White House Report Acknowledges Few Scientists Permitted To Assess Cannabis Use In Humans

Posted by Ninja Smoker at 9:02 am on July 22, 2011

http://www.theweedblog.com/white-house-report-acknowledges-few-scientists-permitted-to-assess-cannabis-use-in-humans/

Only fourteen researchers in the United States are legally permitted to conduct research assessing the effect of inhaled cannabis in human subjects, according to data included in the White House’s 2011 National Drug Control Strategy, released last week.

In a section of the report entitled ‘Medical Marijuana,’ the administration states, “In the United States, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) has approved 109 researchers to perform bona fide research with marijuana, marijuana extracts, and marijuana derivatives such as cannabidiol and cannabinol.” However, it later clarifies that of these 109 scientists, only fourteen “are approved to conduct research with smoked marijuana on human subjects.”

Among those scientists licensed to work with either cannabis or its constituents — primarily in animal models — most are involved in research to assess the drug’s “abuse potential, physical/psychological effects, [and] adverse effects,” the report stated.

In 2010, a spokesperson for the US National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) — the federal agency that must approve any US clinical trial involving marijuana – told the New York Times: “[O]ur focus is primarily on the negative consequences of marijuana use. We generally do not fund research focused on the potential beneficial medical effects of marijuana.”

Earlier this month, DEA Administrator Michele Leonhart denied a nine-year-old petition seeking to initiate hearings regarding the federal classification of cannabis as a schedule I substance, stating in part, “[T]here are no adequate and well-controlled studies proving efficacy.”

Commenting on the report, NORML Deputy Director Paul Armentano said: “Only in an environment of absolute criminal prohibition would this or any administration purport to the public that it is acceptable to allow no more than fourteen researchers to clinically study a substance consumed by tens of millions of Americans for therapeutic or recreational purposes. This acknowledgement illustrates once again the administration’s supposed commitment to ‘scientific integrity’ does not apply to cannabis.”

For more information, please contact Allen St. Pierre, NORML Executive Director, at (202) 483-5500 or Paul Armentano, NORML Deputy Director at: paul@norml.org.

Can You Smoke Resin?

What is Resin and How to Smoke it Out of a Bowl

Resin is the byproduct of smoking marijuana and sticks to basically any surface that the marijuana is being smoked out of. The resin is composed of a lot of tar, ash, carbon, and cannabinoids that are inherently found in cannabis. Many people say that this is the unhealthiest way to smoke because of the immense amount of tar that you are inhaling. Unfortunately, sometimes there are difficult financial times or they maybe a drought in your neighborhood.

If this occurs, and you want to use your resin it is pretty easy to get medicated off the resin. You just have to put the flame that comes from your lighter and burn the resin that is in your bowl. A good circular motion makes sure your resin burns evenly.

Another way to hit your resin is scrape all of it from your bowl, in to a ball, and hit the ball. Very simple.

Now, we will get in to the different  areas where you can find resin. Resin pretty much coats your bowl from top to bottom so you can hit the resin in many different ways. Put your thumb over your bowl; you are going to use your bowl as the shot gun. Now put your flame up to the shot gun and take a hit while keeping the flame lit. If you do this correctly the flame will light everything underneath and around your bowl. There are mass amounts of resin reserves in this area.

Now you can use the shotgun as a mouth piece. Keep your thumb on top of the bowl and put your flame by the mouth piece that you would normally use to hit the bowl. There is resin here too.

WARNING: Taking resin hits can heat up your bowl extremely quickly. The bowl can burn you, so let it cool if you are hitting it vigorously.

 

From theweedstreetjournal.com

Medical Marijuana Research Conference To Be Held in Illinois

International Medical Marijuana Research Conference Held This Week Near Chicago
White House sponsors conference only days after it threatens medical marijuana states

Chicago, IL — Starting tomorrow, the International Cannabinoid Research Society (ICRS) will hold its 21st annual symposium in St. Charles, Illinois, just outside of Chicago . Notably, this year’s symposium is sponsored in part by an array of pharmaceutical companies, the U.S. National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), and ElSohly Laboratories, Inc., the federal government’s only licensed source of research-grade cannabis (marijuana) used in therapeutic studies. The symposium features poster presentations by four members of the Multidisciplinary Scientific Advisory Board of Americans for Safe Access — Dr. William Courtney, Dr. Jeff Hergenrather, Jahan Marcu and Dr. Amanda Reiman.

This important public health symposium is taking place less than a week after Deputy Attorney General James Cole inconspicuously issued a memorandum on June 29th to U.S Attorneys, defending the government’s threats of criminal prosecution against local and state officials, as well as others producing or distributing medical marijuana even if such actions are legal under state law. Rarely has the federal government threatened public officials over the development and passage of their own public health laws.

“This symposium and its sponsors shows that medical cannabis is a valid medication that has been recognized and studied by scientists right under our noses,” said Steph Sherer, Executive Director of Americans for Safe Access (ASA), the country’s leading medical marijuana advocacy group. “meanwhile, the federal government continues its antiquated, political campaign to undermine the ability of millions of patients to safely and legally obtain their medication.”

Part of what’s happening this week includes a presentation by Temple University doctoral student, ASA Advisory Board member, and cannabinoid researcher Jahan Marcu, focusing on research around cannabinoid receptors in the brain to better understand how and which parts of the cannabis plant work best with the human body. Marcu previously published findings in the Journal of Molecular Cancer Therapeutics on a study showing enhanced anti-cancer effects with certain compounds found in the cannabis plant. For his presentation in 2009, Marcu received the prestigious “Billy Martin Award” from the ICRS.

Dr. Amanda Reiman will be presenting on dispensary-based research and models for patient access to whole-plant medicine. While an ASA Advisory Board member, Reiman was also a postdoctoral fellow in the School of Public Health at the University of California, Berkeley, and is currently a medical cannabis researcher who regularly presents at ICRS and other related conferences. Reiman’s research on the impact of localized medical marijuana distribution on patients is particularly relevant given the federal effort to undermine the regulation of such facilities.

“The federal government cannot both support medical marijuana and undermine its legal implementation,” continued Sherer. “This contradictory policy must end.” The government has multiple options currently available, not the least of which is a 9-year-old petition to reclassify marijuana now pending before the Drug Enforcement Administration, as well as Congressional legislation recently introduced by Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA), HR 1983, which also calls for rescheduling marijuana from its position as a dangerous drug with no medical value.

Available for Interviews:
ASA Advisory Board members presenting at the ICRS symposium
Dr. Jeff Hergenrather 707-823-3000
Dr. Amanda Reiman 510-847-2405
Jahan Marcu 215-828-9183
Dr. William Courtney 707-353-0627

Further information:
International Cannabinoid Research Society symposium: http://www.icrs2011.org/
Last week’s memo from U.S. Deputy Attorney General James Cole: http://AmericansForSafeAccess.org/downloads/James_Cole_memo_06_29_2011.pdf

Map of Cannabis Use Around the World

I came across this wonderful map at the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime in their very interesting Cannabis Market PDF.

The darker blue areas show where cannabis smokers (or as they call it ‘level of abuse’) are more than 18% of the population.

The data is relatively recent and clearly shows that the US, Europe and Australia love their weed! (or hash)

Read more about World Map of Cannabis Use | Dope Smoker by null

this is great…

Top 20 Marijuana Quotes

Here are some more the funniest, weirdest, and all around best marijuana quotes…

20. “Considering the fact that I’ve used it in the past, and know what it is, and seen the results of it, I don’t view marijuana as a dangerous drug.” – Tim Robbins

19. “I think people need to be educated to the fact that marijuana is not a drug. Marijuana is an herb and a flower. God put it here. If He put it here and He wants it to grow, what gives the government the right to say that God is wrong?” – Willie Nelson

18. “I wasn’t driving down the wrong side of the street, smoking marijuana, waving my gun out the window.” – Coolio

17. “If you substitute marijuana for tobacco and alcohol, you’ll add eight to 24 years to your life.” – Jack Herer

16. “Instead of taking five or six of the prescriptions, I decided to go a natural route and smoke marijuana.” – Melissa Etheridge

15. “I enjoy smoking cannabis and see no harm in it”. – Jennifer Aniston

14. “If you ain’t got a good job and you ain’t smokin’ weed, then I don’t know what the fuck you are doin’ wit your life.” -Kat Williams

13. “They lie about marijuana. Tell you pot-smoking makes you unmotivated. Lie! When you’re high, you can do everything you normally do, just as well. You just realize that it’s not worth the fucking effort. There is a difference.” -Bill Hicks

12. “When you smoke the herb, it reveals you to yourself.” -Bob Marley

11. “That is not a drug. It’s a leaf,” – Arnold Schwarzenegger

 

10. “Even if one takes every reefer madness allegation of the prohibitionists at face value, marijuana prohibition has done far more harm to far more people than marijuana ever could.”- William F. Buckley Jr.

9. “Forty million Americans smoked marijuana; the only ones who didn’t like it were Judge Ginsberg, Clarence Thomas and Bill Clinton.” – Jay Leno

8. “I now have absolute proof that smoking even one marijuana cigarette is equal in brain damage to being on Bikini Island during an H-bomb blast” – Ronald Reagan

7. “The drug is really quite a remarkably safe one for humans, although it is really quite a dangerous one for mice and they should not use it.” – J.W.D Henderson Director of the Bureau of Human Drugs, Health and Welfare, Canada

6. “Casual drug users should be taken out and shot” – Darryl Gates Head of Los Angeles Police Department United States Senate Judiciary Committee

5. “When I was in England, I experimented with marijuana a time or two, and I didn’t like it. I didn’t inhale and never tried it again.” –Bill Clinton

4. “When I was a kid I inhaled frequently. That was the point.” – Barack Obama

3. “Now, like, I’m President. It would be pretty hard for some drug guy to come into the White House and start offering it up, you know? … I bet if they did, I hope I would say, ‘Hey, get lost. We don’t want any of that.'” – George W. Bush

2. “I think pot should be legal. I don’t smoke it, but I like the smell of it.” – Andy Warhol

1. “I used to smoke marijuana. But I’ll tell you something: I would only smoke it in the late evening. Oh, occasionally the early evening, but usually the late evening – or the mid-evening. Just the early evening, midevening and late evening. Occasionally, early afternoon, early midafternoon, or perhaps the late-midafternoon. Oh, sometimes the early-mid-late-early morning. . . . But never at dusk.” – Steve Martin

Medical Marijuana Ads Help Dying Industry

Ads for pot face fewer regulations than ads for cigarettes and booze

By Anna Rendall, SF Public Press

Medical marijuana advertising is taking off, propping up the fortunes of ailing media companies that have seen income from other business sectors plummet in the recession.

Advertisements offering free edibles for new patients and products such as “super silver haze” are helping to keep the San Francisco Bay Guardian, SF Weekly and East Bay Express in business. Similar ads have even started cropping up — tentatively — in more staid publications, such as the San Francisco Chronicle.

Ads for pot are growing so fast in part because they face fewer regulations and restrictions than marketing materials for cigarettes and alcohol. The only real regulation is one requiring the ads to warn customers that they need a doctor’s recommendation.

“Marijuana advertising is a small percentage of our total advertising — we wish that we had more,” said Mina Bajraktarevic, advertising sales manager at the Bay Guardian, whose back page has become a wall of green with medical marijuana advertising.

“We’ve been involved in this for years,” said Bruce Brugmann, publisher of the Bay Guardian. “We haven’t heard    any complaints.”

Not all media companies are comfortable with pot ads, and some have equivocated about whether to accept them. Some advertisers were waiting to see the outcome of the vote Nov. 2 on Proposition 19, the state pot legalization bill, before agreeing to take money from the burgeoning industry.

Ten years ago most medical cannabis clubs were intentionally low-key and relied only on word of mouth. Being illegal, they were inconsistently tolerated by the authorities.

Now, with rapidly liberalized enforcement policies, the most successful medical cannabis businesses are the ones that get their brand name out to the public. Dozens of the businesses are racing to capture the pot-smoking community’s mindshare, and are pumping hundreds of thousands of dollars into local media this year to do so.

“We probably spend around $2,500 to $3,000 a month on advertising,” said Kevin Reed, president of the Green Cross, a medical cannabis dispensary on Market Street between Eighth and Ninth streets. “We’re in a world where you’re competing with all these fly-by-night businesses who don’t have to follow the rules — they’re not regulated.” Until recently, more than half a dozen dispensaries had failed to register their businesses with the San Francisco Department of Public Health.

One of the pioneers of pot advertising was KUSF Radio. Four years ago, the station, run by the University of San Francisco, had a Green Cross-underwritten public-service announcement that ran on 90.3 FM.

But sometimes it’s hard for pot clubs to buy ads; several have lined up ad agreements only to have them retroactively rejected.

In May, Facebook canceled the Green Cross’ existing advertisements on the site. MediCann, a group of clinics specializing in medical marijuana evaluations, also had its Facebook ads snuffed.

In August, the Green Cross paid in full for a slot on a huge electronic billboard on Interstate 280 at the Serramonte Shopping Center in Daly City — only to see it taken down a day later.

The circumstances surrounding that reversal were not quite clear. SF Weekly ran a blog post suggesting the ad was taken down because its content was objectionable. But a spokeswoman for the mall, Cherie Napier, said that the real reason was that the billboard was only permitted to run ads for products or services sold at the mall. The marijuana ad, she said in an e-mail, “would have been a violation and could have resulted in a $10,000 fine from the state.”

Aside from the weeklies, the medical pot business supports a whole genre of “cannabis friendly” magazines, such as West Coast Leaf and Kush.

“We don’t do general newspapers or anything like that,” said Adrian Moore, director of operations at 7 Stars Holistic Healing Center in Richmond.

Bigger news outlets don’t appear ready to take advertisements for marijuana, at least not yet.

To what extent can marijuana be advertised? Kris Hermes, executive director of the Oakland-based Americans for Safe Access, called advertising for the drug a First Amendment issue.

“Our rough position is that we’re in favor of patients finding out how to access medical marijuana,” Hermes said. “We encourage local governments to figure out ways of allowing advertisements that aren’t counterproductive to [get to] the members of the community.”

Source: The Bay Citizen (http://s.tt/129t2)

Pizza Amendment Pokes Fun At Medical Marijuana Measure

Photo: Cannabis Culture

Under a joke amendment proposed by a Republican legislator in Washington, medical marijuana patients could order pizza on the state’s dime.

​It seems everyone’s a comedian when it comes to cannabis. Now a Washington legislator has added a joke pizza amendment to a bill which would expand the state’s medical marijuana law.

Rep. Glenn Anderson (F-Fall City) proposed a joke amendment requiring the state to reimburse medical marijuana patients for pizza the eat while legally high. Anderson’s amendment specifies it would not reimburse for more than three toppings, or for tips to pizza delivery drivers.

Philip Dawdy, spokesman for the Washington Cannabis Association, a trade group for the medical marijuana industry in the state, didn’t seem to mind the joke. “It’s the best amendment in the history of the Legislature,” Dawdy told reporter Jonathan Martin at The Seattle Times.

“The entire subject is rather cheesy,” Seattle Hempfest organizer Vivian McPeak told Toke of the Town. “All I am saying is give pizza chance.”

“Pizza is a no-no on renal diets but hey, as long as it’s government subsidized… after all, they’re concerned with our health, right?” medical marijuana patient/activist Ric Smith told us.

Photo: Seattle P.I.

Rep. Glenn Anderson (R-Fall City): “At this point, smoking a joint might not be a bad idea”

​ Some cannabis activists, however, weren’t amused. After all, Washington’s medical marijuana law requires that patients must be suffering from a “terminal or debilitating” disease.

“Glenn Anderson’s ‘medical cannabis pizza amendment’ might be funny if it were not one of a dozen amendments proposed by a very few legislators which seek to make our law unworkable and ineffective,” Ben Livingston of the Seattle-based Cannabis Defense Coalition told Toke of the Town Monday morning. “It’s not the only amendment he proposed, though it is the least egregious.”

“The former pot smoker may find humor in jokes about the appetite-stimulating properties of cannabis and cancer patients getting the munchies — we admit to making such jokes amongst our friends with cancer and other qualifying illnesses,” Livingston told us, “but wasting state dollars and employee hours with such whimsy seems to trivialize the wasting syndromes and severe nausea that medical cannabis helps alleviate, as well as our state’s budget crisis.”

“Mr. Anderson’s amendment is, at best, insensitive to suffering patients, but it’s indicative of what many of our legislators think of medical cannabis,” Steve Sarich of CannaCare told Toke of the Town on Monday morning. “Unfortunately for Mr. Anderson, he’s made a joke of himself with this ridiculous amendment.”

Rep. Anderson said he came up with the pizza amendment idea during a House Republican caucus on Friday morning when lawmakers got in a discussion about their favorite munchies. “It got to be a pretty long list of favorite comfort foods,” he said. “But you’ve got to draw the line somewhere.”

Anderson said he supports the bill, SB 5073, because it would impose a framework on how medical marijuana can be legally grown and sold in the state. Washington’s medical marijuana law, passed by voters in 1998, doesn’t answer the question of whether dispensaries are legal.

SB 5073, which has already passed the Senate, would legalize and regulate medical marijuana dispensaries and food processors, and would also finally give Washington patients legal protection from search and arrest for possessing cannabis.

Anderson said he suspects most lawmakers have smoked pot, and that the House will pass the bill if it reaches the floor.

The bill could come up for a vote on the House floor at any time. If that happens, Anderson said he plans to talk about the amendment, then he might withdraw it.

“Times are pretty serious right now,” Anderson said. “At this point, smoking a joint might not be a bad idea.”

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Support Marijuana Legalization And Get Ypur Name On A Virtual Brick

Two weeks ago, we launched our new organization, the Coalition for Cannabis Policy Reform (CCPR), to bring citizens together to work toward legalizing marijuana in2012.

Already, thousands of people like you have stood up and pledged their support for going back to the ballot next year.

With that kind of support, I am confident that we can win. Together, we’re going to build this organization, brick by brick, and lay the foundation for an even stronger grassroots movement — but we need your help to do it.

That’s why, today, we are launching our Founding Members program. With a contribution of $25 or more, we’ll place your name on your own personalized virtual brick on our website’s Founders Wall, publicly recognizing you as a Founding Member of the Coalition for Cannabis Policy Reform.

Contribute $25 to our Founding Member drive today — and have a brick added in your name to our virtual wall!

To recognize friends like you, we’re building a virtual brick wall, symbolizing the support we have for cannabis policy reform.

Each brick represents a supporter of the cause, with his or her name engraved on the front, along with a personalized comment. Our virtual wall will let the world know everyone who is a part of this new effort from the very start.

Every contribution counts. If we build our virtual wall with just 1,000 bricks, we’ll have already raised $25,000 for our cause.

Will you buy your own personalized brick right now — so we can add your name to our Founding Member wall?

Show your support for building the grassroots movement that will tax and legalize cannabis in California: Contribute $25 and get your own personalized brick added to our Founding Member wall!

Your contribution to CCPR will help us build the movement we need to end cannabis prohibition in California. Together, we can lead the nation to a more sensible drug policy — brick by brick.

We are extremely grateful for your support.

Dale Jones
Chair
Coalition for Cannabis Policy Reform

P.S. Want to check out how the Founding Member wall is already shaping up? Click here to check it out — and then click here to buy your own personalized virtual brick.

Pastor Indicated For Growing Medical Marijuana in Church

Photo: Ocean State Cannabis

Pastor Erik Johansson: “They killed all our plants in violation of state law”

The pastor of a Rhode Island parish was indicted May 11 on federal charges of conspiracy and cultivating more than 100 marijuana plants — in his church.

Erik Johansson, 48, an ordained minister for Prospect Ministries Inc., was arrested last September after police in Warwick, R.I., executed a search warrant at the church, reports W. Zachary Malinowski at The Providence Journal.

The cops confiscated 183 marijuana plants in several different grow rooms, $565 in cash and other supplies and items used to grow marijuana. Officers said they also discovered an extensive ventilation system to disperse heat and carbon dioxide.

Graphic: Greensboro News-Record

​ The police found two registration cards, dated 2009 and 2010, that allow Johansson to be a caregiver in the state’s medical marijuana program. However, Rhode Island law allows the licensees to grow no more than 24 plants for up to five patients.

Federal mandatory minimums of five years in prison also kick in with more than 100 plants.

Following his arrest, Rev. Johansson applied to open one of Rhode Island’s first medical marijuana dispensaries, to legally sell cannabis to registered patients in the state. The Health Department did not select his group, Rhode Island Compassion Center.

In his application, Johansson complained about his treatment by the police and their decision to destroy his marijuana crop.

“While we were locked up for over 24 hours, they killed all our plants in violation of state law,” Johansson wrote, reports ReLeaf. “The amount of medicine lost and its effects on our patients has been excruciating. The physical, psychological and emotional effects have been devastating to us.”

“Basically, we assisted people and got them off pharmaceuticals,” Johansson said. “We got them off medicine that was killing them. There was so much demand in the community.”

Johansson’s live-in girlfriend, Lydia Brindamour (preachers get to have live-in girlfriends now? cool), was also arrested. On Monday, she signed an agreement to plead guilty to a federal charge of aiding and abetting Johansson in the cultivation of marijuana.

Johansson faces from five to 40 years in prison if convicted.

He said he is ready to fight the charges in federal court. Johansson said if the case goes to trial, he will have about 15 of his patients take the stand and testify about how his marijuana gave them pain relief.

“There is no way they are going to convict me,” Johansson predicted. “[My patients’] lives have been saved. I don’t want to go to trial, I want to be left alone.

“This is a plant — God’s gift,” Johansson said.

Both he and Bindamour are free on unsecured bond.