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2/14/2012 Tony Bennett Is Right That Legalizing Drugs Would Save Lives
"First it was Michael Jackson, then it was Amy Winehouse and now the magnificent Whitney Houston. I'd like to have every gentleman and lady in this room commit themselves to get our government to legalize drugs. So they have to get it through a doctor, not just some gangsters that sell it under the table." That's what Tony Bennett said at a pre-Grammy Awards party on Saturday night, shortly after learning of the tragic death of Whitney Houston, and he's exactly right. One of us (Neill) is a former police officer who fought -- and lost friends -- on the front lines of the failed "war on drugs." One of us (Katharine) learned about the commonality of human pain in another difficult way, spending two years in a residential facility ("rehab"). She wasn't there for drugs, but many of those struggling alongside her were. There has been some confusion and criticism over Bennett's remarks and, because of our experience dealing with the pain and heartbreak of drug abuse and harmful drug laws, we feel compelled to expand upon his heartfelt remarks in the hopes that we can help break through some of the misunderstanding underlying the reaction to what Bennett said. (Huffington Post)
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posted: 2/20/12                   0       5
#1 



1/9/2012 Grading the Republican Presidential Candidates
Anyone who's following presidential politics has a general sense that some Republicans are okay on the marijuana issue, and most Republicans are terrible. But don't take our word for it, see for yourself in this video. MPP has compiled a collection of videos from the Republican presidential candidates' views on marijuana, and graded them accordingly. See which candidates pass the test, and which ones clearly have some work to do. (Marijuana Policy Project)
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posted: 1/11/12      
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#2 



1/6/2012 Tallahassee settles suit over informant Rachel Hoffman's death
Tallahassee city commissioners approved a $2.6 million settlement Friday in the wrongful-death suit of a police informant who was fatally shot during a 2008 drug sting. The parents of Rachel Hoffman, 23, sued after her death, claiming police were negligent in setting up the Florida State graduate as an undercover informant after she was caught with marijuana and pills without a prescription. Jury selection for the lawsuit began this week and the trial was scheduled to begin Monday. After a closed door session with attorneys Friday, commissioners voted 3-2 to approve the settlement, the first $200,000 of which will be paid by the city in the next few weeks, City Attorney Jim English said. The rest will be paid after the Florida Legislature passes what is known as a "claims bill," which could take years. (Associated Press)
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posted: 1/15/12                   0       8
#3 
keywords: Andrea Green, Cocaine, Deneilo Bradshaw, Ecstasy, Florida, Florida State University, Gun Control, Informants, Irv Hoffman, Jim English, Marijuana, Police, Rachel Hoffman, Tallahassee, United States, Virgin Islands, War On Drugs Add New Keyword To Link



11/14/2011 High IQ linked to drug use
The "Just Say No" generation was often told by parents and teachers that intelligent people didn't use drugs. Turns out, the adults may have been wrong. A new British study finds children with high IQs are more likely to use drugs as adults than people who score low on IQ tests as children. The data come from the 1970 British Cohort Study, which has been following thousands of people over decades. The kids' IQs were tested at the ages of 5, 10 and 16. The study also asked about drug use and looked at education and other socioeconomic factors. Then when participants turned 30, they were asked whether they had used drugs such as marijuana, cocaine and heroin in the past year. (CNN)
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posted: 11/23/11                   0       7
#4 
keywords: Cardiff University, Cocaine, Education, Heroin, James White, Journal Of Epidemiology And Community Health, Marijuana, United Kingdom, United States, War On Drugs Add New Keyword To Link



10/17/2011 50 percent of Americans favor legal marijuana, poll finds
Slowly but surely Americans seem to be making peace with the pot pipe. According to a new poll released by Gallup on Monday, 50 percent of Americans say marijuana use should be legal

up from 46 percent last year. This year, 46 percent said it should be illegal. Those numbers mean that, for the first time in the poll's 42-year-history, Americans who say that marijuana should be legal outnumber those who say it should be illegal. Societal acceptance of marijuana has come a long way since 1969, when Gallup first posed the question "Should marijuana use be legal?" Back then, only 12 percent of Americans favored legalization of the drug. From the '70s through the mid-'90s, support remained in the 20s, but it has been climbing steadily since 2002. (Sacramento Bee)
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posted: 10/18/11                   0       4
#5 



10/8/2011 The federal government is cracking down on medical marijuana
California's four U.S. Attorneys, including Sacramento's US Attorney Benjamin Wagner, held a press conference Friday to announce the federal government's intention to crack down on medical marijuana dispensaries. The federal government has sent out letters to dispensaries and their landlords in San Francisco, San Diego, and Marin County. The letters state that the dispensaries are in violation of federal law, which supersedes state law, and that landlords should evict their dispensary tenants and dispensaries should close up shop within 45 days otherwise both the dispensary owners and the landlords will be arrested and prosecuted. The four U.S. Attorneys say they aren't aiming to close every dispensary in the state; just those that are "clearly profiteering" from the medical marijuana industry. But the letters come after the news that the IRS is trying to make Harborside Health Center in Oakland, the largest medical marijuana provider, pay $2.4 million in tax penalties for trafficking in illegal drugs. The federal government is sending a message loud and clear "we are no longer going to respect state medical marijuana laws". After Obama was elected he promised to respect state laws legalizing medical marijuana. He directed U.S. prosecutors to leave the sick with medical cards alone. Obama has broken that promise. By attacking the medical marijuana dispensaries the federal government is cutting off the sick from their medicine, and thus in effect attacking the sick with medical cards and ignoring state laws. And while the Obama administration begins the assault on medical marijuana; there is a scandal growing that has gotten little attention. In December of 2010 a border patrol agent, Brian Terry, was found killed by drug cartels in Mexico. Then in March 2011 an agent of the Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF), a federal agency, named John Dodson blew the whistle on a program called "Fast and Furious". "Fast and Furious" is a program by the ATF to sell thousands of guns to traffickers and drug cartels in Mexico; allegedly so the federal government can build a legal case. Two guns found at the scene of Brian Terry's death were linked to the "Fast and Furious" program. Since March the Obama administration has been distancing itself from the program. (Examiner)
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posted: 10/12/11                   0       3
#6 



9/10/2011 National drug survey shows big drop in methamphetamine use
Drug use among college-age adults is increasing, driven largely by an increase marijuana use, a national drug-use survey has found. Nearly one in 10 Americans report regularly using illegal drugs, including marijuana, cocaine, heroin, hallucinogens, inhalants or prescription drugs used recreationally, according to the National Survey on Drug Use and Health made public today. The survey, sponsored by the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), collects the data from interviews with 67,500 randomly selected people 12 years or older. Marijuana, with 17.4 million regular users, is by far the most commonly used drug. Its popularity is growing: 6.9% of the population reported using marijuana regularly, up from 5.8% in 2007. Among 12- to 17-year-olds, 7.4% reported having used marijuana in the past month, about the same as last year. Drug use among young adults 18 to 25 has inched up steadily from 19.6% in 2008 to 21.5% in 2010. Marijuana use in that group rose from 16.5% in 2008 to 18.5% in 2010. Gil Kerlikowske, director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, attributed the uptick in marijuana use to the increase in the number of states that have approved it for medical use. Delaware in May became the 16th state to approve medical marijuana. Drug use climbs (USA Today)
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posted: 9/14/11                   0       6
#7 
keywords: Alcohol, American Association Of Poison Control Centers, Bill Piper, Brown University, Centers For Disease Control, Cocaine, Delaware, Department Of Health And Human Services, Drug Enforcement Administration, Drug Policy Alliance, Fibromyalgia, Gil Kerlikowske, Heroin, Lsd, Marijuana, Mdpv, Mephedrone, Methamphetamines, Methylone, Office Of National Drug Control Policy, Peter Delany, Rebecca Mcgoldrick, Students For A Sensible Drug Policy, Substance Abuse And Mental Health Services Administration, United States, War On Drugs Add New Keyword To Link



8/16/2011 Obama Stumped by Question on Marijuana Legalization
It's become pretty clear that the president is going to be asked about marijuana legalization absolutely any time he takes questions from the public, so it kind of amazes me that he is actually getting worse at talking about it. This latest exchange is just embarrassing: President Barack Obama sidestepped a question about medical marijuana legalization at a town hall event in Cannon Falls, Minnesota Monday. "If you can't legalize marijuana, why can't you just legalize medical marijuana?" a woman asked the president. "A lot of states are making decisions about medical marijuana," Obama explained. "As a controlled substance, the issue is then that is it being prescribed by a doctor as opposed to... you know, well, I'll leave it at that." [Raw Story] That is the best he can do to address one of the hottest topics in modern American politics. He'll just "leave it at that," because an increasingly frustrated public might react negatively to a slightly lengthier attempt at explaining why anyone, least of all sick people, should ever have to worry about being arrested and thrown in jail for having some marijuana in their pocket. (Huffington Post)
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posted: 9/14/11                   0       5
#8 



6/24/2011 Ending Federal Marijuana Prohibition Act of 2011
On June 23, 2011, U.S. Representatives Barney Frank (D-MA), Ron Paul (R-TX), Steve Cohen (D-TN), John Conyers (D-MICH.), Barbara Lee (D-CA) and Jared Polis (D-CO) introduced H.R. 2306, a bill to end the federal prohibition on the possession, cultivation, distribution, importation and exportation of marijuana. This is a remarkable bill for several reasons. First, the bill would truly and completely decriminalize marijuana under federal law. Unlike state laws that reduce the penalty for possession of marijuana from a criminal offense to a summary offense or violation like a traffic offense, there would be no federal violation for possessing or growing marijuana. For example, it is not a federal offense to drive too fast on a federally-funded highway -- it is only a violation of state law. Under this bill, it becomes solely a matter of state law whether one can possess or grow or sell marijuana. Second, by removing marijuana from the Controlled Substances Act, one of the major impediments to state medical marijuana laws would be removed! If enacted, there could no longer be any argument that the state medical marijuana law is in "conflict" with federal law. The bill does not address any issues of regulation of marijuana as a "drug" under the Federal Food, Drug, Cosmetic and Device Act. (Sterling on Justice & Drugs)
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posted: 7/29/11                   0       5
#9 



6/17/2011 Marijuana dispensary raided in south Sacramento
A marijuana dispensary in south Sacramento was raided yesterday by Elk Grove police and the Sacramento County Sheriff's Department. The two operators of the dispensary, a son and his father were placed under arrest. The two police departments claimed that they were operating as a for-profit establishment while the law only allows for non-profit dispensaries. However, this is clearly a front used by the local police to try and scare others out of the pot industry that is developing. An Oakland based group, Americans for Safer Access, contends that police departments frequently justify raids by claiming a dispensary is not operating as a non-profit establishment. But what they are really doing is trying to maintain control over a market that is starting to become more mainstream. Sacramento police should not be wasting their time busting up marijuana dispensaries. By doing so they are merely interfering in patients suffering from severe illnesses from gaining access to the medicine they need. They are imprisoning people over laws with little public support. They are wasting taxpayer money on an offense which is non-violent, and doesn't harm the surrounding environment. (Examiner)
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posted: 6/28/11                   0       5
#10 
keywords: Americans For Safer Access, Drug Cartels, Elk Grove, Marijuana, Mexico, Oakland, Police, Sacramento, United States, War On Drugs Add New Keyword To Link



6/13/2011 Drug Legalization: A Step Closer, But Still a Long Shot
A recent report on drug policy, backed by high-profile political figures, argues for a move away from the “zero tolerance” approach. However, it fails to offer any clear solutions on halting violence and organized crime, and has been rejected by a number of Latin American governments. The Global Commission on Drug Policy's report (get it English and Spanish here) -- issued June 2 in New York City and signed by an unprecedented 19 high level world leaders, including former presidents of Brazil, Mexico, Colombia and Switzerland, the incumbent Prime Minister of Greece, the former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, the former U.S. Secretary of State George Shultz, the former European Union High Commissioner Javier Solana, and the British billionaire Richard Branson, among others -- may be the most important call ever for reform to the 1988 United Nations Convention on Drugs (pdf version here). That convention, adopted worldwide and enforced largely by the United States, set the international ground rules for the so-called “war on drugs.” The Global Commission is trying to rewrite those rules. And this recent proposal is nothing short of a paradigm shift. (In Sight)
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posted: 6/15/11                   0       7
#11 



6/3/2011 Vermont Becomes Eighth Medical Marijuana Dispensary State
Vermont is now set to become the eighth medical marijuana dispensary set. Gov. Peter Shumlin (D) Thursday signed into law a bill that will create a system of up to four explicitly authorized and state regulated dispensaries for medical marijuana patients. (Drug War Chronicle)
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posted: 6/5/11                   0       7
#12 



5/17/2011 Smell Pot? SCOTUS Kills 4th Amendment
The Supreme Court says police can enter your home without a warrant, if they smell marijuana, and if when knocking on the door, they hear what sounds like the destruction of evidence. But apparently, by making sounds like destruction of evidence like flushing a toilet, police can come in. Students for Sensible Drug Policy's Aaron Houston discusses. (Russia Today)
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posted: 5/18/11      
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#13 



5/17/2011 The Supreme Court's Stinky Ruling on Marijuana Odor: What Does it Really Mean?
This week's Supreme Court decision in Kentucky v. King has civil-libertarians and marijuana policy reformers in an uproar, and rightly so, but it's not exactly the death of the 4th Amendment. Here's a look at how this case could impact police practices and constitutional rights. It all started when police chased a drug suspect into a building and lost him. They smelled marijuana smoke coming from an apartment and decided to check it out, so they announced themselves and knocked loudly on the door. They heard movement inside, which the officers feared could indicate destruction of evidence, so they kicked in the door and entered the apartment. Hollis King was arrested for drugs and challenged the police entry as a violation of his 4th Amendment right against unreasonable searches. In an 8-1 decision written by Justice Alito, the Court determined that an emergency search was justified to prevent destruction of evidence, even though police created the risk of such destruction by yelling "Police!" and banging on the door. The determining factor, in the Court's view, was that police had not violated the 4th Amendment simply by knocking on the door. Since the subsequent need to prevent destruction of evidence was the result of legal conduct by the officers, the events that followed do not constitute a violation of the suspect's constitutional rights. Naturally, any fan of the 4th Amendment can look at this scenario and wonder what's to stop police from "smelling" marijuana and "hearing" evidence being destroyed any time they have an urge to enter a particular dwelling. What does destruction of evidence sound like anyway, and what doesn't it sound like? Doesn't someone jumping up to destroy evidence sound the same as someone jumping up to answer the door before police kick it down? It's hard to argue with anyone who sees this result as a blueprint for facilitating not only widespread police actions that circumvent the warrant requirement, but also more innocent people being killed in their own homes in misunderstandings that could have been prevented by just a little patience from police. (Flex Your Rights)
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posted: 5/18/11                   0       7
#14 
keywords: Flex Your Rights, Hollis King, Marijuana, Police, Privacy, Samuel Alito, Scott Morgan, US Constitution, US Supreme Court, United States, War On Drugs Add New Keyword To Link



4/27/2011 Alleged Illegal Searches By NYPD Rarely Challenged in Marijuana Cases
Illegal searches are more common than people realize, but few end up getting challenged in court, law enforcement officials and defense attorneys say. Checks and balances within the criminal justice system are intended to ferret out improper arrests, but many defendants and their lawyers say they face insurmountable obstacles when fighting marijuana charges – and the alleged illegal searches that sometimes led to them. More than 50,000 people were arrested in the city for misdemeanor marijuana possession last year – the highest in a decade. And a substantial number of these arrests take place in the police precincts where the most stop-and-frisks occur, which are predominately black and Latino neighborhoods. More than a dozen men who were arrested in these precincts for misdemeanor marijuana possession told WNYC the police recovered marijuana on them through illegal searches. None of them challenged these allegedly illegal searches in court. (WNYC)
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posted: 5/27/11                   0       3
#15 
keywords: Civilian Complaint Review Board, Devry University, Drug Policy Alliance, Ed Mccarthy, Eugene O'donnell, Harold Crawford, Jeannette Rucker, John Jay College Of Criminal Justice, Marijuana, New York, New York City, New York State Division Of Criminal Justice Services, Police, Privacy, United States, War On Drugs Add New Keyword To Link



4/25/2011 Drug-bashing RI Republican charged with drug use
Robert Watson, a high-ranking Republican state legislator in Rhode Island, is in hot water after being charged with driving under the influence of marijuana and possession of marijuana and drug paraphernalia. Drug charges alone would be bad enough for a public official, but Watson, Rhode Island's House minority leader, is still remembered for his controversial anti-drug, anti-gay and anti-immigrant remarks. In February, Watson said the Rhode Island legislature had their priorities right "if you are a Guatemalan gay man who likes to gamble and smokes marijuana." (The Raw Story)
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posted: 5/3/11                   0       4
#16 



2/10/2011 Happy toking: Strong majorities for drug reform (The Economist/YouGov poll)
THIS week’s Economist-YouGov poll contains some exciting news for devotees of the weed. A huge majority of Americans, more than two to one once don’t knows have been excluded, support the legalisation and taxation of marijuana. Even without excluding the don’t knows, a clear majority favours treating the drug equivalently to tobacco and alcohol. The data (see chart) reveal some interesting patterns. In every age group, more people favour than oppose legalisation. Predictably enough, the young are very strongly in favour, but babyboomers are almost as strongly so; and even those over 65 are narrowly in favour as well. Breaking the poll down by party, one finds that Republicans as well as Democrats are in favour, though the former much more narrowly so. (The Economist)
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posted: 2/28/11                   0       3
#17 



1/27/2011 Obama Says Drug Legalization is "An Entirely Legitimate Topic for Debate"
The staggering vote count and significant media coverage of the demand for discussion of drug policy in today's YouTube interview were too great to ignore. Obama gave us an answer this time, and here it is: [Video] (Stop The Drug War)
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posted: 2/2/11                   0       5
#18 



12/19/2010 Missoula District Court: Jury pool in marijuana case stages 'mutiny'
A funny thing happened on the way to a trial in Missoula County District Court last week. Jurors – well, potential jurors – staged a revolt. They took the law into their own hands, as it were, and made it clear they weren’t about to convict anybody for having a couple of buds of marijuana. Never mind that the defendant in question also faced a felony charge of criminal distribution of dangerous drugs. The tiny amount of marijuana police found while searching Touray Cornell’s home on April 23 became a huge issue for some members of the jury panel. No, they said, one after the other. No way would they convict somebody for having a 16th of an ounce. In fact, one juror wondered why the county was wasting time and money prosecuting the case at all, said a flummoxed Deputy Missoula County Attorney Andrew Paul. District Judge Dusty Deschamps took a quick poll as to who might agree. Of the 27 potential jurors before him, maybe five raised their hands. A couple of others had already been excused because of their philosophical objections. (Billings Gazette)
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posted: 12/22/10                   0       9
#19 
keywords: Andrew Paul, Dusty Deschamps, John Masterson, Marijuana, Martin Elison, Montana, Montana Department Of Corrections, National Organization For The Reform Of Marijuana Laws, Police, Touray Cornell, United States, War On Drugs Add New Keyword To Link



12/9/2010 Budding Prospects: Youth Activists Push Marijuana Reform
On November 7 a group of student activists gathered in a room on the University of Colorado campus to discuss strategies for how to run a marijuana legalization campaign in the 2012 elections. Five days earlier, voters in California had defeated Proposition 19 by a margin of seven points. Although the vote represented the largest percentage a US legalization measure has ever garnered (46.5 percent), many in the drug policy reform community were discouraged. Young activists who had spent the past several months encouraging students on California campuses to register, and who worked furiously in the final days to get out the vote, were exhausted. There were a lot of sullen expressions in downtown Oakland on election night. But for the students in Boulder, and in some ways for the legalization movement more broadly, the fight is just beginning. After all the media attention heaped on the Prop 19 campaign, it should come as no surprise that the vanguard of the legalization drive in Colorado is made up of college-age activists. Motivating young voters was a central focus of the grassroots effort for Prop 19, and to a large extent it worked. In a postelection follow-up, the Public Policy Institute of California found that 62 percent of voters under 34 supported the initiative. The campaign I helped to organize through Students for Sensible Drug Policy (SSDP) printed more than 100,000 door hangers with bar codes that, when scanned by cellphones, directed students to their polling place. And we didn't stop with California. We worked with our partners in the Just Say Now campaign to organize phone banks staffed by students from all over the country, who made thousands of calls for the low cost of several pizzas per night. (The Nation)
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posted: 12/11/10                   0       11
#20 
keywords: Aaron Houston, Adam Eidinger, Alan Amsterdam, Barack Obama, Boulder, California, Colorado, Comedy Central, Controlled Substances Act, David Bronner, Denver, Denver Post, Dr. Bronner's Magic Soaps, Drug Cartels, Dustin Moskovitz, Eric Holder, Facebook, George Soros, Jimmy Carter, Los Angeles Times, Marijuana, Maurice Hinchey, Napster, Nick Shapiro, Oakland, Oaksterdam University, Peter Lewis, Police, Richard Lee, Sarah Palin, Sean Parker, Students For Sensible Drug Policy, Tea Party, Ted Kennedy, US Congress, US Department Of Justice, United States, University Of Colorado, War On Drugs, Washington DC, White House Add New Keyword To Link



10/27/2010 End the War on Pot
I dropped in on a marijuana shop here that proudly boasted that it sells “31 flavors.” It also offered a loyalty program. For every 10 purchases of pot — supposedly for medical uses — you get one free packet. “There are five of these shops within a three-block radius,” explained the proprietor, Edward J. Kim. He brimmed with pride at his inventory and sounded like any small businessman as he complained about onerous government regulation. Like, well, state and federal laws. But those burdensome regulations are already evaporating in California, where anyone who can fake a headache already can buy pot. Now there’s a significant chance that on Tuesday, California voters will choose to go further and broadly legalize marijuana. I hope so. Our nearly century-long experiment in banning marijuana has failed as abysmally as Prohibition did, and California may now be pioneering a saner approach. Sure, there are risks if California legalizes pot. But our present drug policy has three catastrophic consequences. (New York Times)
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posted: 11/1/10                   0       23
#21 



10/25/2010 What the Feds Can Do About Prop 19: The attorney general will have a tough decision to make if California legalizes marijuana.
Assume for a moment that California voters approve Proposition 19 on Nov. 2. The state will have just enacted a process for legalizing, regulating, and taxing marijuana use that no one else in the world has ever attempted. But Attorney General Eric Holder, President Obama’s top law-enforcement officer, has said the administration will “vigorously enforce” federal drug laws in the country’s most populous state regardless of the vote. For all the trails that approving Prop 19 would blaze, much of its impact would depend on the extent to which Holder follows through on that threat. The attorney general has shown some willingness to scale back on marijuana enforcement; his Justice Department ended Bush-era crackdowns on medical pot dispensaries in California. Of course, the post–Prop 19 world would be different. California cities could license businesses that grow and sell marijuana on a large scale. Drug dealers in other states would surely head to California’s “coffee shops” (as weed retailers are called in Amsterdam), buy some California-grown product, and illegally transport it back home. It’s arguable that pot smokers and presumably some dealers can do that today, but they at least need a doctor’s permission and a state-issued ID card, which provides cover for authorities, however easily those cards may be obtainable. With that cover removed, Holder, whose department includes the Drug Enforcement Administration, could hardly ignore such a blatant violation of federal drug law. (Newsweek)
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posted: 11/1/10                   0       19
#22 



10/18/2010 Former surgeon general calls for marijuana legalization
Former U.S. Surgeon General Joycelyn Elders told CNN Sunday she supports legalizing marijuana. The trend-setting state of California is voting next month on a ballot initiative to legalize pot, also known as Proposition 19. The measure would legalize recreational use in the state, though federal officials have said they would continue to enforce drug laws in California if the initiative is approved. "What I think is horrible about all of this, is that we criminalize young people. And we use so many of our excellent resources ... for things that aren't really causing any problems," said Elders. "It's not a toxic substance." (CNN)
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posted: 10/18/10                   0       20
#23 



9/29/2010 One in 28 US kids has a parent in prison: study
The US's exceptionally high rate of incarceration is causing economic damage not only to the people behind bars but to their children and taxpayers as a whole, a new study finds. The study (PDF) from the Pew Research Center's Economic Mobility Project, released Tuesday, reports that the US prison population has more than quadrupled since 1980, from 500,000 to 2.3 million, making the US's incarceration rate the highest in the world, beating former champions like Russia and South Africa. This means more than one in 100 Americans is in prison, and the cost of prisons to states now exceeds $50 billion per year, or one in every 15 state dollars spent -- a figure the study describes as "staggering." According to the authors, one in every 28 children in the US has a parent behind bars -- up from one in 125 just 25 years ago. This is significant, the study argues, because children of incarcerated parents are much likelier to struggle in life. A family with an incarcerated parent on average earns 22 percent less the year after the incarceration than it did the year before, the study finds. And children with parents in prison are significantly likelier to be expelled from school than others; 23 percent of students with jailed parents are expelled, compared to 4 percent for the general population. (The Raw Story)
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posted: 10/3/10                   0       13
#24 



9/28/2010 Sooner or later, marijuana will be legal
It's as predictable as the sun rising and setting. Even though police made more than 850,000 marijuana arrests last year, a recent government report shows youth marijuana use increased by about 9 percent. Supporters of the failed war on drugs will no doubt argue this increase means policymakers should spend more taxpayer money next year arresting and incarcerating a greater number of Americans. In other words, their solution to failure is to do more of the same. Fortunately, the "reform nothing" club is getting mighty lonely these days -- 76 percent of Americans recognize the drug war has failed; millions are demanding change. (CNN)
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posted: 9/29/10                   0       12
#25 



9/27/2010 The Budgetary Impact of Ending Drug Prohibition
State and federal governments in the United States face massive looming fiscal deficits. One policy change that can reduce deficits is ending the drug war. Legalization means reduced expenditure on enforcement and an increase in tax revenue from legalized sales. This report estimates that legalizing drugs would save roughly $41.3 billion per year in government expenditure on enforcement of prohibition. Of these savings, $25.7 billion would accrue to state and local governments, while $15.6 billion would accrue to the federal government. Approximately $8.7 billion of the savings would result from legalization of marijuana and $32.6 billion from legalization of other drugs. The report also estimates that drug legalization would yield tax revenue of $46.7 billion annually, assuming legal drugs were taxed at rates comparable to those on alcohol and tobacco. Approximately $8.7 billion of this revenue would result from legalization of marijuana and $38.0 billion from legalization of other drugs. (CATO Institute)
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posted: 10/3/10                   0       7
#26 



9/24/2010 We ignore rise in drug abuse among kids
By William J. Bennett, Alexandra Datig and Seth Leibsohn

Last week, the government released its National Survey on Drug Use and Health. It didn't make much of a news splash, but it should have -- and in years past, it would have. When a serious war is taking place, officials throughout the administration hold press conferences and issue statements while print and televised media across the country report on it. Almost none of this happened, although the reasons for talking and reporting are greater than they have been in a very long time. Here's the takeaway: Illicit drug abuse is seriously affecting our children, our schools, our workplaces and our society. And it is on the rise. In 2009, nearly 22 million Americans were regularly abusing illicit drugs: a rise of 1.5 million abusers of marijuana from 2008 and a rise of 2.3 million users from 2007, a rise of 205,000 abusers of Ecstasy from 2008, a rise of 188,000 abusers of methamphetamine from 2008 and a rise of 800,000 abusers of prescription drugs from 2008. (CNN)
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posted: 9/27/10                   0       9
#27 
keywords: 9/11, Afghanistan, Alexandra Datig, Barack Obama, Big Pharma, California, Center On Addiction And Substance Abuse, Drug Enforcement Administration, Ecstasy, Iraq, Joe Califano, Joseph Califano, Marijuana, Methamphetamines, Office Of National Drug Control Policy, Rand Corporation, Seth Leibsohn, United States, War On Drugs, William Bennett Add New Keyword To Link



9/18/2010 How marijuana became legal: Medical marijuana is giving activists a chance to show how a legitimized pot business can work. Is the end of prohibition upon us?
When Irvin Rosenfeld, 56, picks me up at the Fort Lauderdale airport, his SUV reeks of marijuana. The vice president for sales at a local brokerage firm, Rosenfeld has been smoking 10 to 12 marijuana cigarettes a day for 38 years, he says. That's probably unusual in itself, but what makes Rosenfeld exceptional is that for the past 27 years, he has been copping his weed directly from the United States government. Every 25 days Rosenfeld goes to a pharmacy and picks up a tin of 300 federally grown and rolled cigarettes that have been sent there for him by the National Institute of Drug Abuse (NIDA), acting with approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Rosenfeld smokes the marijuana to relieve chronic pain and muscle spasms caused by a rare bone disease. When he was 10, doctors discovered that his skeleton was riddled with more than 200 tumors, due to a condition known as multiple congenital cartilaginous exostosis. Despite seven operations, he still lives with scores of tumors in his bones. (CNN)
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posted: 10/3/10                   0       3
#28 



9/16/2010 Daniel Pacheco delivers 52,000 Signatures to Drug Czar Gil Kerlikowske for Just Say Now
Daniel Pacheco, a member of Students for Sensible Drug Policy, delivered 52,000 signatures for Just Say Now to DrugCzar Gil Kerlikowske asking President Obama to end marijuana prohibition. (Just Say Now)
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posted: 9/21/10      
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#29 



8/19/2010 Canadian police find bears guarding pot crop
A pair of marijuana growers in Western Canada appear to have been using bears to protect their illegal crop, but the well-fed animals proved to be a bit lax in their guard duties, police said on Wednesday. (Reuters)
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posted: 8/23/10                   0       6
#30 



8/3/2010 'Just Say Now': Left-Right Coalition Launches Campaign To Legalize Pot
A transpartisan coalition of prosecutors, judges, cops, students, bloggers and political operatives on both sides of the aisle launched a campaign Tuesday to bring an end to marijuana prohibition, focusing on ballot initiatives in 2010 and 2012. The campaign, "Just Say Now," gets its name from Nancy Reagan's iconic anti-drug slogan from the 1980s that has become synonymous with the government's black-and-white approach to drug policy. "The stars are aligning in a very interesting way with Tea Party activists, who are generally libertarian," said Aaron Houston, head of Students for Sensible Drug Policy, on a conference call Tuesday afternoon announcing the formation of the coalition. "On the right and left it's a very popular issue." The campaign will be backing marijuana initiatives in 2010 in Arizona, Oregon, California, Colorado and South Dakota. The group will back initiatives in Nevada and elsewhere in 2012. (Huffington Post)
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posted: 8/22/10                   0       5
#31 



8/3/2010 Capitol Hill Marijuana Lobby Readies New Voter Campaign
Aaron Houston, who for the last seven years has been Capitol Hill's only full-time lobbyist for the legalization of marijuana, is preparing a new national campaign aimed at voters. He has high hopes that a union of liberal Democrats and small-government conservatives can coalesce around the marijuana issue. (Capitol News Connection)
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posted: 8/22/10                   0       5
#32 



8/3/2010 Happy Birthday, President Obama -- What Do You Say Now?
The Democrats are making President Obama’s 49th birthday on Wednesday a big deal. Our society uses birthdays to define responsibility and adulthood. The Constitution provides that a person is not mature enough to be President unless he or she is 35 years old. You have to be at least 30 to serve in the U.S. Senate and at least 25 to serve in the House of Representatives. If you are 18 years old, you can vote in federal or state elections, according to the 26th Amendment, but states or Congress could make the voting age even lower. (Fire Dog Lake)
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posted: 8/22/10                   0       5
#33 



8/3/2010 Senate Deducts Brownie Points for Devil's Food Dopers
Don't get baked on baked goods. That's the warning the Senate sent last week when it voted to toughen penalties for those who peddle pot brownies to minors -- a decision that drew gasps from drug policy reform advocates who were, momentarily, elated over a new law that drastically reduces the disparity between prison sentences for crack and cocaine offenses. President Obama on Tuesday signed the law overhauling mandatory sentencing guidelines for crack cocaine and powder cocaine. Crack users, who are mostly black, for the past quarter-century have faced far tougher sentencing guidelines than cocaine users -- under the prior law, a suspect would need to be found carrying 500 grams of cocaine to face a five-year sentence; a crack user had to be caught with just 5 grams to get the same sentence. While the move was hailed by some drug policy groups, the pot brownie bill tempered their excitement. "It's a black eye on the Senate. It's a mark of shame," said Aaron Houston, director of Students for Sensible Drug Policy. (FOX)
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posted: 8/22/10                   0       6
#34 



8/2/2010 Announcing JustSayNow.com
Jane Hamsher on CNN: Pot laws unpopular, racist, unfair (CNN)
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posted: 8/22/10      
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#35 



7/23/2010 Oakland Okays Indoor Medical Marijuana Mega-Farms
In a marathon session Tuesday night, the Oakland City Council Tuesday approved an historic plan for large-scale indoor marijuana farms, but only after hearing from a cavalcade of medical marijuana patients, growers, and dispensary operators intent on ensuring that small and medium-sized growers are not squeezed out. While the ordinance is aimed at medical marijuana, the council, which has endorsed the Proposition 19 tax and regulate cannabis initiative, clearly sees the potential for tax revenues and jobs under a perhaps not-so-distant marijuana legalization in California. The council passed a proposal that will authorize city officials to issue permits for four indoor marijuana farms to supply the city's four allowed existing medical marijuana dispensaries. The ordinance sets no size limitations. Some would-be medical marijuana cultivation entrepreneurs have proposed growing operations as large as 100,000 square feet. Applicants for the four permits would submit proposals to the city. Permit holders would have to pay a $211,000 annual fee, as well as any taxes imposed by the city. The city currently taxes dispensaries at 1.8% and has plans to increase that tax to 8%. The large-scale grows would have a similar tax burden. (Drug War Chronicle)
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posted: 7/24/10                   0       13
#36 
keywords: Americans For Safe Access, Anheuser-busch, California, Harborside Health Center, Homegrown Wellness, James Anthony, Jean Quan, Keith Stevens, Kris Hermes, Larry Reid, Luis Santiago, Marijuana, Miller, National Organization For The Reform Of Marijuana Laws, Oakland, Stephen Deangelo, United States, War On Drugs Add New Keyword To Link



7/7/2010 The High Road -- Growers who cashed in on illegal pot now welcome legalization and taxation.
(SF Weekly)
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posted: 7/22/10                   0       9
#37 



6/28/2010 When Capitalism Meets Cannabis
One of the odder experiments in the recent history of American capitalism is unfolding in the Rockies: the country’s first attempt at fully regulating, licensing and taxing a for-profit marijuana trade, The New York Times’s David Segal writes in a lengthy look at the developing industry.

More than 80,000 people here now have medical marijuana certificates, which are essentially prescriptions, and for months new enrollees have signed up at a rate of roughly 1,000 a day. As supply met demand, politicians decided that a body of regulations was overdue. The state’s Department of Revenue has spent months conceiving rules for this new industry, ending the reefer-madness phase here in favor of buzz-killing specifics about cultivation, distribution, storage and every other part of the business. (New York Times)
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posted: 7/2/10                   0       13
#38 



6/16/2010 State Board of Pharmacy reclassifies marijuana
To implement S.B. 728, Board makes marijuana a Schedule II drug

The Board reviewed scientific and medical literature and heard testimony from experts and members of the public before voting to move marijuana into Schedule II. This action is consistent with Oregon’s assertion that marijuana does have an acceptable medical use. The Board reviewed scientific and medical literature and heard testimony from experts and members of the public before voting to move marijuana into Schedule II. This action is consistent with Oregon’s assertion that marijuana does have an acceptable medical use. (Oregon Board of Pharmacy)
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posted: 6/22/10                   0       14
#39 
keywords: Marijuana, Oregon, Oregon Board Of Pharmacy, United States, War On Drugs Add New Keyword To Link



5/18/2010 54% Say Illegal Drug Use Is Primarily A Criminal Problem, Not Health Issue
However, voters are evenly divided over whether the war on drugs diverts police way from focusing on higher-priority crimes. Thirty-eight percent (38%) say it is a diversion, but 39% disagree. Twenty-three percent (23%) are not sure. (Rasmussen)
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posted: 5/19/10                   0       17
#40 



5/11/2010 An Imperfect Improvement: Obama's New Drug War Strategy
There's no question that it points in a different direction and embraces specific policy options counter to those of the past thirty years. But it differs little on the fundamental issues of budget and drug policy paradigm, retaining the overwhelming emphasis on law enforcement and supply control strategies that doomed the policies of its predecessors. (Huffington Post)
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posted: 5/19/10                   0       21
#41 



3/6/2010 Pentagon shooter John Bedell's parents warned cops
In a blog posting, Bedell said the government viewed "an event such as the Sept. 11 attacks as a small cost in order to perpetuate its barbaric control." (NY Daily News)
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posted: 4/25/10                   0       13
#42 



2/17/2010 FDA approved cannabis medicines needed for veterans to relieve symptoms of PTSD
"It is clear that many veterans are already using herbal cannabis to self-medicate to relieve the symptoms of PTSD. Consequently, there is a clear need for standardized, FDA approved, oral cannabis products which can, and should be, provided to veterans and others who can benefit from its use. Medical cannabis has far fewer and milder side effects than most currently prescribed pharmaceutical products do. We are working hard to have one or more products ready for FDA clinical trials as soon as possible." (The Medical News)
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posted: 2/18/10                   0       10
#43 



11/21/2009 Medical Marijuana: No Longer Just for Adults
At the Peace in Medicine Healing Center in Sebastopol, the wares on display include dried marijuana -- featuring brands like Kryptonite, Voodoo Daddy and Train Wreck -- and medicinal cookies arrayed below a sign saying, “Keep Out of Reach of Your Mother.” The warning tells a story of its own: some of the center’s clients are too young to buy themselves a beer. Several Bay Area doctors who recommend medical marijuana for their patients said in recent interviews that their client base had expanded to include teenagers with psychiatric conditions including attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. “It’s not everybody’s medicine, but for some, it can make a profound difference,” said Valerie Corral, a founder of the Wo/Men’s Alliance for Medical Marijuana, a patients’ collective in Santa Cruz that has two dozen minors as registered clients. (New York Times)
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posted: 8/22/10                   0       2
#44 
keywords: AIDS, Alberto Torrico, Attention Deficit Disorder, California, Cancer, Centers For Disease Control, Edward Hallowell, Frank Lucido, Gene Schoenfeld, Harvard University, Jean Talleyrand, Keith Stroup, Lester Grinspoon, Marijuana, Medical Board Of California, Medicann, Methamphetamines, National Institute On Drug Abuse, National Organization For The Reform Of Marijuana Laws, Nora Volkow, Organicann, Peace IN Medicine Healing Center, Ritalin, Santa Cruz, Santa Rosa, Sebastopol, Stephen Hinshaw, United States, University Of California, University Of Michigan, War On Drugs, White House, Wo/men’s Alliance For Medical Marijuana Add New Keyword To Link



8/25/2009 Argentine court: No prison for pot use
Country's lawmakers ponder law to legalize drug possession outright (MSNBC)
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posted: 8/28/09                   0       14
#45 
keywords: Anibal Fernandez, Argentina, Argentine Congress, Argentine Supreme Court, Cristina Fernandez, Marijuana, Richard Nixon, United States, War On Drugs Add New Keyword To Link



7/23/2009 'Outlaw Mother's Milk' Says Drug Czar
"marijuana is dangerous and has no medicinal benefit," Gil Kerlikowske (Huffington Post)
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posted: 7/24/09                   0       9
#46 



7/13/2009 America's Love-Hate History with Pot
Forty-one percent said they think marijuana should be made legal and 52 percent are opposed (CBS)
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posted: 7/13/09                   0       10
#47 



7/2/2009 Progressives Push Against Drug War: Will Dems Listen? While many of our elected representatives privately support serious changes to our failed drug laws, they believe they are alone (Huffington Post)
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posted: 7/7/09                   0       8
#48 



6/15/2009 Momentum builds for broad debate on legalizing pot
Doing so, they contend to an ever-more-receptive audience, could weaken the Mexican cartels now profiting from U.S. pot sales, save billions in law enforcement costs, and generate billions more in tax revenue from one of the nation's biggest cash crops (Associated Press)
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posted: 7/7/09                   0       9
#49 



6/13/2009 Drugs Won the War
“We’ve spent a trillion dollars prosecuting the war on drugs,” Norm Stamper, a former police chief of Seattle, told me. “What do we have to show for it? Drugs are more readily available, at lower prices and higher levels of potency. It’s a dismal failure.” (New York Times)
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posted: 7/8/09                   0       8
#50 




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