BUYING POT LEGALLY 33 YEARS AFTER WOODSTOCK

Thirty-three years ago this Thursday, Aug. 15, the Woodstock Music and Art
Festival began on Max Yasgur's Farm in Sullivan County, New York, and
forever changed popular American culture.

It was the first time that hippies' acid- and folk-rock was fully
recognized as important, politically potent music. It was the first time
the counter-culture showed it might actually be large enough to stop a war.
And it was the first time that tens of thousands of people smoked marijuana
openly and, by implication, became activists in the fight for its
decriminalization.

The 1969 festival drew more than 450,000 people, created one of the worst
traffic jams in US history, ruffled the feathers of virtually every local
official in Sullivan County, and is remembered by many who were there as a
high point of their life, so to speak.

As I recall, folksinger Arlo Guthrie was interviewed by talk-show host Dick
Cavett a few days after the festival. While acknowledging the good times
enjoyed by many, 33-year-old Cavett asked Guthrie about reports of "bad LSD
and marijuana" circulating at the festival. Looking incredulous, Guthrie
replied, "I've never heard of 'bad marijuana.'"

The folksinger then flustered Cavett by asking if the talk-show host had
ever smoked pot. Cavett had to know that much of his audience smoked pot,
and he didn't want to look like a wuss to these viewers. At the same time,
he no doubt could imagine all the FCC problems he'd have if he admitted
using any illicit drug, no matter how mild.

Finally, Cavett answered with the line that President Clinton later made
famous, "Yes, but I didn't inhale." Cavett got away with it. Clinton didn't
although the president later said that he had tried to inhale but choked
because he wasn't a cigarette smoker. Al Gore was more candid. Not only had
the vice president smoked marijuana, he admitted, he had inhaled.

(As for George W. Bush, asked during the campaign about reports he used to
smoke pot, regularly get drunk, and occasionally snorted lines of coke, he
would say only that those days are over. That was it, and no one seemed to
care.)

The one thing these two presidents, a should-be president, a legendary
folksinger, and a celebrity interviewer have in common is that they smoked
pot for recreation, and - far more significantly - took part in illegal
transactions to get it. Remember that under federal law, merely giving
marijuana to another person can be a crime.

Such legal problems notwithstanding, many Americans realize marijuana can
be of value in various ways. The late astronomer Carl Sagan "smoked
marijuana regularly, convinced it enhanced his scientific insight," noted
The Washington Post three years ago in a review of the book Carl Sagan: A
Life in the Cosmos.

More importantly, marijuana has been shown to fight glaucoma, calm upset
people, block pain in many parts of the body, and relieve the nausea and
lack of appetite that AIDS patients typically suffer. In light of this,
California voters in 1996 passed Proposition 215, which legalized the use
of marijuana for medical purposes.

Nor is California alone. Quickly following this state's lead were Alaska,
Arizona, Colorado, Hawaii, Nevada, Oregon, Washington State, and Washington
DC. The US Justice Department was outraged, at one point trying to suppress
the results of the vote in the District of Columbia and later threatening
to suspend the license of any doctor who prescribed medical marijuana.

But, of course, none of this worked. There was no legal way to suppress
election results, and the California Supreme Court subsequently ruled that
doctors have the right to prescribe pot. The only problem has been: where
can patients legally get their dope?

District Attorney Paula Kamena has wisely worked with Sheriff Bob Doyle and
Marin's police chiefs to create a policy that allows patients to grow and
possess as much marijuana as they need. The problem is theft from their pot
patches. Given the value of marijuana and the difficulty of growing much of
it without attracting public attention, pot-patch thieves have been common
in Marin for at least 25 years. Now that numerous patients and their
caregivers can grow pot legally, the opportunity for ripping off patches
has only increased.

Allstate, California State Automobile Association, Travelers Indemnity
Company, and OneBeacon insurance companies have all paid claims filed by
patients whose medical marijuana was stolen. And those are the happy
endings. Slightly over 20 years ago, a pot-patch thief was shot to death by
a grower after the grower was tear-gassed in the face and assaulted. The
grower was acquitted in Marin Superior Court on grounds of self-defense.

Incidents such as these are a major reason why the Cannabis Buyers' Club,
which the Marin Alliance for Medical Marijuana runs in Fairfax, is of such
value. Patients don't need to worry about thieves, and they don't have to
do business with illicit dealers.

Ironically, this Thursday night on the 33rd anniversary of Woodstock's
opening, the Fairfax Planning Commission is scheduled to consider a
recommendation from city staff that would tighten restrictions on the club
at 6 School Street Plaza.

As a staff report notes, "The use permit process relative to the Marin
Alliance for Medical Marijuana has been quite long and complicated." As far
back as 1993, the town council went on record as favoring the legalization
of medical marijuana. In 1997, the town issued the cannabis club a use
permit and renewed it four years later. But given what the club pays its
staff, the typical member is a hip idealist rather than a Harvard MBA, and
the club's most recent problem was the late submittal of an audit to city
staff.

Complicating the situation further is a federal district court's order that
the Oakland Cannabis Buyers' Cooperative close. That order was reversed by
a federal court of appeals only to be reversed again by the US Supreme
Court. The Fairfax Club, however, is not part of those proceedings, and it
seems to have the State Supreme Court on its side. As always, there is no
certainty how the courts will ultimately rule, but it would be tragic if
Fairfax closed its Cannabis Buyers' Club unnecessarily.

The Light realizes there are a couple of idiosyncratic individuals on the
club's staff, and we have not always agreed with them on all issues. But we
value the work they are doing, and we urge the Planning Commission to let
them continue.