Posted on 01/11/2002 10:44:30 PM PST by LloydofDSS
Jan 11, 2002 Widow's Home Seized After Son's Arrest for Drug Possession The Associated Press ATHENS, Ga. (AP) - Police have seized the house of an 82-year-old widow because they say she knew her son dealt drugs there and did nothing to stop him. Fannie Gresham's small home was seized Thursday under a state law allowing authorities to confiscate property linked to the illegal drug trade. Authorities also arrested her 50-year-old son, Tommie "Top Dollar" Gresham, on a drug charge after he allegedly dropped several rocks of crack cocaine and fled. Police records show 29 incidents of drug activity at the address since 1992 and authorities say drug dealers were caught numerous times fetching drugs from the house for street sales. Based on that, and police claims that the elder, widowed Gresham was helping her son's alleged operation, Superior Court Judge Stephen Boswell issued a court order in December allowing the seizure. Boswell gave Fannie Gresham 14 days to move her belongings. Her attorney, Jim Smith, likened the seizure to the widespread illegal taking of property and land from blacks that he says tarnishes America's past. "They have never seized any drugs in this house. This lady is not accused of a single thing," he said. Police predicted more such seizures as they crack down on the drug trade in the city's troubled neighborhoods. A hearing on the seizure has been scheduled in February.
Maybe I can go to the courthouse next week and actually copy the warrants and stuff (or whatever I can find).
The newspapers are not always that accurate (Duh!)
Barry Goldwater
This sounds like a good point, protect the children, until you look a little more carefully.
It turns out that making drugs legal would shut down the neighborhood drug pushers who often push drugs on children. Alcohol is a good example. There are not local neighborhood alcohol pushers because legal alcohol has made them uneconomic.
The drug war is another feeble attempt to control the appetite of the people for what they want. You might have a chance in hell in a pure dictatorship, but no chance at all in a free society.
The drug war is very simply a war on the people.
"Scientists who were the first to study the genus Cannabis clearly discerned different species. The father of plant taxonomy, Linnaeus, officially designated the Cannabis genus in 1753 when he founded the binomial system of botanical nomenclature still used today [4]. Linnaeus added the "sativa" appellation (literally, "sown" or "cultivated," i.e., used in agriculture), indicating the utilitarian nature of the plant. Since his time numerous attempts have been made for a coherent taxonomy of Cannabis. Species designations have come and gone [5]. . . "
" . . . In 1889, botanist and plant explorer George Watt wrote about the distinction between types of Cannabis : "A few plants such as the potato, tomato, poppy and hemp seem to have the power of growing with equal luxuriance under almost any climatic condition, changing or modifying some important function as if to adapt themselves to the altered circumstance. As remarked, hemp is perhaps the most notable example of this; hence, it produces a valuable fibre in Europe, while showing little or no tendency to produce the narcotic principle which in Asia constitutes its chief value."[6] . . ."
" . . . The key Cannabis species problem derives from the fact that there is no convenient species barrier between the varying types that would allow us to draw a clear line between them. In taxonomy, often the delineating line between species is that they cannot cross-breed. But disparate types of Cannabis can indeed produce fertile offspring, not sexually dysfunctional "mules."" . . .
" . . . The prevailing opinion currently recognizes three species: C. sativa, C. indica, and C. ruderalis. [10] "Industrial" types fall exclusively within C. sativa, although all Cannabis plants contain stem fiber and can have multiple uses in primitive societies where they are indigenous." . . .
" . . . Recent analytical advances are leading many scientists to believe that a more accurate and satisfying way to differentiate the different forms of Cannabis would be by their biochemical composition."
" . . . Thus, using the chemotype approach, Cannabis variants can be classified on the basis of their THC-CBD balance. This is accepted by a growing number of scientists. Gabriel Nahas, M.D., Ph.D., writes, "One should still distinguish two principal large groups of varieties of Cannabis sativa , the drug type and the fiber type. In addition to this classical distinction of these two groups, botanists generally accept description consisting of three chemical types: (a) the pure drug type, high THC content (2-6 percent) and lacking CBD[cannabidiol]; (b) the "intermediate type" (predominantly THC); and (c) the fiber type (THC<0.25 percent)." [16]"
" . . . he 1937 Marijuana Tax Act defined marijuana as: "(A)ll parts of the plant Cannabis sativa L., whether growing or not; the seeds thereof; the resin extracted from any such plant; and every compound, manufacture, salt, derivative, mixture, or preparation of such plant, its seeds, or resin; but shall not include the mature stalks of such plant, fiber produced from such stalks, oil or cake made from the seeds of such plant, any other compound, manufacture salt, derivative, mixture, or preparation of such mature stalks (except the resin extracted therefrom), fiber, oil, or cake, or the sterilized seed of such plant which is incapable of germination." [18]"
You found a clue here. The police had 29 chances to bust this guy and they blew it 29 times. This is not too surprising when you realize that busting a poor drug dealer COSTS the government about $50,000 to put him in prison and about $25,000 per year to keep him there. No profit in that.
Are we really surprised that they opted to take his mothers home rather than put him away. Much more profit in that.
The Police are there to protect and to serve.
Hold on a second: souther rock said 'I believe in doing what is right. Apart from what is right, there are no "solutions".'
As I see it, he is essentially saying that since he doesn't see anything right, he's going to do nothing. That, to my mind, is apathy which is the creed of someone who can't accept that the world doesn't work the way he wants it to. Same thing a fanatic believes, see my earlier post.
Extremism in defence of liberty is no vice. I agree with Goldwater. When it comes to, say, the Communists, extremism is certainly the order of the day. They presented a clear and present danger to our liberty, and so in that case it was no vice.
Moderation in pursuit of justice is no virtue. Yeah, if you want to be a virtuous person, politics probably isn't your best career option. I consider good manners to be a virtue, as well as kindness and forthright, clear speech. "Moderation" (really expediency) sucks, but that's how solutions, however imperfect and thus wrong, happen. This is especially true when you're fighting the inertia of a welfare state.
Without the alterations:
I would remind you that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice! And let me remind you also that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue!The beauty of the very system we Republicans are pledged to restore and revitalize, the beauty of this federal system of ours, is in its reconciliation of diversity with unity. We must not see malice in honest differences of opinion, and no matter how great, so long as they are not inconsistent with the pledges we have given to each other in and through our Constitution.
Originally, you stated the following to me:
"Marijuana (illegal) is the leaves, flowers and bud of the plant. Hemp (legal) the stem & stalk and products thereof."
Yet, you and I have just posted portions of a detailed study that clearly says that marijuana plants and hemp are different plants; they appear to be the same, yet biochemically (that's how the author differentiated them) they are significantly different: one high in THC, the other extremely low in THC. In the "high THC" plants, marijuana smokers key on the leaves and buds. In the "low THC" plants, the fibers from the stalks are used (hemp).
With all due respect, it seems that your posted evidence supports my original contention rather than your own. Am I missing something (entirely possible...)??
The Drug War is all about giving more power to government, more easdropping, more money to police, lawyers, judges, prisons, and the mafia.
The Drug War makes a very cheap commodity like weeds and flowers, very profitable, and gives incentives hook people onto its use, thus the new profession of "pusher" was invented as soon as drugs were made illegal, and profitable. There were no pushers at all in this country until the early 1900's.
The stupid people that still support the impossible drug war are being duped, ignorant, and cannot see that drug use has not lessened since it was made illegal, and they cannot understand why they have made no progress at all in 80 years.
The Drug war people are unfortunately never held accountable for all of the taxpayers money they have wasted over the years with absolutely not one single example of success. I only wish that those that support the War on Drugs were made to pay for it, and leave the rest of us alone, reimburse us for the taxes we already paid for it, and finance it on your own.
There is no light at the end of the Drug War tunnel.
But there are some big advantages to this approach. The police can be privatized and stop to be state controlled socialist institution. Police should generate its own income and free the taxpayers from the burden. Free market should be the highest authority in a free society.
Prisons also should be private and run for profit. The last link of the ailing justice system are the courts. They should be privatised also. That way the trials will be much faster and judges will have to earn their living by the fees.
No more socialism and no more feudal relics. Let money and market rule.
The point being there was no separate classification between the narcotic "hemp" and fiber "hemp" in 1889. It was the same plant C. sativa.
The US government did not discern a difference in 1937, taxing everthing of the plant, exempting the stalks and it's products.
Scientists would not make a distinction until the late 1950's and early '60's based on chemical assay.
Distinction based on chemical differences is a bit of intellectual throat-clearing rather unique to Cannabis.
I can't recall where else in biology that the definitive classification waits on chemical testing.
"It looks like an Pine rattlesnake, but you can't be sure until the toxicology comes back."
"Chemical testing shows the plant in question is Mountain Juniper Cupressaceae Juniperus scopulorum . . ."
These are not the usual statements in biology.
The reports from the Ukraine (posted), Switzerland, and Canada (not posted) show a great deal of work to develop a hybrid plant low in THC for hemp production.
and point out the required effort to cull and select next generation seed to keep the THC low.
If there is a "low THC" hemp plant to begin with, then why the effort it develop a "low THC" strain ?
And why cull the seed to keep the plant from reverting to type (higher levels of THC) ?
Back to the original subject of the thread (Thom. Jefferson, remember him ?):
If the taxonomy depends on tools to be discovered in the future (Washington, Jefferson, Adams, etc. certainly had no access to chemical spectrography), then
there could be no distinction at the time. There was no distinction made in 1889, none in 1937.
In fact a distinction was not made until the 1960's when the government addressed the "drug problem" (see "intellectual throat-clearing" above).
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