White House Official Talks About Medical Marijuana

The Associated Press; April 27, 2004
by Wilson Ring

MONTPELIER, Vt. (AP) - A question and answer period with a top Bush administration drug control official ended early Tuesday after a supporter of medical marijuana disrupted the meeting.

Dr. Andrea Barthwell was taking questions after outlining the administration's prevention efforts when the man started shouting from the audience at the Pavilion office building.

"These people are telling me I have to live in pain," the man said to a scattering of applause before being confronted by a security guard. After a few minutes he left.

Barthwell had just finished an outline of the Bush administration's drug control plan, which calls for an almost equal balance of preventing drug use and abuse, providing treatment for addicts, and using law enforcement to disrupt illegal drug supply.

She had only begun to discuss the medicinal use of marijuana while taking questions when her talk was disrupted. The time scheduled for her presentation was up and Vermont Health Commissioner Dr. Paul Jarris decided to end the meeting rather than try to continue.

The Vermont House is considering a bill that would exempt patients with certain chronic conditions from arrest and prosecution for possession of limited amounts of marijuana. The bill was approved by the Senate last year.

Advocates of medicinal marijuana argue it can be a humane and effective pain reliever for people suffering from a variety of chronic illnesses, such as cancer, AIDS or glaucoma.

Barthwell, whose formal title is deputy director for demand reduction for the Office of National Drug Control Policy, said after the meeting that the Bush administration opposed the decriminalization or legalization of marijuana for medical use.

"Our position is that a crude plant product is not medicine," said Barthwell. "We would not want to see that here or anywhere."

She said the active ingredient in marijuana, which can provide relief to chronically ill patients, can be found in the drug Marinol.

And she said advocates for reforming national marijuana laws were supporting efforts to use marijuana for medicinal purposes as a way to begin legalizing it for other uses.

Earlier Tuesday Barthwell appeared before the House and Senate Health and Welfare Committees.

Gov. James Douglas opposes the use of medical marijuana. His Health Commissioner, Dr. Paul Jarris, said that as a physician he couldn't support the use of medical marijuana, a plant that contains numerous chemicals.

Burlington Mayor Peter Clavelle, who is seeking the Democratic gubernatorial nomination, supports legalizing medical marijuana.

There is growing public support across Vermont for medical marijuana. On Town Meeting Day more than 82 percent of Burlington voters came down in favor of legalizing marijuana for medical use.

At Tuesday's meeting several people in the audience wore T-shirts with the slogan "ONDCP Spreads Myths," but the audience was quiet until the one man started shouting, ending the meeting.

http://www.mpp.org/VT/news_7012.html

Legislators fail to protect medical marijuana patients

West Virginia legislators could have acted to protect medical marijuana patients this session. They chose not to.

In the face of overwhelming public support for medical marijuana -- 80 percent nationwide, according to Time magazine -- West Virginia legislators have stayed mute. The only victims are West Virginia's seriously ill medical marijuana patients.

Luckily, there is hope: you. Your voice can break the silence. Your words can help ease pain.

Please urge your legislators to introduce a medical marijuana bill next session. Only you can convince them that this issue is important to West Virginians.

Please take a few moments to Take Action. After you choose your favorite pre-written letter and type in your address, our site will automatically e-mail your letter to your legislators ... all with the click of a few buttons. The whole process takes less than two minutes, but it makes a world of difference. Also, you can print the letters and send them to your legislators through regular mail.

Members of the West Virginia Legislature must be convinced to protect the state's seriously ill patients who need marijuana as their medicine.

Thank you for supporting the Marijuana Policy Project. Please pass this information on so that even more voices for reform can be heard
http://www.mpp.org/WV/index.html

we all just need to move to Canada, and make pot legal once more. Once Candas population is majority pot smokers, theyll have every incentive to make pot legal. the US is never going to fully legalize marijuana, especially with GB and his fucked up commission. We all need to do what they did in Canada, stand in front of the capital, or supreme court, and smoke non-stop with hundreds to thousands of fellow pot smokers. i dunno tho, with GB, hed prolly throw bombs on us, lol! Cant there be at least ONE state that allows marijuana, for EVERYBODY! We need to start a protest, once people see that ALL of us are willing to fight for what we believe is right, maybe then some supreme heads might turn, and study more about the TRUE marijuana, not no bunk street weed. If they studied the effects of vaporizing Weed, they would realize there is no unhealthy side effects, and everybody should be allowed to puff on some budz. Its time for All of us to stand up, and fight for what we KNOW is right!

HEAL YEAH BIATCH.
THE MILLION BLUNT MARCH

i feel tht while GB is in power he will influence blair to do the same over here hopefully they will both be voted out next election n we get more understanding ppl in charge.

i will cast my ANTI GW vote bright and early
i hope people see GW bush is a fucked up for the rich prez only
and vote his ass out,
he does not care about any worker anywhere
or any vet or any servicemember
he is a fuking joke

this vote is to see who runs agianst him(kerry)

i would vote for a black woman prez before bush
hows that for a change

basing a vote on their stand on pot is the most retarded thing ive ever heard. i love pot as much as the next person. hell i smoke everyday. but theres lots more important issues to base a vote on than their stand on marijuana.

To a selfish rich republican arsehole there are probably many issues to think about that don't really affect them.
To someone who's main painkilling drug will get them jail time, it's quite important.

dont accuse me of being selfish and then turn around and say something way more selfish than what i said.

whats more important? seriously, in the whole scheme of things. not just taking into account yourself. having a president who thinks pot should be legal (which in itself wont get it legalized) or paying attention to more important facts like economy and home land security.

and im all for the legalization of pot. but if its that big of a deal for you to smoke pot to ease pain for some medical reason, go north to canada. seriously. its that easy. to legalize it here will take a long time, and lots of hard effort no one has thrown into the movement yet. probaly because were all stoner. just save yourself the b*tching, whining, and problems of possibly being arrested, and move up north.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by sensiskunk

we all just need to move to Canada, and make pot legal once more. Once Candas population is majority pot smokers, theyll have every incentive to make pot legal. the US is never going to fully legalize marijuana, especially with GB and his fucked up commission. We all need to do what they did in Canada, stand in front of the capital, or supreme court, and smoke non-stop with hundreds to thousands of fellow pot smokers. i dunno tho, with GB, hed prolly throw bombs on us, lol! Cant there be at least ONE state that allows marijuana, for EVERYBODY! We need to start a protest, once people see that ALL of us are willing to fight for what we believe is right, maybe then some supreme heads might turn, and study more about the TRUE marijuana, not no bunk street weed. If they studied the effects of vaporizing Weed, they would realize there is no unhealthy side effects, and everybody should be allowed to puff on some budz. Its time for All of us to stand up, and fight for what we KNOW is right!

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this guy has it all figured out. if youre really that worried about having pot legal. move to canada. youll never have to worry about being bombed or attacked. the good ole US is the next door neighbor. nobodys gonna beat up on lil buddy. and smoke your pot. and whine about the US and our policys. at least then you wont be able to ruin th elives of my children with an uneducated vote just because you wanna smoke pot legally and thats all that matters.

u blew this out of proportion man, i was stoned as fuck when i wrote that, so take that under consideration, before u criticize me! I keep track of what GB and his commission do, and it disgusts me to see that hes still in office! And the most recent event that occured in Baghdad, the beheading of an american cilivilian, hopefully will force the senate to remove the troops. And for your information, i dont just care about legalizing marijuana, i care more about the sake of the environment! you dont even know me, so stop wrongfully accusing me!

the beheading wont get troops pulled out. if anything more will go. we can not back out now. no matter who gets in office, we will be in iraq for a long ass time. weve started it, and now we must finish.

and if one did pull out now. it would be the worst decision ever. give them an even more reason to hate us. and thatd look bad on us from the rest of the world too. we wont be out of iraq any time soon

duzn't even matter the white house is prolly all stoners newayz. but i mean god damnit a fourteen year old has more sense than the damn prez. seriously, hes got an i.q. of 91, which is 6 points above being mentally disabilitated. And the frikkin government says they're gonna retaliate, no shit, we're gonna do sumthin to piss em off so they kill more innocent civilians. sounds like a bushism to me... o well wut can i say i'm just a frikken teen. doesn't mean i can't hate our government! ;)

if you hate it. leave!

well, u've got a good point there lol. but wut i mean is not that i hate it, i just wish that someone would have the sense to actually make democracy instead of having money control the government. I mean how did gwb get there in the first place i might add?