Archive for the ‘Tax & Regulate’ category

An Open Letter to Democrats (and Republicans)

October 19th, 2010

I heard a joke recently:

Q: What two things do all politicians want?
A: To get elected, and to get re-elected.

I’m sure there’s some truth in the joke, but I think that most people who run for state office do so out of a sense of civic pride, responsibility, and moral purpose. They want to protect what’s good, and fight what’s bad, regardless of their party or ideals.

It is a rare candidate or elected official who will state publicly, Cannabis prohibition is a tragic and expensive failure. We should tax and regulate marijuana for all responsible adults.”

That was a politically dangerous statement just a few years ago. Today, not so much. In fact, I think it’s a position that can attract more votes than it repels.

My message to Montana candidates for public office is this:

Right now, today, start considering the inevitable prospect of taxing and regulating marijuana as a rational option worthy of your thoughtful consideration. Don’t succumb to the lies saturating the status quo. Demand facts, and don’t tolerate hysteria.

Why? Because it’s the right thing to do, and a majority of Montana voters probably want you to.

It’s the right thing to do because:

Candidates, please contact me if you would like to discuss further. Montana NORML would like to help you.

P.S., Same message to you Green, Libertarian, Constitution, Independent, and Tea Party candidates, and everyone else. Let’s talk.

Montana NORML Newsletter – Conference Highlights, Voting and the News

October 15th, 2010

Good evening Montana, we love it when you forward this email to your friends!

It was great to meet so many of you at the MMGA conference earlier this week. It’s clear that marijuana is now an industry, a tangible force that has the power to affect the Montana economy and Montana families.  That’s always been the case, but now it’s coming out of the darkness, into the light.

Highlights of the conference for me included:

  • I spoke with at least 50 different people over the 48-hour conference, and all were 100% in agreement: of course we need to make cannabis legal for everyone. We will get there.
  • The legislative panel, at which candidates Mat Stevenson, Dave Lewis, Mary Caferro, and Don Judge appeared. It’s great to know that some legislators are willing to consider marijuana regulation thoughtfully and with our feedback in mind.
  • The after-party event. Thanks Chris! :)

Speaking of legislators, I want to be sure that everyone reading this votes this November. Some of you may have already voted via absentee ballot, which anyone can get.

I know some people believe that “voting makes no difference”, and I’m here to tell you you’re wrong.  Montana is a small state, population wise, which means that serious votes for legislative office are regularly decided by a few hundred votes, or less.

That means that if you have five friends, and each of them has five friends, and each of them has five friends that vote with us, we could tip a lot of elections our direction. If we get organized.

We all need information about candidates’ positions on cannabis. The best current source is here:

http://candidates.montanadrugpolicy.org/

I hope you’ll all forward that link to five friends, right now.

A serious message for all you cannabis farmers out there:  protect your art, protect your craft, protect your business, and organize your patients. They need to be registered to vote, and know what district they live in, and who to vote for. Each and every one of them. This week!

If not you, who? If not now, when?

And now, the news:
(For real-time news, become a Facebook Fan or Twitter follower.)

Montana Marijuana News

National Marijuana news:

Become a supporting member of Montana NORML now! http://mtnorml.org/join

And, as always, let us know if you get a letter to the editor published that supports NORML’s goals. We’ll send you some goodies.

Be the change you wish to see.

Montana NORML Newsletter – Activism, Caregivers, Voting and the News

October 8th, 2010

Dear Montana,

First, to everyone who showed up at Tuesday’s event in Missoula, thank you (you know who you are!) To everyone who said you’d show up and then didn’t, well, weak sauce.

The Women’s Marijuana Movement and the NORML Womens Alliance can be powerful. I encourage all you ladies out there to get involved. Yes, I mean set aside a few minutes a day,  go beyond mere talking about action, step up, and do something. You have the power.

I also have a message for all you cannabis farmers (a.k.a. “caregivers“) out there. The more patients you have, the more important your political role is. You cannot just work in the garden, you must inform your patients about the goings-on in Helena. You must ensure all your patients are registered to vote. And you must ensure they do actually vote.

Why? Because Montana’s medical marijuana law will come under vigorous scrutiny and assault in January. While unlikely, it could also be repealed entirely. Rest assured it will be changed significantly, with serious new restrictions.

Who should they vote for? Well, that depends on where you’re located.  Luckily, there’s a database of legislative candidates and their positions on cannabis:

http://candidates.montanadrugpolicy.org

If anyone knows of online interviews or other info we’re missing on any candidates, just send me an email with the evidence.

Patients, I have a message for you too.  I know some of you are very ill. I know some of you are kinda-sorta ill. I have respect for you all — you’re choosing one of the safest therapeutically active plants known to humankind.

My message for patients is just a reminder — that the best way to ensure high quality, low prices, and uninterrupted availability of cannabis is to make it legal for all adults, regulated in a manner similar to how we treat beer. Cannabis is definitely not the “same as” beer, but the regulatory model is one we all understand. Stores that check ID, microbrewery licenses, homebrew, and so forth. Please keep focused on that as the end goal, not some quasi-pharmaceutical catastrophe.

My message for everyone else is to be encouraged — the tide continues to turn our direction. American society is flipping the switch. Soon, more and more mainstream political candidates will come out in favor of regulating cannabis for all adults. I swear it’s an election-winner, if only some Dem (or Repub) had the guts to come out and declare their support. More on that later this month.

Events!

The big one coming up is the MMGA Symposium in Helena on Oct 10th and 11th. It’s FREE, this coming Sunday and Monday, featuring one of the federal government’s medical marijuana patients (Irv Rosenfeld), and lots of medical and legal info. I’ll be there, and would like to see you. Arguably, the MMGA is the biggest, strongest, most public pro-medical-marijuana group in Montana right now, so please come out and see what they’re doing.

And now, the news…

Montana Marijuana News

More News You Can Use

As always, if you write a letter to the editor in support of humans’ right to cannabis that gets published online, send us the link and your physical address, and we’ll send you some goodies.

Kindly.

Let’s help California end marijuana prohibition

September 22nd, 2010

As I said in last week’s newsletter:

As most of you know, California voters will decide whether to pass Prop 19 in about six weeks. If it passes, marijuana would be legal for adults 21+ to grow and possess and consume. There are more details, but that’s the core element you need to understand.

The fact that it’s on the ballot and polling at just about 50% approval right now is already a great success. Mainstream society is really talking about and seriously considering ending marijuana prohibition. We’re almost there.

Unfortunately, some groups working to defeat the initiative — not just the law enforcement and the booze industries, but also groups that consider themselves marijuana activists. Some commercial growers.  Some “I gots mine” medical marijuana people. And some pie-in-the-sky ‘treat maryjane like dandelions’ folks.

Prop 19 ain’t perfect. How could it be perfect, for all of us? But it stops the arrest of overwise law-abiding adults for growing their own. That’s a policy worth supporting! We can continue to make improvements, but with nearly a million people arrested for cannabis nationwide last year (as usual),  the sooner we can stop the insanity, the better.

In the end, the victory or defeat of Prop 19 will likely come down to who has the most cash for ads — the supporters or the opponents? So, now, I’m asking each of you to make a donation to Montana NORML before Oct 1st. We’ll send donations received between now and then to the campaign in California. Donate $4.20, or $42, or $420, today.  Visit any page on the Montana NORML website and click the yellow donate button on the right-hand side. Pool spare couch change with your friends. Make a Montana NORML deposit at Missoula Federal Credit Union. Raid your 401k (just kidding). Please help us to reach our goal of $1000 by October 1st  (which is do-able, if YOU donate just $4.20!) (And of course, if you’d prefer the money stayed with Montana NORML to support our work to make marijuana legal for Montana adults, just let us know.)

Click below to donate:

Montana NORML Newsletter – Prop 19, National NORML Conference and the News

September 17th, 2010

Patriots,

I’ve never been more sure that working to make marijuana legal for all responsible adults is a just and noble cause. I spent part of the last week in Portland Oregon, at the 2010 National NORML Conference. Here’s a very brief peek at what I learned:

First, as most of you know, California voters will decide whether to pass Prop 19 in about six weeks. If it passes, marijuana would be legal for adults 21+ to grow and possess and consume. There are more details, but that’s the core element you need to understand.

The fact that it’s on the ballot and polling at just about 50% approval right now is already a great success. Mainstream society is really talking about and seriously considering ending marijuana prohibition. We’re almost there.

Unfortunately, some groups working to defeat the initiative — not just the law enforcement and the booze industries, but also groups that consider themselves marijuana activists. Some commercial growers.  Some “I gots mine” medical marijuana people. And some pie-in-the-sky ‘treat maryjane like dandelions’ folks.

Prop 19 ain’t perfect. How could it be perfect, for all of us? But it stops the arrest of overwise law-abiding adults for growing their own. That’s a policy worth supporting! We can continue to make improvements, but with nearly a million people arrested for cannabis nationwide last year (as usual),  the sooner we can stop the insanity, the better.

In the end, the victory or defeat of Prop 19 will likely come down to who has the most cash for ads — the supporters or the opponents? So, now, I’m asking each of you to make a donation to Montana NORML before Oct 1st. We’ll send donations received between now and then to the campaign in California. Donate $4.20, or $42, or $420, today.  Visit any page on the Montana NORML website and click the yellow donate button on the right-hand side. Pool spare couch change with your friends. Make a Montana NORML deposit at Missoula Federal Credit Union. Raid your 401k (just kidding). Please help us to reach our goal of $1000 by October 1st  (which is do-able, if YOU donate just $4.20!) (And of course, if you’d prefer the money stayed with Montana NORML to support our work to make marijuana legal for Montana adults, just let us know.)

The other presentation in Portland that made a big impact on me was about whether medical marijuana will actually make it harder to make cannabis legal for all grownups. I’ve wondered the same thing, but this presentation gave me, and now you, the tools to ensure that doesn’t happen. A few quick recollections:

  • Stop calling it “medicine”. Medicine isn’t social, medicine isn’t advertised by price, medicine isn’t sold with sex appeal, and medicine isn’t cooler when it’s big (big buds, big joints, big bongs). Of course cannabis has incredible medical benefits. But that doesn’t mean we should treat it like Codeine and Prozac. Call it an “herbal supplement” maybe.
  • Medical marijuana laws treat patients like second-class citizens, through price gouging and being forced to jump through bureaucratic hoops as a last resort, rather than as a readily accessible and safest first option.
  • Stop agreeing that there is “abuse” of the medical marijuana law. The card-carrying “grinning 20-somethings”, as I’ve called them, are simply demonstrating their eagerness to comply with the law. They would rather be a part of a legal regulated system than the criminal black market.  That’s just being a good citizen!
  • Medical marijuana is a “trial period” for legalization. Despite the media histrionics, we are discovering that society does not collapse when 25,000 people are exempt from arrest for marijuana possession. Let’s take the next step.
  • Adults shouldn’t need permission from a doctor to use one of the safest therapeutically active substances known to humankind. It’s less addictive than caffeine and less toxic than aspirin.

Some of the above might ruffle some feathers. But when we have Truth, Justice, and Liberty on our side, we need to keep speaking out.

Next week, I’ll be back to encouraging you to register to vote, learn who’s running to represent YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD, and so forth. But for now, the news:

Montana Marijuana News

Bonus News

Kindest regards.

Is medical marijuana a path to legalization, or permanent medicalization?

September 17th, 2010

Click below to watch Russ Belville’s brilliant presentation from the 2010 NORML conference considering this question. Watch all the way to the end for some specific activist tactics.

Montana NORML Newsletter – Tax and Regulate Bill, Upcoming Events and the News

September 3rd, 2010

Friends,

This morning I woke up and sent the following question to over 200 Montana legislative candidates. I asked the question, “Would you support a bill that taxes and regulates marijuana in a manner similar to alcohol? Why or why not?”

I already have some encouraging responses (and potential bill sponsors), and will be posting some news about that soon.

Next week, I’m off to the national NORML convention, a 3-day, information-packed, energy-multiplying, strategy-refining summit of marijuana policy reform leaders and experts from around the nation and the world.

So, there will be no newsletter next week.

However, there’s lots for you to do in the coming weeks.

  • Make sure you’re registered to vote, and write on a slip of paper what Montana House and Senate district you vote in. Tape it to the side of your monitor. Click here for help.
  • If you want to take personal action to help a candidate in Billings defeat his anti-marijuana opponent on Saturday, Sept 11, reply to this email right away and say “I want to help in Billings”. Transportation might be available to and from.
  • Sep 7-10, Polson, a medical marijuana “awareness day” hosted at the Jette store. Call 406-249-0801 for details.
  • Sep 9-11 in Portland, Oregon, the national NORML convention.
  • Sep 11, Missoula: 15th Annual Missoula Hempfest, a family-friendly hemp-focused event with fantastic music, a beer garden, hemp vendors, and fun for all. Visit our NORML table and say “high” to volunteer Cynthia.
  • Sep 14, Bozeman: “Montana Cannabis Forum: Fact from Fiction”,  featuring local and international experts, starting at 7PM at the Emerson Cultural Center Theatre.
  • Sep 24, statewide: last day to register as a write-in candidate (PDF form here). It would be great to have someone (anyone) run in HD60 (Park City). An anti-marijuana candidate is running there unopposed. Ready to run? I’ll help!
  • Oct 10 & 11, Bozeman: MMGA event, details to be announced soon.

Oh also — anyone know of a dentist who would be willing to barter for services with a friend of NORML?

Oh, here’s the latest news:

Montana Marijuana News

More Marijuana News

By the way, Montana NORML is an all-volunteer organization. There are no paid staff.  You can help us offset expenses by becoming a supporting member today. Thanks.

Montana NORML Newsletter – Proposed Medical Restrictions, Caregiver Expo Speech and the News

August 20th, 2010

Friends, Just a brief note today, and an excerpt from my talk at the Caregiver Expo in Missoula yesterday. The committee working to “fix” medical marijuana just released their updated draft bill. This isn’t law yet, but it’s proposed law which might end up redefining the system next spring. It’s a 59-page document based in many ways on Colorado’s recently updated law, but a few things you may be interested in are:

  • allows 3 immature and 3 flowering plants (instead of just “6″)
  • eliminates “affirmative defense”
  • eliminates “caregivers”, and instead creates a tiered system of providers, dispensaries and commercial growers (with hefty annual licensing and inspection fees).
  • restricts providers from selling more than two ounces to any patient in a 30-day period
  • requires a pain specialist in addition to another doctor — just for pain patients
  • makes failure to carry your card a misdemeanor
  • prohibits provider/doctor partnerships or financial arrangements

Get all the details here. Here’s a portion of my speech yesterday at the Caregiver Expo. Thanks to all who attended:

These United States of America are headed for marijuana legalization. This will happen at different times in different states and with different details, but make no mistake, it’s happening. More and more, the standard answer to the question “how should we deal with marijuana?” will become “pretty much like beer.”

Some of you may object “no, it’s a sacred and precious medicine, not beer!”

Look — the best possible thing for cardholders is full-blown legalization. It might not be the best thing for your caregiver business, but it is certainly best for everyone else — including people for whom cannabis is truly medicine.

Allowing anyone to grow their own or buy marijuana from licensed storefronts would reduce prices, increase reliability and quality, and allow the free market to determine which merchants have the best combinations of quality and price.

It’s easy to get mired in debates about details like plant counts, organic versus pesticide, tax policy, and commercialization versus nonprofit co-ops.

But the most important thing, the thing we all need to keep our eye on, is making all of that possible. Through the legalization of cannabis for all adults. I’m saying it’s important to cut to the chase, and not get bogged down in complicated, half-tongue-in-cheek pseudo-medical regulations.

I cringe when I hear caregivers say ‘we should be regulated like pharmacies!’ — I acknowledge that many of you are experts at your craft, but you are expert farmers, not pharmacists. Don’t mix the two up.

Don’t get me wrong — quality and cleanliness, safety — of cannabis matters, whether you’re talking medical or social. But we don’t need to pharmaceuticalize cannabis. Consider: microbreweries tell you the alcohol content of their varieties.

The public and the legislature already subconsciously understand that marijuana will soon be regulated like beer. Look at what’s often proposed: “away from schools and churches!” (just like bars)

Finally. As many of you doubtless know, people in California will vote on marijuana legalization in a few months. The initiative they’re voting on isn’t perfect, but deserves your support. Visit taxcannabis.org for details.

If it passes, the dominoes truly start to fall, and we need to be ready. We need to be ready to stand up without fear and say: Marijuana prohibition is an expensive and tragic failure. It’s time to regulate marijuana for all adults.

I hope you’ll join me.

And now, the news:

Montana Marijuana News:

Bonus News:

We could use your help, by the way. Would you like to get involved? You can always start a subchapter or become a supporting member. I am also looking for a volunteer with Excel skills and an eye for detail to do some data auditing. Let me know. Onwards and upwards.

Montana NORML Newsletter – Wacky Letters to the Editor, Legislation and Let’s Legalize it Already

August 6th, 2010

Dear Everyone,

A few things on my mind tonight.  First and foremost are two wacky letters to the editor that appeared in Montana papers today.

The first is from an out-of-state lifelong prohibitionist who believes that anyone who smokes a joint is supporting the “Afghanistani” terrorists who caused 9/11.  (Yes, I know most of that sentence is absurd).

The second is from a surgeon in Lewistown who believes our medical marijuana law is a “threat to civil society” and needs to be updated in various ways, such as 5-doctor panels, $1000 6-month re-certification fees, 30-year age requirements on caregivers, and malpractice insurance requirements.

You can read both and weep, or laugh, or scream, or post outraged comments on the newspaper website or Facebook. But you will not be helping.

The way to respond to ludicrous letters in the paper is to respond with a letter of your own. It needs to be well reasoned and brief. It should be sent in the next few days, and reference the original.

And obviously, we think it should propose taxing and regulating cannabis for all adults, as the solution to the medical marijuana conundrum.

Here’s a reason to write the letter: politicians (known for listening carefully to which way the wind is blowing) pay “clipping services” to gauge the opinion of society, and what appears in the opinion section of the paper is a major part of that. They figure that for everyone who writes a letter, there are at least a hundred people who didn’t botherWhich will you be?

If you need help, let me know.


Next, I had the opportunity to speak with an employee of the Missoula Police Department today. We talked about the craziness of the medical marijuana scene, and he told stories about 23-yr-old dudes walking in grinning, cards in hand, asking for their “weed” back. He went on to talk about how the medical marijuana law needs to be severely restricted to people on the verge of death for whom nothing else works, etc etc.

I said, “Or, we could treat it more like beer.”

He immediately nodded and said, “Sure, but for now it’s medical and….”
That was enlightening to me. He agreed that the beer model works for cannabis. I think most people do. If we could just get past medical.


You should know by now that the legislative committee working on medical marijuana for the state of Montana has been hard at work this summer.

If you are closely following the progress of the revisions to Montana’s medical marijuana bill, these reports will be of interest. Included on the list are law enforcement recommendations,  a review of Colorado’s recent medical marijuana changes, ambiguities in the definition of a “patient”, etc. Click here and spend an hour reviewing what the state’s been discussing.

Then, email them your polite thoughts on the matter.


Finally, I’ve come to understand that the organizers of the Bozeman Hempfest are not happy with NORML, and in fact intend to pass out fliers at the event urging visitors to “boycott” Montana NORML.  If you decide to pay the entry fee and attend the event, I encourage you to request a conversation with the event organizers to hear their argument.  I’ve tried, but don’t understand it.

Enough. Here’s the latest news:

If you find these updates useful, please consider becoming a supporting member of Montana NORML.

Keep on keepin’ on.

NORML Newsletter: Giant Weed-Harvesting Robots, and the News

July 16th, 2010

It seems there was some confusion about last week’s newsletter headline about $88 ounces. That price was projected by the venerable RAND corporation in their report analyzing likely effects of marijuana legalization in California.

Does that mean tobacco-company weed harvested and ground up by the acre by giant robots? Maybe.  Don’t worry, there will always be room for high-end marijuana, just like we have plenty of options in the high-end beer and wine categories. But there’s no getting away from the fact that with full legalization comes a potentially dramatic price reduction.

Legalization might cut into growers’ profits, yes. I’m sorry about that, but reduced profits are no reason to keep arresting people for something that should not be a crime.  And, you’ll have lots more legal customers!  For more on this phenomenon in California, check out this NORML blog post.

Moving on — most of you already know that a committee of legislators is meeting throughout the summer to discuss changes to Montana’s medical marijuana law.  The idea is that bringing interested parties (law enforcement, schools, growers, patient advocates) together in the same room enough times will identify areas of concern and generate thoughtful discussion, and eventually a proposal that is tolerable to all sides will result. And, the thinking goes, this proposal will therefore sail through the legislature and be implemented in the spring.

We should expect significant changes to the law next year. If you’re a patient or caregiver, pay close attention, because, who knows, your legal status may flip to criminal with the stroke of a pen.  If you want to know more, don’t forget these meetings are public. Anyone can attend, or watch over the internet. Check the committee website for details.

If you show up, you’ll optionally have 30 seconds to state your case to the committee. Of course we recommend you tell them politely to have the courage to get past medical.

Speaking of getting involved, our friends at Montanans for Responsible Legislation (the group suing the city of Great Falls over their marijuana business ban) are throwing a huge fundraiser at the Rock Creek Lodge this weekend. Three days of music, food, and camping, with drum circles, fire dancers, vendors, caregivers and general fun to be sure. Check their website for details.

RUMOR ALERT: We’ve heard some fascinating rumors and conspiracy theories about Montana NORML in the last few weeks. I’d like to respond to all of them at once, so please, if you have heard anything, let me know.

Finally, here’s the news of the week:

Montana Marijuana News:

Thanks all, and remember:  we have Truth, Justice, and Liberty on our side.

You can get the free weekly NORML newsletter delivered to your inbox by signing up here.