Potimus Prime

In what appears to be a full-out, flagrant show of the United States’ hypocritical stance on the growing and usage of hemp and marijuana, medical or otherwise. Raids continue to be carried out even after state dispensaries were told they were to be given safe harbor under the superseding state medical marijuana laws, the federal government “advised” the National Cancer Instituted to remove all suggestions alluding to the medical properties of cannabis from their website; one after the other, our government is employing these guerilla tactics against “Big Bad Marijuana” while issuing their buddies and campaign donors licenses to grow the plant legally, with carte blanche.

Consider US Patent 6,630,507, which describes and protects the use of cannabinoids as antioxidants and neuroprotectants. If the United States government truly believes that marijuana has no medicinal properties, why does the Department of Health and Human Services hold this patent, a patent that lists the application of medical marijuana during treatment as useful in the case of several diseases, including: Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, dementia and HIV?

Online coupon websites have been springing up like dandelions; businesses are bumping shoulders with each other, attempting to reel in fresh and recurring business through special deals and loyalty programs. Medical marijuana collectives and dispensaries are hopping on the online coupon bandwagon right and left, reeling in new patients with coupons accessible via mobile/web. Check into your favorite dispensary on Foursquare next time you’re there, you might get a freebie!

In a world where competing medical marijuana retail venues litter the streets in the kinds of numbers as McDonalds or Starbucks, online coupons are helping budding business owners draw in new and hopefully, recurring business. Colorado entrepreneurs saw the need for a bottleneck and filter for this surge of loyalty cards and goods vouchers and launched MMJDAILYDEALS.COM, an online medical marijuana coupon aggregator that currently serves over 10,000 patients in five Colorado cities and suburban areas: Boulder, Colorado Springs, Denver, Ft. Collins, Summit County & Mountains.

Right now, their front page deal is a quarter ounce of any top shelf strain (which currently consists of: Chocolate Chunk, NYC Diesel, and Super Skunk) for $42 at Cannabis & Co in Denver, Colorado. It pleases me as an internet technology evangelist and medical marijuana patient to see these businesses adopting this online coupon strategy.

Chuuuuuuuuuuuuuch!

Snoop Dogg’s new web show, the Double G News Network (GGN) made its debut today on the social video giant YouTube. Catch the blunt as it falls and be one of Snoop’s first fans to catch the premier as he puts his Facebook Wall and Twitter Stream on blast.

Snoop Dogg: world premiere of tha double g news network ya digg!!!

Recovered last year at a garage sale outside the city of Buffalo, New York, the “lost hemp diaries” detail the work of Lyster Hoxie Dewey, who served as an assistant botanist of the United States Department of Agriculture from 1890 to 1902, and afterwards as botanist in charge of fibre investigations. In these marijuanalogues (for real) Lyster Dewey recorded his painstaking efforts cultivating varieties of hemp on a parcel of land belonging to the US Government, this parcel of land was then known as Arlington Farms, the chosen site for what is now the United States Pentagon, the largest office building in the world.

As early as 1914, Dewey writes of inspecting hemp at Arlington Farms. For nearly a quarter-century, he carefully notes his quotidian progress as a grower and hemp advocate: “Thursday, October 19, 1922. Fair, cool. Go to Arlington Farm on the 9 a.m. bus and work all day,” he wrote. “Harvesting Kymington, Yarrow, Tochigi, Tochimington, Keijo and Chinamington hemp.”

What was just another day at a garage sale will go down as another page in history of the United State’s twisted and sometimes ambiguous affair with hemp. David Sitarski was looking for local historical artifacts and stumbled upon several dusty diaries and yellowed photo albums and paid $130 for the items, planning on using them for a website he was creating. Eventually, after researching more about the artifacts, he deduced that the old man in the photographs was a crucial hemp pioneer, and jobless and hurting for cash, Sitarski auctioned off the items, asking $10,000. Michael Krawitz, funded by David Bronner, president of Dr. Bronner’s Magic Soaps, was able to purchase the historic objects for $4,000 and has put them on display in a public museum. (Fun fact: Bronner was arrested in October 2010 for planting hemp seeds on a lawn at DEA headquarters.)

Download Hemp by Lyster H. Dewey (USDA Yearbook of Agriculture 1914)

News Source: Washington Post

Blair Herter of G4′s Attack of the Show visits the Ganja Gourmet in Denver, Colorado and shows us some Chicken “Pot” Pie, Pineapple Kush Cheesecake and other cannabis infused treats made by Ganja Gourmet chef Jenny “Giggles” and friends.

If State Legislature passes a bill sponsored by Tom Ammiano to reduce the criminal penalties for growing marijuana, California could see marijuana growing turned into a wobbler offense — giving district attorneys the choice to charge the offense as a misdemeanor or a felony. AB 1017 cleared committee on Wednesday (05/18/2011) and will see its way to the Assembly floor.

Patrick Goggin, a San Francisco lawyer who has worked on hemp legislation in Sacramento, said Ammiano’s bill has a good chance of passing through the assembly and the senate. The question will be whether Gov. Jerry Brown, who is close with the prison guards union, is willing to sign it, he said. (Source: The Bay Citizen)

California seems to be gung-ho for legalization, and they appear to be on the right tracks. With luck and perseverance, other states will soon follow suit in wake of the Golden State’s actions: reducing possession of marijuana (up to 1oz) penalties to an infraction that surmounts to a $100 ticket and cultivation to a possible misdemeanor.

Remember to let your Assembly Member know you support AB 1017!

Over the past two decades, we have certainly seen a spur of growth in regards patient access to dispensaries and collectives to obtain the necessary medication for conditions such as MS, HIV, depression, cancer, and anxiety. Patients join a collective or dispensary by showing their doctor’s medical marijuana recommendation and are granted access to the entity’s current cache of medications, which include dried flower, edibles, extracts, tinctures and more.

Now, what if this array of herbal remedies was stored in and dispensed from an automated vending kiosk? Currently, several collectives and dispensaries have done just that, and with their “Med Box” are starting to test the value in making the process of purchasing medical cannabis an autonomous one.

Many wonder how this can possibly be legal. This process is more than legal, it actually ensures patient and collective compliance and transparency. It provides automation and inventory control for the collective while offering a quick and easy way for patients to get their medicine.

Med Box locations are specially annotated on WeedMaps, or you can keep track of dispensaries and collectives with a Med Box via the official Med Box locations page.

Source: Examiner

Founder and president of Portland-based medical marijuana organization, The Hemp and Cannabis Foundation, Paul Stanford, was sentenced in Marion County Court to 18 months of probation and 160 hours of community service, the state attorney general’s office announced.

Attorney General John Kroger applauded Stanford’s conviction. “Paying taxes is not optional,” Kroger said. [...] Officials discovered Stanford hadn’t filed income taxes while investigating his organization for violating state and federal charity laws. The group has filed only sporadic financial reports, officials said.

Upon close of the investigation in 2010, the IRS revoked the non-profit organization’s tax-exempt status and assessed more than one million dollars in payroll taxes; the organization purportedly owes back taxes to the Oregon Department of Revenue as well.

Source: Oregon Live

NORML’s Freedom Card is a small, two sided pamphlet (I wouldn’t even call it that) which details your rights, and lets authority figures know that you understand your rights, in case of involvement with law enforcement personnel. Print the NORML Freedom Card document out on cardstock (front and back) then trim and fold between the opposing text. You can even print out the version with four cards to a page, so you can hand some out to friends and conserve paper at the same time!

NORML Freedom Card Text

Side 1

The U.S. Constitution prohibits the government from interfering with your right to remain silent, to consult with an attorney, and to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures by law enforcement. However, it is up to you to assert these rights. This NORML Foundation Freedom Card will help you do so effectively.

If you are confronted by a police officer, remain calm. Be courteous and provide your identification. Politely refuse to answer any further questions. Ask to talk to an attorney. Do not consent to any search of your person, your property, your residence or your vehicle. Tell the officer you would like to give him or her this card, which is a statement of the constitutional rights you wish to invoke. Do not reach for this card until you have obtained the officer’s permission to do so.

Side 2

I hereby invoke and refuse to waive all of the following rights and privileges afforded to me by the U.S. Constitution:

• I invoke and refuse to waive my Fifth Amendment right to remain silent. Do not ask me any questions.
• I invoke and refuse to waive my Sixth Amendment right to an attorney of my choice. Do not ask me any questions without my attorney present.
• I invoke and refuse to waive all privileges and rights pursuant to the case Miranda v. Arizona. Do not ask me any questions or make any comment to me about this decision.
• I invoke and refuse to waive my Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures. I do not consent to any search or seizure of myself, my home, or of any property in my possession. Do not ask me about my ownership interest in any property. I do not consent to this contact with you. If I am not presently under arrest or under investigatory detention, please allow me to leave.
• Any statement I make, or alleged consent I give, in response to your questions is hereby made under protest and under duress and in submission to your claim of lawful authority to force me to provide you with information.

THE NORML FOUNDATION
1600 K Street, NW, Suite 501
Washington, DC 20006-2832
www.norml.org / 202-483-8751

Public support for the legalization of industrial hemp farming is accelerating rapidly and garnering media attention as a federal bill (H.R. 1831) to remove the restrictions on the cultivation of industrial hemp was introduced by Representative Ron Paul yesterday, which marks the fourth attempt to overturn ruling since the United States government outlawed hemp farming over half a century ago.

“We are pleased to see the re-introduction of the Industrial Hemp Farming Act in Congress. Vote Hemp is currently working with a Democratic Senator who is preparing to introduce companion legislation in the Senate in support of industrial hemp farming,” says Vote Hemp President, Eric Steenstra. “It is due time for the Senate as well as President Obama and the Attorney General to prioritize the crop’s benefits to farmers and to take action like Rep. Paul and the cosponsors of H.R. 1831 have done. With the U.S. hemp industry valued at over $400 million in annual retail sales and growing, a change in federal policy to allow hemp farming would mean instant job creation, among many other economic and environmental benefits,” adds Steenstra.

Sixteen states and the District of Columbia have passed pro-cannabis legislation to date, and of those, six states (Maine, Montana, North Dakota, Oregon, Vermont and West Virginia) have authorized hemp farmers to legally grow their plants. However, despite state acceptance, the farmers in these states still risk raids by federal agents, prison time, and forfeiture of land if they are caught cultivating the plant.

Source: PR News Wire