SO NOW WHAT: THE FEDS, CANNABIS AND CALIFORNIA?

Long-standing activist, publisher and comedian Ngaio Bealum on the
feds, the county-and what the medical-cannabis community can do to survive

This past Friday, California's four U.S. attorneys laid out a case
that the state's medical-cannabis collectives are crime-causing,
illegal money machines that funnel pot to children. Then, they
announced a plan to shut down all of the commercial dispensaries and
grows within 45 days. Ngaio Bealum, who's been a medical-cannabis
activist for most of his life, has seen this before. The comedian and
publisher of West Coast Cannabis sat down with SN&R just as the feds
announced their latest crackdown to talk fact, fiction-and what happens next.

So, what the hell is going on?

The Department of Justice has apparently lost its mind and they have
decided that, instead of going after the bankers and companies who
defrauded the economy out of trillions of dollars, they're going to
come after cannabis users who have put millions of dollars into the
economy. Apparently, they feel it's better for cannabis to be an
underground, nontaxable item than for it to be a revenue-generating,
job-creating industry.

Let's speculate as to the feds' motivation to crack down on California.

There are a lot of things. I think it was [H.L.] Mencken who said,
"Don't expect a man to understand you if his job is to not understand
you." If you look at how they have to justify their billion-dollar
drug-war budgets, most of those they arrest are cannabis users. And
if they can no longer arrest a cannabis user, how are they going to
justify hundreds of millions, if not billions, of dollars. So that's
the first thing: Those cats are just afraid for their jobs, as
cannabis users are afraid for their jobs.

So, the feds just need to "look busy."

But half of me also thinks the right-wingers in the Department of
Justice are trying to embarrass President [Barack] Obama, who said it
wouldn't be a good use of the government's time and energy to go
after people who are abiding by the laws of their state. I don't
think the federal government expected the level of exponential growth
that first happened. But shit did explode. It went crazy. It went
from maybe five clubs in Sacramento to how many now, 80, 100?

Do you think the cities and counties will stand up against the feds?

That is my hope. I'm surprised that [Gov.]Jerry Brown isn't at the
DOJ right now going, "What the hell?"

Well, he just signed Assembly Bill 1300.

But he didn't sign Senate Bill 847. ... That makes sense. It really
should be left up to local jurisdictions. ...

My whole thing today is people need to get involved. People need to
start voting people out of office. My whole contention has been that
cannabis users make up about 15 percent of any electoral-

Is it that high?

I just read a report today that said 20 percent of people in the
world are regular cannabis consumers, and 45 percent of the people in
the world have tried cannabis. ... So if all these guys stand up and
vote for more cannabis freedom, then the politicians will have to
listen. We've tried logic and reason and compassion ... but that's
not working. So, cats have got to go.

You'd think they'd like all those millions in cannabis money?

A hundred million dollars to the [California State Board of
Equalization] in the last two years. Harborside just paid the city of
Oakland a million dollars in the past year, right?

We're going to get nearly $2 million in the city of Sacramento.

On top of all the jobs. When I worked for the Los Angeles Patients
Caregivers Group in L.A., I had a living wage, I had a 401(k). I had
a health plan I had a damn good job. So, why would you, in a
recession-we're at 12 percent in Sacramento?-try to take away jobs from people?

You know a lot of collective and cooperative owners and operators.
What are they saying?

Everybody's panicking. They're all freaking out. Which is completely
understandable, because this will affect people's lives and livelihoods.

You see, there seems to be this illusion that it's all these cats
with big money who showed up and opened a club and everybody's making
millions of dollars. That's not it. People with compassion and love
have sunken their whole life savings into cannabis clubs to help sick
people. They give away cannabis to sick people. Sunnyfields, which
[used] to be out in the county, helps out with food drives. ...
There's probably a shady guy or two, but that's true of any industry.

So, if you're a cannabis-club owner in Sacramento, once you get over
the panic, what do you do?

You have to lean on your elected officials, first of all.

But do politicians have the will?

You see, that's the thing: Maybe 10 years ago it would have been
sticking your neck out. But right now, you're supporting the will of
the people.

So if you run a collective or oversee a grow, do you shut it down? Do
you "go underground"? Do you wait it out? Even if you don't get a letter?

If you don't get a letter, you probably sit still on it. If you get a
letter-and they're not sending most letters out to operators, they're
sending them to landlords. And if you're the landlord of a $2 million
property, and the Department of Justice is threatening you with not
just asset forfeiture, but also jail time, you don't really have a choice.

It seems unlikely that they'd go after a third party so aggressively.

The [Drug Enforcement Agency] sent out letters in 2005, and it
freaked everyone out, but no one got prosecuted. And most people
stayed open. But you never really want to have to call the
government's bluff. Because the government is big and huge and
gigantic-and, oftentimes, quite mean. And you don't want to be the
one guy. I mean, no one should ever go to jail for cannabis. But you
don't want to go to jail for 10 years, or 20 years, or 40 years, just
to prove a point.

Do you think they'll go further this time?

That's the problem: You can never tell. If I was running a club this
time, I would probably keep it as low-key and as bare bones as I
could while still reasonably serving my community.

Today, in 2011, can you put the genie back in the bottle, so to speak?

You can't close the barn door after the horse is gone! You can't put
the genie back in the bottle-that's the thing. It's way, way too
late. You can't stop it. It's like Michael Jordan.

Does it bother you, though, that at some level Obama is complicit in
this? Or do you not agree with that statement?

I'm not sure if he's complicit. I've always understood cannabis
freedom, or decriminalization, as a second-term issue. Sort of the
same way that Gov. [Arnold] Schwarzenegger damn-near waited till his
last day in office to signing a bill to decriminalize possession in
California. If you can't do it in your first 90 days, you can't do it
in your first three or four years, because you just give fodder to
your enemies.

I can see how some people might want to force [Obama's] hand leading
into this election year. Politics are so convoluted. You don't want
to embarrass the DOJ if you're the president, because that makes it
so much harder for him to work with them. ... But I've never seen
people or politicians fight so hard as they do against Barack Obama.

Where's Gov. Jerry Brown?

I think he quit smoking weed! Since him and Linda Ronstadt broke up,
I don't think there's been that much weed in the house.

It gives him a racy heart.

He's got to lay off the sativas. You need more indicas, bro. I would
recommend tinctures. ...

But seriously, Jerry Brown should be the first cat over at the
Department of Justice, going, "What are you doing? What are you
doing? We're how many billions of dollars in debt?" I say this all
the time: Cannabis users and cannabis growers are the only outlaws I
know that want to go legit.

No one wanted Steve Cooley to win attorney general, but, really,
could it get any worse had he won?

And where the hell is [Attorney General] Kamala Harris? Because if it
wasn't for cannabis users, she would not have a job. She would not
have a job. She barely won-and she won because of the marijuana vote.

But it would be way worse under Cooley. Just look what he did in L.A.

Look what's happening in Sacramento County.

You have to remember: People have sunken their last savings into
getting these clubs open. Sacramento County doesn't really need 80
cannabis clubs ... but if they're hitting you with fines of $500 and
$1,000 a day, and you're not seeing that many patients, because there
are so many places to go-

It's actually hard out there for a club owner.

No one's really making any money. Especially once you factor in the
exorbitant rates for advertising (laughs).

Where will be we in a year from now, just after the November 2012 election.

It's hard to say. I can't see the movement getting any smaller. First
of all, there's 10 percent unemployment. There's people sleeping in
the park because everybody's upset, and I don't know how putting
people out of work is going to have less people showing up at the
park. ... And now you're shutting down one of the few industries
creating jobs, and creating jobs all over-for scientists and
consultants, painters, electricians, ad reps,
magazines-WestCoastCannabis.com. I don't know how in the world you
can go to the board of supervisors and say, "We want to give you a
million dollars," and they say, "No we're going to spend half a
million dollars to shut you down." Where in the world does that makes sense?

Orangevale?

(Laughs) Orangevale.

But I think people need to rise up. Register to vote, and vote
against the bullshit. If you can't change the laws, change the
lawmakers. And that's where I'm at these days. They say if you make
revolution impossible, it makes evolution inevitable.

I guess that makes sense.

It makes lots of sense. Tattoo it on your arm.