article in denver post.

[dwight fellman]

I have not heard from John B. in many years. Good to hear from him.

http://www.denverpost.com/opinion/ci_28561730/guest-commentary-problems-colorado-marijuana

[Oliver Steinberg]

IF the bureaucrats and courts played fair, and played by the letter of the law, then trying to achieve reforms through the courts and the agencies would have worked a long time ago.   For instance, the DEA's own chief administrative law judge ruled way back in 1989 that under the law as NOW written, cannabis should be removed from Schedule 1.   But the prohibitionists DON'T play by the rules.  The drug witch hunt trumps the law and trumps the Constitution; so the only effective way to secure our rights is by electoral action.    The only significant progress against prohibition has resulted form electoral actions, starting in San Francisco with Proposition P, and then Priop 215 in 1996 in California, and eventually leading to ballot initiative triumphs in Colo, Wash, Alaska, and Oregon.   Shadow-boxing in the courts and bureaucracies ignores the political nature of the oppression we have endured too patiently for too long.

On Sat, Aug 1, 2015 at 4:21 PM, dwight fellman <fel...@gmail.com> wrote:

I have not heard from John B. in many years. Good to hear from him.

http://www.denverpost.com/opinion/ci_28561730/guest-commentary-problems-colorado-marijuana

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[Chris Kurle]

Great read.

The irony isn't lost on me when I read about Minn Med raising prices due to low enrollment. What did they expect the results would be here when such a narrow medicinal law was put on our books? Now, I am happy with any reform to help those in need but of course we need to expand those offered protection under this as well.

Back to the subject of this message; I like the writer's point. Since Colorado business is in compliance with state law it does sound like a logical approach. Get approval and gain legitimacy under the law to work within the system. I don't know if its that easy but it does sound like a good suggestion.

With the likes of Chris Christie telling us he will shut down legalization, although I don't see how, it is prudent to continue our battle to strike prohibition down from all avenues available. Really all he could do, provided McDonald's sponsors him to the White House, is shut down the legal distribution system as the feds cannot enforce federal statute upon the private growers in a meaningful manner nor can they compel Colorado authorities to do go against the state's constitunial statute and enforce federal law on private usage restrictions. They would essentially rather push it all underground than acknowledge legalization works.

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[Oliver Steinberg]

Of course John Birrenbach has a valid point, but until the politicians accept that a majority or a large and militant minority favors ending prohibition--and ALSO until the threat from prohibitionist interests is perceived as less risky than opposition to legalization--approaches such as brother Birrenbach's simply won't succeed. 
     His delusion (and I admire him for it) is the one shared by religious petitioners seeking recognition of Rastafarian or other cannabis churches, and of medical petitioners seeking the removal of cannabis from Schedule 1.   They don't quite comprehend that the courts and the bureaucrats themselves constitute an integral element of the institutionalization of prohibition.   Therefore not only because of the powerful prejudice still accepted as "conventional political wisdom," but also to perpetuate their own vested interest in the institutionalization of prohibition, neither courts nor agencies will grant relief or offer justice, despite the merits of the arguments.

      Courts and agencies are NOT immune from political pressure--they operate at all times immersed in it.  
     These pressures come first from so-called law enforcement--the for-profit policing and for profit prison systems.   NO lawmaker, elected or appointed, dares to risk being called "soft on crime."   Look at the blatant example of the Minnesota Sex Offender Program--denounced by a federal judge as grossly violating the Constitution (a fact admitted even by the state's news media) and still the lawmakers who all took a pledge to uphold the Constitution balk and dodge and refuse to take steps to comply.

     Then factor in the pharmaceutical companies--who won't accept competition from cannabinoid medication unless and until they can establish total control and exploitation of the process.   Then throw the liquor lobby into the scales.   In Minnesota, add the wealthy, influential, and culturally sacro-sanct "treatment" racket.  Don't forget the hard-core unrelenting hostility of the theocratic "religious right" who, as they see it, have been beaten by Satan on abortion and same-sex equality even to the imposition of "gay marriage," and who sure won't yield gracefully on the drug war!

     Furthermore, the mass media, both news and entertainment-driven, has played such a central role in demonizing cannabis, glamorizing alcohol, and mockingly deriding all efforts at cannabis reform, that we must list them as perhaps the mightiest beneficiaries of the institutionalized "war on drugs."   Most of the corporate media endorsed and advanced the same-sex-equivalency agenda, in sharp contrast to how vigorously they've promoted drug witch hunt propaganda for the past CENTURY.

     In our hands rests the only power that can match and overcome the combined strength of these defenders and guardians of "the new Jim Crow."  In our hands we hold the secret ballot.   Men and women have struggled and died to secure the right to vote.
     We must learn to use it, not just to remove the risk and stigmata of criminality from ourselves, but also to restore the liberties of all our fellow citizens who don't realize their own jeopardy from the police state, and then to seek restorative justice for the millions of past and present victims of the drug prohibition folly.

     Those who seek recourse in the courts and agencies manage to expose the bankruptcy, corruption, and moral turpitude of the appointed parts of our government, whenever their reasonable requests, petitions, and lawsuits are rejected.   And, they are always rejected!    So while I respect the diligence and purity of heart of their approach, I ask the rank and file of cannabis activists to keep their eyes on the prize.   We have to repeal federal prohibition and to do that we have to elect our own Congress candidates and clearly defeat some of our Congressional foes.   Likewise, in the Presidential race, it's time to assert ourselves!

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