A DIFFERENT KIND OF JOINT SESSION

Last week the Capitol Police busted a young intern working for Rep.
Ron Paul (R-Tex.) for toting a baggie of pot and a bong into the
Cannon House Office Building, but they'll have to look the other way
when stockbroker Irvin Rosenfeld brings his stash onto their territory
today. For more than 20 years, the federal government has supplied
Rosenfeld with marijuana cigarettes, which he smokes under doctor's
orders to ease symptoms of a rare bone disorder.

Before arriving from Florida to lobby in Congress for medical use of
marijuana with the pro-pot group NORML, Rosenfeld made sure to inform
authorities of his dispensation to smoke 12 joints a day -- he's one
of seven people who get Uncle Sam-grown reefer under a program that
began in the Carter era. (It was shut down in 1992, but some patients
were grandfathered in.)

We couldn't reach Rosenfeld, but NORML supplied a letter from his
Miami physician saying the pot helps with pain and works as a muscle
relaxant and an anti-inflammatory agent, adding: "Mr. Rosenfeld is not
impaired by this medicine."

William Emory, associate general counsel for the Capitol Police,
assured us that Rosenfeld could light up on the Hill (in designated
smoking areas) but said, "He can't share it with anybody else. The
exemption is for him and him alone."