Wow it’s been a month since my last post. I’ve been without internet for three whole weeks because of a move to a brand new building that was not cable ready yet. The withdrawal symptoms are too ugly to describe. Anyhow, the pamphlet I’ve been distributing has had a few changes to it from what I posted but it’s for the most part identical.

When I talk to people about this issue, I'm usually met with two extremes; yes legalization is surely down the road, or no way. But the difference between the former and the latter is that the former, and ok, I'll admit that I'm a bit biased, is more informed, actually know who there representatives are, the long history of prohibition, and general drug war statistics, whereas; the latter comes up with dogmatic views or various political and economic conspiracies.

I truly believe that the only reason marijuana is illegal today is because of a bad law was passed in 1937, and then another in 1970, and people all too often people muddle together law code with moral code. People just can't wrap their heads around the fact that there once was a time when the government could not tell you what to do in the privacy of your own home. Perhaps I have a bit too much faith in the workings of our political and economic system because I just don't believe it's any specific industry (alcohol or pharmaceutical) that is keeping marijuana illegal. It is simply people's misconceptions led by a powerful few that make their living off marijuana being illegal, the politicians that listen to them, and the masses that follow their lead for lack of their own better judgment. There isn’t a limited market for substances that alter the mind and body in my opinion, but I'm sure many of people disagree with me here. That's ok. I talk to many very smart people who completely disagree.

I spoke with someone who works for the legislature the other day who read my pamphlet. It was a rather refreshing conversation. This person told me that they are trying to model Iowa’s medical marijuana program after California’s. I take this as a good sign because we all know what is going on in California right now, medicine has become readily available and the sky has not fallen in on them. Oh the thought of a medical program like California’s right here in Iowa! I shall try not to get my delicate hopes up but oh what an idea!

This person also asked me if I had plans to lobby. I said I had no plans to. I do not own a nice suit, and am not so outgoing. I met a lobbyist once and he told me the most useful attribute a lobbyist could have is “the gift of gab”. This is something I do not have. Besides, Thoreau says, Beware of ventures that require new clothes. He is pretty smart so I shall listen to him. But I do have plans for another project that has not quite taken shape yet.

Pamphlet Update

I have found someone willing to print my pamphlets at virtually no cost. It’s been quite a long time but here are the reasons. Well, the first reason is because I have not been able to secure a mode of reliable transportation until just now, well next week actually. There are many things I’ve been putting on hold for this particular reason. Next, I’ll be the first to admit that I’m a rather selfish creature. I treat my heart as the primary organ, and cater first to its whimsical needs, all too often, at great cost to other worthier activities. Unfortunately, it tends to find maximum contentment in gazing for long moments at the various budding plants in my backyard -- the ambitions of a green fibrous creature stretching out from under the dirt towards the light is a wondrous thing. I think I also spend too many hours trying to decipher the language of the birds that speak with each other outside my window -- I feel I am getting close though. But the time shall come, when I will get the urge to begin soliciting my ideas, and I will put on my more respectable clothes, and travel the city of Des Moines.

Greetings Fellow Corn People

Hello to everyone and no one at all. I have not had time to post much lately. Life has simply gotten in the way, but marijuana prohibition is never far from my thoughts. I have decided to scrap my medical marijuana newsletter project after laboring over it excessively because of outside input and some personal reflections.

I decided something simpler and more attention grabbing would create more of a desired effect; I have abandoned all politically correct notions, and will no longer promote freedom under the guise of “medical marijuana”. Because I am new to this Activism thing I am not as of yet so jaded, so I have decided to try and enlist the help of the public, since I feel our legislators are already aware of our presence in the form of the many angst ridden letters I and some of you have already written to them.

So I am posting here what I have of my first pamphlet, a simple two sided, 8 x 11 document, easily photocopied, soon to be distributed throughout town with the help of those sympathetic to our cause. It’s time Iowans had their noses mashed into the notion of freedom and limited government.

COMMON SENSE;

ADDRESSED TO THE

INHABITANTS OF IOWA,

ON THE FOLLOWING
INTERESTING SUBJECTS:


I. Of the Origin and Design of the Prohibition Laws in general, with concise Remarks on Marihuana Prohibition.
II. Of the origins of Tyranny and Oppression and the Cause of Freedom.
III. Thoughts on the present State of American Affairs.
IV. Of the present ability of America, with some miscellaneous Reflections.

The Author wishes to put forth the warning now that the following document is slightly offensive. Perhaps even an example of what not to do, an anti-persuasive, when trying to recruit dissenters from the other side. To be called a mindless freedom hater would brew contempt in any rational being, but nonetheless, the author could not prevent the flow of these thoughts.

Maybe individuals of higher standards, less impulsive, more patient and meticulous could restrain themselves for the better outcome; however the Author does not profess to have any of these desired qualities; but rather, has always had the amusing suspicion that she would never really amount to anything.

But it is only natural, when those oppressed have been given, or rather have taken, the opportunity to speak openly to their oppressors, with a comfortable amount of anonymity, that a certain amount of contempt and frustration seep through. Imagine that you go about living your life feeling that every fabric of your being seeks to live life kindly, and with integrity. I hope that this is not a far stretch for you. Then being told by your oppressors, that even your loftiest ambitions are not good enough, that your curiosities and explorations are corrupt, and that you are what’s wrong with society. It is enough to breed insanity and uncertainty in the most genetically gifted of creatures.

But the epiphany that facilitated the creation of this document was the realization that this is not an attempt to recruit those along the fence, or dissenters from the other side. It is an attempt to draw a line in the sand, to locate supporters of Our Cause. A call to all sympathizers: those who can lend resources, intellect, and ideas. Our Cause, be it a specific one, but put down to its basic fundamentals, is simply the cause of all man, the Cause of Freedom: the right to live and be let alone.

THE AUTHOR.

That some men would seek to control the impulses of other men, be they ambitious, hopelessly romantic, self-absorbed, or even self-detrimental, by locking them up inside concrete and metal among savages is both curious and irreprehensible.

Millions have been arrested, yet our oppressors content themselves by hanging symbols of freedom over their porches while humming its virtues, we affirm, with very little thought for its true definition. Whether it be that they lack confidence in their own moral judgments, or that they hold them as too infallible, they allow government; that which our most trusted forefathers, wise men, and polymaths defined as a necessary evil in all of their most championed philosophical arguments, to expand virtually unchecked.

They pawn their own constitutional rights for greater access inside our homes, so they can dictate our lives by force, using civilian police to enter our private dwellings by way of battering rams, with guns drawn, clothed in black paramilitary gear.

They allow marihuana prohibition to exist because they lack faith in their neighbors, in their country, and they unconsciously fear the intricate forces that make this nation great can not withstand letting those alone who do not view a certain plant in the same light as they do.

They justify their oppression by calling us reckless lawbreakers. They have forgotten, or have never known, that the questioning of authority and civil disobedience are valuable ideas; notions that led to the creation of this country and the end of segregation. It was Thoreau who wrote: The greater part of what my neighbors call good, I believe in my soul to be bad, and if I repent of anything, it is very likely to be my good behavior.

What demon possesses our oppressors, that they behave so well, as to condone the mistreatment of peaceful others, simply because of written law? Or that compels them towards unwavering obedience to laws they feel are wrong, just until they change, if they ever do? In doing so, they reduce themselves to the level of objects, of machines, and marionettes. Thoreau again: Must the citizen ever for a moment, or in the least degree, resign his conscience to the legislator? Why has every man a conscience then? I think that we should be men first, and subjects afterward. We affirm.

In the early days of the Republic, it would have been unthinkable that Congress could prohibit the local cultivation, possession, and consumption of marijuana. These are not words written by some drug-riddled anarchist but by Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.

But those days ended when our first drug czar accused a certain plant species of [causing] white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes, entertainers, and any others. Of being a reefer that makes darkies think they’re as good as white men, and the most violence-causing drug in the history of mankind. Congress listened and enacted the Marihuana Tax Stamp Act of 1937, the evil spawn of racist intentions and yellow journalism.

Now here we are in Our time. We here at IMAP are not so old, but we have lived long enough to see plenty of the human race do good, driven by nothing but a strange inherent desire to create, love, and learn; and sadly, we have seen plenty of the human race do evil, driven by laws written to protect and to serve.

Marihuana prohibition is the most unjust law of Our time. It is a principle that pays for one group of people to oppress another. But it is now only supported by a Minority of Americans. The will of a few, force fed to all: it is happening now in our country.

Hx tells us that freedom and altruism are never enough to force policy changes in a prospering land. Instead it has been violence in Mexico, the failing economy, and overcrowded prisons that have brought the Majority to come to the same conclusion; billions of dollars would be saved, additional tax revenue generated, and powerful drug cartels crippled.

Marihuana is so safe that in the entire written history of man, there have been no recorded overdoses. Yet marihuana prohibition, the will of the Minority, kills thousands in violence analogous to violence during alcohol prohibition. Dead gangsters lying on bloody sidewalks of Chicago convinced politicians in just thirteen years the deadly consequences of the prohibition laws. Perhaps the lives of Browns down south or Blacks in the ghettos do not resonate as much inside certain consciences. If not, then let it be known that violence and injustice have seeped into our suburbs as well.

In Colorado, a disabled medical marihuana patient was arrested for growing two marihuana plants. Police seized his home, which he had paid in full with accident settlement money. In Michigan, police raided the home of a 20-year-old college student in the middle of the night and shot him in the chest as he sat unarmed on his couch over fifty dollars worth of marihuana.

These are examples of seventy years of marihuana prohibition, an idea that has been nothing but futile and deadly. Marihuana is more popular today than it ever was before it was made illegal.

A really smart guy once wrote, “A long history of not thinking a thing wrong, gives it the superficial appearance of being right, and raises at first a formidable outcry in defense of custom”. That is why, frustratingly, we find even the smallest mention of easing restrictions on marijuana promotes hallucinations in the most rational of beings.

Our oppressors champion the debunked gateway theory as the foundation of their argument. They never cease to advertise their worries for the children, yet they promote an environment of unregulated sales. They place marihuana in the highest restricted drug category, even above meth, the drug of death. They say marihuana has no medicinal value but hold several patents on chemically isolated THC for its medical efficacy. They ban a substance that has killed no one, but tax for profit a noted two that have killed millions. All the while they push on us their opiates and barbiturates, their uppers and downers.

They stand in a mindless state of denial, and refuse to recognize their drug-free society for what it is, a sick and twisted totalitarian utopia. Yet, in search of their absolutist fantasies we throw away billions, spray chemicals on fertile soils, militarize civilian police forces, build prisons instead of schools, waste law enforcement resources, and force our failed policies on other countries; all in an effort to extinguish a relationship that has existed peacefully between a single plant species and the human race for thousands of years until one racist drug czar used fears of White women mingling with Blacks and Mexicans inside jazz clubs to end it.

Marihuana prohibition is an empty shell of a policy based on perceptions built upon faulty premises. That thought brings us to our primary goal here at IMAP: to change perceptions using facts, statistics, and Common Sense. We dared to hope that marihuana prohibition was on its last legs and could not sit idly by while our oppressors stomped out the hopeful, consistent pangs of freedom that beat so fervently in our little Activist hearts.

At the very least, we wanted our voices heard before they turned our unceasing cries for freedom, our noble pursuits at happiness into something insidious, evil and sinister. Before taxpayer funded efforts began to diminish our cries, demoralize them as mere selfish desires to fuel addictions and pawn away lives in an effort to mindlessly sedate ourselves, or accuse us of being blinded by a cloud of maddening reefer smoke, or hopeless junkies with no direction.

IMAP wants to make a stand, here and now, to challenge our oppressors for more intellectual arguments. Even a dog ceases to greet his master at the door if he is mistreated enough. We have decided to be the voice for the millions mistreated.

Thank you for your time. If you agree with our notion of freedom, please help by photocopying these pamphlets and distributing them by any means necessary.

IOWA MARIHUANA ACTIVISM PROJECT.

We ask now for your support by simply submitting your email for our upcoming newsletter, whatever other information you wish to give is up to you. We would especially love article submissions. If we choose your submission, we will publish it in our upcoming newsletter either openly or anonymously. Also, have you been adversely affected by the corrupt prohibition laws? Been hit with excessive fines, job discrimination, loss of citizenship rights including the right to vote and bear arms, property seizures, loss of student financial aid, thrown in jail, or forced to pee in a cup? We would like to hear from you. Want to lend your time? Any suggestions or Activism ideas are also welcome. In other words, we really want to hear from you. All correspondence can be sent to IMAP2009@yahoo.com

Had to put this video on..

Wow. A member of Congress quoting Anslinger and debunking the gateway. Thought I'd never see the day.


Tennessee Congressman Steve Cohen vs. FBI Director Robert Mueller

If I were Filthy Rich...

This weeks Powerball Lottery is at $170 million dollars. I never buy tickets, but still occasionally daydream about how I'd spend the money. So if I were a millionaire, most of my money would go towards drug law reform in Iowa. I would run commercials and put stuff up on billboards. Throw some charity balls. We'd piss off a lot of people, and It’d be a lot of fun.

The other day, I was trolling for prohibitionists sites, just to keep an eye on what they were doing and saying, it’s never really anything groundbreaking. But I came across a non-profit society called Save Our Society from Drugs. The site lacks any real substance as far as persuasive arguments go. But I did find an interesting page that I’ll link here called “Follow the Money Trail”. It gives a list of wealthy contributors to past and current drug legalization ballots.

A guy by the name of George Soros appears on the list the most. Apparently he is the 29th richest person in the world with an estimated net worth of over $11 billion. If these figures are correct, the amount of money he’s donated to drug law reform is just a shiny flash in the pan, but hey, Mr. Soros, we still respect you. Cheers.

New Poll Shows Ohio Support for Medical Marijuana at 73%

A recent KCCI poll shows support in Iowa at only 53%, with 9% undecided, still a majority but not quite as good as Ohio. Come on Iowa, we can do better.

Here is a link to the article.

The end of the article mentions the following:

"The Office of National Drug Control Policy's 2008 Marijuana Source Book reported that marijuana accounted for 40 percent of drug arrests nationally -- but only 2.5 percent of inmates in state prisons across the nation are there for marijuana-only offenses.

The report disputes the notion that marijuana can be legalized for medical use without creeping into the rest of the population. It cites federal statistics that show eight of the 10 states with the highest percentage of residents who used marijuana within the past month also were states with medical marijuana programs. Five of the 10 states with the highest percentage of new youth marijuana users also had medical marijuana programs in place. "


I followed the link to Marijuana Source Book but the information wasn't there. This statistic peaks my curiosity so I'll check up on it later -- because this seems to contradict findings in a recnt state-sponsored student survey in California that found marijuana use among students have gone down since 1995 (see page 25) but remained relatively stable in recent years.

BTW, I obviously hate the ONDCP and recommend a book called "Lies, damned lies, and drug war statistics" By Matthew B. Robinson, Renee G. Scherlen.

The authors speak at the Cato Institute in this video.

If you want to become even more agitated at the ONDCP, watch this Video link to Congress's Domestic Subcommittee oversight hearing on The National Drug Control Strategy, Budget, and Compliance: Priorities and Accountability at ONDCP. Its frustrating when you hear how much is spent on futile efforts on supply side reduction when all the evidence points to the fact that it SIMPLY DOES NOT WORK, and this guy can say with a straight face that he cares about the well being of the American people -- that he actually wants drug use to decline in the county. I beg to differ. Well alas, I guess we won't have to deal with him anymore.

There's is a new drug czar now...who's been recently quoted as saying this:

"Regardless of how you try to explain to people it's a 'war on drugs' or a 'war on a product,' people see a war as a war on them," he said. "We're not at war with people in this country."

It's gonna take a little more than just a slight change in catch phrases and rhetoric to fix our current state of affairs but I shall try and be optimistic. The comments in the story also seem very encouraging...

Great Medical Marijuana Business Seminar in Los Angeles on May 23-24, 2009

Thursday, May 7, 2009

Cannabis Career Institute Workshop May 23-24

The Cannabis Career Insitute is going to be hosting a workshop on May 23 and 24, 2009 on how to safely own and operate a Medical Marijuana Dispensary. As the Charles Lynch case has shown us, the DEA seems intent on ignoring State's Rights, and the laws passed by states who have legalized Medical Marijuana. With 14 states having legalized Medical Marijuana, and with several others (including my own state of New York), it is imperiative that Medical Marijuana growers, suppliers, caregivers and patients have reliable sources of information so that they can take every step possible to be safe against the DEA's war on Medical Marijuana, which amounts to a war on innocent American Citizens. The Cannabis Career Institute is helping to fill a void that needs to be filled.

If you cannot make this workshop, they have a online course available through their Cannabis Career Institute web site.

Medical Marijuana Dispensary/Business Work Shop

Time: May 23, 2009 at 11am to May 24, 2009 at 11am
Location: Los Angeles, Ca
Organized By: George Grimes


Event Description:

Learn what it takes to safely own and operate a medical marijuana dispensary business and enjoy all the benefits of the medical cannabis industry.

For Additional Information Join the Weedworks Network.

Cannabis Career Institute