Reschedule Cannabis

If this does not prove to you that we need change in America, nothing will. Here is a woman trying to help her sick and dying aunt just to be able to eat a little bit of food so she doesn’t die hungry, and what does she get? Fired from her job as police dispatcher, this shows how desperate Americans are becoming to get safe access to medical marijuana.

Laura Llanes does not regret buying her aunt marijuana, even though it has cost her a job as police dispatcher.

She was stunned, nevertheless, when she was fired last week after admitting she bought the marijuana to help relieve her aunt’s suffering through breast cancer and chemotherapy.

Marijuana for medicinal purposes is legal with a prescription in 13 states; Illinois is not one of them.

This is happening all across the country and it needs to stop! Sick and dying people in states that do not have protection for medical marijuana users are being persecuted, and punished when all they are trying to do is use a natural, safe, and effective medicine to combat chemotherapy loss of appetite and nausea.

Llanes, 28, of Lake Villa remains adamant she did the right thing, saying her biggest mistake was telling a few co-workers what she had done: “They ratted me out.”

It seems her co-workers did not agree with her actions, which she did not do while on employers time, and told her boss. Should people be fired because co-workers rat them out for off-duty things? This is ridiculous, I smell a lawsuit!

Her aunt, who lives in Aurora, was “sick constantly, not eating, not having an appetite. She is diabetic. She has to eat. She was whittling away to nothing,” said Llanes.

“I thought I will get her some marijuana so it would get her to eat. It worked. She did get the munchies.”

Llanes has not been charged with a crime, but when confronted by her supervisor at CenCom E-9-11, she admitted she had bought marijuana and was promptly fired Wednesday.

“All that mattered was that I admitted to committing an illegal act,” she said.

It should not be illegal to purchase marijuana in America, especially for medical reasons. This is absurd and the employees who ratted her out should be ashamed, she is only trying to help her sick aunt. And now, she has declined to buy her more, and now this woman will suffer pain while the co-workers get a pat on the back for ratting out a compassionate family member.

I hope these people sleep well tonight knowing a woman will be laying in pain dying slow because of their actions.

We need to protect patients like this and shield them from persecution like this. We need change in America regarding marijuana laws, and now is the time!!!!

A prescription drug in pill form called Marinol contains synthetic THC, the main ingredient in marijuana. But it doesn’t work for everyone, and its results are slow-arriving and unpredictable, Mirken said.

“If you talk to cancer patients, they don’t want to get high,” he said. “They just don’t want to feel sick.”

meanwhile a woman lay dying, vomiting, cannot eat in her bed… while we fight over laws regarding her smoking three (yes count them) three marijuana joints.

Patients have the right to sue drug companies.

The Supreme Court today upheld the right of patients who are hurt by a prescription or over-the-counter drug to sue the drug maker for damages.

The 6-3 decision rejected a strong move by the Bush administration and the pharmaceutical industry to shield drug makers from lawsuits if their products were approved by the Food and Drug Administration.

At issue were suits involving the more than 11,000 drugs on the market in the United States. The outgoing Bush administration told the court last fall that federal approval of a drug “preempts,” or bars, juries from deciding whether it is unduly dangerous.

But the high court, led by Justice John Paul Stevens, disagreed and said Congress had not taken away the consumer’s right to sue. He said the view of the Bush administration “does not merit deference,” particularly considering that the FDA prior to the Bush era had favored lawsuits as a means of protecting consumers from dangerous drugs.

Instead of using deadly, and potentially harmful (amputation) medication, why not use some of that natural, safe, and effective medical marijuana for nausea?

Well, if you are like most Americans, you are forced to use medicine that carries some fairly risky warnings. But this latest news shows why it is important for Americans to be informed and also have access to safe and natural forms of mediciation and not just harmful chemical compounds made and trademarked by drug companies.

Here is what happened to a patient who was suffering from nausea,…

Today’s ruling upholds a nearly $7 million jury verdict in favor of a Vermont musician whose right arm was amputated after she was injected with an anti-nausea drug made by Wyeth.

The injection struck an artery and caused gangrene, a rare but occasional complication from directly administering Phenergan, the anti-nausea drug.

Diana Levine, the Vermont woman, settled a suit against the clinic that gave her the injection and then sued Wyeth. She contended that the drug maker had not properly warned her and other consumers of the danger.

In its defense, Wyeth said the federally approved warning label told doctors and nurses to use extreme caution when injecting the drug. Levine and her lawyers said that was not sufficient. Who would take an injection to relieve nausea, she asked, if a patient knew she could lose her arm as a result?

The jury agreed with her and awarded her $6.7 million in damages.

The FDA has been under scrutiny for a very long time regarding its labeling of medication and also has been sued for its published lies regarding medical marijuana.

Considering the quote “the FDA prior to the Bush era had favored lawsuits as a means of protecting consumers from dangerous drugs” you can clearly see, the FDA has never stated its warning should protect from lawsuits.

Why does this matter?

Because nausea medicine like above are prescribed to cancer patients suffering from nausea, and medical marijuana should be more available as a safe and effective means for controlling nausea, rather than injecting yourself with chemicals than can result in you having limbs amputated, can’t you see this is exactly why we need medical marijuana in our communities. Because the medicine the drug companies want to sell us, is killing us, and the medicine that would help us, they are keeping illegal and out of our reach.

Well, not in all states. In California, you can have your medical marijuana and a police officer cannot take it away from you. Hurray for those free Cali folk.

More progress being made in Palm Springs, California. Bravo.

Medical marijuana collectives and cooperatives will now be allowed in Palm Springs, following a vote Wednesday by City Council.

How many are allowed?

The approval means Palm Springs is the first city in Riverside County to allow these facilities.

The ordinance is expected to go into effect in 30 days following its second reading, officials said.

“This is an incredible first step,” Councilwoman Ginny Foat said.

The Palm Springs City Council voted 3-1, with Councilman Lee Weigel voting no and Mayor Pro Tem Chris Mills absent, in favor of the ordinance, which allows two collectives and/or cooperatives to operate within city limits.

However, seven already are in operation… why set the limit so low if there are already more existing medical marijuana cooperatives than would be allowed? The Mayor voted “absent” no doubt he is not a medical marijuana supporter, which is why he tries to portray the co-ops as illegal…

This means several of the estimated seven dispensaries now operating in the city Palm Springs illegally will have to close.

City Attorney Doug Holland said the city is close to filing lawsuits against two of the existing dispensaries and is still gathering evidence against five more.

“If they are illegal, they ought to be shut down as soon as possible,” Mayor Steve Pougnet said.

Patients need to be able to have safe access to their medication. Why are they trying to portray legal medical marijuana co-ops as “illegal?” Just because they changed the amount of allowed co-ops to two within city limits? That does not mean they are doing anything “illegal!”

Patients and medical marijuana advocates need to voice their support here.

State law allows medical marijuana its time for these city council members to stop trying to delay the process and portray legal medical marijuana co-ops as “illegal.”

Minnesota is moving closer to securing protection for medical marijuana patients.

“Medical Cannabis Bill Passes Senate Committee in Bipartisan Vote, 8-3″

One of those testifying was Joni Whiting of Jordan, a disabled Vietnam veteran who had strongly disapproved of marijuana use until her daughter was diagnosed with melanoma and began suffering unbearable nausea and pain from the treatments. “I was opposed to marijuana,” Whiting said, “but the nausea my daughter suffered from the chemotherapy was so bad she lost a lot of weight, and the pills the doctor prescribed didn’t help — including Marinol, the THC pill. Marijuana allowed her to eat and also helped ease her pain, and she looked better than I’d seen her in months. I would have rather spent the rest of my life in prison than have denied her the medicine that kept her pain at bay and allowed her to live 89 more days.”

This is exactly why medical marijuana needs to be approved. Even marinol pill does not work as effectively, and safely as the natural cannabis.

Minnesota’s medical marijuana bill, S.F. 97, cleared its first major hurdle this afternoon, passing the Senate Health, Housing and Family Security Committee in a bipartisan vote of 8 to 3. The committee received spoken and written testimony from a number of patients and family members describing the relief provided by medical marijuana when conventional treatments had failed.

“I believe this will be the year medical marijuana becomes law in Minnesota,” said Sen. Steve Murphy (DFL-Red Wing), a sponsor of the bill. “We’ve seen now from the experiences of 13 states — one-quarter of the country — that these laws work well, and that the dire warnings of opponents simply don’t come true. The voters understand that there is no reason to subject suffering patients to arrest and jail for using a doctor-recommended medicine.”

More and more law makers are choosing the side of compassion and reason…

“I’m pleased to co-author this important legislation that will empower doctors and patients while protecting sick and dying Minnesotans from the threat of criminal prosecution,” said Sen. Debbie Johnson (R-Ham Lake). “Most FDA-approved drugs assist in managing short-term pain. Chronically ill and terminal patients need alternatives. Medical marijuana is one of those alternatives.”

Even Republicans are behind the effort to legalize medical marijuana.

Thirteen states, including one-quarter of the U.S. population, now permit medical use of marijuana under state law. The newest such law was enacted by Michigan voters last November, passing with a record-setting 63 percent “yes” vote. Medical organizations which have recognized marijuana’s medical uses include the American Public Health Association, American Nurses Association, American Academy of HIV Medicine, and American College of Physicians, which noted “marijuana’s proven efficacy at treating certain symptoms and its relatively low toxicity,” in a statement issued last year.

A plan to let seriously ill patients smoke pot is back at the Minnesota Legislature.

A plan to let seriously ill patients smoke pot is back at the Minnesota Legislature. The bill from DFL Senator Steve Murphy gets its first hearing of the session in a Senate health panel on Wednesday. The legislation would allow those with cancer, AIDS, multiple sclerosis, Alzheimer’s disease and other debilitating conditions to use marijuana to control pain and other symptoms. Gov. Tim Pawlenty has stood against the proposal and has said it would make enforcing drug laws harder. Lawmakers have considered medical marijuana bills going back a decade, without signing off. However, two years ago, the full Senate passed the bill.

Its time to stop allowing politically motivated Governors to stop people in pain from getting medical marijuana.

To show you medical marijuana can and should be accepted even in the smallest towns across America. When it comes to pain and medicine, it is time to look past these abolitionist ideas and promote a healthy and safe life style even for those who choose to use cannabis.

A small southwest Missouri village has passed an ordinance to allow the use of medical marijuana.

Mayor Joe Blundell said Cliff Village, with a population of about four dozen, wanted to show grass-roots support for Missouri to legalize medical marijuana as 13 other states have.

“This is symbolism, pure and simple,” Blundell told The Kansas City Star for a story published Tuesday. “I would like to be the brave one who grows the first plant, but they’ve built a lot of cages for the people who stick their necks out.”

It takes courage to fight for medical marijuana.

Cliff Village’s ordinance allows someone with a doctor’s approval to possess a few ounces of marijuana and grow a few plants.

Cliff Village passed the ordinance on Feb. 1 by a 3-2 vote. The mayor’s father was one of the council members to back him.

Columbia passed a similar ordinance in 2004.

All Americans should be able to have safe access to medical marijuana for whatever they need to alleviate.

The 30-year-old mayor said his interest medical marijuana comes from a painful past injury from a train accident that left him in a wheelchair.

“When I got introduced to this flower, it not only alleviated my pain, it got me out gardening,” Blundell said. “I’m not just stoning myself out. It allowed me to function.”

More and more people report what medical marijuana users have known for years, the plant can help those who have health problems or issues, to live a better, more productive and pain free life.

wow, they have arrested eight people over the photo of Michael Phelps smoking cannabis through a glass “bong” or aka water pipe.

This is insane, and calls for an immediate look into the decriminalization of marijuana at the federal level.

A Columbia, S.C., television station reports that eight people have been arrested after a photograph surfaced of Olympic star Michael Phelps smoking what looks like a bong.

WIS-TV says seven people have been charged with drug possession and one person with distribution.

The television station also reports that police have confiscated the bong that Phelps allegedly used during a party at the University of South Carolina, in Columbia.

He should’ve used a vaporizer and brought up the healthy aspect of using a vaporizer over inhaling smoke!

It’s time for America to stop wasting millions of tax payer dollars arresting, prosecuting, and jailing millions of it’s own citizens who choose to use cannabis. It’s time to reschedule cannabis today!

Here is a sick woman, who has now been evicted from her home because of her medicine.

SILVER CITY, N.M. (AP) - A handicapped woman says the manager of her apartment complex told her to move in three days after discovering the woman has marijuana for medical use.

Bobbie Wooten says she got an eviction notice Tuesday after a surprise inspection by a management representative for Silver Cliffs apartments who spotted her two marijuana plants.

A spokesman for the Arizona realty company that manages the complex says the eviction is within the terms of the lease, which calls for a drug-free environment.

Wooten, who uses a wheelchair, was paralyzed from the waist down in a car crash several years ago and suffers severe spasms.

She joined the state’s medical marijuana program when it went into effect last year.

State Health Department spokeswoman Deborah Busemeyer confirmed she’s in the program.

A “drug free” environment? I am willing to bet these apartments are filled with people on prescription narcotics, chain smoking cigarettes, and no doubt consuming alcohol. Prescription meds, alcohol, nicotine, are drugs and are found in many of the homes there. Why is this crealy burdened and sick woman being targeted because of her medical marijuana? She is part of the state approved medical marijuana program and this should be a lawyer’s dream case.

Sue. Sue Sue Sue.

Could someone be kicked out of her home because of her Vicodin prescription? No. Would the apartment complex and Sheriff be sued if they evicted and elderly woman for taking blood pressure medicine? yes, they would be.

I say this woman needs to find a good lawyer and stand up for her rights. She is part of the State medical marijuana program and laws need to be enacted to protect patients in this sort of situation.

New Mexico has a legal, state approved medical marijuana program. This sounds like the beginning of legislation, or a lawsuit.

In keeping up with the latest news on drug companies and their pain killers, here is the latest on Pfizer.

(Bloomberg) — Pfizer Inc. will pay $894 million to resolve most legal claims that its painkillers Celebrex and Bextra caused heart attacks and strokes.

Pfizer will pay $745 million to settle 90 percent of the suits claiming injuries from the products. The remainder will go to end class-action consumer fraud lawsuits and charges of inappropriate marketing by 33 states and the District of Columbia, New York-based Pfizer said today in a statement.

Pfizer, the world’s biggest drugmaker, was being sued over allegations that Celebrex and Bextra increased the risk of heart attacks or strokes after a similar pill, Merck & Co.’s Vioxx, was pulled from the market over the same side effects in 2004. Celebrex is still sold, generating $2.3 billion for Pfizer last year, while Bextra was recalled over a rare skin condition in 2005. Pfizer will book the settlement amount in its third-quarter earnings scheduled to be reported Oct. 21.

“Anytime that you have an opportunity to resolve litigation, which is inevitably something that creates uncertainty, in terms that make sense for the people and corporation, it is a good thing to do,” Amy Schulman, Pfizer’s general counsel, said in a telephone interview. “Given the stage we were at and events that have transpired, this seemed like an appropriate time to reach a resolution of the various matters.”

The reason this is important to medical marijuana patients or advocates, or caregiver, is that cannabis has often been used as a pain killer, and it does not have these types of side effects. One has every right to question the safety of these drug companies.

The article goes on to say…

Pfizer acquired Celebrex and Bextra as part of its more than $60 billion acquisition of Pharmacia Corp. in 2003. Bextra, Celebrex, and Vioxx are part of a class of medicines called non- steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, which also include ibuprofen and naproxen. U.S. regulators have warned that these drugs may increase the risk of heart attack and stroke.

Pfizer said there is no evidence that Celebrex, when taken at lower doses, poses a risk to the heart. Patients taking the biggest Celebrex dose of 400 milligrams twice a day tripled their chance of a heart attack or stroke, compared with people taking a placebo, according to a study presented in March at the American College of Cardiology meeting.

A more definitive assessment of Celebrex risks won’t come until 2010 or 2011, when a $100 million study of 20,000 patients comparing Celebrex with the pain pills ibuprofen and naproxen is expected to be completed by the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio.

Pfizer said the settlements include $60 million to 33 states and Washington, D.C., over alleged illegal promotion of Bextra and $89 million for consumer fraud lawsuits.

I hope people educate themselves on the safety of the “medicine” they are taking, to find out if it may affect their own health. When we see lawsuits like this being settled, one has to wonder, what is going on?

We need to start thinking more clearly on medical marijuana, and promoting the safe medicinal use of cannabis.

Well, I don’t think any of us in America expected this housing foreclosure mess, and financial crisis that is upon us. Needlesstosay, we are putting off the move to California at this time, but I will surely post about it in the future. However, since the election is coming, I guess it is my duty to address the clear question about the two candidates who are running for the President of the United States in November. Which one supports medical marijuana? Which one wants to lock up people for smoking cannabis?

Clearly, I do not need to go into John McCain’s thoughts on the subject to make it known, he is against anything to do with ‘medical marijuana.” He does not believe it has medicinal qualities, nor does he support its decriminalization, nor the legalization, for that matter. This man supports throwing people in jail, for the crime of possession, or even smoking a marijuana joint. Really, we need to do away with this mentality and get to the real issues facing America.

Barack Obama, on the other hand. Has a clear, and long record, of supporting medical marijuana. He has also voted to stop the raids on medical marijuana patients. This is all good news, and should come into play, come election day, if you are a supporter of medical marijuana.

Barack, gets it! He understands, some patients, need safe access to marijuana, or cannabis, for medicinal use.

We encourage all voters to think for themselves, but if you support medical marijuana, the choice is abundantly clear. Vote Obama!

In the past Senator Barack Obama has promised to end the federal raids on state medical marijuana patients, as well as their caregivers. He has voted against amendments to undermine state laws regarding cannabis as medicine.

It’s time for this country to go green, and by green I don’t mean energy, although that’d be nice too. Let’s knock some sense into congress and finally get meaningful legislation regarding medicinal marijuana in the next four years!

On June 2, 2007 Obama said this about raids: “I don’t think that should be a top priority of us, raiding people who are using … medical marijuana. With all the things we’ve got to worry about, and our Justice Department should be doing, that probably shouldn’t be a high priority.”

While the economy is certainly on everyone’s mind, we need to vote in someone who fill move forward with a new plan regarding rescheduling cannabis and helping change marijuana laws in this country. Go Obama!