Token Justice

[Guest guest]

First let me say, I do not advocate any recreational drug use including

alcohol.

 

On a small scale medical marijuana is available from the U.S. Government

and it has been for many years, although it is being scaled back and THC the

active ingredient is available from doctors in " pill " form (pharma companies) to

stimulate the appetite in seriously ill people. I do

not see much of a difference, at least not enough difference to warrant this

war, especially where medical marijuana has been approved by the " people " . The

" People " seem to count less and less each year.

 

Then when these people are arrested they are prohibited by the courts from

presenting any defense on their own part based upon legal medical use or

cultivation or any mention that they may be licensed by cities to cultivate and

dispense it for the sick and dying. Juries then convict them without hearing any

of the pertinent information. Some justice huh. Not just in Oz, we have our own

variety of kangaroos in the us also. F.

 

 

http://www.alternet.org/drugreporter/19346/

 

Token Justice

By Steve Kubby, AlterNet

 

Posted on July 26, 2004,

http://www.alternet.org/story/19346/

 

The term medical marijuana took on dramatic new

meaning in February, 2000 when researchers in Madrid

Spain announced they had destroyed incurable brain

tumors in rats by injecting them with THC, the most

psychoactive ingredient in cannabis.

 

Most Americans don't know anything about the Madrid

discovery. Virtually no major U.S. newspapers carried

the story, which ran only once on the AP and UPI news

wires, on Feb. 29, 2000. Why has this vitally

important information been suppressed while the media

regularly trumpet any possible breakthrough in cancer

research?

 

The Madrid study wasn't the first time that THC has

been administered to tumor-bearing animals. In 1974

researchers at the Medical College of Virginia, who

had been funded by the National Institute of Health in

order to find evidence that marijuana damages the

immune system, found instead that THC slowed the

growth of three kinds of cancer in mice – lung and

breast cancer, and a virus-induced leukemia. Since

then, dozens of other peer-reviewed scientific studies

have confirmed that THC and other canabinoids shrink

tumors, cut off their blood supply and may even

program cancer cells to die.

 

Because news of such advances in our understanding of

medical marijuana has been suppressed, serious

opposition still exists within the law enforcement

community. They claim that the Compassionate Use Act

of 1996 was some sort of hoax, or worse, not a law to

be obeyed because federal marijuana laws trump state

laws.

 

As a result, seven years after voters approved Prop.

215, sick, disabled and dying people are still being

arrested, jailed, humiliated and bankrupted. An

ideology of zero tolerance has deprived medical

marijuana patients not only of justice but of life

itself.

 

Contrary to assertions by police and US officials,

federal law ought not to trump state medical marijuana

laws, according to the 9th Circuit Court decision on

December 16, 2003. In that decision, the Court found

that " the appellants have demonstrated a strong

likelihood of success on their claim that, as applied

to them, the CSA [Controlled Substances Act of 1970]

is an unconstitutional exercise of Congress' Commerce

Clause authority. "

 

On May 14, 2004, District Court Judge Martin J.

Jenkins acted upon this decision by the 9th Circuit

Court and granted a preliminary injunction against the

federal government, thereby protecting the medical

marijuana rights of the two patients who are suing the

government in this case.

 

Just one month later, in the case of County of Santa

Cruz et al. v. Ashcroft, U.S. District Judge Jeremy

Fogel issued a temporary injunction barring the

federal government from raiding the marijuana gardens

of the Wo/Men's Alliance for Medical Marijuana, or

WAMM.

 

The ruling allows the collective to resume cultivation

free from the fear of further federal prosecution.

This relief comes 18 months after a brutal Drug

Enforcement Administration raid on WAMM in Santa Cruz,

and a year after the collective's seriously ill

members filed suit against the federal government to

stop the law enforcement harassment.

 

Law enforcement and prosecutors also claim that

patients dragged before the courts possess " too much

for personal use. " However, Proposition 215 set only

one medical-marijuana possession limit, and that limit

is " for personal medical use. "

 

In 2002, the California Supreme Court affirmed this

quantity limit in People v. Mower. There, the court

clearly held that the only quantity limit or

requirement in Proposition 215 is " for personal

medical use. "

 

But how much is too much? How much would be too much

if your life depended on it?

 

Most narcotics officers claim that more than a few

ounces of marijuana per month would be more than is

necessary for personal use. In contrast, the US

government allows their legally licensed patients to

consume a pound per month. In Canada, patients such as

myself are licensed to grow and consume up to two

pounds per month. Law enforcement refuses to accept

these levels of medical usage, but patients can and do

consume these amounts of cannabis and still lead

productive lives. Indeed, many need it to be able to

live at all.

 

If respect for the law is to mean anything in our

society, our elected officials must set aside their

zero tolerance ideology and uphold California's

medical marijuana law – exactly as it was written and

passed by the people of California. Elected officials

should begin tomorrow to implement the Compassionate

Use Act of 1996 by taking the following four specific

actions:

 

1. Stop arresting sick people. Don't authorize

budgets or federal grants that will be used against

sick people. Adopt and implement the Mower Decision to

protect sick people from arrest.

 

2. Stop treating sick people like criminals.

According to the Mower Decision, bona fide medical

marijuana patients are entitled to a special hearing

to establish that they have a recommendation or

approval to use medical marijuana from a licensed

physician. Unless police have clear evidence of actual

sales, it is unlawful and immoral to arrest marijuana

growers who make claims of medical use.

 

3. Stop forcing sick people into the black market.

Demand that the federal government take action on the

petition filed by Jon Gettman with the Drug

Enforcement Administration on July 27, 1995, and

reschedule marijuana from a Schedule I to a Schedule

III. That action alone would solve many of the

problems and concerns voiced by law enforcement and

allow patients to go directly to their pharmacist to

obtain their medicine.

 

4. Start prosecuting those who violate the rights

of sick people. Elected officials must provide legal

protection for sick and dying patients from illegal

arrests and prosecutions. To uphold the law, officials

must see to it that police and prosecutors are held

accountable for violating the medical marijuana rights

of patients, caregivers and physicians.

 

Make no mistake; this issue is no more about marijuana

than the Boston Tea Party was about tea. This is about

sick and dying people who are living in fear that the

very people they pay to protect them have turned

against them, all because they use a medicine that the

Federal government's own IOM study says, " there is no

clear alternative for people suffering from chronic

conditions that might be relieved by smoking

marijuana, such as pain or AIDS wasting. "

 

Seven years is long enough. It's time to stop hiding

behind federal laws and the failed ideology. The

voters have spoken and they have clearly voted to stop

treating medical marijuana patients like criminals.

Medical marijuana is the law; now is the time for law

enforcement and our elected officials to show good

faith and stop arresting sick people.

 

It is time for our elected officials and police to

uphold their oath of office and uphold the will of the

voters who wisely chose to protect sick people and

exempt them from the War on Drugs. It wasn't difficult

for the voters to understand medical marijuana, they

voted by a whopping 56 percent to 44 percent to pass

the law. Juries don't seem to have a problem

understanding medical marijuana either. Only police

and prosecutors seem to have difficulty comprehending

that medical marijuana is real and it is the law.

 

Medical marijuana patients need real justice. They

need police and prosecutors who will respect their

rights, their dignity and protect them from real

criminals.

© 2004 Independent Media Institute. All rights

reserved.

View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/19346/