cannabisnews.com: Flying High on The Fourth
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Flying High on The Fourth
Posted by CN Staff on July 05, 2013 at 13:35:47 PT
By Al Kamen
Source: Washington Post
Washington, D.C. -- The flag flying over the Capitol on the Fourth of July might look like your typical Old Glory. But you probably won’t notice the fibers that make it special. It’s believed to be the first hemp flag to flutter over the dome since the government began outlawing marijuana’s less-recreational cousin back in the 1930s.Colorado hemp advocate Michael Bowman is the man responsible for getting the flag, made from Colorado-raised hemp and screen-printed with the Stars and Stripes, up there.
He cooked up the idea while lobbying Congress this year to include pro-hemp measures in the massive farm bill. That legislation failed last month, of course, but the seed of the hemp flag had been planted. Rep. Jared Polis (D-Colo.) gave Bowman an assist with the details, which included working with the Capitol’s flag office. (The flag program allows people to buy flags flown over the Capitol, so they rotate in new Old Glories nearly every day.)“It’s a powerful symbol,” Bowman says, adding that the red, white and blue flying over the Capitol is a reminder of the role that hemp played in the founding and early days of the country. Betsy Ross’s flag was made of hemp, he notes, and Colonial settlers even paid their taxes in the crop, which was used for all kinds of goods, from rope to fabric to paper. Those Conestoga wagons heading west were covered in canvas fashioned from hemp fibers.So, he thought having it fly on America’s birthday seemed pretty appropriate.After its Capitol flight, the flag will make its way back to Colorado, where it will fly over the state capitol building in Denver. After that, Bowman is sending it on a tour of statehouses in states where legislation is pending that would legalize hemp. One of the first up: Vermont. And while advocates are quick to point out that hemp lacks the THC content beloved by stoners, this will still be one high-flying flag.Source: Washington Post (DC) Author: Al KamenPublished: July 3, 2013Copyright: 2013 Washington Post CompanyContact: letters washpost.com Website: http://www.washingtonpost.com/ URL: http://drugsense.org/url/2HcnaWJ4CannabisNews Hemp Archiveshttp://cannabisnews.com/news/list/hemp.shtml 
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Comment #11 posted by mexweed on July 13, 2013 at 13:21:08 PT:
Proposed rewording
Thanks, Quax, for kind words and valuable Haiti suggestion. I remember overhead photos a few years ago showing the perceptible "national boundary"-- on the Dominican side, vegetation, on the Haitian side nothing. In Darfur, Mia Farrow's photos showed an empty devegetated landscape around refugee camps; up to ten km away, a constantly receding circumferential "tree line" to which women would walk daily to reach some wood they could hack down and carry the long way home fastened on their heads. For some women in those camps six hours daily walking was the time cost of getting firewood to cook the hard grains, beans etc. that the humanitarians were able to deliver to such remote places (nothing parishable would make the journey). Who's looking after children, let alone providing challenge and education, with mother thus employed?Dad is either dead or in the Pen somewhere, oops sorry my mind drifted to famous beloved USA with our 2 million prisoners. Yes, PRISON-INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX is widely used and fairly accurate, but to add a little more sting, let's try: PRISON-INDUSTRIAL-GOVERNMENT SYNDICATE or SYNDROME (PIGS)
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Comment #10 posted by mexweed on July 13, 2013 at 13:17:12 PT:
Proposed rewording
Thanks, Quax, for kind words and valuable Haiti suggestion. I remember overhead photos a few years ago showing the perceptible "national boundary"-- on the Dominican side, vegetation, on the Haitian side nothing. In Darfur, Mia Farrow's photos showed an empty devegetated landscape around refugee camps; up to ten km away, a constantly receding circumferential "tree line" to which women would walk daily to reach some wood they could hack down and carry the long way home fastened on their heads. For some women in those camps six hours daily walking was the time cost of getting firewood to cook the hard grains, beans etc. that the humanitarians were able to deliver to such remote places (nothing parishable would make the journey). Who's looking after children, let alone providing challenge and education, with mother thus employed?Dad is either dead or in the Pen somewhere, oops sorry my mind drifted to famous beloved USA with our 2 million prisoners. Yes, PRISON-INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX is widely used and fairly accurate, but to add a little more sting, let's try: PRISON-INDUSTRIAL-GOVERNMENT SYNDICATE or SYNDROME (PIGS)
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Comment #9 posted by Quax Mercy on July 07, 2013 at 15:16:06 PT:
Haiti trial-run
Nice job, Mexweed.
If I may suggest...Why not make Haiti the trial run? They could have had a couple years of Hemp seeded hillsides and begun a reforestation project to boot - With wide scale hemp-crete reconstruction - attendant industries to be derived from the abundant fodder - they should be marking their advancement with each successive harvest instead of huddling in the colera-prone camps, awaiting the next disasterDo I even have to mention When Hemp gets on its feet, I can imagine Hemp Associated Industries having the budget to just DO these kinds of projects world-round. The PTB are deathly afraid of the Hemp-minded having access to these sized funds.But maybe we can hasten the day by funding a class action lawsuit against the Waste, Fraud, Corruption & Abuse perpetrated by the Banks, the DEA, NIDA & the ONDCP, and the Prison-Industrial Complex in the name of Prohibition. These people need to be put under oath, and either affirm or recant their history of lies, with consequences for the felons among them.But, again, I applaud your vision, Mexweed.
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Comment #8 posted by mexweed on July 07, 2013 at 13:58:03 PT:
cannabis vs tobacckgo
Lobbyists from Big 2WackGo eternally remind captive legislators that tobacco built this country. From the early 1600's it was the Big $$ export crop which helped finance governments, Revolutions etc., and eventually in the 1900's, with government subsidy help, the USA led the world in promoting the (profitably taxed) modern superaddictive H-ot B-urning O-verdose M-onoxide $igarette (number #1 cause of disease, death and deforestation in human history). But now destiny nudges you, me, us to preside over two revolutions: (1) substitution of cannabis for tobacco, in internal use and on croplands everywhere; (2) substitution of vaporizer, e-cig (liquid formula vape) and 25-mg-per-serving "one-hitter" dry-herb vape-toke utensils for hot-burning 700-mg-per-lightup commercial $igarette, 500-mg-per-lightup joint or blunt, 450-mg-per-lightup beedi etc., in short replace "smoking" with "vaping". Slogan: "More Marley, Less Monoxide with a long-stemmed Choomette Vape Toke One-Hitter."Mr. Obama expressed concern over Global Warming (climate change) and proposed doing what Republicans always say Democrats always do-- raise taxes-- in this case a carbon tax to deter wasteful carbon fuels use, etc. Maybe that will help, but here's another strategy: certain gases especially carbon dioxide (C02) are credited with causing global warming; trees eat carbon dioxide; therefore let's drasticly increase ther number of TREES on the planet.  It turns out CANNABIS is rated high as a PRECURSOR crop for tree planting! The massively aggressive cannabis growth rate and production of abundant biomass (litter) each autumn speedily builds up a good topsoil for young trees to get a start in. Send students, teachers, interns, psychologists, ex-offenders, immigrants etc. to drought-stricken areas for vacation or sabbatical service picking up, clipping off fire-hazardous deadwood, bundling, hauling to dry streambeds and laying there successively (a) fine particulate-- sawdust, shreddings etc., (b) chips, (c) bundled stalks etc., (d) flat cardboard imported from downtown, (e) a line of pallets and (f) slabs of plywood nailed or screwed down into the pallets, forming a cart road, or nearly-four-foot-wide pallet-plywood-patio-pathway for lifttrucks to deliver heavy palletized loads in and out from a nearby truckroad access.(g) seed all the brushmass except right under the roadway with CANNABIS.h. After a year or two, seed with fast-growing invasive drought-resistant species such as cottonwood and eucalyptus, depending on climate. This road system uses creekbeds as routes up into droughted highlands where much deadwood logging needs to be done to avoid billion dollar fires; the deadwood exported to town substitutes later in product manufacturing for the killing of a living tree somewhere, thus protecting forest economically worldwide. 
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Comment #7 posted by runruff on July 07, 2013 at 07:52:17 PT
Chris Rock and Kid Rock?
What do they talk about at family gatherings?
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Comment #6 posted by The GCW on July 05, 2013 at 19:05:03 PT
News from Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania NAACP Says Legalize Marijuana"Last week, the Pennsylvania NAACP endorsed a pending marijuana legalization bill. And on the 4th of July, the civil rights group stepped up that support, holding a press conference to gain traction for the legislation.
The bill, Senate Bill 528, is sponsored by Sen. Daylin Leach (D-Montgomery County), and is currently bottled up in the Senate Law and Justice Committee. It would legalize, tax, and regulate the possession of small amounts of pot, as well as its commerce."I am honored that the NAACP has spoken out in favor of my legislation to legalize, regulate and tax marijuana in Pennsylvania," Leach said at the press conference. "As noted in recent reports, the war on drugs is racially-biased, inefficient and ineffective; and this modern day prohibition of a product less harmful than alcohol and tobacco needs to end. We can better use the resources we’re spending to fight this unnecessary war, and we can better spend our time and energy cracking down on substances that are actually harmful."Cont.http://www.cannabisculture.com/content/2013/07/05/Pennsylvania-NAACP-Says-Legalize-Marijuana
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Comment #5 posted by The GCW on July 05, 2013 at 19:01:55 PT
Refusing to grow hemp was against the law...
Hemp Flag Flies High on The Fourth of Julyhttp://www.cannabisculture.com/content/2013/07/05/Hemp-Flag-Flies-High-Fourth-July"CANNABIS CULTURE - The use of hemp was prevalent in the days of America's founding fathers. George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, among others, grew hemp. Betsy Ross sewed the first American flag out of hemp. Centuries later, this Fourth of July, a hemp flag flies over America once more.
The hemp flag make its debut above the United States Capital building, in Washington, D.C., on the Fourth of July.Americans may think of hemp as taboo and not a patriotic crop; however, the use of hemp was relied upon and thoroughly entwined in American history.
Hemp was once the most valuable crop in America. It was legal to pay taxes with hemp until the early 1800s. In fact, refusing to grow hemp in America during the 17th and 18th centuries was against the law! For a brief period in the late 1700s, American citizens in Virginia could be jailed for refusing to grow hemp – quite the opposite of the current political climate surrounding hemp."Cont.
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Comment #4 posted by museman on July 05, 2013 at 17:14:15 PT
"Old Glory"
More like "old gory."Yeah. I'd prefer to celebrate Little Big Horn myself than the BS one-sided history of the global conquerors. In fact, its about time to apologize to the original inhabitants and make reparations -like giving it all back...LEGALIZE FREEDOM
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Comment #3 posted by runruff on July 05, 2013 at 15:43:01 PT
Civil War?
 Only in America would a government claim to have had a "Civil War". Americans killed more Americans in their "Civil War' than any other war in American history. How civil is that? [Oxymoron].The American Indian among you does not celebrate the July forth Seventeen Seventy Six. But we like to remember July forth eighteen sixty three, the week our enemies slaughtered each other en-mass at Gettysburg. This proves the nature of the occupiers. If they were not busy "manifesting their destiny" they are busy turning on each other.Another day we celebrate is June Twenty Second Eighteen Seventy Six. It was a little matter of an intrusion buy a few hundred illegal aliens. They were met by the local immigration police and national guard, fought and defeated at a place called The Greasy Grass Creek. History calls this place The Little Big Horn.A pox on the 4th!
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Comment #2 posted by museman on July 05, 2013 at 13:51:41 PT
correction
Ok so the hemp came from Colorado. I stand corrected. The rest rides.
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Comment #1 posted by museman on July 05, 2013 at 13:48:39 PT
I wonder
Does a hemp flag burn better? Would some one do the honors?Fracking putrid, stinking scum that has risen to the top. I bet you think you are oh so cool because you paid thousands of the tax-payers money to import the hemp from either China or Canada. A 'token' symbol of the right of the state over the right of the people.Hemp burns better that churned up money -which is what has been a major ingredient in our US Flags for some time now.Steal that flag and burn it please?Lets see a REAL patriot in action!LEGALIZE FREEDOM
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