Posted on 11/03/2004 1:51:01 PM PST by Wolfie
Medical Marijuana Approved
Helena -- Montanans suffering from certain medical conditions may be able to legally smoke marijuana to ease their symptoms come January 1. The Medical Marijuana Act passed by a 63 to 37 percent margin Tuesday with 375 of 881 precincts reporting. The new act will protect patients, their doctors and their caregivers from state and local arrest and prosecution for the medical use of marijuana.
Teresa Michalski of Helena couldn't be happier. Michalski once lived in fear that her late son, Travis, would spend the last few months of his short life in jail for using marijuana during the last stages of Hodgkin's disease.
"I knew the people in Montana were compassionate and I could count on them," said Michalski, a fifth-generation Montanan.
U.S. Deputy Drug Czar Scott Burns, however, warned Montanans that federal law trumps state law, and said during a recent visit to Montana that no state initiative permitting the medical use of marijuana can circumvent the federal law prohibiting the possession and use of the drug.
"There's no safe harbor," Burns said.
But Paul Befumo, treasurer of the Marijuana Policy Project of Montana, said he's "elated" that the measure passed.
"People don't have to worry about being criminalized any more," he said.
Proponents say smoking marijuana relieves nausea, increases appetite, reduces muscle spasms, relieves chronic pain and reduces pressure in the eyes. It can be used to treat the symptoms of AIDS, cancer, multiple sclerosis and glaucoma, among other diseases, they say.
Medical marijuana has been approved by voters in Alaska, California, Colorado, Maine, Nevada, Oregon and Washington. In Hawaii, a law was passed by the Legislature and signed by the governor in 2000. In Vermont, a law was passed by the Legislature and allowed to become law without the governor's signature in May 2004, the Marijuana Policy Project reports.
The Montana measure's campaign was financially backed by the national Marijuana Policy Project out of Washington, D.C.
It's totally relevant.
As you know, Hamilton, Washington, and the United States Congress told Jefferson he was blowing smoke up their collective a$$ and set up the First Bank of the United States.
Two years after the Constitution was ratified.
By the people who wrote and ratified it (way before FDR).
Ever occur to you that Jefferson was wrong?
Bizarre theory? From you, the master of the bizarre? Case in point.
Our RKBA is to protect us from a government turned tyrannical. Surely you agree.
Yet you believe that the Founding Fathers gave this government the power to defend us against infringements of our RKBA's? Right. And they also gave the fox the power to defend the hen house.
BWAHAHAHAHA! You are a stich. Me, bizarre. Indeed.
"Got anyone banned lately?"
Patience.
But he is the main one. Other progressives supporting the pro-drug movement with millions are Sperling and Lewis.
What??
That book I referenced was non-fiction. He calls himself a Libertarian. Right on the friggin' cover!
Geez, I feel like Alice in Wonderland ... in "1984".
Two years after the Constitution was ratified.
By the people who wrote and ratified it (way before FDR).
Ever occur to you that Jefferson was wrong?
Ever occur to you that the disagreement was not over regulating commerce?
I suppose you placed his commerce clause reference in bold because, what, it looked pretty?
The governor of Montana needs to just warn this jerk that agents arresting legal state users will be met with anything up to and including deadly force for illegal detention.
They may have disagreed over wheather establishing a national bank did indeed constitute regulating the internal commerce of a state or not. There is no evidence there was any disagreement with his assesement of the limits of federal authority under the Commerce Clause, just wheather or not establishing a national bank exceeded those limits.
Although I would respect a Governor who stands up for his state, I would hope the issue would be more noble than the right to smoke dope.
Good for Montana. It's about time someone recognized the need for this.
You're muddying things up with your Commerce Clause claptrap. Cool it.
Ooh. Just a wee wittle tiny fwaction?
That "tiny fraction" represents millions of dollars without which these organizations would either fold or fade into insignificance.
Soros and his billionaire buddies fund NORML, MPP (DPA), and DRCnet, the three biggies for marijuana reform.
Without them, the legalization movement would consist of one website at marijuanaiscool.com.
Then it wasn't an exercise in regulating commerce, and establishing the bank was in no way a refutation of Jefferson's arguments with regards to the Commerce Clause.
You're muddying things up with your Commerce Clause claptrap. Cool it.
What, you want to leave the Commerce Clause and the Constitutional issues out of it, and make it "just about the pot"?
Link does NOT support your claims. Besides, I said NO Soros funded links.
They left it to each state to protect that right, along with free speech, freedom from unreasonable searches, a right to an attorney, and any other right the citizens of a particular state wished to protect.
There you go again with your bizarre theory that our inalienable rights can be infringed upon by States of the Union, who are pledged to uphold the Law of the Land.
Bizarre theory?
Case in point. Our RKBA is to protect us from a government turned tyrannical. Surely you agree.
Indeed I do. -- We are so protected from any level of government in the USA, by our US Constitution.
Yet you believe that the Founding Fathers gave this government the power to defend us against infringements of our RKBA's? Right.
"Gave"? -- No. They wrote a document with checks & balances on such infringements of power made by any level of our various governments, local, state or fed.
And they also gave the fox the power to defend the hen house. BWAHAHAHAHA! You are a stich. Me, bizarre. Indeed.
Your loony reaction to my question makes my point.
Got anyone banned lately?
Patience.
Paulsen, one thing I've learned here is patience, -- by seeing trolls like you come and go on FR for years. --- Eventually you'll crack under the strain of pretending to be a conservative.. I can wait.
Well that's an awfully dumb way to look at it. Are people who want to see alcohol remain legal liberals? If not, what the heck is the difference?
'Cool it' usually means he's about to start his accusations that we're not arguing 'fair'. The other night he claimed we were disrupting the forum & punched abuse.
Weird fella.
Now you're backtracking. Gave? Oh no, robertpaulsen.
There it is. For all to see. You believe the Founding Fathers gave the federal government the power to protect our RKBA. Why would they do that? Why would they give that power to the entity that may become tyrannical?
What a goofy statement.
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