420 Girls

[420RedHead]

We've joked about sugar highs for years, but a new poll shows Americans now think getting high on sugar is worse for you than getting high on weed. Conducted by NBC News and the Wall Street Journal, the survey asked 1,000 adults what they thought was most harmful to a person's overall health, tobacco, alcohol, sugar, or marijuana. Not that surprisingly, most people said tobacco or alcohol. But 15 percent said sugar was health enemy number one, and that's almost twice the number who thought marijuana deserved the top spot. - Women's Health Magazine

 

[420RedHead]

April 20 brings a chance to stop and reflect on the draconian marijuana laws still threatening so many Americans. In addition to the lives harmed by arrests and incarceration, the economic costs of prohibition are enormous. The war on drugs has cost at least $1 trillion since it was announced in 1971 by President Nixon. The term 420 began as a secret code. But 40 years later, in some states the need for a code has given way to cannabis pride and open celebration. In other places, people will smoke or otherwise consume pot in private parties. And for those in prison and jails and for their loved ones, it will be just another sad day. - CNN

 

[420RedHead]

As can be imagined, the April 20 celebrations across Colorado and Washington, as well as other marijuana friendly states like California and Oregon, will be joyful, well attended and burgeoning with cannabis products. It might even feel as if marijuana is already legal, but it isn't, and, in some states, the need for secret codes is still very much alive. In Oklahoma, manufacturing hash carries a mandatory two year prison term but can also mean life in prison. Under Louisiana law, a second pot possession conviction is classified as a felony offense, punishable by up to five years in prison. Three time offenders face up to 20 years in prison. And in Florida, possession of more than 20 grams of marijuana, as well as the cultivation of even a single plant, is a felony offense and punishable by up to five years in prison and a $5,000 fine. - CNN

 

[420RedHead]

A young woman smokes a legal herb called damian as policemen stand nearby prior to marching in support of the legalization of marijuana in Germany during the annual Hemp Parade, or "Hanfparade", on August 7, 2010 in Berlin, Germany. The consumption of cannabis in Germany is legal, though all other aspects, including growing, importing or selling it, are not. However, since the introduction of a new law in 2009, the sale and possession of marijuana for licenced medicinal use is legal. - Zimbio

 

[420RedHead]

A woman sits in a VW Beetle decorated with painted marijuana plants prior to participating in the annual Hemp Parade, or "Hanfparade", in support of the legalization of marijuana in Germany on August 7, 2010 in Berlin, Germany. The consumption of cannabis in Germany is legal, though all other aspects, including growing, importing or selling it, are not. However, since the introduction of a new law in 2009, the sale and possession of marijuana for licenced medicinal use is legal. - Zimbio

 

[420RedHead]

Websites like the Marijuana Majority feature statements from celebrities and politicians in favor of marijuana policy reform, across the political spectrum, from Bill Maher to Pat Robertson. No longer a part of a fringe, those who see a better way to regulate marijuana are casting aside the secret codes and openly declaring support. The marijuana flag was waving proudly on Election Day, when Colorado and Washington became the first states where voters approved taxing and regulating marijuana for adult use. Two recently introduced pieces of federal legislation would protect medical marijuana states from federal interference and end federal marijuana prohibition. - CNN

 

[420RedHead]

If you come to think about it, currently there is a massive black market taking a large chunk of change without providing any benefit to Hawaii itself. And for those who have been to Hawaii, you know that high grade street weed is real expensive. Under a legal marijuana system we would be able to see a drop in prices and an increase in Hawaiian revenue which would only serve to better the Islands. In other words by simply turning on this currently illegal revenue stream, you'll increase the value of the main revenue stream, tourism. You would also reduce crime and create more jobs for local citizens. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that Hawaii will legalize within the next four years. The probability would be two years but we'll just call it four to be safe. Currently the majority of the population is okay with the idea and support for the movement will only grow. In the end the entire US will eventually legalize, but for now these liberal states will make way for the more conservative ones to follow. Good for you people of Hawaii, the people of MD411 support your cause 100% - Marijuana Doctors 411

 

[420RedHead]

Threatened with jail and unemployment, people who use marijuana in most states must hide their activities. In 2011, more than 750,000 people were arrested for marijuana possession and sales in the United States. In 2010, 86% of those charged for possession in New York City were black or Latino. That, even though these groups represent about half the city's population and use marijuana less than whites. But, slowly, support for cannabis regulation is growing. A recent Pew research poll found that 52% of Americans support taxing and regulating marijuana, a historic high. It isn't that more people are using marijuana, those rates have remained stable, it's that more people feel they can come out of the closet about their support for marijuana policy reform. - CNN

 

[420RedHead]

Quite simply, the birth of 420 occurred at precisely 4:20 in the afternoon to begin a bedroom bong session at the house of Du and Puff on a Saturday in October of 1970. The Bebe along with the brothers began preparing to "bong out", when Bebe glanced at the clock on the nightstand and said, "It's 4:20, time for bong loads". After getting high, they proceeded to do some audio recording with Bebe, as we did frequently, using his assortment of voices, including his impression of Abraham Lincoln, and said as tape was rolling: "4 score and 20 years ago..." As it turned out, 420 became an instant code in our neighborhood. We gravitated to any and all Bebe terminology he conjured up. 420 seemed to just roll off the tongue better than any other number, 4:19, 2:37, 3:58 etc, and gosh knows we needed a code to use in front of non-stoners, especially for the parental establishment. I remember once Bebe saying, "It's 420" in front of Hello Andy's mother, and she responded by saying in a minor panic, "My goodness, it can't be that late yet, I have to go pick up your sister!" As knucklehead teenagers, I guess we never realized parents were on such prompt time schedules. 420 developed its own lexicon, "Do you have any 4-twone?", "Who's got the 4-twone?", "This is excellent 4-twone" or "420", and "I'm too 4-twentyed". Sign language and lip reading also evolved, as well as a hesitation code of sorts, where a person would say 4, then moments later, 2, followed shortly thereafter by a 0. There was the countdown as well 4-2- Zero. Way too stoned: "4-twoned". It was also used to define certain kinds of weed, "420 Colombo" and "Thai 420" for Thai sticks. - 420 Magazine

 

[420RedHead]

The U.S. federal government has failed to make public its own 1994 study that undercuts its position that marijuana is carcinogenic. A $2 million study by the National Toxicology Program. The program's deputy director, John Bucher, says the study found absolutely no evidence of cancer. In fact, animals that received THC had fewer cancers. Bucher denies his agency had been pressured to shelve the report, saying the delay in making it public was due to a personnel shortage. The Boston Globe reported Thursday (1-30-97) that the study indicates not only that the main ingredient in marijuana, THC, does not cause cancer, but also that it may even protect against malignancies, laboratory tests on animals show. The report comes on the heels of an editorial in the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine that favors the controlled medical use of marijuana, and calls current federal policy misguided, heavy handed and inhumane. The Clinton administration has said that doctors prescribing marijuana could be prosecuted for a federal crime. Marijuana has been reported to ease the pain, nausea and vomiting in advanced stages of cancer, AIDS and other serious illnesses, but the federal government claims other treatments have been deemed safer than what it calls a psychoactive, burning carcinogen. However, The Boston Globe says the government's claim appears to be undercut by its own $2 million study. - BOSTON, Jan. 30, 1997 (UPI)

 

[420RedHead]

As a multipurpose plant, ganga is used medicinally, even by non-smokers. There were no indications of organic brain damage or chromosome damage among smokers and no significant clinical psychiatric, psychological or medical differences between smokers and controls. - US Jamaican Study 1974

 

[420RedHead]

There are no long lasting ill effects from the acute use of marijuana and no fatalities have ever been recorded.
There seems to be growing agreement within the medical community, at least, that marijuana does not directly cause criminal behavior, juvenile delinquency, sexual excitement, or addiction. - Dr J. H. Jaffe, The Pharmacological Basis of Therapeutics. L.Goodman and A Gillman, 3rd edn. 1965

 

[420RedHead]

Seeking to gauge how much should be grown, Washington state officials said they've estimated the average pot smoker's consumption at a joint every three days. In Washington, that means state sanctioned growers need to cultivate enough marijuana for about 80 million joints, or 123 joints per year for each of the state's roughly 650,000 smokers, The Seattle Times reported Tuesday. The effort to quantify pot consumption is more than a conversation between two high guys wondering how much pot gets smoked in a year, it's important for regulatory purposes, officials say. If the state authorizes too little marijuana to be grown it will drive users to illicit drug dealers. If it authorizes too much, the weed will likely flow across state lines where it hasn't been legalized.

 

[420RedHead]

On the way to the mountain range in Viet Nam, the H'Mong guide was kind enough to point out the marijuana plants growing on the side of the road. She insisted, however, that the H'Mong people grow marijuana solely to make hemp.

 

[420RedHead]

Prohibition goes beyond the bounds of reason in that it attempts to control mans' appetite through legislation and makes a crime out of things that are not even crimes. A prohibition law strikes a blow at the very principles upon which our Government was founded - President Abraham Lincoln (December 1840)

 

[420RedHead]

Removing marijuana from the jurisdiction of the federal government and allowing the states to regulate it, like they would alcohol is the best place to start. This seems to be strange for a lot of people, but I'm only going back to 1937 when that's the way it was handled. The states always did this, and I'm motivated strongly also because the states legalize it for the use of medicinal purposes and it is helpful to people who have cancer or are getting chemotherapy. So this is not a huge radical idea, it's something that was legal for a long, long time. And the war against marijuana causes so much hardship and accomplishes nothing. So I would say that marijuana, as far as causing highway problems, is minuscule compared to alcohol, and yet we knew prohibition of alcohol was very bad. So this is just getting back to a sensible position on how we handle difficult problems. And, for me, it should be the states. - Ron Paul

 

[420RedHead]

Sufferers from multiple sclerosis and other painful illnesses have long smoked marijuana to alleviate the discomforts of their condition. Doctors, who had previously advised their patients to buy the drug from shady types on street corners, will now be able to write them a private prescription costing about £11 a day, Sativex. Free supplies courtesy of the National Health Service await a formal finding that the medicine is cost effective. Some 100,000 people in Britain have MS, with muscle cramps and spasms preventing about a third of them from performing simple tasks such as unscrewing a lid, getting dressed or climbing out of a car. Doctors will only be able to prescribe the new drug to MS patients with cramps and spasms for whom other treatments have failed. And there is to be no funky smoking of the stuff, patients will spray the fluid under their tongues about eight times a day. - The Economist.

 

[420RedHead]

Moms got tougher drunk driving laws on the books and were directly responsible for passing and then repealing alcohol Prohibition. Now marijuana activists are trying to enlist the nation's mothers in marijuana legalization efforts. - Freedom's Phoenix

 

[420RedHead]

Victims of Multiple Sclerosis since June 21 this year (2010) can legally purchase a marijuana based medicine known as Sativex in Britain to alleviate the excruciating pain and spasms associated with their condition. Jamaica, which has an enduring cultural and law enforcement association with the herb, had set the pace globally in terms of research and development of legal drugs from ganja since the 1970s through the groundbreaking efforts of Professor Manley West and Dr Albert Lockhart at the University of the West Indies (UWI). Professor West and Dr Lockhart isolated a compound in cannabis which they discovered could be used in the treatment of glaucoma, a broad term which encompasses disorders of the eye in which pressure within the eye is elevated, resulting in damage to the organ causing pain, visual disturbances, and even blindness. The upshot of their collaboration was the development of canasol, which contains an alpha agonist, which helps to relieve the pressure in the eye without the side effects of other therapies. - The Gleaner - Jamaica

 

[420RedHead]

So the figurehead of the Democratic Party, President Barack Obama, hasn't exactly been kind to the medical marijuana nation, what with all the federal raids on dispensaries and all. While Obama's flip flopping on pot has some weed activists burning mad, one group of cannabis supporters in California is saying if you can't beat'em, join'em. That's right, the recently formed Brownie Mary Democratic Club will be organizing voters. - LA Weekly