I believe it is a matter for the majority of people to see that the whole cannabis prohibition, the whole DEA “dogma” that “marijuana is a dangerous drug without accepted medical use” be exposed in its anti-scientific, deceptive nature. What makes dogma “dogma” is the categorical refusal of its defenders to recognize any logic, however obvious, that contradicts (or even does not explicitly confirm) the dogmatic “foundation”.

There are several such false premises that make it “justifiable” in the eyes of the DEA and its allies to keep the remarkable medicinal plant known as cannabis illegal”. Let’s try to refute some of these “reasons” for cannabis “illegality” as has been articulated by the DEA (which is the sole arbiter of a substance’s “legal” status”, a fact that is in itself an affront to democratic principles. To start with, cannabis is not physically addictive as it lacks the recognizable “physical withdrawal syndrome” (like opiates, or alcohol, for example); the so-called “gateway drug theory” has been proven to be nonsense by a scientific research, and was even declared “half-baked” by a recent study; drug Marinol, much touted by the DEA, is not at all the same as medicinal cannabis which, as opposed to Marinol, has over 70 active compounds interacting in therapeutic ways. Cannabis decriminalization is followed by a decrease (not an increase) in “teenage use”, as the example of Portugal clearly shows, and (with another major scare-tactic disintegrating), smoking cannabis does not increase one’s risk of lung cancer; combine all this with the violence-suppressing qualities of cannabis use, its propensity to be a “safe alternative” to alcohol/hard drugs, its remarkable medicinal properties, and then see if the DEA “dogmas” have any factual foundation and not just an empty talk that is being enforced by a version of philosophical “radical pragmatism” which basically “allows” its followers to disregard the truth in favor of, let’s say, DEA “dogma”, with such a dogma being constantly “reinforced” by a consciousness of “guilt” and “fear”.

Another big “unreality” that DEA just loves is its Utopian “vision” of a “drug-free society”. This would not be even hypothetically possible, as we, humans, have always used substances in one way or another since the dawn of history to help us “cope” and endure. The key here is moderation and proper education about “safe substance use”, and the problem in the future that I envision is not the increased use of cannabis, but the perseverance of the deadly “appeal” of alcohol on many, many people, not to mention dangerous, physically addictive prescription drugs (even if we forget about hard drugs for a moment). So, how would the DEA pursue its drug-free Utopia even if its anti-cannabis repression proved successful, is not entirely clear for me!

These non-entities, or “un-realities” can still be used as if they were “realities”. Shamefully and ignorantly, the patients of the State of Illinois were deprived of a legal access to their medicine on the grounds of the DEA intimidation having to do with “gateway drug” theory! Imagine, a social policy of this magnitude decided on the basis of an “entity” that does not even exist! This would be a good example of how powerful in its evil potential the philosophy of “radical pragmatism” can really be. Another example is the effort by a group of rogue politicos to overturn the will of the Montana voters and to repeal the medical marijuana law, duly enacted by the people of that state. But isn’t it really easy to see the “radical pragmatist” doctrines and quickly reject them? Not so fast!

This is where the consciousness of “guilt” and fear come in, when our “courageous” politicians pretend that they see “black”, where as in reality they often know that they are seeing “white”. For any of them to say that they see what they see would be “heresy”. This is how the radical pragmatist systems survived in history, occasionally for quite a long time. So, why does a “radical pragmatist” system eventually fall? For many reasons, such as economic and ethnic in the old Soviet Union, but almost always radical pragmatism falls on its face because the people are no longer willing to be “living a lie”. Currently, in this country there seem to appear the new “breed” of elected representatives who are refusing to “live a lie” when it comes to cannabis legalization, even if a position like this will “jeopardize” the support by the DEA and its prison-industrial complex clients. Even the fact that cannabis use suppresses violent behavior may not necessarily “appeal” to the prison-industrial complex, as less violence means less prisons, fewer prisoners, the whole “nine yards”.

There has been what I perceived as a slightly veiled criticism on Facebook of my persistent effort to bring philosophy into the cannabis legalization discussion. Let me answer this criticism as briefly as I can. First, the legalization supporters do not, in my view, have any choice in the matter. DEA and its allies rely on “radical pragmatism” to effect their policies, and that is a “philosophy”, a wrong, dangerous philosophy, but philosophy nonetheless. Another point is that, even though this may take some time”, no system, be it political or economic, can indefinitely survive based on a bunch of “un-realities”; sooner or later someone is going to “get up” and say, Wait just a minute! Where is the evidence for any of those scary things (about cannabis, for example) that you’ve forced us to take as “absolute truth” for decades? I really do believe that even such a “monolithic” system as Marxism finally fell in good measure because the Marxist philosophy was shown to be totally bankrupt, and that, believe it or not, may prove quite demoralizing for the regime supporters.

So then, what we (and I mean, all of us) need to do is spread this scientific knowledge (along with the refutation of “dogma”), so that even for the politicians this becomes a question of either siding with fear and ignorance (which will assure one kind or “legacy”), or with science, progress and compassion, which will bring a totally different “legacy” altogether; for if some of these crooks care about nothing else, they will care about their “legacies” and whether they stood and kept silent while the modern-day “storm troopers” dragged a cancer-afflicted granny to jail for using a natural remedy for her cancer symptoms! Let’s also not forget to ask our politicians as well why they are “crying broke” and yet, at the same time, keep financing the so-called “marijuana enforcement” while most of the country wants this rather harmless natural substance decriminalized altogether, and definitely legalized when it comes to its many remarkable medicinal uses.

Sometimes when I think about these issues, I am sincerely wondering as to why we are still discussing marijuana legalization as if the arguments against it were rather compelling. Isn’t it amazing that we are still talking about this issue, and the arguments are compelling, but for the cannabis legalization, not against it.

Indeed, let’s forget about marijuana for a moment, along with the contentious arguments about its “merits” and “demerits” and imagine the hypothetical situation of this nature: Let’s just imagine that we would have a natural, non-toxic substance, capable of helping many serious medical conditions without any appreciable side effects, that on not even one occasion caused a death or an overdose in all its 5,000 years of its use by humans, and that, in addition such a substance had an ability to suppress violent behavior, increase appetite, induce rest and enhance sexual experience without any serious “undesirable” long-term consequences of its use. If we were a normal, rational creatures, we would be ecstatic because we do have such a substance, it’s been known to humans for millennia and its name is cannabis. And yet, not only we (or at least our government) are not “ecstatic”, but the lives of thousands of people have been severely damaged or destroyed as a result of a simple possession of this almost miraculous herb. This situation is so ridiculous that it is almost hard to believe, and yet it is very much the reality.

It is a reality because of a racist rant by one Harry Anslinger, this country’s “first chief narc”, a paranoid president Richard Nixon, and some very powerful industrial interest, alcohol and tobacco lobbies being, of course, at the very forefront of the anti-cannabis battle. And then, of course, there is a prison-industrial complex with its practically insatiable appetite for human blood directed by the “Drug Enforcement Administration” and other highly repressive entities in alliance with it. And so, as I tried to explain in other articles, the powerful “dogma” was created, a dogma that claims that marijuana is a “dangerous drug with no accepted medical use”, but in order to maintain such a dogma, a strong apparatus of repression is needed, and so its proponents have resorted to a philosophy of “radical pragmatism” that supposedly “allowed” them to substitute their own “truth” for the historical and scientific one.

As discussed in other articles, the “radical pragmatist” system of cannabis prohibition is based on a series of scientific and philosophical un-realities, that more and more people can see for themselves. Cannabis is not physically addictive, the so-called “gateway drug” theory is fully discredited, smoking cannabis is not associated with the increased risk for lung cancer (wasn’t that a disappointment for the prohibitionists who counted on that as their “reliable” scare-tactic); Cannabis use also suppresses violent behavior, and to even suggest that it does not have remarkable medicinal properties is a clear break with reality! I suspect that not all people are yet aware that cannabis use suppresses violent behavior, but this information must be disseminated to become a common knowledge, as there are very few things in our society that are feared and abhorred as violence. I do believe that only the direct quote from the prestigious “Substance Abuse: A Comprehensive Textbook” will suffice, lest I am somehow accused of falsifying the facts: We can be sure that the DEA and its allies are unlikely to educate the public that

Cannabis use has been shown to suppress violent behavior. Yes, that’s right, marijuana use suppresses violence. As Substance Abuse: A Comprehensive Textbook explains, “by inducing a calm, relaxed state, marijuana is not conducive to violence and only the unsophisticated think otherwise”. Wow! Although I believe that the DEA can easily withstand the “accusations” of being overly “sophisticated”, this alone, in my opinion, should put an end to the whole argument about Cannabis legalization.

But wait, there are more “good reasons” if our opponents really want to see them. Even in the presence of such overwhelming reasons to immediately legalize cannabis, some people, even our so-called “politicians” are not as receptive to the truth as they should be. “Well”, they “reason”, it would be more politically correct and “safe” for me if I “don’t rock the boat” and vote against cannabis legalization. “I mean, after all, why would I complicate my relationship with the DEA and its allies”? Unfortunately for the prohibitionists, the truth is far from being that simple as to simply violate the rights of a few people and “get on” with their lives. It just so happens that cannabis is retained in the “system” for much longer periods of time than, say, alcohol, opiates, cocaine and methamphetamines, so that the whole “random drug screens” are completely counterproductive, as they are unfairly targeting cannabis users, tend to “weed them out”, while ending up “stuck” with alcohol, hard drug or prescription drug abusers whose drug use (especially on the weekends) are hard to use because most of those dangerous substances, as opposed to cannabis, are out of the system by Monday. Is this what the employers really want? Which brings us to another, related issue.

I believe that the biggest unreality in which the “drug-free.org”, similar organizations and their DEA sponsors are the victims of (if we can even think of these people as “victims”, is that they live under the utopic delusion that the completely “substance-free” society is possible. Yet, they are unable to name one single culture in the whole of human history, where the substances, in one form or another, were not used. We want to think about our society as “full of stress”, which it, without a doubt, is! Bit the same were true of human societies throughout history, and humans always needed “something” to help them hope with the harsh realities of this existence. So then when the DEA and its allies spend so much money and effort chasing a non-toxic natural substances, while teenagers poison themselves with all kinds of junk, from “sniffing glue” to “alcohol-caffeine mixtures”, this does appear ridiculous to an ordinary human mind. The solution to the nation’s alcohol and drug problem is not repression, but education. Education about the safe substance use, similar to the safe sex education in the past (and remember the opposition to that?)!

However, there is simply no other choice and the “powers that be” will see it in due time (and some are already seeing this). But in the meantime we need to defeat the “dogma”. We need to defeat this monstrosity that sends people to prisons for decades, that condemned a 25-year old mother to 10 years in prison over 31 dollars worth of cannabis, we need to free our cannabis political prisoners such as Marc Emery, Roger Christie, Rev. Eddy Lepp, Chris Bartkowicz and other victims of the anti-cannabis tyranny! And again, as I stressed before, only as we organize and act together, will we succeed. Otherwise this flagrant deception perpetrated by the government against its own people with respect to cannabis medicinal plant will continue to last for a long time, for years, for decades, for generations…. And every time, since Jack Herer and before him we promise to ourselves that we would defeat the prohibition, but it never happens… Because of our inactivity!

Yes, it is a “hassle” to register in the newspapers “on line” so we could comment on articles; yes, it takes time to write to Editors, yes it takes time and effort to write articles such as this one that hopefully point out to the truth yet another time! Young people should remember to register to vote and to actually vote, marking the anti-cannabis political bigots for a certain and bitter defeat! We need to educate our parents, our grandparents, our neighbors and even our educators about cannabis, and destroy the “dogmas” they have all been brainwashed with for decades! But we will do it, we will do it together, because, just like other repressive systems fell as they lost all credibility, this one, unreasonably and cruelly targeting the cannabis medicinal plant will fall as well!

March 3, 2011

You cannot have a total devotion sometimes - “A Course in Miracles”.

As I observed in other comments and articles, the DEA and its prohibitionist allies have intensified their anti-cannabis “crusade”, something that is worrisome because the anti-marijuana repression is becoming more and more brutal all around the country. Many of the recent events confirm this observation, especially sentencing a mom in Oklahoma to 10 years for $ 31 worth of cannabis. At the same time, a group of rogue “politicos” in Montana are trying to directly trample the will of that state’s voters by “outlawing” the medicinal cannabis contrary to the wishes of at least 67% of the electorate. At the same time in Las Vegas, the city where compulsive gambling, alcohol abuse and violent crime are all pretty rampant, the local police and DEA agents have the “nerve” to go after and mercilessly harass the medicinal cannabis patients in that city.

The open warfare that the DEA and its minions wage against the medicinal cannabis is also bringing some heart-breaking results: in Illinois the medical marijuana Bill lost by only four votes due to a systematic campaign of disinformation and undisguised “arm-twisting” by the DEA and its “law enforcement” allies. And in Maryland, the Speaker of the House wants another “several years” to establish the “safety” of medical marijuana before it can become available to the patients in need. Several more years? Meaning that 5,000 years of the safe cannabis use by humans are “not enough”, that more delays are needed, the delays that will allow the DEA to invent new ways to combat medicinal cannabis and the rights of patients who need it. Look how hypocritical the medicinal cannabis opponents really are: they seemingly worry about “our children” while ranting against the medicinal cannabis, yet they would much rather uphold their “dogma” than see children with painful syndrome, wasting illnesses, cancer chemotherapy, autistic disorders or intractable epilepsy to get relief. This is the kind of people we are dealing with in our struggle for patients’ rights and for medicinal cannabis.

But even the ruthless cannabis prohibitionists are not “immune” from the general philosophical principles which, as I will try to show, spell the prohibitionists’ inevitable future ideological demise, despite the utmost fallacy of their whole truth-defying mentality, or the methods that they employ indiscriminately to delay their inevitable collapse. The main philosophical “difficulty” for the prohibitionists, and the one that clearly “spells” the final disintegration of their “dogmas”, is the series of interlocking “un-realities” on which their doctrines are based. None of the social systems or policies that have been based on un-realities have survived a test of time, and all of them ended up in a “trash can” of history, being remembered simply as products of the delusional thinking of the time.

Let’s look at some recent un-realities that will be easily understood, as most people do agree that those patterns of thinking were “unreal”, but it is also our task also to show that the unreality of false or dogmatic worldview, and a thinking based on such false beliefs, do lead to disastrous social consequences. One glaring example of such policies comes to mind when we remember the AIDS epidemic, especially when it first started. Not only the appropriate “containment” measures were not undertaken (because why interfere with God’s punishment for “sinful” behavior of the victims), but the succession of the US administrations denied anti-AIDS finding to the developing countries unless such finding was to be exclusively used for the “abstinence-based” programs. Such a policy, based on dogma and on “unreality” led to a rapid spread of AIDS epidemic, with hundreds of thousands of victims, including children. Of course, as the “dogma” of abstinence was shown to be negligently counterproductive, the safe sex, including with the use of condoms, has had a very positive impact on the further dynamics of the HIV epidemic.

Now let’s direct our attention to another “unreality”, the one involving gay people. In all of history and in all respects, gay people were discriminated against because of an “unreal” notion that sexual orientation is a matter of choice, and not just “choice”, but a “moral” choice. Again, boundless suffering has been the result for many thousands of gay people, and all of it was based on an “unreality”. It is only lately, after it was proven conclusively that sexual orientation is not a matter of choice, moral or otherwise, that the whole notion of anti-gay bigotry collapsed, but not before inflicting a very significant damage on a very significant number of people without any fault of their own.

We can also look at the history of stem-cell research where the conservative “hawks” still try to block it, despite the overwhelming benefit that such research can bestow upon humans and the many serious medical condition that they suffer. These efforts by the religious fanatics is “based” on the belief that life begins at conception, and that, somehow, using the human embryos which are to be discarded anyway, violated the sanctity of life. This particular line of thinking is based on a total unreality, for an early stage embryo and “human life” are two very different things. Philosopher Aristotle distinguished between “potentiality” and “actuality”, where the acorn, for example, represented a “potentiality”, while a filly grown oak tree is an example of a developed “actuality”. Just the same, an early stage embryo represent a “potentiality”, but it is not to be confused with the “actuality”, and it is not to be acted as if “potentiality” and “actuality” were one and the same.

And how about the recent war in Iraq? The whole “affair” that cost billions of dollars and created countless victims, was based on an “unreality”, unreality invented by the war mongerers to justify their blood-thirsty “adventure”. The “unreality” of the existence of weapons of mass destruction, serving as a pretext for war, and its subsequent disastrous consequences in all that has followed that insanity. I made these several examples (and the list of them is infinitely greater, as we can imagine), simply to demonstrate that any social policy, military policy or any kind of policy will eventually disintegrate if such a policy is not based on “reality”.

It is on this philosophical consideration that I based my prediction of the inevitable and miserable collapse of the DEA “dogmas”, as they are “anything but” based on reality. Perhaps to understand the forthcoming explanations even better, we should not overlook yet another “unreality” held in “high esteem” by the DEA and its allies. The “unreality” is based on a utopia that the substance-free society is “possible”. Yet, there has not been one single human society in history that has not used substances, in one form or another. Human beings need “substances” to help them cope with the trials and tribulations of life, and the only question is whether a substance used is safe or not, and whether it is culturally mandated that the substances be used “responsibly”.

The DEA and its allies do not even “see” the delusional pattern of thinking advocating for a “drug-free” society, just like very recently the politicos in Arizona preached of “drug-free” Arizona, and I remember thinking, “what drug-free, what with alcohol, and dangerous prescription drugs floating around”. And so now, just because the sick people will be able to get their cannabis medicine, the state of Arizona, according to those people, will not be “drug free”! Indeed, when a “dogma” is defended, the truth does no longer matter! Now, we see better (at least on the basis of these limited examples), what kind of havoc we can expect if we allow our “leaders” to build their social policies based on “un-realities”. It is noteworthy not to overlook that the DEA and its allies are completely indifferent and impervious to the suffering that they inflict upon people, acting together with its “client” and the most faithful ally – the prison-industrial complex.

Sick patients, including the celebrities like Montel Williams practically beg with tears in their eyes to have compassion towards seriously ill people who need cannabis as medicine – and to no avail. When the remarkable medicinal properties of the cannabis plant, along with its safety are brought up, all the DEA and its allies have to say is “so what”? None of this matters, because cannabis is illegal under the federal law, and the people controlling this deplorable status quo are us! An ultimate mockery of the democratic principles, if you ask me! According to the DEA warped and ruthless mentality, it makes no difference how many people suffer as a result of its policies – as long as their “dogma” is intact.

When during the senate confirmation hearings as a result of which the anti-scientific extremist Michele Leonhart and the arch-conservative Republican “hawk” Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL), swore the “eternal allegiance” to one another, they also pledged to violate the voters’ rights in the states that legalized medicinal cannabis. During this “touching expression” of mutual devotion between these two anti-democratic stalwarts failed to mention the voters even once! I kept wondering as to where do the voters come into this “grand scheme” of escalating anti-cannabis repression? Do the voters who legalized medical marijuana in their states have any “voice” at all in deciding these matters”?

Which brings us straight to the main point of this whole discussion – what will happen if the DEA and its prison-industrial complex friends happen to prevail in this struggle – against all logic. In fact, many people are worried about exactly this, and they often ask me this question to which we now turn. Let’s first establish beyond doubt that the DEA policies are hopelessly based on a series of glaring philosophical and scientific un-realities. The details of these people’ untenable position have been addressed in several previous articles, but let’s still look at it, as it is extremely important for understanding that the DEA “philosophy” is doomed. In its opposition to cannabis freedom, the DEA cites certain premises, none of which is “real”.

Cannabis is not physically addictive as it lacks a “documented physical withdrawal syndrome” in its users; the “gateway drug theory” is completely discredited and is declared “half-baked” by the scientific community; cannabis use does not increase the rates of lung cancer; the rate of cannabis (and substance use in general) go down when personal possessions of substances are decriminalized (as in Portugal); cannabis is non-toxic and is incomparably safer than alcohol and many (if not most) prescription drugs, even the over-the-counter medications; and if all this were not enough, cannabis use suppresses violent urges and behaviors. Furthermore, to even suggest that the drug Marinol (which is just a synthetic THC analogue) and medical marijuana are one and the same is to challenge reality in yet another, totally incomprehensible and bizarre way. Needless to say, the assertion by some that cannabis plant does not have medicinal properties is a clear “break with reality”, and further assertion that seriously ill patients simply lie to obtain the drug “to get high” is not only the break with, but also an assault on, reality! Of course, no one ever died or overdosed as a result of cannabis use.

Earlier we already addressed the unrealistic and delusional mentality that society without substance use is possible. We cannot help but to recognize that the DEA “dogma” that marijuana is a “dangerous drug with no accepted medical use” is a fable based on glaring scientific and philosophical un-realities, and therefore, it cannot survive the test of time. In fact the people of the future will be totally incredulous that the rogue, unconstitutional agency such as the DEA could actually imprison people for cultivating and using a natural substance alleviating their suffering in the privacy of their own homes! Is this the “presumption of liberty” that our founding fathers had in mind when they devised the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence”? I don’t think so.

So then, what will happen if the DEA and its allies win? Well, for one thing, the principles of democracy will be trampled because the DEA could not care less about the voters’ will. What is just as important is that the current “random drug screens” unfairly target the cannabis consumers, as cannabis metabolites are “slow” to leave the “system” as opposed to cocaine, alcohol, or opiates, for example. So then, the so-called random drug screens open the door for alcohol, hard drug, and dangerous prescription drug abusers to enter the job market at the expense of peaceful, agreeable and productive employees who may also be cannabis consumers. Is this what the employers want?

Let’s not forget that we live in a basically contentious and violence-prone society, and that people do need to relax after dealing with their diverse and often difficult to deal with, realities. The question becomes that of a “safe substance use”, just like the “safe sex” education a few years ago, and responsible cannabis use is the best for this purpose than any other “alternative”. If we look again at the main DEA “dogma” that “marijuana is a dangerous drug with no accepted medical use”, we can easily see now that the whole thing is based in an “unreality”, and, therefore, cannot succeed in the long run.

Any social policies based on the unreal premises cannot be successful as well. Even the persecution of medicinal cannabis suppliers and growers is based on an unreality, for unless medical marijuana can start falling to earth as a Manna from Heaven, it needs to be sown, grown and tended to, so a continuing harassment of medical marijuana providers has unreality as its basis as well. Sensing the hopelessness of their “dogmas”, the DEA and its allies fully embrace the dangerous philosophy of “radical pragmatism”, that basically “empowers” them not only to impose their own “truth”, but to actually make it so that their dogmas “become” the “truth”. To strengthen their position, the DEA and its allies fill the prisons with the non-violent “offenders”, criminalize more citizens than any other country of the civilized world, blackmail politicians, deny the patients their medicine, and do all this at a great financial and moral cost to society. And if for this purpose the free exchange of ideas, as well as appropriate scientific research is suppressed – so be it!

Many (of not most) of the despots in history resorted to “radical pragmatism” to reinforce their ideologies, but none ever succeeded. This is because, even though the radical pragmatists make people “live a lie”, the growing segments of society refuse to continue living a lie forever. When these societal forces mature and organize, the system of “radical pragmatism” falls to the ground, as it inevitably will with respect to the DEA and its “dogmas”.

However, philosophical necessity or not, the change will not come on its own. Freedom is not “free”, or easy, for that matter. In article after article I implore the people, especially the young people, to get actively involved in the process. It is necessary to write comments to articles appearing on the Internet, it is necessary to write “letters to editors”, it is crucial to register to vote and actually voting, it is quite helpful to donate money to cannabis freedom organizations, so that they can continue their struggle on behalf of all of us! Even talking with one’s parents, grandparents, neighbors, teachers or trusted coworkers can bring sizable benefits to the “cause”.

When I write my articles, or my comments to other people’s articles on the Internet, or “letters to editors”, I conceptualize this as “sowing the seeds” in consciousness, the seeds without which no “fruit” will ever materialize. The “idea”, as holistic theologians and philosophers have always known, gets strengthened by being shared, and as great philosopher Georg Hegel said, our whole history is the “evolution of the consciousness of freedom”. Let’s win the struggle for cannabis freedom, and let’s prove another statement by Hegel, and that is “the real is the rational, and the rational is the real”!

February 25, 2011

It definitely appears as of late that the DEA and its prohibitionist allies have intensified the already quite intense anti-Cannabis repression on all levels. Just recently, the Oklahoma mom was given a 10 year sentence for 31 dollars worth of pot, a harassment of Las Vegas Medicinal Cannabis establishments are in full “swing” the open war against patients’ rights and Medicinal Cannabis is waged in every State that considers it, and the so-called “random drug tests”, which I consider a cornerstone of prohibitionist repression are on the rise. The organization “Join Together” reported a couple of days ago that 10 States even consider random drug tests for public assistance recipients, the abhorrent invasion of privacy notwithstanding, while also in defiance of previous court decisions declaring such practices unconstitutional.

The war on Medicinal Cannabis patients continue unabated, with absolutely brutal measures such as denial of housing subsidies and outright dismissals (as in the case of Walmart vs. Joseph Casias, a cancer patient and employee of the year, fired for testing “positive” for his medication – the Medicinal Cannabis. Children are encouraged to “rat” on their patents for growing Cannabis, a situation altogether close to what the “Hitler Youth” did in Nazi Germany. And what about political prisoners held in American prisons for their Cannabis Freedom activism – people like Marc Emery, Chris Bartkowicz and Roger Christie? We can can continue on and on with the cases of anti-Cannabis/Medicinal Cannabis brutality, but we also have to cover at least some of the factors that make it possible for this whole outrage to exist.

First of all, let’s meet some of Cannabis Freedom opponents, the unsavory lobbyists for alcohol and tobacco industries, the Big Pharma, the “hate groups” such as “Heritage Foundation” and “Family Research Council”, as well as, of course, the monstrous entity already described in my other blogs – the “Prison-Industrial Complex”. Without the staunch support by these individuals and entities it would be very difficult for the DEA to maintain the level of repression that it is currently able to maintain. It should be clear to everyone that money and profits motivate the alcohol and tobacco lobbies, for these people know well the so-called “gateway drug theory” for the scientific garbage that it is, and they realize that if more people choose a much safer way to relax with Cannabis, rather than with alcohol, the huge profits of the industry may take a serious “hit”. The same goes for Big Pharma, as Medicinal Cannabis can and will eventually serve as a safe, effective and inexpensive alternative to many of pharmaceutical chemicals currently on the market. Dr. Lester Grinspoon, Professor-Emeritus of Psychiatry of the Harvard Medical School, said it best:

“Cannabis will one day be seen as a wonder drug, as was penicillin in the 1940s. Like penicillin, herbal marijuana is remarkably nontoxic, has a wide range of therapeutic applications and would be quite inexpensive if it were legal”.

A big difference from the racist ramblings of the first Cannabis prohibitionist, Harry Anslinger”, and paranoid and anti-scientific declarations of his admirer, President Richard Nixon. Then we have the “hate groups”. Their numbers are said to be increasing, something that does not surprise me especially, considering the contentiousness and violent tendencies underlying this society, something that will have to be addressed sooner or later.

It is noteworthy that the “hate groups” don’t just oppose the Cannabis Freedom, they oppose everything progressive, everything that may promote human liberty and understanding. They oppose Gay Rights, reproductive freedom, stem-cell research, safe sex education, you name it! Of course, Cannabis/Medicinal Cannabis Freedom is no exception, and I believe that very few people would expect it to be. But what about the rest of the population? Why more people are not “rising up” (or speaking out) against these enemies of Liberty? How could they be allowed to go as far in their despotism as to even turn into “nothingness” the basic tenet of this democracy – the Presumption of Liberty, that the Shafer Commission pointed to even back in 1972? How can even now, for example, a bunch of rogue “politicos” in Montana abolish the Medicinal Cannabis Law, duly voted for and supported by absolute majority of the population? Why in these hard economic times, our so-called “representatives” would be willing to enact massive cuts in many essential programs, but no one “dares” to speak about cutting the over-bloated DEA “marijuana enforcement” budget, or the budget of its “clients”, the Prison-Industrial Complex”?

Well, now is the time to turn to what I called earlier the cornerstone of the DEA system of repression, the so-called “random drug tests”. This system is actually so ingenious that even the KGB itself would probably “admire” it. Aren’t we surprised that in poll after poll absolute majority of Americans voice their support for marijuana decriminalization and for Medicinal Cannabis Legalization, and yet these issues are not advancing nearly fast enough? Some people would probably say, Well, Dr. “K”, aren’t you exaggerating a bit? If, according to you, most people support these Initiatives, why aren’t they speak up? Why don’t they try to advance the causes they believe in so much, and openly demand the change of brutal and outdated anti-Cannabis “laws”, the end to DEA absolute dominance, and the end to the whole failed “drug war”, for that matter? The answer is FEAR! Fear is the all-time favorite weapon of all the tyrants in history, applicable to impose their will in so many different diverse situations. You see, it is one thing to answer to an anonymous “poll”, but it is quite another matter to come out openly, and to declare the opposition to the DEA and its minions publicly.

What if a person who decides to do that occasionally indulges in the safe relaxation with Cannabis in the privacy of his own home? Well, the DEA and its allies want to make sure that such privacy does not exist. Because an open protest may easily lead to a “random drug test”, and if it comes out to be positive, a person’s life is severely damaged, if not destroyed, on so many levels. And, of course, any marijuana arrest will have a ruinous effect on a person’s life, even according to well-known Christian Conservative Pat Robertson and the former US Surgeon-General Joycelin Elders. Even the politicians are not “immune” to the fear-tactics and blackmail by the DEA and its allies. The DEA is good with attaching “labels”, and few politicians will risk being labeled as “soft on drugs”, be it for the support of Medicinal Cannabis or Cannabis Legalization in general. What this all means, is that we need to extend our education to employers as well.

This is where we can demonstrate that the random “drug screens” the way they are done now, are completely counterproductive. Because of a “safety mechanism” built in the Cannabis plant (addressed in other articles), Cannabis metabolites leave the system slowly, making their “detection” possible for a long time, as opposed to alcohol, cocaine, opiates, many tranquilizers, or methamphetamine. So people, including the young people, indulge in alcohol, hard drug, and prescription drug abuse often because these substances are much less likely to be detected, especially if a “binge” happens on Friday night, for example. This is exactly why Cannabis prohibition goes far beyond simple “denial of good”, but instead fosters the evil that is not known or understood by many people. Let’s not forget for a moment that Cannabis use suppresses violent urges and behaviors, which alcohol (and cocaine), on the other hand, effectively promote.

In this highly stressful society people do look for ways to relax and “unwind” from all the trials and tribulations they have to go through all the time. Alcohol, hard drugs, or dangerous, physically addictive prescription drugs are hardly suitable for this purpose, and the DEA Utopia of a drug-free society is unrealistic and deceptive. The substances (including alcohol and prescription drugs, and even something as simple as sugar)surround us on all sides, and the safe substance use will eventually have to be taught, just like the safe sex in the past, especially when the “powers that be” recognized that abstinence is not really a viable option.

Even though there is no way out of presenting this rather bleak picture of the DEA repression, its dominance will come to a crushing end. This is, as I already pointed out in other articles, simply philosophically inevitable. The reason is that ALL the DEA scare tactics are based on “unreality” Cannabis is not physically addictive, the so-called “gateway drug” theory is invalid, there is no “teenage drug use” has not increased in any country (or State) that decriminalized Cannabis, and the much touted drug Marinol is not at all the same as Medicinal Cannabis. To deny the remarkable medicinal properties of the Cannabis Plant is not a “rational” thing to do altogether. History and philosophy prove that when a public policy, (and I mean any public policy), is based on a total “unreality”, such policy will collapse miserably, with the people of the future incredulous as to how it survived for as long as it did!

So, what are we to do in the face of a continuing and intensifying Anti-Cannabis repression by the DEA and its allies? Is their a solution that we can pursue? Yes, there is, but any solution will require the overcoming of “consciousness of fear”! Also, it is crucial that we register to vote and actually vote on election days. I agree with Bill Maher that it is disgraceful that only 11% of 18- to 29-year-olds actually voted in the last election! Well, youngsters, do not count on our generation to legalize Cannabis for you, as most of the “baby boomers” are too brainwashed by decades of misinformation to make themselves into an effective force for this kind of change! Make sure you vote, and make sure you target any politician ranting or acting against the Cannabis Freedom for a certain defeat! The voting booth is one of the few places where people may feel reasonably safe against the DEA reprisals. Another thing that is mandatory if we want the Cannabis Freedom to prevail is to comment at the news articles that come every day on the Internet. Yes, this will entail personal “exposure”, but this is one thing that may greatly influence both editorial attitudes and public opinion. Also, if tens of thousands of people suddenly start to comment, the repressive apparatus at our enemies’ disposal will be simply overwhelmed. Make sure also that you talk with your friends, parents, grandparents, and even teachers about Cannabis and stand up to the deception and disinformation surrounding this issue.

To win the Cannabis freedom will require determination, courage, and a concerted effort of tens of thousands of people, but when the prohibition finally falls, and its perpetrators are exposed for what they are, and for the crimes against humanity that their actions caused, the reward, both physical and spiritual, will be “sweet” and long-lasting!

February 20, 2011

According to great German “pessimistic” philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer, “All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident“. Even though Schopenhauer spoke in general, about any truth, this quote applies to Cannabis Liberation Movement as if it had been specifically “coined” for it. Right now, as it appears, Cannabis activists are in the second stage of their “truth”’s journey through the “stages” on its path to eventual and inevitable acceptance, even though the “opponents” are not relaxing their viciousness even with regards to compassionate use of Medicinal Cannabis, and continue to oppose is on many fronts and on many levels, using intimidation and blackmail of politicians (among other maneuvering) to advance their evil agenda.

A few people have asked me about what they personally can do to bring about the defeat of Cannabis prohibition. This is what I will try to address in this blog, but for right now let me just say that we, all of us, need to revive the old slogan of the Musketeers, “ONE FOR ALL, AND ALL FOR ONE”! The reason we need to mobilize and organize into a strong and coherent force for change is that we have powerful adversaries, who indiscriminately use fear to thwart progress, and the fear-tactics that these opponents of freedom use are really not new or “original”. “A Course in Miracles” says it well:

“And fear, with ashen lips, blinded and terrible to look upon, is lifted to the throne of love, its dying conqueror, its substitute, the “savior” from salvation”.

Let us go over some of the prohibitionists’ fear tactics, so that we have a more coherent picture of what we are facing, and then we can look at how these “scare-tactics” are maintained, how they can be debunked, and what is the role of each and every one of us individually in achieving this goal.

A favorite prohibitionist scare-tactic has been that Cannabis is “addictive”. Yet, Cannabis use does not lead to a formation of what is known as “physical withdrawal syndrome”, the physical dependence that develops to alcohol, nicotine, and many of the prescription drugs on the market. Having some “flu-like symptoms” for a couple of days after heavy and prolonged Cannabis use hardly qualifies as “addiction”, and it is not even close to what we call “physical addiction”. Let’s talk for a moment about methadone maintenance therapy for opiate addicts. We cannot place anyone on methadone, no matter how bad he or she “feels”, or how much opiates he/she reports to have been using. The rules (both State and Federal) are very specific. We must document the presence of an objective “physical withdrawal syndrome” in order to establish a diagnosis of “physical dependence”, and for opiates this would include needle tracks, goose-flesh, rapid heard beat, increased bowel sounds, diarrhea, signs of infection (including fever) from using dirty “equipment”, and some others. Most people have heard of a terrible physical withdrawal of alcohol, including seizures and DT’s, or of a strong physical addiction to nicotine, making it so much difficult to quit smoking. It is fairly clear that Cannabis use does not lead to a formation of physical dependence, as its use is not accompanied by the “physical withdrawal syndrome”.

Another favorite scare-tactic is that Cannabis is a “gateway drug” leading to the use of other, much more dangerous substances, such as heroin and cocaine. I am not going to spend much time on this “theory” as it has already been thoroughly debunked and even declared “half-baked” by a recent large study. Suffice it to say is that to say that Cannabis “leads” to other drug use is the same as to say that drinking coffee leads to alcoholism, or that using alcohol “leads” to LSD, for example. The “gateway drug” theory is completely invalid, it is a non-existing entity, and yet many politicians still act as if it were “universally accepted”, and even make important public policy decisions based upon this non-existent entity, In fact, the recent research is showing that Cannabis may potentially serve as an “exit substance” for recovering alcoholics, hard drug, and prescription drug addicts, because rather than leaving these people “in the cold” for the sake of “total abstinence”, Cannabis use may help alleviate some accompanying emotional problems, such as anxiety, insomnia, depression, and mood swings that contribute to a relapse to alcohol/hard drug use in so many cases.

I gather it was a big “disappointment” for the prohibitionist camp when another recent large study determined that there is no connection between smoking Cannabis and lung cancer. Not only there is no such connection, but Cannabis has been recently demonstrated to have a wide-ranging anti-cancer activity with many potential applications. One of the biggest scare-tactics that the prohibitionist utilize is what they perceive as a potential increase of “teenage use” of Cannabis if it is legalized. First of all, in country after country where the Cannabis decriminalization has taken place, this particular effect is no observed. Portugal would be the case in point where the overall substance use (and criminality) were decreased by as much as 10% as a direct result of decriminalization of a personal possession of “substances”, including, of course, Cannabis.

I have stressed repeatedly that I am not in favor of any teenage substance use (except for medical reasons), but it is the nature of young people of this age to “experiment”, and it would be much safer in all respects if they “experiment” with Cannabis, rather than with alcohol, cocaine, amphetamines or “Oxycontins”. What I am trying to say is that when we talk about the “gateway drug” theory, the exact opposite of it is actually true, as the recent Federal study itself concluded when it was determined in December 2010 that, even though the Cannabis use among teenagers is slightly up, the much more dangerous “indulgences” such as tobacco smoking and, (especially), binge drinking are significantly down. Now, how would that possibly “fit” into the so-called “gateway drug” theory?

The DEA and its prohibitionist allies designate Cannabis Plant as having “no accepted medical use”. This ignorance and arrogance do not stop to amaze me. For thousands of years Cannabis plant has been used as medicine in multiple cultures, and it never even occurred to anyone to suggest that it is “not medicine”. How can the DEA possibly feel “entitled” to contradict the testimonies of thousands of people and to say in effect that all those patients are lying simply in order to obtain a “dangerous drug” and to “get high”. Bit, just all other “dogmas” in history collapsed when it became obvious that they were not based on “reality”, the DEA dogma will inevitably collapse as well, or a good portion of philosophy on these issues should be abandoned; but really, I don’t think that the DEA should delude itself more than it already does, and harbor any such unrealistic hopes.

There is one more point to be made here. The DEA constantly brings up that Cannabis is “illegal” on the Federal Level, no matter what the States do, and this is a perfectly “circular” argument, because first, the DEA is the very one who imposes this “illegality”, and second, the “illegality” is a human concept, it is not immutable like the “law of gravity”, for example. Well, let’s go now to what each and every one of us can do to bring about the eventual defeat of Cannabis prohibition. As I mentioned earlier, we need to adopt “One for all, and all for one” Musketeer attitude all over again. The only way to win (any) Civil Rights struggle is to overcome the “consciousness of fear”.

Now, isn’t it surprising that during the “anonymous” polls, a decisive majority of the voting public speak in favor of decriminalization of Cannabis. But yet, not nearly as many people are willing to write comments to the relevant articles, as they appear on line, or to sign petitions, or to write to politicians, or to raise these issues during “town hall” meetings, etc. Why is that? The consciousness of fear! It is one thing to answer an anonymous poll, but it is quite another thing to “come out of the closet” as a Cannabis Freedom activist, and for many people this would require a certain courage. The only possible way out of this dilemma is numbers. Yes, numbers of people who chose to overcome the consciousness of fear in Eastern Europe more than 20 years ago, in Tahrir Square only days ago, and in Cannabis Liberation that is still to come full-force.

But what if, you ask me, the DEA and its allies continue to disregard “reason”, proceed with its repressive tactics, and even decides to “crush” the upsurge in “free thinking” about Cannabis by intensifying its “witch-hunts”. Is that possible? Yes, of course, it is possible, but it will never succeed in the long run. To increase the repression as a response to a Liberation Movement has occurred to many despots in history, and it always failed. Let’s see what will happen of the anti-Cannabis repression becomes even more severe: the alcohol, hard drug use, prescription drug use and violence will all increase. Is our society ready for such an eventuality just to protect the DEA “dogmas”? I don’t think so.

In this regard, and at the risk of being somewhat repetitive, I emphasize again and again a proven fact that Cannabis use (as opposed to alcohol use) suppresses violent urges and behaviors. This is extremely important in our violence and discord-prone society. Every American housewife asked to vote on Cannabis Legalization, will have to ask herself a simple question, Am I safe around Cannabis users? If we are to prevail, the answer to this question should be an unequivocal “YES”! “One for all and all for one” also implies the necessity of a massive public outcry when any one of use gets arrested. We should protest in Pennsylvania when Roger Christie is a Cannabis political prisoner in Hawaii, we should write to editors and make our voices heard in Illinois when people like Marc Emery, Chris Bartkowicz, Rev. Eddy Lepp and other Cannabis martyrs are deprived of their freedom by the despots operating under a “color” of State and Federal authority.

When we respond in numbers, in such a way that if any of us gets arrested, all of us, in a sense, get arrested, we will “overwhelm” the prohibitionists’ apparatus of repression, and this is the only way to win this struggle. Even right now, during the budget debate, why aren’t politicians talking about slashing the DEA’s so-called “marijuana enforcement” budget when over 50% of the population want the Plant decriminalized (if not legalized) altogether? The challenges that we, as Cannabis Freedom activists face are enormous. Even the ancient Gnostics knew only too well that the hardest fight is a fight against ignorance, but it just does have to be fought. To defeat the prohibitionist ignorance, we will all need to act together, stand up for one another, even face danger on occasion, because the enemy will not give up its “dogmas” easily. What we need to see also is the Medicinal Cannabis patients come out of their solitary “closets” and giving a strong voice to remarkable medicinal properties of the Plant; what we need to see is people speaking the Truth about Cannabis to their friends and relatives, and doing it everywhere, on a massive scale. Our common consciousness is a curious thing, it has the ability (nay, the evolutionary necessity) to progress towards freedom; President Obama was absolutely right when he remarked upon the Revolution in Egypt that the “human soul has freedom as its most important aspiration”. True that, Mr. President, as well as the fact that no amount of repression has ever been able to stifle this deep-seated “consciousness of freedom” as an integral and inextinguishable attribute of the human soul and of the human existence!

All evil is ignorance – Plato

01-23-2011 As the science of human psychology develops, more and more experts start accepting the main premise of Holistic Theology that we, as humans, have only two basic, primal emotions from which all our other emotions, and moods, and dispositions, and worldviews subsequently arise; these primal emotions are love and fear. The great spiritual classic, “A Course in Miracles” summarizes this proposition in a following way: “The fundamental conflict in this world is between creation and miscreation; all fear is implicit in the second, and all love in the first. The conflict is therefore one between love and fear”.

On or about December 24, 2010 there was a “revolt” of the jury pool in Montana when the potential jurors informed the prosecution that they were not willing to convict the defendants of a “crime” of marijuana possession; not only was this event highly significant from the legal point of view, but it also served as a shining example of the repudiation of fear, of the rejection by ordinary people of the hateful and irrational government policies towards Cannabis consumers. And this happened in a State where Medicinal Cannabis use is legal, and where people can evaluate for themselves the effects of even highly limited Cannabis freedom as opposed to unbridled repression! The fact is that if we look back in time on our own society and its many civil rights struggles, we will not only see that the “politics of fear” are not by any means something “new” when it comes to Cannabis Liberation Movement, but that fear-tactics have remained basically the same, using similar intimidation techniques, the same appeal to ignorance, disinformation and intolerance.

The good news is that these politics of fear are eventually and inexorably defeated, as the premises that they try to advance are in direct contradiction of Reality, the Reality that can be ascertained by either the “correspondence” with known facts or by an appeal to our moral judgments. I remember when, just a few short decades ago, the fear mongerers did all they could to prevent or delay the Gay equality using their favorite and enduring “argument” of What would happen with our children if they believe that it is OK to be Gay!! We must save our society from “homosexual agenda” and the “activist judges” who try to “promote” it! As we can see now, these and similar scare tactics were bound to collapse as they had no “correspondence” with any material facts and had no chance of withstanding the moral challenge to their premises, so that when we now look back we are incredulous that many people actually did believe this nonsense. Indeed, as we look back now at the Gay equality Movement, or Black Civil Rights Movement, or Feminist Movement, we can see and appreciate that the “alternate realities” created by the fear mongerers at those times, the “alternate realities” unsubstantiated by facts, will inexorably and miserably fail as our information improves and our consciousness evolves towards freedom.

This is precisely the way that the Cannabis Liberation Movement will undoubtedly develop and succeed in the future, as there is absolutely no “foothold” in Reality for the DEA “dogma” that Cannabis is a “dangerous drug with no accepted medical use”. When this country’s first “Chief Narc” Harry Anslinger, obsessed with his hatred towards the Plant, devoted his whole life to demonizing it and making sure that all the “loopholes” with regard to Cannabis Freedom are closed, what did he use as his reasoning?! That the Jazz musicians create their “demonic music” under the influence of marijuana and then seek sexual relationship with White women; and that the main reason for marijuana prohibition is its effect on the degenerate races?! Do these appear to our contemporary consciousness as valid “reasons” for outlawing the Plant? Well, if not then we have to admit that the original “reasoning” for Cannabis prohibition was deeply flawed to really say the very least about it. Or take President Nixon in 1972 who said in response to the findings of Shafer Commission that recommended immediate marijuana decriminalization that “Every one of the bastards advocating for legalization of marijuana is Jewish”. Is this what the Founding Fathers envisioned the President’s “proper” response to the recommendations of a scientific Commission should be?! The Shafer Commission was absolutely correct in asserting that Cannabis prohibition and criminalization was incompatible with the Presumption of Liberty that is the very essence of the Constitution and a new Promise that was this country upon its creation by the Founding Fathers.

Let’s now examine how the contemporary ideological heirs to Harry Anslinger and Richard Nixon apply the anti-Cannabis fear-tactics in their futile attempts to combat what seem to be the inevitable and time-honored conclusions of science and philosophy. This is necessary for the understanding of why these “efforts” will undoubtedly collapse as the time goes on. First of all, the denial of facts is the pre-eminent feature of any “alternate reality”, including the one “created” by the Cannabis prohibitionists. The remarkable medicinal properties of the Cannabis Plant which have been used by humans for thousands of years are denied; the non-toxicity of Cannabis with not one single death or overdose attributable to it is ignored; the fact that Cannabis is so much safer than alcohol and most pharmaceuticals is disregarded; and the truth of paramount significance that Cannabis use suppresses violent urges and behaviors is not even mentioned by the DEA prohibitionists.

This last fact deserves further elucidation. Despite the DEA propaganda machine being put in an “overdrive” when it comes to anti-Cannabis hysteria, we hear a lot about all kinds of violence and mayhem caused by alcohol, but not Cannabis; there is not one single case in point when an act of violence was committed under the influence of Cannabis, while there are millions that have been committed under the influence of alcohol and/or hard drugs, or even the dangerous, physically addictive prescription drugs. Let’s do ourselves a favor, America: we hear the “drug commercials” by the “Big Pharma” companies all the time on TV; let’s pay more close attention to the potential “side-effects” of all those chemicals and try to compare them with the non-toxicity of Cannabis. Let’s then try to decide what remedy would we prefer in many cases for our own selves, or for our loved ones, if and when the need arises. This is not to say that most pharmaceuticals do not have “their place”, but it is to say that Medicinal Cannabis is a valid therapeutic choice, and that it should never, ever be kept from the patients in need.

In its vicious fight against the Medicinal Cannabis and patients’ rights the DEA not only denies the existing realities, but it also “twists the arms” of politicians to act on the basis of “realities” that do not exist at all. The glaring example of this is the so-called “gateway drug” theory that is by now completely discredited by serious science. Another DEA propaganda tool is its assertion that the drug Marinol, a synthetic THC analogue, is the same as Medicinal Cannabis, something that is such a scientific and philosophical fallacy that it can only be “fairly compared” with the racist craziness of Harry Anslinger himself. But this does not even end there. The DEA and its henchmen are actually saying this: Medicinal Cannabis does not really help anyone medically, and all the cancer, chronic pain, glaucoma and chemotherapy sufferers are simply lying in order to be able to “get high”. Can you imagine the utter ignorance, presumptuousness and arrogance in making these kinds of assertions?! These assertions go beyond the simple denial of Reality, they are a direct assault on Reality! When people of the future look at this outrage from the “consciousness of the future” perspective, they will be totally aghast at such a “position”, and may not even believe that it really formed a basis for the DEA public policy.

Back in 1996, when the courageous people of California first approved the Legalization of Medicinal Cannabis in their State, the DEA blatantly resorted to undisguised scare tactics, threatening Doctors with the loss of a special DEA Number and Medicare participation if they so much as “discussed” the Medicinal Cannabis with their patients! Back then, and even right now, the DEA has always readily embraced the philosophy of “radical pragmatism” that basically disregards the ethical need to “prove” its position as a “truth claim”, and then it has acted in accordance with its own “agenda” as if it were the truth! Because of its firm ideological grounding in “radical pragmatism”, the DEA has felt free to ignore the facts, suppress the dissent, and even take political prisoners like Canadian businessman and politician Marc Emery and the Medicinal Cannabis grower Chris Bartkowicz! No wonder the people like George Soros (and myself) who came from the backgrounds of an intimate knowledge of fear (and the philosophy of “radical pragmatism”), are so vehemently pro-Cannabis Freedom, as we see clearly the moral bankruptcy of its opponents.

There is one more interesting point that needs to be brought up. On one recent occasion the DEA let slip the remark that it is really “only a police Agency” that is “enforcing” the existing Federal Law. Really?? What is the DEA doing then trying to dictate the drug policies? Because if the DEA is “only a police Agency”, but yet it influences the social policies as much as it does, then it follows that this country is a police State. California Proposition 19 directly challenged the DEA “dogma” about Cannabis, and so 9 previous DEA Directors urged the Attorney General to sue California if the Proposition passed. The Attorney General Eric Holder threatened to practically take a military action against the President’s most loyal voters if they defied the DEA and passed Prop. 19! The Attorney General also said something to the effect that the current Cannabis laws cannot be changed by voting. Then, Mr. Attorney-General, pray you can tell us how such “laws” can be changed, for surely you do not mean to say to the American people that what was created by the racist Harry Anslinger and and his paranoid admirer Richard Nixon is practically “written in stone” and unchangeable, like the Law of gravity! During the recent Senate confirmation hearings for an anti-scientific extremist Michele Leonhart to be the new head of the DEA, both she and the arch-Conservative Senator Jeff Sessions (R-AL) vowed to continue to disregard the voters’ will in the States that Legalized Medicinal Cannabis. Is this the “democracy” that the Founding Fathers strove to establish in this country, a system where the voters actually decide on the country’s policies?!

However, not all of us are ignorant, and in 1988 the DEA Administrative Law Judge, Francis Young called for decriminalization of the Plant, calling marijuana “one of the safest therapeutically active substances known to man”. But yet again, in what was in my view a defiance of Constitutional authority, the DEA simply refused to comply with the judicial decision. There are other considerations that the government of this country will have to take into account when the new, constructive and Reality-based approaches are devised with regard to Cannabis Plant. Our society is the one with ever increasing stress and anxiety levels, it is a contentious, and angry, and often violent society. So, it is extremely important that the people be able to safely relax and “take the edge off”. Neither alcohol, nor hard drugs, nor the prescription “pills” will satisfy this purpose; in many ways the substance use in the future will be subject to an “education effort” for the purposes of “safe substance use” (just as about the “safe sex”), and this is the only viable option that is left for the Government to take, not a kind of “drug free Utopia” advocated by the DEA and its minions, which is nonsense as we are surrounded by unsafe drugs such as alcohol, nicotine and others on all sides.

Very recently, on 12-14-10 the government released the study about the “teenage drug use” that both the Government and the “yellow media” grossly misrepresented to the public. The study showed that, while the Cannabis use among teenagers rose slightly, the binge-drinking and smoking fell in this age group! These latter facts are a huge positive development, as the truly dangerous substances are beginning to be perceived as such, and a much less dangerous substance is chosen instead. And even though I am not about to condone any teenage drug use, it is still clear to me that even the young people “experimentation” with Cannabis is much safer than a similar experimentation with alcohol, pills, or hard drugs. We should also make a point that the decrease in nicotine and alcohol use among teenagers may at least in part be attributable to the anti-smoking and anti-alcohol abuse education which, as opposed to anti-Cannabis propaganda, does have a strong “foothold” in Reality, what with all the disease and deaths attributable to their use, the facts that can be easily shown to anyone!

Well, you can say, then what is the problem in the face of such overwhelming facts in favor of Cannabis/Medicinal Cannabis Freedom? The problem is the DEA and its Prison-industrial Complex. As even the former US Surgeon-General Joycelyn Elders noted on CNN in October 2010, we criminalize more people in this country than all other countries of the Civilized World”, and that our prison population virtually “exploded” after 1970 when the DEA and its so-called “Controlled Substances Act” were allowed to take over the social policies of this country. Just look at the overcrowding of prisons, in California for example, and see for yourselves the inhumanity and the spiritual degradation of those who would keep the present system intact.

But the Prison-Industrial Complex in this country is like a monstrous spider that could not care less about Reason, humanity or basic human rights; it even objected to enacting Bill 1449 in California which finally decriminalized small Cannabis possessions in that State! Truly, these people’s appetite for human blood is without limits! In order to maintain the “status quo”, the DEA and its allies have created an almost air-tight and elaborate system of repression; for any politician to even talk about greater Cannabis Freedom is an “unforgivable heresy”; while any mentioning about cutting the huge DEA budget (in the face of an ever-increasing deficits) is an even greater “heresy”! Any Doctor in this country who practices and advocates for Cannabis/Medicinal Cannabis Freedom is at a great risk of losing his DEA “number”, or even his license. So, what will happen if the DEA continues to ignore the facts of Reality and persist in its anti-Cannabis repression? Can this succeed? I am delighted to be able to give my answer to this “proposition” that it will NOT! The “dogmas” that have no counterpart in Reality will not survive in a long run, as they never have. More and more the people in this country will “wake up” and realize that the irrational, crude, hateful, fear-mongering games that are being played on them by the DEA are completely counter-productive; the employers of this country will have no choice but to realize that when they fire good, conscientious workers for being positive for Cannabis, they are left with alcohol, hard drug and prescription drug abusers, including millions of people who are forced to “drink themselves to sleep” every night (or to take addictive sleeping pills, or both), and then go to work and try to “produce” in the morning! The DEA can, of course, still disregard all this, but the longer it is allowed to do so, the greater will be the condemnation of its policies by the consciousness of the future.

From the Holistic perspective, Cannabis is markedly pro-evolutionary as it increases appetite, induces rest, suppresses violent urges, and enhances the sexual experience. Dr Lester Grinspoon, Professor of Psychiatry of the Harvard Medical School, said it best to the Los Angeles Times on May 6, 2005: “Cannabis will one day be seen as a wonder drug, as was penicillin in the 1940s. Like penicillin, herbal marijuana is remarkably non-toxic, has a wide range of therapeutic applications and would be quite inexpensive if it were legal”.

Cannabis Freedom will prevail, the proper “safe substance use” education will be developed sooner or later, the Portuguese example showing that decriminalization of personal possession of substances leads only to decrease in criminality and overall substance use will be assimilated, and the fear tactics of enemies of progress and human rights will be decisively rejected! And if this and similar blogs help to sow the Reality “seeds” in our consciousness, to show the inexorable advent of Progress, to facilitate our collective evolution in the consciousness of Freedom, so much the better!

No beauty is comparable to the beauty of truth – Rene’ Descartes

The Real is the Rational, and the Rational is the Real – Georg Hegel

Sometime during the mid-seventies a group of Soviet dissidents gathered at a secret Moscow apartment and raised a toast “for the success of our hopeless affair”. No one at that time anticipated the collapse of the Soviet system, neither in the Soviet Union, nor in the West. The Soviet system, based on fear, military might and repression appeared as strong and “monolithic” in the 70-s, as it had 20 years earlier, and yet it collapsed not even 20 years after the dissident gathering just mentioned. For even though the Soviet system was based on fear and repression, there is one more thing that it was based on – “unreality”, and that, as far as I am concerned, was the main reason for its undoing. In fact, there are many theories as to why the Soviet Empire finally collapsed as it did, and most of them probably have some overall merit, but from my point of view, no less important than all the economic, military, ethnic and other problems that plagued the Soviet Empire, the final philosophical defeat of Marxism, and its ideological and economic system, was just as much to blame (or, rather, to credit) for that monumental event of the end of the 20-s Century as all the other theories the “pundits” had to offer.

Whenever any “dogma” is defended by any repressive regime or entity, such a “defense” requires the “alternate reality” to be constructed around the “dogma”, so as to give it a “plausibility” that it cannot get from the world of more commonly accepted Reality. The main “guardian” of the Soviet system, the KGB, created many “alternate realities” to justify the otherwise unjustifiable abomination that was the Soviet Empire. For example, right after the war, under the direction of highly paranoid Joseph Stalin, the KGB created an “alternate reality” that supposedly “showed” that Adolf Hitler did not “really” die in the Berlin bunker on April 30, 1945, but was instead “rescued” by the British and the Americans, and was now living in comfort in a “castle” in West Germany, protected by the Western Allies who nevertheless could not hide that “crime” from the brave Soviet intelligence (the KGB, who else)! There were even the “pictures” of the “castle” obtained by the “fearless” Russian agents, aimed to convince any potential “doubter” that Adolf Hitler was still alive and was hiding behind the backs of the “Anglo-Americans”. What better excuse did one need to start the “Cold War” which would dominate international relations for many years to come, and which had almost succeeded in bringing about what was known as the “mutually assured destruction”.

There were other “alternate realities” constructed by the KGB and its machinery of disinformation, such as its Fifth Chief Directorate. In 1961, the KGB “disseminated” the “alarming news” that West German “spies” were crossing over to the Soviet Occupation Zone called the German Democratic Republic (DDR), and so the Berlin Wall was built practically overnight, serving for the next 27 years as a terrifying symbol of Communist repression. Of course, as we all know now, the Berlin Wall was not built to stem the “infiltration of spies” from the West to the East, but instead to stop the exodus of about 100,000 people a day from the Eastern Occupation Zone to West Berlin in search and pursuit of freedom. It was, of course, not even remotely possible to challenge those alternate realities on the basis that they were simply not true. I could continue with examples of the “alternate realities” used by the KGB to uphold Communist “dogmas”, but I think it is clear that such “alternate realities”, however ridiculous they appear to our consciousness later on in history, may nevertheless hold a “vividness” and “persuasiveness” that those who construct them can effectively use at that moment in history. Any appeal to the “truth” would have been a suicide for anyone attempting such “revelations”.

We can also show that some “alternate realities” have been (and still are) operational in the West, including in the United States. If someone had suggested a 100 years ago that a Black man would become a President of the United States, and that Gay people would, by the agreement of the President and the Congress, be able to serve openly in the US Military, such a person would have been “laughed out of the room” and declared to be in need of a “serious” psychiatric help. Even such great thinkers of the 20-s Century as the writer Erich Remarque and philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre were known for their ridiculing and condemning of homosexuality. In one of his “famous” statements, Erich Maria Remarque even said that “friendship between the US and Russia is just as “possible” as when two homosexuals try to make a baby”. Jean-Paul Sartre considered homosexuality as an “example” of “inauthentic behavior” where “a homosexual” would “deny” his own human nature and the personal “existential” choices that he would otherwise make to “change” his homosexuality. As we all know, even in the United States the Gay rights Movement had to travel a long and tortuous road to the status of near-equality that it has now achieved in this country, where only very recently the homophobic preacher Jerry Falwell of the now-defunct “Moral Majority” asserted in all seriousness that AIDS was a “punishment from God” for homosexuality, and that in that assertion he was supported by none other than President Ronald Reagan himself!

If anyone should be able to truly appreciate the fallacy of “alternate realities” constructed for political purposes, it is our President Barack Obama. Look at all the “alternate realities” being built by the right-wing extremists about the President being a Muslim, about him having been “planted” by the terrorists in order to establish the “Sharia Law” in this country and “make sure” that Iran gets nuclear weapons. It is becoming clear to absolute majority of people by now how preposterous these fantasies are, but again, before they are exposed, the alternate realities can do a whole lot of damage. It is also quite obvious to me that the opponents of the Cannabis/Medicinal Cannabis freedom in the United States are actively engaged in the creation of yet another “alternate reality”, this one “dedicated” to convincing the world that marijuana, which has been used by humanity for thousands of years as “medicine” and a “recreational” substance, is somehow a “dangerous drug” without “accepted medical use”.

In fact, the “alternate reality” about Cannabis was started by one Harry Anslinger and continued by Richard Nixon, although even at that time the “unreality” of their position could be demonstrated based on thousands of years of human history. We all know now about the strong racist overtones underlying Harry Anslinger’s views on the subject, and the paranoid ideation of Richard Nixon in following this ideological and public policy blunder. So, how do we know in this often chaotic world which “reality” is “real” and which one is “alternate”? Because the distinction is not nearly as easily apparent as people may imagine, especially right at the time when one of those “alternate realities” is “constructed”. Why would great philosopher Hegel make his statement that the “Real is the Rational and the Rational is the Real”, and how can we possibly sort all this out? Well, there are a couple of ways to distinguish the “real” and the “rational” from the “unreal” and the “irrational”. This we can attempt to do on both the “material” and the “spiritual” planes.

Let’s deal with the “material” plane first. When we look back on the past flow of consciousness, be it our own, or a wider “duration” as philosopher Henri Bergson defined it in the beginning of the 20-th Century, we can ask ourselves a simple question as to whether certain events “correspond” with the facts of material reality which is often much easier to do after a time period has elapsed and certain results achieved or not achieved based on the inferences of what was once presented as “true and unalterable” reality are evaluated. We can further show that when the actions are based on verifiable facts of material reality, they lead to much more successful outcomes than the actions not based on such facts. We can see that the KGB fantasy used to construct the Berlin Wall fell apart after only three decades, as when we look back, we see not a single fact “cited” by the KGB as “justification” for its coming into existence. So then, when the “Wall” came down, there was suddenly no surprise because its very existence was never “rational” or rationally justifiable, and we can all see it now. So when Ronald Reagan said in 1988, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this Wall”, he was speaking on the basis of a true reality, the reality of the Wall being a tool of repression, and not at all what the KGB and its alternate reality claimed it to be. The same test will apply to the disaster of the War in Iraq. We know now that that there had never been any “weapons of mass destruction”, that the whole “affair” was based on an “alternate reality”, and we certainly can now “appreciate” the results that have materialized out of that senseless endeavor.

And what about the gay equality, another example that I mentioned earlier? Well, as we look back, we again fail to detect any “facts” that were actually present to justify gay oppression at any point of our history. All the “dogmas” that were used to persecute gays are now seen to be without any factual foundation and, therefore, unreal. And again, when we look at the persecution of the Cannabis/Medicinal Cannabis users, we fail to see any substantiating facts that could justify this repression. The DEA-created alternate reality in support of a “dogma” that marijuana is a dangerous drug without an accepted medical use” is disintegrating right before our eyes. There are no “facts” to meaningfully support this “dogma”. Cannabis is non-toxic, non-physically addictive, very effective in a wide variety of medical conditions and capable of suppressing violent behavior, a property very important for our contemporary society, a fact that is blatantly neglected by the DEA and its Cannabis prohibitionist allies. In justifying Cannabis’ (Medicinal Cannabis’) “illegality” the DEA and its allies use a perfectly “circular” argument, so that, according to them”, Cannabis is illegal because… it is illegal “under Federal Law”.

When the DEA claims that drug Marinol is the same as the Medicinal Cannabis, it only shows its own scientific and philosophical illiteracy, as Marinol is a synthetic product lacking the “whole” that is the nature-made Medicinal Cannabis. And, just as I showed this to be the case when it comes to Berlin Wall, anti-Gay hysteria, Iraqi “weapons of mass destruction”, or our President being an “agent of radical Islam”, the consciousness of the future will look with total incredulity at our present day situation surrounding Cannabis/Medicinal Cannabis Freedom in our society. There are absolutely NO facts supporting the persecution, and this will be seen all too well by the individual and collective consciousness of the future.

The “need” for anti-Cannabis repression will be seen not to have “corresponded” to the actual material realities surrounding this issue. But what about the “spiritual plane”, what about people that will still say that they are “morally justified” to suppress the Cannabis Freedom (and, especially, the Medicinal Cannabis Freedom)? As philosopher Immanuel Kant taught, we may not be able to see the “Reality” of things, or how the “things are in themselves”, other than through “moral experience”. It is through “moral experience”, according to Kant, that we may be able to “penetrate” the “shifting flux of appearances” in “the world of becoming” and get to the Reality we are trying to “apprehend”. Very well, let’s see if we can use the Kantian “moral experience” to what has become the struggle for Legalization of the Medicinal Cannabis. National Geographic recently described a person living with HIV who used Medicinal Cannabis in order not to die from the AIDS “wasting syndrome” when the new anti-HIV medications had not yet become available. Let’s now assume that for a moment we become “omnipotent beings” with the ability to change certain events of the past, and let us further ask ourselves, individually and collectively if we would consider it “moral” individually and collectively, to deprive that person of the Medicinal Cannabis that obviously saved his life without actually damaging anyone else? Because of the prevailing “goodness” of the people of this country, my hope is that very few people would have actually sided with the prohibitionists and taken Medicinal Cannabis from the person in question. We can go on and apply the Kantian Principle to other examples I made earlier, so we can see that it applies to them as well, be it Berlin Wall, anti-Gay repression, or the War in Iraq.

What is it, some may ask, that makes all despots act almost alike, whether these despots are of the KGB, DEA, “Sacred” Inquisition, National Socialism, Bush’s regime, or anti-gay bigotry? What is it that underlies the defense of their “dogmas”, including the creation of “alternate realities”? After all, we are talking about the regimes and entities so diverse that many people may question if there is anything that could “unite” them all without attempting to create yet another “alternate reality”. What underlies all these historical errors is the philosophy of “radical pragmatism”. What this philosophy advocates is that “the truth is what we make it to be” without any regard to correspondence with the facts of material reality or the “moral guidance” proposed by Kant. Radical pragmatists are “big” on such concepts as “might makes right”, “end justifies the means”, “the greater good” and so forth. A radical pragmatist would have no qualms about suppressing the rights of the few in order to advance what he sees as “benefit (including future benefit) for the many”. There is absolutely no problem for a radical pragmatist to disregard and brush off the known facts of reality in order to “uphold” her “dogmas”. When it comes to Cannabis Freedom, the radical pragmatists from the DEA simply brush off such accepted facts as that Cannabis suppresses violent behavior, or that the overall drug use and criminality in Portugal were greatly reduced after “personal possessions” of “substances” had been decriminalized in that country. Having dismissed these indisputable facts, the DEA continues instead to wage a brutal “drug war” on the American People in defense of its anti-Cannabis obsession. In other words, there is no truth for a radical pragmatist that does not support the original premise, or “dogma” in need of “upholding”.

As we can see upon our reflections on history (including even the most recent history), the philosophy of “radical pragmatism” inevitably breaks down in the end. There have to be “correspondences” with the material facts in the “existing” Reality, as well as in the sphere of moral judgments, for the Truth to be established and defended in the long run. There is no chance that any “truth claim” will survive otherwise, no matter the severity of repression. Just as we have seen with the Berlin Wall, anti-gay persecutions, or War in Iraq, the “truth claims” that have no counterpart in either material or a spiritual Reality are bound to collapse in the end. It is with this realization that we can confidently say that Cannabis, and especially the Medicinal Cannabis” freedom is only a matter of time, only a matter for our individual and collective consciousness to progress sufficiently and to see this current DEA – engendered error the same way we are now able to see many others.

On December the 23, 2010, a well known Christian Conservative, Dr. Pat Robertson, spoke to his audience about the need to decriminalize small personal possessions of marijuana, “a couple ounces, or so”. Dr. Robertson correctly observed that sentences for “marijuana offenses” are way too harsh, and that the whole “enforcement” business is costing this country an absolutely inordinate amounts of money. Former US Surgeon-General, Dr. Joycelyn Elders, remarked on CNN prior to November elections that, because of the anti-Cannabis repression in this country we are criminalizing more of our population than any other country of the Civilized World. As Dr. Elders pointed out, and as many people already know, the prison population in this country practically exploded since 1970, or when the DEA “took over” along with the so-called “Controlled Substances Act” of 1970.

At the historic L.A. Conference organized by the Drug Policy Alliance in cooperation with the California Society of Addiction Medicine held on July 8, 2010, there was an almost total consensus about decriminalization of marijuana for personal use, while the California State Medical Association had already made a policy statement in which it expressed that “criminalization of marijuana is a failed public policy”. All this is after the Shafer’s Commission recommended decriminalizing marijuana back in 1972, and Judge Francis Young said in 1988 that “marijuana is the safest therapeutically-active substance known to men”. Why, then is marijuana still illegal in this country, why our everyday, decent, hard-working people are still being thrown in jail over the use of a natural substance with a multitude of medicinal properties? How is it that both the serious science and the common sense say “legalize (or, at least, decriminalize) Cannabis” to this government, but to no avail? How is the DEA able to fight “tooth and nail” the Medicinal Cannabis that has served humanity as medicine for thousands of years? In order to answer these, and some other questions, we need to look at what the L.A. Conference called the “Prison-Industrial Complex” in this country, an entity with tremendous amount of “lobbying power”, which is being headed and directed by none other than the DEA itself! It is very hard to really understand the despotic powers that these people have, and it is even harder to make others understand them, but what helps in my case is that I am a former political refugee from a world at one time ruled by the KGB, so the mechanics of this repression are made somewhat more “intelligible” for me.

When Pat Robertson made his remarks about the need to decriminalize Cannabis to the “700 Club”, he correctly observed that criminalization of marijuana costs this country a whole lot of money, in addition to the harsh, life destroying criminal sanctions directed at the people of this country for exercising their rights as free citizens. In order to even begin to understand the DEA’s iron grip on power in the United States, let’s look first at the current debate about cutting our Federal spending as a way to deal with the ballooning deficit. Many proposed spending “cuts” are being discussed, but have we noticed that there is practically no discussion about reducing the DEA budget, or that of the Prison-Industrial Complex as a whole? In fact, it appears to me that our so-called “representatives” in Congress would much rather talk about taxing  mother’s milk than about cutting the DEA budget together with its “marijuana enforcement”. Any one who would even dare to suggest that maybe the DEA should somehow contribute to the much-needed saving of resources, would be labeled as “soft on drugs” with the potential very unpleasant political consequences.

A monstrous entity known as the Prison-Industrial Complex could not care less about the lives it destroys, or the financial resources it wastes. We all know how hard it is to get a job in this sluggish economy, so we can imagine just how much harder this task becomes after a “marijuana conviction”. Consequently, a person’s life may be severely damaged over practically nothing, even if such a person is lucky enough to avoid Dr. Robertson’s assertion that “before we know it, such a person ends up with a 10-year sentence due to the marijuana “sentencing guidelines”. But this is exactly what the Prison-Industrial Complex’s human monsters want in the end! Many of the people, after having become victims of its repression, are marginalized, unemployed, underemployed, alienated, devalued... It is a little surprise that some of these victims become firmly attached to the criminal justice “system” for years, if not for life, feeding the Prison-Industrial Complex machinery with all its police, drug agents, prison guards, probation officers and the like. As Officer McPherson from Law Enforcement Against Prohibition explained at the L.A. Conference, much of the fierce anti-Cannabis rhetoric by the “law enforcement” is explained by none other than the “departmental funding”. People’s lives are destroyed and huge financial resources wasted – all of this for their “departmental funding”.

Let’s look at some other aspects of the tremendous power wielded by the DEA and its henchmen. One would expect that, especially now, after a very recent tragedy in Arizona where several people were killed and wounded by a mentally unstable individual, we start finally talking about violence reducing properties of marijuana, something that is clearly articulated in the prestigious “Substance Abuse: A Comprehensive Textbook”, so that more liberal marijuana use policies in our society can actually contribute to an overall decrease in violence and anger, sometimes spilling into tragedies that we just witnessed. Given that the prestigious Textbook, published by none other than the American Association of Addiction Psychiatry, states that “marijuana use decreases violent behavior” and that “only the unsophisticated think otherwise”, isn’t it highly surprising that more Doctors do not get up and at least quote this scientific knowledge? Not so fast! The doctors and medical establishments are completely and totally under the DEA control, with every doctor needing a special DEA “number” to even practice medicine, while any dispute with the DEA puts a quick and “efficient” end to such a person’s career. It is only now that some voices are beginning to be heard that the mindless anti-marijuana policies actually make this country’s alcohol, hard drug, and prescription drug abuse much worse, because most people know that “marijuana stays in your system”, and can be detected by a “drug screen” for a long time, while alcohol, cocaine, opiates and methamphetamines “clear” from the system rapidly and are much less likely to be detected, especially after a “weekend” use. Never mind that those substances are incomparably more harmful than Cannabis and can lead to serious addictions. It is the anti-Cannabis “dogma” that is important to the DEA, not the people’s well-being!

Perhaps nowhere is the DEA more vicious and totally untruthful as in the issue of Medicinal Cannabis. Nowhere are the scientific facts are concealed so blatantly, and the scientific research itself is suppressed unashamedly, as if we were living in the Inquisition-controlled Europe of the Dark Ages, and not in a 21-st Century America! DEA and its allies resort to straight-up lies when they tell the State Legislatures to reject the Medicinal Cannabis Legislation in their States because of the “problems” experienced in the States that Legalized the Medicinal Cannabis under their State laws. “Problems”? What problems? In California, a strong supporter of Medicinal Cannabis has just been elected that State’s new Attorney General, in Colorado the media reports increased tax revenues from Medicinal Cannabis sales, and even in New Mexico the new Republican Governor just stated that the repeal of the State Medicinal Cannabis law is “not a priority”. The DEA and its fear-mongering allies cannot really point to any serious problems in the States where this ancient medicine is legal, with not one death or overdose, or a serious adverse reaction requiring medical intervention.

But this is not something that will deter the DEA and its allies in any way; as their “trump card” these people throw in the faces of the State Legislators the “fact” that Cannabis is “illegal under the Federal Law”. But who is keeping it illegal? The same DEA, of course! So, the cancer patients are not “free” to use the herbal medicine that helps their symptoms because the DEA says that the plant is “illegal”, but the people who keep it illegal are those same despots working for the DEA! How do American People still tolerate this horrible game played on them by the DEA is totally beyond me as well. I know that in the future, when we sufficiently progress in what philosopher Georg Hegel called the “consciousness of freedom”, we will be amazed at the level of this craziness, at the repression perpetrated by the DEA against the supposedly “free people” of this country.

When our Founding Fathers established this country, they did so based on certain sacred principles, first and foremost of those being that the United States will have its Government “by the People, of the People and for the People”. The Founding Fathers also sought a free development of science, so that the scientists never have to be burned at the stake for stating the scientific truths, as was common under the “Sacred” Inquisition in Europe. What do you think our Founding Fathers would have said about the “Agency” which suppresses scientific research, breaks people’s doors down and fills jails and prisons with honest Citizens for growing hemp? For one thing, the founding Fathers would be in a state of shock and total disbelief! What would our Founding Fathers think of the nine former DEA “Directors” who urged the Federal Government to sue the voters of California if they dared to legalize Cannabis?? Would the Founding Fathers approve of the DEA spending the taxpayer money tapping the phones of foreign opposition leaders? What would our Founding Fathers say to a “proposition” that about 80% of the voters of this country are in favor of the Legalization of Medicinal Cannabis, but the DEA uses the blatantly anti-democratic means to thwart the Will of the People, even though this government was supposed to be “for the People, by the People, and of the People”.

If this is what the government is designed to be, how can it withhold the Medicinal Cannabis when 80 % of the electorate wants it legalized?? How can the Illinois Legislators even consider voting against the Bill to Legalize Medicinal Cannabis in their State knowing full-well that about 70% of the Illinois voters support it?! Now, this is not the democracy the Founding Fathers envisioned in their sacred promise of a new beginning given to the freedom-loving pioneers of this new country. Even now, in a staggering show of hypocrisy, the US Senate just confirmed Michele Leonhart, a rabid Cannabis prohibitionist and an anti-scientific despot, to the be the head of the DEA.

The Senators made no attempt to ask Leonhart some “tough questions” about Medicinal Cannabis, as some on the side of Reason had hoped, thus completely turning their backs on their own constituents, on the sick people of their States, on the will of their own voters who decided that the Medicinal Cannabis should be “legal” in those 15 States, and who have a reasonable expectation that their Senators will actually “represent” them on a Federal Level, instead of exhibiting “we-are-ashamed-for our-own-States” attitude. This is the kind of power that the DEA and its allies feed on, this is how they destroy the sacred Spiritual promise made by our Founding Fathers, turning this country into yet another repressive Empire instead of a new beginning for the long-suffering humanity.

In a recent program on National Geographic called “MarijuanaNation”, a patient with AIDS was featured among others, who would have died of a “wasting syndrome” in the 90-s when the new and effective treatment for HIV was not yet available, but whose Medicinal Cannabis use helped to “tie him over” until the drugs did became available, and as a result, the person is alive today. The medication that had been long used to treat nausea of chemotherapy, Reglan, was recently taken off the market because of its potential and horrible side-effects of “Tardive Dyskinesia” syndrome characterized by “tongue protrusion, lip smacking, face grimacing and eye twitching”. Many other medications (most recent – a painkiller Darvocet) had to be taken off the market because of the intolerable side-effects, and yet because of the DEA tyranny the sick people of most States are still not free to use the Cannabis natural Medicine that has none of these side-effects. Surely, the Medicinal Cannabis Legalization is a “non-partisan” issue, because Liberals and Conservatives alike (or their loved ones) may one day become sick and need the remarkable properties of the Cannabis Medicinal Plant, rather than “tongue protrusion” and “lip smacking” that they would get from Reglan or similar chemicals. And what about some patients with intractable pain or seizure disorder, who have found the relief from Medicinal Cannabis, a safe and effective relief, that they could not obtain from anything else?! Of course we are not surprised to know that the “Big Pharma” is allied with Big Alcohol and the Prison-Industrial Complex in opposing the Medicinal Cannabis Legalization!

One of the greatest philosophical errors any society can commit is when the “truth” becomes “relative”. It is no longer the “truth” because it is what it is, but the “truth” imposed instead by the “powers that be”, such as the DEA based upon the “alternate reality” that it created, when it is trying to pressure the lawmakers to abandon the sick people based on “entities” that no longer even exist, such as the fully discredited “gateway drug” theory. When the truth is “relative” (to our political beliefs or prevailing ideologies), it is no longer the “truth”, and no society will survive for a long time if it attempts to build its public policy based on “moral and ethical relativism” where the “truth” becomes “what we say it is”, instead of being what it is! I certainly hope that the American people will promptly and filly recognize the game that the DEA and its prohibitionist allies are playing on them, and choose the survival of the United States as a free country where the scientific inquiry reigns supreme, and where the TRUTH is what it is, instead of being what the DEA “ideologues” want it to be!