Washington State should have seen it coming. After all, pot growers and pot dealers were two of the loudest factions trying to kill California’s Prop. 19 last fall. They didn’t want voters to decriminalize pot, didn’t want any disruption to their business model, just didn’t want change. The measure failed, narrowly. So in this new political landscape where marijuana legalization looks increasingly within reach, it’s par for the course that the people currently opposing Washington’s legalization measure, Initiative 502, are the biggest pot smokers of all: medical marijuana patients.
Not all of them, of course. But enough that they’ve launched a polished website called Patients Against I-502, started an aggressive Facebook campaign designed to peel away votes, and issued statements publicly opposing the initiative.
Filed in June, I-502 is sponsored by prosecutors (including former US Attorney John McKay) and public-health leaders, and is widely seen as the most cogent, competent effort in US history to legalize, tax, and regulate marijuana. It appears headed to the 2012 ballot, with nearly a million dollars pledged and over 100,000 signatures collected. Two credible polling firms have found this year that about 54 percent of state voters support the measure.
“Washington has a chance here to displace California as the primary vehicle for reforming marijuana laws,” says Allen St. Pierre, director of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, on a phone call from K Street in Washington, DC.
I-502 would still allow authorized patients to grow, use, and exchange pot under the existing medical-marijuana law passed by voters in 1998. But certain medical pot activists are complaining that I-502 wouldn’t allow people to grow pot at home (only buy it in stores), and that it only allows adults to buy and possess one ounce of pot (patients could still have up to 24 ounces, but they say the one-ounce limit is too restrictive for recreational users). They also say that a DUI provision is so toxic that the entire measure should be rejected.
Edward Agazarm, one of the most outspoken promoters of the anti-502 website, sent an e-mail this month with a subject line declaring that the initiative amounts to “rape by cops w/guns and the ACLU.”
What does he mean by “rape”?
The “rape”—according to Agazarm, who is also vice president of the Citizen Solutions firm that petitions for Tim Eyman initiatives—is that I-502 sets an automatic cutoff for stoned driving. Anyone with 5 nanograms of THC per milliliter of blood would automatically be guilty of a gross misdemeanor. “That level is NOT supported by science and would subject patients to highly invasive blood testing, unnecessary confinement, and a criminal conviction that will haunt them for life,” the activists’ website says. For essentially these same reasons, prominent medical-marijuana patients Ric Smith and Vivian McPeak, director of Seattle Hempfest, have opposed the measure. Medical-marijuana attorney Douglas Hiatt has also denounced I-502.
They’re right that the science is minimal and some people could exceed the 5-nanogram limit, if they are regular medical-marijuana users, without necessarily being impaired. They note that even Washington’s blood-alcohol limit of 0.08 percent is still debatable in court, whereas this measure would result in an automatic conviction for exceeding the THC limit.
But several attorneys say that marijuana DUI arrests wouldn’t increase.
“The concern is not warranted,” says Seattle City Attorney Pete Holmes, a prosecutor and co-sponsor of the initiative. He says that even in the 11 states that allow medical marijuana but have zero tolerance for THC, “they haven’t seen an increase in the DUI prosecutions for marijuana.”
Alex Newhouse, a criminal defense attorney in Yakima, points out that if voters pass I-502, officers would still need probable cause to stop a car and would need to find evidence of driver impairment before seeking a blood draw. Even then, he says, any tests would have to be conducted by a medical professional (typically at a medical clinic or an ER). “If a person is not driving erratically and they don’t appear intoxicated, [and] there is nothing for the officer to see in plain view, there is no probable cause to investigate anything,” Newhouse says.
And I-502 arguably does something useful for marijuana users accused of a DUI. It separates active metabolites, which indicate inebriation, from THC-COOH, the inactive metabolite that remains in the system for days or weeks. In other words, it tests to see whether people have used marijuana recently, not simply whether they’ve used marijuana in the past month.
Why include the DUI language and the provision about only purchasing pot in licensed stores? So the initiative will pass. That’s what New Approach Washington’s polling showed would win (54 percent to 38 percent). That DUI provision alone prompted 62 percent of voters to say they were more likely to support I-502, and only 11 percent said it would make them less likely to support the initiative, according to a poll in May by Quinlan Rosner Research.
“Nobody likes people driving a two-ton piece of metal on the public highway while they are impaired and putting people at risk of death or serious injury,” explained Alison Holcomb, New Approach Washington campaign director. “That is not acceptable in our society.”
The sponsors of Patients Against I-502 did not reply to an e-mail seeking comment. 
Thanks to Dominic Holden for his article.
Insofar as the Anti-New Approach Washington group and Sensible Washington (Old Approach Washington) highlight the issue for the general public, we will make it work to our advantage. In order to pass this legislation, we need the support of the middle-class voters who are not necessarily marijuana users but are against the policy of marijuana prohibition.
In the meantime, sensible medical cannabis consumers would be better advised to work on amending the medical cannabis law in our state to accommodate the THC levels of medical cannabis users (as is written into the Arizona law). Even so, actual impaired driving should not be tolerated no matter what the cause.
Impaired driving kills.
Marijuana prohibition kills.
Marijuana does not kill.
DUI-C limits do not kill.
NotSpicoli,
I see from your post that you also work for the I-502 campaign. These questions have been asked of both Dominic and Alison but both seem afraid to address them, maybe you will be so magnanimous to enlighten the rest of us.
Question 1. Would it be legal to possess any marijuana or only marijuana that is in state approved packaging with a state tax stamp?
Question 2. Where in the initiative would it make it legal to at any time transfer any amount of marijuana to someone else?
Question 3. What are the signs of marijuana impairment?
Thank you and have a good day.
@33: “Medical benefits are not proven, and from my experience I see little to no possible chance of it ever being any better than Aspirin for pain.”
Is there ever any post you make that isn’t 100% wrong? Does that bother you?
You should read more and write shitty fanfic less. Your brain’s rotting.
@47 Dominic: You wrongfully stereotype mmj patients in this article by calling them “biggest pot smokers of all”. This is a great disservice to patients by continuing to propel the public misperception of the various ways patients medicate. You paint the mental image that the misinformed public uses to discriminate against patients and recreational users alike.
Many patients benefit from “medibles”, infused foods, beverages, tinctures, gel-caps, or even eating or juicing raw cannabis, all without the “high” associated from smoking. These methods yield higher measurable THC metabolites in the blood – without the associated impairment!
We are saying: “It is wrong to create a law that will unfairly incriminate innocent people”.
I defy any rational person to disagree with this statement.
We, in no way imply that driving impaired is acceptable behavior, unfortunately, that message is sometimes lost while arguing semantics.
The Patients Against I-502 web site presents all the scientific evidence needed to support our claims. To ignore this science is to say that you either lack intellectual cognizance, or that you are apathetic to the needs of others.
To simplify my previous assertion; supporting the DUIC statutes in I-502 means that you are either an idiot or an asshole – you choose the description that best fits you.
@Troy
“supporting the DUIC statutes in I-502 means that you are either an idiot or an asshole – you choose the description that best fits you”
Are you serious?
@53: Hmmmm. Did you notice Dominic, Allison, and NotSpicoli still aren’t responding to our unanswered questions?
Maybe that’s why they call it “dope”?
To the nay-sayers, that believe medical marijuana laws are “just an excuse to get stoned”, please educate yourself. Cannabis was a medicine for thousands of years before it was “not a medicine”.
Not only has cannabis proven to be useful for the conditions provided for in Washington State law < http://apps.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?… >, it also has applications to help with PTSD, Insomnia, and a host of other unrecognized conditions that also present health benefits.
Evidence indicates that cannabinoids are not only useful to counter the side effects of cancer treatments, but are also able to destroy cancer cells. This means that it is not just a useful form of relief, but may also prove to be a PREVENTATIVE MEDICINE TO CANCER!
This is where the other failures of I-502 must be considered. Creating oils from cannabis requires larger quantities. If I recall the ratio correctly, it takes one pound of marijuana to yield one ounce of oil.
This means the one ounce allowed under I-502 is not enough, and will be prohibitively expensive to use legal cannabis for anything other than smoking. One solution to this problem is to allow home-grows, which is something else that NAW’s bill denies.
It is true, that I-502 does not impact the protections allowed for in grows by patients, but also disallows home-grows by non-patients who wish to explore the medicinal qualities of cannabis for conditions not currently recognized under state law.
Cannabis is an herbal medicine. Denial of this statement is pure conjecture. This medicine should be affordable. The tax structure proposed under I-502 potentially make it cost-prohibitive for people on fixed-incomes to experiment to see if cannabis is the right fit for their given ailment.
As has already been pointed out, this tax-inflation of marijuana will also do nothing to deter an illegal black market. The result of this is potential for further abuses by criminals if I-502 passes.
Since the law will not be able to be changed for 2 years after passage, if it proves to be a dismal failure through increased crime, arrest and incarceration, then the general public will have “buyers remorse” for supporting the initiative, and will set the entire legalization movement backward, by many years.
This is why I am so insistent that this bill has to be right the first time. There is too much at stake for any of us to get this wrong; all would-be legalization activists should be greatly concerned. I-502 may prove to be a step backward, not forward.
I ask that everyone take a much closer look at what they are getting themselves into. Read the bill. If you elect to ignore the warnings of Patients Against, then you should also ignore the claims of NAW – read the bill, then decide for yourself – don’t take anyone’s word as truth.
There is no shortage of related videos on YouTube discussing medicinal values and history. Following is a shortlist of recommended “must sees” to understand more. You may want to bookmark these to watch as time allows:
– PBS – The Botany of Desire: Cannabis intoxication:
< http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Kskl8F9w… >
– Explorer Marijuana Nation – National Geographic Channel:
< http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jnzr-KkU8… >
– MontanaPBS – Clearing the Smoke: The Science of Cannabis – Full Documentary:
< http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e3ZfgerGd… >
– Marijuana a Chronic History (Full Version):
< http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5hqFYC8pV… >
@56, Alex: I love ya brother, but, yes, I am serious. I hate to break it down to such simplistic terms, but for some of the trolls on this issue, it was needed to quantify my argument in the only terms they understand, that of insult.
As I have stated many times over (and am tired of doing so); I-502 presents a moral dilemma: reject it and be deemed a divisionist or radical within the movement, or accept it and admit you are willing to sacrifice the freedoms of segments of the population for political gain.
I view my position as fighting for the freedoms of “all”. Anything less, especially taking a position that would incriminate the innocent, implies that the innocent and vulnerable are nothing more than political fodder – the logical conclusion is that supporters of I-502 don’t care, and can rightfully be deemed as “assholes”.
You are welcome to call me an asshole for defending my position – which I have laid out throughout these posts, and in my view, have laid a solid case and proves I-502 indefensible to the claims I have made.
I don’t take offense to disagreement – I take offense to uneducated assumptions and unqualified opinions.
Alex, I think you are wrong, along with Alison, Dominic, and everyone else behind I-502. The one thing you all have in common is that you are willing to sacrifice innocent people, and deprive those most deserving of their medication; all based in unsound science.
What would you call yourself under these conditions?
@53 Island Bound: Another question you should ask is: If your ounce gets wet, and suddenly weighs more, are you protected from prosecution for more than 28 grams?
Alex @ 1, 2, 3, 24, 56
Maybe you would like to answer what marijuana impairment looks like?
While never having been pulled over for being black I have been pulled over numerous times for simply looking brown. Let go with no ticket, warning or even explanation as to what I had done to cause the stop, even after asking. Even with marijuana in plain sight You can pretend all you want that a police officer needs a reason to pull someone over, the rest of live in the real world. We understand that police can claim whatever they want as a pretext for a stop, then claim they smelled what ever they want, as a pretext to a blood test. Currently there is no limit to the amount of THC anyone can have in their blood as long as there is no impairment to their driving.
What I read of the DUIC provision in I-502 is that anyone that is under 21 and a caregiver for a medical marijuana patient, that consumes by smoking, runs the risk of loosing their lives (being arrested and taken to jail with a criminal record that may haunt them for life.) Most collage undergraduates and all high school students would be at risk of the same thing if they decided to drive their car to leave a party because they smelled marijuana being smoked. Minors, living at home with a parent that smoked (presumably legal marijuana) would also be at risk anytime they left home in their car.
Regardless of its intended purpose, to me the zero tolerance policy for minors in I-502 empowers any racist law enforcement officer to harass minority minors at will, by demanding their blood if they are driving and claiming that he smelled marijuana without having to provide any proof of impairment. It will allow our government to destroy the lives of innocent children whose only crime was to live with a parent that consumes, takes care of their sick grandparents, or leave a party where smoking is going on even if they did not smoke any them selves.
Sorry I have to agree with Troy @ 55
@53, Island Bound:
#1: I-502 makes it no longer a crime for an adult 21 and over to possess any combination of the following: 1 oz. of useable marijuana, 16 oz. of marijuana-infused products in solid form, and/or 72 oz. of marijuana-infused products in liquid form. There is no requirement that the end user keep any of these items in any specific packaging. See Sec. 20(3).
#2: I-502 makes it legal for licensed producers, licensed processors, licensed retailers, and their employees to transfer marijuana to others. Please see Sec. 4, pp. 9-10; Sec. 15(3), p. 23; Sec. 16(3), pp. 23-24; and Sec. 17(2), p. 24.
#3: Signs of marijuana impairment include, but are not necessarily limited to, compromise of reaction time, attention, decision making, time and distance perception, short-term memory, hand-eye coordination, and concentration. Additional information is available on a new marijuana-specific page hosted by the University of Washington’s Alcohol and Drug Abuse Institute: http://adai.washington.edu/marijuana/.
If you have additional questions, please feel free to write to Campaign@NewApproachWA.org or call the campaign office at (206) 633-2012. I’m happy to answer questions, but I’m a little busy these days and don’t have time to camp out in online comments sections.
Best,
Alison
Posted by auntie grizelda: @53: Hmmmm. Did you notice Dominic, Allison, and NotSpicoli still aren’t responding to our unanswered questions? Maybe that’s why they call it “dope”?
While I resent the implication that because I am against the policy of marijuana prohibition I am a user of cannabis.
I am a volunteer for I-502 and nothing more. I am sorry that I do not know the answer to the first 2 questions that were asked.
As to the third question, I can answer. What are the signs of marijuana impairment is not the right question. The question is, “What are the signs of impaired driving?”
There are well known driving patters and constitute probable cause for stopping a driver. They include swerving, drifting, stopping inappropriately, slow response at traffic lights, etc.
Fortunately, because cannabis does not actually impair driving ability significantly for most users, impaired driving is not a significant issue for experienced cannabis users.
“#2: I-502 makes it legal for licensed producers, licensed processors, licensed retailers, and their employees to transfer marijuana to others. Please see Sec. 4, pp. 9-10; Sec. 15(3), p. 23; Sec. 16(3), pp. 23-24; and Sec. 17(2), p. 24.”
The key point is that if you’re “licensed”. So what happens if you ask your spouse or partner to hold the cannabis you just bought for you while you run to the bathroom or something of that nature, is that considered distribution and is a crime? That looks to be the case under I-502, just as it would be a class C felony (same category and maximum sentence as unlawful imprisonment) if that person you handed the ounce to already happened to have half an ounce on them. This makes little sense.
“#3: Signs of marijuana impairment include, but are not necessarily limited to, compromise of reaction time, attention, decision making, time and distance perception, short-term memory, hand-eye coordination, and concentration. Additional information is available on a new marijuana-specific page hosted by the University of Washington’s Alcohol and Drug Abuse Institute: http://adai.washington.edu/marijuana/.”
It seems a little disingenuous to include this link to the UW for a couple reasons, one being that they have a vested interest in I-502 as it earmarks millions of dollars to the university and this particular section of it. It’s also hard to take their fact sheets seriously when the factsheet comes from a cannabis “prevention” group; “As we inaugurate this site, we are grateful to our colleagues at Australia’s National Cannabis Prevention and Information Centre for permitting us to include their Factsheets.”
However, even if you are taking these factsheets to heart, this is pulled directly from it; “Although most of these studies examined the effects of low doses of marijuana, recent research has suggested that decrements in performance are generally dose-related and typically persist for two to four hours.”
If this information is solid (as you seem it to be by spreading it) then how can you further justify a zero tolerance limit for patients under 21? If impairment seems to persist for 2-4 hours, how could you possibly justify a limit that will prosecute after 24 or more hours? Why was the decision made to consider listening to some science why refusing to acknowledge the utter lack of scientific consensus over such a limit?
@61, Island Bound:
If the THC per se DUI standards in I-502 were likely to lead to an increase in unreasonable arrests and blood tests of unimpaired drivers, we should already have empirical evidence available to us from the following states:
Arizona (zero tolerance since 1990, including metabolites like carboxy-THC (THC-COOH) — the medical marijuana exception requiring actual proof of impairment wasn’t adopted until November 2010);
Delaware (zero tolerance since 2007, excluding inactive metabolites);
Illinois (zero tolerance since 1997, including metabolites);
Indiana (zero tolerance since 2001, including metabolites);
Michigan (zero tolerance since 2003, excluding inactive metabolites);
North Carolina (zero tolerance for drivers under 21 since 1983, excluding metabolites);
Pennsylvania (zero tolerance since 2004, including metabolites, with 1 ng/mL active THC as the administratively-established minimum level that may be admitted as evidence in a DUI case);
Rhode Island (zero tolerance since 2006, excluding metabolites, actual impairment must be proved for medical marijuana patients);
South Dakota (zero tolerance for drivers under 21 since 1998, including metabolites);
Utah (zero tolerance since 1994, including metabolites); and
Wisconsin (zero tolerance since 2003, excluding metabolites).
We can also consider the experiences of Nevada and Ohio, which have 2 ng/mL of active THC, and higher levels of metabolites, as their per se standards; and Iowa, which adopted a standard of 50 ng/mL of any metabolite in urine.
Fortunately, we haven’t seen a spike in unreasonable arrests and blood draws in those jurisdictions. There is no reason to expect Washington will be the anomaly.
Best,
Alison
“Fortunately, because cannabis does not actually impair driving ability significantly for most users, impaired driving is not a significant issue for experienced cannabis users.”
NotSpicoli you just pointed out exactly why I-502’s DUID provision is so ridiculous and unfair. Most regular consumers and patients will likely never receive a DUI under today’s laws because they likely won’t be impaired (some studies show cannabis consumers drive better after consuming). If they are impaired, and for brand-new smokers who drive and might as well be impaired, our officers can and absolutely do give out green DUIDs for this.
This is why a new per se limit is so utterly pointless, because for truly impaired drivers it’s unnecessary because they can be prosecuted with a DUID right now. However, any regular smoker will almost certainly never be able to pass a 5 ng or zero tolerance test, despite that fact that as you pointed out, most regular consumers aren’t impaired drivers. Why set a law that will specifically target and cause the persecution of a group of drivers who we can both admit likely won’t be impaired?
Allison @ 65
You site a list of states and when they passed laws regarding zero tolerance but show no data to support your claims that there was no increase in what you call “unreasonable arrests and blood tests.” Please site the studies that show there has been no increase in rate of minority arrests for green DUI vs. non-minority green dui or you are not speaking to the point I was making. The real point that you should be making though is studies showing how fatalities and accidents are down in each of these states as a result of the passage of these laws and showing why it was the change in these law and not other laws or regulations that caused the decrease in accidents.
Thanks so much for your responses.
@ 65 – Alison – this is one of your more disingenuous posts to date. Of the states you mention, only five even have medical marijuana laws; two of which are new (Arizona 2010 & Delaware 2011). Is it any surprise to anyone that states like Utah or North Carolina have zero tolerance for cannabis at all?
(*Side note – Utah is best known for its supply of groupies for musicians, and ranks highest in credit card charges for internet porn, because of their various prohibitionist memes…)
Perhaps law enforcement in those states have not figured out how to incorporate the law to their financial benefit?
You have consistently ignored the assertions that 1.) police do profile: < http://www.alternet.org/story/152850/rac…“industrial_scale”:_fbi_using_census_data_to_map_and_police_communities_by_race?akid=7769.234046.NAPN5d&rd=1&t=8 >, and 2.) police do incriminate unfairly: < http://articles.nydailynews.com/2011-10-… >.
So far, you have skirted the difficult issues you have been presented with, answering only those that allow you to save grace.
When will you admit, that I-502 is so fundamentally flawed; that you need to drop the current bill, and work with the rest of the legalization community to build a rock-solid base of support?
The rest of us will support you, but only when you desist with the idea that it is OK to throw fellow human beings under the bus. Until then, you are on your own, with the people that you manage to BS.
Patients Against will follow every step of the way to educate those that you elect to misinform. That is a promise.
It is time to move on. It is clear that this group will not be swayed at this time.
Just like when dealing with prohibitionists: questions asked and answered.
The prohibitionists and the PANAW do not agree with the answers New Approach Washington is providing. Though the prohibitionists and the medical cannabis opposition group have little upon which they agree, they share a common goal: the defeat of I-502.
Our enemy is the federal government’s policy of marijuana prohibition and the ignorance and mercenary interests that maintains it–not medical cannabis users.
I-502 is a harm reduction strategy aimed at ending prohibition. It is an imperfect law created in an imperfect system. It involves the calculus of determining the greater good and lesser of evils and the political calculus to increase the chance of passage. There is no artifice here. I-502 was written to win a battle because we are truly at war and cannot afford any more defeats.
When we encounter any group spreading misinformation and promoting hysteria, we will continue to provide the answers. Our greatest resource as a movement is the facts, respectfully and honestly delivered. “When the people know, they will ‘just say no’ to marijuana prohibition” is our most effective strategy.
The medical opposition’s negative campaign to torpedo I-502 does not diminish my resolve to support a positive campaign to amend the state’s inadequate MUCA to include appropriate accommodations for those who use cannabis medicinally and suffer from disabilities–including a suspension of per se DUIC in the absence of impairment.
@69 – while you are working to pass a law, just so you can work some more to amend it – we will be working to get this law right the FIRST time around.
Why should we vote for a bill that will create yet another law that we will have to spend YEARS fighting, just so we can have the right to use the medicine our doctor recommends? I-502 will force patients to choose between their medicine today and driving tomorrow.
By the way NotSpicoli, amending the “Medical Use of Cannabis” act is not as easy as you make it seem. Does the Legislature’s nightmarish attempt to amend it this past spring ring any bells? We’re worse off now than we were before! The mess left behind by the last attempt to amend the MUCA will take YEARS to fix! The last thing patients need is one more item on the growing to-do list.
Knowing for a fact that I-502 will cause unimpaired drivers to be convicted of a crime they didn’t commit, NAW should have written their law to protect citizens from the conflict created by their unnecessary and unscientific law. Instead they took the easy road, crossing their fingers that patients wouldn’t be smart enough to figure out what’s hidden in their 64-page initiative.
@69 NotSpicoli: There is nothing to sway. Our position has been clear the entire time. We believe it is immoral to pass a law that will incriminate the innocent. It is supporters of New Approach Washington that are asking us to compromise our principles. We are not the voice of dissension, you are.
We have repeatedly made the case that I-502 unfairly disenfranchises patients, debunked the probable cause argument, shown that it will exacerbate an illegal black market, and will in all-liklihood set the legalization movement backward instead of forward.
This was our opportunity to counter Dominic’s sweeping generalizations, and gross mischaracterizations of who we are and our reasons for opposing I-502.
The dividing line has been identified, either you are OK with throwing patients under the bus, or your not. It is up to each individual to decide how I-502 defines their moral character.
All activists, on both sides of this debate, still share the common task of educating the general public on the ills of prohibition on cannabis, and the benefits of industrial hemp.
I wish we could work together under better circumstances, but since the DUI language will not be pulled, that will not happen anytime soon. Maybe someday, when cool heads and reason prevail, we will be able to work in unity. Until such time, we are forced to be divided by a bad initiative.
I have nothing more to add, that I have not already said. I am tired of repeating myself. I do ask that people actually read the bill, not the hype from NAW, or even Patients Against I-502’s supporting evidence – just read the bill, then decide for yourself.
Happy Halloween everyone – have a great day.
NotSpicoli,
I do not think anyone who has read your posts would assume that you have ever even tried marijuana. You consistently equate marijuana with alcohol in ways that are inappropriate. I wonder why your passion for this subject is your intent is really to legalize marijuana and not somehow profit from the continuation of the prison industrial complex.
In 2010 the ACLU had a chance to work with Sensible Washington and promote real reform of the marijuana laws in Washington State, they were not passive about their lack of support, but instead choose to actively work against I-1068. Now they propose changes to the laws calling it legalization which will likely result in more not less people spending time in jail and for longer. If you follow the money trail as suggested by muraco @37 and @38 and check the PDC filings as I have you will see that most (more than half) of the money that New Approach Washington has taken in has been from lawyer unions, active lawyers, retired lawyers, or out of state interests. There is a reason for this. Lawyers stand to make out big time from the green DUI.
Right now it is illegal to be in possession of cannabis products outside of the body, but once they are ingested, unless you are on parole or probation, it is not against the law to be in possession of cannabis inside your body unless you are both driving and impaired (the key here is the impairment). New Approach Washington intends to make it illegal for people to possess therapeutic amounts of cannabis inside their body (as well as outside), while not demonstrating a problem that needs to be fixed (marijuana induced traffic accidents.) There is very conflicting evidence from what I have seen in regards to marijuana and driving. I have seen studies that show cannabis only users tend to be safer drivers than the general public. This may be because of the heightened self preservation instinct (some call it paranoia) associated with cannabis use, or the concern for arrest. Marijuana in combination with alcohol has been shown to exaggerate the effects of the alcohol, so all I have seen is a need for a modification of the limit for alcohol when active thc is present.
As Alison clearly points out in her response to my Question # 2 it will still be illegal, a felony, to hand your friend a joint, a pipe full of marijuana or your stash so they may fill their own pipe, but there will no longer be a misdemeanor to plead down to. Police claim most arrest are not for possession, but clearly most sentences are. The police will continue to do their job with relish, by arresting people that distribute marijuana without a license, but those people that are just sharing with their friends, not actually dealing will not have a lesser charge to plead to. Of course these laws will be enforced in the racist manner our current marijuana laws are.
Also the zero tolerance policy “designed” to protect children means that any minor that comes into contact with a person that is using may test positive even if the minor has NEVER consumed any cannabis themselves. People that only drink do not get this. No matter how much alcohol you consume that person next to you will not get drunk. A minor care taking for a medical marijuana patient, living at home with an adult that can legally consume, or going to a party will be guilty under I-502 if they drive.
HOW CAN THIS BE GOOD FOR OUR CHILDREN?
Alison @ 62
I know you will probably not have time to answer this but I need to ask it anyway.
How many of the signs of impairment listed in #3 @ 62 would a police officer need to be able to articulate in order for a driver to be taken for a blood test? Or does the phrase “not necessarily limited to” mean that having dark skin and driving a car that smells of dead skunk could also be seen as impairment?
Thanks
NotSpicoli @ 69
“I-502 is a harm reduction strategy aimed at ending prohibition. It is an imperfect law created in an imperfect system. It involves the calculus of determining the greater good and lesser of evils and the political calculus to increase the chance of passage. There is no artifice here. I-502 was written to win a battle because we are truly at war and cannot afford any more defeats.”
I am just wondering how you see I-502 as harm reduction. As I see it if I-502 becomes law, police will continue to enforce the distribution laws keeping virtually all cannabis consumers criminals. The stores will not materialize because to apply is admission of intent to commit a federal crime, supplying the license is also a federal crime, and from what I understand the Feds are currently disrupting dispensaries throughout California that are complying with state law. Do you really believe they are going to allow stores that sell to the general public to operate? This will prevent any legal marijuana from being in the market at all. What will prevent the courts from ruling that the people’s intent was not to have all marijuana legal, but only marijuana obtained legally? While we would then have laws on the books that say marijuana is legal, all of the marijuana available to the general public will still be totally and complete against the law. I see no harm reduction here.
Making sure that people that need therapeutic doses, instead of recreational doses, of cannabis can not drive does not reduce the harms to them or the general public.
If you believe that there are so many accidents caused by marijuana consumption alone, bring your data. If you believe, as I do, that marijuana enhances the effects of alcohol that cause problems with driving, but is not the cause of those problems then rewrite your green DUI to lower the alcohol threshold when over a driver is over a certain amount of active thc in their blood. I think you would get my support and probably many others with a medical need to live over the 5ng limit.
Certainly there is never harm reduction in any 0 tolerance policy. The minor green DUI is the most deplorable thing I can imagine. Regardless of the intent of our laws, this one included, the way our drug laws are enforced, I do not know how anyone could support this provision knowing how it will be used in minority communities.
Currently people that take therapeutic doses of cannabis are not criminals. I-502 makes them criminals if they need to drive.
Currently minors that are in the presence of marijuana smoke but do not consume are not criminals. I-502 may make them criminals if they need to drive.
Legalization does not mean more people in jail for longer. It means no one in jail if they have not hurt someone else.
Happy Halloween
@63 NotSpicoli: Okay. I was just trying to be funny with the “dope” comment. I wasn’t bashing you personally. It makes no difference to me whether you support I-502 or not. How you vote is your choice. There is a lot on this subject that I admittedly don’t know; that’s why I’m asking questions.
I appreciate you, Alison, Troy Barber, Island Bound, AnthonyM, Patients-Against-I-502 and others helping me find some answers.
Unfortunately, life usually isn’t 100% black and white, is it?
Thanks for taking the time to educate yourself on this incredibly important matter, Auntie G.
Thank you, Troy, for your constant efforts, and for making so much sense in your comments and providing links, and staying positive.
Yeah, calling someone an “idiot or asshole” is staying positive . . . @55
NotSpicoli @ 69
Right on! Way to cut through the myopic hissyfitting.
California did it! D’Oh!
I-502 is just 61,000 signatures from making it and NAW received another $300,000 this week from 2 large contributors.
We can assume that I-502 will be on the ballot.
When I-502 is presented to the legislature for passage (before being sent to the voters), I suggest that will be the perfect time to introduce an amendment to SB-5073 calling for medical cannabis users to be exempted (accommodated) from the per se DUI-C provision.
By way of example, the Arizona law states, “a registered qualifying patient shall not be considered to be under the influence of marijuana solely because of the presence of metabolites or components of marijuana that appear in insufficient concentration to cause impairment.”
I suggest priming the pump by writing to our cannabis savvy legislators now, e.g., Roger Goodwin, Mary Lou Dickerson, and Jeanne Kohl-Welles, et al.
I make this suggestion again, regardless of the fate of I-502. Of the people I know who support I-502, such an amendment would receive their equally enthusiastic support.
Quick question… What happens to an impaired driver now? How would it change?
Probable Cause and Reasonable Suspicion are legal realities and prerequisites to arrest that have not been “debunked” even the least bit by SW or PANAW. The challenges to these realities here and elsewhere, though originally flowing from legitimate concerns, appear now to be desperate attempts to trigger emotional responses to gather support in opposition of I-502.
I am not an idiot or an asshole. I know exactly what I’m talking about. I will not forget all the people forced into treatment, jail and financial ruin because of simple possession. I also feel strongly that we all have a duty to protect our children. If SW and PANAW were as good at making friends as they are at making enemies, I-1068 and I-1149 would have made it to the ballot, though they both would have failed due to the lack of regulation . . . . believe me, these things aren’t easy for me to admit.
How anybody can say that I-502 will take the legalization movement backwards is beyond me. We are talking about legalizing simple possession and allowing farmers to grow cannabis! This is unprecedented! We are forcing the federal government’s hand for the benefit of every state! There are so many pieces that will be put into play by I-502 that simple allegations such as “it will be preempted” demonstrate ignorance of the big picture. It is true that no farmer or organization will be growing cannabis until federal law changes. The same would be true under I-1149 or I-1068. But once I-502 becomes law, the feds will finally have to explain themselves in the spotlight or back down. If they back down, the jobs will come. Many jobs. And they will be greener jobs.
There is no need to debate these issues with PANAW here or anywhere else anymore. A line has been drawn in the sand. When the dust settles and I-502 is law, we’ll see who is right. I am confident that I am on the right side, the side that most Washingtonians stand on. The side that my local community will provide the greatest amount of support for.
The best to all of you. See you on the front lines.
Posted by people are everywhere on November 2, 2011, “Quick question… What happens to an impaired driver now? How would it change?”
Currently, anybody can be stopped for impaired driving, arrested with probable cause, and with probable cause be subjected to a blood test. Refusing a blood test results is an automatic, one-year license suspension. Washington’s current medical marijuana law specifically provides that medical authorization is no defense to DUI.
Blood test results can be used as evidence at trial, even if only the inactive metabolite THC-COOH is discovered and no active, delta 9 THC. (I-502’s 5 ng/mL active THC per se standard will allow defense attorneys to defend those with lower levels of delta 9 THC or only THC-COOH.) Currently, in our stigmatized societal climate, any marijuana use may sway jurors to convict even in the face of inadequate impairment evidence.
Prosecutors may even reconsider filing charges in cases under 5 ng/mL or with only THC-COOH, depending on what other evidence of impairment may exist.
For more information, see the New Approach Washington’s fact sheet, “Driving Under the Influence of THC” under the FAQ’s.
@85 NotSpicoli: Thanks for the update.
“How anybody can say that I-502 will take the legalization movement backwards is beyond me. We are talking about legalizing simple possession and allowing farmers to grow cannabis! This is unprecedented! We are forcing the federal government’s hand for the benefit of every state! There are so many pieces that will be put into play by I-502 that simple allegations such as “it will be preempted” demonstrate ignorance of the big picture. It is true that no farmer or organization will be growing cannabis until federal law changes. The same would be true under I-1149 or I-1068. But once I-502 becomes law, the feds will finally have to explain themselves in the spotlight or back down. If they back down, the jobs will come. Many jobs. And they will be greener jobs.”
Alex, how you can not see how this will set the movement back is completely beyond me, and I just don’t think you understand the whole issue here. For one, they aren’t allowing farmers to grow cannabis, it’s only for registered growers licensed through the state, which will be a part of the initiative that will be pre-empted, just as with the distribution system.
You say it demonstrates ignorance of the big picture declaring the fact that it’s pre-emptable, but quite literally the opposite is true. It’s not hard for anyone to see (better yet a lawyer) that this initiative is not designed to withhold a federal attack, it is not designed to withstand pre-emption and it absolutely, undoubtedly creates a positive conflict with the Federal Government. For all of these reasons, I-502 will be pre-empted, and saying otherwise is simply wrong.
With this being the case, how the hell will this make the feds explain themselves? Do you not see what’s going on around the country? The feds are attacking PATIENTS everywhere and aren’t explaining themselves, what makes you think they won’t quickly and easily throw away a legalization initiative if they have the authority to? They’ve already explained how adamantly against legalization they are, so destroying the initiative after it passes would be a given, and assuming they might “back down” is laughable at this stage in the game.
So, with that being said, why NAW would waste everyone’s time and money over an initiative that does NOTHING to fight the feds is something I still don’t understand, because once the initiative is pre-empted, state law enforcement will have every authority to prosecute for cannabis offenses (besides maybe the 1 ounce decrim which might be withheld, but along side the disgusting new DUID laws). If I-502 would of kept the regulations but also removed cannabis from the state’s Controlled Substances List (repealing prohibition in the process), than the federal government would of had NO authority to pre-empt that (the Federal Government cannot reinstate state criminal sanctions), meaning that even if the feds did attack us after it passes, it would at least remove the authority for our state enforcement to prosecute for cannabis offenses, which would be a HUGE deal (as NAW has pointed out multiple times, close to 99% of cannabis arrests are made my state officers).
“If SW and PANAW were as good at making friends as they are at making enemies, I-1068 and I-1149 would have made it to the ballot”
Unfortunately the ACLU of Washington made it hard for I-1068 to find friends – in fact (many of you here know this, but for those who don’t) I-1068 had SEIU (Servers Employee International Union) pay thousands of dollars to validate signatures mid-year and was planning to donate enough paid signature gatherers to get it on the ballot, but they backed down after heavy lobbying from Alison Holcomb and the ACLU and after they came out publicly against us, despite the fact of how much protection it would of brought (there public reasoning was our lack of regulations, which is once again laughable because any regulations we added would of been pre-emptable, and Alison is smart enough to know that).
Think about his for a second. 50% of the American population, give or take a few percentage points, support legalization. 70-80% support medicinal marijuana. The population is angry with its government which is evident by the occupy protests around the country and the approval ratings of congress. Times are tough. A direct attack on state sovereignty is exactly what this country needs with respect to marijuana reform. In this atmosphere, let the federal government move to preempt and defile the 10th amendment. With as much media attention I-502 will get if it passes, all eyes will be on the federal government to see what happens.
Federal law must change. Let Washington be the spark that ignites the bomb.
Alex you have the right idea but have totally the wrong approach for what you’re saying. It’s written very directly into our Federal law that they can pre-empt anything that creates a positive conflict with our Federal Controlled Substances List, which cannabis is on, and cannabis regulation will do. With that being said, the Federal Government will then have every legal authority to destroy the initiative, and the problem is that I-502 hands them an easy victory. I don’t understand how it will challenge the feds when it’s so pre-emptable, the only way to truly challenge the feds is to remove cannabis from a state’s CSL which the federal government can NOT pre-empt, and which would of started a legitimate battle in court (the same reason the feds couldn’t pre-empt when New York removed alcohol prohibition a decade before we did it nationally).
To assume the feds won’t just shut I-502 down happily is totally a misunderstanding, and to assume there will be some massive public outreach may be true to some degree, but it won’t be enough to stop them from destroying it (obviously, or otherwise they’d be listening to backlash and would start to respect state medical cannabis laws).
The only way to truly back the feds in the corner is to pass something that they can’t attack, which removing civil and criminal penalties they cannot (once again, the Federal Government cannot reinstate state criminal sanctions).
Alex and Everyone Motivated to Weigh in on Legalization:
This thread is probably losing steam, but I feel the need to add my perspective, especially to what Alex has been writing about the ages 18-21 issue, and about aggressive police officers.
Like Alex, I’m a parent, and like Alex, I worked hard to make sure the kids grew up healthy and whole. If I could have arranged for our son and daughter to forgo alcohol and marijuana until age 21, I would have. Alcoholism runs in our family and has ruined lives. We talked about this with the kids often. Even so, before the children were out of high school, alcohol was being consumed, as was marijuana. In this society, most families find that their children drink and/or toke before age 21. We raised our children to stay sober for as long as possible, but we also wanted them to explore. The kids knew that alcohol kills from overdoses & car wrecks, but marijuana is illegal and can get them in more trouble.
There was a day when our daughter was 19 or 20, and she’d been out with her best friend, sitting in a car in a local park. A police officer pulled up to their car, and they rolled down the window and had a chat with them. The girls became alarmed when he poked his flashlight into the car and really looked hard for “illegal activity”. Turns out, the two girls were simply talking, but what if they had been careless? What if some buds were in the car and the cop could smell it? Suddenly those college educations would have been in jeopardy, as would their ability to get hired. And these girls are great people. It was a close call, and it brought it all home to us. A “per se” law would be devastating.
Alex, when your kids are young and you’re working hard to be the best parent (and I’m sure you are), you hold that belief that your kid is going to be the one who is not going to toke until, by scientific standards, the brain is fully formed. Let’s be realistic. Did you toke before age 21? (This little Catholic girl did!) Did you drink before age 21? (I think about 85% of kids do.) What’s safer? Marijuana!! Ergo, what is the the more intelligent choice, marijuana or alcohol? Marijuana!! So why are we going to create a law that penalizes marijuana use far more harshly than alcohol use, when it’s alcohol that will put the kids in the grave? And why are we going to be unrealistic about alcohol & marijuana use under age 21?
Oh–I know why we’re going to do that. Because we are catering to the misinformed in order to get a law passed. Any law will do, NAW says, as long as “legalization” passes. I put the word in quotes because it is not true legalization, it is not true reform.
I fundamentally do not understand any of the laws that “legalize” for an ounce or less. Why? I have enough alcohol in my pantry to kill me many times over, and that’s legal. In fact, in one stop to the store, I can legally buy enough alcohol to kill me many times over. So why will I not be able to own more than an ounce of cannabis–a bud that has no lethal dose? Oh–I know the answer to that. It’s because we’re letting a misinformed public dictate the law.
The two individuals behind these initiatives are polar opposites in a very key way. Alison Holcomb of the ACLU/NAW is determined to legalize in any way possible–she will do whatever it takes. Besides that, she is an excellent politician, and is very good at working behind the scenes to raise money and to keep money from being donated to Sensible Washington. We all can’t stand politicians who flip-flop according to polls, but we also realize that the strategy works, and Ms. Holcomb has used polling data from a misinformed public to inform her initiative. So that’s how we got these unpopular (for the informed Cannabis Culture) regulations in the bill, and that’s how we now have this controversy.
The “other camp”, Sensible Washington, has an initiative written by Douglas Hiatt. Douglas does not equivocate. It’s ironic to me that he suffers from a bad back because I never met a person with a stiffer spine, morally speaking. He’s a lousy politician–probably because he doesn’t bend in the wind, he doesn’t play to polls, he doesn’t go to misinformed people and ask them what they want to see included in the law, even though they don’t know what they’re talking about. He thought long and hard about how to legalize, and he drafted an initiative that reflects the way alcohol prohibition was repealed. This kind of repeal withstood Federal preemption 70 years ago, and is likely to be strong. Regulations are not included for two excellent reasons: #1–Regulations invite preemption by the Feds, and most likely the Feds will win that legal argument. So if NAW’s i-502 passes, then is preempted by the Feds, the voting public will be convinced that all legalization can be preempted. #2–Regulations are best written by the legislature, just as regulations for alcohol use were written by the legislature nearly 70 years ago. Regulations should not be voted on by a misinformed, divided public that is not in a position to make good law. Prop 19 taught us that, but the NAW folks came up with harsher penalties to try to win over more conservative voters. #3–Sensible Washington’s Repeal initiative was always based upon the fact that the legislature will/would step up to the plate within a few months and enact regulations–just as they did 70 years ago.
During the past two years, I have been disenchanted with Alison Holcomb’s–and here Dominic Holden’s–disingenuous message to the public that Sensible Washington has no regulations, as if Sensible Washington is proposing a free-for-all. The message is this–We the Public Repeal, as we did 70 years ago, and the legislature enacts regulations, as they did 70 years ago. In fact, we all know that the legislature has an adequate set of regulations already written by the very admirable State Representative Mary Lou Dickerson.
Alex and Everyone Motivated to Weigh in on Legalization:
This thread is probably losing steam, but I feel the need to add my perspective, especially to what Alex has been writing about the ages 18-21 issue, and about aggressive police officers.
Like Alex, I’m a parent, and like Alex, I worked hard to make sure the kids grew up healthy and whole. Reality differed from my wishes, and like most kids in America, our kids toked before the age of 21. I guess they have defied science since they’ve both grown up to be capable and vibrant twenty-somethings.
There was a day when our daughter was 19 or 20, and she’d been out with her best friend, sitting in a car in a local park. A police officer pulled up to their car, and they rolled down the window and had a chat with him. The girls became alarmed when he poked his flashlight into the car and really looked hard for “illegal activity”. Turns out, the two girls were simply talking, but what if they had been careless? What if some buds were in the car and the cop could smell it? Suddenly those college educations would have been in jeopardy, as would their ability to get hired. And these girls are great people. It was a close call, and it brought it all home to us. A “per se” law would be devastating.
Alex, when your kids are young and you’re working hard to be the best parent (and I’m sure you are), you hold that belief that your kid is going to be the one who is not going to toke until, by scientific standards, the brain is fully formed. Let’s be realistic. Did you toke before age 21? (This little Catholic girl did!) Did you drink before age 21? (I think about 85% of kids do.) What’s safer? Marijuana!! Ergo, what is the the more intelligent choice, marijuana or alcohol? Marijuana!! So why are we going to create a law that penalizes marijuana use far more harshly than alcohol use, when it’s alcohol that will put the kids in the grave? And why are we going to be unrealistic about alcohol & marijuana use under age 21?
Oh–I know why we’re going to do that. Because we are catering to the misinformed in order to get a law passed. Any law will do, NAW says, as long as “legalization” passes. I put the word in quotes because it is not true legalization, it is not true reform.
I fundamentally do not understand any of the laws that “legalize” for an ounce or less. Why? I have enough alcohol in my pantry to kill me many times over, and that’s legal. In fact, in one stop to the store, I can legally buy enough alcohol to kill me many times over. So why will I not be able to own more than an ounce of cannabis–a bud that has no lethal dose? Oh–I know the answer to that. It’s because we’re letting a misinformed public dictate the law.
The two individuals behind these initiatives are polar opposites in a very key way. Alison Holcomb of the ACLU/NAW is determined to legalize in any way possible–she will do whatever it takes. Besides that, she is an excellent politician, and is very good at working behind the scenes to raise money and to keep money from being donated to Sensible Washington. We all can’t stand politicians who flip-flop according to polls, but we also realize that the strategy works, and Ms. Holcomb has used polling data from a misinformed public to inform her initiative. So that’s how we got these objectionable (for the informed Cannabis Culture) regulations in the bill, and that’s how we now have this controversy.
The “other camp”, Sensible Washington, has an initiative written by Douglas Hiatt. Douglas does not equivocate. It’s ironic to me that he suffers from a bad back because I never met a person with a stiffer spine, morally speaking. He’s a lousy politician–probably because he doesn’t bend in the wind, he doesn’t play to polls, he doesn’t go to misinformed people and ask them what they want to see included in the law, even though they don’t know what they’re talking about. He thought long and hard about how to legalize, and he drafted an initiative that reflects the way alcohol prohibition was repealed. This kind of repeal withstood Federal preemption 70 years ago, and is likely to be strong. Regulations are not included for two excellent reasons: #1–Regulations invite preemption by the Feds, and most likely the Feds will win that legal argument. So if NAW’s i-502 passes, then is preempted by the Feds, the voting public will be convinced that all legalization can be preempted. #2–Regulations are best written by the legislature, just as regulations for alcohol use were written by the legislature nearly 70 years ago. Regulations should not be voted on by a misinformed, divided public that is not in a position to make good law. Prop 19 taught us that, but the NAW folks came up with harsher penalties to try to win over more conservative voters. #3–Sensible Washington’s Repeal initiative was always based upon the fact that the legislature will/would step up to the plate within a few months and enact regulations–just as they did 70 years ago.
During the past two years, I have been disenchanted with Alison Holcomb’s–and here Dominic Holden’s–disingenuous message to the public that Sensible Washington has no regulations, as if Sensible Washington is proposing a free-for-all. The message is this–We the Public Repeal, as we did 70 years ago, and the legislature enacts regulations, as they did 70 years ago. In fact, we all know that the legislature has an adequate set of regulations already written by the very admirable State Representative Mary Lou Dickerson.
Hi Mary Clare!
Good to hear from you. Unfortunately, I stand by what I have written above. Children will be children, and parents love their children. I favor laws that create incentives for our kids not to use intoxicants, be around people who use intoxicants, or drive while intoxicated. I know these laws will not prevent kids from using intoxicants, including marijuana, but I am not willing to find out what would happen without these laws. I want to play it safe, just like most people on my side of the mountains. We cannot afford a public backlash once cannabis is legalized.
Federal laws need to change. I-502 will be a catalyst to do just that.
Alison has done the most wonderful job in securing a position on the ballot for I-502 and listening to the state’s general interests. It’s a compromise between both extremes. What she has helped create will work to change so much in the long run on state and national level.
Alex,
And I stand for full legalization without jeopardizing the freedom of anyone. As for laws that prevent our children from drinking or imbibing in marijuana, why can we not have a marijuana law that matches the laws governing alcohol for individuals age 18-21? Why do those individuals who choose to use marijuana instead of alcohol get a stiffer penalty when they are wisely choosing the less dangerous alternative?
And I will remind you–marijuana is not an intoxicant. Alcohol is an intoxicant. There is nothing toxic in marijuana.
We obviously have a lot of educating to do.
Thanks, Alex. I’ll always remember how hard you worked on both I-1060 and I-1149. I’m glad you’re still fighting the good fight.
Mary Clare
This is from an attorney? Sorry, Alex, but you and I both know that the cops can pull you over damn near for anything and nearly always get away with it….”He appeared to be weaving”….”His license plate light was out”… God forbid they have an outstanding warrant for a parking ticket or expired tags. I know you have heard all of these, and countless others, from legal patients, if you have any of them, as well as from normal criminal clients.
What’s comes next? The infamous “I smell pot”….probable cause? If they don’t all a search, out come the drugs dogs who have been trained to alert on command by their handlers. (A person who is now a patient used to train these dogs…and how to teach them to “alert” on command)
I’ve heard stories from many patients who were pulled over by the cops…and these patients don’t even SMOKE their medication and had no cannabis in their vehicles. You haven’t heard of them doing this, Alex? If you haven’t, then you’re not handling enough cases.
The idea that they won’t have the “resources” to do all this testing is simply specious. How much additional money will be going into law enforcement from 502? Do you think they aren’t writing DUI’s right now because they have no resources?
They’re taking blood now, even though this is not statutory limit. Once they have one, and they know the cases will be solid, they’ll ramp up to do it regularly.
What will patients do at that point? Argue probable cause? Yeah, right.
They’ll all have public defenders and they’ll be screwed.
NAW seems to be arguing that the “American public has been misinformed for decades”….so rather than trying to inform them, it’s just easier to give in to their misconceptions and throw patients to the wolves, even though NAW knows that all these patients are NOT impaired. And the only reason for doing this to patients is to get the votes you think you need from these misinformed people.
It’s clear that the philosophy of the NAW is that the end justifies the means….no matter how many patients will suffer. Do you people have no conscience whatsoever? Do you realize that there will be patients that will lose their jobs, lose their homes and become homeless, lose their vehicles to impound….and generally have their lives ruined simply to get your organization a few more votes?
Sorry….we’re never buying that argument!
@CannaCare
Look. I’m sorry you are so upset. But read Allison’s and my posts above. They should answer your questions.
I’m not asking you to buy into anything I say. I’m just explaining so that voters get both sides of the equation and can make an educated choice. What we all get to do is wait and see what happens if and when I-502 passes. I believe that my predictions on what this initiative will do for the country will eventually come to pass.
I’ve said it once before, and I’ll say it again: The challenges to I-502, though originally flowing from legitimate concerns, appear now to be desperate attempts to trigger emotional responses to gather support in opposition to it. Are you forgetting about all of the people forced into treatment, jail and financial ruin because of convictions for simple possession, DOC violations, and probation violations? I am not. Are you forgetting about the stigma that is still very much attached to marijuana use and that will need to be alleviated to trigger reform on a national level? I am not.
Your goals are very patient orientated. My goals reach much further than that. We really have chosen different paths. Please don’t view my position as a personal attack on you or an attempt to deceive the voters. That really is not the case.
It sounds like the NAW company line again. Set up the 50,000 patients of Washington State to take a fall on DUI charges so that non-patient stoners won’t convicted of possession? It’s OK to ruin our lives as long as the stoner community is safe from arrest?
It’s lucky your polling didn’t tell you that you get a sure-fire win if you could just get rid of all those pesky Jews.
Do you folks at NAW really think we’re just going to stand around and watch you criminalize us and not fight you tooth and nail? You don’t get to throw us to the wolves just so you can get a few more votes.
And what about all the patients who suffer from anorexia or who are cancer patients that are undergoing chemotherapy? Many of them take prescription Marinol and don’t use cannabis at all. I guess they’ll all be getting charged with DUI’s as well. I’m sure they’ll all sleep better knowing that they’re going to have to give up their prescription medication, or face DUI’s, just so you and your constituents can have a legal ounce of pot. I’m sure that they’ll be happy to make that sacrifice for NAW’s idea of “the greater good”.
You want voters to get “both sides of the equation” so they can make “an educated choice”? Then why does the NAW website FAQ for medical cannabis patients fail to mention that this initiative will criminalize all of them? You’d think they might want to “educate” themselves about THAT little missing detail before they sign their legal rights away. Was this just an oversight on your part? Are you forgetting about all of the totally innocent patients that will be “forced into treatment, jail and financial ruin” simply because you don’t want that same fate for recreational pot smokers? If this is NOT “an attempt to deceive the voters”…..what would you call it? Selective education?
You’re right…I’m standing up for patients. Obviously someone has to protect patients from the evil intentions of NAW.
It’s hard to not see it that way Alex when you all refuse to see (or at least admit) just how detrimental adding a per se limit to our state would be. To say it would be anything less than dangerous would be disingenuous.
If patients were being pulled over at alarming rates right now with high active THC levels, then I would possibly sympathize more with your position. However, this simply is not the case. If you disagree with me, post the stats. I am basing my opinions off of what I actually see in the courts where I am from. Furthermore, I continue to stand by all my comments above.
Anthony, I appreciate your response immediately above. This request is not a personal jab at you, and I have already drawn my own conclusions on these issues, but why doesn’t SW publicly provide the following on its website:
1) A detailed step by step analysis on why hemp would not be legal under 502 should federal law change, taking into consideration the whole of 69.50 RCW and the processes by which substances/chemicals can currently be rescheduled.
2) A detailed response as to why SW disagrees with this analysis regarding preemption: http://www.newapproachwa.org/sites/newap….
All I’ve heard so far are parroted conclusory statements when it comes these issues. SW, please publically provide answers to these questions that can be peer reviewed. NAW did.