Dying Woman Loses Appeal on Marijuana as Medication

This is sick, this administration and the AMA wants people like this woman and myself to die and suffer.
It is the truth and it IS that simple.

Dying Woman Loses Appeal on Marijuana as Medication
By JESSE McKINLEY
Published: March 15, 2007
SAN FRANCISCO, March 14 — Federal appellate judges here ruled Wednesday that a terminally ill woman using marijuana was not immune to federal prosecution simply because of her condition, and in a separate case a federal judge dismissed most of the charges against a prominent advocate for the medicinal use of the drug.


Angel Raich
The woman, Angel McClary Raich, says she uses marijuana on doctors’ recommendation to treat an inoperable brain tumor and a battery of other serious ailments. Ms. Raich, 41, asserts that the drug effectively keeps her alive, by stimulating appetite and relieving pain, in a way that prescription drugs do not.

She wept when she heard the decision.

“It’s not every day in this country that someone’s right to life is taken from them,” said Ms. Raich, appearing frail during a news conference in Oakland, where she lives. “Today you are looking at someone who really is walking dead.”

In 2002, she and three other plaintiffs sued the government, seeking relief from federal laws outlawing marijuana. The case made its way to the Supreme Court, and in 2005, the court ruled against Ms. Raich, finding that the federal government had the authority to prohibit and prosecute the possession and use of marijuana for medical purposes. But the justices left elements of Ms. Raich’s case to a lower court to consider.

On Wednesday, a three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit found that while they sympathized with Ms. Raich’s plight and had seen “uncontroverted evidence” that she needed marijuana to survive, she lacked the legal grounds to exempt herself from federal law.

The court “recognizes the use of marijuana for medical purposes is gaining traction,” the decision read. “But that legal recognition has not yet reached the point where a conclusion can be drawn that the right to use medical marijuana is ‘fundamental.’ ”

Eleven states have medical marijuana laws on the books, and the New Mexico Legislature is poised to approve a medical marijuana bill there, with the support of Gov. Bill Richardson. Medical-marijuana advocates estimate more than 100,000 Americans use the drug to treat medical conditions.

California was the first state to legalize medical marijuana, in a 1996 ballot measure, Proposition 215. That measure set off a decade-long fight over a variety of legal issues surrounding marijuana, including state rights and “common law necessity” defenses like the one Ms. Raich was trying to use.

Graham Boyd, director of the Drug Law Reform Project of the American Civil Liberties Union, which has an unrelated medical marijuana case pending before a federal judge in San Jose, said the decision in Ms. Raich’s case was a setback for the movement but not a crippling one.

“Today is just one chapter in a story that is still not over,” Mr. Boyd said

Robert Raich, Ms. Raich’s husband and lawyer, said she might appeal the case to the full Ninth Circuit. In the other ruling on Wednesday, a judge in United States District Court here handed a victory to the marijuana advocate, Ed Rosenthal.

Mr. Rosenthal, 62, said federal prosecutors had unfairly made him a target with an array of drug, money-laundering and tax-evasion charges, many of which closely mirrored charges he was convicted of in 2003, when he was growing medical marijuana under California’s law at a dispensary in Oakland. That conviction was overturned last year by a federal appeals court, which found evidence of jury misconduct.

Mr. Rosenthal had asked the judge, Charles R. Breyer, for a dismissal at a hearing this month, suggesting that the prosecution was vindictive. On Wednesday, Mr. Breyer obliged in part, dismissing the charges of money laundering and tax evasion, but leaving the marijuana charges in place. And while Mr. Breyer said that he believed the prosecutors had acted in good faith, that nonetheless “the presumption of vindictiveness has not been rebutted.”

Joseph Elford, a lawyer for Mr. Rosenthal, said the case had been “a tremendous waste of taxpayer resources.”


Carolyn Marshall contributed from Oakland, Calif.

There are many stories like this.
There are no drugs that help with muscle spasms, certain types of nerve damage and especially nausea and loss of appetite from illness and chemotherapy as well as, and in some cases at all, like marijuana.
The AMA's attempts at synthesizing it, Marinol and others make most people more ill. I am one of those. They do not care.
It is no more a gateway drug than cigarettes or coffee... I've never met an alcoholic or junkie that did not drink coffee or smoke, why not blame their addictions on those drugs? It is the same logic. Idiots.
Only the deluded would believe that religion has nothing to do with this.

[jinx]

And yet genesis makes it pretty clear that god had no problem with magic brownies...

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. 28 And God blessed them, and God said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth." 29 And God said, "Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit; you shall have them for food. 30 And to every beast of the earth, and to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food." And it was so.

[Dagney]

Originally Posted by rkzenrage

T
Only the deluded would believe that religion has nothing to do with this.

Perhaps I'm deluded then, but my belief is that it has nothing to do with religion, and everything to do with the inability to tax it.

If they could tax it (ie make it legal, by prescription, etc), it would be okay - since they can't...well, it's not.

IMO, it's not all about religion. Money's rumored to be the root of a lot of evil too.

What does taxing it have to do with anything?
You have no right to tax everything someone does in their home.
I can grow my own tobacco and smoke it and it is no one's damn business if I do.
I can make up to 50 gallons of booze and as much beer a year as I like as long as I do not sell it and you have no right to tax it.
Who the hell are you?
Evil is a myth.

Originally Posted by jinx

And yet genesis makes it pretty clear that god had no problem with magic brownies...

You may like this then.

marijuana & religion
http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/hemp/potbible.htm
http://www.equalrights4all.org/religious/bible.htm

"Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree in which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat. And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to everything that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so." And God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day. (Gen. 1:29-31)

" Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you; even as the green herb have I given you all things." (Gen 9:3).

" In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations." Rev 22:2:

"The Lord said unto me, 'I will take my rest and I will consider in my dwelling place like a clear heat upon herbs.' " -- Isaiah 18:4-5

And the earth brought forth grass and herb yielding seed after its kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was good. (Genesis 1:12)

God said, "Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree in which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat. And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to everything that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so." And God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day. (Gen. 1:29-31)

(No prohibition of cannabis or any other drug is made in the Ten Commandments: See Ex. 20:1-17)

(Cannabis is mentioned in Ex. 30:23 but King James mistranslated it as 'sweet calamus') :
Moreover, the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, 23 Take thou also unto thee principal spices, of pure myrrh five hundred shekels, and of sweet cinnamon half so much, even 250 shekels, and of qaneh-bosm [cannabis] 250 shekels, 24 And of cassia 500 shekels, after the shekel of the sanctuary, and of oil olive an hin: 25 And thou shalt make it an oil of holy anointment, an ointment compound after the art of the apothecary: it shall be an holy anointing oil. 26 And thous shalt anoint the tabernacle of the congregation therewith, and the ark of the testimony, 27 And the table and all his vessels, and the candlestick ahd his vessels, and the altar of incense, 28 And the altar of burnt offerings with all his vessels, and the laver and his foot. 29 And thou shalt sanctify them, that they may be most holy: whatsoever toucheth them shall be holy. (Exodus 30:22-29)

* As one shekel equals approximately 16.37 grams, this means that the THC from over 9 pounds of flowering cannabis tops were extracted into a hind, about 6.5 litres of oil. The entheogenic effects of such a solution -- even when applied topically -would undoubtedly have been intense.
He causeth the grass to grow for the cattle and herb for the service of man: that he may bring forth food out of the earth; And wine that maketh glad the heart of man and oil to make his face to shineth. (Psalm 104:14-15)

The Lord said unto me, "I will take my rest and I will consider in my dwelling place like a clear heat upon herbs, and like a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest. For afore the harvest, when the bud is perfect and the sour grape is ripening in the flower, he shall cut off the sprigs with pruning hooks and take away and cut down the branches. (Is. 18:4-5)

And I will raise up for them a plant of renown, and they shall be no more consumed with hunger in the land, neither bear the shame of the heathen any more. (Ezekiel 34:29)

(Jesus "Not that which goeth into the mouth defileth a man; but that which cometh out of the mouth, this defileth a man." (Matt. 15:11)

One believeth that he may eat all things. Another…eateth herbs. … Let us not, therefore judge one another any more: but judge this rather, that no man put a stumbling block or an occasion to fall in his brother's way. I know, and am persuaded by the Lord Jesus, that there is nothing unclean of itself: but to him that esteemeth anything to be unclean, to him it is unclean. For the kingdom of God is not meat and drink; but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost. (Epistle of St. Paul: Romans 14: 2,3,13,14,17)

Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times, some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils; Speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with a hot iron; Forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from meats which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving of them which believe and know the truth. For every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused if it be received with thanksgiving: For it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer. If thou put the brethren in remembrance of these things, thou shalt be a good minister of Jesus Christ, nourished up in the words of faith and of good doctrine, whereupon thou hast attained. (Paul: 1 Timothy 4:1-6)

And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb. In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielding her fruit every month; and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. (Rev. 22:1-2)

"It is recorded that the Chinese Taoist recommended the addition of cannabis to their incense burners in the 1st century as a means of achieving immortality."

400 years. For most of our nation's history, farmers grew marijuana -- then known exclusively as hemp -- for its fiber content. Colonialists planted the first American hemp crop in 1611 near Jamestown, Virginia. Soon after, King James I of Britain ordered settlers to engage in wide scale farming of the plant.1 Most of the sails and ropes on colonial ships were made from hemp as were many of the colonists' bibles, clothing, and maps.2

According to some historians, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson cultivated marijuana and advocated a hemp-based economy.3 Some colonies even made hemp cultivation compulsory, calling its production necessary for the "wealth and protection of the country."4 Marijuana cultivation continued as an agricultural staple in America through the turn of the 20th century.

During both wars laws against growing hemp were lifted and farmers had to grow it for the war effort. George Bush's parachute lines were made of hemp.

[jinx]

So, yeah, I don't think it's about religion. I think Dagney is right about it being about money, although I don't think it's the taxes.

The textile, tobacco, pharmaceutical (no patents on herbal) and distilleries stand to lose a lot... textiles the most. They were who lobbied to outlaw it to begin with, using race as a fear tactic.
Not about religion, huh, so the religious right have nothing to do with this? Ok, tell me another one.
The only people who would be ok with people suffering while they stand by and watch, and making sure they drum-up enough propaganda so others think it is ok would be the religious right.

I'm still waiting to hear why taxing this is more important than people's lives and suffering... that slays me.

[Happy Monkey]

Originally Posted by rkzenrage

The only people who would be ok with people suffering while they stand by and watch, and making sure they drum-up enough propaganda so others think it is ok would be the religious right.

Not the only ones- you mentioned another group earlier: corporatists.

[Dagney]

I'm not going to get baited into an argument...but this is my opinion on matters.

If it was legal...it could be regulated and sold either via prescription or otc. Either way, people can make money off of it, and yes, taxes would be paid on it in states where sales taxes apply to prescription and otc meds.

It is not legal. Hence, no one can reap the benefits legally - and those who are greedy and evil (money=root of most evil if you look for it) - want that money, can't have it, and therefore, don't want anyone else to have it. Or benefit from it. (I believe that article stated she was also charged with money laundering (ohh, that's money) and tax evasion (ohh, that's money there too). )

Which agrees with Happy Monkey's statement regarding corporatists.

IMO, you're beating the religious horse a little too much. It's not ALL the fault of the religious right. (A lot of it, perhaps, but not everything).

D

[piercehawkeye45]

This is pathetic. Why the fuck do other people feel the right to say what people can take or not for their own comfort and survival. What is the argument against medicinal marijuana? It can be treated the same way as morphine or oxycotin.

[rigcranop]

I wish all those who oppose, drug company execs & their lobbyists, politicians, far-right, religious zealots suffer three times over for denying the ill this aid. And "gateway drug" is the most pathetic excuse/reason of them all.

[Toymented]

Does she live in an apartment where the smoke wafts through the ventilation system infiltrating the neighbors living space? What restrictions should exist in this situation?

Originally Posted by piercehawkeye45

This is pathetic. Why the fuck do other people feel the right to say what people can take or not for their own comfort and survival. What is the argument against medicinal marijuana? It can be treated the same way as morphine or oxycotin.

Neither of those drugs do what marijuana does for any of the things it works for.

Second hand smoke is irrelevant to this discussion.

[piercehawkeye45]

Pain reliever?

Can you explain further rkzenrage?

[WabUfvot5]

Basically opiates work by changing the way your mind perceives pain. Marijuana is more complex. It's not just THC but a lot of psychoactives in with it. Since our beloved government bans research on it the exact benefits and workings of it aren't known. Perhaps some other government has done studies but I don't know. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

Anyway this is fucked up. I'm sure a number of local dealers will step up to help Miss Raich but it shouldn't come to that by any means.