Posted on 08/13/2008 6:30:00 PM PDT by microgood
When Owen Beck was 17, doctors amputated his right leg to stop the spread of bone cancer. His parents, desperate to find a drug that would relieve their son's excruciating phantom limb pain, brought him to Charlie Lynch's medical marijuana dispensary in Morro Bay, Calif., carrying a recommendation from a Stanford University oncologist. The marijuana not only eased the pain but also alleviated the nausea caused by chemotherapy.
Called to testify as a character witness in Lynch's federal marijuana trial, Beck did not get far. When he mentioned his cancer, U.S. District Judge George Wu cut him off and sent him packing. Wu decreed there would be no talk of the symptoms marijuana relieves, no references to California's recognition of marijuana as a medicine, no mention even of the phrase “medical marijuana” in front of the jury.
In short, there would be no explanation of how Lynch came to operate what prosecutors called a “marijuana store” in downtown Morro Bay for a year, openly serving more than 2,000 customers. Under federal law, which forbids marijuana use for any purpose, all that was irrelevant. So it's hardly surprising that Lynch was convicted last week of five marijuana-related offenses that carry penalties of five to 85 years in prison.
Nor is it surprising that so many self-described conservatives, including Republican presidential candidate John McCain, support the prosecution of people like Charlie Lynch, abandoning their avowed federalist principles because of blind hostility toward a plant they associate with draft-dodging, flag-burning hippies. It's not surprising, but it's shameful.
The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) has raided more than 60 medical marijuana dispensaries in the last two years. Because the deck is stacked against them, dispensary operators facing federal drug charges typically plead guilty.
Lynch instead gambled on a defense known as entrapment by estoppel, which occurs when someone is arrested for actions the government assured him were legal. Before he opened Central Coast Compassionate Caregivers in 2006, Lynch called the DEA to ask about his legal exposure. He says an agent told him he should consult with state and local authorities, which he took to mean he could avoid trouble as long as he complied with state and local law.
It's not hard to see why Lynch believed he was operating a legitimate business. He had the blessing of the Morro Bay Chamber of Commerce and the city council; local officials, including Morro Bay's mayor, posed for pictures at the dispensary's opening; and neither his neighbors nor the city police objected.
At Lynch's trial the DEA denied giving him any sort of green light, or even a yellow one. But the response he says he got from the agency is the response he should have gotten, because under the U.S. Constitution the medical use of marijuana is a local matter.
At one time John McCain seemed to acknowledge as much. In April 2007 he said, “I will let states decide that issue." But he quickly abandoned that position, and this year he said he'd continue the DEA's medical marijuana raids, declaring, “It is a national issue and not a [state] issue." By contrast, McCain's Democratic opponent, Barack Obama, has promised to stop the raids.
McCain's medical marijuana position contradicts his professed allegiance to federalism. “The federal government was intended to have limited scope," he says on his website, vowing to appoint judges who “respect the proper role of local and state governments."
That commitment is inconsistent with reading Congress's power to regulate interstate commerce broadly enough to cover homegrown medical marijuana, as the Supreme Court did in 2005. “If Congress can regulate this under the Commerce Clause," Justice Clarence Thomas noted in his dissent, “it can regulate virtually anything -- and the federal government is no longer one of limited and enumerated powers."
By supporting the Bush administration's medical marijuana policy, McCain is renouncing such concerns. Worse, his promise to flout the Constitution probably will enhance his appeal among conservatives.
Doesn't anyone remember the idea of a Republic, or the Founder's idea of the "laboratories of democracy" anymore? Why is it people automatically assume that whatever the solution to a particular problem is, it has the be the same solution for everyone?
Perhaps, but it doesn't make any difference anyway. This is appropriately a state matter, and the writer, who's probably a pothead, is perfectly correct in nailing McCain for hypocritically failing to take a federalist position.
This is the way any federal trial goes. Did you or did you not sell MJ? Anything else is not allowed unless it is evidence that you did NOT sell MJ. Your reasons why don’t matter, and there is no discussion of mitigating circumstances until sentencing.
Also, in fed trials I have watched, the defense can only bring up topics the prosecution brings up, defense can’t bring up a new topic. So the cancer patient was not allowed to bring up a new topic.
Sentencing itself is constrained by mandated point systems- so many points (or levels) for this and so many for that, minus points for mitigating circumstances- so (I’m making up the numbers because I don’t have the guidelines open), four levels for possession, eight levels for possessing more than five ounces, ten levels for possession with intent to sell, ten levels for actual sale, and minus five levels because you pled guilty adds up to seventeen levels which translates to X months in Club Fed. The mandated system came about because people on both sides were screaming about too harsh or too lenient decisions from judges, so they developed a rigorous setup of levels and points that pretty much ties judge’s discretion.
Want legal or decriminalized pot? Stop voting for Drug Warrior candidates. As long as being tough on pot gets votes, and being soft on pot loses elections, we will get more and better Drug Warriors who will pass laws and appoint judges so that we get more Drug War.
If you want drug warriors, elect them at the state level and let them do it there. We need to get the federal government out of it. The abuse of the Commerce Clause is out of control, and we can't stop it we're complicit in it.
No, but even in the heavily-controlled environment called prison "the problem" is not solved. People ruin their lives and careers over all sorts of stupid things (Edwards, and one could hope for Redfriend and Strident).
I'm not as notoriously libertarian as W.F. Buckley though I've subscribed to his magazine for more years than I have digits but... this solution is not only not working, it's fueling other political/social elements even more poisonous to and destructive of our culture.
Legalization has its problems. It's fair to say that one boundary on the extent of the issue was set in China in the 1900s with the ban on opium.
“We need to get the federal government out of it. “
Stop electing Federal Drug Warriors!
I’ll bet that all of the presidential candidates with the exception of the Libertarians and maybe Peace and Freedom would be Warriors, at least on paper.
And Senate candidates usually are, even Boxer and DiFi vote for tough laws.
When a candidate loses because of his tough stance on pot laws, the next dozen candidates will have changed their minds.
Bottom line is, we have the laws we have because a majority of Americans want it that way and support politicians who promise to keep it that way.
Otherwise they simply would not get elected.
As long as it's about the pot, instead of about the Constitution it will probably stay that way.
Do they not understand or not care what the cost is in terms of damage to republic as an institution, and corrosion to the balance of powers?
The Constitution is written on it.
DuPont and King Cotton didn't care much for it.
Ask Anslinger about it turning you into a homicidal maniac.. Just lookit all the people Willie Nelson has murdered.
Heh. Is this a joke?
The questions answers itself.
Marijuana has no valid medical use. Narcotics do.
and they do not take heroin and make it into a useful drug.
They make opiate derived drugs from opium, or they manufacture a totally synthetic equivalent thereof.
I don’t care what anyone ingests or does as long as it doesn’t affect me.
That means people can do all the drugs they like as long as they can fulfil their obligations - job, family, etc.
I don’t want to hear about “education,” “treatment,” “I’m sick,” etc. If they can’t support their kids, take ‘em and adopt them out.
/rant
I never thought any of the kids that smoked in high school would be the kind of people to get far in life. Maybe I’ll actually go to my reunion just to see if thats true or not.
Do they understand? Look at how people vote, who they vote for.
“It slipped the leash long go. We no longer live under the system of government bequeathed to us by the Founders, IMHO.”
Actually since 1865.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States leads the world in rates of experimenting with marijuana and cocaine despite strict drug laws, World Health Organization researchers said on Tuesday.
Countries with looser drug laws have lower rates of abuse, the researchers report in the Public Library of Science journal PLoS Medicine.
http://www.reuters.com/article/domesticNews/idUSN0125478320080701
_________________________________
“It slipped the leash long go. We no longer live under the system of government bequeathed to us by the Founders, IMHO.”
Actually since 1865.
OTOH, medical marijuana has won nearly every time it has been put before voters.
Okay. Yet they seem to understand that Clarence Thomas is a conservative. Why do they have this "blind spot" that makes them seemingly oblivious to what he's saying?
Will you personally pay the difference in price between pot and Marinol for those who need to use one or the other? If not, I'd say price is a perfectly legitimate reason for people to prefer pot.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.