Free Republic

Lansing City Clerk Chris Swope tells Michigan Messenger he has been investigating the allegations that a Lansing medical marijuana clinic, Your Healthy Choice Clinic, is offering inducements for votes — something that would violate state law. Swope says it is not completely clear what the dispensary is offering a free 1/2 gram of pot or a free medible (edible product made with marijuana) for. On the one hand, the text of the website says the offer is for registering to vote, but the second half of the website posting indicates that voters should vote for and against certain candidates for...

Barney Frank and Ron Paul unite - over weed Caroline May June 22, 2011 ... Thursday the pair plan together to unveil legislation to legalize marijuana. ... Other co-sponsors include Tennessee Democratic Rep. Steve Cohen, Michigan Democratic John Conyers, Colorado Democratic Rep. Jared Polis and California Democratic Rep. Barbara Lee.

New Zealand Are addictive medicines cures or problems? “Legalising cannabis for medicinal purposes would be the thin end of the wedge towards increasing drug use in New Zealand, according to a former detective who now manages a drug education company.” APN News and Media also reports: “Dale Kirk, managing director of MethCon, said taking a softer line on drug offenders would do more harm than good.” “I think we'd see people suddenly developing medical problems to source the drug,” asserts Kirk. The former detective is also concerned about impressionable children and vulnerable teenagers, but especially the many ways in which...

In 2005 the Supreme Court said the federal government's power to "regulate commerce…among the several states" extends to the tiniest speck of marijuana wherever it may be found, even in the home of a patient who grows it for her own medical use in compliance with state law. "If Congress can regulate this under the Commerce Clause," Justice Clarence Thomas warned in his dissent, "then it can regulate virtually anything—and the Federal Government is no longer one of limited and enumerated powers." The Obama administration, which was in court this week defending the new federal requirement that every American obtain...

A pot grower won't be allowed to use Colorado's medical marijuana law to fend off federal drug charges. The decision Wednesday by U.S. District Judge Philip A. Brimmer means that Christopher Bartkowicz faces a possible life sentence on federal marijuana cultivation charges. Brimmer said that suggestions by the White House that the U.S. government wouldn't pursue pot cases in states that allow medical marijuana cannot be used as a defense on federal drug charges.

California's state government has managed to add thousands of jobs during the past year, defying a mammoth budget deficit and a brutal recession. The job growth for state workers contrasts with the loss of 759,000 jobs in California's private industry in the past 12 months. "I don't know how this can happen," said David Kline, a spokesman for the California Taxpayers Association. "A lot of people are having trouble keeping their jobs, paying their bills and feeding their families. Most taxpayers would be incredulous if they see these numbers." During the 12 months that ended in June, state government added...

People suffering from cancer, AIDS and other diseases could turn to marijuana for pain relief under a plan approved Wednesday by an Illinois House committee despite claims that it would be a step toward legalizing pot. Under the legislation, people with a doctor's permission would be eligible for a state registry card allowing up to seven marijuana plants in their homes and 2 ounces of "usable cannabis." The measure is written to expire after three years. Advocates say marijuana eases pain without the side effects of heavier drugs and reduces nausea from chemotherapy. "There is needless suffering going on out...

Medical marijuana advocates were celebrating Thursday night. The U.S. Attorney General has announced plans to end raids on medical marijuana dispensaries that are legal under state law.

Ted Nugent Blames Hippies for Divorce, Abortion, Drugs and Crime 7/3/07, 2:22 pm EST It was only a matter of time before Ted Nugent decided to rain on the Summer of Love’s anniversary parade. In an article from today’s Wall Street Journal titled “The * Summer of Drugs,” the notoriously opinionated guitar god took some time off his busy hunting schedule to blame “stoned, dirty, stinky hippies” for “rising rates of divorce, high school drop-outs, drug use, abortion, sexual diseases and crime, not to mention the exponential expansion of government and taxes.” * Highlights (including some choice words for Jimi...

Drug addicts to be given i-Pods if they beat their habits By JAMES SLACK Last updated at 16:37pm on 22nd July 2007 Drug addicts could be offered food vouchers and the chance to win prizes such as i-Pod music players by the Government body refusing treatment to Alzheimer's sufferers. The National Institute for Clinical Excellence (Nice) wants to offer heroin and crack addicts 'incentives' to quit their habit. The users - many of whom commit crime to feed their habit - will be offered vouchers if they test clean for the illegal substances. The size of the taxpayer-funded gift will...

Alienation avoidance. I read with great interest John Miller’s op-ed in The New York Times, “A Third Party on the Right” in which he complains about the close races that have been tipped to the Democrats by those voting for the Libertarian-party candidate. While I am not a libertarian who advises others to vote Libertarian, many of my libertarian friends and relatives feel otherwise. They view the Republican Party as cavalier about individual liberty, supporting big government when it serves their purposes as much as Democrats do when it serves theirs. What conservative Republicans often fail to realize is that...

GENTLE PEOPLE WITH FLOWERS IN THEIR HAIR January 8, 2007 The San Francisco metropolitan area has a higher percentage of people who are regular drug users than any other major metropolitan area in the United States, a study from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration found. According to the National Surveys on Drug Use and Health 2002-05: Nearly 13 percent of San Francisco residents reported using some type of illicit drug, such as marijuana, cocaine or heroin, in the previous month; the national average is 8.1 percent. Other areas with drug-abuse rates higher than the national average included...

The months of recalls and warnings surrounding popular prescription painkillers have done more than frighten consumers, batter drug makers' bottom lines and raise questions about the procedures and criteria by which the Food and Drug Administration approves medications. The fact that so many legal drugs pose serious health risks is also reigniting a debate over the medicinal value of other substances — illegal drugs, particularly marijuana — and what critics believe is the government's continuing resistance to studying their possible benefits. Frustrated researchers say the question is not whether marijuana could serve legitimate medical purposes. Marijuana has been looked at...

The wonderful thing about having Canada as a neighbor was always knowing that its Molson-drinking, "eh"-affixing, health-care-socializing denizens were a mostly harmless bunch. Not any longer if you're U.S. drug czar John Walters. Wally is exercised about BC Bud, a high-grade, high-potency, high-price marijuana that will get smokers giggling quicker than the more mundane stuff grown in Mexico or that hollow out behind Uncle Billy's shed in Eastern Kentucky. Walters apparently has it figured that if the old-fashioned stuff could make the characters in "Reefer Madness" act so insanely, this nuevo-reefer must be, well, as bad as crack. "Canada is...