News

Medical marijuana advocates Saturday opened a three-day event to rally support to regulate a legal dispensary industry in California, spurred on by videotaped messages from two members of Congress who recently pushed an amendment to deny funds for federal raids on cannabis businesses.

Federal Objections Delay State's Program Last spring, after the governor signed into law a measure legalizing the possession of marijuana for medical use, cancer patient Diane Jump and hundreds of Delawareans suffering from serious health problems were relieved to know that the drug they had been using to treat the crippling nausea and pain of chemotherapy would not land them in jail.

Years of debate and fine-tuning in the state legislature over allowing medical marijuana still have not settled all the questions Connecticut doctors have about medical marijuana. Is it, as some contend, a humane solution for patients who can't get relief from other medicines, or a reckless move toward something that hasn't been fully tested scientifically?

Advocates submitted a batch of signatures Friday toward qualifying a ballot initiative that would legalize personal possession and use of marijuana for adults in Oregon.

Opinions

GETTING arrested for possessing small amounts of marijuana will no longer be a crime under a bill now pending in the Legislature. Rather than facing a $1,000 fine and six months in jail, those with less than 15 grams of marijuana - a little more than half an ounce - would be fined $150 for their first offense and up to $500 for repeated violations.

Police work is not as easy as one might think. After college and the police academy, I was pretty brain damaged and thought that things were black or white. They were right or wrong, either against the law or lawful. WRONG!

TEWKSBURY, Mass. -- Russ Caswell, 68, is bewildered: "What country are we in?" He and his wife Pat are ensnared in a Kafkaesque nightmare unfolding in Orwellian language.

TEWKSBURY, Mass. - Russ Caswell, 68, is bewildered: "What country are we in?" He and his wife, Pat, are ensnared in a Kafkaesque nightmare unfolding in Orwellian language.

Letters

Re. "Pot legalization problematic" by Garnett Payne, letters, May 16 I thought Garnett Payne was a conservative and that true conservatives oppose nanny-state policies. Obviously, I was wrong.

We are less than a month away from the June 5 primary, and one of the most controversial issues on the ballot in Butte County is Measure A. The initiative would limit where and how much medical cannabis can be grown in Butte County.

Calls to end the infamous War on Drugs don't just come from the funny dressed hairy crowd anymore. Over the decades a number of Canadian senate committees have called for an end to it and the conservative Fraser Institute has condemned it since 2001.

Question, from a non-user: How is it that those U.S. states that have legalized marijuana, which resulted in saving investigation, arrests, prosecution, less overcrowding and prison costs, have not seen a measurable increase in its use or of hard drugs?

Let me get this straight. The City Attorney's office is recommending that the city not regulate Vallejo's existing medical marijuana dispensaries, despite a voter mandate to do so, because it believes that the case law regarding the legality of these operations remains unsettled ("Vallejo Council urged to avoid setting pot dispensary regulations," May 6) Yet, the Vallejo Police Department and county prosecutors continue to bring charges against these same operations -- alleging that the law is clear and that these facilities are operating illegally.

To the editor: Re: " Vancouver city hall coddles, protects poisonous pro-dope lobby," May 9. Mark Hasiuk's last column was a toxic, hateful piece of journalism. Under the civil and legal argument that the Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users is not playing by the rules (apparently it operates without a permit), he feels completely justified to demonize and vilify the people and work of VANDU.

Re "High on Romney" by Nick Miller (SN&R The 420, May 10): You've got to be blasted out of your mind-or you got some bad dope-to think Mitt Romney and the "anti-everything" religious forces will be better for your marijuana habit.