Free Republic

Conservatives pride themselves on resisting change, which is as it should be. But intelligent deference to tradition and stability can evolve into intellectual sloth and moral fanaticism, as when conservatives simply decline to look up from dogma because the effort to raise their heads and reconsider is too great. The laws aren't exactly indefensible, because practically nothing is, and the thunderers who tell us to stay the course can always find one man or woman who, having taken marijuana, moved on to severe mental disorder. But that argument, to quote myself, is on the order of saying that every...

Medical Marijuana OK, Says Texas Medical Association On May 14, during its annual state convention, the Texas Medical Association unanimously - and without discussion - adopted a new policy recommendation supporting the right of doctors and patients to discuss medical marijuana as a viable treatment option, without fear of recrimination by authorities. The TMA delegates also reaffirmed the association's call for further research on medicinal marijuana, "including well-controlled studies in patients who have serious pain-related conditions," according to the report of the TMA's Council on Scientific Affairs, which was approved by the TMA delegates. "Paramount is support for physicians to...

Pot Use Tied to Stroke in Three Teenagers NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Large doses of marijuana might in rare instances lead to stroke in teenagers, according to a new report. Although it is unusual for teens to suffer a stroke, and there have been few reports of stroke linked to marijuana use, the cases of three teenage boys suggest the association is real, researchers report. The boys all had a similar type of stroke in a brain region called the cerebellum shortly after smoking marijuana. Their strokes could not be explained by blood clots that traveled from the heart,...

Medical Pot Group Basks in Victory, Eyes New Harvest Valerie Corral had just finished a conversation with an ill friend Wednesday when the phone rang. This time there was good news, unlike much of what had come over the past two years. In September 2002, her medical marijuana garden was raided by federal agents who confiscated 167 plants. This was followed by months of scrapping together marijuana for the 250-member Wo/men’s Alliance for Medical Marijuana. This week’s news: U.S. District Court Judge Jeremy Fogel issued the injunction that WAMM had sought barring future raids by the federal government like the...

You Can't Trust The Drug "Experts" Research on Illicit Substances Is As Biased As Its Funding Source "One night's ecstasy use can cause brain damage," shouted a newspaper headline in September 2002, after the journal Science published a study that found a single dose of the drug ecstasy injected into monkeys and baboons caused terrible brain damage. Two of the 10 primates in the study had even died. The media trumpeted the news around the world and drug enforcement officials held it up as definitive proof of the vileness of ecstasy. But a year later, an odd thing happened. The...

Suit filed in meth-lab raid Thornton woman says cops forced her to strip outdoors By Jim Hughes Denver Post Staff Writer A Thornton woman has sued the members of the North Metro Drug Task Force for forcing her to strip down for an outdoor "decontamination" during a fruitless drug raid in April 2002. Barbara Adriaens was working on homework for an art class in the second-floor bedroom of her condominium when the Northglenn/Thornton SWAT team burst in to execute a search warrant for a suspected methamphetamine lab, according to her lawsuit. Even though officers found no evidence of a meth...

April 22, 2004 Leave Medical Marijuana Group Alone, Judge Tells GovernmentBy THE ASSOCIATED PRESS AN FRANCISCO, April 21 (AP) — A judge ordered the federal government on Wednesday not to raid or prosecute a California group that grows and distributes marijuana for its sick members.The decision, by Judge Jeremy Fogel of Federal District Court in San Jose, was the first interpretation of an appeals court's ruling in December that federal prosecutions of medical marijuana users were unconstitutional if the marijuana was not sold, transported across state lines or used for nonmedicinal purposes.Nine states, including California, allow medical marijuana use, but...