Remembering Ronald Reagan

How Many vigilante victums??

From one part of the country to another it seems that these cases are not limited to one area. In the cities and in rural areas victims are beaten and a good number are murdered. This is occurring and law enforcement, legislators and the public are turning a blind eye.

Can we define the causes of these crimes? If we simply look at newspaper reports we can clearly see the cause; the cause is none other than the public sex offender registry.

The latest vigilante action to come across the internet is a case from Florida. A register Offender was walking his dog in his own front yard when he was attacked, beaten and his dog was killed. Those responsible had found his name and picture on the public hit list known as the Sex Offender Registry.

Was this an isolated case? Hardly. Here are a few interesting cases.

Michael Dodele had been free just 35 days when sheriff's deputies found him dead from stab wounds last month in his mobile home. A neighbor was arrested for the murder. The neighbor had "told every house" that he had found Dodele's name listed on the Sex Offender Registry. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/12/10/the_skinny/main3597422.shtml

Two released sex offenders who were on the Sex Offender Registry were murdered. A man is believed to have posed as an FBI officer, went to their apartment and shot them. Police said that the man spoke with three roommates and said he was as a member of the FBI and said he wanted to talk to them about their Level III sex offender status. http://www.talkleft.com/story/2005/08/29/340/52675

Dennis McCarthy was stabbed to death at his Holly Township home Sunday morning, just one week after release from prison. Police said, "We have strong suspicions that he was targeted" http://www.mlive.com/news/detroit/index.ssf/2009/08/murdered_sex_offender_released.html

Stephen A. Marshall shot and killed Joseph Gray. The victim had been dozing on a couch at his home in Milo, Maine. Five hours later, Marshall knocked on the door of William Elliot's vinyl-sided mobile home in Corinth, 24 miles away. When Elliot appeared, the 20-year-old assassin fired at point-blank range. The murders were vigilante strikes against registered sex offenders who were strangers to Marshall and to each other. http://archive.guidemag.com/magcontent/invokemagcontent.cfm?ID=BF0FA813-7607-4666-B1F081D6A6C701CC

Registered Sex Offender Targeted - Investigators say two Scott County men took the law into their own hands. They admitted to setting a fire that killed an innocent woman. "It was vigilante justice," said Scott County Sheriff Anthony Lay. "This is a prime example of how an innocent person has been fatally injured," added Sheriff Lay. http://deaths-of-others.blogspot.com/2009/02/tn-reaction-to-vigilante-justice.html

These are but a minute sample of the vigilantly murders that are being carried out with the full knowledge of police departments across the country. I say full knowledge because any time you make it easy for vigilantes to target a group that they hate, the outcome is obvious. In this case murder. However beyond the murders of RFSO's, there have been other vigilantly attacks such as these:

Vigilantes Use Online Sex Offender Map to Burn Down Wrong House. Critics of these tools often say that they can make those sex offenders targets of retribution crimes by would-be vigilantes, and that seems to be just what was attempted in a case of arson in Evansville, Indiana. There, a trailer full of equipment sitting in the driveway of a house was ignited by arsonists who also scribbled "GET OUT PERV" on the garage door. The vigilantes, however, seemed to have the wrong address. http://www.switched.com/2008/02/05/vigilantes-attempt-to-burn-sex-offenders-house-and-miss/

Vigilantes: Coming soon to a community near you "in a scene reminiscent of the Salem witch trial days, a crowd of angry neighbors descended on a New Hampshire home, taunting the woman resident as a "molester" and "skinner" (prison lingo for a child molester) before tossing a burning scarecrow on her front porch."

"A drunken father and son broke into the house of a paroled sex offender in New Jersey and began beating another man whom they mistakenly took as the sex offender. Yet again, the vigilantes had found their victim through a "Megan's Law" community notification law."

"In Bakersfield, California, a knife-wielding vigilante tried to break down the door of a sex offender whose name, photograph and address had been distributed in the neighborhood by police. Police shot the vigilante dead." http://forensicpsychologist.blogspot.com/2007/10/vigilanteism-coming-soon-to-community.html

Vigilantism against a wrongfully convicted sex offender "In June 1995 the state of California opened up a 900-number hotline in which callers can get information about registered sex offenders. Someone in the neighborhood found out that Ted was on the list. He and Jean have since been hounded and harassed. The neighbors have placed posters all over the neighborhood containing information about Ted. They have received three death threats." http://www.privacyrights.org/node/2878

Once again these are but a few of the enormous number of vigilantly attacks that are taking place here in the land of the free. One would expect this in some place like Siberia, but here?

So why are the police and legislators still backing the registry? Well maybe it is working to protect children, that would explain it right?

Report finds Megan's Law fails to reduce sex crimes, deter repeat offenders in N.J. "Despite wide community support for these laws, there is little evidence to date, including this study, to support a claim that Megan's Law is effective in reducing either new first-time sex offenses or sexual re-offenses," [ihttp://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2009/02/study_finds_megans_law_fails_t_1.html

Megan's Law: does it protect children? "Most states have very little evidence on the actual impact of community notification on their jurisdiction. Most of the understood benefits of the laws are based on assumptions about the nature of sexual offending and the behavior of parents and community members. Such assumptions are rarely supported through research, but continue to legitimize the law for law enforcement workers and members of the public" http://www.nspcc.org.uk/Inform/research/Findings/meganslaw_wda48233.html

Seems that the registry is not protecting children and the government knows it.

Considering the real danger to life and limb that the public registry poses, it is time for humane people to stand up and call for an end to the violence, murders and vigilantism. It is time to take the registry out of the public view and place it back in the hands of law enforcement. It is time to make America safe for ALL of its citizens.

Bend Gets First Medical Cannabis Club

BEND, Ore. -- A new club opening in northeast Bend on Wednesday, Dec. 8 aims to provide a secure location and safe access to medical cannabis for Oregon Medical Marijuana Program cardholders in Central Oregon.

There are six other similar clubs in Oregon.

“The Central Oregon Alternative Therapy Club, LLC (COAT) is a collective of patients and their primary caregivers who cultivate, exchange and use marijuana as medicine,” says Christopher Smith, manager of the club.

Smith said he has been a successful entrepreneur for more than 10 years and served six years in the U.S. Marine Corps.

Registered cardholders simply follow Oregon State Law, which allows for the transfer of medical cannabis from cardholder to cardholder.

“Budtenders” are registered cardholders who transfer the medicine in exchange for a donation. There is also a monthly membership fee.

Delivery service in Bend, and to La Pine and Redmond, will also be available to pre-qualified members.

COAT is a smoke-free environment and club members will abide by a strict set of rules.

Some of the regulations include: no entry without a valid OMMP card; no loitering; no persons under the age of 18; members agree not to sell or attempt to sell any medical cannabis acquired by donation from COAT and they must agree to uphold the restrictions on amounts of medical cannabis in their possession according to Oregon medical marijuana laws.

Medical marijuana was legalized in Oregon in 1998. Medical marijuana is legal in fourteen other states and the District of Columbia. Arizona legalized medical marijuana in November this year.

COAT is located at 2600 NE Division Street, Suite, 101 at Cottage Square in Bend.

For more information, visit the Website at: http://www.centraloregonalternativetherapy.com. or call 541-647-2308. Hours are Monday – Saturday noon to 6 pm and Sundays noon to 4 pm.

Sentencing in E. Oregon pot plantation case

PORTLAND— A Roosevelt, Wash., man who was charged with helping operate a marijuana plantation in Oregon’s Grant County is scheduled to be sentenced Thursday in federal court in Portland.

The Oregonian reports Sergio Hernandez-Escalera will probably be deported to Mexico after his prison term.
He pleaded guilty to manufacturing more than 1,000 marijuana plants.
Two other men pleaded guilty in June and are awaiting sentencing.
A drug team raided the plantation in northeast Oregon in August 2009 and seized about 23,000 plants.


Read more: http://www.statesmanjournal.com/article/20101129/UPDATE/101129015/Sentencing-in-E-Oregon-pot-plantation-case#ixzz16h7uoVDO

How far will the T.S.A. go in violating our freedoms.

Science V. Religon

Science is not based on faith,like religion is.It is based on the FACTS at hand.No science isn’t always correct. Many times theories have to be changed because of new evidence.No science is not based on faith. It is built on knowledge.It is based on what is real. Not the primitive mythologies and superstitions of religion. Ya I believe in freedom of religion. If people want to remain ignorant of reality that’s their right.

The skinny on the Fatty.

The
govt says that marijuana (cannabis) has no medicinal value yet they
hold a patent! US Patent 6630507 titled "Cannabinoids as antioxidants
and neuroprotectants" which is assigned to The United States of
America, as represented by the Department of Health and Human Services.

WHY DOES THE MEDIA IGNORE THIS?

BECAUSE THEY ARE TOLD TO.

REMEMBER THIS THE NEXT TIME AN OFFICIAL TELLS YOU THAT WEED HASN'T BEEN STUDIED ENOUGH!

The
patent claims that "Cannabinoids have been found to have antioxidant
properties, unrelated to NMDA receptor antagonism. This new found
property makes cannabinoids useful in the treatment and prophylaxis of
wide variety of oxidation associated diseases, such as ischemic,
age-related, inflammatory and autoimmune diseases. The cannabinoids are
found to have particular application as neuroprotectants, for example
in limiting neurological damage following ischemic insults, such as
stroke and trauma, or in the treatment of neurodegenerative diseases,
such as Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease and HIV dementia."
The patent was obtained in October of 2003.

Cannabinoids,
for those who were wondering, are a group of chemical compounds found
in marijuana that are also referred to as terpenophenolic compounds.
One specific cannabinoid compound found in cannabis is
tetrahydrocannabinol, more commonly known as THC. This substance gives
marijuana its psychoactive effects.

Cannabis stops cancer - Harvard
Cannabis stops breast cancer - UCSF
Cannabis grows brain cells - Princeton
US Govt Patented Medicinal Marijuana, US patent #6630507

Are we together on legalizing pot ,or what?

Cant we get along together enough to get the law passed?
What is this stuff about "stoners against prop 19 ?
What stoners are listening to the wrong side? Get your head out of your ass and vote right.

Supreme Court Ruling: Indefinite Detention For Sex Offenders

In a 7-2 decision, the justices declared that a federal law allowing federal prisoners deemed "sexually dangerous" to be held even after they have served out their original sentences is constitutional.

The Court said Congress does have the power to keep such dangerous offenders out of society indefinitely.

Justice Clarence Thomas dissented, arguing that Congress went too far, and nothing in the Constitution permits this kind of extended confinement.

Did the Supreme Court get it right? Or is this just another expansion of federal power?

Since September 2001, I can't believe the actions of our government. This is not the land of the FREE anymore, it's the land of the locked up. What are we doing people? Look who we are becoming! If we allow the government to lock up American Citizens and throw away the key even after they have completed their sentence we are in trouble. More and more laws on written every day. Not affected yet? You will be. Big Brother is growing stronger. Before 1980, the prison population in the United States basically stayed at around only 250,000 people a year. Since that time, the number of incarcerated Americans has risen to over 2.5 MILLION people. That is 1 out of every 33 Citizens!! Revolution is coming. I hear Paul Revere!!


I know Ill get a lot of flack for this post,but this is a civil rights issue.
Im not saying that sex offenders shouldn't have to pay for crimes committed.Im saying that sex offenders should have the right not to be mistreated and abused
at the hands of the state.
--=====--
They start with the Sex offenders and soon were all on a list..That how the holocaust started. With the List.

Pot Could Tilt Races In Oregon

While Democrats are watching turnout levels in California to gauge the ability of marijuana ballot initiatives to turn out young voters, organizers to the north point to a second case study, which concludes that such a referendum would dramatically bolster interest in voting.

Backers of an Oregon measure to regulate the buying and selling of medical marijuana commissioned a poll to determine the effect of the question on young, progressive voters inclined to sit out the election. Pollsters quizzed 400 Oregonians who described themselves as Democrats or independents and rated their interest in the midterm election between one and five on a scale to ten. Half of the voters were given information about Measure 74 and the other half were told about the race for governor, currently a dead heat between Democrat John Kitzhaber and Republican Chris Dudley.

Voters told about the pot initiative were more than twice as likely to increase their interest voting -- which, in Oregon, is done by mail.

President Obama will visit Oregon on Wednesday to try to rally young voters. At least two Oregon House races remain competitive, with freshman Democrat Kurt Schrader and long-serving progressive Peter DeFazio fending off challengers.

Unlikely voters who were told about the pot initiative increased their interest in vote by an average of 3.5 points on the ten-point scale. By a margin of 62 to 21, they overwhelmingly support the measure and at a rate of 50 to 23, they prefer the Democratic candidate for governor. Both candidates, however, have spoken against the pot measure.

Medical marijuana is currently legal in Oregon, but voters rejected a 2004 measure that would have expanded the program to legalize dispensaries. The Yes on 74 campaign's war chest is filled with little more than seeds and stems, but the organization hopes that Democrats and organized labor will recognize the political wisdom of touting Measure 74 and offer the campaign some in-kind assistance.

Motivating young people to engage in politics, especially in an off-year, midterm election, is no simple matter. But the Oregon survey reflects what political operatives have found in California, Colorado and Washington state.



While Democrats are watching turnout levels in California to gauge the ability of marijuana ballot initiatives to turn out young voters, organizers to the north point to a second case study, which concludes that such a referendum would dramatically bolster interest in voting.

Backers of an Oregon measure to regulate the buying and selling of medical marijuana commissioned a poll to determine the effect of the question on young, progressive voters inclined to sit out the election. Pollsters quizzed 400 Oregonians who described themselves as Democrats or independents and rated their interest in the midterm election between one and five on a scale to ten. Half of the voters were given information about Measure 74 and the other half were told about the race for governor, currently a dead heat between Democrat John Kitzhaber and Republican Chris Dudley.

Voters told about the pot initiative were more than twice as likely to increase their interest voting -- which, in Oregon, is done by mail.

President Obama will visit Oregon on Wednesday to try to rally young voters. At least two Oregon House races remain competitive, with freshman Democrat Kurt Schrader and long-serving progressive Peter DeFazio fending off challengers.

Unlikely voters who were told about the pot initiative increased their interest in vote by an average of 3.5 points on the ten-point scale. By a margin of 62 to 21, they overwhelmingly support the measure and at a rate of 50 to 23, they prefer the Democratic candidate for governor. Both candidates, however, have spoken against the pot measure.

Medical marijuana is currently legal in Oregon, but voters rejected a 2004 measure that would have expanded the program to legalize dispensaries. The Yes on 74 campaign's war chest is filled with little more than seeds and stems, but the organization hopes that Democrats and organized labor will recognize the political wisdom of touting Measure 74 and offer the campaign some in-kind assistance.

Motivating young people to engage in politics, especially in an off-year, midterm election, is no simple matter. But the Oregon survey reflects what political operatives have found in California, Colorado and Washington state.
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Young, inspired voters were a key constituency that elected Obama in 2008, and their turnout in 2012 -- when a number of swing states are considering marijuana initiatives -- could determine control of the White House and Congress.

Voters fired up by pot are already working to drive California turnout for November.

Activists from Just Say Now have made nearly 6,000 calls in the last week, organizers say, using an online tool to turn out voters supportive of Proposition 19, which would legalize marijuana. Just Say Now is coordinating with the Women's Marijuana Movement, which is also phone-banking on behalf of Prop 19, targeting women, who tend to vote Democratic.

Hundreds of mothers have signed a letter endorsing Prop 19, arguing controlling and taxing marijuana usage will make their communities safer for children. A small group of moms released the letter Tuesday and discussed their support for the measure.

"What we're doing with the policies that are in place now is hampering the kind of conversations we need to be able to have with our children," said Hanna Dershowitz, a lawyer and mother of two. "A reasonable conversation," she said, can only take place "in the context of controlled regulated marijuana."

Gretchen Burns-Bergman, a mother of two and Executive Director of Parents for Addiction Treatment and Healing, said she's all too familiar with the problems of pot prohibition and wonders how many other lives have been devastated by the policy.

"I know the damage of marijuana prohibition firsthand," Burns-Bergman said in a conference call with reporters Tuesday. "My son was arrested in 1990 for marijuana possession, which began a decade-long saga, a tremendous emotional saga for our family, a wasting of potential, and a tremendous tax burden to the state to incarcerate him."

Burns-Bergman said after his first arrest at age 20, her son was in an out of prison for 11 years, learning to inject heroin while behind bars. "Taking somebody who is a nonviolent pot smoker and introducing him to this kind of a system is terribly damaging," she said.

Buffalo Springfield Reunite At Bridge School Benefit

Buffalo Springfield reunited at Young’s annual Bridge School Benefit this weekend. The weekend featured a lot of big names, including Elvis Costello, Elton John, Jackson Brown, Pearl Jam and Billy Idol (along with Grizzly Bear, Modest Mouse, Leon Russell, Neko Case, Emmylou Harris, etc.), but the Buffalo Springfield reunion was the first time the band were back together (or, as back together as they could be) since their 1968 breakup. Neil Young, Stephen Stills, and Richie Furay played with Young’s bassist, Rick Rosas (subbing for the late Bruce Palmer) and drummer Joe Vitale (in for Dewey Martin, who passed away last year). Watch them do “Mr. Soul,” “Rock & Roll Woman,” and other below:

Big names line up in support and against pot dispensaries.

Troy Torgerson says medical marijuana helps him manage his pain.

PORTLAND, Ore. – One thing voters may notice in Oregon’s Voters’ Guide this election is that some big names are supporting Measure 74, a measure that would green-light state-sanctioned medical marijuana dispensaries.

Turn on your radio Monday and you might hear a new ad with the voice of former Portland mayor and police chief, Tom Potter, supporting the measure.

“But I do support Measure 74,” he says in the ad. “It regulates medical marijuana. That change is overdue. Since medical marijuana is legal, we need to regulate it.”

The measure would allow patients like Troy Torgerson to buy pot and no longer depend on a personal grower or other patients with extra medical marijuana.

“I’m in a lot of pain, so the medicine does help a lot,” he says.

“Too many patients do not have access to medical cannabis,” says Anthony Johnson, co-author of Measure 74. “Patients that are homebound, seriously ill - a patient who gets diagnosed with cancer and must undergo chemotherapy shouldn’t have to wait three months for harvest or have to turn to the black market.”

Opponents to the measure say the measure is an attempt to legalize pot and will open more people up to drug addiction.

The Oregon Medical Association, which represents doctors, urges people to vote no, writing, it “exceeds the needs of unhealthy Oregonians and is beyond the practice of good medicine.” It will “result in the legalization of marijuana beyond any possible medical market under the medically unsubstantiated guise of medical need.”

The three major law enforcement associations - the Oregon District Attorneys Association, the Oregon Sheriff’s Association and the Oregon Association of Chiefs of Police – all oppose Measure 74.

“We’re at a crossroads of taking this drug to basically legality,” says the sheriff of Clatsop County, Tom Bergin, who’s one of the most outspoken opponents of Measure 74.

“And when you legalize something like this (availability) it means more abuse,” he says.

“If Measure 74 works effectively like we believe it does, it may very well help lead to legalization in the future,” says Johnson, “but that’s a debate for another time and Measure 74 should be debated on its own merits.”

There are more than 36,000 people enrolled in Oregon’s medical marijuana program which is about one percent of all Oregonians. California, New Mexico and Maine already have dispensaries.

Vote Yes for Measure 74

In DC, No Such Thing as Too Poor For Medical Pot

WASHINGTON - There should be no such thing as too poor to buy pot if you live in D.C., at least if the marijuana is for a medical condition.

That's part of the conclusion of a new law enacted in the nation's capital earlier this year. The medical marijuana law allows people to legally obtain the drug for medical reasons. But the law also includes a provision different from the 14 other states with medical marijuana laws, requiring the drug to be provided at a discount to poor residents. Who will get the reduced-price marijuana and how much it will cost, however, is still being worked out.

City officials say they plan to publish their first draft of regulations implementing the law on Friday. Patients aren't expected to be able to purchase medical marijuana in the city until 2011.

How Did an Entire Political Party Decide to Reject Climate Change Science?

Ron Brownstein notes in a terrific new National Journal column just how striking it is to see a major American political party decide, all at once, to reject climate science in its entirety. (via Jay Rosen)

British Foreign Secretary William Hague, a prominent conservative leader in the U.K., was in the U.S. last week, and described climate change as perhaps the 21st century’s biggest foreign-policy challenge,” He added, “An effective response to climate change underpins our security and prosperity.”

His strong words make it easier to recognize that Republicans in this country are coalescing around a uniquely dismissive position on climate change. The GOP is stampeding toward an absolutist rejection of climate science that appears unmatched among major political parties around the globe, even conservative ones. [...]

Just for the record, when the nonpartisan National Academy of Sciences last reviewed the data this spring, it concluded: “A strong, credible body of scientific evidence shows that climate change is occurring, is caused largely by human activities, and poses significant risks for a broad range of human and natural systems.” Not only William Hague but such other prominent European conservatives as French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel have embraced that widespread scientific conviction and supported vigorous action.

Indeed, it is difficult to identify another major political party in any democracy as thoroughly dismissive of climate science as is the GOP here. Eileen Claussen, president of the Pew Center on Global Climate Change, says that although other parties may contain pockets of climate skepticism, there is “no party-wide view like this anywhere in the world that I am aware of.”

And in case this isn’t clear, unanimous Republican opposition to any meaningful efforts to combat global warming makes any kind of coordinated international effort impossible.

What’s more, as the climate crisis intensifies, and the need for swift action becomes even more painfully obvious, the GOP line is getting worse, not better. How many Republican U.S. Senate candidates on the ballot this year support efforts to address global warming? None.

I realize that part of the problem here is that Republicans reject the science because they oppose the solutions. If they acknowledged reality, GOP officials would no doubt have a harder time explaining why they don’t want to deal with a climate crisis that has the potential to wreak havoc on the planet in dramatically dangerous ways.

But the result is the same. The combination of deliberate Republican ignorance and the Republican scheme to break the United States Senate makes the crisis even more serious, with little hope on the horizon. It also speaks to a larger truth — because there’s no commonly shared reality among Democratic and Republican policymakers, the prospects for compromise are effectively non-existent.

Sen. Susan Collins (R) of Maine this morning noted, “I don’t know who first described politics as the ‘art of compromise,’ but that maxim, to which I have always subscribed, seems woefully unfashionable today.”

Yeah, I wonder why that is.

Health care should be a civil right.

With a nation as rich as the United States hell ya! health care should be a civil right.The U.S. is the only one of all democratic countries not to have health care for everyone.Its time that this be recognized in the U.S. to.

John Lennon's 70th birthday celebrated in Central Park

NEW YORK — It's hard to imagine which event sounds more implausible: John Lennon's 70th birthday, or the 30th anniversary of his murder.

On the day when the Liverpool Lad would have become a septuagenarian, fans will visit Central Park's tranquil Strawberry Fields and attend a nearby benefit concert in Manhattan.

The memorial to the slain ex-Beatle and peace activist includes a mosaic donated by the city of Naples, Italy. A plaque lists 121 countries that endorse Strawberry Fields as a Garden of Peace.

The song observes that "living is easy with eyes closed, misunderstanding all you see."

The birthday celebration got started on Friday in England, where Google UK released a video "doodle" to a Lennon soundtrack.

Happy 70th birthday Ringo Star

Thank you for all the great music.

Dennis Hopper dies; actor, director's 'Easy Rider' became a generational marker

Dennis Hopper, 74, an actor and director whose low-budget biker movie "Easy Rider" made an unexpected fortune by exploring the late 1960s counterculture and who changed Hollywood by helping open doors to younger directors including Steven Spielberg and George Lucas, died May 29 at his home in Venice, Calif.

1970 Kent State Shootings Recalled 40 Years Later

KENT, Ohio -- The words Kent State helped define a generation.

The date May 4, 1970, is forever etched in the minds of 50 and 60 somethings who were college students at the time.

That was when Ohio National Guardsmen fired into a crowd of students demonstrating against the escalation of the Vietnam War with the April 30 invasion of Cambodia.

Four students were killed. Many others were injured.

"May 4 is one of those days like Nov. 22 and Sept. 11," said Cincinnati attorney Tim Burke, who was Xavier University's Student Body President in 1970.

Though the gunfire occurred in Northeastern Ohio, the shock waves quickly reached the Queen City.

"It was just unimaginable that these students would be gunned down that way," recalled Gus Perdikakis, a University of Cincinnati senior at the time. He's now President of Gus Perdikakis Associates in Symmes Township. "It was a very tense time -- a lot of concern among the students."

That led to an escalation of anti-war activities on both the UC and Xavier campuses.

At Xavier, Burke recalled a Midnight Mass being held in the middle of the Evanston campus.

"A number of the Jesuit faculty members came down and concelebrated that Mass," Burke said.

Xavier students also participated in a march from their campus to Clifton, where they joined UC students and the women of Edgecliff College for a silent walk Downtown and back Uptown.

"I recall the crowd being estimated at 10,000 people," Burke added.

Retired UC history professor Herb Shapiro said opposition to the Vietnam War grew geometrically.

"It was really a decisive turn in the road as far as the war was concerned and also, I think, in the seriousness of students," said Shapiro.

Within days the UC Administration Building was occupied by protesters. Many carried signs indicating they were part of the SDS -- Students for a Democratic Society.

Throngs gathered on "The Bridge" outside Tangeman University Center to listen to speakers.

Several hundred people ventured Downtown and gathered in the intersection of 5th Street and Walnut Street.

Shapiro, who had just gotten back into town, joined them and was arrested.

"We went down to the holding pen, which was in City Hall at the time," he recalled. "Then, all of those students and two faculty members, we went through the city court. It was all rather short."

Members of UC's Student Senate held lengthy open meetings about whether to continue to hold classes or cancel the remainder of the Spring term.

Student Senator John Schneider recalled very large crowds and a very tense atmosphere.

"You could cut the tension with a knife," said Schneider, now President of First Valley Corporation.

UC's Board of Trustees eventually decided to shut down the school.

"It was wise, I think, to close the university," Schneider stated. "It would have been very difficult to restart classes at that point."

However, the closing meant that many young men faced the possibility of being drafted into military service.

Perdikakis was one of them.

"I was married at the time -- just had our first child," he said. "So, the thought of having to pick up and go and be drafted was looking over my head."

Burke recalled that Xavier remained open with student leaders pushing for a strike against violence.

"We encouraged people to choose if they wanted to go to class," he said. "That was fine if they did, but many of us were going to do other things."

Forty years later, the memories of those turbulent times seem as fresh as ever.

"I think it should really be remembered as a symbol of the breakdown of responsive institutions which were supposed to take into account the feelings that people had," Shapiro stated. "That was this war had lost what degree of public standing or acceptance it may have had at one time."

Schneider took it one step further.

"I think that whole period was when people lost a lot of trust in government, had started to have a lot of doubts about its competence and I think that continues to this day," he theorized. "It probably explains a lot about the attitudes that are out there today."

However, both Schneider and Burke said the Kent State shootings changed them as people.

"I think it did tend to focus me more on being a good citizen," said Schneider. "That period of activism has focused me more on trying to be a good citizen in the city and being more involved in neighborhoods."

Burke said it was a life lesson learned early.

"I was already an activist, but probably as much as another other single social event that encouraged me to remain active in helping to do things that changes in our society," he said.

What was the message to the college students of 1970?

"It said to be careful, but not stop speaking out," Burke stated. "Four kids died in a very tragic and unnecessary way and all they were trying to do was stop a needless war."

When UC closed in 1970, many seniors weren't able to attend commencement. So, the UC Alumni Association decided to hold both a 40th Reunion and a special graduation ceremony for them on June 11, 2010.

The Class of 1970 had 4,979 members that the UC Foundation has tracked the past four decades. Most of them, 2,404 or 48 percent, live in the greater Cincinnati area. Seventy-five have been UC faculty or staff members, 63 work in medicine, 49 are employed in the legal field, 21 are architects and three are college Presidents or Chancellors. In addition, 46 are Presidents or founders of their own firms and 160 hold the title of Senior Vice-President or higher in corporations.

Jack Herer, father of marijuana legalization movement, dies at age 70 in Eugene

Jack Herer (left) with Dennis Peron (right), founder of the Cannabis Buyers Club, in San Francisco in 1996.

Writer and activist Jack Herer, whose 1985 book "The Emperor Wears No Clothes" ignited the modern marijuana legalization movement, died Thursday from complications from a September heart attack that felled him moments after speaking at a Portland rally. He was 70.

Herer had been recuperating since March in Eugene. His wife, Jeannie, was at his side at the house the couple had rented when he died.

"I never accepted that he was really going to go," Jeannie Herer said. "I'm sad that it happened, but I'm glad that it happened in Eugene. Everyone has been wonderful to us here."

Fellow activists expressed sorrow at losing the man who racked up hundreds of thousands of miles crossing the country for nearly 40 years campaigning to restore the hemp plant to American agriculture.

"He was one of my personal heroes," said Madeline Martinez of Portland, executive director of the Oregon chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws.

Herer died just as the movement is gaining momentum. Oregon and 13 other states plus the District of Columbia now permit medical marijuana. Last fall, the Obama administration said it will not prosecute for possession in medical marijuana states. In November, California residents will vote on a legalization initiative; activists in Oregon and Washington are gathering signatures now for similar initiatives.

That political advance grew from Jack Herer's crusade.

He was living in Portland in the early 1980s when he wrote "Emperor," now in its 11th printing.

The book says the government banned hemp in 1939 as part of a campaign to eliminate the scourge that went by the Mexican slang marijuana. But few people, Herer wrote, realized that marijuana was the dried flower of the female hemp plant, which humans had used as medicine for thousands of years.

The rest of the hemp plant, Herer argued, could do nothing less than save the world. For millennia, he said, people made fiber, clothing, rope, fuel, high-protein food from the fast-growing, easily cultivated plant, and they could again.

And Herer loudly proclaimed the right to get high, arguing that in fact, people ought to get high, morning, noon and night. He found medical research showing that marijuana can protect the body against cancer.

Born in New York City, Herer grew up in Buffalo, N.Y, the youngest of three children. He dropped out of high school and joined the Army, serving in Korea. After his hitch, he picked up work as a sign painter.

In the early 1960s, he moved his wife and family to Los Angeles. A short time later, he divorced but stayed close with his children. He married and divorced twice more before marrying Jeannie Hawkins in 2000.

Herer came to marijuana relatively late in life, smoking his first joint at 30. He chucked the sign business and opened a head shop on Venice Beach, then made a lifelong friend in "Capt." Ed Adair, another head shop owner and a longtime marijuana advocate in Los Angeles.

In 1973, the men pledged to campaign until marijuana was legal, everyone imprisoned for possession was freed or they turned 84. Adair died in 1991 and Herer fought on.

Herer was arrested in 1981 for trespassing on federal property while collecting signatures for a California ballot initiative. He served 14 days in prison and started writing, "The Emperor Wears No Clothes."

After his release, Herer moved to Portland to open a head shop called The Third Eye, now a fixture on Southeast Hawthorne Boulevard. He completed the book in Portland, got it printed on hemp paper and began his years-long travels across the country.

In 2000, at a hemp festival near Eugene, Herer suffered a stroke and endured a long, agonizing recovery. He had improved in recent years and resumed his speaking schedule. He attributed his better health to daily use of a highly concentrated marijuana oil.

He resumed his heavy travel schedule, which included a Sept. 12 speech at Portland's Hempstalk at Kelley Point Park. He delivered a tub-thumbing speech, walked offstage and fell over from a heart attack.

He survived and eventually his wife rented a house in Eugene, where she cared for him until his death.

Herer is survived by his wife, six children, a brother and a sister. Funeral arrangements are not completed.

'Orange Sunshine: The Brotherhood of Eternal Love and Its Quest to Spread Peace, Love, and Acid to the World' by Nicholas Schou - latimes.com

'Orange Sunshine: The Brotherhood of Eternal Love and Its Quest to Spread Peace, Love, and Acid to the World' by Nicholas Schou - latimes.com

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Hawaii Senate Votes To Tax Pot $30/Ounce, Allow Dispensaries

Medical marijuana would be taxed $30 an ounce and sold at county-licensed "compassion centers" that would grow and sell marijuana to qualified patients and caregivers under a bill passed Tuesday by the Hawaii State Senate.
The bill to allow the sale and taxation of medical marijuana, Senate Bill 2213, was passed by lawmakers as they try to add up enough money to stop the state's projected $1.2 billion budget shortfall, reports Richard Borreca at the Honolulu Star-Bulletin.
The marijuana bill, after provoking debate on the Senate floor, eventually passed 20-4.
"I don't think this is helping to alleviate the drug problem," said Sen. Norman Sakamoto (D-Salt Lake/Foster Village), who had evidently wandered into the wrong debate.
Windward Oahu Republican Sen. Fed Hemmings said the FDA should test medical marijuana before people sell it.
Gary Hooser (D-Kauai/Nilhau) defended the bill, calling the arguments against it "offensive to many in our community whose only relief from cancer or HIV is through the use of marijuana."
"These votes show that Hawaii's Senate supports sensible marijuana policies that will serve the best interests of state citizens," said Eric M. McDaniel, a legislative analyst with the Marijuana Policy Project.
"Hawaii's most vulnerable citizens deserve safe and reliable access to their medicine, and no Hawaiian deserves to go to jail simply for using a substance that is safer than alcohol," McDaniel said. "If House members agree, I would strongly encourage them to pass these measures as well."
The Drug Policy Forum of Hawaii, headed by Pamela Lichty and Jeanne Ohta, and the Peaceful Sky Alliance, headed by Matt Rifkin, played crucial roles in getting these measures through the Senate, according to MPP.
The bill, with its special $30-an-ounce tax, now goes to the House for further consideration

Hippie busses forever

Hippie buses began in the 1960's and the tradition never went away. There are still people out there decorating buses in the '60's hippie style. The most famous bus was Furthur, the bus that Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters drove across the country. This journey was made famous in Tom Wolfe's book, "Electric Kool-aid Acid Test." The original bus is rotting away in a swamp on Ken Kesey's ranch in Oregon. In the late '80's they got their hands on another bus and Further II went on the road.

I knew a couple of people, in the '70's when I lived in Fullerton, California, who were bus nomads. One guy, Silverbear, would come by most years on his annual migration from somewhere in Oregon or Washington down to the desert of Arizona. His bus, "Patchs", got its picture in a 1979 book called Rolling Homes by Jane Lidz. The book has been out of print for awhile and it has become a collector's item. I understand Patchs might be still on the road. Another friend, Arthur, converted a step van into his home, and I visited another guy who owned a school bus with a couple of VW buses welded on top.

People are still converting buses to motor homes and some of them paint them wildly. I have seen several of them at the Burning Man Festival over the last ten years and they still regularly appear at Rainbow Gatherings. I found a few websites that have collected photos of these. One of them has about 40 photos of colorfully painted Volkswagen buses. Another one has pictures of various hippie buses.

My Gypsy Caravan project is an extension of the love affair I have had with buses and do-it-yourself mobile living for over 30 years.

L.A. Medical Marijuana Edibles: More Than Just Your Big Brother’s Pot Brownie

January 30, 2010 – Never mistake the homemade pot brownie found at a frat party for the marijuana dispensary’s pot brownie. So much more goes into the making of the medical-use treat — higher grade trimmings and quality butter, for starters. Plus a brownie like Big Sexy’s Sinful Sweets Peanut Butter Confession, available in most L.A. dispensaries, has just the right dosage and the correct strain of cannabis to give a patient suffering from depression an uplifting, energizing feeling. A patient looking for a muscle-relaxing edible, say, would probably want to go with the cannabis-laced ice cream instead.
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Because such things have to be carefully considered, patients with doctor’s recommendations need the guidance of caregivers at marijuana dispensaries. It wouldn’t be wise to walk into a store and randomly choose from the variety of edibles available: from oral sprays, pills and tinctures, to ice cream, pastries and granola bars, to peanut butter, tea and honey. Each is made with a different strain of cannabis — sativa, indica and hybrid — which produce different effects and are beneficial to specific illnesses.

For those who don’t have a doctor’s recommendation and have never been in a pot shop before, here’s a peek at some of the edibles available in medical marijuana dispensaries. The following were purchased at Zen Healing in West Hollywood by a medical marijuana patient with a doctor’s recommendation. Also included are his “tasting notes.”
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Our volunteer patient had a sweet tooth but for those more interested in savory edibles there are frozen personal-size pizzas (for around $25 at the Venice Beach Care Center) and bagel bites available as well as olive oil (usually one tablespoon a dose).

It’s not recommended to cook with the olive oil, however, since THC starts to break down at 315-320 degrees Fahrenheit. But if you ever do get a hankering for a vegetable LaGanja (lasagna) or Ganja Ganoush, you can always fly to Denver and visit the first pot restaurant in America, Ganja Gourmet.

US waves white flag in disastrous 'war on drugs'

After 40 years, Washington is quietly giving up on a futile battle that has spread corruption and destroyed thousands of lives

By Hugh O'Shaughnessy

Sunday, 17 January 2010

After 40 years of defeat and failure, America's "war on drugs" is being buried in the same fashion as it was born – amid bloodshed, confusion, corruption and scandal. US agents are being pulled from South America; Washington is putting its narcotics policy under review, and a newly confident region is no longer prepared to swallow its fatal Prohibition error. Indeed, after the expenditure of billions of dollars and the violent deaths of tens of thousands of people, a suitable epitaph for America's longest "war" may well be the plan, in Bolivia, for every family to be given the right to grow coca in its own backyard.

The "war", declared unilaterally throughout the world by Richard Nixon in 1969, is expiring as its strategists start discarding plans that have proved futile over four decades: they are preparing to withdraw their agents from narcotics battlefields from Colombia to Afghanistan and beginning to coach them in the art of trumpeting victory and melting away into anonymous defeat. Not surprisingly, the new strategy is being gingerly aired in the media of the US establishment, from The Wall Street Journal to the Miami Herald.

Prospects in the new decade are thus opening up for vast amounts of useless government expenditure being reassigned to the treatment of addicts instead of their capture and imprisonment. And, no less important, the ever-expanding balloon of corruption that the "war" has brought to heads of government, armies and police forces wherever it has been waged may slowly start to deflate.

Seattle's new city attorney to dismiss cases of pot possession

Seattle's new city attorney is dismissing all marijuana-possession cases, starting with those that were already under way under the old city attorney.

By Emily Heffter

Seattle Times staff reporter

Seattle's new city attorney is dismissing all marijuana-possession cases, starting with those that were already under way under the old city attorney.

City Attorney Pete Holmes, who beat incumbent Tom Carr in November, said he dismissed two marijuana-related cases in his first day on the job, and several others are about to be dismissed.

In addition, his new criminal division chief, Craig Sims, said he is reviewing about 50 more cases. Unless there are "out of the ordinary circumstances," Sims said, the office doesn't intend to file charges for marijuana possession.

"We're not going to prosecute marijuana-possession cases anymore," Holmes said Thursday during a public interview as part of Town Hall's Nightcap series. "I meant it when I said it" during the campaign.

Seattle voters approved Referendum 75 in 2003, making marijuana the lowest priority for local law enforcement. City records show that Carr still prosecuted many cases.

In the first six months of 2009, Carr declined eight of the 62 marijuana-related cases filed with his office, a city report shows. Of the cases he took up, marijuana was the only charge in 21 cases. In the second half of 2008, Carr dismissed 21 marijuana-related cases and filed 60 others. Of those, marijuana possession was the only charge in 20 cases.

Holmes' policy change comes amid several state-level efforts to decriminalize or legalize marijuana.

A ballot initiative filed Monday would legalize adult marijuana possession, manufacturing and sales in the state. The Legislature is also considering two bills to decriminalize and regulate marijuana, or to make it legal in the state.

The drug would remain illegal under federal law.

Push for Looser Pot Laws Gains Momentum.

Seattle — A push to legalize marijuana on the West Coast is picking up steam as Washington lawmakers and pot proponents in California and Oregon propose separate measures.

The Washington state legislature will hold a preliminary vote Wednesday on whether to sell pot in state liquor stores, though even its authors say the bill is unlikely to pass. The same day in California, backers of a well-funded ballot measure to legalize marijuana are expected to file more than enough signatures to put the initiative before state voters in November.

Activists have also been busy in Washington state, with one group filing a marijuana-legalization initiative last Monday to put the issue on the November ballot. Activists in Oregon, meanwhile, say they have collected more than half of the signatures they need by July to allow a vote on whether the state should set up a system of medical-marijuana dispensaries.

The efforts are part of a national marijuana-legalization movement that has lately been emboldened by several factors, including laws allowing marijuana for medical purposes. The recession may be another reason. With many states suffering big budget deficits, for instance, legalization advocates say the states could benefit from new taxes on the sale of marijuana. In addition, the Obama administration appears to have taken a more-mellow attitude on medical marijuana as societal views about the drug evolve. In a poll last week of 500 adults in Washington state by SurveyUSA, 56% of respondents said legalizing marijuana is a good idea.

“We’re beyond a tipping point culturally,” said Roger Goodman, a Democrat representing Kirkland, Wash., and other Seattle suburbs in the Washington legislature who co-authored the legalization bill, known as HB 2401. “Now we’re at a point where we’re figuring out the safest way to end prohibition.”

West Coast states—especially California—are particularly in the vanguard of the marijuana-legalization push given the region’s more-liberal attitudes toward a variety of issues. Legalization measures in other states, such as Massachusetts and New Hampshire, haven’t gotten as far, said Allen St. Pierre, executive director of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws.

Washington lawmakers will vote on a second bill next week that seeks to reduce the penalties for possessing small amounts of marijuana to a $100 fine from a crime with jail time.

Still, there is deep opposition to legalizing marijuana in Washington state from law-enforcement groups and chemical-dependency organizations, many of which argue it would make the drug even more accessible to teenagers than it is currently. Also many argue that marijuana is a “gateway drug,” meaning it will lead those using it to moveon to other drugs.

“What message does legalizing marijuana send to the youth of Washington?” asked Riley Harrison, a ninth-grade student, before a packed committee hearing this week in Olympia. “That you’re willing to gamble our future for a little tax revenue?”

Washington, California and Oregon are three of 13 states that have medical-marijuana laws, which permit patients with doctors’ notes to use the drug. The New Jersey legislature last Monday approved a medical-marijuana bill that will make it the 14th state and outgoing Gov. Jon Corzine is expected to sign it before leaving office next week.

The legality of selling medical marijuana remains tenuous. Federal law considers pot illegal, and enforcement of state laws varies widely among California cities and counties. Last October, though, the Obama administration said it wouldn’t aggressively pursue users of medical marijuana where it is legal.

The legalization ballot measure in California was organized by a pot seller in Oakland, Calif., Richard Lee, whose group says the petition now has more than 700,000 signatures, far more than the 434,000 or so it needs to qualify for the November ballot. The measure would let local governments determine how to regulate and tax pot sales.

So far, Mr. Lee says that his business—which includes a medical-pot club and marijuana-business school dubbed Oaksterdam University, named after the city of Amsterdam where marijuana is decriminalized—has spent “a little more than $1 million” supporting the pot-legalization initiative. Mr. Lee says he is optimistic the measure will pass.

An April survey by the Field Poll found that 56% of California voters support legalizing pot and taxing its proceeds as a way of mitigating the state’s financial crisis.

The California measure’s opponents include various law-enforcement groups represented by lobbyist John Lovell. He says the California Peace Officers’ Association, California Narcotic Officers Association and California Police Chiefs’ Association are concerned that legalizing pot will lead more impaired drivers and embolden illegal-drug cartels to gain control over a legal industry. “The bottom line for all three groups…is we already have significant criminal and societal problems with alcohol abuse,” said Mr. Lovell.

Source: Wall Street Journal (US)
Author: Nick Wingfield and Justin Scheck
Published: January 15, 2010
Copyright: 2010 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
Contact: wsj.ltrs@wsj.com
Website: http://www.wsj.com/