POT STINKS!

No doubt about it, everything about pot stinks. Once the plants get over a
foot tall, you can smell them in the breeze growing in the wild. Once you
kill the males and the female flowers start blooming, the breeze carries a
truly enticing aroma.

If you should fire up a doobie in your car of more potent pot like Haze or
Skunk, your car will forever, (almost) smell like Pepe Le Pew. Cops love
that smell, that means they get to cuff you and give you and your car a
most intimate groping.

Despite the protestations of the Feds, more potent pot is a good thing,
because the better the pot, the less smoke is needed to achieve the desired
results. Reuters News Service sent out a new bit of Drug Czar propaganda
last week. Papers across the US slapped headlines on the story like:
"Stronger pot may make reefer madness real, US fears". These US papers
likely edited to fit a space and simply slapped it on the page, in support
of "public safety". This has been the approximate level of "reporting"
about marijuana for almost one hundred years, certainly since the days of
our first Drug Czar, Harry J. Anslinger and the original "Reefer Madness"

Vaporizers are on the market to eliminate the smoke in smoking marijuana,
cannabis throat sprays are coming to market from Bayer, and the American
Cancer Society is funding a "cannabis patch", (think "nicotine patch.) Does
it make sense to have John Walters, the DEA's "Drug Czar of the America's",
a law enforcement officer; speak on the medicinal efficacy of marijuana?
Not really, according to DEA Law Judge, Francis L. Young: "...those with
AIDS, or who are undergoing chemotherapy and who suffer simultaneously from
severe pain, nausea, and appetite loss, cannabanoid drugs might offer
broad-spectrum relief not found in any other single medication."

On July 20th, 2004, a coalition of scientists sued the U.S. Drug
Enforcement Administration, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services,
National Institutes of Health, and National Institute on Drug Abuse with
obstructing medical marijuana research in violation of federal law. Even
though numerous, in depth studies, including one US Presidentially
sponsored study, (the Shaffer Report,) have been conducted over several
decades and even though each and every one states that marijuana is much
less dangerous than alcohol and less addicting than coffee and that we
should stop arresting people for its' use, the prohibition continues
against marijuana or any study of its properties.

John Walters and all those who thrive from drug war will never admit they
are wrong. Scientists from around the world know the truth, many of them
focus their work on ending the myriad harms of this drug war and no where
are the harms and the hypocrisy more obvious than in regards to disallowing
sick and dying patients the right to use medical marijuana. Doctors in
California and the other states that allow for medical marijuana dare to
challenge the AMA to recommend marijuana to their patients. The American
Nurses Association, some 6 million strong is for medical marijuana. Even
the Texas Medical Association is in favor of doctor/patient discussions
about marijuana and they have called for more studies ASAP. Surveys done
in every region of America indicate that 70 to 80% of US citizens are in
favor of medical marijuana.

The scientists filing suit against the "suits" have for years battled for
the right to produce a better quality marijuana, a better mechanism of
delivery and a means to soothe suffering and pain. Doctors and patients
simply want their medicine now, while they are alive, while they are ill or
in pain and yet the government continues to do everything possible to
thwart studies of this herb.

I tried pot in the 60's that compares quite well with the "potent" pot that
circulates these days, to include Thai stick, Hawaiian and hash. Once
again, the ever changing, yet never changing drug policy of U.S. officials
is truly, obviously and once again still "Reefer Madness."

Pot LAWS stink too!

To learn more, please visit: www.cultural-baggage.com, www.mpp.org,
www.mapinc.org, www.drugwarfacts.org, www.drugpolicy.org, www.norml.org or
for a laugh, visit: www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov. Listen to the 4:20 Drug
War NEWS each afternoon and to Cultural Baggage, "the Unvarnished Truth
about the Drug War" on KPFT radio, 90.1 FM or online at www.kpft.org each
Tuesday at 6:30 PM, CDT. You'll hear judges, congressmen, police and
prisoners speaking of the need for drug reform.