Midwest Proves Fertile Ground For Marijuana Reform

[hofner67]

Too long to post entirely (four pages) below page 1 of 4

 

http://www.alternet.org/drugs/150560/the_midwest_proves_fertile_ground_for_marijuana_reform%2C_despite_rabid_republican_agenda

 

 

April 10, 2011 |

 

The Republican hardliners who have taken over several Midwestern state governments have largely stalled efforts to modify marijuana laws there this year. But after more than a decade of pressure from grassroots activists, the region is beginning to show some change.

 

"The Midwest is starting to catch up," says Jill Harris, a policy director at the Drug Policy Alliance. "Just the fact that it's a conversation now, when it wasn't five years ago, is progress."

 

The most dramatic advances have come in Michigan, where voters legalized medical marijuana in a 2008 referendum, and in Kentucky, which in early March reduced the maximum penalty for possession of less than half a pound from a year in prison to 45 days. Offenders who are considered likely to appear in court and don't do anything to make the police officer who catches them think they're a threat will get a summons instead of being arrested.

 

Michigan's medical law is one of the most liberal in the country. Like California's and Colorado's, it allows dispensaries to provide medical marijuana to patients, and it now has at least 150 "compassion centers," says Tim Beck, political director of the Michigan Association of Compassion Centers. The state has registered 64,000 patients and 25,000 caregivers, and another 24,000 applications are pending.

 

However, medical marijuana faces a backlash from Gov. Rick Snyder's administration, and the state is sharply divided regionally. Ann Arbor, Lansing and Traverse City have legal, openly run dispensaries. Detroit and Flint are neutral. The Detroit suburbs of Livonia, Birmingham and Bloomfield Hills have banned them, says Beck, and in Oakland County, Detroit's affluent and Republican northwestern suburbs, "the prosecutors and the county sheriff have declared war on medical marijuana."

 

Beck believes the overall law is safe, though, because Michigan requires a three-quarters majority for the legislature to nullify a ballot initiative, and the Republicans include deficit hawks and libertarians as well as "social conservatives still fighting the Vietnam war." But key state legislators have said some stronger regulations are likely, such as banning on-premises consumption in dispensaries.

 

In June 2010, the federal Drug Enforcement Administration subpoenaed the records of seven patients from compassion centers in Lansing, as part of an investigation into what it considers drug dealing. State health-department workers refused to turn them over, as the medical-marijuana law makes it a misdemeanor to release confidential patient records, but when Republican Attorney General Bill Scheutte took office in January, he agreed to go along if the workers were immunized against prosecution.

 

This and other issues are in litigation. Scheutte has also moved to prosecute some patients, accusing them of "attempting to exploit the law to essentially legalize marijuana."

 

"I'm not going to deny it," says Beck. "It is an interim step to legalization. It's a model for tax and regulate."

 

In Ohio, Wisconsin and Indiana, the three states whose antiworker legislation has dominated domestic news this year, medical-marijuana bills have been pushed onto the back burner.

 

In Ohio, three medical-marijuana bills have been introduced, but Ed Orlett, a former state senator now working with the DPA, says it is unlikely they'll even get a committee hearing.

 

The bills take a "middle of the road" approach, says Tonya Davis of the Ohio Patient Network. They would let patients grow their own herb, but are intended to "prevent the storefronts from popping up."

 

Davis, a Dayton-area grandmother who suffers from pseudohypoparathyroidism, calcium deposits on her brain, and several other ailments, says the problem with the legislators is they "watched too much 'Reefer Madness' as a kid. Most of it is ignorance. When we get the fear out of it, I think that's when it will change."

[DayTripper]

Michigan's medical law is one of the most liberal in the country. Like California's and Colorado's, it allows dispensaries to provide medical marijuana to patients, and it now has at least 150 "compassion centers," says Tim Beck, political director of the Michigan Association of Compassion Centers. The state has registered 64,000 patients and 25,000 caregivers, and another 24,000 applications are pending.

 

....

 

"I'm not going to deny it," says Beck. "It is an interim step to legalization. It's a model for tax and regulate."

 

Thanks for nothing.

 

I thought it was a model for compassionate health care; I had no idea I was voting to tax myself.

[JimD]

Who is this Beck character and when did he become my spokesman???

[hofner67]

leave it to the MACC to take the "medical" out of "medical marijuana."

[imiubu]

Where is our offensive?

 

To heck with beck.

Why are these monkeys getting any print at all?

Oh, sleeping with the enemy.

[Kingdiamond]

Who is this Beck character and when did he become my spokesman???

Tim Beck helped craft the current law for us then pulled a Benedict Arnold and attempted to sell us out by killing the compassion clubs for his dispensary ambitions .

 

Tim Beck, political director of Oak Park-based Michigan Association of Compassion Centers, hopes to participate in Jones' task force and supports the concept of taxing medical marijuana and clarifying laws related to dispensaries.

 

"I think Senator Jones is a fair man," Beck said. "We believe in his concepts, but the devil, in the end, will be in the details. We feel comfortable working with him."

 

[Big J]

This dude is all about the money he wants to have dispensaries. That way he can profit off the sick. And why the heck would you say something like that. I mean give the anti mm people fuel against us really you say "this is just a step towards legalizing. " that is what the anti mm want people to believe. They want everyone to think we are nothing more then junkies try to legalise our drug of choice. When we are people trying to survive. I had someone say when they found out I was a patient "there is nothing wrong with you look at you you huge you don't look sick." now I know there are people that look sick. I however don't but my brain tumor said otherwise. The fact that every narcotic they threw at my migraines does nothing. Oh wait topamax killed people guess it does do something!

 

Mr. Beck sir I have a voice please do not speak on my behalf. I would not mind if BB spoke for me he has taken the time to ask our needs and wants. But you Mr. Beck are in this for yourself now. You may have started out with the right idea but money is blinding isn't it?

[DayTripper]

This dude is all about the money he wants to have dispensaries. That way he can profit off the sick. And why the heck would you say something like that. I mean give the anti mm people fuel against us really you say "this is just a step towards legalizing. " that is what the anti mm want people to believe. They want everyone to think we are nothing more then junkies try to legalise our drug of choice. When we are people trying to survive. I had someone say when they found out I was a patient "there is nothing wrong with you look at you you huge you don't look sick." now I know there are people that look sick. I however don't but my brain tumor said otherwise. The fact that every narcotic they threw at my migraines does nothing. Oh wait topamax killed people guess it does do something!

 

Mr. Beck sir I have a voice please do not speak on my behalf. I would not mind if BB spoke for me he has taken the time to ask our needs and wants. But you Mr. Beck are in this for yourself now. You may have started out with the right idea but money is blinding isn't it?

 

Blueberry gets us; he is one of us.

Tim Beck is an Insurance company owner who has always gotten rich off of other peoples misfortune.

Tim Beck has always wanted legalization, and he used our medical need to advance that end goal.

 

It's hard to blame Tim Beck for much of anything - he was always a liar and anyone who spent time with him realized it pretty quickly. Tim Beck never changed, our expectations did.

 

It is because he did not change that he is still working against us and for himself.

 

I offer as proof his quote from the listserve on felons growing marijuana: "flower them, (felons), they are scum".

 

I don't know about you folks; but everytime I copped a bag I was a felon. Everyone who sold me a bag was a felon. Everyone who smoked a joint with me was a felon. In short: 99.9% of us are felons, (with or without convictions), and through dumb luck and chance Tim Beck doesn't have a felony conviction. Now he wants to parlay that into something more than a dying insurance company hq'ed Detroit.

 

I'm fairly certain he would harm me if he thought he could get away with it. I couldn't be bought and he knew it; when he tried he couldn't find me. No one could I'll be at the March on the 25th.