On Thursday March 4, 2010 a group of patients from Alabamians for Compassionate Care took a trip to Mobile, Alabama to attend the Heads vs. Feds debate between long time High Times Editor Steve Hager and retired DEA agent Robert Stutman which took place at the University of South Alabama. For those of you unfamiliar with this production it’s basically a cannabis consumer and advocate for legalization debating a DEA agent and also has audience participation. It was the first one I have attended, although it has been to Alabama before. I figured it would be dynamite and I was not disappointed.

Representing for Alabamians for Compassionate Care were yours truly, Christie O’Brien, Chris and DJ Butts, Sam Barksdale, Phillip Nettles and my son Alex Nall (who is a supporter but not a consumer). We arrived early and got front row seats. I had inquired the day before how many people were expected to attend and the lady at Jaguar Productions told me that the student ballroom had been set up to seat 150. Chris Butts printed out 250 Compassionate Care flyers…just to be safe… and Alex voluntarily stationed himself outside the entrance and made sure everyone who came through the door got a flyer. However, there wound up being about 400 people who attended the event so we ran out fairly quickly. I was joyously surprised to see that much interest in the topic of marijuana legalization. Judging from the response throughout the debate a good 99% of attendees want marijuana legalized. There is some very real momentum in the great state of Alabama right now!

Phillip had brought a video camera and tri-pod to film the event but we were told that only NORML would be allowed to film. Not sure whose rule that was, but they were serious about it. A local TV news crew showed up and was not allowed to film either. However, it provided a very good opportunity for me to demonstrate to the ACC members how to bum rush the media and get them the information that they need to cover this issue in Alabama. As soon as I realized the media would not be allowed to film I grabbed Sam Barksdale, who is a Mobile resident, patient, and the Alabama Compassionate Care coordinator for South Alabama, and took him over to meet the reporter. I introduced them, gave the reporter one of our flyers (they were incredible BTW THANKS CHRIS!), told her about the bill and that we expected it to come up in committee on either the 24th or 31st of March. I then presented Sam to her as a local patient to interview. I’m pretty sure Sam will be getting a call as we get closer to time for the bill to drop.

However, all chance for video was not lost. A few of our members used their digital cameras and cell phones to record as much of the event as possible. And, one of our members, Sam Barksdale was chosen by Steve Hager to film with his personal video camera.

About ten minutes before the event started Steve Hager and Robert Stutman arrived. I introduced myself to Steve who said he knew me and he inquired about the latest with Marc Emery. At one time Cannabis Culture and High Times were rivals and not always on the best of terms. However, we all support Marc Emery and completely disagree with how he is being treated by both the American and Canadian governments. Steve asked for my card and said he would introduce me to the audience during the debate. He then asked Sam Barksdale to film the event with his personal video camera, which was a very neat thing for him to do. Sam was very excited.

The debate began with a short film giving the backgrounds of Hager and Stutman. Hager was presented as the hippie and Stutman as the hard charging government agent, who is obviously opposed to anything hippie. My only real critique with the whole event is the portrayal of cannabis consumers as ‘hippies’….even if some of us are. I realize and respect that Steve Hager is of the 60’s generation (I often wish I was) and mean no disrespect by my critique. It’s just that people who consume cannabis are a very diverse bunch. Yet, when this issue comes up in politics or in public we are all forced to fight the damn culture war instead of focusing on the drug war. Not everyone who consumes cannabis dresses in tie-dye, wears Jesus sandals, and burns patchouli incense. That being said, the film was giving backgrounds on the participants and that is Steve Hager’s background and it was interesting.

After the film the debate began with the moderator laying out the rules and informing the audience that they could participate by asking questions at the end. However, she said, there would be no discussion or back and forth on the questions. Basically, it was ask your question and sit down.

Steve and Robert each started out by saying that they are actually friends, respect each other, and have been doing this show for ten years. They each asked that the audience be respectful and not boo either party.

Steve started by giving the history of marijuana, talking about its numerous medicinal qualities, about why it is illegal (racist policy, big pharma etc), industrial hemp, prisons etc. Here is a video of part of his opening statement. You must have a facebook account to view it. Hopefully it will be on YouTube shortly. Steve Hager opening statements video.

Robert Stutman opened by telling the audience about his life as a DEA agent, about how he had a close friend and fellow agent killed by the mob over drugs and how that affected him. He also told the audience that he did not think prison was the place for drug users, that he preferred forced treatment instead. I felt like that was an attempt to counter any hard questions from the audience before we even had a chance to ask them…a sort of “I’m really on your side, so don’t be too hard on me” kind of thing. He countered Steve Hager’s opening remarks by saying that Steve wasn’t telling everyone the truth.

In response to Steve’s argument about marijuana being kept illegal (by big pharma) because it can be grown by anyone and is free medicine Stutman said, “Well penicillin can be grown by anyone too for free and it hasn’t been outlawed and there aren’t millions of people growing it for free medicine.”

Not kidding. That is what he said. Despite the glaring reasons why growing penicillin at home and using it as medicine are impractical to the point of impossibility. With marijuana all you have to do is dry the plant and smoke it, cook with it etc…The audience didn’t buy it for a second.

In response to the medicinal qualities it was the same ol’ same ol’ one would expect from a government official who has made his living off the drug war. Stutman asserted that; “Marijuana has no medicinal value, there is no research that proves anything, there is Marinol for sick people, that only two chemicals found in marijuana have ever been proven to have any medical value, it’s a gateway drug, that it leads to schizophrenia and there was an article coming out in the New York Times the next day about that very thing.”

Of course, what he didn’t say is that the same study comes out of Australia every year, that no one with any credibility in the medical community will say they know what causes schizophrenia or that schizophrenia symptoms usually present right after the onset of puberty or in the early 20’s and that those are the age groups used for this study.

In response to Hager’s assertion that industrial hemp could really help save the environment, produce jobs, and be a boon to the economy Stutman replied; “What Steve didn’t tell you is that Canada legalized industrial hemp a few years ago. In the beginning there were (over 300 I think he said) farmers growing it and now there are only 6. He also said if hemp was such great stuff then why, in countries where it is legal, isn’t everyone wearing it?

The back and forth went on for about 15 minutes. I can’t remember the whole thing verbatim so here are 8 video clips from the event HERE.

Finally, my favorite part of the program arrived….Q & A. As soon as the moderator said GO I was out of my chair and at the mic. I had decided to ask the DEA agent a question often posed by my friend and fellow reformer Dean Becker of the Drug Truth Network. Here is the video of me asking the question and the unbelievable non-response given by Stutman.

Name one Drug War objective that has ever been met.

As you can see, Mr. Stutman was unable to answer the question so he got on his bike and rode it round and round the room. When they do that you know you have won. Since we were not able to ask follow up questions or discuss the issue further I was not able to counter his claim that the Drug War isn’t actually a war. Had I been able to I would have asked him how he defined war. In my definition of war armed paramilitary SWAT teams riding in armored personnel carriers, kicking in doors at 3 a.m., using flash bang grenades and summarily extra-judicially executing non-violent drug offenders or cramming them in POW camps (US prisons) IS WAR. Except, in this war, the ‘enemy’ (American citizens) aren’t allowed to fight back or defend themselves.

I would have also asked him that if 45% fewer American’s smoked marijuana now than in the 70’s how come arrests for marijuana are at an all time high with over 800,000 being arrested last year and 90% of those for simple possession for personal use.

At that time I had to leave and get my son back on his campus before 9 p.m. so I missed whatever other questions were asked. I do know that Chris Butts asked Steve to tell the audience why there is such a dismal amount of medical research in the US and who was blocking it. When I arrived back the event was still going on so I returned to my seat to finish it out. During the closing remarks Steve introduced me to the audience, which I greatly appreciated. Here is that video clip.

Steve Hager introduces Loretta Nall to crowd

After that introduction and as soon as the event concluded literally hundreds of students packed our part of the room asking how they could get involved with ACC and drug policy reform in Alabama in general. Around 200 signed up and three different young ladies volunteered to head up an ACC chapter on campus. I am also going to get them started with an SSDP chapter and a NORML chapter.

I only saw 6 or 8 people lined up to talk to the DEA agent.

Our crew went over and talked to Steve for a little bit and had some photos taken with him. There are other pics out there and I will track them down later.

I had a chance to speak to the moderator of the event afterward. She thanked me for kicking the Q&A off. She is a communications professor and has done work with some anti-drug groups. I told her that I would have very much enjoyed being allowed to counter the DEA agents claims and to have had more of a discussion with him. She agreed and said that the next time they present the program they will have me on a panel along with some other members of the audience and perhaps a local policeman. We exchanged info. I am looking forward to her call.

All in all the event was worth spending 10 hours in a car to get there and back. If you have a chance to attend a Heads vs. Feds event I strongly recommend that you do so.

Source.

This article is posted in order to illustrate the degree to which Marijuana Nay-Sayers are willing to distort the truth.

March 8, 2010 – The left says he was a right-winger; the conservatives say that he was a leftist. What is abundantly clear, from reading his Internet commentaries, is that Pentagon shooter John Patrick Bedell was a psychotic pothead. He hated a government that he believed was standing in the way of his desire to use, grow and glorify marijuana. He virtually worshipped the drug. “I’m a cannabis enthusiast,” he proclaimed.

In terms of ideology, he expressed conservative ideas about limiting the role of government, but opposed the war in Iraq and favored open borders.

But rather than try and make silly ideological points by accusing Bedell of being either left or right, there is an urgent need for the blogosphere-and the major media-to address the question of how he became criminally psychotic and a patsy for conspiracy theories. The answer is marijuana, which alters the ability of the mind to comprehend reality but which is depicted by most of the media as safe and harmless.

This connection-between pot and mental illness-is a matter of the medical record but is conveniently being ignored in the many stories about this young man’s strange journey and tragic end.

The book, “Marijuana and Madness,” cites studies and evidence from around the world, some of it going back 40 years, linking the use of marijuana-supposedly a “soft” drug-to mental illnesses, including schizophrenia and psychosis. One of the latest studies finds that “Marijuana use at a young age significantly increased the risk of psychosis in young adulthood…”

The public laughs at the old propaganda films such as “Reefer Madness,” which depict marijuana smokers as crazed zombies. However, the Pentagon rampage was likely triggered by marijuana-inducedpsychosis . Bedell was not only a heavy marijuana user and had been busted for possession and growing the drug, but dedicated much of his life to glorifying the substance.

He had declared cannabis “to be one of the most useful plants known to humanity” and said that he looked forward to the day when “billions and billions of carefully cultivated, highly valuable cannabis plants [are] growing throughout the United States with complete security of property.” He said he envisioned “the use of cannabis as a monetary system.”

The “Medical Marijuana” Scam

The rampage at the Pentagon has also raised disturbing questions about the Obama Administration’s policy of allowing “medical marijuana” dispensaries in such places as California, where Bedell was living, to operate free from fear of federal prosecution. President Obama and his Attorney General Eric Holder have been accused of encouraging marijuana use by refusing to use federal resources to prosecute “medical marijuana” users and the “dispensaries” which supply them with the illegal dope.

He reportedly claimed during one pot bust that he had a “medical marijuana” card which entitled him to use marijuana for “health” reasons.

Bedell, 36, had a bachelor’s degree in science and was enrolled in graduate school. A professor called him helpful, hardworking and intelligent. At some point, however, he developed an addiction for marijuana and apsychosis that led to the Pentagon rampage. How many other intelligent young people with good backgrounds and a good future get exposed to marijuana and other drugs and throw it all away?

One can hope that the tragic story of John Patrick Bedell and his victims will cause our major media to review the dangerous implications of allowing more and more people access to the drug, on the spurious grounds that it is somehow medicinal, and start a much-needed examination of the billionaires and organizations pushing drug legalization in America.

Billionaire George Soros has been called “an extremely evil person” by Calvina Fay of the Drug Free America Foundation for putting millions of dollars into groups like the Drug Policy Alliance dedicated to legalization of pot and other drugs. Another billionaire, Peter Lewis, chairman of Progressive Insurance Company, has also put millions of dollars into the cause. Lewis, who was arrested in New Zealand and admitted to three charges of importing drugs after customs officers found two ounces of hashish and 1.7 ounces of marijuana in his luggage, is being honored with the “America’s Future Lifetime Leadership Award” at the June 8 awards gala of the “progressive” Campaign for America’s Future.

Conspiracy Theory

While he thought the U.S. Government had itself been taken over by a drug-trafficking cabal, Bedell was such a believer in marijuana that he tried to grow it out in the open, on the balcony of his apartment. He wrote, “I deliberately did not seek permission of any kind, and did not obtain a doctor’s recommendation for the use of cannabis, which would have made my garden relatively acceptable under California state law.”

Not surprisingly, Bedell was busted by the police, adding fuel to his anti-government mentality.

He believed conspiracies, such as an alleged plot to cover-up government involvement in the 9/11 terrorist attacks. “This organization,” referring to the alleged conspiracy pulling the strings behind the U.S. Government, “like so many murderous governments throughout history, would see the sacrifice of thousands of its citizens, in an event such as the September 11 attacks, as a small cost in order to perpetuate its barbaric control,” he said.

He apparently targeted the Pentagon because of his belief that military officials had covered up the alleged murder of a Marine Colonel with knowledge of drug trafficking.

Society Reaps What Soros Sows

Although drug legalization has been mostly a left-wing cause, funded by “progressive” billionaires such as George Soros and Peter Lewis, the libertarian Cato Institute has been promoting legalization of dope for many years. It, too, has been funded by Soros.

“I smoke marijuana, and I like it,” declared Cato research fellow Will Wilkinson in a controversial and eye-opening column. He added that “the casual pleasure marijuana has delivered is orders of magnitude greater than the pain it has assuaged, and pleasure matters too. That’s probably why Barack Obama smoked up the second and third times: because he liked it.”

John Patrick Bedell liked it too; in fact, he was a marijuana addict. But he inflicted a lot of pain on other people, including the two guards he shot at the Pentagon.

The pain has also been evident in other cases, such as admitted pot lover 16-year-old Jeff Weise, who murdered nine people and injured five others in Red Lake, Minnesota, in 2005, and Charles “Andy” Williams, a regular marijuana user who smoked the drug just before killing two schoolmates and wounding 13 others in a San Diego suburban school on March 5, 2001.

Legal Dope is the Next Step

These dangers are rising because of the growing number of people with access to marijuana on so-called medical grounds. However, “medical marijuana” has been shown to be a fraud and a cruel hoax, as those on the inside of the pro-pot movement have been caught on film admitting that getting the public to accept the notion that smoking marijuana alleviates health problems is a scam designed to promote the eventual legalization of dope.

Bedell’s psychiatrist is quoted as saying that he used marijuana to “self-medicate,” which sounds ridiculous until you realize that thousands of people with real and imaginary medical conditions, including mental illness, are currently “self-medicating” by getting “medical marijuana” at marijuana “dispensaries” in California and other states.

I visited one of these places in Oakland, California, operating under the name of the “Blue Sky Coffeeshop,” and saw lines of people flashing “medical marijuana” cards to get their marijuana in brown paper sacks. I took a tour of Oaksterdam University, also known as “America’s First Cannabis College,” which teaches people how to grow high-quality dope. Oaksterdam had a big cardboard cut-out of the pot movement’s hero, Barack Obama, in the lobby.

Oaksterdam founder Richard Lee is proposing a November ballot measure to legalize marijuana statewide and dramatically expand access to the drug.

The Bedell case demonstrates that people who have been led to believe that marijuana can alleviate their physical or mental problems may be coming come down with far more serious psychological problems that can threaten the lives of the rest of us.

House Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Rep. Lamar Smith has said that “By allowing marijuana dispensaries to operate free from fear of prosecution, the Administration is promoting the use, and therefore the demand for marijuana. Marijuana fields operated by Mexican drug trafficking organizations are most prevalent in California, Oregon and Washington-three of the 13 states that allow the use of medicinal marijuana.”

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) says that “no sound scientific studies supported medical use of marijuana for treatment in the United States, and no animal or human data supported the safety or efficacy of marijuana for general medical use. There are alternative FDA-approved medications in existence for treatment of many of the proposed uses of smoked marijuana.”

Bad Timing by the Pot Lobby

Ironically, on the same day that Bedell attacked the Pentagon, the popular left-wing website AlterNet ran a column by Paul Armentano insisting that the mainstream media “are running wild with the absurd notion that marijuana use causes psychological problems” such as schizophrenia and psychosis. It turns out that Armentano is the deputy director of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) and the co-author of the book Marijuana Is Safer. The book has been endorsed by such figures as David Boaz of the libertarian Cato Institute and “progressive” writer Barbara Ehrenreich.

Rather than publicize the marijuana-psychosis connection, the major media have shied away from it, probably because some journalists use pot themselves as a “recreational” drug.

A 1,300-word article in the Washington Post on Sunday, “Pentagon shooter’s spiral from early promise to madness,” waited until the 21st paragraph to note that Bedell “smoked marijuana frequently” and that a family member pleaded with him to stop because “it was making his thinking more disordered.”

Obama Won’t Enforce the Law

A week before Bedell went on his shooting rampage at the Pentagon, parent drug-prevention volunteers from California, Oregon, Maryland, and Virginia met in Washington, D.C. with the office of U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder. They told the Attorney General’s staff that statements from some officials of the Obama Administration appeared to support the claims of drug users and traffickers that smoking marijuana “could legally be approved by State law.”

Joyce Nalepka, president of Drug Free Kids: America’s Challenge (DFK) and former president of Nancy Reagan’s National Federation of Parents for Drug Free Youth, appealed for help from the Obama Department of Justice (DOJ) to combat the widening massive campaign by professional drug legalization lobbyists, drug users and drug traffickers to legalize “medical marijuana.”

Other members of the anti-drug coalition meeting with DOJ officials were Shirley Morgan, Oregon parent drug prevention founder of the Mt. Hood Coalition Against Drug Crime; Roger Morgan, Chairman, Coalition For A Drug-Free California; and DeForest Rathbone, chairman of National Institute of Citizen Anti-drug Policy.

In a news release, they said, “Widespread publicity falsely portraying marijuana as a medicine convinces kids that pot is harmless thus leading to increasing teen drug use…” They cited a study showing that teenagers are smoking tobacco less and marijuana more.

They said pro-drug messages are coming from the efforts of “convicted billionaire international finance swindler and drug-legalization advocate George Soros,” who “has provided significant financial support for professional drug legalization lobbyists and for their elaborate public relations campaigns to obtain state referendums approving ‘medical marijuana.’”

Soros Calls the Tune

The problem, they noted, is that “Soros and the professional drug legalization lobbyists also provided substantial financial support for the Obama presidential campaign,” and that Obama himself had said that it was entirely “entirely appropriate” for “medical marijuana” to be prescribed in some cases.

The anti-drug activists noted that Obama officials have followed up with more statements that have given the public the impression that using marijuana will not be punished by federal law enforcement authorities. They point to the following:

*
Shortly after assuming office, President Obama’s spokesman NickShapiro said that “The president believes that federal resources should not be used to circumvent state laws (authorizing medical marijuana.)”
*
In a statement on February 25, 2009, Attorney General EricHolder said,”What the president said during the campaign … will be consistent with what we will be doing here in law enforcement.What (Obama) said during the campaign … is now American policy.”
*
A drug legalization lobbyistresponding to the above statement bragged,”Holder’s statement marks a dramatic shift in U.S. drug policy…”

Such statements, the anti-drug activists said, have “caused a widespread perception among parents that drug money campaign contributions may have bought for the drug traffickers and drug users a de facto license to sell and use marijuana under the fraudulent claim that it is medicine.”

To refute that perception, they called on President Obama and Attorney General Holder to “immediately and forcefully reaffirm federal primacy of drug laws and authorize a massive counteroffensive against the illegal trafficking and use of marijuana in states where it has skyrocketed under their leadership.”

Both Maryland and D.C. are working to pass pro-drug legislation, with the Maryland legislature scheduled to hear a bill on March 18 in Annapolis.

Nalepka noted that, during the meeting with senior Department of Justice staff, the group of anti-drug activists was told that the federal government did not have the resources to go after the problem of “medical marijuana.”

Nalepka countered, “That’s why we’re here-we want the government to get the resources. It is well-known that marijuana is both physically and psychologically addictive and is a definite stepping stone to many drugs.”

She concluded, “Allowing this to continue is treason, i.e., a betrayal of trust, against our own children and grandchildren.” by Cliff Kincaid Source.