Comments Help Comment #4 posted by FoM on September 29, 2003 at 17:14:57 PT Related Article By Ed Rosenthal - 9 - 29 - 2003 The Cannabis Crusades: Medical Marijuana and the Recall Election:http://independent.org/tii/news/030929Rosenthal.html [ Post Comment ] Comment #3 posted by FoM on September 27, 2003 at 12:23:34 PT News Article from The Courier Mail Doctors To Prescribe MarijuanaBy Simon KearneySeptember 28, 2003People will be able to register to use marijuana for medical conditions in NSW from next year.The scheme – which caused an outcry when proposed by the Carr Government before last March's state election – won in-principle Federal Government approval last week.Legislation allowing gravely ill people to use marijuana – most likely in the form of a pill or nasal spray – is due to be released within weeks.The scheme will be expanded to include both a clinical trial and to offer several categories of gravely ill people immediate use of cannabis."The NSW proposal would involve two parallel initiatives, namely clinical research trials and a compassionate access scheme," Federal Parliamentary Secretary for Health Trish Worth said. A spokesman for Special Minister of State John Della Bosca confirmed the compassionate scheme was being considered to run alongside the clinical trials announced earlier this year."It would be limited to a range of very sick people, people with AIDS, Cancer and Multiple Sclerosis," he said.The NSW Government plans to create an Office of Medical Cannabis in the NSW Department of Health.To register for the scheme, patients would have to supply a doctor's certificate outlining that conventional treatments for their condition have been unsatisfactory.A State Government source said one of the key developments being monitored was British research into a marijuana pill, in which scientists have isolated marijuana's active component, THC. A spray to deliver a dose of THC has also been suggested by Premier Bob Carr.Ms Worth confirmed that the Federal Government supported the scheme as long as it complied with medical guidelines and international narcotics agreements."Any clinical research trial would need to meet the Therapeutic Goods Administration's (TGA) requirements for conducting clinical trials in Australia," she said.The State Government is looking at options to try to avoid growing a marijuana crop themselves.In Canada a similar trial ran into problems because the Government-grown marijuana tastes so bad nobody wants to smoke it. http://www.thecouriermail.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,7397460%255E421,00.html [ Post Comment ] Comment #2 posted by maryjanefreedom on September 27, 2003 at 03:02:10 PT Good I glad you lost your voting rights. We don't need any more wacky liberals voting. [ Post Comment ] Comment #1 posted by escapegoat on September 26, 2003 at 14:38:34 PT Ed's right... "Although I was spared prison time, the loss of my voting rights is cruel punishment for me, because I have always been politically and civically active."It's also a sure sign of the coming of totalitarianism.Everybody thinks Canadians are so mellow. But I can tell you that this type of disenfranchisement would spark riots here, because we recognize just how dangerous it is. You've paid your debt to society, you shall participate in it. [ Post Comment ] Post Comment