cannabisnews.com: Spliffed Spliffed Posted by FoM on April 06, 2001 at 17:17:29 PT By Robert Downey Source: Seattle Weekly Legislative hearings are frequently drowsy affairs, and the afternoon session of the Senate Committee on Health and Long-Term Care on February 12 promised to be no livelier than most. But a citizen activist changed all that in a hurry. The hearing was to take public testimony on Senate Bill 5176: "an act relating to rules to implement the medical marijuana law." Citizen activist Joanna McKee of the medical marijuana supply cooperative Green Cross unwittingly livened things up by showing the room the enormous amount of pot the Legislature was preparing to allow an ill individual to possess. Until McKee's performance, the bill, introduced for the third straight session by Sen. Jeanne Kohl-Welles of Seattle, was hardly controversial. Its purpose was merely to allow the state Department of Health to define how much marijuana a physician might legally prescribe a patient to relieve pain, nausea, and anxiety due to a diagnosed medical condition, to carry out the public will expressed in Initiative 692 passed in November 1998. A substantial number of members of the committee were known to sympathize with the bill; after initial doubts, law enforcement agencies had begun to rally round it; even the governor's highly conservative Council on Substance Abuse had come around. Of the 18 people signed up to testify that day, not one planned to oppose the bill. The bill itself is an effort to win a numbers game: The authors of Initiative 692 declined to specify what a "reasonable" amount of therapeutic marijuana might mean, instead referring to allowing patients to legally possess "a 60-day supply." That ambiguity has created controversies between law enforcement agencies and medical marijuana users. SB 5176 attempts to clarify the situation by instructing the state Department of Health to take existing federal guidelines into consideration in defining what constitutes a legal supply. "All I was trying to do was show the committee what the Feds are dispensing to patients in its program," says McKee. "My point was, whatever we do in Washington, it shouldn't be less than what the [federal] government is allowing people to have right now." To allow the legislators to visualize her point, McKee held up a canister sent to her by one of the eight patients still receiving marijuana from the federal government's nearly phased-out medical marijuana experiment. "What happens is, the marijuana is grown at a federal site in Mississippi and shipped to the North Carolina Research Triangle Institute, where they roll it into cigarettes and pack it into these canisters and send it off to pharmacies to be picked up by authorized patients," explains McKee. Each canister constitutes a 30-day supply, so Washington patients, under the rule proposed in SB 5176, would be able to possess double the amount in the canister, or 1 pound, 11 ounces. In terms of volume, the can McKee held up that day was pretty impressive, too; so big that you'd have trouble packing a purported 60-day supply into a volume the size of a half-gallon milk carton. Anybody, sick or not, who can go through that much ganja in 60 days without lots of enthusiastic help is one serious viper indeed, mon. And, in those "street prices" so beloved of cops and journalists, that amount of Mary Jane would go, depending on grade and season, for somewhere between $8,500 and $11,000. Something clearly is out of whack here, and it's not too hard to figure out what. For the last 40 years, since marijuana became a significant cash crop (the third biggest in America, it's estimated, and easily the most profitable), private growers have been hybridizing and cloning and genetically engineering their weed for ever-greater punch and productivity. But the bureaucrats at the fed's Lazy M Ranch in Mississippi haven't had the financial incentive to do the same. Consequence: Street bud these days averages somewhere between 10 and 20 times as potent as the dirt weed the feds dish out. No politician so far has publicly admitted that therefore the whole notion of basing "a 60-day supply" on what the feds pass out is dangerously out-of-date. Instead the joint just keeps getting handed along. On March 9, the full Senate passed Kohl-Welles' bill and passed it to the House, where it breezed through the Health Care Committee last Tuesday and on to Rules. Its fate there is uncertain; it takes the OK of both co-chairs of the committee to move the bill out for floor debate, and Republican co-chair Clyde Ballard of East Wenatchee is not widely known as a proponent of liberalizing drug laws, even in compassionate cases. Even if Ballard recognizes that his own law-and-order-oriented constituency is beginning to lean toward strictly controlled legalization of marijuana, it may not do the state's citizens much good in the short run. Rather than confront the growing sentiment at the state level for changes in marijuana law, the feds are trying to reverse state laws that conflict with the federal definition of marijuana as a Class I (no redeeming medical value) "controlled substance." The same day SB 5176 moved onto the Rules Committee, the Supreme Court heard U.S. v. Oakland Cannabis Buyers Co-op. Try to visualize anything useful coming out of that quarter. Go on, try. Note: The Legislature's medical-marijuana law runs afoul of reality.E-mail: rdowney seattleweekly.com Source: Seattle Weekly (WA)Author: Roger DowneyPublished: April 5 - April 11, 2001Copyright: 2001 Seattle WeeklyContact: letters seattleweekly.comWebsite: http://www.seattleweekly.com/Oakland Cannabis Buyers Co-ophttp://www.rxcbc.org/Washington Citizens For Medical Rights http://www.eventure.com/i692/CannabisNews Articles - Initiative 692http://cannabisnews.com/thcgi/search.pl?K=Initiative+692 Home Comment Email Register Recent Comments Help Comment #12 posted by SPIVER on April 17, 2001 at 15:05:45 PT: decriminalizing marijuana I myself am not a user, but i know a few people who have died or are dying from terminal cancers. I believe that all people going through serious pain deserve the opportunity to be able to use something may give them some ease. I thank anyone and everyone who is fighting to have marijuana either decriminalized or entrely legalized. Keep up all of your efforts! [ Post Comment ] Comment #11 posted by kaptinemo on April 08, 2001 at 08:17:29 PT: Something to think about... A few weeks ago, I bought a DVD. X-MenThe basic premise of it is that those who were feared and despised by society as a whole wind up saving it from something a lot worse than any supposed threat engendered by them. But underlying it all was the The Real Threat. Which lay in intolerance. Intolerance by society against the different. And an equally virulent intolerance borne of anger and frustration of those spitted on the short, sharp and dirty end of the majority's prejudices.I know, I know; it's hardly original. The theme runs throughout Western literature. The problem is, most people just don't take the lessons to heart.Just as today, most people don't see the DrugWar as a slide into tyranny. Lacking a degree of historical perspective - which would scream at them that they are this close to the fire - they continue to walk that famous Road paved with Good Intentions.Or refuse to see that those who are fighting that slide as anything but 'degenerates'. 'Druggies'. Practitioners of 'Cheech & Chong medicine'.Future historians, who can afford the luxury of distance from this particular battlefield, will marvel at how truly blind many of those were who so loudly supported the DrugWar...and its' excesses.I just hope that enough of us are around to set the record straight... [ Post Comment ] Comment #10 posted by Dan B on April 08, 2001 at 07:04:37 PT: By the way . . . . . . notice McTroll's e-mail address. It is not real.Further proof that the real author was trying to send a message about the police and prosecutors, rather than actually sending a message from them.Dan B [ Post Comment ] Comment #9 posted by Dan B on April 08, 2001 at 06:58:30 PT: Thanks, McTroll. I think it is abundantly clear that McTroll was writing a sarcastic statement intended not to glorify the sins of the drug warriors, but to show us the true nature of our opposition and to help us form a united front against them. I think we should copy this comment and post it up where we can see it every day. Let it remind us of the hatred and bigotry that keeps the war on drug users going, and let it remind us that we can never back down in this fight--that we must win for our own freedom's sake and, truly, for the sake of our children.Dan B [ Post Comment ] Comment #8 posted by freedom fighter on April 08, 2001 at 00:24:57 PT Using children to fight a dirty warnever can make it right..Too many souls have been lost to this insanity.. [ Post Comment ] Comment #7 posted by Jack Brown on April 07, 2001 at 16:16:16 PT: Thanks. Pot Smokers! "My children, and the children of other officers, prosecutors and government bureaucrats." as written by Your Local Police and Prosecutors ( McTrol ).Lets all hope and pray that who you have spoken of does not ever have to use Marijuana as medicine or lets add yourself and all your friend to the list. But if you have to maybe then you will thank us for all the crap we have had to endure so your sorry &*%$ can get some relife. This is not for your children or for enjoyment it is for sick and dieing people. If you want your kids to stay off drugs maybe you should get a lock for your medicine cabinet! [ Post Comment ] Comment #6 posted by McTroll on April 07, 2001 at 07:59:10 PT: Thanks, Pot Smokers! Look: we're out there every day dodging bullets from dopers and druggies. We need more of us police, to save the children! Of course, to save the children, we found it er, necessary, shall we say, to jail their mommies and daddies for small amounts of marijuana. This was to save the children, save the children from drugs and crime, from drug dealers and users! It is especially helpful to save the children from their doper mommies and daddies, when we find that their mommies and daddies have property: maybe a nice house or car for us to take. This is for the children, of course. (Not their children, silly! My children, and the children of other officers, prosecutors and government bureaucrats. That's what we really mean when we say, "it is for the children.") I want to thank all you pot smokers for making it easy for me to save the children, too. Just make sure you don't vote, or if you do vote, make sure to (re)elect one of my ex-prosecutor buddies. I appreciate the way you dope smokers don't like to join together to demand your so-called "rights", like other groups have done. That also makes it easy for me and my other prosecutor and police friends to pass more and more laws that put more and more money in our pockets. And more and more of you marajaweenie tokers in the pokey. Yes, that makes me smile. And laugh-all the way to the bank! Saving the children by jailing pot smokers. The more I think about it, the more I like it. Signed,Your Local Police and Prosecutors [ Post Comment ] Comment #5 posted by chris on April 07, 2001 at 00:49:57 PT: somewhere between $8,500 and $11,000 HAHAHA Im sick of stupid journalist who are so stupidwhen it comes to bud they need a 16 year old to tell them whats up!the street price of ganja goes like thisshitty mexican weed goes for$20 - $25 1/4 oz ($15 if your lucky)$65 - $80 oz$100 - $200 1/4 LB$300 - $500 lbmidgrade herb $25 - $35 1/4 oz$100 - $150 oz$200 - $300 1/4 lb$500 - $800 lbChronic (high grade)$20 g$40 - $50 1/8 oz$75 - $90 1/4 oz$250 - $400 oz$800 - $1000 1/4 lb$2000 - $5000 lbSUPER POTENT (one hitter quiter)$50 - $80 1/8 oz$100 - $150 1/4 oz$500 - $600 oz$5000+ lb [ Post Comment ] Comment #4 posted by The GCW on April 06, 2001 at 19:00:04 PT The bad evil. Isn't one of the reasons this amount is a tad larger 'cause it will be needed at times by, say, cancer patients who will need what they need and they will need it at times when they can't turn off the suffering to make more regular trips to the source. If they grow it then they have to have enough on hand till it produces the next crop. As I saw my son die of cancer July 4th, 1997 at age 17, I assure you if cannabis could help (& my son may not have), that the issue is not how much one would have before caging him.Quote: Street bud these days averages somewhere between 10 and 20 times as potent as the dirt weed the feds dish out. I have heard Government cannabis is weak, but...Maybe they should put emphasis on hiring someone competent in a green thumb instead of perhaps low budget growers.As far as the Garden of Eden goes, if the devil were to control the garden, the devil would do what is being done today. An evil and wicked gardener would lock you up for using it, kill you for using it etc. 'cause the bad evil can not comprehend that 1st page of the Bible. [ Post Comment ] Comment #3 posted by Ethan Russo, MD on April 06, 2001 at 18:57:25 PT: Somebody's Fantasy "Street bud these days averages somewhere between 10 and 20 times as potent as the dirt weed the feds dish out." The government cannabis averages 3% THC. Very, very little of even the finest homegrown buds approach 30%. 60% THC is a theoretical upper limit for modern sieved or washed hashish (see Rob Clarke's book: Hashish!). Thus, the usual journalistic hyperbole obtains here. [ Post Comment ] Comment #2 posted by stripey on April 06, 2001 at 18:11:00 PT Cont. . . =) . . . [vipe]r indeed, mon.Oops. =) [ Post Comment ] Comment #1 posted by Stripey on April 06, 2001 at 18:09:26 PT C'mon, that's just low. . . "Anybody, sick or not, who can go through that much ganja in 60 days without lots of enthusiastic help is one serious viper indeed, mon." God forbid that people need more than one or two joints a day to ease the chronic pain and nausia and loss of appetite generally associated with the degenerative diseases for which marijuana is perscribed. I have a hard time seeing where a journalist who obviously doesn't like the MMJ movement anyway has the knowledge or the basis for comparison on what a "reasonable" amount is. Anyone who would take cuts at the sick and dying over a plant in the first place is one serious vipe [ Post Comment ] Post Comment Name: Optional Password: E-Mail: Subject: Comment: [Please refrain from using profanity in your message] Link URL: Link Title: