02/09/09
Tennessee Medical Marijuana Act of 2009
Our good friend Robert has alerted us to the fact that some really fine State Representatives out of Memphis have filed HB0368 in the Tennessee House of Representatives. The Tennessee Medical Marijuana Act of 2009.
Gotta love it when real Democrats stand up and take the initiative to do what’s best for the people of the state. Advocating for Medi-Pot is an activity that is done out of wisdom and foresight. A practical, non-partisan endeavor that is undertaken by smoker and non-smoker alike. To advocate for Medical Marijuana is to advocate for the infirm and the suffering. It is to advocate for wellness and relief.
So it is with great pride that we thank Senator Beverly Marrero, D-Memphis and Rep. Jeanne Richardson, D-Memphis for their courage and resolve. This is quality leadership and it is badly lacking in the great state of Tennessee.
We at Ablogination ask that you, especially if you blog or are a member of the Main Stream Media, make lots of positive noise about HB0368.
The suffering of Tennessee need that which will relieve them of their pain. Those POW’s of the Drug War need their freedom.
The Science of the Shills
In light of the recent row over the marijuana use of Olympian, Mike Phelps, the news is now awash with bought and paid for pseudo-science and other such propaganda.
A handy example of the age old lie that “Marijuana causes Cancer” is seen in this disgraceful display from some place called The Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle Washington, which makes the erroneous claim that marijuana is linked to Testicular Cancer.
Now, wait just a minute…
Testicular Cancer is one of the most uncommon forms of the disease there is. A male’s risk of contracting this ailment over his lifetime is about four tenths of a percent.
Only about 1 in 100,000 actually contracts a malignant form.
Now, since the authors of this “research” admit themselves that the research is not definitive, why did they do it in the first place? Why did this report come out now? Which liar commissioned this study?
From the FHCRC’s own release…
Established risk factors for testicular cancer include a family history of the disease, undescended testes and abnormal testicular development. The disease is thought to begin in the womb, when some fetal germ cells (those that eventually make sperm in adulthood) fail to develop properly and become vulnerable to malignancy. Later, during adolescence and adulthood, it is thought that exposure to male sex hormones coaxes these cells to become cancerous.
Now let’s see, it begins in the womb? Doesn’t that make the FUCKING SHIT HEREDITARY?!!!!!
That many factors and all of a sudden Marijuana causes it?
This “study” (in blatant ONDCP propaganda) hinges on one tiny factor. The unproven belief that Marijuana affects the male hormones and the relation between those hormones and TC.
“Science” could not get any more weak if it stated the moon was the sun at night.
Anyway, all this does is attempt to distract from the real debate. Does Marijuana’s benefits outweigh any perceived risks?
The real, independent science says yes…
By Marc Kaufman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, May 26, 2006; Page A03The largest study of its kind has unexpectedly concluded that smoking marijuana, even regularly and heavily, does not lead to lung cancer.
The new findings “were against our expectations,” said Donald Tashkin of the University of California at Los Angeles, a pulmonologist who has studied marijuana for 30 years.
“We hypothesized that there would be a positive association between marijuana use and lung cancer, and that the association would be more positive with heavier use,” he said. “What we found instead was no association at all, and even a suggestion of some protective effect.”Federal health and drug enforcement officials have widely used Tashkin’s previous work on marijuana to make the case that the drug is dangerous. Tashkin said that while he still believes marijuana is potentially harmful, its cancer-causing effects appear to be of less concern than previously thought.
The lifetime trials of individuals, such as myself, who have smoked pot regularly for over thirty years speak much louder than solicited anti-Marijuana propaganda-as-science ever will.
Also…They conveniently forgot to mention that Testicular Cancer has one of the highest cure rates of all Cancers. Over 90 percent. 100 percent if it has not metastasized. Even for the relatively few cases in which malignant cancer has spread widely chemotherapy has a success rate of 85 percent.
Fortunately, though lagging far behind the rest of the country in caring for the infirm, Tennessee has a chance to move out of the dark ages and into the light.
We ask all concerned to call their State Reps and encourage them to support this all important measure.
Comments, Pingbacks:
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02/10/09 @ 09:12 
· http://tn420.org Which Republican? How many are there?
But to be fair, there are plenty of Blue Dogshits who also oppose relief for the suffering. Harold Ford Jr was a perfect example of that. Along with many others.
All we can do is keep pushing it until intelligence and compassion one day prevail.
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02/10/09 @ 13:42 This entry was posted on that site Tuesday, February 17th, 2009 at 3:25 pm by Radley Balko.
Maryland State Police Raid Parents’ Home for Teen’s Misdemeanor Pot Charge
Tuesday, February 17th, 2009
I received this email months ago, but for various reasons hadn’t had the time to follow up. Yesterday, I was finally able to confirm the details of at least the specific raid described below. I haven’t yet been able to find the other examples in Carrol County, Maryland mentioned in the email, but if anyone out there knows of other cases, please let me know. This is outrageous. It ought to put the fear of God into the parents of teenagers. It used to be that if your kid got picked up for possessing pot, they called you down to the police station, and you drug your kid home by the collar. Now, they send the SWAT team to tear down the door and terrorize the entire family at gunpoint.
For now, I’m omitting the family’s name and other identifying information. I haven’t been able to get back in touch with the woman who sent the email, but I was able to confirm the details of her case in a conversation with the family’s attorney.
I am a 45 year old mother of 3 boys ages 12, 18 and 22. I reside inn Carroll County, MD. I have been a federal employee for 17 years. My husband has been employed…with a local firm for over 27 years. Although my husband had some very minor law infractions back in the early 1980’s (traffic violations), since that time he has never been arrested for any criminal violation. I myself have never had any type of criminal violation and have had one traffic violation (driving 10 miles over) in over 20 years of driving.
On October 3, 2006 my oldest son was involved in a traffic stop and arrested on a misdemeanor marijuana charge. Just about a year later on September 30, 2007 my son was again stopped and arrested for a misdemeanor marijuana violation. I was present in court on January 4, 2008 when he plead guilty and paid a $350 fine. At about 3:30 a.m.on January 10, 2008 approximately 16 Swat Team Members of the Maryland State Police entered our home with force with M-16s at the ready. Please note that we are the only county in Maryland that does not have a county police department. While the M-16s were drawn they handcuffed four of us (my oldest son has been living with his girlfriend for sometime now) this includes my 12 year old son. After reviewing the search warrant I was horrified to realize these “hut-hut”men came in with M-16s in the middle of the night because my son had been arrested for a misdemeanor marijuana charge. The affidavit filed for the search warrant stated that” it had been the officer’s experience that persons who are arrested with illegal drugs continued to use, abuse and/or distribute illegal drugs”. This was the probable cause. The affidavit also indicated that other than my oldest son, no person living in our home had any prior criminal history.
I would like to provide you with more details but the bottom line is that they did find small amount of marijuana in our downstairs basement and confiscated a shotgun that my husband had since he was 18 years old. The gun has never even been fired. The two of us, my husband and myself, were taken to the local barracks and held for over 8 hours without being read our rights or being granted a phone call.
We have since learned that over 100 of these warrants have been issued by the judges here in Carroll County during the past year. Apparently if your son or daughter is arrested with even a trace of marijuana in Carroll County, they will follow up and issue a warrant based on one officer’s belief that the person will abuse the drug again. We have now heard horror stories of other families just like ours that have also been traumatized in much the same way….
The state’s attorney has contacted our attorney….and indicated they will be dropping all charges against me and they would be willing to drop all charges against my husband if he agreed to an out patient type drug program. Please understand that acting as a father first my husband told the cops that anything they found in our home was his regardless of where it was found. We have decided not to agree to this because we believe this is no longer about us. This is about the next family that is terrorized in this way. This is about an innocent person that could be killed the next time for a misdemeanor pot charge. We go over and over what could have happened. We feel blessed that it didn’t. But we feel a duty to make sure our feelings are known.
I hope you look into what is going on here in Carroll County. I’m beginning to believe that we live in a police state.
The attorney who represented the family told me yesterday that the husband eventually plead guilty to possession of marijuana, though the marijuana was a trace amount, and likely belonged to the son who had moved out. He was given what’s called a “probation before judgment,” which means the charge will be cleared from his record if he stays clean for three years. The state also dropped the ridiculous gun charge.
I cringe when I hear the phrase “police state,” because it’s so often overused. But to be honest, I’m not sure how I’d argue to this woman that she doesn’t live in one. Two misdemeanor pot charges against a kid who no longer lives at home, and they send the paramilitary squad barreling into his parents’ house in the middle of the night.
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02/17/09 @ 16:32 · http://tn420.org More punks with machine guns like Sheriff Lott.
Cowards like those depicted here are one of the reasons America has not been able to live up to her potential.
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02/17/09 @ 19:40 Permalink
02/23/09 @ 17:20 Tearful Atlanta Cops Express Remorse for Shooting 92-Year-Old Kathryn Johnston, Leaving Her To Bleed to Death in Her Own Home While They Planted Drugs in Her Basement, Then Threatening an Informant So He Would Lie To Cover It All Up
Sorry, but I’m having a hard time conjuring up any sympathy for these guys. They’re due to be sentenced this week. To put it into perspective, all three are expected to receive about the same sentence as Ryan Frederick. That ain’t justice.
I will say, however, that evil and inexcusable as these bastards are, there’s some truth in this excerpt:
Tesler said when he joined the narcotics unit, he was told to “sit, watch and learn” from superiors who cut corners to meet performance quotas for arrests and warrants. “I was a new part and plugged into a broken system,” Tesler said.
Tesler said when he saw Smith about to plant baggies of marijuana inside Johnston’s home to make it look like a drug house, he shook his head in disapproval. Tesler said he falsified the police report and later lied about the raid because Smith told him to follow the cover-up script. Tesler said he wasn’t about to “rat” on a senior officer.
His father, Jack Tesler, said his son was “being vilified and over-prosecuted.”
Smith said his moral compass failed when he began to think “drug dealers were no longer human.”
“I saw myself above them,” he said.
This is what happens when you declare “war” on American citizens. You dehumanize them. And you instill an ends-justifies-the-means, win at all costs mindset in your “warriors.” This mindset infected the entire narcotics unit at Atlanta PD. You’d have to be awfully naive to believe the problem is limited to Atlanta.
Officers Junnier, Smith, and Tesler are going to prison. But you could make a good case that they were only responding to incentives. A lot of other people have Kathryn Johnston’s blood on their hands too, people with names like Bennett, Gates, Walters, Souder, Tandy, and Meese. They’ve been ratcheting up the war rhetoric of drug prohibition for 30 years. It boggles my mind that I’m “known” for this issue. For this to even be an issue, we had to have reached the point where most of America is now accustomed to the notion that state agents dressed in battle garb can and will tear down the doors of private homes in the middle of the night for nothing more than mere possession of psychoactive substances. And most of the time, they do it under the full color of law.
It shouldn’t be at all surprising that this particular war’s boots on the ground might start to take all of that war imagery to heart, and take shortcuts around whatever largely ritualistic Fourth Amendment procedures we have left to “protect” against whatever it is we still might call “unreasonable” searches (if a violent, terrifying, paramilitary-style raid in the middle of the night on someone suspected of a nonviolent, consensual crime isn’t “unreasonable,” I don’t know what would be).
Kathryn Johnston’s death is tragic. But the real tragedy here is that had the cops found a stash of marijuana in her basement that actually did belong to her–say for pain treatment or nausea–her death would have faded quickly from the national news, these tactics would have been deemed by most to be wholly legitimate, and we probably wouldn’t still be talking about her today.
These cops were evil. But they worked within an evil system that’s not only immoral on its face, but is rife with bad incentives and plays to the worst instincts in human nature.
UPDATE: Via the AJC:
U.S. District Judge Julie Carnes sentenced former officer Gregg Junnier to six years in prison, Jason Smith to 10 years in prison and Arthur Tesler to 5 years in prison.
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02/24/09 @ 21:38 · http://tn420.org Thanx, vic.
We wrote on this when it happened at the cove. This is the first update I've seen.
http://www.tn420.org/cove/forums.php?m=posts&p=376#376
There's no question they were conditioned by pros. But also no excuse for their actions.
An innocent, beautiful person was murdered in the name of the Drug War, and perhaps, racism.
The cover up and the fact that they did not fess up until they were nailed puts these vermin in the shitter.
Ten and Six year sentences are nowhere near enough for this cold blooded, crime.
The main problem I have is that the "Drug Czar", John Walters, who is ultimately responsible for this act of terrorism isn't going to prison with them.
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02/24/09 @ 22:15 overcome the effects of chemotherapy.
WHY IS THERE A 2009 MED-POT BILL GOING FORWARD??????
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10/19/09 @ 13:08 · http://tn420.org When I read what you wrote I can't help but think that you have a typo and intended to state
WHY (ISN'T) THERE A 2009 MED-POT BILL GOING FORWARD??????
If that's the case, there is one in the Health and Human Resources committee in the TN legislature.
Going forward is what's not being done.
The TN Legislature is little better than the tribal leaders in Afghanistan when it comes to intelligence and getting things done.
I mean, they put more emphasis on getting guns in bars than healing the infirm.
Very Talibanish to say the least.
To answer you, there is also a Federal Medical Marijuana statute that is basically an experiment. There is only one federally licensed Marijuana grower in the nation.
If the person you speak of has a Federal license it makes sense that the person you know got his from the cops since no co-ops exist here.
The BPD is a different kind of law enforcement agency. They tend to put people first and prioritize better.
They're simply not the drones that the JCPD or Irwin are. I would honor such an act of compassion on bended knee.
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10/19/09 @ 14:17 Leave a comment:
