The things in my head go 'round and 'round

This article was in the Detroit News on September 25th:

Poll: Michigan voters lean toward approval of medical marijuana, stem cell research
Charlie Cain / Detroit News Lansing Bureau

A majority of Michiganians is inclined to legalize marijuana for sick people, but a second statewide ballot proposal to relax restrictions on stem cell research in Michigan is a closer contest — and the advertising blitz has just begun on that measure.

The latest Detroit News-WXYZ Action News poll found that the voters, by a 59-37 margin, favor the ballot proposal to allow terminally and seriously ill people to legally use marijuana if a doctor certified the drug could ease their suffering.

The statewide poll was conducted for The News, WXYZ and three outstate television stations from Saturday to Monday by Lansing’s EPIC-MRA. It showed that the biggest backers were women (63 percent support), Metro Detroiters (60 percent) and Democrats (68 percent). Among men, the proposal garnered 51 percent support and 49 percent of Republicans favored it.

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If Proposal 1 is approved by voters in November, Michigan would become the 13th state to legalize medical marijuana. Supporters estimate that as many as 50,000 Michigan residents would legally qualify for medical marijuana to treat a host of “debilitating” medical problems such as cancer, HIV /AIDS, hepatitis C, Alzheimer’s disease, Crohn’s disease and chronic diseases or their treatments that produce wasting syndrome, severe pain, sever nausea, seizures or muscle spasms, such as those caused by multiple sclerosis.

“I’m all for it,” said poll participant Jeff Bergel, a 52-year-old wholesale representative and father of two from Walled Lake.

“I lost a brother-in-law to brain cancer last year and I think marijuana could have helped make his more comfortable. My dad has glaucoma and I understand it could help him as well.”

On the controversial issue of stem cells, poll respondents, by a 50-32 margin, favor amending the state Constitution to allow scientists to derive embryonic stem cells from human embryos for medical research. Support among women is 57 percent compared to 42 percent among men. Support is 56 percent in Metro Detroit, but 45 percent among voters in the rest of the state.

Michigan has one of the nation’s most restrictive laws on stem cell research; a scientist here who uses new human embryos for stem cell research can face a $10 million fine and up to 10 years in prison.

Supporters of embryonic stem cell research say research could lead to better therapies and possible cures for a host of diseases and injuries such as cancer, Parkinson’s, juvenile diabetes and spinal cord injuries. Opponents — including political heavy hitters Right to Life of Michigan and the Michigan Catholic Conference — say research on human embryos is morally wrong because it destroys life. Critics of the measure also say its adoption could lead to human cloning, although the proposal doesn’t seek to change state law that already bans cloning.

“I’ve thought about it a lot and I think stem cell research would be all right,” said Regina Gerling, a grandmother from Muskegon who took part in the poll.

“I’m a diabetic, so I wish they would find new cures.” Law enforcement groups are near unanimous in their opposition to medical marijuana, saying it’s part of a broader agenda to legalize marijuana for everyone. But there doesn’t appear to be any group ready to spend money on an ad campaign to defeat the measure.

Michael Opland, a 64-year-old father of three from Harrison Township, said he supports medical marijuana, although he believes a lot of people would get the marijuana even though their medical conditions wouldn’t warrant it.

“A certain number of people would probably take advantage of the law,” he said. “But it’s worth it to get marijuana to people who really need it.”

The stem cell campaign is likely to get red-hot in the coming weeks. Opponents of the proposal started running TV commercials this week, suggesting that Michigan taxpayers would shell out hundreds of millions of dollars for the research. The opposition group, Michigan Citizens Against Unrestricted Science and Experimentation, filed a financial statement with the state on Thursday, showing it has rose about $595,000 — including $500,000 from the Catholic Conference — and had $233,000 on hand as of Sept. 18.

Supporters of stem cell research have not yet launched an ad campaign, although they are expected to shortly. They say the ballot proposal doesn’t direct a dime of state money to research. The group, CureMichigan, filed its financial statement on Thursday, showing it had raised $2.27 million and had $257,000 on hand. It also has loans and obligations of more than $1.5 million, including more than $1 million in loans from the A. Alfred Taubman Trust of Bloomfield Hills.

Judith Maser, a retired clothing buyer from Novi, was originally opposed to stem cell research.

“Now I believe stem cell research could help a lot of people,” she said. “I think medicine has gotten so advanced that this is the future for our young people.”

Interesting reading, now isn’t it?

Namaste.

My last couple of posts having to do with the Michigan Proposal 1 have received a good deal of attention. From Marquette, down to Traverse City, over to Midland, Grand Rapids, Howell (Hi Dani. How you doin’ chiquite?), New Baltimore, Oakland, and a few more.

But you are all being rather quiet. I would like to hear from folks as to why or why not they will be voting for this proposal. Is there any real opposition to this? Or are you just expecting it to get on the ballot, and trust the voters to either pass it, or vote it down?

Passive measures in something this important seems rather short-sighted, that is just my opinion.

Talk to me.

Namaste.

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.
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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?

Editors note. A lot of you are hitting on this page when you are searching for Michigan Proposal 1. That is all fine and good, but there are other articles on this blog concerning support and opposition to this important proposal. Please either click on the title “Things in my head go ’round and ‘Round” or hit the archives to see what else is out there.

Thanks, and don’t for get to vote on Tuesday Nobember 4th.

There seems to be a lot of interest in Michigans Proposal 1 that would legalize medical marijuana. I have been getting a few hits on what I wrote a couple of days ago on it.

There is pro and con about this proposal, as you could figure out. There are doctors who support it, and there are doctors who don’t. Of course the ones who don’t support it are labeled as being in the wallet of the big drug companies.

The proposal would require and ID, and annual registration. A patient would be able to grow up to 12 plants of their own. This proposal mirrors ones in 12 other states, so you would think that a good deal of the language has been lawyered to the point where no one could argue about any part of it. The biggest con is that Federal law still makes marijuana possession illegal. That is a big concern, considering the raids on medical marijuana stores in California.

I was reading a blogger from Michigan who took a look at the wording of the proposal and reviewed it here. He says that he will be voting for the proposal, but doesn’t get into saying why.

I would also vote for it for a couple of specific reasons. 1. Marijuana is a weed that has tremendous versatility above and beyond the bud. We are being incredibly short sighted to eliminate this plant from use. The fibers can be used for clothing, rope, and a million other things. The seeds can be pressed for oil, or ground and used for food they are high in nutrients. 2. We have to get beyond that people get high. People get drunk on a daily basis, to great detriment to not only their own health but the health of others. Alcoholism helps drive up all of our insurance rates. And don’t say to me that you would rather work with a drunk co-worker than one who is high. I will take the high one over the drunk one any day. Marijuana is not the evil that it has been made out to be.

So. That is my 2 cents.

What say you, populace?

Namaste.