cannabisnews.com: Medical-Pot Fight Goes To Justices










  Medical-Pot Fight Goes To Justices

Posted by CN Staff on November 26, 2004 at 10:51:10 PT
By Richard Willing, USA Today 
Source: USA Today 

Angel Raich, a 39-year-old mother of two, smokes marijuana eight times a day in her Oakland home. She does it to relieve pain from a brain tumor and more than a dozen other maladies. And she does it with her doctor's blessing and the permission of the state of California, which allows medical patients to use the otherwise illegal weed if recommended by a physician.
Since 1996, California and 11 other states have passed laws that ease or eliminate sanctions for the medicinal use of pot. But the federal government says it still has the right to prosecute Raich and patients like her because federal law considers pot a harmful drug without proven medical benefits.On Monday, in a lawsuit brought by Raich and another patient, the U.S. Supreme Court takes up a question that a growing number of medical marijuana users say is critical to their physical well-being and that the federal government says is important to its war against illegal drugs: When it comes to pot and patients, does federal or state law rule? 'Couldn't Go On' Without It "I understand that my case brings up an interesting point of law that fascinates judges and lawyers," says Raich, whose husband, Robert, is one of the lawyers on her case. "But for me, it's a matter of life and death. With cannabis, I can play with my kids, walk without a wheelchair, sometimes even get a few hours sleep at night. Without it, I couldn't go on for very long."Despite a drug war waged by the Bush administration and the Clinton administration before it, marijuana remains a big illegal business. In 2000, Americans bought about $10.5 billion worth of marijuana from drug dealers, according to an estimate by the Office of National Drug Control Policy. Last year, the FBI recorded 755,286 marijuana arrests — an all-time high. Most arrests were for simple possession. California voters approved the state's "compassionate use" act by voting in 1996 to keep marijuana illegal except for patients under a doctor's care. Raich, a self-described "proper conservative mom," tried pot a year later at the suggestion of a nurse. According to papers filed by Raich's physician in her Supreme Court case, Raich suffers from scoliosis, severe chronic pain, joint dysfunction, endometriosis, fibromyalgia, non-epileptic seizures, an inoperable brain tumor, a uterine fibroid tumor and post-traumatic stress disorder, among other ailments. Snipped:Complete Article: http://www.freedomtoexhale.com/fight.htmSource: USA Today (US)Author: Richard Willing, USA TodayPublished: November 25, 2004Copyright: 2004 USA Today, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.Contact: editor usatoday.comWebsite: http://www.usatoday.com/Related Articles & Web Site:Angel Raich v. Ashcroft Newshttp://freedomtoexhale.com/raich.htmSupreme Court To Hear Medical Pot Casehttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread19887.shtmlHope for Healinghttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread19885.shtmlSupreme Court To Hear California Med Pot Casehttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread19882.shtml

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Comment #30 posted by runruff on November 28, 2004 at 11:37:47 PT:
A book to read.
American Dynasty by Kevin Phillips [2002]
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Comment #29 posted by kaptinemo on November 28, 2004 at 05:52:23 PT:
Thank you, Ekim
I went to the links (I haven't visited Mr. Cowan's site in months) and read about this deceptively named New Freedom Initiative.As a high school kid in the 1970's, we had to read Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World", with story about a future society's population kept suitably pacified by Paxil lookalikes while it's leaders didn't partake...for obvious reasons. When Mr. Bush first began mouthing off about testing all Americans for mental illness, I knew that something was fishy. Now the stench fromn that rotting fish is much more pronounced. I've seen the debilitating effects of long-term exposure to Ritalin up close, and thank God they had not had such things in my day or they would have certainly dosed me with something similar. Now, Uncle wants to ram such meds down the throats of every American.In the Soviet Empire, if you were publicly dissenting against government policy the government's psychiatrists would declare you insane, and disappear you into a loony bin and shoot you full of drugs that WOULD mnake you crazy. I still remember the case of Andrei Plyushch and his accounts of what he saw and experienced in one such place.Looks like Mr. Bush's NeoCon friends are seeking to replicate that kind of horror 'right here in River City'. And you can bet they'd like to pour their version of Huxleyan 'soma' down the gullet of every person who challenges their 'authority'.The 'Madness of King George' indeed...
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Comment #28 posted by AOLBites on November 27, 2004 at 21:03:59 PT
OT: police in action-gameboy or stungun you decide
thought you all would appreciate this even though its OThttp://tinyurl.com/3ktzgTeen Handcuffed, Tasered During Altercation With PoliceWed Nov 24, 8:18 PM ETA 14-year-old student at Lincoln Park High School was handcuffed and shocked with a Taser gun during an altercation with police. Police used the Taser gun on the male youth after four officers were unable to restrain him, according to a report in the News-Herald.The incident started at about 9 a.m. last Thursday when the boy refused to stop playing a handheld video game after several requests by a teacher to put the game away, police told the paper.The teacher sent the student to see the assistant principal, Larry Phillips, who told the boy he could have the game back at the end of the day, but the teen still refused to give it up, the paper reported.Officer Paul Cochran, who works in the building as the school liaison officer, was called to assist. Once Cochran began a procedural pat-down, the teen began kicking and punching the officer, who then tackled him, according to the paper.Phillips and Cochran attempted to hold the teen down while a secretary contacted police for backup.Officers who arrived at the scene handcuffed the teen, but he continued to fight, police told the paper. That's when one officer pulled out a Taser gun and shocked the boy.The teen was stunned for a moment, but then continued to resist, police told the paper.Officers gave the teen a warning to stop fighting before they were forced to shock him again with the Taser gun, police told the paper.After the second shock, officers were reportedly able to take the video game out of the student's coat pocket and detain him.The boy was not injured but suffered a couple of scrapes when he rolled around on the floor during the scuffle, police told the paper. -=cut=- 
cont   http://tinyurl.com/3ktzg[aren't cops in schools Fun? Ha.]
the Singapore version
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Comment #27 posted by ekim on November 27, 2004 at 20:10:39 PT
what does Grassley say about this
Top Story: Bush’s New Freedom Initiative: “Treatment” For Using Cannabis, From The Wonderful Folks Who Brought Us Vioxx, Baycol, Etc. Author of IOM Report Says, "I can't understand why it isn't rescheduled." 
http://marijuananews.com/news.php3?sid=769
http://www.leap.cc/events
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Comment #26 posted by cloud7 on November 27, 2004 at 17:55:17 PT
Is this the interstate commerce clause case?
Yes
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Comment #25 posted by runruff on November 27, 2004 at 17:08:22 PT:
Blood for oil.
The truth is staring you right in the face. Not to believe we are in Iraq or Kuwait for he oil is to dwell in a belief system beyond my understanding. We're trading blood for oil period. 
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Comment #24 posted by mayan on November 27, 2004 at 16:47:27 PT
Screaming Silence...
on ELECTION FRAUD...Boycott The News:
http://www.boycottthenews.org/Take Back the Media:
http://www.tbtmradio.com/geeklog/public_html/index.php
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Comment #23 posted by FoM on November 27, 2004 at 15:43:39 PT
BUDSNAXZ
I know that the whole election season was filled with issues that made Kerry look really bad and yet the Kerry campaign didn't stoop to similar actions. Only one issue had my attention. The invasion of Iraq. Nothing else mattered to me. 
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Comment #22 posted by BUDSNAXZ on November 27, 2004 at 15:25:03 PT
FOM
I too am completely disgusted at our current illegal administration. Everyone I know voted for Kerry under the same premise to get rid of BUSH. I am completely convinced the repuglicants STOLE the election. You can't believe all those exit polls that are right every time were completely wrong this election. We should never have gone into Iraq in the first place and now our troops are getting used as fodder for their war for oil. I am so ashamed of our government. They make ordinary Americans look like sh*t to the rest of the world and its not our fault.
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Comment #21 posted by siege on November 27, 2004 at 11:51:23 PT
NFI    passed
That's right folks the New Freedom Initative  #$%^&*() passed in the Senate on Saturday!It is now mandatory for states to use federal funding to screen your children for mental disabilities and drug them. It is a precursor for ALL Americans to be tested!You can call his office yourself, here is the number for the capital hill switch board:
1 800 839 5276Ask to speak to Rep. Ron Paul.http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x2737890
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Comment #20 posted by FoM on November 27, 2004 at 11:41:18 PT
EJ Thanks
I mentioned Neil Young because I am listening to his music as I type but so many people wanted change. Even if a person didn't like Kerry how could they vote for Bush? I would have voted for anyone that could have beat Bush. 
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Comment #19 posted by E_Johnson on November 27, 2004 at 11:29:33 PT
MaxFlowers
I was about to say the same thing.
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Comment #18 posted by FoM on November 27, 2004 at 11:27:30 PT
Max Flowers
I'm glad I'm not alone in thinking the way I am. I don't like feeling so out of it. So many people disliked Bush and yet he won. Even Neil Young performed at a few of the concerts for Kerry and he's a Canadian!
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Comment #17 posted by Max Flowers on November 27, 2004 at 11:21:57 PT
FoM
You are not alone in that feeling, believe me... there are millions of us lost in that strange world you are now inhabiting. 
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Comment #16 posted by FoM on November 27, 2004 at 09:48:52 PT
Richard
It's nice to see you and yes this is the case.
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Comment #15 posted by FoM on November 27, 2004 at 09:19:21 PT
Sukoi
I never cared who was president but I do care now since he invaded Iraq. I watched Charlie Rose last night and this war will be going on a long time and there is nothing we can do about it. That is so darn sad to know. We will lose so many young men and no one seems to care. How did someone like him ever get to be president? I know how but why did any person vote for him? I almost feel like I live in my own world and I don't feel like I fit anymore.
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Comment #14 posted by Sukoi on November 27, 2004 at 09:08:47 PT
Bush in Canada
I read somewhere that there was actually some talk about arresting him for "war crimes" under international law once he set foot on Canadian soil. I don't think that it will ever happen but it is interesting to think about what the repercussions would be!
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Comment #13 posted by FoM on November 27, 2004 at 08:55:33 PT
Sukoi
I go to a Neil Young Board and there are a a couple Canadians there. The Americans asked if when he visits if they would just try to make him stay. It was funny but they don't want him either. 
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Comment #12 posted by Sukoi on November 27, 2004 at 08:44:09 PT
Off Topic: Bush to speak to Canadians
Bush visit, new relationship with U.S. fraught with political risk for Martinhttp://www.canada.com/windsor/windsorstar/news/story.html?id=ad6d4d4d-b244-4697-a352-3513b0a2f277"He will be speaking to Canadians . . . ," Martin said Thursday in Khartoum, Sudan.
 
"The one thing we wanted to do is give him a chance to speak to Canadians and that will happen."This should be interesting, I wonder how he will be received by the Canadian public? 
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Comment #11 posted by The GCW on November 27, 2004 at 08:27:30 PT
Catholic's don't obey Jesus Christ.
"As expected, the Catholic Church slammed the proposal to generate revenues from the cultivation of marijuana."http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v04/n1680/a02.html?397(Why don't the catholic's do the works of Jesus Christ, instead?) 
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Comment #10 posted by Richard Paul Zuckerm on November 27, 2004 at 08:09:02 PT:
IS THIS THE INTER-STATE COMMERCE CLAUSE CASE?
Is this the interstate commerce clause case?
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Comment #9 posted by afterburner on November 27, 2004 at 08:06:32 PT
Here We Go Again
"But would eliminating ibogaine's psychedelic side diminish its effectiveness?"In a word, yes. This misguided attempt to remove the visions parallels earlier attempts to create a non-addictive opiate. That search led to ever more powerful and addictive drugs, culminating in heroin. Medical science created the Schedule One status with their incessant search for the "active ingredient." Dr. Weil has spoken of the need for whole plant therapies, from his clinical experience as a medical doctor who has used both traditional Western pharmaceutical-based prescription medicine as well as herbal medicine, meditation, and nutrition. US CA: Column: Honor Complexity by Fred Gardner, (19 May 2004) Anderson Valley Advertiser California http://www.mapinc.org/newscc/v04/n752/a08.html?397 :{....{[Dr. Andrew] Weil's UCLA talk drew a crowd of about 200, including medical students and physicians who were getting Continuing Medical Education credit. The following excerpt seems particularly apt, given the neo-prohibitionist party line -repeated ad nauseum at the recent Souder subcommittee hearings- about marijuana containing one or more beneficial molecules that the pharmaceutical industry will, in due course, identify and produce for us in a form that is "pure." {Weil[, MD] said, "One of the most dramatic advantages of learning to use plants in medicine is their relative lack of toxicity compared to isolated derivatives of plants. This should be obvious. If you find something in nature that has a biological effect, that affects animals, and you attempt to concentrate that therapeutic power, you inevitably concentrate toxicity because they're one and the same thing. {....{"...When you present the body with a complex array, you're giving it choice in how it responds. That's fundamentally a different kind of pharmaco-therapeutics from giving a person a purified, isolated molecule that's a shove in one direction. {"I think both those kinds of medicine have their place. But I have to tell you, as somebody who's practiced botanical medicines for many years, there's often great value in using these natural mixtures. {"The reason that pharmacologists and most physicians have such trouble with this concept is that we are strongly under the spell of reductionism. Reductionism is a useful tool. It makes life simpler. It is very difficult to study complex substances. How do you study a plant with 50 complex molecules, all of which might contribute to its activity? It is much simpler to say that one of these equals the whole, and to isolate that and study it. But you're missing out on the clinical relevance of the whole plant, which may be very different from that of the isolated molecule..." {"In other areas of science -outside of medicine-there's a rising interest in complexity... If you want to describe changes in weather patterns or the shapes of clouds, you can't use simplistic, classical formulas, you have to use new mathematical models based in complexity. The rise of complexity theory and its success in physics, mathematics and other disciplines has not made the slightest inroad into medicine. Pharmacology is locked into reductionist ways of thinking, especially when it approaches natural products. We're dealing with the most complex phenomenon that nature has produced, the human organism. It seems to me it makes much more sense, if you're treating a complex thing, to treat it with a complementary complex thing."} ***Psychology Today: The Path to Weilness http://cms.psychologytoday.com/articles/pto-20031028-000003.html :{And if we've been too hardheaded to buy into Weil's prudent approach to healing until just lately, he's forgiven us. All that matters now, he says, is that integrative medicine, which combines both alternative and conventional approaches to maximize the body's natural healing powers, is catching on in a big way.{The rising cost of traditional health care is high on the list of reasons that alternative therapies, from acupuncture to herbal remedies, are on the cusp of mainstream acceptance....{Integrative medicine is comforting to those of us reluctant to entirely abandon prescription meds in favor of dietary supplements and meditation. And its emphasis on a true partnership between patient and practitioner, in which lifestyle issues such as diet, stress and relationships are considered, is also proving popular to a nation of people increasingly discontent with the five-minute physician consultation.{"In integrative medicine, we might give a patient with rheumatoid arthritis a whole package of things to do: a change in diet, a dietary supplement, a mind-body technique, an herb, an exercise regimen," Weil says. "Conventional medicine would just give her a prescription for steroids." {...He insists that his philosophy, which in the '70s advocated something called "stoned thinking" (perception based on intuition), hasn't changed much in the past several decades; what has changed is his reception by colleagues and a public leery of HMOs and an impersonal medical industry.... {And being well is easier to achieve and maintain than we believe. Weil says that the key to better health is in taking positive control with simple tasks, like learning to prepare healthful food, buying fresh flowers, taking a stress-reducing "news fast" by avoiding newspapers for one day and spending time only with kind people. His prescriptions tend to be for lifestyle changes or items found at the greengrocer: Don't drink tap water. Take vitamins. Mend a broken relationship. Volunteer. Eat more fish. Eat more garlic. Breathe....{"In some ways, I regret having used the term 'stoned,' left over from my '60s-era life," Weil says. "It was meant to be provocative--but not about being intoxicated. It's about a different way of perceiving the world that relies on intuition, and using what you see in the world to develop a hypothesis. Of course, doctors are discouraged from using intuition--another unfortunate practice of Western medicine."} ***"I cannot help feeling that what we are now doing in the name of the drug problem is the drug problem."
- Dr. Andrew Weil -"Mystery is at the heart of existence and it is something that one experiences very profoundly as part of the psychedelic vision. "
- Dr. Andrew Weil - The Cannabis Link - Dr. Weil http://cannabislink.ca/medical/weil.htmWeil's integrative medicine gathering steam | Arizona Daily Star ... http://www.dailystar.com/dailystar/printDS/6529.phpIntegrated medicine -- Rees and Weil 322 (7279): 119 -- BMJ http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/content/full/322/7279/119Peyote is used by followers of the Native American Church in a healing ritual which involves personal revelatory visions that help people straighten out their lives, combined with the drum beat that focuses the consciousness on the tribal unity. 
--paraphrased summary based on, Flesh of the Gods: The Ritual Use of Hallucinogens edited by Peter T. Furst, Praeger Publishers (New York: 1972, 1973)
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Comment #8 posted by mayan on November 27, 2004 at 05:48:53 PT
unrelated...
Here's some more on Ohio and the media blackout...Rev. Jackson Visits Ohio, Supports Recount:
http://www.votecobb.org/New Ohio voter transcripts feed floodtide of doubt about Republican election manipulation:
http://www.freepress.org/departments/display/19/2004/930Media Blackout on Election Fraud by Media News Group:
http://denvervoice.org/features/Nov_2004/who_is_the_denver_post.htm
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Comment #7 posted by FoM on November 26, 2004 at 22:38:38 PT
Off Topic: Article on Ibogaine Treatment
Here is an article from the LA Times. The Magical Mystery Tour: http://www.freedomtoexhale.com/mystery.htm
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Comment #6 posted by mayan on November 26, 2004 at 18:19:40 PT
Make or Break
This case sure is making the rounds. Too bad USA Today decided to put it in their Thanksgiving issue. I would imagine they sell fewer papers that day but I could be wrong. This case will make or break states' rights. The way out is the way in...9/11 COMPLAINT AND PETITION AS FILED WITH NY AG ELIOT SPITZER - 11/19/04:
http://www.justicefor911.org/ 
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Comment #5 posted by The GCW on November 26, 2004 at 17:02:55 PT
Justices? Justice?
11:27:4 PM“Woe upon all who shun justice, spurn mercy, and reject truth! Woe upon all those who despise the revelation of the Father while they seek the chief seats in the synagogue and crave flattering salutations in the market places!” –Urantia page 1826. (“the revelation of the Father here refers to the revelation We are given on the 1st page of the Bible where it says all the seed bearing plants are created by God and He said they’re all good.)http://www.urantia.org/papers/paper166.html The part of Us that helps produce the seed of knowledge is from a tree; it is in Us from Our plant beginnings. IT IS THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. It derives from the tree of knowledge of the good and evil; it has itself in Us. Cannabis helps aid the realization of its existence.Urantia continues:“Woe upon you Pharisees who have persisted in rejecting the light of life!” (Is cannabis the light of life? Cannabis is the tree of life; is it also the light of life? Is cannabis all things?)“spurn the visitation of God” (Cannabis helps bring God into Your consciousness/ prohibiting cannabis is to “spurn the visitation of God.” Others can not have access to the visitation of God because they do not obey Jesus Christ and love one another; but they further fight to keep Us who do obey from receiving that visitation of God, that comes from using cannabis with thanksgiving.DID JESUS CHRIST HAVE TO DEAL WITH CANNABIS / KANEH BOSM PERSECUTION?“Woe upon all of you lawyers who have taken away the key of knowledge from the common people!” (Cannabis is or leads to a key of knowledge) (is cannabis the tree of life or the tree of knowledge of the good and evil; is cannabis all things?)“You yourselves refuse to enter into the way of truth, and at the same time you would hinder all others who seek to enter therein. But you cannot thus shut up the doors of the kingdom of heaven; these we have opened to all who have the faith to enter, and these portals of mercy shall not be closed by the prejudice and arrogance of false teachers and untrue shepherds who are like whited sepulchres which, while outwardly they appear beautiful, are inwardly full of dead men's bones and all manner of spiritual uncleanness."Christ God Our Father is Our Justice.
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Comment #4 posted by FoM on November 26, 2004 at 14:52:47 PT
EJ Happy Thanksgiving
I know it's a day late but I mean it. It sounds like your turkey was really good. We have friends who raised their own calf years ago to ultimately butcher. We picked him up for them and he was so cute with his big brown eyes I knew I could never raise my own for food. I'd cry and he wouldn't be butchered and would die of old age! LOL!
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Comment #3 posted by E_Johnson on November 26, 2004 at 14:43:27 PT
New York Time breaks the vaporizer barrier
"``I really hope and pray the justices allow me to live,'' said Raich as she crammed a blend of a marijuana variety known as ``Haze X'' into a contraption that vaporized it inside large balloons."In todays' NYT.BTW HAPPY THANKSGIVING everyone. I cooked a free range organic sustainably farmed turkey from Oregon. Tasted pretty good.
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Comment #2 posted by FoM on November 26, 2004 at 14:01:38 PT
kaptinemo
First I hope you had a nice Thanksgiving. My kapt loved his turkey dinner! LOL!Now seriously I am very worried about this case. If they don't honor the letter of the law no one will every be safe from Federal control and that means scary things to me. I am a blue state kinda person and don't want to live like red state seem to think is the right way. That might be over simplified but that the best way I can think of saying it. I love where I live but if it doesn't change in our state we might need to move to a blue state but it might not matter depending on the case. Bums me out big time!
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Comment #1 posted by kaptinemo on November 26, 2004 at 13:14:59 PT:
Time to see if they can walk the walk
The 'conservative' Chief Justices, that is. Because this rests at the very heart and soul of conservative principles, namely, limitation of governmental powers. And there's one thing this Administration refuses to acknowledge: limits to its' conduct. This is going to be one tough fight. I am prepared to see the SC twist itself up in pretzel logic the likes of which haven't been seen since the Bakke case some 24 years ago in order to justify voting against what is CLEARLY a Constitutional matter of the 10th Amendment. But too many States have too much involved in this to back down; even some Southern States have a dog in this fight, when they've stated plainly they are against MMJ. This case will define, once and for all, whether the *States, themselves* are politically viable entities, or if they are defunct as such. The shock waves of a negative ruling will determine if there really are limits to Federal power, or none at all. And if there are none? We've already seen what the Feds are willing to do to us, including kill us...and nothing ever happens to them but a sweet, soft, gentle love pats on the wrist. A negative ruling means 'open season' on ALL cannabists, but most especially upon the MMJ people, as they are the most vulnerable and most public of us.It also means that NO AMERICAN CITIZEN IS SAFE from abuses of Fed power - the same abuses we have been suffering from for decades will now be visited upon the rest of society. For what can be done to restrict the rights of a minority in time is historically used as a justification to oppress the majority. If there is no bulwark to slow down the steamroller of unchecked Fed power, that already abused power will be implimented with ever increasing force and callousness.Cross your fingers people, and pray these Black Robes still retain a smidgin of their oh-so-publicly avowed 'conservatism'. I am not engaging in melodrama when I state that this will be the 'Dred Scott' decision of the 21st Century. In that decision, it was the Court's ruling, against the morals of the members of the Court, to let stand the odious practice of slavery by strict adherence to the letter of the Constitutional law governing slaves, namely, that they were only 60% human. It can be stated very accurately that that decision made civil war inevitable.This time, the SC has a much easier task, as it's already laid out quite plainly for them. To find in the Fed's favor is to negate every Amendment and Constitutional check-and-balance as being moot. Bill Klinton tried to do exactly that with his Executive Order 13083. The so-called 'conservative' members of Congress caused such a ruckuss about this that Billy Boy quickly rescinded the order to make the States a memory. Let's see if those same 'conservatives' will stick up for those principles again...
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