THOMAS TWP. — On Friday, a neon-green sign that said “Tri-City Compassion Club, park here” in stenciled block letters was posted in front of the lot and Thomas Township home owned by John F. Roberts.
Roberts, 49, whose home — where he lives with his fiancée Stephanie Whisman, 38 — was raided by DEA agents July 6, is the new location of the Tri-City Compassion Club.
Roberts, a state-registered grower, patient and a former leader of the Bay City-based compassion club — now the newly named Mid-Michigan Tri-City Compassion Club, which has more 300 members, according group President Kim M. Zimmer — left the Bay City group and was allowed to use its old name to begin a separate club.
Roberts said the purpose of the club is to educate prospective patients about getting started legally and to inform current patients about growing and processing methods.
Members also bring baked goods, oils and dried marijuana to sample, purchase and trade — provided they are certified medical marijuana patients, Roberts said.
He said the clubs offer a comfortable alternative for patients who don’t wish to purchase their medical marijuana on the black market.
None of the meeting attendees wished to speak publicly about their involvement with medical marijuana or reasons for attending the club meeting.
Zimmer said her club parted ways with Roberts after his home was raided in July. She declined to speak about specifics of the separation.
“There is no conflict,” Roberts said. “The person who owned the building wanted to go in a different direction than I wanted and that I could afford.”
He wouldn’t disclose the owner or location of the building the club calls home but said he had been paying the club’s building lease until he left and could no longer afford to.
Roberts’ club is in his backyard among wooded trails and fire pits.
Cars parked on the grass at the outskirts of Roberts’ property Friday.
About 15 medical marijuana patients, two children, caretakers and others who were curious exited their vehicles and crossed a length of freshly cut grass, walking toward a brownish-red wooden storage shed with two open doors.
Inside about four medical marijuana patients sat in chairs around a coffee table, upon which lay brownies and muffins baked with cannabis butter — they were donated by one of the group members — and on another table were two jars full of marijuana buds — each containing about an ounce of marijuana, Roberts said.
An empty container on the table said “donations for baby girl.”
The anticipated donation was marijuana, not money, Roberts said.
Roberts said he and others provide medicine, what he calls “Rick Simpson hemp oil,” to a state-registered 6-year-old girl suffering from a brain tumor — free of charge — and it takes 2 to 3 ounces of marijuana to make enough of the dark, tar-like extract, which he said lasts two weeks.
Mixed with peanut butter for ingestion, the oil helps the child to sleep and to eat regularly, Roberts said.
Roberts said he’ll continue to conduct compassion club meetings at his home each Friday and Monday from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.
Author: Jeannie Herer
3/4 of US and Germany Support Medicinal Cannabis
Germany/USA: Three quarters of citizens in the USA and Germany support the medical use of cannabis
According to a poll conducted by Emnid Institute there is a broad support in Germany when it comes to the medical use of cannabis. Of 1,001 interviewees asked by phone 76 per cent said that the use of cannabis for medicinal purposes should be allowed while only 18 per cent disagreed and 6 per cent had no opinion on this issue. The poll consisting of two questions was ordered by the German Association for Cannabis as Medicine (ACM). According to the answers to the second question 65 per cent of Germans think that a treatment with the cannabis compound dronabinol (THC) should be paid by the health insurances, which currently is usually not the case.
Support for the medical use of cannabis was highest among highly educated people, men, people between 50 and 60 years of age, and partisans of the small political parties, Greens (90 per cent), Liberals (85 per cent) and the Left (85 per cent). More than three quarters of the large parties Social Democrats (83 per cent) and Christian Democrats (77 per cent) also supported the medical use of cannabis. The lowest support was observed among non-voters (72 per cent). These results are in agreement with a recent Rasmussen poll in the USA showing that 75 per cent of Americans support the use of cannabis for medicinal purposes if prescribed by a physician.
The Coming American Hempire
by Rand Clifford
“…The continuous consolidation of money and power into higher, tighter and righter hands.”
That was George H.W. Bush’s answer to reporter Sarah McClendon’s question in 1992 regarding what Iran-Contra was all about. He also told her that, “If the American people really knew what we had done, we would be chased down the streets and lynched.”
Extraordinarily candid of “Poppy” Bush, revealing not only the fundamental goals of Iran-Contra, but also the ultimate goal of financial Elites, now and always. For those people who really pay attention, Poppy’s candidness was generic, dredging up moans of, “Oh…really?”
“…The continuous consolidation of money and power into higher, tighter and righter hands.”That was George H.W. Bush’s answer to reporter Sarah McClendon’s question in 1992 regarding what Iran-Contra was all about. He also told her that, “If the American people really knew what we had done, we would be chased down the streets and lynched.”
Extraordinarily candid of “Poppy” Bush, revealing not only the fundamental goals of Iran-Contra, but also the ultimate goal of financial Elites, now and always. For those people who really pay attention, Poppy’s candidness was generic, dredging up moans of, “Oh…really?”
And to our distracted masses who chronically pay little attention, it was mere wasted insight, naked truth—especially the part about what the American people would do if they “…really knew what we had done…” Can you imagine mainstream media (MSM…also known as, CorpoMedia) giving the masses truth about what is being done to them? CorpoMedia tells the masses exactly what they want the masses to believe; truth is irrelevant. They call it “perception management”. What do you think about having your perceptions managed?
And speaking of lynchings…even with the list of treasonous candidates so bloated, and growing every day, there will be no lynchings—at least not until the masses learn to think for themselves instead of simply slogging along in a fantasy land spun for them by CorpoMedia, slogging along imagining there is meaningful truth amid the monolith of daily official lies; imagining TV has anything to do with reality, especially, “reality” TV.
So what about our representatives in Washington D.C.? In 2009 the average net worth across the Senate was $13,989,022.98, led by Herb Kohl, a Democrat from Wisconsin, who was worth an estimated $214,570,011 in 2008. In the House of Representatives there are actually a few who officially declare a negative net worth…while the highest net worth goes to Darrell Issa (R-California), almost $165 million. Such are the monied hands our government OF The People, BY The People, FOR The People has been financed into. Are you a multi-millionaire? Is your neighbor? How many multi-millionaires do you know personally? These are not The People, and they are not FOR The People.
After the Supreme Court recently ruled that there are no limits to the amount of money corporations may spend to influence elections, ownership of our government OF the Elite, BY the Elite, For the Elite, though obvious for so many years, has now been officially cemented—even beyond such contemporary jokes as “e-voting”. Who do you think is laughing?
Perhaps it only makes sense that the Elite own our government, since they own practically everything else. In 2009, the wealthiest 10% of Americans owned 71% of all US assets, with the wealthiest 1% owning 38%. And if that lopsided distribution of wealth isn’t hideous enough, our recent collapse of financial markets because of Wall Street Casino devilry turned into the greatest upward transfer of wealth in history. All we can expect is more of the same, especially considering the quadrillion? dollars worth of casino currently being obscured on Big Bank balance sheets.
By the way, the bottom 40% of Americans control 0.2% of wealth in America.
The way things are going, if we can somehow avoid extincting the human species, it won’t be long before a handful of oligarchs and their minions, the “…higher, tighter and righter hands”, control virtually all of the world’s wealth, while everyone else is essentially a slave.
However, there IS a natural ally that has been saving people for thousands of years, one powerful enough to save us even from our globalist/imperialist/capitalist miasma. That natural powerhouse older than money is hemp.
Hemp…a more useful, beneficial crop is hard to imagine. Throughout the history of civilization hemp has been the ultimate famine buster; hemp seed is our best source of vegetable protein, one of nature’s finest foods. Legendary also for its versatility, hemp today offers thousands of products that could replace so many modern consumer goods with natural, often cheaper and better alternatives…one has to wonder if it will ever be legal again to farm industrial hemp in America, considering its potential for reallocation and spreading around of wealth.
In the early days of our “republic”, in many situations it was illegal not to farm hemp. Then in the early 1930s, machinery to greatly reduce the labor-intensity of hemp farming was developed. Popular Mechanics magazine, in February of 1938, ran a cover story praising the new machinery to make hemp so competitive, hailing hemp as “The New Billion-Dollar Crop”. Alas…it was already looking black for hemp; in 1937, congress had passed an illegal tax law that essentially outlawed hemp farming in the United States. Surprise!
“Reefer Madness” was being hammered into the heads of Americans by William Randolph Hearst’s national chain of newspapers, with help from other media. Then came WWII, and the feds’ new film “Hemp For Victory!” They glorified hemp as an indispensable ally, doing all they could to entice farmers into growing hemp for the war effort. They actually told the truth…. Hemp helped us win the Big War…then the feds resumed their mantra about marijuana being the “Assassin of Youth”. Any hard evidence of “Hemp for Victory” went down the memory hole, they hoped….
The true reason our farmers face prison and fines for growing hemp is much the same as it was 73 years ago: Hemp’s threat to profits from cotton, timber and paper—and especially, oil—for starters. Shifting of vast profits of entrenched industrialists toward The People would be involved, and there lies the pinch. If hemp were legal to farm, certain nefarious Elite schemes since the Industrial Revolution would be jeopardized.
So now, over seventy years since farming of the most valuable crop in history was domestically banned, look around at the death and decay. Big Oil has prevailed to the point that one of the most admired countries in the world has become the most dangerous, an Imperial Thanatos trampling the globe, killing people for control of the last great reserves and supply routes to Western markets of the black gold that is killing our biosphere. Oceans are dying. The atmosphere is heating up. And Imperial Thanatos is threatening anyone who might stand in the way of its “Benign Global Hegemony” with preemptive annihilation from the greatest killing power ever amassed, including “tactical” nuclear weapons. Meanwhile, back in the homeland, “The continuous consolidation of wealth and power into higher, tighter and righter hands” has so concentrated the nation’s wealth that for the vast majority of Americans, their standard of living is plummeting while the American Dream becomes a nightmare, and the Elite laugh it up.
For too many 18+ year-olds, the best job opportunities are in the business of killing foreigners for their resources, or pipeline routes, such as in Afghanistan. America is morally, spiritually and financially bankrupt. Higher, tighter and righter hands exalt globalization, and a New World Order—final phase in our inevitable bloody slog toward a world of Lords, and serfs….
But is it inevitable? If we kicked the oil addiction, and moved away from globalization, toward regionalization, the future might look less black…even, green? We are always lectured about how oil is vital for everything! Oil gives us our food, fuel, fiber, plastics, rubber, medicine…ad nauseam. But, we DO have an alternative. Fully utilizing hemp, instead of oil, we could move toward a greener future, living in a living system, as opposed to dying in a dying system. Oil is death, originally and perpetually, very old death. Watch what happens in the Gulf of Mexico, despite the “news”…. Hemp is living. Food, fuel, fiber, paper, plastics, medicine, on and on—hemp has the potential to replace many products of oil and petrochemical alchemy with products that, exactly unlike oil, have a place in a living system.
And now we approach a most telling time in the history of American hemp interdiction. Medical marijuana is advancing rapidly, despite the hypocrisy of being classified as a schedule 1 drug (no medicinal uses). The Oakland city council gave final approval last week to make their’s the first city in the country to allow “…large-scale industrial pot cultivation.” They intend to license four production facilities to grow, process and package medical marijuana—which will “…be heavily taxed and regulated.”
We are also in the midst of a country-wide push to legalize the personal use of marijuana, also to be heavily taxed and regulated. So the big question flying at us is: If possession and personal consumption of marijuana were to be decriminalized, will domestic hemp farming remain banned?
By linking industrial hemp (no drug potential) with the drug marijuana, then employing the shameful and ridiculous “Reefer Madness” chicanery—that’s how the feds snuffed hemp’s competitive potential with entrenched industries in the first place. They rarely speak truth, would never admit anything like: “Certainly, we used the nastiest tricks to kill the American Hemp Industry back in ‘37. Hearst was pretty worked up about hemp’s threat to his timber and paper biz, especially since duPont had recently patented sulfuric acid paper processing. Cotton men were itchy. Rockefeller…oil men barked loud and clear. The list is a long one. And petrochemicals were gonna be the next monster thing. Lotsa money at stake. So we made ‘em all happy, pulled the plug on hemp by linking it with marijuana. Slick.”
They were so lucky to have marijuana, and still are. But what if they lose their massive War On Drugs cash cow? If possession and private consumption of marijuana becomes legal, how will the feds justify continued prohibition of hemp farming? Will farmers be allowed to again grow industrial hemp? Will the War On Drugs die of starvation? Will We The People be allowed one of our greatest weapons to fight globalization—to empower regionalization and help to fairly spread the wealth?
Naw…they’ll find a way to keep tyrannizing us, to perpetuate the status quo. They always seem to because never do enough people know the truth. Too many people are having their perceptions “managed”.
For instance, how many people know anything about Ron Paul’s latest hemp bill, co-sponsored by Barney Frank: HR 1866, “The Industrial Hemp Farming Act of 2009″?
The inevitable place such bills go to die is:
The House Judiciary, Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security.
Slick.
What do you think has made Americans such slow learners?
Rand’s novels CASTLING, a “Story of the Power of Hemp”…and, TIMING, the sequel…are published by StarChief Press.
So what about our representatives in Washington D.C.? In 2009 the average net worth across the Senate was $13,989,022.98, led by Herb Kohl, a Democrat from Wisconsin, who was worth an estimated $214,570,011 in 2008. In the House of Representatives there are actually a few who officially declare a negative net worth…while the highest net worth goes to Darrell Issa (R-California), almost $165 million. Such are the monied hands our government OF The People, BY The People, FOR The People has been financed into. Are you a multi-millionaire? Is your neighbor? How many multi-millionaires do you know personally? These are not The People, and they are not FOR The People.
After the Supreme Court recently ruled that there are no limits to the amount of money corporations may spend to influence elections, ownership of our government OF the Elite, BY the Elite, For the Elite, though obvious for so many years, has now been officially cemented—even beyond such contemporary jokes as “e-voting”. Who do you think is laughing?
Perhaps it only makes sense that the Elite own our government, since they own practically everything else. In 2009, the wealthiest 10% of Americans owned 71% of all US assets, with the wealthiest 1% owning 38%. And if that lopsided distribution of wealth isn’t hideous enough, our recent collapse of financial markets because of Wall Street Casino devilry turned into the greatest upward transfer of wealth in history. All we can expect is more of the same, especially considering the quadrillion? dollars worth of casino currently being obscured on Big Bank balance sheets.
By the way, the bottom 40% of Americans control 0.2% of wealth in America.
The way things are going, if we can somehow avoid extincting the human species, it won’t be long before a handful of oligarchs and their minions, the “…higher, tighter and righter hands”, control virtually all of the world’s wealth, while everyone else is essentially a slave.
However, there IS a natural ally that has been saving people for thousands of years, one powerful enough to save us even from our globalist/imperialist/capitalist miasma. That natural powerhouse older than money is hemp.
Hemp…a more useful, beneficial crop is hard to imagine. Throughout the history of civilization hemp has been the ultimate famine buster; hemp seed is our best source of vegetable protein, one of nature’s finest foods. Legendary also for its versatility, hemp today offers thousands of products that could replace so many modern consumer goods with natural, often cheaper and better alternatives…one has to wonder if it will ever be legal again to farm industrial hemp in America, considering its potential for reallocation and spreading around of wealth.
In the early days of our “republic”, in many situations it was illegal not to farm hemp. Then in the early 1930s, machinery to greatly reduce the labor-intensity of hemp farming was developed. Popular Mechanics magazine, in February of 1938, ran a cover story praising the new machinery to make hemp so competitive, hailing hemp as “The New Billion-Dollar Crop”. Alas…it was already looking black for hemp; in 1937, congress had passed an illegal tax law that essentially outlawed hemp farming in the United States. Surprise!
“Reefer Madness” was being hammered into the heads of Americans by William Randolph Hearst’s national chain of newspapers, with help from other media. Then came WWII, and the feds’ new film “Hemp For Victory!” They glorified hemp as an indispensable ally, doing all they could to entice farmers into growing hemp for the war effort. They actually told the truth…. Hemp helped us win the Big War…then the feds resumed their mantra about marijuana being the “Assassin of Youth”. Any hard evidence of “Hemp for Victory” went down the memory hole, they hoped….
The true reason our farmers face prison and fines for growing hemp is much the same as it was 73 years ago: Hemp’s threat to profits from cotton, timber and paper—and especially, oil—for starters. Shifting of vast profits of entrenched industrialists toward The People would be involved, and there lies the pinch. If hemp were legal to farm, certain nefarious Elite schemes since the Industrial Revolution would be jeopardized.
So now, over seventy years since farming of the most valuable crop in history was domestically banned, look around at the death and decay. Big Oil has prevailed to the point that one of the most admired countries in the world has become the most dangerous, an Imperial Thanatos trampling the globe, killing people for control of the last great reserves and supply routes to Western markets of the black gold that is killing our biosphere. Oceans are dying. The atmosphere is heating up. And Imperial Thanatos is threatening anyone who might stand in the way of its “Benign Global Hegemony” with preemptive annihilation from the greatest killing power ever amassed, including “tactical” nuclear weapons. Meanwhile, back in the homeland, “The continuous consolidation of wealth and power into higher, tighter and righter hands” has so concentrated the nation’s wealth that for the vast majority of Americans, their standard of living is plummeting while the American Dream becomes a nightmare, and the Elite laugh it up.
For too many 18+ year-olds, the best job opportunities are in the business of killing foreigners for their resources, or pipeline routes, such as in Afghanistan. America is morally, spiritually and financially bankrupt. Higher, tighter and righter hands exalt globalization, and a New World Order—final phase in our inevitable bloody slog toward a world of Lords, and serfs….
But is it inevitable? If we kicked the oil addiction, and moved away from globalization, toward regionalization, the future might look less black…even, green? We are always lectured about how oil is vital for everything! Oil gives us our food, fuel, fiber, plastics, rubber, medicine…ad nauseam. But, we DO have an alternative. Fully utilizing hemp, instead of oil, we could move toward a greener future, living in a living system, as opposed to dying in a dying system. Oil is death, originally and perpetually, very old death. Watch what happens in the Gulf of Mexico, despite the “news”…. Hemp is living. Food, fuel, fiber, paper, plastics, medicine, on and on—hemp has the potential to replace many products of oil and petrochemical alchemy with products that, exactly unlike oil, have a place in a living system.
And now we approach a most telling time in the history of American hemp interdiction. Medical marijuana is advancing rapidly, despite the hypocrisy of being classified as a schedule 1 drug (no medicinal uses). The Oakland city council gave final approval last week to make their’s the first city in the country to allow “…large-scale industrial pot cultivation.” They intend to license four production facilities to grow, process and package medical marijuana—which will “…be heavily taxed and regulated.”
We are also in the midst of a country-wide push to legalize the personal use of marijuana, also to be heavily taxed and regulated. So the big question flying at us is: If possession and personal consumption of marijuana were to be decriminalized, will domestic hemp farming remain banned?
By linking industrial hemp (no drug potential) with the drug marijuana, then employing the shameful and ridiculous “Reefer Madness” chicanery—that’s how the feds snuffed hemp’s competitive potential with entrenched industries in the first place. They rarely speak truth, would never admit anything like: “Certainly, we used the nastiest tricks to kill the American Hemp Industry back in ‘37. Hearst was pretty worked up about hemp’s threat to his timber and paper biz, especially since duPont had recently patented sulfuric acid paper processing. Cotton men were itchy. Rockefeller…oil men barked loud and clear. The list is a long one. And petrochemicals were gonna be the next monster thing. Lotsa money at stake. So we made ‘em all happy, pulled the plug on hemp by linking it with marijuana. Slick.”
They were so lucky to have marijuana, and still are. But what if they lose their massive War On Drugs cash cow? If possession and private consumption of marijuana becomes legal, how will the feds justify continued prohibition of hemp farming? Will farmers be allowed to again grow industrial hemp? Will the War On Drugs die of starvation? Will We The People be allowed one of our greatest weapons to fight globalization—to empower regionalization and help to fairly spread the wealth?
Naw…they’ll find a way to keep tyrannizing us, to perpetuate the status quo. They always seem to because never do enough people know the truth. Too many people are having their perceptions “managed”.
For instance, how many people know anything about Ron Paul’s latest hemp bill, co-sponsored by Barney Frank: HR 1866, “The Industrial Hemp Farming Act of 2009″?
The inevitable place such bills go to die is:
The House Judiciary, Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security.
Slick.
What do you think has made Americans such slow learners?
Rand’s novels CASTLING, a “Story of the Power of Hemp”…and, TIMING, the sequel…are published by StarChief Press.
Medical Marijuana Pioneer Protests Cash Cow Dispensaries
![valariewamm[1].JPG](http://blogs.sacbee.com/weed-wars/valariewamm%5B1%5D.JPG)
One of protagonists of the modern marijuana movement in California charges that the burgeoning dispensary trade has become a cash cow aloof from the people it is meant to serve.
Valerie Corral filed the state’s first known “medical necessity” defense when she challenged her arrest for cultivating five marijuana plants, arguing she had a right to use cannabis to treat seizures resulting from a car accident.
After prosecutors threw out the charges in 1993, Corral co-founded the Wo/Men’s Alliance for Medical Marijuana, a Santa Cruz pot-growing collective renowned for serving the terminally ill. She later worked to pass the California’s Proposition 215 Compassionate Use Act legalizing medical use.
But these days, she is fed up with the growth of California’s contemporary marijuana “collectives” – namely pot-distributing dispensaries with thousands of registered members and millions of dollars in annual marijuana transactions.
“Something has happened to our movement, something that is dark and denigrates the issue,” Corral said recently at the HempCon medical marijuana convention in San Jose. “It (the movement) did not happen so people can get rich.”
Dispensaries under California law must operate as non-profits. But Corral decried an evolution of a massive medical marijuana industry she says is characterized by generous salaries and an entrepreneurial spirit that overshadows the core purpose of helping and comforting people in need.
WAMM members, including AIDS and cancer patients, directly cultivate and share medical marijuana rather than ringing up cash register transactions at a pot shop. Members hold Tuesday night meetings to distribute the marijuana based on medical needs and ability to pay.
After Prop 215’s passage in 1996, Corral hoped the WAMM model – with small groups of growers and medical users working together — would become the standard.
“I thought the WAMM consciousness would take off,” she said. “It didn’t. The dispensaries did.”
Yet WAMM remains a cultural icon in the marijuana movement. In 2002, federal agents stirred a political backlash by raiding the marijuana garden, confiscating the crop and arresting Corral and her husband, WAMM co-founder Mike Corral.
The city and county of Santa Cruz joined in lawsuits against the federal government. In 2004, A U.S. District Judge, Jeremy Fogel, issued an injunction barring future raids of the WAMM site. Last year, U.S. Attorney Eric Holder announced he won’t target medical marijuana in states where it is legal.
Since the WAMM was founded in 1993, 223 members of the collective have died. Seventeen are buried near its marijuana garden. Others are commemorated on painted stones.
“It’s difficult to watch your friends die,” Corral said. “It’s difficult to watch people suffer. It can be very unnerving and put us face to face with our own mortality.”
California voters are to decide in November whether to legalize marijuana for recreational use for adults over 21. Corral says she supports Proposition 19 as a civil libertarian and because she hopes it will drive the price of marijuana far below what is currently being charged in most dispensaries.
Regardless of the outcome, she said WAMM will continue operating as a purely medical collective.
“I’m in this for the liberty. I’m in it for the social justice,” Corral said. “I’m in it not only for the healing but for the profundity of the healing.”
Patti:"The Mrs. Fields Of Cannabis"
We are in Patti ‘s kitchen making pot brownies. I’m not allowed to say where it is, except in an apartment in Orange County. I’m not allowed to say what her last name is. I’m not even allowed to say exactly how she makes her brownies. (“I’m not giving you my ****ing secrets,” she growls, dragging on a cigarette.)
Strangely, though, I am allowed to give you her Web site, paticakes.com , which strangely is spelled with one “t” whereas her first name is spelled with two, and I daren’t ask her why because she’s in one of those moods. (“Well, you’re writing too ****ing slow,” she says when I tell her she’s talking too fast.) I can assure you, however, Patti is a real person I’ve known for several years and really does make awesome baked goodies, although I can assure you I’ve never tried any infused with cannabis.
The cannabis butter, which looks like pesto sauce (or Simple Green), is the key to Patti’s potent brownies.
FRANK MICKADEIT, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
Video: Queen of Cannabis Baking
<p>Your browser does not support iframes.</p>
<p>Your browser does not support iframes.</p>
Anyway, we’re in her kitchen with our mutual friend, Barbara Venezia , who has shot a video of this whole thing. Patti has done catering over the years, but seems to have really found her passion with the advent of liberalized marijuana laws. Patti has a doctor’s note that allows her to make pot brownies, cookies and her premium Sunshine, or “health” bars, and “share” or “donate” them to cannabis collectives, which “donate” back her costs to her.
Two things make Patti’s pot goods great, she says: One: The quality of the non-cannabis ingredients. “I use top-shelf chocolate and I make everything from scratch. A lot of the dispensaries use mixes … the Rice Krispies treats. … I’m not into that. I want to be the Mrs. Fields of cannabis.” Two: the quality of the cannabis. It’s potent. “When I say take two (bites), I mean two (bites). The first person I gave one to ate the whole thing and he couldn’t function for two days.”
In the old days , pot brownie bakers would fold ground-up cannabis into the batter. No more. Patti proffers a plastic bowl containing what looks like pesto sauce. “Cannabis butter,” she says. “Everyone uses it now – unless you’re stupid.” It takes Patti 10 hours to make her cannabis butter, repeatedly heating and cooling the blend of regular butter and finely ground marijuana cuttings, a laborious process she believes best draws out THC, the active ingredient in pot.
Patti poured the cannabis butter into a mixing bowl with the chocolate batter, stirred furiously, poured it into a baking pan and popped it in the oven. Then we went out onto her lushly landscaped patio to talk and smoke – me an Arturo Fuente , her a Marlboro Ultra Light. She doesn’t smoke pot. “Smoking is a head trip – eating is a body trip,” says Patti, who uses pot to calm her nerves. “I bounce off walls (without it). For me it’s truly calming.”
I snip the end of my cigar with a pair of pruning clippers I find on her patio table and point to a squat green plant with serrated leaves. “So you grow it out here?” I ask.
“That’s a weed!” she snorts. “You don’t know what (pot) looks like?” I guess not.
She doesn’t grow pot. “The cat would eat it,” she says, pointing to her beloved Siamese. She buys two strains: sativa, “an ‘up’ – you can function well on that” – and indicia – “that, you veg out in front of the TV for a day.”
“I would never say I’m a stoner or a pot head. I medicate myself before I go to bed. Otherwise I’d never get to sleep.
Why’d you start this? I ask.
She says she grew up in an East Coast Italian family “where everyone had a restaurant or a bakery.” She’s always cooked and baked. And, since the ’70s, medicated herself with pot.
Now, she’s seized the business opportunity and is as enthused as I’ve ever seen her about anything. She follows the legal and political battles. She’s aligned with local growers and distributors – who more and more are driving to patients to get around city crackdowns on dispensaries. She bonds with her customers, many of them middle-age women like her. One suffering from shingles called her crying one day – crying out of gratitude.
“This is my fight,” Patti says. “It’s something I’ve believed in for years and years.”
All too soon my cigar is gone and we can smell another aromatic delight emanating from the kitchen.
This Week's Corrupt Cops Stories
If we can’t keep drugs out of the prisons, how can we keep them out of the country?
In Oklahoma City, an Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics (OBN) agent was arrested Tuesday by Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives agents in a scheme authorities said was shipping weapons to Mexican drug trafficking organizations. OBN Agent Francisco Javier Reyes Luna, 29, faces two counts of providing false statements in violation of federal guns laws and one count of providing a restricted weapon to a person not licensed to own it for using a straw purchaser to buy five AK-47 semi-automatic rifles from a gun shop and for giving a .50 caliber Barrett semi-automatic rifle to an unknown individual. He may be facing more charges, if the federal complaint is any indication. He’s out on $25,000 bail right now.
In Tulsa, Oklahoma, one man was released from prison and another had charges dropped in a police corruption scandal that continues to fester. So far, 14 people have been freed from prison or had charges dropped in the scandal in which six former and current police officers have been charged in federal court with offenses including drug conspiracy, perjury, witness tampering and civil rights violations. Two men, former Tulsa Police officer John Gray and former US Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives Agent Brandon McFadden have already pleaded guilty and are cooperating with prosecutors. Gray admitted to lying on search warrant affidavits in the case of Hugo Gutierrez, who was released from federal prison last Friday. Gray also admitted stealing $10,000 from Gutierrez when he arrested him. Charges against Deon White were dropped July 29. His case is one of 53 associated with undercover Tulsa Police Officer Jeff Henderson, who was indicted July 20 on 58 counts of drug conspiracy, perjury, witness tampering and civil rights violations, federal court records show. The Tulsa World is keeping track of it all here.
In Austin, Texas, a former Austin police officer went on trial Tuesday for having sex with a hooker while on duty and paying her with drugs. Scott Michael Lando faces charges of prostitution, delivery of a controlled substance, misuse of official information, and aggravated assault by a public servant for a series of incidents dating back to May 2006. This trial only deals with four prostitution counts and will feature the hooker, who will testify that Lando gave her drugs and other items in return for sex. Prosecutors already told the court Lando had access to drug dealers and got drugs from them. The state will decide later whether to move forward on the other counts.
In Barboursville, West Virginia, a Western Regional Jail guard was arrested August 3 after getting caught in a sting by authorities. Nathaniel Shawn Johnson, 22, went down after the West Virginia State Police got a tip that he was bringing drugs and tobacco into the jail. They then used an undercover officer, who paid Johnson $300 after he agreed to buy and deliver Oxycontin and tobacco to the jail. He is charged with conspiracy and bringing a weapon onto jail grounds (he had a .22 rifle in his pickup).
Medical Marijuana Patient Faces Life in Prison for a Half Ounce in Texas
by Phillip Smith, August 11, 2010, 01:30pm, (Issue #644)
A Texas asthma sufferer who went to California for a medical marijuana recommendation and then got busted in June on a Texas highway with small amounts of marijuana and hashish is facing up to life in prison after being indicted by a Brown County grand jury. He is charged with possession of a controlled substance with intent to deliver, a first-degree felony in the Lone Star State.
Chris Diaz, 20, has been jailed on $40,000 bond since the June 27 arrest. He was busted with 14 grams of weed and hash.
Under Texas law, possession of less than two ounces of marijuana is a Class B misdemeanor punishable by up to six months in jail, while possession of hashish is either a state jail felony punishable by up to two years for less than a gram, or a second-class felony punishable by up to 20 years if less than four grams, although probation is also possible. It is unclear exactly how much hash Diaz had.
Diaz was pulled over for an expired license tag while en route from California to Austin, and according to the DPS trooper’s report, could not produce a drivers’ license or proof of insurance. He was then arrested for failure to identify, and during a subsequent search, police found a small amount of hashish on his person. A search of the vehicle then turned up more hash and marijuana in pill bottle from a California medical marijuana provider.
The DPS report said the search also turned up a cell phone “containing text messages referring to drug sales” and a notebook with “drug and law writings.” Those are apparently the basis, legitimate or otherwise, for the drug distribution charge.
Texas does not have a medical marijuana law, and its authorities do not recognize having a recommendation from another state as a defense against prosecution.
Diaz has attracted supporters both inside Texas and nationally. The Texas Coalition for Compassionate Care and a group called I Am Sovereign are publicizing the case and pressuring Brown County officialdom. And the asthmatic Diaz sits in jail in Central Texas awaiting trial, without his medicine.
Brownwood, TX
United States
See map: Google Maps
'Bhang' to trigger new patent war?
WASHINGTON: An ancient Indian high could soon get ‘bhang-alored’ to the United States if the efforts of an American confectioner prove successful.
Scott J Van Rixel, a New Mexico chocalatier, has applied to trademark a product called “Bhang: The Original Cannabis Chocolate.”
Rixel’s highly-anticipated confection, coming amid a rousing debate about legalizing marijuana in the US, is laced with a form of cannabis.
If he gets his first creation through the system, Rixel says he plans to start selling at least two more types of ‘Bhang’ chocolates in the US and may even consider expanding the line to India. He has already incorporated a company named ‘ Bhang Chocolate Company Inc’ for this new venture, according to the Wall Street Journal.
While “Bangalored” has become part of the new-age tech lexicon to describe flight of American jobs to Bangalore, Bhang is the latest Indian product that is coming up for a patent and trademark spat between India and the west, following items such as neem, turmeric and basmati rice.
Pundits believe Rixel’s chances of getting his application through are low because the Indian government has moved quickly in recent years to build a database of traditional Indian biological and medical practices. The now 250,000-strong database, available to international patent offices for reference to stymie trademark infringement, lists “Bhang.”
In fact, long before the US debate over medical marijuana erupted, India has a history of recognizing flower power, with the cannabis-based bhang renowned for its medicinal properties and even religious significance.
Marijuana-based drinks such as “bhang ki thandai” and confections such as bhang burfi are commonly consumed during festivals such as Holi in north India.
Medical Marijuana Passes Through Airports
By Jessica Headley
 |
Airport security used to be the end of the line for travelers holding medical marijuana. Now some passengers report airports and TSA looking the other way.Medical marijuana patients reported no problems as they boarded with carry on luggage and cannabis plants through airports in states that were both medical marijuana friendly and not.However, officials with TSA say it isn’t in their jurisdiction. TSA leaves it up to local law enforcement, and officials say they call local authorities to handle all known cases involving individuals in airports carrying medical marijuana or cannabis plants.One TSA spokesperson, Dwayne Baird, commented “State laws supersede what we would do in the aviation sector, and it would be up to the local law enforcement officials to determine the action they would take based on whatever the person was trying to bring on board an aircraft.”Jason Christ with Cannabiscare says, “People don’t know where to get seeds. They don’t know where to get clones. They are afraid to drive through states. To go through California to Montana, say to get a good strain from California, I would have to drive through Oregon and through Idaho, which don’t recognize medical marijuana. They’ll take you to jail.”Many medical marijuana patients view the ability to pass through airports with their cannabis plants as part of new regulations. TSA says there are no new regulations. However, medical marijuana patients claim airports, TSA, and local authorities never would have allowed them in the past to pass through airports with their plants. Now, the culmination of local authorities and other airport authorities have allowed it at multiple destinations.Medical marijuana carriers noted a common theme amongst the local law enforcement response. It is a response that deemed it okay to carry the cannabis plants through airports as long as the starting and final destinations were medical marijuana friendly.Update
Too poor to buy pot? Not in D.C. (if it's medical, that is)
http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2010-08-06-medical-marijuana_N.htm?csp=34news
By Jessica Gresko, The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — No one should be too poor to buy pot if they live in Washington, at least if the marijuana is for a medical condition. That’s the conclusion of a new medical marijuana law enacted in the nation’s capital.
The District of Columbia passed a law earlier this year that allows residents to legally obtain the drug for medical reasons. But it also includes a provision unlike the 14 other states with medical marijuana laws, requiring the drug to be provided at a discount to poor residents who qualify. Who will get the reduced-price marijuana and how much it will cost, however, is still being worked out.
“Obviously because there’s no roadmap on how to do this, it may require some tweaking over time,” said David Catania, a D.C. councilman and the chairman of the city health committee that drafted the law. “We may, in fact, set an example for other states.”
The first round of regulations implementing the law is expected to be released Friday. It may answer some questions about how low-income residents will be treated, but the regulations will also be revised over several months, and patients aren’t expected to be able to purchase medical marijuana in the city until 2011.
Right now the law says that patients “unable to afford a sufficient supply of medical marijuana” will be able to purchase it “on a sliding scale.” Low-income patients will also get a discount on a required city registration fee. Dispensaries, meanwhile, will have to devote some revenue to providing marijuana to needy patients.
The range of what the drug will ultimately cost low-income residents is anyone’s guess. On the illegal market, an ounce of marijuana can range from about $100-$140, according recent police estimates. City officials have estimated that an ounce from a dispensary will cost about $350 and that the average user will purchase about that much a month, though up to two ounces would be permitted. While one city report suggests 300 people would buy marijuana in the first year — a number some consider low — no one knows yet how many would qualify for a reduced rate. One guess is 30%, about the same as the percentage of the district’s population that is on Medicaid.
Allen St. Pierre, the executive director of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, a Washington-based nonprofit that advocates for the legalization of marijuana, said the city will have to be careful that dispensary prices aren’t too different from what it costs to buy marijuana illegally, a price he estimated ranges from $200 to $500 an ounce. If buying marijuana at a dispensary costs more, some people — poor patients in particular — may just keep buying illegally.
No other states require dispensaries to provide the drug at a discount, though in November residents in Berkeley, Calif., will vote on a ballot measure that could require dispensaries there to provide free marijuana to poor patients. A number of California dispensaries already voluntarily do that for patients who can prove hardship.
“I think that ethic of taking care of people who can’t take care of themselves has been part of the medical cannabis movement from the beginning,” said Steve DeAngelo, the executive director of Harborside Health Center in Oakland, which until recently had a program that gave out free weekly “care packages” to about 600 patients on unemployment or pensions.
For Washington residents, qualifying for a reduced rate may also be tied to the federal poverty level. The city has among the highest poverty rates in the nation — only Mississippi is substantially higher — and more than 1 in 3 residents get some form of health care assistance.
Teresa Skipper, an HIV-positive resident who uses marijuana to stop frequent nausea and help her eat, said she hopes the new law will make getting the drug easier for her since she is a Medicaid patient. She would like to get the drug legally, but she says she can’t and won’t pay more than the $50 an ounce she pays on the illegal market.
“People under the poverty level and below shouldn’t have to pay anything,” said Skipper, who uses about an ounce a week. She’s waiting to see what officials will decide, but she said it may not change much for her.
“Marijuana is like gas and food to me. It’s in the budget,” she said.