An editorial in the Vancouver Province: What is going on in the Lower Mainland? We're supposed to be enjoying a season of peace and goodwill. Instead, we've been hit with a string of five tragic and seemingly pointless homicides. The strong suspicion is that at least some of these killings are related to our region's violent underground drug trade, which continues to thrive, despite repeated police warnings. Why do so many Lower Mainlanders become involved in this deadly business? [continues 175 words]
Re: 'More study needed on effects of marijuana' (Daily News, Dec. 14) Madeline Bruce may be interested in one statistic regarding the God-given plant cannabis (marijuana). In over 5,000 years of documented medical use there hasn't been one single death directly related to cannabis use. That's safety on a Biblical scale. Truthfully, Stan White Dillon, Colo. [end]
Re: Medical marijuana series, The Journal, Dec. 10 to 12, and "Marijuana as medicine a complex issue," Opinion, Dec. 14. Congratulations to Sharon Kirkey and Jodie Sinnema for excellent coverage on medical marijuana. Congratulations to The Journal for the editorial, which did not criminalize patients using medical marijuana, and welcome to the tragic politics of chronic pain in Canada. On one side we have people with bodies crushed by car accidents or destroyed by illness or military devices; they use medical marijuana as a last resource because synthetic marijuana (THC) helps them. [continues 160 words]
Neighbouring Business Owners Relieved Blitz 420 Won't Be Opening In Akinsdale A store that sells paraphernalia associated with drug use will not be allowed to open in Appleyard Square. At a hearing last week several businesses and residents sought to have the development permit for Blitz 420 revoked. This week the subdivision and development appeal board ruled in their favour. "Surrounding businesses will suffer due to the nature of the business of the developer if the proposed development is allowed. The developer's business would adversely affect surrounding businesses financially," the board wrote in its decision, which was released publicly Thursday. [continues 522 words]
Few of us would take medical marijuana away from the sufferers we read about in a special report on the treatment in The Journal and Ottawa Citizen - like the woman with multiple sclerosis and the former soldier with post-traumatic stress disorder. Still, medical marijuana remains a problem for physicians and governments. It is both an illegal street drug and a home remedy for a variety of health problems, and the line between those two uses is not always clear. As long as marijuana is an illegal high, there is a possibility people will try to scam the system to get their weed. [continues 562 words]
Tammy is still amazed at all the people who arrived at her Edmonton doorstep, trying to sell seaweed, Goji juices or miracle cures after they discovered her son had cancer. "People become very desperate," said Tammy, using a pseudonym to maintain her family's anonymity. "Cancer patients are absolutely helpless. - They are at the mercy of the treatments." Her son was diagnosed in his teens with a rare cancer that first showed itself in aching joints, eventually spreading to his lungs. [continues 326 words]
Ecstasy is widely considered a drug of choice for teenagers, popped at raves or house parties and popular for its relatively low cost and long highs. But recent toxicology figures from the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner in Alberta show that older Albertans are also using the drug, often as part of a cocktail of dangerous narcotics. Between Jan. 1, 2000 and Dec. 1, 2011, the medical examiner's office completed investigations into 50 unintentional overdose deaths in Alberta in which ecstasy or MDMA was directly or indirectly involved. [continues 767 words]
The violence between two rival Calgary gangs is at a low ebb with many of the main players dead or in prison, but the groups are still conducting their dangerous business. The Herald counted more than a dozen men with known ties to FOB or the FOB Killers (FK) who have been deported, are behind bars awaiting trial or are serving prison sentences, including two recently convicted of first-degree murder for the triple shooting homicide at the Bolsa Restaurant on New Year's Day 2009. [continues 985 words]
Mall Tenants Want Development Permit Revoked The owner of a store that sells paraphernalia related to drug consumption appears to have had a change of heart on whether or not he wants to open his store. Despite telling the Gazette in November he would be abandoning his location at Appleyard Square, located on Akins Drive, because of opposition from local tenants and the mayor, Blitz 420 owner Tim Kaput appeared before the subdivision and development appeal board to fight an appeal of his development permit by neighbouring tenants and residence. [continues 553 words]
Once a month, Rob Blair's green salvation is delivered to his door in a plastic baggie: 100 grams of marijuana grown especially for him. The 41-year-old Calgarian, who suffers from chronic pain after a bad cycling crash 18 years ago, is one of several dozen city residents allowed to ingest cannabis legally. Inside his downtown bachelor pad, he's got a couple glass bongs and a HerbalAire vaporizer he sometimes uses to consume marijuana. His preference, though, is "old school." [continues 1136 words]
Prime Minister Stephen Harper stumbled when he defended his government's policies on the legalization of marijuana. And his biggest fault may be in putting American concerns ahead of Canadian ones. Legalizing marijuana in Canada would "cause us a great deal of trouble at the border with the United States," he said in an interview with the Filipino Post. "I don't want to say they would seal the border. But I think it would inhibit our trade generally because they're certainly not going to make that move (legalizing marijuana) in the United States," he said. "I think as a cross-border phenomenon, this would cause Canada a lot of difficulty." [continues 464 words]
Re: "City stance on prisons is illogical," Opinion, Dec. 3. Good for Mayor Stephen Mandel for standing up to the Harper government's parliamentary dictatorship and refusing to build more prison cells in Edmonton. This may be seen as a NIMBY approach, but it is, more importantly, a statement against Harper's relentless drive to incarcerate a higher number of Canadians, even at a time when the crime rate has been steadily declining. It's not enough for men such as Justice Minister Rob Nicholson to proclaim "we don't govern based on statistics," nor for Public Safety Minister Vic Toews to return gun lobby favours by treating Sturm, Ruger rifles like they were duck-hunting guns. Tough on crime, soft on guns makes no more sense than a new war on soft drugs. Toronto, Ont. [end]
Dealing With Parolees Costs Too Much: Mandel Edmonton Mayor Stephen Mandel demanded Tuesday that the federal government stop building prison cells in the city because dealing with ex-inmates costs police too much money. "We have more than our fair share of prisoners in our city. We don't want any more," Mandel said. "If the federal government wants to expand prisons, do it elsewhere. . . . We have done our share." Mandel is concerned the federal and provincial governments don't sufficiently reimburse cities for the costs of dealing with justice issues, which can include everything from "tough on crime" laws to processing bail applications. [continues 327 words]
Re: "Paranoid on pot," Editorial, Nov. 1. I've been a patient with access since 2007. The program is very good and the marijuana is very effective in pain control, nausea and increasing your appetite. I don't believe there are any real short-term or longterm side-effects of the drug. I have battled chronic pain for 25 years and had to be on horrendous dosages of narcotic pain medication. I have used marijuana during those 25 years and legally since 2007. I have no side-effects or concerns. I have a complicated medical history of ankylosing spondylitis, Crohn's disease, osteoporosis, fibromyalgia and heart problems, and I can guarantee the pot helped. [continues 63 words]
Not only should medical marijuana be made available to patients in need, but adult recreational use should be regulated. Drug policies modelled after alcohol prohibition have given rise to a youthoriented black market. Illegal drug dealers don't ID for age, but they do recruit minors immune to adult sentences. So much for protecting the children. Throwing more money at the problem is no solution. Attempts to limit the supply of illegal drugs while demand remains constant only increase the profitability of drug trafficking. For addictive drugs like heroin, a spike in street prices leads desperate addicts to increase criminal activity to feed desperate habits. The drug war doesn't fight crime, it fuels crime. [continues 68 words]
Eleven years ago next month, Alberta Court of Queen's Bench Justice Darlene Acton handed down a landmark ruling that gave Calgary multiple sclerosis sufferer Grant Krieger the right to grow and cultivate marijuana. She noted the absurdity in the federal law of the day that gave ill Canadians suffering from severe illness the right to possess marijuana but no legal outlet in which to buy it. A year later, the federal government made it possible for sick Canadians to buy medicinal marijuana through legal means. Yet, to this day, it remains almost impossible to find a physician who will prescribe it. [continues 403 words]
The inescapable conclusion from the Supreme Court's recent ruling on Vancouver's so-called safe injection site for drug addicts is that even writers don't read anymore. No one who has actually read the Sept. 30 document, after all, could possibly contribute a single line of prose to the fantasy narrative echoing incessantly around the court's order to keep the Insite drug facility operating. The effect is significant for more than pedantic or forensic reasons. Democracy is, of course, distinguished from other political systems by its process. [continues 979 words]
Although the decision directly involves a facility 1,400 kilometres away and in another province, the Supreme Court's unanimous decision last week to keep Vancouver's (and North America's only) safe injection site (InSite) open, affects the entire country. It is a positive step forward to looking at harm reduction as a critical piece of the pie of addiction, which affects individuals in every city, town and rural county in Canada. Stephen Harper's majority government tried to close the facility (which has been open since 2003), but last Friday those efforts were squashed. [continues 716 words]
Drug addicts in Vancouver's downtown east side now have the protection of the Supreme Court of Canada to avail themselves of a medical facility, the Insite clinic, where they may inject themselves with heroin under medical supervision. Now: What about drug addicts in the country's prisons? Can they expect the court's ruling to change the way they are treated? This is no academic question but one which the members of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Public Safety and Security may soon be seized. [continues 483 words]
Inside Alberta
