Pubdate: Tue, 9 Nov 2010
Source: Maneater, The (Uof Missouri - Columbia, MO Edu)
Copyright: 2010 The Maneater
Contact:  http://www.themaneater.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1283
Author: Seung Ah Lee
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/topic/NORML

NORML CONFERENCE BRINGS STATE AND NATIONAL SPEAKERS TO MU

The Missouri chapter of The National Organization for the Reform of 
Marijuana Laws (NORML) held its 2010 Fall State Conference on 
Saturday and Sunday on campus.

The purpose of the conference was to give activists from around the 
state a chance to come together and learn from regional and national 
speakers about what's going on regarding the "war on marijuana," said 
Sean Randall, a law student at UM -- Kansas City and a member of the 
Missouri Affiliate of NORML.

Randall said, in general, NORML works on three different issues of 
marijuana law reform: medical marijuana, responsible recreational use 
by adults and industrial hemp.

MU NORML Chapter President Spencer Pearson, who's also a Maneater 
staff member, said medical marijuana is the most urgent reason for the reform.

"People who are dying or going through intense chronic pain, or going 
through a number of disorders that affect their daily life or lower 
the quality of their life could be helped out tremendously by this 
just one, simple plant," Pearson said. "Even if you don't believe 
anyone should be able to get high, there is no excuse that those 
people shouldn't have cheap, easy, safe access to that plant."

David Huddlestonsmith, a physician and a guest speaker, talked about 
recent medical research. He said cannabis might especially help the 
cure of cancer and Alzheimer's patients.

He said one study suggests cannabis might slow down tumor growth.

"One of the cannabinoids is able to go ahead and stop blood vessels 
from proliferating," he said. "So, instead of the tumor being able to 
grow, when you don't have any new blood vessels, it starts to shrink 
down. It doesn't cure it, but it makes the tumor come down more and 
more. It can end up shrinking the tumor down into a more manageable size."

The conference's keynote speech was given by Radley Balko, a senior 
editor of Reason Magazine. His speech was entitled "Dog Shooting and 
Other Marijuana Law Enforcement Tactics."

Balko said the war on drugs has allowed for mass militarization of 
police forces.

"We're up to 50,000 SWAT deployments per year in the country, from 
two to 300 per year," Balko said.

He said the vast majority of those 50,000 deployments were 
drug-related, and of those, the vast majority were specifically for marijuana.

"One hundred fifty times a day in this country, a team of police 
officers dressed like soldiers breaks into someone's home in the 
middle of night basically to enforce potential crimes," he said.

Medical marijuana is legal in 14 states and the District of Columbia. 
In the state of Missouri, possession of any marijuana up to 
thirty-five grams is a misdemeanor, punishable by up to one year in 
jail and a fine of up to $1,000. Possession of more than 35 grams is 
a felony and is punishable by up to seven years in prison and a fine 
of up to $5,000. 
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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake