Dennis Peron, an activist who helped legalize medical marijuana in California, died Saturday afternoon in a San Francisco hospital. He was 71. Peron was a force behind a San Francisco ordinance allowing medical marijuana, a win that later helped propel the 1996 passage of Prop. 215, which legalized medical use for the entire state. A Vietnam War veteran, Peron spent some of the last years his life on a 20-acre farm in the rolling hills of Lake County, growing and giving away what he once sold: medical marijuana. [continues 434 words]
Researchers at the University of Georgia have published a study in the July issue of Health Affairs showing that Medicare's prescription drug benefit program saves money in states that have legalized marijuana for medical use. Authors Ashley Bradford and Dr. David Bradford - daughter and father, BTW - calculate that in 2013, patients using medical marijuana in 17 states enabled Medicare Part D to save US taxpayers $165.2 million that would have been spent on prescription drugs. As reported by the university's media office, the Bradfords [continues 654 words]
The truest words at "Altered State," the Oakland Museum of California's new exhibit all about America's favorite illicit drug - and, according to the museum's curators, the first-ever cannabis-centric museum exhibit in America - greet visitors at the very beginning, well before they reach the four large healthy indica plants behind glass or hear Richard Nixon's diabolical mumble rumble through their ears. "Californians can't seem to agree on cannabis." Some might call this a prevarication, but it is nonetheless the strongest stance the exhibit takes. [continues 790 words]
"My Goals Are for the Sick. That's Something I Cannot Compromise." There was a time not so long ago when partaking in marijuana wasn't easy: It was often challenging to purchase, it definitely wasn't lawful to drive around with it in your glove compartment, the bud itself wasn't lab-tested for dangerous chemicals and you took a risk every time you sneaked a toke. So, in year 2016, if you enjoy the privilege of medical cannabis, you definitely have Ryan Landers to thank. [continues 471 words]
HIGH TIMES and their events are having a rough go of it lately. The all-things-weed publication had to withdraw from Washington and Oregon last year after failing to secure locations for their Cannabis Cup events. And amid complaints, their annual 4/20 party had to move to a new location in Colorado. You might be wondering: When will the long-running pot magazine be able to hold an event with thousands of revelers consuming cannabis openly in Oregon? They did already, nearly 20 years ago. And I was there. [continues 648 words]
Former Surgeon General Joycelyn Elders gave one of two keynote talks at the International Cannabis Business Conference in San Francisco last weekend. Dr. Elders had been fired by Bill Clinton after acknowledging to the American people that marijuana has medical uses and masturbation is normal. In 2000 the Clinton Era slurved into a TV show called the West Wing, in which the president was played by Martin Sheen. One episode, watched eagerly by pro-cannabis activists, was reportedly based on Dr. Elders' experience. That turned out to be Hollywood PR - head writer Aaron Sorkin was just trading on the notoriety generated by Elders' firing. [continues 1012 words]
"They didn't even call me," says Dennis Peron, perched on one of the fold-up chairs arranged around his Castro District kitchen table on a recent evening. "Why not even call?" "They" are the people who are continuing Peron's work, his life's mission: to make marijuana legal. At 70, his hair white and his speech still rapid but softened by a stroke, Peron has been at it for almost 40 years - ever since he arrived in San Francisco fresh from Vietnam, his Air Force duffel bag stuffed with southeast Asian ganja. And his body bears the scars. [continues 824 words]
For a certain generation, Joe DiMaggio was San Francisco's greatest citizen. The son of a Sicilian fisherman, whose people gifted the city cioppino and christened Fisherman's Wharf, DiMaggio never forgot his roots. Even after the Hall of Fame baseball career with the New York Yankees and the marriage to Marilyn Monroe - whose legend eclipsed his own during his lifetime - he spent much of his retirement at the family's waterfront restaurant on Jefferson Street. Located next to the docks where, when Joe was a boy, the clan would gather on Sundays to help repair his father's fishing nets, the restaurant's two story building - now named after his younger brother, Dominic - is still in the DiMaggio family. [continues 821 words]
Despite the Fourth Year of Drought, Farmers and Industry Sources Say 2015 Produced a Crop of High-Quality Bud. The storm on November 2 signaled the official end to the 2015 cannabis growing season. And judging by industry and farmers' reports, California likely harvested a bumper crop of great bud this year - despite the fourth year of drought. "It's been stellar," said Casey O'Neill with Happy Day Farms in Garberville. "So far, it's looking pretty kick-ass," said Kevin Jodrey organizer of the cannabis competition called The Golden Tarp awards. [continues 790 words]
Judge Recently Ruled That Congress Has Banned Federal Actions Against State-Permitted Marijuana Businesses Ruling Cited Marin Alliance for Medical Marijuana, Which Was Shuttered in a 2011 Federal Crackdown Marin Alliance for Medical Marijuana Operator Lynnette Shaw Plans to Reopen the Business In 1991, amid the AIDS crisis in San Francisco, a former jazz and blues singer named Lynnette Shaw was hired as the intake officer at the San Francisco Cannabis Buyers Club, California's first medical marijuana dispensary. The modest Cannabis Buyers Club would eventually transform into a flamboyant weed emporium on Market Street that founder Dennis Peron dubbed "the five-story felony." Shaw, who would partner with Peron in backing California's Proposition 215 medical marijuana law, went another direction months before the initiative passed in 1996. She ventured across San Francisco Bay to establish California's first locally permitted and regulated medical marijuana provider. [continues 1410 words]
DALY CITY, Calif. - The smell of cannabis impregnated the air. Hundreds of people crowded around a makeshift stage, where men in head-to-toe marijuana print threw cannabis caviar, joints, and dollar bills at onlookers. "Best weekend ever!" screamed a man dressed in a joint costume. Organizers said more than 16,000 people attended the Nor-Cal Cannabis Cup here in June. Inside a fenced-in area in the parking lot of the Cow Palace, people smoked out of three-foot bongs, tried rainbow-color vape pens, and tasted cannabisinfused gourmet ice cream, all out in the open. Those without a medical marijuana card waited in line for hours for a two-minute consultation with a doctor, who charged $100 for a three-month medical marijuana recommendation. [continues 1112 words]
Four decades ago, activists gathered once a year in front of San Francisco City Hall to agitate for their cause. The highlight of the "Day on the Grass" was a ritual smoke-in, with some of the cannabis that one of them also happened to sell out of a Castro District restaurant. Without fail, and in stark contrast to today's elected officials, a sitting San Francisco supervisor would join them. Harvey Milk was a pioneer not just for gay rights, but also cannabis legalization. He frequently fraternized with self-described dope dealer Dennis Peron, who by 1978 had been busted by San Francisco police multiple times for dealing marijuana. [continues 838 words]
The next time you relax over a glass, a joint, or a dab of your favorite recreational tonic, I want you to ask yourself a question: "Who had to die so I could have this?" It will be an uncomfortable thought, but if your drug of choice is cannabis, it is necessary, whether your flower was sustainably grown in Mendocino or came from the cartel. For the experiment with ending cannabis prohibition in America to begin here in California and spread to most of the country, people had to die. In marijuana's case, those people were gay men - specifically, gay men dying from complications of AIDS in droves in apartments in the Castro, in an overwhelmed San Francisco General Hospital, and in childhood bedrooms in hometowns across flyover country. [continues 747 words]
The suits are coming! The suits are coming!" That premonition has grown in recent years from a whisper to a peal among some cannabis activists, small farmers and behind-the-curtainists, and the conspiracy theories are true (sort of). No, Phillip Morris hasn't unleashed additive-laden joints onto the mass market, but venture capital and ensuing corporate structure are flooding into Colorado, Washington and other marijuana-friendly states. Is it as scary as the back-to-the-landers think? It's hard to say what the long term effects will be. But one activist-cum-entrepreneur thinks a balance can be found. [continues 629 words]
Professional reformers, longtime activists, and stakeholders in the marijuana industry attended an invitation-only meeting at the Waterfront Hotel in Oakland January 9 to discuss plans for a marijuana 'legalization' initiative to be on the ballot in California in 2016. The invitations came from the Coalition for Cannabis Policy Reform (CCPR), a group led by Dale Sky Jones that was formed after the defeat of a legalization measure in 2010, and the Drug Policy Alliance, represented by lobbyist Jim Gonzales The keynote speaker was Bill Zimmerman, a Los Angeles campaign consultant who is widely credited with masterminding the 1996 Proposition 215 campaign, which legalized marijuana for medical use in California. [continues 3333 words]
Not long ago, a friend of mine visited the doctor. Afterward, I asked him for the diagnosis. "Good news," he said with a grin. "I'm still sick." A clean bill of health would have been a setback. That would mean no more marijuana. I am often asked how to legally obtain some weed in San Francisco, what ailment is required to get a medical marijuana recommendation. This fascinates people to this day, out-of-towners as well as locals. When I am honest, I say, "About $40 and 10 minutes." [continues 743 words]
If you were seeking a taste of old-school police work in San Francisco, you might try something like this: A young man at Hippie Hill in Golden Gate Park sits on a blanket, smoking marijuana. A stranger approaches him and asks to buy some. The young man declines. Being a free spirit, he insists on sharing instead. He pinches off a few nugs, hands them over, and refuses payment from the stranger, who disappears. Minutes later, he is surrounded by cops. It was a setup. He is busted. In court, the stranger, who was an undercover police officer, swears the operation was a clear-cut case of possession with intent to sell - a felony. After all, the cop testifies, he stuffed a $20 bill under the free spirit's blanket. This doesn't sell with the jury, which returns a not guilty verdict. [continues 736 words]
Will California's anti-smoking laws impede the opportunity for business growth after legalization? My question stems from the idea that there could be Dutch-style coffee shops and smoking lounges, or some such other California incarnation of a social establishment catering to patrons of the green. What are the known legal obstacles for would-be proprietors of a business where marijuana is (openly) consumed on-site? - -The Bulldog Using deduction, I surmise that you (or perhaps a "friend" of yours) are interested in opening an Amsterdam-style cannabis club. I applaud your sentiments. I myself would love to visit. [continues 374 words]
San Bernardino, Calif. - In the "medication area" of the nation's biggest marijuana exposition, scantily clad young women hand out marshmallows they've dipped into a rushing fountain of pot-laced chocolate. A few steps away, Anthony Ramirez offers free hits from a bong filled with the waxy marijuana extract that his family started producing when a friend's mother needed relief from the pain of lupus. Across a vast outdoor plaza lined with hundreds of booths, this month's Cannabis Cup gathering in Southern California has attracted more than 10,000 visitors at $40 a ticket. By mid afternoon, some of them are sprawled on overstuffed couches that merchants have thoughtfully provided. Others move from booth to booth, sampling wares from businesses that have risen from the underground economy to create a burgeoning industry of hazy legality. [continues 4456 words]
It might be a stretch to say the history of America's underground marijuana trade is encapsulated in the story of Donald Hoxter. Not by much, though. Few people can say they've smuggled as much as 10 tons of marijuana across both the Mexican and Canadian borders per year. Or that they were one of the first hippies in the Pacific Northwest to pioneer America's homegrown crop in the early 1980s, some 15 years before marijuana became legal--first in California, then in more than a dozen other states--for medical purposes. [continues 4045 words]
The Most Influential Man in the Battle for Legalization Is a Wonky Intellectual in Dad Jeans The driving force for the legalization of marijuana in America - a frenetic, whip-smart son of a rabbi who can barely tell indica from sativa - has just entered enemy territory. Ethan Nadelmann, the executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance, is here in California's crucible of conservatism, Orange County, to talk about the failure of the War on Drugs and why the government should leave pot smokers alone. As a grizzled ex-DEA agent glares at him from the audience of a lecture hall on the campus of U.C. Irvine, it's clear that this crowd has not gathered to celebrate cannabis culture. [continues 2464 words]
I have a friend who has a medical-marijuana recommendation for menstrual cramps. But she medicates all month long. She sees it as an act of civil disobedience. I see it as being disingenuous and jeopardizing access for terminally ill patients. Who's right? - -Lady Bud Johnson Activist and Proposition 215 co-author Dennis Peron said that all cannabis use is medicinal use. But the fight over whether cannabis use is medicinal or recreational has been raging through the community since before Prop. 215 passed in 1996. There are a bunch of differing viewpoints. People who use cannabis to manage severely debilitating conditions are very protective of maintaining their right to safely access and use the drug. Other folks recognize pot's medical value, but like to smoke it because they enjoy getting high. [continues 370 words]
The corporados have their deadly Predators and Reapers, but declassed workers in the East Bay are developing a Cassandra drone that is capable - at least in theory - of sending back images from days to come. On June 3 we visited the hangar in Richmond to which one of their prototypes was transmitting grainy, intermittent video and even some faint audio to a MacBook Pro. If the new drone technology works, these transmissions will turn out to be accurate images of the period ahead. [continues 480 words]
Venture capitalist Steve Berg figured he had an unassailable business model. Berg's San Francisco firm, the ArcView Group, was pledging to find "angel investors" for startups offering products and services for California's $1.5 billion medical marijuana industry. But last week, U.S. prosecutors in California announced criminal prosecutions against targeted marijuana dispensaries and threatened landlords with property seizures. Suddenly, the state's burgeoning medical marijuana sector is dealing with fear and introspection. Industry advocates are calling for increased state regulation, thinking that could weed out bad actors in the trade and ward off the feds. [continues 952 words]
DA says evidence was not good enough to convict Dennis Peron Child pornography and drug possession charges against gay activist and medical marijuana guru Dennis Peron were dismissed Wednesday after prosecutors admitted the evidence against him was weak. A year ago today, police raided the bed and breakfast where Peron lives, seizing suspected methamphetamine, Ecstasy and marijuana and computers they said contained images of child pornography. In June, prosecutors were ordered to make a seized computer hard drive available for defense examination, but as of Wednesday Peron's team had not received it. [continues 454 words]
Mission Station Police Being Investigated for Alleged Misconduct Child pornography charges against medical-marijuana guru Dennis Peron became cloudier last week after District Attorney George GascA3n announced that police involved in a raid of Peron's residence are now under investigation for misconduct in other cases. The Aug. 4 raid of Peron's residence, which doubles as a bed and breakfast known as the "Castro Castle," turned up child pornography on computers and several types of drugs, according to a police affidavit. [continues 437 words]
Dr. Marion P. "Mollie" Fry packs for federal prison in her red "Marijuana Medic" T-shirt. She is an activist who wears her cause, who clutches a medical cross with a cannabis leaf, who points animatedly at her chest hollowed by radical breast cancer surgery. Her emotional account has stirred rallies demanding acceptance for the "medicine" that alleviated her suffering. Now, in a widely followed saga, Fry, 54, and her husband, Dale Schafer, 56, are to surrender Monday to serve five years in federal prison for conspiring to produce and distribute marijuana. [continues 2231 words]
"I was not one of the '60s radicals," says Dale Gieringer '68 of his time at Harvard. "I was pretty libertarian and sort of Republican-leaning. Definitely in the political minority." Despite this, he has gone on to become one of this country's leading advocates for marijuana legalization-hardly an issue with which many conservatives choose to ally themselves today. "I arrived at an interesting time at Harvard," he says now. "I didn't even know what marijuana was as freshman. It was dangerous, something that disreputable people used. There was no discussion of drugs at Harvard at back then." [continues 657 words]
Manager Larry Richards sells marijuana to authorized patients in the back room of Oakland's Coffeeshop Blue Sky. He supervises a staff of 22. In downtown Oakland, Larry Richards is a licensed medical marijuana provider. His boss, Richard Lee, is the activist-entrepreneur who opened Oaksterdam University in 2007 and helped put Proposition 19, the failed state initiative to legalize marijuana, on the November ballot. Richards, 50, grew up near Portland, Ore., and lived 12 years in Honolulu, where he worked as a hotel desk clerk and waiter. He shares a house in Concord with his three German shepherds and a roommate. [continues 749 words]
Prop. 19 Lost Support of Some Pro-Marijuana Groups. Its Backers Aim to Write an Initiative With Wider Appeal. The drive to put another marijuana legalization initiative on the California ballot took a step forward Saturday when activists from across the state squeezed into a crowded conference center here to launch the debate over writing the next ballot measure. The campaign for Proposition 19, which lost 54% to 46% in November, wants to start drafting a new initiative in the spring and to complete it by July, turning then to the expensive and time-consuming task of building support and qualifying it for the November 2012 ballot. [continues 734 words]
Critics of Prop. 19 Range From Skeptical to Rabid -- and Some of Them Come From Inside the Movement In 1911, after years of scandal and high-profile corruption trials, California voters overwhelmingly approved one of the most rigorous ballot initiative laws in the country. The idea was to allow voters to bypass state lawmakers when they were too timid, cowed, or corrupt to act on the voters' behalf. Almost a century later, the process is still relatively simple and accessible. Any group or individual can write an initiative and submit it with a $200 fee to the state attorney general's office. After the initiative's fiscal cost was analyzed, the signature gathering began. If the authors didn't have access to a large group of well-organized volunteers, signature gatherers could be easily hired at a price. For about $1 million, a professional company would send paid staffers to shopping malls, commercial districts, and public transportation hubs to collect roughly 440,000 signatures of registered voters required to qualify the initiative for the California bal! lot. And if the initiative won 50 percent of the vote on Election Day, it became law. [continues 3953 words]
SAN FRANCISCO -- The medical-marijuana political movement in America began the night police busted into Dennis Peron's apartment with a warrant. They twisted Peron's arms behind his back and placed him in handcuffs. They forced Jonathan West, Peron's boyfriend, to the ground, and an officer held him there, Peron said, with a boot on the young man's chest. When officers learned West had AIDS, Peron said, they put on rubber gloves. "He was very skinny, very weak," Peron, a longtime marijuana and gay-rights activist and former pot dealer from San Francisco, recalled. "And they were very mean." [continues 2971 words]
The crowds showed up for last weekend's International Cannabis and Hemp Expo at the Cow Palace, but widespread support for Proposition 19, the legalization effort on the November ballot, was not in evidence. At the same time new polls show increased public support for the statewide measure, known as the Regulate, Control, Tax Cannabis Act, while some medical marijuana advocates are expressing concern about it. Among those is longtime marijuana advocate Dennis Peron, who authored Proposition 215, the California Compassionate Use Act, which voters passed in 1996. The act allows qualified patients to grow and use medicinal cannabis as recommended by their doctors. [continues 834 words]
New Column to Cover the Latest in Marijuana Highest greetings from Amsterdam. My name is John Sinclair and I've been a marijuana legalization activist ever since I founded Detroit LEMAR (LEgalize MARijuana) in January 1965, following the receipt of a LEMAR flyer sent from New York City by poets Allen Ginsberg and Edward Sanders, the progenitors of this movement. Between 1964 and 1968, I was harassed by the Detroit Narcotics Squad for smoking, dispensing and advocating marijuana use. I served six months in the Detroit House of Correction in 1966 for possession of a half-ounce of weed, and I served 29 months of a 9-1/2-to-10-year sentence for possession of two joints of marijuana -- a crime then defined as a Violation of State Narcotics Laws (VSNL) -- between July 1969 and December 1971. [continues 1141 words]
SAN FRANCISCO -- California has a long history of defying conventional wisdom on the issue of marijuana, including its embrace of the drug in the 1960s and its landmark medical pot law 14 years ago. So it may not be all that surprising that a November ballot measure to legalize the drug has created some odd alliances and scenarios. Pot growers have opposed it. Some police have favored it. Polls show the public is deeply divided. Only politicians have lined up as expected: Nearly all major party candidates oppose the measure. And hanging over the whole debate is the fact that marijuana remains illegal under federal law. [continues 857 words]
Just who intends to puff, puff, pass on Proposition 19? Jennifer Soares came out of the closet on April 17, 2010, but not in a gay way. She's a drug lawyer against legalization. Sitting on a legal panel at the International Cannabis & Hemp Expo at the Cow Palace, Soares was asked by an audience member her thoughts about Proposition 19, the Regulate, Control and Tax Cannabis Act of 2010, which will appear on the ballot November 2. With the pungent smell of pot wafting through the endless rows of booths advertising everything from hemp clothing to THC lollipops, Soares nervously spoke into the microphone. [continues 2562 words]
Can Oaksterdam Weed Magnate Richard Lee Push Legalization Over The Top? (July 29, 2010) One day last month, Richard Lee was able to snatch a few minutes of freedom from the chaos of his daily life at his Oaksterdam University, the centerpiece of Oakland's marijuana district. In the previous 15 minutes he had checked the enrollment figures for a growing workshop he was scheduled to teach that weekend, made a snap decision about some future students who said they were promised reduced tuition and had his photo taken for High Times magazine, constantly consulting with his assistant while rolling around the aisles on two floors of his flagship business. [continues 2896 words]
One of the most prolific figures in marijuana reform, Jack Herer, known as the "Hemperor," died last Thursday in Eugene, Ore., at the age of 70. The activist and author suffered a heart attack in September in Portland and had been in poor health ever since. People knew him best for his book, "The Emperor Wears No Clothes," which sold over 600,000 copies worldwide. The book is a history of marijuana and its prohibition and serves as the basis for many arguments for marijuana legalization. First published in 1985, it contains a disclaimer that offers $1 million to anyone who is able to refute anything in the book. Herer sent the book out to numerous congressmen, senators and members of anti-marijuana groups. No one has claimed the million yet. [continues 137 words]
The Jazz Age Hotel Normandie Reopens As a Marijuana Destination The Hotel Normandie, a stoic brick building weighing down a corner of Normandie Avenue and 6th Street, opened in the Roaring '20s as an elegant residence, promising in tasteful advertisements to "leave nothing to be desired by the most experienced and exacting." Tuesday night, the hotel will host another grand opening, for a very different, experienced and exacting clientele: pot smokers. The aging Koreatown edifice has been rechristened Dennis Peron's Normandie Hotel, and the late-night event was timed for April 20, the annual day of celebration for cannabis worshippers worldwide. [continues 1017 words]
The first of three initiatives to fully legalize marijuana use in California went up in smoke on Jan. 15, 2010. Written by Assemblyman Tom Ammiano, Assembly Bill 390 would have legalized marijuana use and sales for adults 21 years or older and imposed a $50 per ounce tax for drug education and rehabilitation. Opponents of AB 390 cheered the failure as a victory for the safety of our state's children, but proponents of the bill still intend to bring the issue to the November election ballot. [continues 567 words]
ASHLAND -- The man who opened the nation's first "pot club" for medical marijuana users will come to town Tuesday to speak in favor of legalizing marijuana. Dennis Peron, known as the "father of medical marijuana," supports across-the-board legalization of marijuana. In a telephone interview, he said enforcing existing laws costs the criminal justice system a fortune. Peron is scheduled to speak from 6 to 7:30 p.m., Tuesday in the Meese Auditorium in the Visual Arts Building at Southern Oregon University, 1250 Siskiyou Blvd., Ashland. The free presentation is sponsored by Ashland Alternative Health, a clinic that helps people obtain medical marijuana cards. [continues 333 words]
Local Growers Give An Inside Look AT A Booming Multimillion-dollar Industry The benevolent outlaw "Nobody produces any better weed than we do here," says Raul G. Raul, a pot grower whose farm is somewhere between Santa Paula and Ojai. Raul likes to think of himself as a benevolent outlaw, supplying "medical" marijuana to clinics and "slanging [dealing] a little on the side to make people happy." His plants are gorgeous, even (or maybe even more so) to a man in recovery who hasn't touched bud in 11 years. Some are easily 15 feet tall, with the sexiest flowers this side of Holland. [continues 2480 words]
Just in from Stockton, Mary parks her car and enters the downtown Oakland coffeehouse -- but she hasn't come all this way for a cup of joe. Instead, she peruses a menu of dozens of strains and preparations of marijuana, all grown in California, all taxed, all legal. Producing a wad of cash and proof of her age -- but no doctor's note -- for a fragrant ounce of "purple kush," she departs a satisfied customer, perhaps grabbing a snack at a nearby restaurant before hitting the highway. [continues 1983 words]
Just in from Stockton, Mary parks her car and enters the downtown Oakland coffeehouse -- but she hasn't come all this way for a cup of joe. Instead, she peruses a menu of dozens of strains and preparations of marijuana, all grown in California, all taxed, all legal. Producing a wad of cash and proof of her age -- but no doctor's note -- for a fragrant ounce of "purple kush," she departs a satisfied customer, perhaps grabbing a snack at a nearby restaurant before hitting the highway. [continues 1987 words]
Reconciling Medical Pot Use and Legalization More than 500 devotees of the cannabis plant attended the 38th annual NORML convention at the Grand Hyatt in San Francisco September 24-26. The crowd was not only larger than in previous years, but people seemed to be listening more intently to the speakers, less apt to gab outside the auditorium. NORML's goals have been remote and vague for decades; now they seem attainable and in need of definition. Local media coverage centered on the "Regulate, Control, and Tax Cannabis Act of 2010" that is likely to be on the California ballot in November 2010. If approved by the voters, it would allow adults over 21 to cultivate, possess, and share up to an ounce. Distribution would be regulated and taxed by local governments. [continues 1451 words]
A day in the life of Marin's oldest medical marijuana dispensary Cheech and Chong would be appalled. The longtime purveyors of marijuana-laced hilarity would have found little to riff on at the Marin Alliance for Medical Marijuana in Fairfax on a recent Sunday afternoon. For four hours, the pot peddler of Marin, one of the oldest marijuana dispensaries in California, proved downright dull. No spliffs were lit up in the waiting room. Bongs were nowhere to be seen. Peter Tosh's "Legalize It" wasn't blasting out of the stereo. Heck, there was nary a longhair in sight all day. The names on two white board menus, one listing more than a dozen varieties of available marijuana strains and the other full of marijuana edibles such as cookies, brownies and "Flying Saucers," provided more chuckles than any customer. A few marijuana-related posters and fliers perched on the walls above the two old white couches in the waiting room were the only thing to keep this place from feeling like a professional-yet-shabby doctor's office. Instead, a diverse, discreet group of around 30 people stopped in throughout the day, with the vast majority in and out the door in a matter of minutes, quietly heading to their car while holding a small brown paper bag. No one even sparked up a bowl in the parking lot. [continues 1532 words]
SAN FRANCISCO - Charles "Eddy" Lepp was sentenced to 10 years in prison Monday in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California. He was convicted in September 2008 of cultivating and possessing more than 1,000 marijuana plants with the intent to distribute them. Federal agents and Lake County Sheriff's Department officials raided Lepp's 20-acre garden in August 2004 and seized more than 32,000 plants. The incident spurred a legal battle, with Lepp claiming the marijuana was to be used for religious and medical purposes. [continues 400 words]
"Statistically, I'm supposed to be dead," says Don Haumant, 57, as he sits in his Minneapolis living room, the winter light coming in through half-closed shades. The one-bedroom apartment is decorated with period furniture - "You might be comfortable on a mission chair," he offers a guest - and flourishes of 1950s and Hollywood memorabilia. Above the couch is a photograph of MGM's studio players from Tinseltown's golden era. Clark Gable anchors the shot. "There's not a whole lot that can be done," said the onetime actor, his speech leisurely but his posture crisp. "That's why I've had to take it upon myself to do the things that are within my power to live a better life. And one of the things I've done is find the substances that are the most helpful and least damaging." [continues 1562 words]
In the latest test of California's medical marijuana law, the state Supreme Court on Tuesday used the experience of a Sacramento man to question whether employers can fire workers who test positive for the drug used under a doctor's advice. For about an hour, justices engaged attorneys at the Stanley Mosk Library and Court Building near the Capitol on the letter and intention of the state's Compassionate Use Act of 1996. The act - the first such law in the country - protects medical marijuana users from criminal liability but has left unresolved other key questions, including rights in the work force. [continues 762 words]
Marijuana activists, advocates and adventurers will converge on Madison Oct. 5-7 for the 37th Great Midwest Marijuana Harvest Festival. Political activist Ben Masel has been involved with the annual festival from the beginning. He was a fresh-faced freshman from New Jersey when he arrived in Madison to attend UW in 1971. "I just got to town as a freshman for that first one," he said. "It was more closely in context with the anti-war movement then." The Vietnam War ended and we've moved on to conduct wars in other parts of the world, but our internal war with marijuana goes on. [continues 753 words]
