Cannabis Freedom

... And I was not a dairy farmer.

Feds launch 'Gestapo raid' over raw milk: "'They swooped in ... like a bunch of Vikings, handcuffed me and stole $30,000 worth of my milk, cheese and butter,' he told the New York Daily News.

His case is just an example of what the government is trying to do to those who believe – based on medical results – that raw milk is better for them than the processed milk available in most grocery stores, according to Nolt's supporters."

Your tax dollars at work, you know, to keep you safe. So what do you have in your cabinets that the government might not like?

HT: The Agitator

WREG-TV Memphis - Updated: "Rape Dance" Investigation appears on national cable news:

"The clip labeled, 'Mitchell High School Memphis ... Rape Dat Ho,' was posted last month. It was flagged as offensive then taken down, but not before News Channel 3 recorded the clip on tape.

The images are disturbing. They are graphic and hard to watch. It shows young men and women engaging in what one parent described as 'sex with clothes on.

Are you freaking kidding me? In Memphis, TN we're seriously worried about kids simulating having sex. It's Elvis on TV all over again. Lets just make a rule that these kids have to be filmed from the waist up. Have we come that far as a city that the only thing we have to worry about is kids simulating a sex act?

To put things in perspective, there was a shooting at Mitchell High School earlier this semester. This whole ordeal is a freaking embarrassment to the city. Our city school system has completely failed our children and we're worried about kids dirty dancing, while Bill O'Reilly blows his load watching. O'Reilly is the same pervert that settled a sexual harassment lawsuit a few years ago. These are the deck chairs we're arranging on the Titanic of the city government.

The people that are blaming the kids the most are the ones that are helping them the least. Not one dime of the school system's money should be wasted on any further investigation.

The Agitator - Yet More Professionalism:

"The [Albany Police] department is facing a lawsuit from a man named Tunde Clement, who it should probably be noted does have a long history of drug offenses. But in this particular case, Clement was clean. Sheriff’s deputies confronted Clement as he was departing a bus, took him to the men’s bathroom, and searched him. When they found no drugs, they arrested him for “resisting arrest,” a charge that was later thrown out, given that you can’t arrest someone for “resisting arrest” if they haven’t committed a crime that should have resulted in arrest in the first place.

The police then strip-searched Clement, and made him squat in front of them. The claimed to have seen white powder on his anus So they took him to a hospital. Without his consent, they then administered drugs to sedate him, induced him to vomit, put a camera up his rectum, and took x-rays of him. Such drastic measures against the consent of a patient usually require officials to show some sort of imminent emergency. There was no such emergency with Clement. And still, no drugs. The hospital later sent Clement a bill for $6,800, and diagnosed him as having “hemorrhoids.”"

I think this is further evidence of the attempt to utilize the drug war to dehumanize the less fortunate in society. Lets compare the outrageous story above to the pass that Cindy McCain received when her prescription pain pill use was outed.

TalkLeft - CNN Examines Cindy McCain

But Cindy McCain wasn't just addicted to pain pills. She was investigated federally for stealing pain pills from a medical charity she headed and for having prescriptions filled in the names of the charity's employees. She admitted it. One of the doctors who wrote the prescriptions for her lost his license.

Mrs. McCain, through her lawyers, was able to get federal prosecutors to let her enter a diversion program and avoid jail.

Diversion is common in state courts for first-time offenders. It isn't in federal courts.

Reuters - Marijuana may up heart attack, stroke risk: study:

"The marijuana users in the study averaged smoking 78 to 350 marijuana cigarettes per week, based on self-reported drug history, the researchers said."

I'm not going to even argue the conclusions of this study because they do not apply to the vast majority of cannabis users. By my calculations, using 350 joints a week is smoking approximately a joint every 20 minutes for 18 hours a day. You would have to be smoking one while rolling your next, all day long. You couldn't hold a job that would pay for that much cannabis. because you wouldn't have time to smoke it all.

From the government's own numbers only about twelve percent of adult cannabis smokers smoke four or more cigarettes per day. Given that the distribution is skewed right, this study's population accounts for only the most chronic (heehee) users.

None of these drug warriors have ever been able to produce a single case of cannabis causing death, not even by heart attack or stroke. Yet, the government still wastes our tax dollars to spew this nonsensical bullshit as if it applied to responsible cannabis users.

Drug dependency takes many forms.

HT: Consumerist Photo Pool

cbs3.com:

WASHINGTON (AP) ― Depression, teens and marijuana are a dangerous mix that can lead to dependency, mental illness or suicidal thoughts, according to a White House report being released Friday."

While I believe that cannabis affects teens and adults differently I don't believe moderate use could actually cause depression. In fact, this study apparently does not show causality, only a "link", whatever that means.

Could it be that there is a "link" between cannabis and depression is because depressed kids tend to self-medicate with the substance that helps them the most? Legal prescription anti-depressants frequently come with FDA "black box" warnings that the use can contribute to suicidal and homicidal ideation, so those drugs aren't without risk either.

In fact, according this 2004 report, in a University of Washington study:

Medical professionals have theorized that depression is the cause of marijuana use, rather than the result. That is, people who are depressed use marijuana to relieve or “escape from” their symptoms of depression. Some studies have demonstrated that marijuana improves mood and that people who are depressed during the initial stages of an experiment are more inclined to begin, continue or increase their marijuana use by the time of follow-up.

HT: DrugRoar

Memphians set your DVR for Sunday 8:30 AM CDT on WKNO TV Channel 10. PBS is airing a special on the private prison business. There is a dangerous move afoot to corporatize the prison industry.

Prisons for Profit . NOW on PBS: "Corporations are running many Americans prisons, but will they put profits before prisoners?

A grim new statistic: One in every hundred Americans is now locked behind bars. As the prison population grows faster than the government can build prisons, private companies see an opportunity for profit."

This week, NOW on PBS investigates the government's trend to outsource prisons and prisoners to the private sector. Critics accuse private prisons of standing in the way of sentencing reform and sacrificing public safety to maximize profits.

For a great expose on the private prison industry driving the war on drugs checkout American Drug War, which I've mentioned previously.

HT: Texas Prison Bidness