FREE THE WEED 27

A Column by John Sinclair

I’m completing my five-month residency in New Orleans working with Dave Brinks & Jimmy Cass to help establish the N.O. Institute for the Imagination, but I made a quick trip to Michigan last weekend to join MMMR publisher Ben Horner for a little series of three visits to medical marijuana sites in Flint, Ann Arbor and Detroit and to take part in the opening of the late Mike Kelley’s Mobile Homestead project at the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit (MOCAD).

COMMON SENSE DECISION ALLOWS MEDICAL MARIJUANA PATIENTS TO DRIVE AGAIN

by Ted Heitor
Finally some good news came from the Michigan Supreme Court that allows medical marijuana patients to operate a motor vehicle with marijuana in their system. As we all know, marijuana can show up on a blood test thirty days or more after using it.  Washington, Nevada, Ohio, and Colorado have set specific legal driving limits of a certain number of nanograms of THC in a driver's blood, and the court recommended that Michigan do the same before long. As for now, an officer will have to prove that you are impaired by administering roadside field sobriety tests before taking you in to get your blood drawn.  Police will also have to show proof that the driver was “under the influence” of marijuana for charges to stick.

Inside Thoughts

by: Adam Brook
Let me start by addressing an issue that was in March issue. My good friend, and MMMR contributor John Sinclair took the HASH BASH to task. Knowing John as I do, I know that while he was “cheesed off”, he was not as offended as I was. As John mentioned he has had a “voluntary commitment to the event". For that I can not thank him enough. He has been a good friend of mine for the last 15 or so years. I only hope that the actions of a few knuckleheads can be made right. John wrote that I had "tight but benevolent control” of HASH BASH.

Medical Cannabis Charity Accepted for Southeastern Michigan Area Combined Federated Campaign

May 17, 2013, Royal Oak, MI – The Officers and Board of Directors of Michigan Compassion are pleased to announce their successful application to participate in the Southeastern Michigan Area Combined Federal Campaign (CFC.) The CFC is the nation’s largest workplace charitable giving program made-up of all State and federal agencies in a 9 county region including the Metropolitan Detroit counties. Michigan Compassion is one of 2,500 other public charities accepted to participate in the program in the Southeastern Michigan Region but the first Medical Cannabis charity to be accepted in any of the 200 nationwide regions.

DRUG WAR MEANS LESS REAL CRIMES ARE SOLVED!

By Chuck Ream

Police are not solving crimes like they used to, and now we can prove it.  Law enforcement dollars would be better spent protecting our safety or finding criminals than on persecuting potheads.

The urgency of spending local law enforcement dollars wisely is illustrated by what currently happens in Michigan following a rape. Thousands of “rape kits” in Michigan have not been processed, yet huge sums are spent on cannabis law enforcement. These priorities are wrong.

It is relatively unknown that law enforcement has been continually less effective at finding real criminals since it began to focus on Drug War.  Murderers, rapists and robbers are apprehended far less often in 2009 than they were when Drug War began in earnest in 1971.

LEGALIZE IT! IN LANSING NOV. 5, 2013!

By Chuck Ream

Michigan’s legislators are responsible every day for a brutal and anti-American cannabis prohibition, and every day they go to work in Lansing. Michigan’s voters from cities across the state have clearly voted that they would like to see the legalization of small amounts of cannabis, or at least full decriminalization. Legislators ignore the voters!

Lansing voters will give them the message!!  Our momentum in Michigan will keep rolling forward!

With your help, the Coalition for a Safer Lansing will have “legalization by exemption” of one ounce or less or marijuana on the ballot for the November 2013 city elections! We know that, in their wisdom and compassion, Lansing voters will find that cannabis prohibition is more dangerous than cannabis!

PLEASE support (give money) to the 2013 Lansing campaign for the legalization of possession of an ounce or less of cannabis by adults. Strike a huge nail into the coffin of cannabis prohibition in Michigan!

We need over 6000 signatures, and $12,000 is our budget. More than $2000 has been raised, and petitioners are already getting signatures. We need petitioners, or money to pay petitioners! Early in the game we can get signatures for $1. The final petition turn in date is August 8.

MMMReport donates $1000 to the 2013 Lansing Campaign!

MMReport is not just a magazine, it is a part of “the Movement”! Thank you MMMReport!

It was five victories in Michigan cities that set up the conditions to get the grant to put our Michigan Medical Marijuana Act on the ballot.

Michigan’s cannabis law reform movement won five local landslide victories on Nov. 6 2012. Ypsilanti voters gave 74% support to the idea of making marijuana laws the “Lowest Law Enforcement Priority” in Ypsi. (LLEP had won in Kalamazoo in 2011). In Kalamazoo medical marijuana dispensaries were on the ballot and won. Grand Rapids voters said they wanted to be like Ann Arbor, with pot possession punished by only a small fine. Detroit and Flint fully decriminalized (legalized) possession of pot for personal use, through the use of a brilliant concept pioneered by Tim Beck.

Tim crafted a petition that is sophisticated by being radically simple. It just attaches a paragraph to the local law that says that “the above law does not apply to any individual in possession of one ounce or less of marijuana who has attained the age of 21 years.”

I told him it wouldn’t work. The Detroit Election Commission said “no way”. The court and appeals court said “take a walk”. The Michigan Supreme Court understood that Tim’s concept of “decrim by exemption” was legal and forced Detroit to put it on the ballot last year. Tim paid the legal bill.

Detroit voters approved this “legalization” of one ounce or less by a 62 % victory margin. Flint voters also approved.

Now we have a “decrim by exemption” petition which has already been tested in the Michigan Supreme Court, which we can use in any Michigan city.

 Lansing is the prize – it will be done this year – please help!

PLEASE *CONTRIBUTE* TO THE DECRIMINALIZATION OF MARIJUANA IN LANSING!

HELP US WIN OUR FIGHT IN MICHIGAN’S CAPITOL – ON OUR LEGISLATORS HOME TURF!

PLEASE! SEND CHECKS TO: COALITION FOR A SAFER LANSING, Committee # 46424,                                 P.O. Box 1358, E. Lansing, Mi, 48826                     Invest in Freedom!

(All contributions must be received by check and reported by amount, date received,                              and donors name and address – make sure this needed information is provided. If                               cumulative contributions are more than $100.01 in a year we must also record and                                report the donor’s occupation, employer, and principal place of business.)                                                       DO YOUR PART FOR VICTORY!  

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BIG PHARMA WANTS TO BE YOUR CAREGIVER

Study shows marijuana pill reduces pain

Recent studies on marijuana in England, Israel and Canada acknowledge the benefits of smoking marijuana to manage pain. Researchers in Israel noticed a significant decline in the amount of prescribed medications taken by patients. After a yearlong study they noted participants took 1.7 pills less per day when smoking marijuana. Along with pain relief, each of the 72 patients studied also reported other positive effects after smoking three times daily over the course of the one year study. Researchers from McGill University in Canada reported that patients with chronic neuropathic pain experienced pain relief, improved mood and better quality sleep after smoking cannabis. In England, Dr. Michael Lee from the University of Oxford has done research involving participants taking MRI’s after smoking marijuana. Dr. Lee stated “'Cannabis does not seem to act like a conventional pain medicine. Some people respond really well, others not at all, or even poorly. Brain imaging shows little reduction in the brain regions that code for the sensation of pain, which is what we tend to see with drugs like opiates. Instead cannabis appears to mainly affect the emotional reaction to pain in a highly variable way.” These MRIs may be able to predict who will respond to cannabis according to Dr. Lee.

This international research may have lit a fire under researchers in America as the U.S. National Institute on Drug Abuse funded a study that concluded what thousands of marijuana users have known for years, marijuana helps for pain management. Don’t light a celebration joint just yet. The new study conducted at Columbia University in New York suggests that a pharmaceutical drug containing the active ingredient of marijuana may be more effective for pain when compared to smoking the herb. The study group was comprised of 15 men and 15 women who were regular marijuana smokers in good health. In five experimental sessions participants were asked to smoke marijuana, take the oral pill, or a placebo. They then participated in a “cold pressure test”, in which they placed their hands in 39 degree water and answered questions about the intensity of pain and how high they felt. Both the smoked marijuana and the higher dose pharmaceutical pill increased pain tolerance and decreased pain sensitivity as the people took an average of 12 to 13 seconds longer to report feeling pain from the cold water than when they took the placebo.  While the group felt the effects from the joint peak in 15 minutes, the capsule took almost three hours. Researchers noted that the pill and the joint were equally effective at controlling pain but suggested that the pill offered longer relief compared to the smoked marijuana. Subjects also felt less high when taking the capsule than smoking the joint.

So what is this new miracle drug?  It’s called dronabinol but you may know it as the FDA approved drug Marinol. That’s right, the same shitty drug that has caused nausea and other horrible side effects since 1985 is making a comeback with a new generic name and propaganda. The price for dronabinal remains at a staggering $700 a month, but your insurance company will have plenty of economic incentive to cover most of that expense. With such large kickbacks available it is certain that the pharmaceutical companies will have all the backing they need as they attempt to take over the medical marijuana world. Hold onto your joints, this is going to be one long ride. 

 

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