Support States' Rights - OK Medical Pot

If ever a piece of legislation should pass readily through the U.S. House of Representatives, it is a measure sponsored by Rep. Maurice Hinchey, D-N.Y., and Dana Rohrabacher, R-Calif., that would prevent the Department of Justice from using tax dollars to prosecute medical-marijuana patients in states that have legalized medical marijuana. Because it is a good bill, expect it to fail.

Polls show that some three out of four Americans support allowing doctors to prescribe medical marijuana for patients who need it. Members must know that constituents within their districts use marijuana to control pain and nausea -- their families would like to live without the fear of prosecution. As Time Magazine reported last year, research shows that the drug has salutary "analgesic and anti-inflammatory effects."

Republicans should be drawn to the states' rights angle of the bill, while Democrats should go for the personal stories of constituents who have found relief, thanks to medical marijuana.

Yet when the House last voted on the measure in 2005, it tanked in a 264-162 vote. As the House is scheduled to consider the measure this week, few expect the measure to pass. "I wish I could tell you it's going to pass," Marijuana Policy Project spokesman Bruce Mirken conceded by phone last week. "I can't realistically expect that."

Over the last decade, two big hurdles existed: Republicans and Democrats. Last year, a mere 15 Repubs voted for the measure -- down from 19 GOP members who supported it in 2004. On the other side of the aisle, Democrats are moving toward the light. In 1998, the Clinton Justice Department filed suit against California medical-marijuana clubs. Last year, however, an impressive 145 Dems voted for Hinchey-Rohrabacher.

Martin Chilcutt of Kalamazoo, Mich., has written to his local GOP congressman, Rep. Fred Upton. A veteran who believes he got cancer because of his military service, Chilcutt told me that his Veterans Administration hospital doctors supported his use of medical marijuana when he had cancer.

Upton's office told me that Upton believes Marinol, the legal synthetic drug that includes the active ingredient in marijuana, should do the trick.

I asked Chilcutt if he had tried the drug. "I don't like Marinol at all," Chilcutt replied. It takes too long to work, it is hard to calibrate the dose you need, and "it made me feel weird." He prefers marijuana because it works instantly -- "You can control the amount you're using, and you get instant feedback."

Upton also fears sending the wrong message to kids about marijuana. But federal law has long allowed the sick access to needed pain control with drugs more powerful than marijuana. Only bad politics can account for the fact that marijuana is a Schedule 1 drug under the Controlled Substances Act, and thus deemed more harmful than cocaine and morphine -- drugs that can kill users who overdose.

Alex Holstein, a former GOP operative and conservative activist, is lobbying Republicans on behalf of the Marijuana Policy Project. He believes that regardless of their position on medical marijuana, Repubs in the California delegation should support Hinchey-Rohrabacher because state voters approved Proposition 215 -- and Republicans should stand up for states' rights and the will of California voters.

As it is, President Bush should direct the Justice Department to lay off medical-marijuana users -- because it is the right thing to do for sick people.

It's not as if the administration doesn't know how to sit on its hands and not enforce existing law. Last week, The Washington Post reported that under Bush, the number of employers prosecuted for hiring illegal aliens plummeted from 182 in 1999 to four in 2003.

If the Bushies can look the other way when well-heeled employers break the law, they can look the other way when sick people try to relieve unnecessary pain.

Who says they haven't?
Hamadeh and associates. Chest, Vol. 94/2, pp.432-433, 1988. "Physicians should be aware of this potentially lethal"
Ok, they are aware. Why haven't these infections shown up in chemo patients since this warning was issued in 1988?

Transplantation, Vol. 61, June 27, 1996. (Marijuana smoke transmits aspergillosis, a fungus having up to a 90% fatality rate if contracted by transplant patients.
Where are the bodies?

Voth EA, Schwartz RH. Medicinal applications of delta 9 THC and marijuana: a perspective. Annals of Internal Medicine 1997: 126:791-8. (Marijuana is not a panacea. It is an impure weed that introduces immuno compromised patients to bacteria, fungi, and other toxic complications.
Where are the victims of these marijuana caused complications?

Any which way you blow it, you have nothing but smoke.
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"A 34-year-old man presented with pulmonary aspergillosis on the 75th day after marrow transplant for chronic myelogenous leukemia. The patient had smoked marijuana heavily for several weeks prior to admission. Cultures of the marijuana revealed Aspergillus fumigatus with morphology and growth characteristics identical to the organism grown from open lung biopsy specimen. Despite aggressive antifungal therapy, the patient died with disseminated disease."

So I guess when posters on this forum say that marijuana has never killed anyone, they didn't count this guy.

You're suggesting the cancer patient smoke marijuana?

If they desire to do so, absolutely.

Where, in his hospital room?

I meant at home. But now that you mention it, I think the hospital room would be a fine place to do it. They can ventilate a room pretty effectively, I would guess.

With a supressed immune system due to the chemo, you're not concerned about a fungal or bacterial infection from the marijuana?

Not if the patient isn't.

You're suggesting the cancer patient smoke marijuana? Where, in his hospital room? With a supressed immune system due to the chemo, you're not concerned about a fungal or bacterial infection from the marijuana?

As opposed to the sterling record hospitals have of never misfiring meds or creating infections with needles and surgical instruments. What do you say we bring a sense of proportion to our concerns? Oh, excuse me, I forget we were drug warriors.

Oh! I suppose you live on San Juan ridge in Nevada County, right?
Nope, I live three ridges north of Yuppieville.

I don't care how long you and your family has lived here before this "flatlander" arrived 30 years ago
Yep, I had it right...One of the new morality crusaders from the city. You yuppies have managed to turn our rural paradise into the same ghetto you fled. I'll bet you have a really nifty fence and argue about property lines with your neighbor. You flatlanders can be humorous at times!

what I said is still fully and absolutely correct in spite of your smug sophistry!!!
My sophistry isn't smug, it's simple truth. We had none of these problems until you arrived with them in tow.
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Aspergillus fumigatus is ubiquitous, it is a common component of soil. You ingest some of it every time you tend your houseplants.

So I guess when posters on this forum say that marijuana has never killed anyone, they didn't count this guy.

Let me be the first to point out that the patient in question did not die of the effects of cannibus, which is generally the issue we'd be concerned about if we were actually interested in comparable harm, rather than scoring any propaganda opportunity that presents itself, no matter how irrelevant and feeble. If marijuana was legal, the FDA or the Dept of Ag would be supervising its purity at market, and something could have legally been done to prevent the death in question. Your patient is a victim of marijuana laws, not marijuana.

"Your "cite" tells me nothing."

Try this link: http://www.chestjournal.org/cgi/content/abstract/94/2/432

Here's another one. This one lived.

"A 48 year old successful kidney transplant patient who heavily used marijuana immediately following his transplant developed invasive pulmonary aspergillosis (IPA), a fungus transmitted in the smoke of marijuana. Marks et al reported on their use of an experimental antifungal drug to effectively treat this life threatening condition (Transplantation, Vol. 61, 1771-1773, No. 12, June 27, 1996), and noted that IPA "is a devastating complication in the immuno-compromised patient" such as patients with AIDS, chronic granulomatous disease, bone marrow transplants and those receiving chemotherapy for small cell lung cancer. Aspergillosis has up to a 90% fatality rate if contracted by transplant patients."

But, all the same, I still find pot-heads amusing.

I find drug-warriors amusing. This would be a symmetric phenomenon, except that my team doesn't have a track record of sweeping thru minority ghettos, putting every kid they can grab off the playground in jail and blighting their futures if they have reefers in their pockets. Unlike the treatment any federal official's kid gets for the exact same offense. What a laugh riot.

"Aspergillus fumigatus is ubiquitous, it is a common component of soil. You ingest some of it every time you tend your houseplants."

Yep, and it's normally not a problem with healthy people. But cancer patients on chemo, AIDS patients, transplants patients, and others with suppressed immune systems are susceptible and may become infected and die.

"If marijuana was legal, the FDA or the Dept of Ag would be supervising its purity at market"

Medical marijuana IS legal and is being recommended in eleven states and neither the FDA or the Dept of Ag is involved in supervising squat.

The thrust of the article in this thread is that the federal government should leave these states alone. To do what, kill immunosuppressed patients?

"If marijuana was legal, the FDA or the Dept of Ag would be supervising its purity at market"

Medical marijuana IS legal and is being recommended in eleven states and neither the FDA or the Dept of Ag is involved in supervising squat.

Really? Why don't you ask the DEA if that's the case.

The thrust of the article in this thread is that the federal government should leave these states alone. To do what, kill immunosuppressed patients?

At the risk of repeating myself, the states aren't allowing these two patients to be killed due to the pharmacological effects of cannibus. The are being killed due to the pharmacalogical effects of a soil bacterium, that could have easily been obviated by perfectly ordinary, everyday ag department inspections.

How much of a share is the government getting today? Zero, zip, nada.

Have you been keeping tabs on the War on Drugs? The (local) government gets their cut in the form of Fed. tax dollars.

So you're saying people will switch from alcohol to marijuana? Now why would they do that? People are going to take up smoking? They'll throw away the Glenlivet and grab some Acapulco Gold?

A lot of rednecks I know would switch from alcohol to marijuana in a heartbeat if it were legalized.

So you're saying people will switch from alcohol to marijuana? Now why would they do that? People are going to take up smoking? They'll throw away the Glenlivet and grab some Acapulco Gold?

A lot of rednecks I know would switch from alcohol to marijuana in a heartbeat if it were legalized.

Why would they do that??? Why wouldn't they? In every historical case known, sea changes in the law cause sea changes in usage. And we have contemporary statistics to draw from in Switzerland, Jamaica, and Denmark, amongst others. The safety factor alone would be plenty enough reason for a rational user to substitute marijuana from alcohol. At the end of the Great Prohibition, the single most notable change in consumption was the return to wine and beer of the vast majority of the population, from the artificial popularity that Gin, burbon, Vodka, rotgut, and other hard liquers enjoyed because of prohibition. Lots of people factor safety considerations into their choice of recreational substances, even if the buzz per buck is of different sorts and intensities. Prohibition causes buzz per buck to be the primary economic consideration, because the only important costs to dealers are the cost of being caught--which makes delivering the most buzz per buck their most efficient leverage on their investment.

"that could have easily been obviated by perfectly ordinary, everyday ag department inspections."

According to the article, they want the federal government to butt out. I don't see the states setting up any drug safety standards. The states ARE allowing these patients to be killed by contaminated drugs.

And whose ag department is going to go to 100,000 homes to inspect home grown cannabis on a monthly basis?

"The (local) government gets their cut in the form of Fed. tax dollars"

Which is spent on drug enforcement for ALL drugs, not just marijuana. Getting money for drug enforcement, hiring people to do drug enforcement, and then spending all the money you're given on drug enforcement is not what I call income.

Taxing drugs and putting that money in the general fund -- that's income.

"A lot of rednecks I know would switch from alcohol to marijuana in a heartbeat if it were legalized."

Sounds like a local thing and not something upon which to build a national policy. You don't happen to have any studies that show alcohol users would switch to marijuana, do you?

If people would indeed switch from dangerous alcohol to "safe" marijuana, I would think that would be a very powerful argument for legalizing it. Yet you're the first person on this board, in all the time I've been here, that I've seen make that argument. I have not seen it anywhere else, even from all the Soros sponsored groups trying to get it legalized.

The question is -- can you support your statement with any studies, facts, papers, cites, polls, anything? Other than your vague reference to "contemporary statistics", that is.

LOL!
Nice try but this reference is blowing smoke. It assumes marijuana smoke caused the problem but presents no lab report confirming that assumption. In any case it is irrelevant. More people die from infections contacted during their stay in the hospital than from marijuana. Smoking marijuana is less likely to cause an infection than visiting a hospital.

See post #47 by donh if you're worried about the fungus among us.
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According to the article, they want the federal government to butt out.

Nice conflation of issues. They want the feds to butt out in the sense of not arresting their patients and suppliers.

I don't see the states setting up any drug safety standards. The states ARE allowing these patients to be killed by contaminated drugs.

The states don't have an ag department, in the sense of federally mandated uniform standards a' la' the Commerce Clause of the Constitution.

And whose ag department is going to go to 100,000 homes to inspect home grown cannabis on a monthly basis?

Oh, I don't know, the same ag department that governs how much and of what sort you can make home-grown alcohol right now?

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