http://www.youtube.com/watc...

According to a LA times write up, the American Medical Association’s recent decision to urge the federal govt. to reclassify Marijuana from a schedule I drug reflects the a general change in attitude towards marijuana since 1996 when California voters passed the marijuana compassionate use act.

Since then,  thirteen other states have followed suit with some kind of marijuana legalization legislation. National polls all indicate, not simply a relaxed attitude towards marijuana use, but attitudes that show informed consent and increasing support for the stuff’s legalization.

The report from the American Medical Association:

http://americansforsafeacce...

 Marijuana use steadily is becoming mainstream and normal.

 I say, power to the people.

--virgil

You guys on the Right are anxious over the Health care Reform Bill that passed the House last Sunday morning because it includes a public option concession. And you’re not quite sure what your boy Lieberman, Senator from Conn.,  is going to do when the bill finally hits the Senate floor for a vote.

Though Joe Lieberman is an Independent, he caucuses with the Democrats and supports a Republican for president. As he said Sunday morning, he will vote to filibuster the health care reform bill if it includes a public option.

On the other side of the aisle, and from the same neighborhood, Independent Senator from VT., Bernie Sanders, has threatened to oppose efforts to move the Health Care Reform bill through the Senate if the package does not include the public option, something that Sanders has long fought for as part of any real health care reform. 

The deal is this, the Democrats in the senate need 60 votes to bring the bill to the floor for debate and sixty votes to bring the debate of the bill to a close. They need only a simple majority, 51 votes, to pass it. 

I wonder what is going to happen next week …?

--virgil

From my family to yours' !

--virgil

According to the 2008 crime stats recently released by the FBI, there's a drug possession arrest in the United States every eight seconds. About fifty percent of those arrests are carried out for simple possession of marijuana.

It's about time we're finally seeing a change in the way we deal with the issue of substance abuse in our communities. And allowing States to decide for themselves the direction of law enforcement policy is a positive step in the right direction.

Regarding marijuana decriminalization, it has been found by a Harvard University Study,  that legalizing the stuff will inject an estimated $77 billion into the U.S Economy.

That's just one benefit, among many, to legalizing Marijuana.

Happy Monday !

--virgil

In this month’s issue of Harpers Magazine there’s an essay by Gideon Lewis-Krause,  Tokeville: On the Frontiers of Federalism and Dope, A letter from Northern California, in which the author recounts his  adventure into Northern California (actually, just north east of San Francisco) to live among the mom and pop grow operations supplying the San Francisco and Oakland area medicinal marijuana market.

The essay describes a cottage industry that has been made legitimate over the last thirteen years, since the passing of the Marijuana Compassionate Use Act in 1996.

It’s a good read, loquaciously eloquent in its descriptions of the back yard farmer’s life and the odd charm of a rural community unified in the somewhat unspoken purpose of supplying marijuana to a hungry urban, white collar, market within the backdrop of the legal tension between State sanction and Federal prohibition.  

In this sense the essay is a picture of what we look like in the throes of changing social values – to legalize marijuana.

 It is true to say that there is a big difference in the social attitudes outwardly reflected between what is Northern California regarding marijuana, as some would say from there, and the rest of the state.

 This morning I came across this in the Christian Science Monitor, Marijuana growers worsening California drought,  succinctly reporting on the environmental impacts from growing marijuana in the mountainous regions of Northern California, west of Interstate 5, and just this side of the Pacific Ocean.

http://features.csmonitor.c...

 According to the article, there are so many non-Mendocino county residents in Mendocino County taking advantage of the mild weather, an abundant supply of water from year round streams and small creeks and very rugged terrain, that illicit marijuana growing is drying up regional streams already burdened by a state wide drought.

 These growers, they hike five or six miles into the back country of the mountains of the Pacific Northwest and live in tents for fives months growing a half a million dollars worth of kind bud. In the process, water from tributary streams is diverted for them plants; and the camp sites become veritable dump sites.

Who actually knows how many there are who do that? To ask most people, it’s too many.

Imagine, it, though?  Five months in the woods, camping and farming. You would need to be the real outdoor type. In the end,  a hundred and sixty pounds of marijuana would be nothing to pack out with a couple of backpacks.  I do hear it’s quite an adventure.

 So,  whether it’s true, or not, that the non-locals are the reason for the over burden of environmentally stressed riparian habitats, there is marijuana being grown in those mountains;  being grown because it’s worth $ 3200 a pound, wholesale – and for the adventure of it, I’m sure.

--virgil

I Found this Interesting.

--virgil

I saw this on another blog site and thought I'd share it with you guys.

You can see Ann Frank Leaning out the second story window watching the wedding party leave the apartment below her. It's the only known footage of Ann Frank and was discovered by the groom after the war.

When the diaries of Ann Frank became public,  the owner of the film delivered this short to clip to her Father, Otto Frank .

 --virgil

I was in the area last week and was happy to spend a couple of days with my brother-in-law in the newly opened Cross Roads Pizzeria on White Lane and New Stine Rd.. I told him that I would tell people about his new place.

Some of you might know it as where Mountain Mike’s Pizza used to be. Remember that place? It was complete with worn wood tables and old linoleum floors.  That’s all gone now .

It has been completely refurbished, replaced with new everything - no more linoleum. The two party rooms are full of light from panel windows and French doors; and  are complete with large, in your face, flat screen TVs at every corner for every sports fan's convenience.

The place is nice, very nice. In the main dinning area, with padded booths along the walls,  are also three large TVs to watch while you eat; and, I have to say, while drinking beer, too – and, eating chicken wings.

The pizza is new, along with everything else – he features a thin New York style crust.  And they are good pizzas!

I’ve known Mark, my brother-in-law, for twenty years and I’ve known him to be the host. I mean, Dude gets into it.  He has that kind of personality and that kind of character that makes a place different – you won’t  find pre-frozen and  pre-prepared chicken wings in the freezer, for example (no Sysco meats, here).

The dough and the two kinds of pizza sauce, the marinara and an Alfredo, featured with shrimp and chicken pizzas, are original and made fresh. Seriously, dude makes his own barbecue sauce for the wings, too.  I can’t eat the hot wings he offers, but others do.

I have to say that what Bakersfield lost in a franchise outlet, it has gained twice as much in a locally owned sports pizzeria serving excellent, personalized pizza.

Good Job, Mark, for a venture started out solid!

Sports fans and pizza likers, check out Crossroads Pizza.  It’s worth it – and, I’m not just saying that.

They deliver, too!

--virgil

This Day in 1791 the first ten Amendments were ratified into the U.S. Constitution.

Amendments

• First Amendment – Establishment Clause, Free Exercise Clause; freedom of speech, of the press, and of assembly; right to petition

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

• Second Amendment – Right to keep and bear arms.

A well regulated Militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

• Third Amendment – Protection from quartering of troops.

No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.

• Fourth Amendment – Protection from unreasonable search and seizure.

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

• Fifth Amendment – due process, double jeopardy, self-incrimination, eminent domain.

No person shall be held to answer for any capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

• Sixth Amendment – Trial by jury and rights of the accused; Confrontation Clause, speedy trial, public trial, right to counsel

In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district where in the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defense.

• Seventh Amendment – Civil trial by jury.

In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise re-examined in any court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.

• Eighth Amendment – Prohibition of excessive bail and cruel and unusual punishment.

Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

• Ninth Amendment – Protection of rights not specifically enumerated in the Bill of Rights.

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

• Tenth Amendment – Powers of states and people.

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people

Though the U.S. Bill of Rights is unique, the idea is not unique to history. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wik...