Making the Case for Medical Marijuana

[patric]

I agree that legalization is a better option.

Senate Bill 808, authored by Sen. Joe Newhouse, R-Tulsa, authorizes the executive director of the Oklahoma Medical Marijuana Authority (OMMA) to order licensees to cease operations if the director finds that an environmental emergency exists.
"Oklahomans are fed up with the bad actors in the marijuana industry, many of whom are here illegally and flaunting our laws, and damaging our environment."

Oh right, "environment"

...and who got all the money Big Pharma was handing out up to the last election?

' The Protect our Kids No on 820 campaign formed in January and has yet to file a contribution report.'
https://oklahomawatch.org/2023/03/08/after-sq-820-loss-marijuana-related-justice-reform-shifts-to-legislature

[heironymouspasparagus]

I agree that legalization is a better option. 

How many people REALLY think they are going to get caught?

This is Oklahoma.

Probably most don't get caught.  Especially if one has connections. 

Heck, if one has the right connections one can get away with attempted murder in Oklahoma, even after one confesses and pleads guilty to it!   (Hint; gotta be white and connected to Tim Harris office somehow....)

[patric]

As part of the budget package, the House on Friday passed and sent to the governor SB 15x, which would increase the annual license fee from marijuana growers from $500 to $2,500.

https://tulsaworld.com/news/local/marijuana/in-late-rush-medical-marijuana-bills-sent-to-governor/article_615c7e8c-fc0f-11ed-8527-17cbd7ab42d1.html

One of the biggest talking points among the cannabis opposition mob is that big Asian corporations are pushing out minorities and mom-and-pop entrepreneurs, so Im a bit confused as to how pricing them out of the competition is supposed to fix that.

[heironymouspasparagus]

As part of the budget package, the House on Friday passed and sent to the governor SB 15x, which would increase the annual license fee from marijuana growers from $500 to $2,500.

https://tulsaworld.com/news/local/marijuana/in-late-rush-medical-marijuana-bills-sent-to-governor/article_615c7e8c-fc0f-11ed-8527-17cbd7ab42d1.html

One of the biggest talking points among the cannabis opposition mob is that big Asian corporations are pushing out minorities and mom-and-pop entrepreneurs, so Im a bit confused as to how pricing them out of the competition is supposed to fix that.

It's not supposed to fix anything!   You have been around long enough to know that!   It IS supposed to turn it into such a massive cluster so that Stitt and his cronies can use it as a propaganda piece to get rid of medical marijuana.

[patric]

It's not supposed to fix anything!   You have been around long enough to know that!   It IS supposed to turn it into such a massive cluster so that Stitt and his cronies can use it as a propaganda piece to get rid of medical marijuana.

From the beginning, the price to play was deliberately low, to encourage small businesses, minorities and those hurt by the illegitimate "war on drugs" to have a hand in the game, and to do so honestly and legally. Most appear to have done so following the letter and spirit of the law, only to be replaced by those with deeper pockets and darker intentions.  Oklahoma is fighting foreign ownership with one hand while encouraging it with the other.
(Somewhat brings to mind the scene where Dr. Strangelove is almost strangled by his own hand, but I digress.)

[heironymouspasparagus]

From the beginning, the price to play was deliberately low, to encourage small businesses, minorities and those hurt by the illegitimate "war on drugs" to have a hand in the game, and to do so honestly and legally. Most appear to have done so following the letter and spirit of the law, only to be replaced by those with deeper pockets and darker intentions.  Oklahoma is fighting foreign ownership with one hand while encouraging it with the other.
(Somewhat brings to mind the scene where Dr. Strangelove is almost strangled by his own hand, but I digress.)

That was the intention of the people who supported it and got it to pass.   NOT the intention of the pieces of Stitt and other Minions trying to game the system.  Deeper pockets and darker intentions group.

[patric]

That was the intention of the people who supported it and got it to pass.   NOT the intention of the pieces of Stitt and other Minions trying to game the system.  Deeper pockets and darker intentions group.

For several years, Stitt has advocated for higher licensing fees as a way to attack growers using medical marijuana licenses as cover for black market operations. (State Rep. T.J. Marti, R-Broken Arrow), though, believes that raising the fees will have the opposite effect.

"I know guys in the business who are trying to do things the right way, and they're really struggling," Marti said. "The ones who are selling their product for $6,000 a pound (out of state), they're the ones who can afford the higher fees, and they're the ones we're trying to get rid of."

The fee increases in question were enacted last year to go into effect this year. SB 437 would have postponed the effective date until Nov. 1, 2025.

Grow licenses are currently $2,500, but under the new structure they will rise on a graduated scale to upwards of $50,000.
Some lawmakers have complained that out of zeal to control illegal operations, the state is instead squeezing out small owners who are trying to run lawful businesses.

https://tulsaworld.com/news/local/marijuana/legislator-says-disagreement-on-fees-for-growers-led-to-stitts-veto-of-far-ranging-medical/article_9edf2762-07f1-11ee-a5cf-bfbc17d7ed77.html

Lawmakers say they are protecting the people from organized crime by stopping recreational marijuana, but in reality they are doing the bidding of the very group that has the most to gain by marijuana staying illegal: organized crime.

[patric]

A conservative and politically influential state such as Ohio legalizing marijuana should be the straw that breaks the proverbial camel's back in terms of bringing federal regulation to cannabis, said Andrew Freedman, a partner at Forbes Tate and executive director of the Coalition for Cannabis Policy, Education and Regulation.

"As Ohio goes, so goes the nation," he said. "It's not the reddest [state] — the reddest was Missouri — but it is historically important, nationally important, presidentially important," Freedman told CNN. "I honestly think it will have massive reverberating effects on what Congress has to do about this."

Ohio voters' approval of a legalization measure on Tuesday comes just months after cannabis saw some of its most significant movements at the federal level. In late August, a US Department of Health and Human Services official recommended that marijuana be reclassified as a Schedule III drug. One month later, a cannabis banking
bill passed a key Senate committee.

More than two-thirds of US states have legalized cannabis in some capacity: 38 states have approved comprehensive medical cannabis programs, and Ohio brings the recreational total to 24 states.
And support for legalization continues to grow. A record 70% of US adults surveyed by pollster Gallup said that cannabis use should be legal, according to a new poll released Wednesday.

https://www.cnn.com/2023/11/09/business/ohio-legal-cannabis-industry/index.html

[heironymouspasparagus]

A conservative and politically influential state such as Ohio legalizing marijuana should be the straw that breaks the proverbial camel's back in terms of bringing federal regulation to cannabis, said Andrew Freedman, a partner at Forbes Tate and executive director of the Coalition for Cannabis Policy, Education and Regulation.

"As Ohio goes, so goes the nation," he said. "It's not the reddest [state] — the reddest was Missouri — but it is historically important, nationally important, presidentially important," Freedman told CNN. "I honestly think it will have massive reverberating effects on what Congress has to do about this."

Ohio voters' approval of a legalization measure on Tuesday comes just months after cannabis saw some of its most significant movements at the federal level. In late August, a US Department of Health and Human Services official recommended that marijuana be reclassified as a Schedule III drug. One month later, a cannabis banking
bill passed a key Senate committee.

More than two-thirds of US states have legalized cannabis in some capacity: 38 states have approved comprehensive medical cannabis programs, and Ohio brings the recreational total to 24 states.
And support for legalization continues to grow. A record 70% of US adults surveyed by pollster Gallup said that cannabis use should be legal, according to a new poll released Wednesday.

https://www.cnn.com/2023/11/09/business/ohio-legal-cannabis-industry/index.html

70%....  and yet, more than half of those continue to vote against it at their local, state, and Federal election levels, by putting in MAGA garbage.

[patric]

Why does this sound so familiar?

https://kfor.com/news/local/attorney-generals-task-force-seizes-72000-lbs-of-illegal-marijuana/


https://cmg-cmg-rd-20111-prod.cdn.arcpublishing.com/resizer/suj-vq6kEURzZE5Nb2RhvWUioHg=/800x0/filters:format(png):quality(70)/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/cmg/YJXNBWRKBJCW7CK7YNHXGY6E7Y.png

Samples didn't test as marijuana, so entire 9-ton hemp shipment will be tested on DA orders Jan 31, 2019
https://www.tulsaworld.com/news/local/crime-and-courts/samples-didn-t-test-as-marijuana-so-entire--ton/article_49943da5-764d-5d30-9836-00328f9fa660.html

The massive truckload of industrial hemp or illegal marijuana seized by authorities in Pawhuska may make it to Colorado after all — but not to its original destination with the purchasers.

Defense Attorney Matt Lyons on Thursday said federal testing has been completed on 11 samples, with only two found to be marginally over the legal THC limit and outside of the test's margins of error.

So the Osage County District Attorney's Office will send the truck to Colorado for THC testing of the entire 9 tons of cannabis in relation to hemp's three-tenths of 1 percent legal limit, he said. The lowest level of THC in medicinal marijuana is 15 percent, Lyons said, which is nowhere near the one-half of 1 percent of THC found in the most potent test sample.

Lyons said the shipment doesn't contain any black market marijuana, which he said is what prosecutors told him was their initial cause for concern.

"They are trying to call this marijuana, when it's clear to the rest of the sane world that it's not," he said.

Additionally, federal and state laws provide support for handling the situation outside of criminal court. But the unresolved situation has exposed how unprepared Oklahoma — and probably other states — is for legal industrial hemp.

Federal law bars criminal enforcement of hemp growers found to be in violation, and the state only imposes civil fines or penalties, according to a Tulsa World review of relevant laws. Transport personnel don't appear to be addressed as far as violations in either set of laws.

"Why is this (still) being criminally prosecuted?" Lyons said. "Is this because you made the mistake of prosecuting them before the tests were done?"

First Assistant District Attorney Michelle Bodine-Keely on Thursday declined to comment. She had said she thought the office might issue a news release Thursday, but it didn't materialize.

Andrew Ross, 29, and business partner David Dirksen, 31, spent almost a week in jail after law enforcement seized the cargo Jan. 9 on Main Street in Pawhuska during a stop for a traffic violation.

Ross and Dirksen, who were providing security for the shipment, each posted a $40,000 bond on Jan. 15. That same day prosecutors had charged them with aggravated trafficking of marijuana — which carries a sentence of 15 years to life in prison.

Also charged with drug trafficking were the tractor-trailer rig's two drivers — Tadesse Deneke, 51, and Farah Warsame, 33. Deneke and Warsame have been unable to secure bonds and remain jailed.

The pair were subcontracted by Patriot Shield Security, the business formed by Ross, Dirksen and two other veterans. All four defendants live in different states.

Trevor Reynolds, a Tulsa attorney for the shipment's two drivers, questioned whether federal authorities will properly test the nearly 18,000-pound shipment.

Reynolds said THC contents in cannabis aren't uniform, in contrast to a block of methamphetamine. He said defense attorneys have concern that authorities may have chosen plant samples that were more apt to have higher THC concentrations than the average of the whole shipment.

"I think Osage County has painted themselves into a corner a little bit," Reynolds said. "I am fairly certain that unless the (THC content) tests at 1.0 percent or higher, the U.S. government is not going to be interested in it."

Federal and Oklahoma hemp laws appear to support that supposition.

Not knowing how much those trunks weigh I would imagine their estimates are a bit off, too.

[heironymouspasparagus]

Why does this sound so familiar?


Not knowing how much those trunks weigh I would imagine their estimates are a bit off, too.

Gee... again...  I wonder why we don't attract good attention of companies wanting to relocate?

And to add to the fascist BS, Enid just elected a Nazi white supremacist to city council.   Just the place I want to live.  Not.

[patric]

When agents raided two sites one morning last April and a tenant called He, she rushed to the property to confront them and demand a search warrant, court records say. What happened next, He said, felt like retaliation for challenging the Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics.

That evening, a well-armed team of agents showed up at her house with another search warrant. The warrant shows it was requested by agents after the confrontation with He at her business and was signed by a judge only minutes before the raid on her house that night.

The agents "snatched her up, left her kids there, took her to jail and didn't release her until the following morning. And they never filed a single charge," Ross said. "Why in God's name are they going after her? This is out of control."

https://www.readfrontier.org/stories/a-marijuana-boom-led-her-to-oklahoma-then-anti-drug-agents-seized-her-money-and-raided-her-home/