A rude federal awakening for medical pot dreams

A rude federal awakening for medical pot dreams
A rude federal awakening for medical pot dreams
Posted By Patrick O'Callahan on April 16, 2011 at 5:24 pm Share this
This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

The feds have come down – hard – on the Legislature’s plans to expand medical marijuana far beyond the voters’ original mandate. Marijuana enthusiasts have only themselves to blame.

Gov. Chris Gregoire did the state a favor Wednesday by trying to clarify how the U.S. Department of Justice might react to the free-wheeling dope industry many lawmakers having been pushing to legalize with a new bill.

The two U.S. attorneys who cover Washington quickly spelled out their likely response: fines, property forfeitures, lawsuits and possible criminal prosecutions. Individual state officials might be targeted if they licensed grow operations and dispensaries, as the measure proposes.

Later Thursday, Gregoire said she would veto the legislation as written.

Read the U.S. attorneys’ letter and you’ll see where they’re coming from. The Justice Department, they said, isn’t interested in pursuing “seriously ill individuals who use marijuana as part of a medically recommended treatment regimen in compliance with state law.”

But marijuana profiteers – be they enabling doctors, retailers, wholesalers, processors or growers – are a different story.

In Washington and elsewhere, they have defied both state and federal law to turn medical marijuana into a commercial industry replete with marijuana shops, festive farmers markets and clinics that do nothing but prescribe marijuana – often quite loosely. The City of Tacoma alone has recklessly licensed 35 dispensaries, with seven more on the way.

Thumb your nose at the feds often enough and openly enough, and sooner or later you wind up in their cross hairs. It was foolish to extrapolate the Justice Department’s sympathy for legitimate patients to a tolerance of any kind of trafficking that labeled itself “medical marijuana.”

For lawmakers, it’s back to the drawing board. Sick people who genuinely need marijuana should be able to get it, legally, without having to grow it themselves.

Shared gardens, nonprofit dispensaries and co-ops might not have triggered federal scrutiny if big money hadn’t been changing hands – and they would have reflected the spirit of the 1998 initiative that legalized medical marijuana under tight restrictions.

The state Senate would have addressed some of the federal concerns. Its version of the marijuana bill would have banned for-profit dispensaries and dope docs. It also wouldn’t have forced dispensaries on unwilling cities and counties.

The House bill leaned more toward the Hempfest vision of medical marijuana; it would have licensed profit-driven dispensaries, let medical enablers keep on enabling and forbidden local communities from saying no.

Both bills envisioned large-scale commercial pot farms, which were never going to happen.

Congress ought to amend the Controlled Substance Act to permit bona fide therapeutic use of the cannabinoids in marijuana, which can help patients with a narrow range of medical conditions. But the Justice Department was already permitting such use; it drew the line only after traffickers started operating as if they were immune from the law.
To the extent that “medical marijuana” reflects actual medical practices and controls, it’s not likely to run into trouble. But if the industry walks and talks like a grand drug-dealing scheme, it shouldn’t be surprised to find itself treated like one.

Categories: Sneak preview
Tags: Contolled Substance Act, Gov. Chris Gregoire, Justice Department, Legislature, medical marijuana





Read more: http://blog.thenewstribune.com/opinion/2011/04/16/a-rude-federal-awakening-for-medical-pot-dreams/#ixzz1JkgeZJDv

The Hemp and Cannabis Foundation President Arrested

The Hemp and Cannabis Foundation President Arrested
Posted March 10, 2011 2:14PM PST
The president of The Hemp and Cannabis Foundation (THCF) in Portland, Oregon, was arrested on charges of failure to pay personal income taxes in 2008 and 2009, according to Oregon Attorney General John Kroger.

Paul Stanford is scheduled for arraignment on March 21 in Marion County Circuit Court, the Oregon Department of Justice said in a statement Tuesday. A department spokesman declined further comment until after the arraignment.


The arrest on Monday follows an investigation by the state justice department's Charitable Activities Section and Criminal Justice Division. Last year, the Internal Revenue Service revoked THCF's status as a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt charity.

According to its website, THCF was founded by Stanford in 1999. THCF also has an affiliated political committee, Campaign for the Restoration and Regulation of Hemp, which was founded in 1990 to promote a legislative model called the Cannabis Tax Act.


THCF claims to be "the nation's premiere physician's clinic helping patients obtain their state's permit to legally possess, use and grow medical marijuana." THCF says it has helped more than 150,000 patients "get legal" in Washington, Oregon, California, Hawaii, Colorado, Michigan, Montana and Nevada.

A spokesman at THCF told The MJ Business Update that it charges $180 for a visit to a clinic, or $120 for patients on welfare. He declined to comment on Stanford's arrest. Stanford could not be immediately reached for comment.

Sources: Press Release, IRS

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IRS tells Fairfax medical marijuana dispensary it owes millions in unpaid taxes - Marin Independent Journal

IRS tells Fairfax medical marijuana dispensary it owes millions in unpaid taxes - Marin Independent Journal
Marijuana tax laws and issues for California dispensaries!

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Hydroponics puts pot on Main Street - Rocklin

Hydroponics puts pot on Main Street - Rocklinloomis, ca

Rocklin hydroponics grow shops for medical cannabis patients! Not for tomatoes ! Lol.

Food Drive for Free Pot Nets 12,000 Pounds of Food from Medical Marijuana Dispensary December 30, 2010 11:03 AM Food Drive for Free Pot Nets 12,000 Pounds of Food from Medical Marijuana Dispensary SANTA CRUZ (CBS/KCBS) The Second Harvest Food Bank in Santa Cruz County had a successful holiday food drive, thanks in part to an amazing number of donations from a small business. No, not a car dealership or a restaurant. The Granny Purps Marijuana Dispensary. The food collection barrels were pretty empty at the dispensary in Soquel, until they got the bright idea to offer joints for food, reports CBS affiliate KCBS. "We originally didn't have a limit and people could bring in as many cans as they wanted," said dispensary co-owner Phil Hicks. "And for every four cans, we would give them a free, pre-rolled joint. They had to be a legal medical marijuana patient and a part of our collective to participate in the promotion." Each patient was also limited to a maximum of three cigarettes a day. Hicks said the next thing they knew, they were inundated with cans of food. "The response blew away anything we expected. We started in November. I was hoping we could fill five barrels before Thanksgiving, but we had seven filled by Thanksgiving," he said. "I said at this rate, I think we can get 10,000 pounds by Christmas."javascript:void(0) Hicks said they ended up collecting close to 12,000 pounds of food. Cannabis Patient, Caregiver & Consultant Buddy at 11:23 PM Labels: cannabis food drive, compassion food drive, modesto food drive, pot food drive, santa cruz compassion

Food Drive for Free Pot Nets 12,000 Pounds of Food from Medical Marijuana Dispensary
December 30, 2010 11:03 AM
Food Drive for Free Pot Nets 12,000 Pounds of Food from Medical Marijuana Dispensary


SANTA CRUZ (CBS/KCBS) The Second Harvest Food Bank in Santa Cruz County had a successful holiday food drive, thanks in part to an amazing number of donations from a small business.

No, not a car dealership or a restaurant.

The Granny Purps Marijuana Dispensary.

The food collection barrels were pretty empty at the dispensary in Soquel, until they got the bright idea to offer joints for food, reports CBS affiliate KCBS.

"We originally didn't have a limit and people could bring in as many cans as they wanted," said dispensary co-owner Phil Hicks. "And for every four cans, we would give them a free, pre-rolled joint. They had to be a legal medical marijuana patient and a part of our collective to participate in the promotion."

Each patient was also limited to a maximum of three cigarettes a day.

Hicks said the next thing they knew, they were inundated with cans of food.

"The response blew away anything we expected. We started in November. I was hoping we could fill five barrels before Thanksgiving, but we had seven filled by Thanksgiving," he said. "I said at this rate, I think we can get 10,000 pounds by Christmas."javascript:void(0)

Hicks said they ended up collecting close to 12,000 pounds of food.
Cannabis Patient, Caregiver & Consultant Buddy at 11:23 PM
Labels: cannabis food drive, compassion food drive, modesto food drives, pot food drive, santa cruz compassion food drive