Federally Approved Medical Marijuana Confronts NH Government

Marijuana Policy Project Legislative Analyst Matt Simon and NH Common Sense Executive Director Kirk McNeil write:

You may have heard mention of a little-known federal medical marijuana program called the Compassionate Investigative New Drug (IND) Program. The program was closed to new applicants in 1992, but four patients have continued to receive shipments of medical marijuana from the federal government since that time.

The most outspoken of these four patients is a successful stockbroker, Irvin Rosenfeld. Rosenfeld will be visiting Concord Tuesday (5/8) for a 9:30 a.m. press conference and meetings with elected officials.

Rosenfeld, 59, has suffered since age 10 from a rare bone disorder known as Multiple Congenital Cartilaginous Exostosis. He recently published a book called My Medicine: How I Convinced the U.S. Government to Provide my Marijuana and Helped Launch a National Movement.

For nearly 30 years and counting, he has received approximately nine ounces per month of marijuana from the U.S. government.

Patients and supporters of SB 409 are welcome to attend and observe the press conference.

Herewith, that press conference, 5/8/2012. One mainstream media outlet eventually showed up, after formal festivities wrapped up. Better late than never, I suppose. (The legislative history to date of SB409, this year's NH medicinal marijuana bill, can be found here.)

Senator Jeb Bradley to NH police chief: "Medical marijuana works. We know it."

By special request, from the NH Senate Health and Human Services Committee's 3/8/2012 public hearing on SB409, "relative to the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes," Committee Chair Senator Jeb Bradley responds to testimony by Enfield Police Chief Richard Crate. Despite the recalcitrant Chief Crate's refusal to compromise with reality, or Constitutionality, the committee subsequently voted 5-0 to recommend the bill's passage. The Senate agreed. As, following this hearing, has the House.

Hemp. Why Are We Still Talking About This?

Here's what the prohibitionists keep avoiding with regard to the "broccoli vs cauliflower," "we can't tell them apart!" appearance issue of industrial hemp: it's crap. They must be high.

If you want to grow quality hemp, then your plants will be tall stalks with tiny flowers and therefore very low THC -- ideally all stalk/no bud. If you're growing pot, they'll be squat plants with large flowers and (presumably) high THC -- ideally all bud/no stalk (and let's not lose sight of the unavoidable fact that THC levels have increased directly due to the "War on People Who Use (Some) Drugs"™, for the same reason that higher-alcohol-content liquor became the bootlegger's product of choice: more bang in a smaller, more easily handled and concealable and transportable package). Anyone intent on entering either market has a considerable economic vested interest in maximizing the preferred characteristic exclusively, because the non-preferred characteristic detracts from the preferred characteristic.

The objectives of the two crops are very different. The plant-spacing of the two crops are very different. And if you were to cross-breed them (as would unavoidably happen if you tried to hide one amongst the other) in an attempt to circumvent arbitrary THC level restrictions (and also presumably attempt to split the difference in spacing requirements, as well, in your attempt to deceive), then your crop would be market-competitive -- and therefore profitable -- neither in the hemp market nor in the pot market. Your product would be rejected by your intended customers. Marketable THC and marketable fiber are incompatible and mutually exclusive -- indeed, mutually destructive. For a profitable crop, you need to pick one and actively avoid the other. The autocrats have made no attempt to debate these points. Why might that be?

Even most cops ought to be trainable to tell the difference. And even government used to understand.

Seriously. Why the hell are we still talking about this...?



Anyway, herewith, the NH Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on HB1615, "relative to industrial hemp," 4/19/2012. In toto -- it simply wasn't worth my time to excise the lone tripping opponent. (The House hearing can be found here, their Executive Session here.)

Prohibition Doesn't Work

Even when it's at least implemented compliant with the rule of law, as with the tragic and doomed 18th Amendment. There are myriad economic, social, philosophical and moral reasons for anyone willing to investigate. The drug war -- or rather, "The War on People Who Use (Some) Drugs"™ -- really has to end. Sooner rather than later.

Your ever-humble chronicler has decided he needs to cease constantly dignifying the opposition with a platform for their delusions and fetishes. Unless they say something really stupid, of course... Sometimes there simply aren't "2 sides" to an issue. Flat-earthers don't get equal time. Irrational autocratic marijuana prohibitionists don't get equal time.

That said, I'm making room here for a "startling" indictment of the systemic self-serving indoctrination perpetrated by government schools. You knew they had an agenda, right? Violence, or the threat thereof, is the only tool government has, and it's teaching the children that fear of government is the source of "society."

A wise man once said

"When the government fears the people there is liberty; when the people fear the government there is tyranny."
-Thomas Jefferson-

More recently -- perhaps even within this submissive's own young life experience -- it was restated thusly:

"People should not be afraid of their governments. Governments should be afraid of their people."
-V-

The government that you pay for has informed this budding citizen that that's nonsense. Is it? Should it be...?

So herewith, just some of the most compelling and informative of the NH Senate Judiciary Committee's hearing on HB1526, "relative to possession of less than one-half ounce of marijuana," 4/19/2012, from NHCLU Executive Director, Claire Ebel, Marijuana Policy Project Legislative Analyst Matt Simon, taxpayer Willie Brown, and Rep. Seth Cohn.

Abject Fear Betrayed?

Are we witnessing the nevertheless-still-malevolent death throes of a violent predator? The hysterical yet vicious last gasp? "I'll chase him round Good Hope, and round the Horn, and round the Norway Maelstrom (or 'round the Moons of Nibia, and round the Antares Maelstrom,' if you prefer), and round perdition's flames before I give him up." The lash of the plummeting Balrog? Or perhaps 'Come back here you coward! It's only a flesh wound...!'

There's a growing palpable desperation emitting among the vile, venal, arrogant, obsessive-compulsive, micromanaging, collectivist authoritarians. Blatantly self-referential "appeals to authority." An unmistakable stench of fear that they're finally losing control over their neighbors' peaceful lives. One relatively tiny corner of their oppressive domain, to be sure, but a critical one, I believe. And they seem to agree. It permeates their very words. Clearly, the drubbing they finally took at the hands of the Senate scared the shit out of them.

They're increasingly strident and grasping, if that's even possible anymore. Incomprehensible as it may be to lovers of liberty, these people -- yes, these barbarians -- will never concede -- ever -- in what must prove an inevitably fruitless effort to hold back the tide in what is ostensibly a free country (what the hell is their definition, anyway?). The rule of law -- beginning with the letter and spirit of the Constitutions -- must win out. Self-ownership must win out. Compassion, in this particular case, must win out. A government that fundamentally understands in no uncertain terms who's running this show must win out.

SB409, "relative to the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes," now before the House Health, Human Services and Elderly Affairs Committee, 4/10/2012. I think I'm finally all "shocked out" by the utterly shameless sycophantic control freaks' wild assertions, misplaced loyalties, and general contempt for peaceful self-determination and the limited servant government of expressly enumerated delegated powers authorized to defend it. See if they've rendered you as jaded.

We'll start, though, with the good, with selected testimony from Rep Jenn Coffey, and NH Common Sense founder and current Marijuana Policy Project Legislative Analyst (and NH resident, jbtw) Matt Simon.

EDIT: Keep this in mind while enduring law enforcement's testimony...

"It’s now settled that state law enforcement officers cannot arrest medical marijuana patients or seize their medicine simply because they prefer the contrary federal law," said Joe Elford, Chief Counsel with Americans for Safe Access (ASA), the medical marijuana advocacy organization that represented the defendant Felix Kha in a case that the City of Garden Grove appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court. "Perhaps, in the future local government will think twice about expending significant time and resources to defy a law that is overwhelmingly supported by the people of our state."

And a Little Child..., the Re-Mix

This, only better. New tools, new voice.

Anastasia McNeil delivers some lyrical "home-grown" wisdom -- which as it happens (could there have been method to Chair Jeb Bradley's madness?) stands in stark temporal and philosophical contrast to the continued insanity championed by your "servant," Chief Crate -- to the NH Senate Health and Human Services Committee regarding SB409, "relative to the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes," 3/8/2012. With a hat tip to Ted Geisel...

Would you like pain
Here or there?

I would not like pain here or there.
I would not like pain anywhere.

Would you like pain in your house?
Would you like to watch your dying spouse?

I do not like pain in a house.
I do not like to watch my dying spouse.
I do not like pain
here or there.
I'd like to stop it
everywhere.
I do not like suff'ring and pain.
I do not like them, but they remain.
Would you solve them with a plant?
Why sit there and say you can't?

Do you want to say:
Not with a note.
From the man in white coat.
Not if you're sick.
I don't care one lick.
You may not use it here or there.
You may not use it anywhere.
You may not use a plant for pain.
I prefer more suffering.

Would you? Could you?
take that pain?
Then Suffer! Suffer!
You'll remain.

But I would not ,
could not,
give you pain.
That a plant could solve
Grown with dirt and rain

You may like choice.
You will see.
You may like choice
just like me.

I do not like pain in a house
I do not like to watch a dying spouse.
When a little plant grown with dirt and rain.
Can take away that suffering.

Hope Springs Eternal

Two weeks ago, the NH Senate Health and Human Services Committee held the public hearing for SB409, "relative to the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes." It went well for most. Not so much for others.

March 22, the committee held their "Executive Session" on the bill, where they vote on what they'll recommend to the entire body. Committee recommendations are overwhelmingly accepted (with some remarkably notable exceptions), so they're important. Herewith, that session.

I'll save you some suspense. Four Republicans (including former Congressman, Senate Majority Leader and Chair Jeb Bradley) and one Democrat recommended unanimously that this bill -- sponsored by 3 GOP Senators, just btw -- ought to pass. Of course, we shouldn't have to be here at all if one particular Democrat -- the one sitting in the governor's office -- hadn't vetoed a similar bill in 2009 -- one, in fact, he essentially wrote. But he's not running again, so he no longer feels compelled to pander to his ostensible "non-base," right? We'll see...

This, too, is on the heels of the super-majority GOP House killing the gay-marriage repeal bill on Wednesday. And earlier this term, they passed marijuana decriminalization and hemp legalization. However much I still disagree with swathes of their agenda, Republicans really are a different, better breed in NH. Better, in fact, than the Democrats on some of the Dems' own traditional issues...

And lest we forget, 40 Years Ago Today: Congress Was Told To Tell The Truth About Marijuana; They Didn’t

Senate panel OKs medical pot bill

NH Chiefs of Police Representative Appears a Little Stunned

By special request, Richard Crate, Enfield Police Chief, addresses the NH Senate Health and Human Services Committee on behalf of the NH Chiefs of Police, regarding SB409, "relative to the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes," 3/8/2012. Delivering legislative testimony on a regular basis for that organization, this is the first time on any marijuana bill, to my knowledge, that he doesn't receive, at worst, polite silence.

Barbarians Feeling Some Resistance

Finally! Some pushback from our ostensible "representatives"! Seriously, I can't recall anything like this kind of pressure put on the forces of evil by a NH legislative committee in the years I've been following this issue. Or any statist-friendly issue, for that matter. Wow...

Once again, medical marijuana rears its fearsomely compassionate head in the NH legislature. This time, starting in the Senate's Health and Human Services Committee. Perhaps needless to say, SB409, "relative to the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes," yet again exposes the barbaric tendencies of the vicious autocrats of the state (can you believe Chief Crate's professed faith in D.C. ...?!?) for what they are. Doesn't seem to deter 'em, though, does it? No self-awareness...

Simply stated (as, to be sure, I have before in these chronicles), presuming the authority to somehow deny natural pain relief to peaceful people who are suffering is barbaric. There is simply no accurate yet appropriately genteel euphemism. Deal with it. Government has no justification for making peaceful lives more difficult. Ever. The time of the authoritarian drug warrior must end. Now. He doesn't own you, he works for you. We must start with the atrocities committed daily against those who are suffering. Civil liberties, human rights and self-ownership must be restored. Government as servant, not master. Legislature as representatives of the People rather than of the vested interests of the (equally servant, just btw) Executive Branch.

If we hope to make any claim to being a civilized -- let alone free -- society, we must stop forcing our fellows to live in misery for our (well, someone's) own ostensibly yet nevertheless deeply disturbed "high ideals." "Misguided" doesn't remotely begin to cover it.

You. Mind your own goddamn business, and "allow" your neighbor to mind his. In return, he'll do the same for you. Liberty. What a concept, huh? You wanna restore some sanity? Start here.

But first, Anastasia McNeil delivers some lyrical "home-grown" wisdom, which as it happens (could there have been method to Chair Jeb Bradley's madness?) stands in stark temporal and philosophical contrast to the continued insanity championed by your "servant," Chief Crate.

Why Can't You Smoke Pot? Because Lobbyists Are Getting Rich Off of the War on Drugs

NH Senate Corrects House's Homework

Usual House Suspects Still Need Remedial Tutoring...

The mystifyingly convoluted journey of the seemingly self-evident concept of HB145, "permitting the audio and video recording of a public official while in the course of his or her official duties" -- that your servants are, as NH Constitution Part 1st Article 8 makes crystal clear, "at all times accountable" -- continues. Last we left it, the NH Senate Judiciary Committee was poised -- surprisingly -- to amend it back to something approximating its original form before the House Criminal Justice Committee had finished diluting it almost beyond recognition (certainly beyond sense).

Well, the Senate did a pretty good job with it, indeed. And so here it is, back before the House CJ Committee, 3/6/2012. Let's try, yet again, to make a few things perfectly clear. Even to politicians.

Number one: "non-public meetings" are called that for a reason. A private meeting with a welfare client is not "generally accessible" to the public. That's a straw man.

Number two: there is a distinction in NH law between the aural component and the visual component. There are no current laws against the visual component. These legislative efforts, therefore, are endeavoring only to clarify the right to record audio. Visual images at, say, "a fatal crash scene" aren't prohibited now. And again, crossing a crime scene tape, interfering with an investigation, is not an area "generally accessible" to the public, now is it? Can you be there without a camera now? No. This bill doesn't change that. That there is a straw man and a red herring.

Number three: the issue is already largely resolved judicially, as the 'Glik' decision by the 1st Circuit Court made clear. That decision was subsequently the deciding factor in your humble chronicler's own criminal case against Weare PD in Goffstown District Court. As for the current law being good enough, there are at least 4 civil actions now pending against Weare PD with regard to them "interpreting" current 'wiretapping' law. Which, given the resolution of my criminal case, is going to cost Weare taxpayers. Reportedly, Weare PD's liability insurance premiums already reflect the coming carnage. The current law is an expensive violation of civil rights. The law needs to respect established rights.

Number four: lose (3) "This subparagraph shall not be construed to permit a person to audio or videotape either in a courtroom or any other place within a court facility without prior approval of the presiding justice," which continues to allow the judicial branch to place itself above the rule of law.

At this point, the House (starting with the committee's recommendation) has several options. It can simply concur with the changes the Senate made, and off it goes to the governor; it can reject the changes and drop the matter entirely; it can reject the changes and request a "Committee of Conference" where a subcommittee from the respective committee of each chamber will meet to attempt to hammer out their differences. The latter option appears to be the direction in which the CJ Committee is leaning. And to make the bill even better, to boot. Golly...