The things in my head go 'round and 'round

I have been looking for opposition to the medical marijuana proposal that looks like it will end up on the ballot this November.

I didn’t find any. Though I did find this from Cannazine:

With an initiative known as the Michigan Medical Marihuana Act headed for the November ballot with strong popular support, Michigan is poised to provide a major breakthrough for the medical marijuana movement.

If the initiative passes, Michigan would be the first state in the Midwest to approve it and, with 10 million people, it would be the second most populous state to approve it, behind California.

Sponsored by the Michigan Coalition for Compassionate Care (MCCC), the campaign has already gathered the necessary signatures and had them approved by the state election board. Under Michigan law, the initiative is now before the legislature, which is half-way through a 40-day window it has in which to act.
Image

If, as is expected, the legislature does not act, the initiative goes to the voters in November.

According to MCCC, the initiative would:

* Allow terminally and seriously ill patients who find relief from marijuana to use it with their doctors’ approval.
* Protect these seriously ill patients from arrest and prosecution for the simple act of taking their doctor-recommended medicine.
* Permit qualifying patients or their caregivers to cultivate their own marijuana for their medical use, with limits on the amount they could possess.
* Create registry identification cards, so that law enforcement officials could easily tell who was a registered patient, and establish penalties for false statements and fraudulent ID cards.
* Allow patients and their caregivers who are arrested to discuss their medical use in court.
* Continuing certain restrictions on the medical use of marijuana, including prohibitions on public use of marijuana and driving under the influence of marijuana.

“The clock is ticking,” said Diane Byrum of Lansing, who heads the MCCC. “We don’t anticipate the legislature will take any action. When that doesn’t happen, then we are automatically on the ballot.”

While Byrum declined to discuss specific campaign tactics for the coming months, she did provide some hints of the arguments proponents would be making. “We will be focusing on the patients this initiative will protect from the fear of arrest or jail for using medical marijuana,” she said.

The campaign will also make efforts to reassure voters, she said. “The law is narrow in scope, it deals only with medical marijuana, there is a mandatory state registration system,” Byrum went down the list. “The sky won’t fall.”

While Michigan voters may want some reassurance, medical marijuana is not exactly a brand new issue in the state. Voters in five towns and cities — Ann Arbor, Detroit, Ferndale, Flint, and Traverse City — have already approved medical marijuana, and it has been before the legislature for several years.

Rochelle Lampkin, a 49-year-old Detroit resident who uses medical marijuana to alleviate optic neuritis caused by Multiple Sclerosis, doesn’t want to wait on the legislature. Although Lampkin is protected by Detroit’s medical marijuana law, she said that was not sufficient. “I first spoke out about using medical marijuana when we were trying to get the ordinance passed, but I think this needs to go statewide. There are people suffering all over the state,” Lampkin said. “People have a preconceived notion about marijuana, and I was one of them, but if you have enough pain, you’ll try anything.”

It helps her, she said. “The neuritis causes the nerves in the back of my eye to swell up and they hurt so bad,” she said. “The marijuana works. It helps to relax the nerves so the pain subsides. I had to be convinced to try it, but I did, and it works. I don’t like smoking it, so I learned how to make a tea out of it. That’s what I use.”

This isn’t about potheads, Lampkin said. “I want people to understand everybody is not out here trying to get high,” she said. “I don’t get high, I don’t smoke, I don’t even drink. I was the square,” she laughed. “When I did try it, it was because other people in my MS group said they used it and I might want to try it. I fought it, but I eventually did try it and it helps.”

As the local pro-medical marijuana votes demonstrated, there is broad support among the Michigan electorate. A recent poll provided further evidence of that support, with 67% of voters saying they supported medical marijuana and 62% voicing approval for this particular initiative.

“This is the baby boomers coming of age,” Tom Shields of the Marketing Resource Group, which conducted the Inside Michigan Politics survey, said in a statement on its release last month.

Voters between 34 and 54 showed 75% support for medical marijuana, and 63% of retirees did. Somewhat surprisingly, younger voters (18 to 34) were the least supportive, backing the measure 61% to 36%.

Still, the initiative is in good initial shape with voters, said Shields. “This is where you want to start at for a ballot proposal,” Shields said. “You want to start over 60% because when the details come out, you lose support… This is a potential winner.”

But there is a long way to go, said Byrum, who will be spending the next few months building and strengthening the campaign. “We’re building a grassroots organization. We’re asking people to make contributions. This is going to take a lot of work.”

So far, at least, there is little sign of any organized opposition, although organizers expect law enforcement to eventually mount objections. One objection already being heard is that medical marijuana would still be illegal under federal law.

As for that argument, Byrum said that would make little difference to Michigan medical marijuana users. “About 99% of drug enforcement cases are done by state law enforcement,” she pointed out. “Passage of this initiative will effectively protect 99% of our patients. We can see that by looking at states that already have these laws. They do provide protection.”

Each state that joins the roster of medical marijuana states only increases the pressure on the federal government to change its policies, Byrum argued. “We believe that as more states pass their own laws it will apply further pressure to get beyond the political debate that dominates Washington and get to the scientific and medical evidence as a basis for policymaking.”

Medical marijuana efforts are ongoing in a number of state legislatures this year. But the legislative process is excruciatingly slow and cumbersome, and it is unclear whether any will make it into law. Initiative campaigns, while expensive, have the benefit of bypassing the politicos and letting the voters choose directly. With high levels of popular support a few months out, it looks as if Michigan may beat the other states out of the gate.

http://stopthedrugwar.org

Namaste.

This out of the Chicago Tribune:

News
Across Midwest, Interest in Medical Marijuana Grows
Michigan vote seen as test for region on issue
Sun, Jul 13, 2008 12:27 pm
more: headline news, medical news, activism, activism news, drug policy news, politics

Source: chicagotribune.com

The move to legalize medical marijuana is advancing in the Midwest, with Michigan poised to be the first state between the Rockies and New England to sanction the use of the illegal drug by terminally or seriously ill people.

Michigan voters will decide in November whether to authorize marijuana use, if a doctor determines suffering could be eased by the drug from such diseases as cancer, Crohn’s disease, HIV/AIDS, Alzheimer’s or hepatitis C.

While years of public opinion polling show opposition to legalizing marijuana, polls and the overwhelming majority of state referendum votes show strong support for medical use of marijuana. At the same time, some physician groups have dropped their resistance to medical marijuana.

The combined effect of public opinion, medical research showing benefits of marijuana in the treatment of some diseases and shifts in attitudes in the medical community has fueled the movement that has seen 12 states adopt medical marijuana laws in the past dozen years.

“We need to get beyond the political debate and into medical terms. That’s where the public is,” said Dianne Byrum, a former state legislator in Michigan and spokeswoman for the Michigan Coalition for Compassionate Care, the Detroit-area group that turned in 475,000 signatures to earn a spot on the fall ballot.

“This is really about patients and their suffering. … For them, medical use of marijuana should give them comfort and not the threat of arrest or jail,” Byrum said.

Doctors drop opposition
There is evidence in the Midwest suggesting political interest. Five Michigan cities already have medical marijuana ordinances. The Minnesota state Senate recently approved a medical marijuana measure, though it died on the House floor. A similar measure died in the Illinois state Senate in the past session. Other measures were debated in Ohio, Wisconsin and Missouri.

Less than four months before the November election, there is no organized opposition to Michigan’s binding referendum. The Michigan State Medical Society, the state’s arm of the American Medical Association, recently dropped its opposition to medical marijuana and said it will be neutral in the fall campaign.

“We’re keeping an open mind that marijuana in limited amounts can help some,” said Dr. Michael Sandler, a diagnostic radiologist and president of the Michigan State Medical Society.

But resistance is expected to develop, given the political volatility of the marijuana issue and the experience California has had since voters there endorsed use of medical marijuana in 1996.

The California law says that patients need a prescription to acquire the drug but it is otherwise vague. That legal opening led to the creation of so-called marijuana clubs and the large-scale growing of the drug in fields and homes. Hundreds of marijuana dispensaries are scattered around the state, and dozens of cities have cracked down on cultivation.

California endorsed “political chaos,” said Allen St. Pierre, executive director of NORML, which advocates “the repeal of marijuana prohibition.”

“No other state has and no other state will replicate what California did,” St. Pierre said. “Every ensuing state [that has approved laws also] narrowly define the types of diseases, require the amount of cannabis they can possess is relatively small and the number of plants they can possess is relatively small. And there will be absolutely no retail dispensary-like model that has emerged in California.”

What Michigan proposes
With that in mind, the Michigan proposal would allow a patient to legally possess 2.5 ounces of marijuana or grow up to 12 plants in enclosed and locked facilities.

Although other states have followed similar guidelines regarding quantities of pot and eligible medical conditions, efforts are under way in some states to change existing laws. A proposal in Oregon, which approved its law in 1998, would allow the drug to be sold in liquor stores. In neighboring Washington, state health officials have proposed limiting patients to 1 1/2 pounds of pot, an amount that has been criticized by some patient advocates as too little and by law-enforcement groups as too much.

The political sensitivity of marijuana was evident two years ago when voters in South Dakota narrowly rejected a medical marijuana plan 52 percent to 48 percent.

Sen. Barack Obama, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, has endorsed medical marijuana, but only if science and the medical community concur and if it were carefully controlled. Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, is opposed to medical marijuana.

‘Just another step’
There is an awkward relationship between states and the federal government on the issue. States that have embraced medical marijuana are technically in violation of federal law after the Supreme Court’s 2005 ruling that said such laws do not provide immunity from federal prosecution. Some marijuana clinics in California have been raided by federal drug agents.

The Michigan vote will be watched as a potential barometer for a region that has yet to embrace medical marijuana.

“This is just another step in a fairly steady progression that the law is starting to catch up with public opinion,” said Bruce Mirken, spokesman for the Marijuana Policy Project, a group that advocates decriminalizing marijuana.

“The dirty little secret to this is that a lot of folks in professional politics think this is a lot more controversial than it really is,” Mirken added.

Interesting, now isn’t it?