TIME TO RALLY

Medicinal Pot Ruling Rocks Dispensary Community; Mass Meeting in
Lansing Planned

The Michigan Court of Appeals last week delivered an opinion that
rocked the state's medical marijuana community.

In a 3-0 ruling, the court decreed that patient-to-patient sales are
illegal. Period.

That decision, for the time being at least, effectively annihilates
the foundation used by many of the estimated 300 to 400 businesses
that have been providing pot to registered patients, putting
dispensary owners and their employees in immediate jeopardy.

As if to put an exclamation point on that message, two Ann Arbor
dispensaries were raided the day after the appellate court issued its
ruling in the case State of Michigan vs. Brandon McQueen and Matthew
Taylor, d/b/a Compassionate Apothecary, LLC.

The victory cry from state Attorney General Bill Schuette was
immediate and unrestrained.

"This ruling is a huge victory for public safety and Michigan
communities struggling with an invasion of pot shops near their
schools, homes and churches," the Republican AG said in a press
release. "Today the court echoed the concerns of law enforcement,
clarifying that the law is narrowly focused to help the seriously
ill, not the creation of a marijuana free-for-all."

That's one way to look at it.

Another perspective is this: The appellate court ruling is both a
significant setback for patients and a massive wake-up call to
everyone who thought that the medical marijuana law overwhelmingly
approved by voters in 2008 was the culmination of a struggle.

There are some who believe that the appellate court erred in its
ruling, and we're told that an appeal is likely.

We here at the Hits, however, have long thought that when the courts
began clearing up what people on all sides of the issue have agreed
are gray areas in the law, the result would be a clamping down on
entities that, no matter how they try to frame the services provided,
sell pot to patients.

Logic would dictate that if more than 62 percent of the people voting
in an election say that they want qualified patients to have access
to medicine recommended for them by a doctor, then they should be
able to do so easily.

The problem is, the law they passed was deliberately vague, and the
gray areas intentional. The most important thing was to get the thing
passed, so that the door would open and people see that allowing
medical marijuana would be an overall benefit - not just to patients,
but the state as a whole.

In taking that approach, however, the law failed to explicitly
provide patients with all the tools they need in order to have
unfettered access to their medicine.

For example, as pointed out to us by Samantha Moffett, an Oakland
County attorney who specializes in medical marijuana-related issues,
the law allows each patient to grow 12 plants, or each designated
caregiver to grow up to 12 plants for each patient.

But nowhere does it say in the law how a patient or caregiver can
legally acquire the seeds, clones or plants needed to get a grow
operation started. In other words, someone has to be willing to break
the law for a legitimate patient or caregiver to even begin trying to
start growing legally.

And what happens if a crop fails for some reason - due to a power
outage at a crucial time, say, or the spread of a fungus? It appears
that those patients are free to acquire their medicine wherever they
can, be it off Craigslist or out on the streets. But the person on
the other side of that transaction does so only at the risk of being arrested.

How does that make any kind of sense?

Or what if a person needs to take their medicine by ingesting it
rather than smoking it? How many people have the skill or resources
to produce marijuana butter or THC-laced edibles?

The answer is, not many. And those who can't - people who were
relying on dispensaries to fill their needs ... well, they are just
out of luck and doomed to suffer.

Now, it can rightly be pointed out that we here at the Hits aren't
exactly neutral observers when it comes to this issue. One need only
glance at the ads in this paper to see that marijuana-related
businesses provide a significant stream of revenue to this rag - a
revenue stream that can only grow more constricted as a result of the
appellate court ruling and the subsequent closure of dispensaries
that's already under way as a result.

And so, there is undeniably some self-interest on our part.

On the other hand, in terms of editorial philosophy, we have been
outspoken in our support of liberal drug policies long before there
was any positive bottom-line effect for doing so. We voiced that
support because it conforms with a broader political philosophy that
maintains the government should let us decide for ourselves what does
or does not go into the bodies of adults. It is also a position born
of deference to facts, the most overwhelming one being that
prohibition is a policy that is a dauntingly expensive failure in all respects.

In regard to the specific issue of dispensaries, we follow the issue
pretty closely here, and have seen very little in the way of real
problems associated with them. Despite Schuette's overheated rhetoric
about an "invasion" of pot shops threatening schools and churches,
the real invasions have been conducted by overzealous prosecutors and
revenue-hungry police forces unwilling to accept the will of the people.

The law enforcement community has a vested interest in seeing the War
on Drugs continue. Like marauding armies, they help perpetuate
themselves by seizing the assets of those unfortunate enough to fall
victim to them.

No one should've ever believed that the prohibitionists would give up easily.

In a recent conversation with one of the shakers in the state's
medical marijuana movement, we were told that those who support a
liberal approach to the issue would eventually win out because "we
have right on our side."

But being right doesn't win battles. Organization and effort do.

Which brings us to the point at hand. Michigan's medical marijuana
users - and the businesses the law has helped create - have their
backs up against a brick wall. And Schuette and his fellow
prohibitionists are far from finished when it comes to pushing folks
further into the bricks.

A package of bills recently introduced in the state Legislature is
designed to place even more restrictions on patients and their access
to medicine.

What should the community's response be?

Many that we've talked to advocate a campaign directed at the
Legislature. If only our lawmakers are given the facts, these
advocates reason, they will see the light and do the right thing.
These advocates correctly note that it is not just simply a
Republican vs. Democrat kind of issue. For one thing, fiscal
conservatives can find reason to support changes that result in
increased jobs and tax revenues at a time when the state needs both
badly. And libertarians on the right agree with the view that
government shouldn't be in the prohibition business.

However, we're frankly skeptical that the current Legislature is
enlightened enough to open the way for dispensaries. But maybe we're
wrong about that. As pointed out by Dan Riffle, a legislative analyst
for the Washington, D.C.-based Marijuana Policy Project - eight
states have created a system of regulated dispensaries since the
Michigan law was first approved, and that in the vast majority of
those states it was legislatures (rather than the public working
through the ballot process) that initiated the changes.

However, there are some activists who are already looking ahead to
the possibility that another ballot measure will be necessary to set
things right here in Michigan. The big question at this point is
whether such an effort should focus on strengthening the existing
marijuana law by explicitly calling for legalized dispensaries and
making other changes that will protect growers and guarantee patient
access to their medicine, or to seek outright legalization.

It's an issue that is sure to be discussed in coming weeks.

What is certain, however, is that no change - whether though the
Legislature or at the ballot box - is going to be achieved without an
outpouring of public support. That means patients, their families and
caregivers. It also means the accountants and lawyers and plumbers
and electricians and grow shop owners and all the others who have
seen the economic benefits that the law has already brought.

It also requires support from the rest of us who want to live in a
state that is forward-looking and more prosperous.

To that end, there is a chance for everyone to flex their collective
political muscle come Sept. 7, when what is hoped to be a large rally
will be held on the steps of the state Capitol in Lansing.

They rally already has an array of support from groups that haven't
always worked together in the past.

"There has never been this many medical marijuana groups coming
together for one event in Michigan's history," Joe Cain, an activist
with the Michigan Medical Marijuana Assn., said in a statement.

To find out more about the rally, contact Cain at 248-961-6106, or
Rich Thompson of the Michigan Association of Compassion Centers at 248-721-3518.