cannabisnews.com: The Growing Pot Economy function share_this(num) { tit=encodeURIComponent('The Growing Pot Economy'); url=encodeURIComponent('http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/25/thread25163.shtml'); site = new Array(5); site[0]='http://www.facebook.com/sharer.php?u='+url+'&title='+tit; site[1]='http://www.stumbleupon.com/submit.php?url='+url+'&title='+tit; site[2]='http://digg.com/submit?topic=political_opinion&media=video&url='+url+'&title='+tit; site[3]='http://reddit.com/submit?url='+url+'&title='+tit; site[4]='http://del.icio.us/post?v=4&noui&jump=close&url='+url+'&title='+tit; window.open(site[num],'sharer','toolbar=0,status=0,width=620,height=500'); return false; } The Growing Pot Economy Posted by CN Staff on November 12, 2009 at 04:01:22 PT By Dawson Bell, Free Press Staff Writer Source: Detroit Free Press Michigan -- The tailspin may be over, but no one's suggesting that bedrock industries of the Michigan economy like cars and real estate are headed for boom times again. The Michigan marijuana economy, on the other hand, appears to be going gangbusters.Once largely underground, activity linked to the cultivation and use of pot is now in full public view thanks to voter approval in 2008 of marijuana use for medicinal purposes. Equipment manufacturers, retailers, doctors, lawyers and publishers are suddenly advertising, hanging up shingles, opening storefronts and building growing equipment all over the state.But suppliers of the newly defined medicine -- the certified caregivers who can grow up to 12 plants a year for as many as five clients -- are, so far, less visible in part because the distinction between legal commerce and criminal activity isn't always clear."There's a whole lot going on," said Matthew Abel, a Detroit attorney who has become a sort of medical marijuana specialist, "and it's going to keep growing."Like a weed. Medical Pot Opportunities Flourish Rick Ferris worked 25 years in construction until a debilitating leg condition took him off ladders. Then he got into landscaping and was doing OK until 2008, when "every laid-off guy with a truck" in southeast Michigan started mowing lawns.But Ferris isn't complaining. In fact, things are looking up at Big Daddy's, site of his latest venture, an Oak Park facility to manufacture hydroponic growing systems. The kind used for growing marijuana.Ferris, 46, is one of an increasing number of Michiganders looking to cash in on last year's voter-approved initiative that legalized the use of medical marijuana. In addition to his manufacturing operation (which shares space with the still-operating landscape business), Ferris is set to publish next month the first issue of the Michigan Medical Marijuana magazine.So far, so good, he said in a recent interview.Since getting under way in the spring, Ferris has hired five employees, three of them full-time. He has sold at least 140 hydroponic (soilless) growing systems and said without them, the landscaping business would have closed."I figured it was either jump in front or be left behind," he said.Nobody can say how many of his fellow Michiganders are looking to make a living in the legal marijuana trade. But no one questions that the number is expanding rapidly.In the first six months they were available, Michigan's Department of Community Health issued 5,100 certificates for the legal use of marijuana for people with chronic or debilitating illness. That number is expected to climb, although no one is guessing how high.In the meantime, activists and entrepreneurs are looking for ways to make pot available to those who need it and to cash in. Or both.In Southfield, a four-doctor medical practice opened in May that specializes in patients who require certification to legally use marijuana. It calls itself the Michigan Medical Marijuana Certification Center.The center just hired four more employees and now have 11, including the doctors, said the firm's office manager, who asked that his name not be published.The office manager said he recognized, as a medical marijuana patient himself, the need and opportunity for a specialized practice after an unpleasant experience with another clinic. But he's unsure what the prospects are for the long run because the rules governing medical marijuana are such a muddle that many potential growers and patients might steer clear."It could be really good for Michigan's economy if they clarified the statute," he said.Matthew Abel, a Detroit attorney and erstwhile Green Party political candidate, said the medical pot law has been such a boon for his business he might "finally have to hire some staff."Abel said the rush has come in three waves, first from patients inquiring about certification, then from caregivers (those authorized under the law to grow marijuana for patients) and lately from people interested in how someone might set up a retail sales operation or dispensary. His position: "My feeling is that anything is legal that isn't illegal."Of course, much of the potential profit in marijuana-related commerce lies in selling the stuff. But Abel points out that the scale of sales permitted under Michigan statute appear aimed at keeping commerce at a low level.Caregivers are authorized to possess up to a dozen plants for each of five clients and be reasonably compensated.Larger commercial operations might be possible if a group of medical marijuana caregivers formed a cooperative, but no one in Michigan, including law enforcement, is exactly sure how.Which might explain why none of the operations currently soliciting Michigan marijuana customers online returned calls from the Free Press over the last week.Earlier this fall in Troy, an entrepreneur who told city officials he planned to set up grow rooms at a facility on Rochester Road was informed by the city attorney such use was illegal under federal law.Two weeks ago, in a posting on the Michigan Medical Marijuana Association's Web site, he said he's going to do it, anywayThat frontier spirit is not uncommon in the emerging world of legal drug trafficking.Another posting on the MMMA Web site announces the launch of an enterprise that will "track costs and PAY TAXES for MM related transactions.""Although no money has been made yet, I have had a ton of fun, never smoked so much killer weed in my life," the president of the enterprise, which is a legally registered business, reported.Source: Detroit Free Press (MI)Author: Dawson Bell, Free Press Staff WriterPublished: November 12, 2009Copyright: 2009 Detroit Free PressWebsite: http://www.freep.com/Contact: letters freepress.comURL: http://drugsense.org/url/vogyqhCKCannabisNews Medical Marijuana Archiveshttp://cannabisnews.com/news/list/medical.shtml Home Comment Email Register Recent Comments Help Comment #28 posted by Had Enough on November 14, 2009 at 21:32:29 PT This thread...Good comments Maybe a few tunes...to add... might be appropriate...************Eric Burdon - Sixteen Tons - Joe Versus the Volcano Themehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E6m1qgnUw74Nice saxophone...And of course from the originalTennessee Ernie Ford: 16 Tonshttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Joo90ZWrUkU***Last...but certainly not least...and you probably never heard it done like this..Unless you were there...I wish I were there...chills up the spine...and all over...Nice sax...nice bass...nice everything...especially the message...Pink Floyd – Money – une video Musiquehttp://www.dailymotion.com/video/x1b2zh_pink-floyd-money_mu [ Post Comment ] Comment #27 posted by FoM on November 14, 2009 at 15:35:50 PT museman I understand what you are saying too. Thanks. [ Post Comment ] Comment #26 posted by museman on November 14, 2009 at 14:38:42 PT Kapt I agree, that the 'collapse' you speak of, on the statistical surface appears quite imminent, and probable. But I feel I must point out that the very systems and infrastructure that are failing are based almost entirely within the contrived weights and measure of the status quo -namely that 1% with control of 90% of the resources- and the age old values that allowed Kings to rule, merchants to thrive, armies to exist for plunder and political force, and the literal establishment of great imbalance on the earth that has reached critical mass for all of the above reasons.The systems that are failing, and the structure of society as it currently is collapsing, is not the 'grim' -it is quite possibly the only way that signifcant population will actually 'come to their senses.' The idea that groups of people will have to 'band together for survival' begs the question as to why they can't 'band together' right now while opportunites beyond such desperation are still here, and in plain sight and attainable by simple action beyond the ritual of the 40 hour week?What is grim to me, is already playing out before mine, and everyone elses eyes who have the point of reference of 'before and after' to testify quite descriptively to the current actions now taking place within the current existing fascist police state, particularly concerning medical marijuana, but the entire thing is a literal act of war against the liberties of Americans (and other humans) every where. These are treasonous acts that deserve no less than public flogging, but be that as it may, I have no doubt that should that collapse come about -and I don't believe for a moment in the fake values of money and all the banking/insurance/loan/mortgage scams that bemoan 'economic collapse' as if it were fulfillment of some kind of biblical prophecy of doom, that the outcome from such a collapse would not be as grim as it seems.Never been able to eat money,...I discovered that food grows quite naturally in many places, -not in the cities of course- and that 'survival' is only as hard as the community one lives in.In my community, if the dollar suddenly became recognized as the worthless germ-ridden valueless mental invention that it is, and the handful of trucks stopped delivering to the local chain supermarket, it would be a rough winter if it happened at that time of year, but we'd all survive, and be much the better for it.Since I escaped the city in the 70s, I tend to ignore their existence as much as I possibly can. Having lived off the grid, farmed the land, and been in rural environments for most of my life, I see the alternative to the infrastucture of the metropolitan society. And lets face it, its those places that are, and are in the most trouble.To me they are Spiritual Babylon, each and every one. I have compassion for those who cannot leave, but little for those who won't. I also admire some few who are there to do good works, and pray they find their way out when the time comes.There is an inherent solution to all human problems, and some of that has been forthcoming within the increased frequency of enlightened thinking and conversation going around the planet right now, -there are simple and clear alternatives to the failed intricacies and complications of such a far flung scheme of power and control as what designed the whole kit-and-kaboodle social/economic structure in the first place. Perhaps they are too simple to be believed. Perhaps presumptions of knowing all that is under the sun has led the experts to miss the obvious in the fundamental reality that we live from, and walk on, but do not relate to. The inventions of property, value, debt, and some wierd forms of economic soothsaying, are not real, or are only as real as the belief that is invested in them. Why not invest that same belief in the real source of our life, planet earth?At any rate, I acknowledge how such a 'collapse' of society, so dependent as it is on so many false things could appear quite frightening from within the parameters of the falling mortar, thus it could seem grim indeed, and the specter of all those sci-fi end-of-the-world movies just naturally comes to mind. The evolution of social order and human interaction is upon us, There will be growing pains. There will be sacrifice. There will be more suffering. The only lessening that is possible is directly related to a new consciousness that is not bound down to the limits currently imposed upon it by the numerous socially engineered fear trips that force the compliance of the entire human race. That new consciousness -call it what you will- is the only tool and lever that will pry loose the parasites that have thrived on the fear of the masses like vampires for millennia. Anything else will only feed the beast for another day.In my humble opinion..END CANNABIS ARPARTHED -- REPEAL PROHIBITION NOW!!! [ Post Comment ] Comment #25 posted by Hope on November 14, 2009 at 11:19:37 PT Kaptinemo, I agree with FoM. "I can't put words out there like you do but thank you for doing it."Thank you. [ Post Comment ] Comment #24 posted by FoM on November 14, 2009 at 09:37:46 PT kaptinemo I can't put words out there like you do but thank you for doing it. I look at us as a country like I am looking down on it as a mass place. When jobs are gone we will work for even a lesser wage. No one will have a chance at the American Dream. That dream could just go away. Without building, innovation, more blue collar jobs the wheel stops. The stock market has always been like legalized gambling or a big pyramid scheme to me. That's what I see happening around our area. When a country gets backed into a corner they react. [ Post Comment ] Comment #23 posted by kaptinemo on November 14, 2009 at 09:27:32 PT: Museman, my vision is a little grimmer I know all too well that, as Solzhenitsyn predicted would happen in Russia after the Fall of Communism, the same could happen here, namely, a failure to hold the guilty to account for what they've done.But what I am afraid of might be even worse.The economic situation is being touted as 'recovering'...while millions face permanent unemployment courtesy of there simply not being many jobs left, thanks to a dismantled industrial base being shipped to China. Some recovery...The social conditions here could begin to resemble Argentina in the 1990's, with people forced to come together and pool resources just to survive. That tends to cause the 1%-that-owns-90% to get twitchy, as when that happens, social movements are born. And those social movements can usually be predicted to have the aim of redistributing wealth from those who have greedily monopolized it.Needless to say, when that 1% is associated with - or, as in America, are the government - the trend is to infiltrate social movements and attempt to suborn their leadership or, if that's not successful, eliminate them.Because of the (predictably) heavy handedness of government agents, the latter is usually attempted first...and only serves to anger those seeking change even more. And so an ugly cycle begins that usually ends with governments being brought down, but leaving real messes behind.The process usually leads to social breakdown, and when that happens,the cops will do what they did after Hurricane Katrina: go home to protect their own. They'll have to, for such conditions are ripe for declaring 'open season' on the hated and feared agents of 'authority' and their families.I really do not want to see this happen. I want this country to come to its' senses, socially, fiscally, militarily and politically. One sure sign of that is to rescind the drug laws as they stand, and formulate realistic ones based upon harm reduction rather than punishment. That will signal that the citizens still have a chance to turn things around before a descent into overt fascism.It's either that, or wait for the collapse...after which, I reckon that a great many personal scores will be settled, one way or another... [ Post Comment ] Comment #22 posted by museman on November 14, 2009 at 08:28:33 PT Kapt I'd quote you, but I'd have to copy the entire post. You bring to focus the issues and fundamental truths that are continually swept under the political rug. (and all too willingly ignored by too many who claim to be on the side of liberty)The basic liberties supposedly afforded to us as 'citizens' of this supposedly 'free' country have taken a back seat -no they're in the trunk- to the desires, demands, and totally corrupt intentions of the powers and principalities. The 'powers' being the 'old money' (so old most don't believe it) and the 'principalities' being their agents and enforcers.Nothing brings this unholy fact to the frontlines of true human consciousness like the more than half a century of persecution of cannabis users.This society has created a monster (and the song from yesteryear is a kind description) in its numerous agencies of 'law' that carry out the wishes of their status quo masters with ruthless callousness, little to no regard for truth, (F**K STATISTICS!!) and committing more crime against humanity and the earth, than all the 'crime' ever committed in this country by incarcerated 'criminals' since this countries inception -and they've done most of it in the past century. The constitutionally designed 'citizens police force' has been replaced with an unconstitutional military trained 'standing army' that are 90 -99 % thugs and bullies who roam the streets and highways like demons from hell, extorting drugs, sex, goods, and property from those they have been empowered to harass and persecute. -(by the US congress creating cannabis prohibition, followed by Nixons NSA, then Reagans WOD and the further development of the NSA, then Bush (Clinton) Bush and the crowning achievement of Constitutional Destruction -the 'Patriot Act.')You say Kapt, that there will be an accounting. I echo your sentiments, but realistically, from where I observe the current dynamics of our fascist police state in action, I can't see how a handful of brave citizens who actually have the guts to state the truth without the cowardly fear of losing the handouts (jobs, loans,..stuff..) from our inglorious 'leaders' are going to overcome the sheer force of the -in-your-face- fear tactics being thrown about right now in all the places known or 'suspected' to harbor cannabis growers and users, by a sudden doubling and tripling of police presence throughout the country. Many of the people who should be at our side marching for final victory are cowering behind their living room curtains, peeking out at the rabid dogs blaring their sirens of terror as they sweep the poor, the struggling, the dis-empowered, -and the cannabis users- off 'their streets.'How can there be any righteous 'accounting' when the only ones who can do it are hiding in unreasonable fear behind whatever they can put between them and the abominable forces at play in there neighborhoods that are paid, sanctioned, supplied, supported, and armed by the very status quo that the majority is enthralled to 24/7?Just the other day I witnessed a young punk cop bully his way through traffic to get ahead of the pack, forcing everyone to clear the way so he could speed the next 30 miles to patrol for pot smokers. I tried to catch up to him, because I swear I would have at least attempted a citizens arrest for his blatant violation of traffic 'laws' but I couldn't keep up with him in my Honda. After speeding through 3 townships, he got away from me so I couldn't find him when I got to town. This is a mild example of the kind or rampant disregard for 'law,' personal liberties, and general peace and welfare of the citizenry that has been thrown over for the easy, cowardly task of busting pot smokers. Never mind that half the cops are in bed with the local meth producers so they can get their own perverse high as they cruise the streets, or that the local (regional) officers of the DEA are responsible for the recent rise in Heroin use (that they can use as justification for their 'job'). There must be an accounting, and there most certainly will be, but to expect the TV-couch-sitting majority to change their habits of submission in time to save our culture from complete collapse, is an unreasonable assumption (in my observations) and in denial of the unpleasant facts concerning our collective social complacency. It seems that nothing short of disaster moves this population off their ass, and the powers capitalize on this to the nth degree.But there are those few brave souls who refuse to be fodder for the machine, who accept the suffering, persecution, prosecution, imprisonment, and rejection of their own cowardly fellow 'citizens' that run to kiss the ass of the status quo, and shout 'burn the witch' 'give us Barabas' etc. so they can go back to their pseudo comfort and enjoy the beer and games. These few heroes may be remembered, if the powers are finally dethroned once and for all, but as long as the pipelines of power still pump the oil of compromise and submission to the oh so accepting masses, the heroes will be vilified by the Status-Quo empowered media, and the criminals will continue to parade themselves around our neighborhoods, and flaunt their false power and authority in everyones face.DOWN WITH THE POLICEDISBAND THE DEA, THE CIA, THE FBI, THE FDA, THE ATF, THE BLM, and UPHOLD THE CONSTITUTIONAL RESTRICTIONS ON MILITARY TRAINED POLICE FORCES. BAN THE MONOPOLY OF LAWYERS AS POLITICIANS, AND LET THE PEOPLE GOVERN THEMSELVES.and then we will LEGALIZE FREEDOM [ Post Comment ] Comment #21 posted by josephlacerenza on November 13, 2009 at 10:44:18 PT Who else is comming out? Found this piece on Huff Po Daniel Radcliffe Plays a Pothead? [ Post Comment ] Comment #20 posted by ekim on November 13, 2009 at 07:43:09 PT CBC Canada 9PM Fri the 13th on CBC Canada 9PM BC BUD SPECIAL!The Fifth Estate, Has a special TONITE at 9 PM. Dealing with the BC bud issue http://www.michiganmedicalmarijuana.org/node/11937 [ Post Comment ] Comment #19 posted by FoM on November 13, 2009 at 04:59:23 PT kapt Good job! [ Post Comment ] Comment #18 posted by afterburner on November 12, 2009 at 22:28:55 PT Thank you Thank you, AMA for recommending changing cannabis from Schedule 1 to a lower schedule (but I don't trust their motivation, likely to make synthetic pharmaceutical derivatives).Thank you, Denver District Judge Larry Naves for supporting the will of the Colorado voters and revoking the prohibitionist tinkering with the Medical Cannabis program.Thank you, Colorado medical-cannabis advocates for banding together to form the Colorado Wellness Association and help move the state - the nation - the world toward a saner and more compassionate standard of medical cannabis supply.Thank you, kaptinemo for your wise words.Thank you, all my brothers and sisters here at home base for your unstinting dedication to the struggle to right the injustice of cannabis prohibition and its evil persecution and exploitation of flower-loving people around the world. Pass the peace pipe. [ Post Comment ] Comment #17 posted by westnyc on November 12, 2009 at 21:08:06 PT WOW! Brillian Kapt--You have a gift! [ Post Comment ] Comment #16 posted by kaptinemo on November 12, 2009 at 18:48:10 PT: What comes around, goes around It may take minutes, hours, days, weeks, years, decades, but what is set in motion, even generations ago, cannot be undone with a simple "I'm sorry". Not something of the monstrous magnitude that cannabis prohibition has done to this country and this world. It's been allowed to go on for too long, and there must be an accounting.It's estimated that 20 million Americans have been arrested for cannabis possession since 1965. 20 million people. That's a huge bloc of voters who can't vote because of this blight upon their lives, a blight that was not only completely unnecessary but maliciously implemented. As the truth about cannabis prohibition's origins and true purpose becomes common knowledge, there will be demands on the public's part to know why this abomination has been allowed to go on, destroying lives thanks to lies and racial bigotry.Those who've benefited from those lies will have much to atone for. And many of those who've suffered at their hands may choose to repay in kind.The past 30 years in this country had seen a shift from what was a budding (no pun intended) development of evolutionary consciousness (the 1960's and early '70's) into a social wasteland controlled by violent, brutal, hypocritical, shutterbrained fanatics (a.k.a 'neoconservatives' and some 'fundamentalists') intent upon eradicating anything that the prior 'age' represented. But their time, like the dinosaurs they are, has passed. The mess they have created will force people to once more band together to survive the chaos that they have unleashed, for we have not yet seen the end of what they have set in motion. And in that banding-together, a new spirit of community will have to form, or we face dissolution as a nation. That spirit of community will require adherence to the tenets of 'cognitive liberty', that are anathema to the corp-rat mind. And the most basic tenet of cognitive liberty is self-sovereignty, and that no one has the right to tell you what you can put into your own body to change your consciousness. The time for 'olive branches' is long past; it's win or die, and we're winning on almost all fronts, with our most intransigent opponents becoming less effectual as we advance. They provided us with the grim impetus necessary to beat them, once and for all. In short, they created us, and have only themselves to blame if that creation rounds on them and releases all the anger that decades of injustice stored up can accumulate.What comes around, goes around. And if what came was misery, then what returns is misery. Measure. For. Measure. [ Post Comment ] Comment #15 posted by Universer on November 12, 2009 at 18:25:49 PT That poem... That work of poetry-in-prose is spot on. A fine piece of writing, bludgeoning sentences pound the senses to deliver stirring truth. [ Post Comment ] Comment #14 posted by Sam Adams on November 12, 2009 at 09:26:00 PT poem, click the link wow, the poem is great, it reads better in the original format:http://www.drugwarrant.com/2009/11/a-drug-war-poem/#commentsit's so true, what we have is nothing less than civil war. And the size of the government's army (LEO) has increased by 5 times since the war begn [ Post Comment ] Comment #13 posted by Hope on November 12, 2009 at 08:53:18 PT Something from over at DrugWarRant that I'd like to share here. It's so true. It's so relevant to me personally. Pete wrote it... but it's my heart speaking, too.A Drug War Poem So you sit there all proper and respectable, and ask me why I am a legalizer. A question of intellectual curiosity borne out of a desire to learn? No, it is a question of pre-determined judgement and disgust, As if I have something to explain! How dare you, sir! You, who created the nightmarish hell that plagues us all — called it a success, proclaimed it a work in progress, lauded the never-ending struggle, even as the flames lapped higher, engulfing us. You were too weak or too venal to embrace a real solution. Educate and regulate, is that really so hard? Minimize the harm and reward responsibility. Instead you embraced fear, and decreed that all others should follow in your footsteps, marching in circles around your sand-buried dome. Education was not only not a solution in your world, but not even an option. It was ruled dangerous, subversive, UnChristian, and UnAmerican, and so one thing that could have accomplished something was deemed completely out-of-bounds. Propaganda and ignorance, that unholy duo, were recruited to care for our youth, and to tend to our duties as citizens. But that wasn’t enough, was it? Oh, no, not for you. You aligned yourself with the scum of the earth and said: “Lo, I give unto you the drug trade, that you may profit mightily, and that I may as well, and one day our forces will meet on battlegrounds around the world, and many will die, but none of them will be us.” And you spent billions of dollars of our money, legislating, arresting, arraigning, prosecuting, convicting, incarcerating, probating, and forced urinating aimed at the marginal members of society, turning them into criminals and feeding your industries, while increasing and protecting the profits of your partners. You destroyed our Constitution, our courts, our respect for law, our families, our youth, our environment, our cities, our health, our wealth, our self-respect. And yes, people died in the battlegrounds. Tragically, horribly. Ashley Villareal was shot in her father’s car. Esequiel Hernandez was shot by a sniper. Alberto Sepulveda was shot in the back. John Adams was shot watching TV. Annie Rae Dixon was shot in her bed. Tarika Wilson was shot holding her baby. Kathryn Johnston was shot defending her home. Veronica Bowers and her baby were shot down over Peru. These weren’t drug dealers or drug warriors. They were simple, extraordinary people who died because you wouldn’t, couldn’t, educate and regulate. And the severed heads and the massacres in Mexico. And the executions in China and Indonesia and the Middle East. And all the people locked up in dungeons all over the world, Their futures cut short — while you sip your martinis, and nod sagely, as the people who gain financially from the tragedies of others, tell you how they can help you win your reelection, so you can continue the job of legislating, incarcerating and annihilating. And so again I say: “How dare you, sir! Have you no shame?” I do not have to explain to the likes of you why my agitation for legalization and education and regulation. I have more sympathy for the child molesters forced to live in boxes under bridges, than I have for you. But I will tell you anyway. I am for legalization because I am a human being with a moral responsibility to do my part to undo some small portion of the damage you have done to… life. I have no choice. At least not while I maintain my humanity. But that’s something you wouldn’t understand. http://www.drugwarrant.com/2009/11/a-drug-war-poem/#comments [ Post Comment ] Comment #12 posted by HempWorld on November 12, 2009 at 08:42:06 PT wouldn't be surprised if there's a few cross-dres sing Repubublicans.Yeah like Rudi Guliani! (who is also a mass-murderer, see 9/11) [ Post Comment ] Comment #11 posted by Hope on November 12, 2009 at 08:29:57 PT Grassley I would have liked to seen, and heard, his reaction to the AMA announcement.As far as people making money off cannabis... it's delightful, compared to people making money off persecuting and imprisoning people, lying to them, even killing them, or driving them to death's door, because of their need or liking of cannabis. People, earning 'wages' to persecute those people who do realize the value of the plant, like Runruff's PO. Their consciences are calloused over and worthless. Oh yes, you minions of persecution... you can smugly deny your guilt and say you're just "following orders" or "doing your job"... but you're for a fact, actually, viciously wicked, and doing the work of evil people wearing uniforms of deluded self righteousness. Speaking directly to Runruff's parole officer, because I've got a suspicion that you read these posts trying to find ways of adding to your persecution of Runruff... you all, all you legions of persecutors, you could back off him. You could come to your better senses and do the right thing... but you won't, right? It's just too much fun to "do your job" and persecute him relentlessly, isn't it? [ Post Comment ] Comment #10 posted by Sam Adams on November 12, 2009 at 08:11:15 PT Grassley runruff you could be closer to the truth than you know - maybe he and Larry Craig are pals or something. I wouldn't be surprised if there's a few cross-dressing Repubublicans.Actually Grassley is somewhat morally consistent. I know he also crusades against drug companies paying off MD's for fake research. He's a consistent Puritan, he doesn't really want anyone to get drugs or medication, for anything. Suck it up and think of Jesus, I guess that's his attitude [ Post Comment ] Comment #9 posted by runruff on November 12, 2009 at 07:51:43 PT Variously attired whores! I still like my image of Grassley in fishnets and stiletto heels. [ Post Comment ] Comment #8 posted by Sam Adams on November 12, 2009 at 07:43:37 PT doctors >>>>In Southfield, a four-doctor medical practice opened in May that specializes in patients who require certification to legally use marijuana. It calls itself the Michigan Medical Marijuana Certification Center.The center just hired four more employees and now have 11, including the doctors, said the firm's office manager, who asked that his name not be published.I think this is a big reason why the AMA finally took action - money money money!!! The ole' money-grubbing Republican MD's are finally making money off medical cannabis, time to jump on board before the ACP doctors make all the money!No better way to get through to a greedy right-wing doctor than with money. Pay them a little more than Pfizer and you'll have a new best friend. A whore in white jacket, yes, but a friend nonetheless [ Post Comment ] Comment #7 posted by FoM on November 12, 2009 at 06:18:33 PT runruff I understand. I really do. [ Post Comment ] Comment #6 posted by runruff on November 12, 2009 at 05:49:10 PT Such sound advise! I try to follow this line but as human beings we know we can be traumatised as in PTSD and [my heart is sad for you] loosing a son.I do, for the most part do very well. I have a lovely, loyal wife, mother, sisters, many very good and special friends like Museman here [20+ years], and a supernatural pet crew.I live a sweet if frugal lifestyle. It is the garbage that is imbeded in my brain that leaks out when I least expect it!I grew a plant and I must pay for my sin! [ Post Comment ] Comment #5 posted by FoM on November 12, 2009 at 05:38:10 PT runruff I look at the bad time in my life (losing my son) as a distant memory. I think that is what is meant by all things will pass. Look to the future and learn from the past. The only thing we can do anything about is now. [ Post Comment ] Comment #4 posted by FoM on November 12, 2009 at 05:35:17 PT Medical Marijuana Business is Growing ... Up November 12, 2009URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33860683/ns/business-businessweekcom/ [ Post Comment ] Comment #3 posted by runruff on November 12, 2009 at 05:35:06 PT Thank you young lady! Or should I call you Ms. Nightingale? [ Post Comment ] Comment #2 posted by FoM on November 12, 2009 at 05:26:00 PT runruff I hope that soon you won't think about that terrible time and it becomes just a bad memory. [ Post Comment ] Comment #1 posted by runruff on November 12, 2009 at 05:16:31 PT Help, let me out! When I was in prison I had beautiful dreams of home and family. When I woke to steel and concrete and a cell block full of Bubah's I would melt! When? I said to myself, how much longer of this? It would be four in the morning and I had to get up to go work 16 hours in the kitchen.Now? I have nightmares where I dream I am still in prison and am afraid to wake!One more thing I remembered this morning. The phones are owned by vendors who charge 27 cents per minute. [ Post Comment ] Post Comment