“I’m Facebooking the families,” said the young lady sitting to my right at the Election Party where I was live streaming the disastrous results. “Oh my god.” She looks up at me. “I’m going to have to say goodbye to some of these families. They’re moving to Michigan. Or Colorado.”

“What? Really? Naw, man, that can’t be right,” said the middle-aged man watching me scroll through the county-by-county results. Not one above 42 percent support, last I was looking with over 70 percent of the precincts reporting. “What about Franklin? What about Cuyahoga?” Nope. No bright spot to be found.

“Our job just got harder,” said the activist leader to a dejected room full of hard-working supporters after the party back at home. “Not only did we lose legalization, but that Issue 2 means it’s going to be harder to get our next one passed.”

With 97 percent of the precincts reporting, Ohio’s marijuana legalization Issue 3 lost with 35.84 percent support. Or, to spin it one way, a nearly two-to-one defeat.

Worse, Ohio Issue 2 won with a squeaker of 51.69 percent support. That amendment introduces the Ohio Ballot Board into the process of determining which future initiatives that tax and regulate things will have to jump through the extra hoop of getting two initiatives on the ballot and both must pass.

There are plenty of post mortem articles out (I recommend Chris Ingraham, for starters) that do a great job of spinning the results of the Ohio marijuana legalization loss. There are plenty of lessons to be learned, the prime one to me being “ignore Platshorn’s Maxim at your electoral peril”.

Bobby Platshorn is the head of The Silver Tour which advocates education of seniors on marijuana legalization, for the sole reason that seniors vote. They both disproportionately oppose legalization and vote in great numbers. Especially if you decide to both base your electoral appeal on the youth vote and run your campaign in the least likely election that youth vote in, a non-presidential, non-Congressional year like 2015. (With a bud-headed superhero mascot. Seniors love that.)

I walked with a couple my age to the polling place this afternoon. I saw a few young people milling about on the streets. None were headed our way toward the polls, though. We talked to a couple of people who had voted our way.

But when we got to the polls, I saw at least a dozen people voting, a few more coming and going, and I’ll bet you even money I was the youngest person in the room (I’m 47). Mostly seniors.

Many of the criticisms that can be leveled at the campaign are easy. There are wise lessons to be learned in an ass kicking, if you swallow your pride enough to see them. That wisdom will come.

Tonight, though, I feel for the people who sacrificed in many different ways in the fight for Ohio’s first-ever shot at legalizing marijuana. I feel for the people who felt their hopes dashed in a gut punch of a defeat. I feel for the people who now face the desperate choice of remaining a criminal or leaving their home state.

Nobody said ending the drug war would be easy. It can be difficult to see with perspective following a devastating loss. I was there when Prop 19 lost in California in 2010 and when Measure 80 lost in Oregon in 2012. In each of those losses, there were lessons learned and progress made.

So, too, goes Ohio.

Ohio just became the seventh state to ever vote on marijuana legalization. California, Oregon, Washington, Nevada, Alaska, and Colorado. That’s all. Ohio just joined a very select club.

Only Washington in that club passed it on their first try; I-502 in 2012 got 55.7 percent. Alaska got 44.25 percent in 2004* and Colorado got 41.08 percent in 2006, and they both had medical marijuana on the books, like Washington. Nevada, Oregon, and California all failed twice; Nevada got 39.13 percent in 2002 and 44.08 percent in 2006. Oregon got just 26.33 percent 1986, pre-medical marijuana, and 46.58 percent in 2012, when Washington and Colorado were crushing it with over 55 percent. California got just 33.5 percent in pre-decriminalization 1972 and then 46.5 percent 2010 with Prop 19.

So, Ohio, 35.84 percent with a controversial business model, terrible public relations, confusing language and conflicting amendments, before you have medical marijuana, in an off-off election year? Bravo, you’re ahead of where California and Oregon started and three to nine points behind where Colorado, Alaska, and Nevada were just a decade ago.

Now get back to work. It might take another year or maybe another five years. Maybe ten. It won’t be easy. But working hard for a losing marijuana legalization campaign means you’ve done more to change the laws than ninety-nine percent of the people out there wishing those laws would change. It also means you’ve learned some hard lessons, made great contacts, and grown thicker skin that will serve you well for the battles to come. Processed correctly, that hurt puts a fire in your belly that fuels you to greater activism and makes that eventual victory feel really, really good.

* Alaska also lost a decriminalization measure in 2000 with a 40.88 percent vote. That dealt with age 18 and older and involved un-criminalizing a constitutional privacy right that had been criminalized, so I didn’t feel it was a great comparison to the other legalization initiatives.

Tonight, Ohio votes to become the fifth US state to legalize adult personal use of marijuana and I, “Radical” Russ Belville, will be in Columbus, Ohio, bringing you the live vote results for MarijuanaPolitics.com and CannabisRadio.com.

Coverage begins at 6pm Eastern with The Russ Belville Show, followed by Toker Talk Radio at 7pm, then Marijuana Election Night 2015 at 8pm as the polls close in Ohio and the results come in. Joining me for The Russ Belville Show will be campaign representatives from ResponsibleOhio, the group fighting for marijuana legalization.

Also scheduled to appear is Garrett Greenlee from the International Cannabinoid Institute (ICI), which will build a $24 million medical cannabis research facility in Ohio when the measure passes. ICI will be the home of researcher Dr. Sue Sisley, the only federally-approved cannabis researcher in the field of medical marijuana for veterans suffering from PTSD.

Other guests will include the parents of desperately ill children who are banking on passage of the measure that also legalizes medical marijuana, specifically the cannabinoid extracts proven helpful for children with seizure disorders, and local Ohio marijuana activists who have fought long and hard to end adult marijuana prohibition.

Toker Talk Radio features the internet’s only live talk-radio call-in number (971-533-7111) for discussion of marijuana law reform. Callers from across the country are welcome to call in with their questions and comments about the Ohio marijuana legalization vote, which includes the legalization measure Issue 3, but also includes the anti-monopoly Issue 2 that could undermine and invalidate Issue 3.

Vote results should come in sometime after 8pm Eastern and I will be live streaming them on CannabisRadio.com and live blogging them on MarijuanaPolitics.com. This will mark the fourth straight Marijuana Election Night coverage I’ve provided live via internet radio streaming. I was there in Oakland, California, at Prop 19 headquarters in 2010 as that initiative began the national conversation on marijuana legalization. In 2012, I was in Seattle, Washington, and brought you live reporters from Portland, Oregon, and Denver, Colorado, as two of those three states voted to legalize marijuana. In 2014, I was in Portland, Oregon, covering our election results and those up in Alaska as they legalized marijuana.

CannabisRadio.com is the premier internet stream and podcast source for everything cannabis, from enthusiasts to reformers, growers to healers, entrepreneurs to lawyers, and everything in-between. The Russ Belville Show is now heard exclusively through CannabisRadio.com and will bring you live episodes Wednesday and Thursday from Columbus as Ohio reacts to the aftermath of the election.

The coverage is absolutely free, but you can help contribute to my continuing coverage of marijuana law reform by visiting this donation link. Thanks for your support and vote No on 2, Yes on 3 in Ohio!

Kevin Drum wrote a post this weekend for Mother Jones entitled “Marijuana for Millionaires“. In it, he expressed his disgust for the legalization amendment Issue 3 to be voted on in Ohio tomorrow, because it constitutionally vests all the commercial marijuana growing rights to ten specific plots of land owned by the campaign investors.

Issue 3 turns out to be surprisingly fascinating—or venal and repellent, depending on your tolerance for sleaze. … I don’t care what they’re legalizing. This stinks. It’s crony capitalism without even a veneer of decency, and if it applied to anything else nobody would have the gall to ever let it see the light of day. If this is the price of pot legalization, count me out.

Kevin Drum can write that without a care in the world, because it appears he has no skin in the game. “I’ve never smoked a joint in my life,” Drum wrote in 2009. “I’ve only seen one once, and that was 30 years ago.” Perhaps now that marijuana has been legalized in a few places, he’s relented and tried a joint. But I doubt it, since Drum also added, “I barely drink, I don’t smoke, and I don’t like coffee. When it comes to mood altering substances, I live the life of a monk. I never really cared much if marijuana was legal or not.”

The problem, Mr. Drum, is that I and hundreds of thousands of cannabis consumers in Ohio do have skin in the game. We are subject to this thing called prohibition in Ohio that allows police to interfere with our liberty over the smell or alleged smell of an aromatic herb on our person, to be detained for even the pretext we may be involved with the criminal distribution of the skunky weed. And some of us aren’t well-off, middle-aged, or white enough like you to avoid being profiled for that law enforcement interference.

The best case scenario we have in an encounter with an officer of the state is the confiscation of our marijuana and a minor misdemeanor that equals a $150 fine. I can probably handle that fine. Maybe a poor black young man cannot and this begins the cycle of unpaid fines that lead to bench warrants that lead to arrests that lead to unemployment that lead to crime.

But don’t confuse Ohio’s current law with “decriminalization”. Yes, there is no arrest for up to 100 grams possession of marijuana in Ohio, but it is still a minor misdemeanor that ends up on your background check. These minor misdemeanors can also mean the suspension of your driver’s license for six months to five years [ORC 2925.11(E)(2)]. For the rest of your life, “drug suspension” remains on your driving record, unless you pay lawyers to help you get your records sealed.

That’s the best case scenario. Our interface with law enforcement can also lead to searches of our person and our vehicle and our home. Upon discovery of any sort of marijuana concentrate, tickets aren’t an option any more. Sure, up to 100 grams of marijuana flower gets you that minor misdemeanor, but over 5 grams of solid concentrate or 1 gram of liquid extract is a misdemeanor and twice those amounts are a felony. That’s arrest and prison time from a month to a year and the “drug criminal” record to affect our job, education, and housing prospects for life.

So I guess it just depends on what offends you more, Mr. Drum – crony capitalism at the marijuana production level (but not the processing or retail level)… or 18,000 tickets and arrests for marijuana next year and every year beyond that are 4 times more likely to affect black people?

What offends you more – the idea that rich people can use their money to benefit politically… or that a mother who acquires 2 grams of cannabis oil to treat her epileptic child’s 1,000 seizures a day will remain a felon in Ohio?

What offends you more – the imposition of a grow “monopoly” (where “mono” = “ten”)… or the subversion of the initiative process by a legislature that is tricking you into requiring two successful majority votes the next time you try to legalize marijuana?

What offends you more – rich people stepping up to legalize marijuana for profit when in forty-five years before and the next five years hence, nobody else would or will be able to step up to do it… or letting cops continue to mess with cannabis consumers’ liberty and handing the opponents of legalization a perfect victory talking point in the lead-up to possibly six states voting on legalization in 2016?

That talking point will be about how the marijuana legalization movement, which talks a lot about “ending mass incarceration of pot smokers” or “how prohibition decimates black families” or “how the poor desperate patients can’t wait for life-saving medicine”, threw them all under the bus when so-called “activists” were left out of making a profit on Big Tobacco 2.0. (I’ve been following Kevin Sabet so long I can write his press releases for him. This will be his favorite talking point since I coined “Not Your Father’s Woodstock Weed” to mock him and he ran with it.)

It’s funny to me how offended everyone is by this “monopoly” of ten pre-owned grow sites with dozens of sub-leasing growers and over 1,000 independent retailers of marijuana in 2015, but weren’t mobilized to act when Ohio created an actual monopoly of one company owning four constitutionally approved casinos. Nobody seemed to be in any hurry to kill constitutional monopolies in 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, but once someone finally got marijuana legalization on the ballot in 2015, the legislature couldn’t move fast enough to kill monopolies.

Oh, but not the casino monopoly. Nothing about issue 2 kills that golden goose. That monopoly can stay.

Finally, Kevin Drum doesn’t understand that we cannabis consumers have been purchasing marijuana from a monopoly all our lives – the dealer. Prohibition makes it difficult to find “the guy” who is selling. The inherent criminal risk allows him to jack up the price to absurdly inflated levels and treat his customers with disprespect. We’ve had to wait hours in parking lots for deliveries of short-weighted, inferior product. We’ve had to spend $300 an ounce on something we know it cost “the guy” $25 to grow.

You’d have us reject up to 1,159 independent pot shops selling dozens of quality, tested, pure strains of cannabis flower and newly-legalized concentrates, where we can get what we want during regular business hours with just a short retail interaction in a secure, well-lit, adults-only store, because the commercial grow model offends your non-toking economic senibilities?

Sorry, Kevin Drum, it’s No on Issue 2, Yes on Issue 3 for any cannabis consumer who’s offended by being treated like a criminal by the state and could give less than four-fifths of a flea’s fart whether “the guy” who’s been price-gouging us for decades can’t get rich in the legal marijuana grow game.

This week I had the good fortune to cover the SW Cannabis Conference and Expo in my first gig with CannabisRadio.com.

Little did I know I’d be walking into a convention center full of murderous criminals who dissolve their enemies in acid, kidnap and behead their sisters, and hang the bodies of police from the overpasses in Scottsdale. [Those links aren’t only Not Safe For Work, they’re not really safe for any compassionate human being with a soul. There is some horror you can never un-see. Consider yourself warned.]

That’s what you’d think, anyway, if you’d only read the comments of Maricopa County Attorney and Harry J. Anslinger-wannabe Bill Montgomery.

“Why is it any different for marijuana in this regard than if we had cartel members in town for their annual cartel convention?” Montgomery asked.

Well, Bill, you can look at my photos of the “cartel convention” and listen to my interviews with the “cartel members” if you like. Which one of these is most like El Chapo and the Mexican Cartels?

Is it José from the Weed for Warriors project, the grassroots organization fighting for medical marijuana access for our veterans? Because his legs, right arm, and left index finger weren’t hacked off by vicious Mexican drug cartels. He lost those fighting our wars in the Middle East and now needs medical cannabis for the neuropathic pain that plagues him to this day.

Is it the former NFL players Eben Britton, Nate Jackson, Kyle Turley, and Ricky Williams from the Gridiron Cannabis Coalition, who are fighting for the access to medical marijuana for football players, knowing now that THC is the best medical treatment to reduce the permanent damage from concussion and traumatic brain injury? I mean, the NFL is a cartel, sort of, but they don’t dissolve anybody in acid.

Was it the Utah State Senator, Mark Madsen, who explained his exasperation with conservatives who can’t see the states’ rights, limited government, personal responsibility arguments for medical marijuana? Or Nathaniel, the African-American historian who brought me hemp-paper newspapers from the 18^th century and historical documents describing hemp as the “nigger crop”? Or maybe Jessica Crozier, the mom with Harvesting Hope who is trying to make sure kids with epilepsy have access to medical marijuana?

Bill Montgomery went on to explain, according to KTAR News, that there “was no difference between this event and cartels getting together to discuss how to smuggle and refine cocaine and heroin.”

Except that these were companies displaying products that are all perfectly legal in Arizona and most of the United States. People selling soil nutrients, grow lights, insurance, security, web design, software, accounting, and other mundane products and services. Even the few marijuana products, like vapor pens or edibles, are legal for medical marijuana patients in Arizona and they weren’t actually on display.

Bill Montgomery is a dying breed, the rabid reefer mad prohibitionist. Phoenix New-Times reported that Bill had a warning for conference attendees, saying in a press conference, “Some folks who are traveling from out of state and may be engaged in business transactions at the Phoenix Convention Center, you could be violating state and federal law when it comes to trafficking in marijuana. And I can’t confirm or deny whether or not local or federal law enforcement may be on hand in an undercover capacity.”

Since there was no marijuana bought or sold or even displayed at the convention center, I can’t confirm or deny how much Arizona taxpayer money was wasted sending undercover law enforcement in to patrol a trade show floor full of trimming machines, lights, and t-shirts, and a few stages of people talking about cannabis.

But that’s Bill Montgomery for you. If it’s weed, it’s evil, period.

Following the first night of the show, I got to meet a spry older gentleman with a perma-grin on his face who sort of reminded me of Don Ameche from the movie “Cocoon”. “You know,” another person confided, “that’s the ‘enemy of the state’.”

“Who, Don?” I asked, pointing at the happy silver-haired senior.

Yes, that man was Don Ream, a Vietnam veteran and medical marijuana patient who had approached Bill Montgomery at a marijuana debate. Don said he didn’t appreciate Montgomery’s comments that “being a better pothead is not being a better human being” and people like Don are a “drag on this country”.

When Don said he was also a recreational marijuana consumer, Montgomery said, “Well, then you’re violating the law, and I have no respect for you. And I have no respect for someone who would try to claim that you served this country and took an oath to uphold the constitution and defend against all enemies foreign and domestic, because you’re an enemy.”

Phoenix New-Times even gave Montgomery a chance to walk back his “enemy” comments about a brave American serviceman. But Montgomery just doubled down, explaining by email, “Is [Ream] an enemy like ISIS or Al Qaeda? Of course not. But if he or any other vet is going to use their status as a veteran to encourage people to break the law, then that does make them an enemy of our constitution and our laws and that is a sad commentary on where we are at.”

I guess Montgomery never read that part in the First Amendment about freedom of speech and petitioning our government for a redress of grievances.

One of the biggest problems affecting marijuana legalization now that four states have succeeded in ending marijuana prohibition is that everybody wants to get in on the game. But now it appears, at least in one state, legalizers have figured out it isn’t wise to split the funding, volunteers, and support between multiple competing initiatives to legalize marijuana.

In California, there are at least seven or eight different groups that have filed or will file initiatives for 2016. In Arizona, Massachusetts, and Maine, the pattern that has emerged is to have one grassroots-led, liberally-construed initiative competing against one professional-led, more-cautious initiative submitted by the Marijuana Policy Project (MPP).

Like MPP’s initiative that has already made the ballot in Nevada, these efforts are known by the branding “Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol” (CRMLA). But now, MPP is dropping its CRMLA in Maine and uniting behind the grassroots efforts of Legalize Maine to get their Maine legalization initiative on the ballot for 2016.

“Joining forces is the best step forward, not only for our respective campaigns, but for Maine as a whole,” explained David Boyer from MPP’s campaign in Maine via written statement. “We all agree marijuana prohibition has been a colossal failure and that it must be replaced with a system in which marijuana is legal for adults and regulated like alcohol. We can more effectively accomplish our shared goal by combining our resources and working together instead of on parallel tracks.”

Here are the details of the proposal for Maine legalization:

1. Adults 21 and older may possess and share up to 2.5 ounces of usable marijuana (more than any other state), as well as all the marijuana they produce at their home grow (like Colorado and greater than Alaska and Oregon).
2. Adults may cultivate up to 6 mature plants, 12 immature plants (non-flowering >18” tall x >12” wide), and unlimited seedlings (non-flowering <=18” tall x <=12” wide) (more plants than allowed in any other state). Adults may also share up to 6 immature plants or seedlings.
3. Establishment of retail marijuana social clubs where adults may purchase marijuana and consume it on site (something no other state has yet legalized).
4. No state limits on marijuana stores, but localities may limit or ban them. Stores will charge a 10 percent sales tax (lower than in any other state, except Oregon’s temporary tax-free 2015 sales).
5. Rights to education, employment, and housing may not be denied solely for being a marijuana consumer (no more urine screens for school, work, and rentals, a protection of our rights not found in any other state).
6. Rights to child custody and contact may not be denied solely for being a marijuana consumer (better protections than exist in any other state).

The campaign now needs to collect over 61,000 signatures from registered Maine voters to put this single initiative on the ballot. Paul McCarrier, head of Legalize Maine, is excited about the combined forces that will now be fighting to end marijuana prohibition in Maine, saying, “Both campaigns have done a great job of educating voters, organizing volunteers, and raising funds, and now we can ramp up those efforts even more.”

A spring poll by Portland-based Critical Insights found that 65 percent of Mainers support the legalization of marijuana.

Christian Baker is a chef living in Glen Ashley, Durban North, South Africa, and is the latest member of Iqela Lentsango, the Dagga Party of South Africa, to challenge the constitutionality of dagga prohibition in the nation of 53 million.

Dagga is the South African term for cannabis, or “marijuana” in North America. It is prohibited by the Medicines and Related Substances Controlled Act of 1965, the Illicit Drugs and Trafficking Act of 1992 (which refers to it as an “undesirable dependence-producing substance”), and international drug treaties to which South Africa is a signatory.

Baker, age 23, successfully argued before the Pietermaritzburg High Court (the KwaZulu-Natal provincial court) to have his charges stayed in the lower Phoenix Magistrate’s Court (the Phoenix Township’s court) for dagga dealing and possession. He now has 60 days to present his defense to the nation’s Constitutional Court.

Baker argues that “I have been smoking dagga for years without harm … I sometimes eat it for its known medical benefits and part of my own spiritual beliefs and practice … I eat the seeds as part of my diet and as a health supplement due to research into the medical benefits and economic potential of cannabis,” according to IOL News in South Africa.

Baker’s argument mirrors that of another Dagga Party member, Lions River farmer John Lawrence Strydom. Almost a year ago, he was arrested for possession of almost five kilograms of dagga. Those charges were withdrawn in March by the province, but Strydom argued for them to merely be stayed, so he could present his case to the Constitutional Court that laws prohibiting dagga violate the South African Bill of rights.

Strydom argues that the word “dagga” itself has been used by police and media to demonize the cannabis plant, echoing similar arguments about the use of the word “marijuana” in the United States. “I smoke it and eat it for its known medical benefits and as a part of my own spiritual beliefs and practices,” IOL News reports Strydom as saying, “I regularly consume it as part of my daily diet and as a health supplement.”

Strydom doesn’t even believe that one can plead “guilty” or “not guilty” to something that cannot naturally be a crime in the first place. “To me this invoked a massive moral dilemma,” writes Strydom, “as either a ‘guilty’ or a ‘not guilty’ plea implies consent to what amounts an unlawful law.” His plea document lays out the case of dagga prohibition violating the UN Declaration of Human Rights, enshrined into South African law by their constitution. In his opening, Strydom states:

I, John Lawrence Strydom, will not plead guilty because it is not morally possible to admit to any alleged crime when

1. There is no apparent victim of the alleged crime, and
2. It can and will be shown in defense that the law against Dagga is unjust, and unjustifiable, and is motivated and sponsored by vested corporate money interests and the collusive interests of the State, and by foreign influence upon the State.

According to Baker, there are about 19 other cases that have been stayed in lower courts pending the resolution of these challenges to dagga prohibition at the Constitutional Court.

“Idaho Is What America Was“ is a statement of pride for citizens of the Gem State who treasure pristine wilderness, Christian values, and conservative politics. Unfortunately, the statement also represents a stubborn clinging to America’s marijuana prohibition that not only defies logic, but defies a simple human compassion for suffering children that all of Idaho’s neighbors have come to recognize.

It was announced last week that 25 children suffering severe epilepsy in Idaho may begin clinical trials this week with the GW Pharmaceuticals drug called Epidiolex, thanks to an executive order from Gov. Butch Otter. GW’s drug is a cannabidiol (CBD) product meant to mimic the substantial success many parents have seen from treating their children with natural, whole-plant cannabis-derived CBD oil in places like Colorado.

However, Epidiolex is truly CBD-only, with no psychoactive THC whatsoever. Most parents using CBD oils in the states that allow them are granted anywhere from 0.3 percent to 5 percent THC in the oil. Many parents find that CBD oil without higher levels of THC doesn’t produce the relief from seizures their children require.

Twenty-five children, out of a possible 1,500 who could qualify in Idaho, will be granted this opportunity to end their suffering. To be one of the 25, the epileptic child must have already tried four other ineffective pharmaceutical medications. Some of the side effects from these medications include: nausea, vomiting, dizziness, drowsiness, constipation, dry mouth, unsteadiness, mouth sores, swollen lymph nodes, persistent vomiting, severe stomach/abdominal pain, yellowing eyes/skin, dark urine, change in the amount of urine, persistent or severe headache, fainting, fast/slow/irregular heartbeat, unusual eye movements (nystagmus), vision changes (such as blurred vision), joint pain, swelling of the ankles/feet, pain/redness/swelling of the arms or legs, numbness/tingling of the hands/feet, sun sensitivity, signs of low levels of sodium in the blood (such as persistent nausea, extreme drowsiness, mental/mood changes including confusion, seizures), depression, suicidal thoughts/attempts, other mental/mood problems, symptoms of a serious allergic reaction, including rash, itching/swelling (especially of the face/tongue/throat), severe dizziness, or trouble breathing.

That’s the list of possible side effects from just one epilepsy medication. So Gov. Butch Otter wants to make sure that the child takes three more of those medications before we try the Big Pharma version of the no-THC-allowed, non-toxic, non-psychoactive oil from a plant?

The executive order from Gov. Otter came after his veto last April of a medical marijuana bill that had passed both houses of the Idaho legislature with tremendous support. Idaho’s Senate had voted 29-5 just two years’ prior on a resolution that the senate is opposed “to efforts to legalize marijuana for any purpose,” including what they referred to as “a ‘medical’ marijuana initiative”. Yet the almost identical Idaho Senate voted 22-12 to approve of limited-medical use of CBD oil for epileptic kids.

Otter’s veto of CBD-only legislation was the first of its kind. CBD-only laws began in neighboring Utah in 2014, then spread rapidly to similarly religious, rural, and conservative states like Iowa and the entire South. With Wyoming’s recent adoption of a CBD-only law, Idaho finds itself surrounded on the west by fully legal states (Oregon & Washington), to the south and east by medical marijuana states (Nevada & Montana) and CBD-only states (Utah & Wyoming), and to the north by Canada, which has medical marijuana and, thanks to the recent majority win by the Liberal Party, likely legal marijuana soon.

And that’s just fine with Idaho’s drug czar. “Idahoans are not afraid of being different than their neighbors,” Elisha Figueroa, director of Gov. Otter’s Office of Drug Policy told the Spokesman-Review. “I think that they are wanting to protect their way of life.”

What way of life was protected when Gov. Otter vetoed a CBD-only law and instead allowed just 25 children of 1,500 to receive life-saving treatment with Big Pharma’s version of CBD oil? According to his veto statement, “there were too many questions and problems” with the bill. “Of course I sympathize with the heartbreaking dilemma facing some families trying to cope with the debilitating impacts of disease,” Gov. Otter explained, “[but the bill] asks us to look past the potential of misuse and abuse with criminal intent.”

Yes, we all know what a den of iniquity Utah became after it legalized a cannabis oil that cannot get anybody high last year. Can Gov. Otter seriously believe that desperate parents giving their epileptic kids a dose of non-psychoactive cannabis oil is the slippery slope that leads to teenagers doing bong rips while they speed down the freeway on the way to their heroin dealer’s house?

In devastating news for the opponents of marijuana legalization, the latest poll from the respected Gallup organization shows, for the third straight poll, a solid majority of Americans nationwide favor the legalization of marijuana for adult personal use.

Gallup’s October 2015 poll shows 58 percent support the legalization of marijuana in the United States, tying the 58 percent recorded on the October 2013 Gallup poll, taken just one year following legalization in Colorado and Washington. Gallup’s October 2014 poll placed support at 51 percent.

Twenty-seven national polls have been conducted since Colorado and Washington passed their marijuana legalization laws on November 6, 2012. Of these polls conducted by ABC News/Washington Post, Angus Reid Global Monitor, Associated Press, Benenson Strategy Group, CBS News, CNN / ORC, FOX News, Gallup, General Social Survey, NBC News / Wall Street Journal, Pew Center, Public Policy Polling, and Quinnipiac University, only eight failed to show majority support for legalization, and two of those showed plurality support while another two were tied.

The last polls that showed majority opposition to marijuana legalization were taken in November and December of 2012, with 50 percent opposed and 48 percent in support. The average of the 27 polls taken since legalization is 51.4 percent. Of the seven polls taken since Oregon and Alaska legalized on November 4, 2014, all show majority support with a poll average of 54.1 percent.

This latest poll and the overall trend in polling shows that, contrary to the assertions of prohibitionists like Project SAM’s Kevin Sabet, the American people are not feeling a “buyer’s remorse” toward legalization, but rather they’re feeling interstate envy for the $100 million in tax revenues and thousands of new jobs created in Colorado and Washington and soon, Oregon and Alaska.

Another damning trend for the prohibitionists is that their senior supporters are dying off and are not being replaced by junior prohibitionists. While barely over a third of seniors (65+) support legalization, no demographic under the age of 65 supports prohibition. Support for legalization stands at 58 percent for people aged 50-64, at 64 percent at ages 35-49, and a whopping 71 percent of adults under age 35 support marijuana legalization nationwide.

In less than two weeks, Ohioans vote to make it the fifth legal marijuana state in America. To our north, the majority win for Justin Trudeau and the Liberal Party bodes well for nationwide legalization in Canada before the end of the year. With California, Nevada, Arizona, Massachusetts, Maine, and Michigan on deck for legalization in 2016, how much longer can the United States maintain the fiction that marijuana is a dangerous drug with no medicinal value that cannot be used safely by adults?

Maybe you’ve seen the recent headlines from CBS News, NBC News, and the Wall Street Journal:

“Marijuana use doubles among U.S. adults”

Well how about that? It seems that when you go from eight medical marijuana states as of 2002 to having 21 medical marijuana states and two fully legalized states in 2013, more adults seem to be using marijuana. Or, at least, admitting it publicly.

“Marijuana Use Doubles in U.S., But So Do Problems”

Problems? You mean like raising $200 million in tax revenue in two legal marijuana states? Or like treating over a million legal medical marijuana patients who no longer fear arrest and incarceration? Or the reduction in suicide rates, opiate overdoses, and drunk driving deaths in states with access to medical marijuana? America’s got 99 problems, but a spliff ain’t one.

“Marijuana Use in U.S. Doubled Over Recent 10-Year Period
About 3 in 10 users are abusing or dependent on the drug, according to a new study”

Ah, now we get to heart of the scare – more adults are using marijuana… and they’re becoming addicted! Degenerate pot zombies roaming the streets in search of strains… ssstttrrraaaiiinnnsss!

Indeed, the surveys show an increase from 4.1 percent of adults consuming marijuana annually in 2001-2002 to the 9.5 percent consumption rates in the 2012-2013 data. Note that I wrote the surveys show. Keep that in mind when NBC writes “Marijuana use has more than doubled in the U.S. since the beginning of the century.” We don’t know that. We do know that there was a doubling in the percentage of people who admitted to breaking federal marijuana laws and possibly state marijuana laws to an anonymous pollster on the telephone representing the federal government.

Think about 2001-2002. George W. Bush was in office and we were collectively in the middle of post-9/11 hysteria. The people were allowing the federal government any measure of power it needed, from the Authorization for the Use of Military Force in Iraq to the USA PATRIOT ACT. Medical marijuana existed only in the West and Maine. The Bush Administration was running ads on the Super Bowl that said pot smokers were contributing to terrorism. How honest would your average American pot smoker be on a federal survey around that time?

But let’s suppose we can trust the figure; that adult use of marijuana really did double in the past decade. So what? Auto fatalities are at a record low, productivity is up, unemployment is down, crime is down, and the support for marijuana legalization has once again reached the all-time high of 58 percent in the Gallup poll.

The issue, according to the scare, is that problem marijuana use has doubled, too. “While not all marijuana users experience problems, nearly three of 10 marijuana users manifested a marijuana use disorder in 2012-2013,” said Bridget Grant of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, a co-author of the study.

Yes, indeed, some people can have a very adverse reaction to using marijuana. It is a mood-altering substance, and like sugar, fats, caffeine, gambling, and sex, some people can develop an unhealthy relationship with that pleasure.

However, “marijuana use disorder” is such a broad spectrum of diagnoses confounded by the contraband status of cannabis in most states that it doesn’t tell us much about any increase in risk to those consumers or the general public.

The study relies on the DSM-IV definitions of substance abuse and substance disorder. These definitions have been changed for the new DSM-V, the reference manual for psychology and psychiatry in the United States. For “substance abuse”, one may qualify if they exhibited “substance-related legal problems”. Thus, any consumer arrested for marijuana meets the definition of “substance abuser”, even if their consumption was responsible and their behavior is functional.

“Substance dependence” is an even broader definition. Three strikes on this list labels you “substance dependent”, including needing “markedly increased amounts of [marijuana] to achieve… desired effect”, which is a naturally-occurring effect when adults who like marijuana develop tolerance. If you lived in a state with legal marijuana, you’re going to have greater access and have less time between dry spells.

That tolerance, per se, doesn’t mean you’re having a dysfunctional relationship with marijuana. But if you’re working full time, or going to school with good grades, or raising a loving family, but you answered that, yeah, you need to smoke more pot these days to get high, you can be considered “marijuana dependent”.

That tolerance issue can also get you your strike for the “diminished effect with continued use of the same amount” and “taking the substance often in larger amounts” items on the list, too. So, for merely being a regular cannabis consumer who now has greater access to cannabis, you’re deemed “substance dependent”.

The scare stories then pivot from the adults who are now using more marijuana to how terrible marijuana is for the developing teen brain and how teens are perceiving marijuana as less harmful than they have in the past.

But those kids should find marijuana less harmful now that it’s not turning their brains into eggs in frying pans, causing their dogs to talk to them, and contributing to Osama bin Laden’s terrorist operations, according to TV commercials. Now that those kids have Google to debunk reefer madness and PubMed to look up cannabis science, they don’t believe the old lies that led to artificially negative perceptions of marijuana.

I’ve just wrapped up my time at the Virginia NORML Conference in Richmond, where marijuana law reformers raised $1,250 to defeat one of the most anti-marijuana-reform state senators in America, Bryce Reeves of Virginia’s 17^th District.

“Virginians can’t change the laws,” read one sign, referring to Virginia’s lack of a voter initiative process, “so let’s change lawmakers.” Bryce Reeves is the perfect target for change.

In February of 2015, the Virginia Senate joined many other Southern states in approving a bill to allow an affirmative defense for parents who treat their child’s intractable epilepsy with cannabidiol (CBD) oil, the non-psychoactive constituent of the cannabis plant.

Senator Bryce Reeves was the only senator to vote against the CBD bill.

Keep in mind this was literally the least Virginia could do for these desperate parents; they’d still have to risk being interstate drug traffickers for bringing the CBD oil from out-of-state, and they’d still be arrested for possession of CBD oil if they are caught with it in Virginia. The affirmative defense just means that after the parents have been arrested, cuffed, hauled to jail, booked, fingerprinted, photographed for their mug shot, arranged to make bail, had their child taken by protective services, hired a lawyer, and then went to court, they could argue to the judge they were using this CBD oil that cannot get anybody high to treat their seriously incapacitated child’s epilepsy, and the judge would dismiss the charges.

Senator Bryce Reeves voted against that. Senator Bryce Reeves apparently believes that if a parent is desperate enough to become an interstate drug trafficker to save their child’s life, they should be locked away in a Virginia prison. Or they should be forced to move out of the state, as many desperate parents do.

Senator Bryce Reeves’ ignorant opposition to forms of cannabis that do not get people high doesn’t end at medical CBD oil for epileptics. There was also a bill to approve of industrial hemp production and manufacturing in Virginia, which passed the House and Senate and was signed by Gov. McAuliffe.

Senator Bryce Reeves was one of five senators who voted against the industrial hemp bill.

As for the cannabis products that can get people high, Virginia lawmakers also attempted to decriminalize the personal possession of marijuana. Currently in Virginia, one can be charged with a felony for marijuana possession for just one half-ounce of marijuana, if a prosecutor can show that the marijuana was intended for sale. Possessing less than a half-ounce subjects the Virginia citizen to misdemeanor penalties of 30 days in jail and a $500 fine for a first offense, or a year in jail and a $2,500 for subsequent offenses.

The Virginia decrim bill would have changed simple possession to a $100 civil fine and created a rebuttable presumption – an assumption that prosecutors could challenge – that cultivation of six or fewer cannabis plants is for personal use. There would be no criminal record and the bill removed any arrest and jail for such offenses.

Senator Bryce Reeves was one of nine senators on a committee that voted to table the decriminalization bill.

So the attendees of the Virginia NORML Conference, after listening to impassioned pleas from longtime Virginia activists Andy Ludwig and Ed McCann, had an impromptu fundraising call to help defeat Bryce Reeves. In just fifteen minutes, they had raised $990 in cash and $330 in credit card donations, totaling $1,250 to remove Bryce Reeves, the most anti-pot senator in Virginia.

When the debates in the currently-legal states and the soon-to-be-legal states all seem to revolve around whether the right people are getting rich from growing marijuana, it sure is refreshing to visit Virginia, where activists still remember the whole point of legalization is to end the discrimination and persecution of cannabis consumers. Without any big marijuana industries, medical marijuana growers, or green rush prospectors funding them, grassroots marijuana reformers put their limited money where their mouth is and engaged directly with the political machine.

Now that’s activism.

All this week I’ve been writing about Ohio Issue 3, the constitutional amendment vote in just seventeen days to legalize marijuana. But also lurking on the ballot on November 3 is Ohio Issue 2, the so-called “Anti-monopoly amendment” added by the Ohio legislature in a transparent attempt to defeat marijuana legalization in Ohio.

Ohio Issue 2, however, isn’t just to crash the Ohio Issue 3 in 2015, but to make the process of legalizing in 2016 and beyond more difficult if Ohio Issue 3 should fail.

The amendment has five points. The final point establishes original jurisdiction for the Ohio Supreme Court to review this amendment. Point 4 reads:

Prohibit from taking effect any proposed constitutional amendment appearing on the November 3, 2015 General Election ballot that creates a monopoly, oligopoly, or cartel for the sale, distribution, or other use of any federal Schedule I controlled substance.

It’s interesting that the Ohio Attorney General successfully argued to the Ohio Supreme Court that Issue 3’s grow plan should be described on its ballot summary as a “monopoly”. ResponsibleOhio, the Issue 3 campaign, countered that “monopoly” wasn’t accurate, as “mono” means “one” and there are ten competing properties with ten different owners that would grow marijuana under the plan. A more accurate term would be an “oligopoly” (market controlled by the rich) and a less accurate term would be a “cartel” (market controlled by few players that collude, which Ohio’s ten growers could not do without violating federal anti-trust laws).

The reason for the “monopoly” language is that “oligopoly” isn’t a term average folks recognize and “monopoly” sounds scarier to voters. “Monopoly” implies that just one company could be profiting from Ohio’s marijuana farms, like just one company profits from the four constitutional casinos passed in an actual monopoly amendment in Ohio in 2009.

Maybe you didn’t hear about that? Yes, the same guy who is proposing the 2015 marijuana Issue 3 was behind the 2009 casino Issue 3 that set up four casinos in Cincinnati, Cleveland, Columbus, and Toledo, all owned by Penn National Gaming. There was well over $45 million spent by Penn and Cleveland Cavaliers majority owner Dan Gilbert on that Issue 3, the greatest amount ever spent on an Ohio initiative.

You didn’t see the Ohio state legislature rush into session to propose an anti-monopoly amendment to compete on the 2009 ballot, did you? Nor did the legislature in 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, or 2014 see fit to address what today they’re calling “galling” and “nauseating”. Somehow, one company buying an actual monopoly in which it runs the entire state casino industry didn’t spur them into action.

But as soon as ten investors put up $20 million to get marijuana legalization on the ballot, where they would profit only from the wholesale side of the industry, while creating thousands of jobs and hundreds of opportunities in the processing and retail side, suddenly there is a need to vanquish the anti-American forces of monopolization. Except for casinos; nothing about Ohio Issue 2 is going to affect the four casinos owned by one gaming company that have generated $809 million in revenue in 2014 alone.

So why, if the state has decided Issue 3 is a “monopoly” did it need to include “oligopoly or cartel” in its fourth point? And if the concern is investors getting rich, why was there a need to include “or other use”, which could be non-profit medical use? If the problem was marijuana, why include “federal Schedule I controlled substances”; was there a chance legalizing heroin, LSD, mushrooms, PCP, or ecstasy was going to make the ballot and pass in 2015?

The fact that the legislature would push an amendment specifically to defeat a concurrent amendment ought to be chilling enough. Issue 3 haters who warn me of setting a precedent don’t seem to mind this anti-democratic precedent being set. If you don’t like Issue 3, vote against it. But having an Issue 2 presents the possibility that the majority could support just ten marijuana grow sites, yet have it snatched away from them by the same Supreme Court that decided ten competing businesses equals a “monopoly”.

It gets worse with Point 1 of Ohio Issue 2:

Prohibit any petitioner from using the Ohio Constitution to grant a monopoly, oligopoly, or cartel for their exclusive financial benefit or to establish a preferential tax status.

The arbiter of this prohibition and the definitions therein is the Ohio Ballot Board, a bi-partisan group of two Democrats and two Republicans appointed by the leaders of the Ohio House and Senate plus the Secretary of State. It’s up to these five to decide what exactly an “oligopoly or cartel” is, what an “exclusive financial benefit” is, and what “preferential tax status” is.

Suppose I propose a medical marijuana initiative for 2016 that calls for funding of cannabis research at Ohio’s universities and provides tax-free medicine to cancer patients or allows them to grow their own medicine. Are the universities a “cartel” gaining the “exclusive financial benefit” of research funding? Are patients not having to pay a sales tax getting a “preferential tax status”? Do you want that decided by the Ohio Ballot Board?

Here’s Point 2 of Ohio Issue 2:

Prohibit any petitioner from using the Ohio Constitution to grant a commercial interest, right, or license that is not available to similarly situated persons or nonpublic entities.

Now we’re not just prohibiting monopolies, oligopolies, and cartels. Now we’re prohibiting commerce if it isn’t equal for everybody and every company. So does my imaginary 2016 medical marijuana initiative grant Ohio universities a right to study marijuana that it’s not granting to private researchers? Do my cancer patients gain a commercial right to purchase marijuana that isn’t granted to similarly situated patients with non-qualifying conditions or even healthy people? Do you want that decided by the Ohio Ballot Board?

Point 3 explains what happens when the Ballot Board decides you’ve crossed the line:

Require the bipartisan Ohio Ballot Board to determine if a proposed constitutional amendment violates the prohibitions above, and if it does, present two separate ballot questions to voters. Both ballot questions must receive a majority yes vote before the proposed amendment could take effect.

If the Ballot Board decides my 2016 medical marijuana amendment violates this anti-monopoly amendment, then my medical marijuana amendment becomes Issue X, “shall Ohio Universities be granted a monopoly and cancer patients be granted a special right?”, and Issue Y, “shall there be medical marijuana for cancer patients in Ohio?”

Maybe that’s no big deal. Medical marijuana is extremely popular. Maybe the hurdle of getting two majority votes in the same election rather than one isn’t too hard to clear. Maybe the Ballot Board looks the other way when it comes to cancer patients instead of potheads.

But language this vague and wide-open combined with a small mostly-unelected partisan board in a conservative state whose lawmakers still believe reefer madness makes me leery of handing them any of the power citizens have in Ohio to implement initiatives. They’ve already twisted the definition of “mono” to mean “ten”; how far would they torture English to stymie the next tax-and-regulate proposal for marijuana legalization in Ohio?

The initiative process is precious. Twenty-six states don’t even have it. Some states that do have a much more arduous process (Illinois) and higher hurdles (60% in Florida) to clear. Don’t let the legislature’s hasty subterfuge of marijuana legalization this year be the Trojan Horse that undermines your initiative process not just for the next marijuana proposal, but any initiative lawmakers want to defeat.

How can NORML bad-mouth and soft-sell a legalization in Ohio that’s better for marijuana consumers than the no-home-grow and per-se-DUID they eagerly promoted in Washington State?

Last night I received some email from colleagues in marijuana law reform who are upset by my last column that called out the big four marijuana law reform groups (NORML, DPA, MPP, & ASA) for ignoring, soft-selling, or criticizing Ohio’s chance to legalize marijuana just nineteen days from now.

I hope everybody reading this understands I have the utmost of love and respect for the major drug reform orgs. I started my activism with Oregon NORML from 2005-2008, worked for National NORML from 2009-2012, and this year, I co-formed Portland NORML. It’s because of that love and respect that I am so disappointed that the reform orgs aren’t pushing harder to help free our people and help our patients in Ohio.

It was in that capacity as NORML’s Outreach Coordinator in 2011 and 2012 that I was the only national representative living in the Pacific Northwest. When Initiative 502 was circulating in Washington to legalize marijuana, many of my regional activist friends were dead set against it. My strong and, at times, vicious support of I-502 earned me nasty internet picture memes, threats of physical harm, and blacklisting by some that still exists to this day.

Some were vehement that I-502’s passage would destroy the lax, unregulated medical marijuana system, but that system was bound to be cracked down on whether legalization passed or not. The legitimate complaints they raised were that I-502 would still allow for the arrest of home cultivators, thus forcing consumers to purchase from the retail stores, and that I-502 instituted an unscientific per se DUID that would criminalize any regular consumer caught driving.

It was a very difficult moral decision for me to support I-502. My support for marijuana law reform has always been a three-part test:

1. Does it improve the plight of cannabis consumers?
2. Does it improve the plight of cannabis growers?
3. Does it equalize our status with alcohol consumers?

For I-502, it was a mixed bag. It certainly improved point 1 by making it legal to possess and buy marijuana. It maintained the status quo for point 2 by keeping home growing illegal. But it worsened the status quo for point 3 by making us easier to convict of DUID than a drunk driver. In the end, I decided the chance of me getting caught in Washington with a bag of weed were greater than the chances I’d be caught in a car accident or pulled over for poor driving and subject to a blood test that would prove me guilty of a DUID I didn’t commit.

In the year 2012 to this date (Oct 15), there were eleven results (see below) from the NORML website regarding Washington’s I-502, not counting the numerous blog posts I had written on the now-defunct NORML Daily Audio Stash blog. The first was a spirited defense of I-502 against the two legitimate complaints being raised by consumers, entitled NORML’s Official Reply To ‘Patients Against I-502’, where executive director Allen St. Pierre wrote:

We fully recognize the per se DUI marijuana provisions in I-502 are arbitrary, unnecessary, and unscientific… We believe the overall impact of this proposal, if approved by voters this fall and enacted, will be overwhelmingly helpful to the vast majority of cannabis consumers in the state… Thus, NORML’s Board of Directors voted unanimously (including the two members from WA) to endorse the initiative, while maintaining our opposition to per se DUID provisions in principal.

Additionally, at NORML we also support the right of consumers to grow their own marijuana… the sponsors found through their polling that the inclusion of the right to cultivate marijuana for personal adult use would reduce their level of public support below that needed for approval. Again, while we continue to support personal cultivation, we believe the initiative still deserves our support, despite this calculated omission by I-502’s sponsors.

In the year 2015 to date, there are seven results from the NORML website regarding Ohio’s Issue 3. The first of those was Sorting Through the Marijuana Mess in Ohio. NORML Founder Keith Stroup wrote:

As might be expected, this proposal, which would enshrine this special privilege for these investors in the state constitution, has met with some cries of outrage from some in the Buckeye state, both legalization activists and the state legislature.

Some activists have raised objections to the proposal because it would not permit average Ohioans to compete for the commercial cultivation licenses…

…[W]e should not act shocked to learn that someone is going to get rich off marijuana legalization in Ohio, should it occur.

Nor should opponents act so offended by the fact that average citizens in Ohio do not have the resources to be part of those investors who would control the commercial cultivation licenses.

It’s a decent defense of Issue 3, but hardly a ringing “[this] will be overwhelmingly helpful to the vast majority of cannabis consumers” endorsement that I-502 got. And nobody from NORML ever called I-502 a “marijuana mess”.

Other posts by NORML this year about Ohio Issue 3 also focus on the negatives of Issue 3. In No More “Joe Camel,” Please!, Keith Stroup chastised the Issue 3 campaign for their use of a cartoon mascot, Buddie, as a get-out-the-vote effort on college campuses. It’s hard to fault NORML for criticizing that irresponsible act by Issue 3’s campaign, but Stroup takes it further by impugning the entire Issue 3 campaign:

The fact that such a silly, and potentially politically harmful public educational initiative would have been launched raises serious questions about how professional this sponsoring group of investors really are.

Those of us who support the legalization of marijuana in Ohio will be watching closely in the coming weeks to see if this debacle was just an isolated stumble, reflecting a lack of sensitivity to the special concerns that apply to drug use and drug policy; or if it is a symptom of a group with more money than common sense.

Buddie was certainly a mistake, but how can one question the professionalism of a group that was able to gather the signatures, make the ballot, produce quality television ads, and generate the same polling numbers as Washington’s I-502, without I-502’s Drug Policy Alliance billionaire backer?

Speaking of television ads, in 2012, New Approach Washington produced numerous professional ads. NORML embedded three of them on their website in Marijuana Legalization Proponents in Washington Unveil First TV Ad and NEW I-502 TV Ads: Former Federal Law Enforcement Officials Support Marijuana Legalization.

But in 2015, ResponsibleOhio has produced and aired as many TV ads as New Approach Washington did, and NORML has yet to feature any of those ads on its website.

As for the rest of NORML’s mentions of Issue 3, we have ResponsibleOhio Initiative Qualifies For The 2015 November Ballot and Ohio: Measure To Regulate Retail Cannabis Sales Qualifies For November Ballot to announce in August when the initiative officially became Issue 3. These were just neutrally-toned news blurbs that announced the basic facts of the measure. Two more posts, 2016 Will Be a Watershed Year for Marijuana Legalization and Swing States: Super-Majorities Endorse Medical Cannabis Access, Men Support Broader Legalization just make passing mention of Ohio’s Issue 3.

The last of seven relevant results for Ohio’s Issue 3 on NORML’s website is Investor-Driven Legalization: A Bitter Pill to Swallow. There, Keith Stroup informs us that for Ohio Issue 3, unlike the National Board’s unanimous support for Washington’s I-502, “the endorsement was less than unanimous; a couple of board members abstained, and one flatly opposed the endorsement, to register their displeasure with the self-enrichment aspects of the Ohio proposal.” Stroup went on to point out all that was wrong with Issue 3:

Using the cover of badly needed criminal justice reform, the investors, operating under the name of Responsible Ohio, are seeking what is clearly an unfair advantage in the “green rush” that is certain to follow marijuana legalization when it is adopted in Ohio.

So the NORML board felt obliged to hold our noses and endorse Issue 3 in Ohio. It was, as the saying goes, “a bitter pill to swallow,”… I believe it was the right decision.

But it surely does feel like the loss of innocence.

Now to be fair, Washington’s I-502 qualified in February, while Ohio Issue 3 qualified in August. NORML usually doesn’t comment on or endorse legalization initiatives until they have qualified. And there were more polls on I-502 to report on than on Issue 3.

However, NORML also had its celebrity advisory board member, travel host Rick Steves, co-sponsoring I-502, pumping hundreds of thousands of dollars into the campaign, and engaging in a statewide barnstorming tour to promote Washington legalization without home grow, with a per se DUID, and a limit of 1 pot shop per over 20,000 residents. In Ohio, nobody from NORML is touring to promote legalization with home grow, without a per se DUID, and a limit of 1 pot shop per 10,000 residents. Worse, their state affiliate, Ohio NORML, and most of its local chapters are openly campaigning against the measure.

How could Ohio cannabis consumers be blamed for perceiving that NORML considers the wrong people getting rich on growing marijuana as something we have to “hold our noses” over, but consumers risking unimpaired DUIDs and continuing home grow felonies was something to enthusiastically promote?

I get emails and comments regularly from Ohio tokers who are thanking me for eagerly promoting Ohio’s legalization and providing them the statistical and rhetorical tools necessary to fight back against all the opponents of legalization, including NORML’s own local Ohio chapters. They are the same kind of thanks I got when I worked for NORML and used the (now-disappeared) NORML Daily Audio Stash blog to beat back the No on I-502 campaign. I’m truly saddened that cannabis consumers aren’t getting those resources from NORML.

Google Search: site:norml.org Washington = 11 relevant results in 2012

1. 2012-02-02 = Washington: Marijuana Regulation Measure Certified For 2012 Ballot
2. 2012-02-24 = NORML’s Official Reply To ‘Patients Against I-502’
3. 2012-02-25 = WA: New Poll Shows 47% of Likely Voters Support I-502, 15% Undecided
4. 2012-06-19 = NEW POLL: Majority of Washington State Voters Support Marijuana Legalization Initiative I-502
5. 2012-07-23 = Poll: Support for Marijuana Legalization Initiative Growing in Washington
6. 2012-08-06 = Marijuana Legalization Proponents in Washington Unveil First TV Ad
7. 2012-08-16 = This Weekend In Seattle: Earth’s Largest Pro-Marijuana Law Reform Rally
8. 2012-09-12 = NEW POLL: Washington’s Marijuana Legalization Initiative, I-502, Holds Huge Lead
9. 2012-09-14 = Most Statewide Marijuana Initiatives Lead Solidly In Polls
10. 2012-10-10 = NEW I-502 TV Ads: Former Federal Law Enforcement Officials Support Marijuana Legalization
11. 2012-10-11 = Guest Blog: Can You Smell It? Marijuana Legalization Coming in 2012

Google Search: site:norml.org Ohio = 7 relevant results in 2015

1. 2015-07-25 = Sorting Through the Marijuana Mess in Ohio
2. 2015-08-13 = ResponsibleOhio Initiative Qualifies For The 2015 November Ballot
3. 2015-08-20 = Ohio: Measure To Regulate Retail Cannabis Sales Qualifies For November Ballot
4. 2015-08-31 = No More “Joe Camel,” Please!
5. 2015-09-14 = Investor-Driven Legalization: A Bitter Pill to Swallow
6. 2015-09-21 = 2016 Will Be a Watershed Year for Marijuana Legalization
7. 2015-10-14 = Swing States: Super-Majorities Endorse Medical Cannabis Access, Men Support Broader Legalization

Did you know that in just twenty days, Ohio is going to voting on the legalization of marijuana? Yes, in 2015, fully a year before California’s next attempt, Ohio may join Colorado, Washington, Oregon, and Alaska in creating the nation’s fifth legal marijuana market.

Like those four legal states, consumers will be able to possess an ounce of marijuana, in public.

Possession of an ounce of extract becomes legal, too, just like three of the legal states and four times more than Washington.

With a $50 home grow license, adult Ohioans can cultivate four mature marijuana plants, just like in Oregon. That’s one more mature plant for an adult than Colorado and Alaska. Washington State still doesn’t allow home grow.

Medical marijuana will be legalized, too, similar to Colorado, Washington, Oregon, and Alaska. But Ohio will allow patients to self-administer medical marijuana at the workplace, something no other state allows.

The maximum allowed number of retail pot shops for Ohio consumers will be capped at 1,159, which is more outlets than all four of the current legal states combined.

The National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws has endorsed the measure, known as Issue 3 in Ohio. So, as you might imagine, the national org is marshaling all its resources online and in Ohio to ensure that legalization comes to the nation’s 7th most-populous state, right?

You’d imagine wrong. Here is NORML’s front page, 20 days away from an Ohio legalization vote:

Isn’t that strange? Absolutely no mention of a statewide legalization vote imminent in less than three weeks among ten blog posts and five feature sliders. Even the post on the Weekly Legislative Roundup makes no mention of Ohio.

But wait, maybe it’s on NORML’s Take Action page, where they catalog every single marijuana law reform measure pending in America…

Wow, that’s pretty stunning. A measure to legalize in Massachusetts in 2016 gets a mention, but not the one on the ballot being voted on in just 20 days in Ohio.

Well, what about the Drug Policy Alliance (DPA)? They sank millions into getting Washington’s I-502 passed. That law had no home grow, instituted a per se DUID, and established the highest marijuana taxes in the world. What’s their website have to say about the big upcoming legalization vote?

But to be fair, DPA covers all drugs. Maybe we should just drill down to the “Drug policy in my state” page for Ohio.

The Ohio page has nothing to say about 2015 legalization in Ohio. But a look at their California page informs you that DPA is working on a legalization initiative for 2016 there.

What about Marijuana Policy Project (MPP)? Their board is officially neutral on the Ohio Issue 3, so we probably shouldn’t expect much on their front page.

Like DPA, maybe we should take a look at their specific Ohio page.

Finally! Somebody in the major national drug law reform groups has acknowledged on their current website that there is a legalization vote happening in 20 days in Ohio. Sure, it’s a non-committal “consider the measure” and not a “Vote for Issue 3 on Nov. 3”, but this lip service from a neutral MPP is more than the pro-Issue 3 NORML is showing on their website currently.

But while NORML has issued an endorsement “with reservations”, their state affiliate in Ohio sacked their former president for his endorsement of Issue 3. Ohio NORML leaders have been campaigning against the initiative. And this is the current Ohio NORML website:

The only mention of the upcoming statewide legalization vote from Ohio NORML is a “Latest News” article dated from August, discussing legalization’s “unlikely opponents”.

The article opens with a graphic of “Dysfunction Jct.”, makes passing reference to National NORML being in support of it, but waves that off because NORML hadn’t endorsed in August. The article isn’t updated to show that National NORML now does endorse it. The article concludes with two organizational quotes from Greens and Libertarians as to why they oppose Issue 3.

Ohio will be voting on medical marijuana in 20 days, as it is contained in the measure. So, what is Americans for Safe Access, the nation’s medical marijuana advocacy group, telling its supporters?

Again, let’s check the Ohio-specific page.

Nope, not a word.

Whether or not the Ohio Issue 3 is a good business model for commercial growing, whether or not the campaign for Issue 3 has been reckless, whether or not Issue 3 is the type of legalization these national marijuana reform organization prefer, it is advocacy malpractice to not inform Ohio’s marijuana consumers that the vote to end their own criminality is imminent.

With apologies to Harry Nilsson

One is the loneliest number that you’ll ever see…

If you’ve been reading my work in various outlets and the reporting on my work, then you know I’ve been one of the few semi-prominent marijuana reformers openly, loudly, and proudly calling on Ohioans to vote YES on their Issue 3, a constitutional amendment to legalize marijuana.

I won’t rehash all of the “why” here. You know where I stand. But maybe you don’t understand my perspective as to why I take this somewhat unpopular stand among my colleagues, many of whom I admire greatly and respect deeply. So let me address some of the common points of contention by explaining a bit of my perspective.

One accusation I face is that I am approaching this Ohio legalization in a “binary” fashion. I’m accused of not understanding nuance – how one can support legalization in general, yet oppose this one specifically.

I get that justification. Many of the reformers who disagree with me use that justification to feel like they are the good guys in this debate, the ones saving cannabis consumers from a fate worse than prohibition. They must really believe that ten designated marijuana lands serving consumers who are legal to possess an ounce or grow their own is a fate worse than suffering a humiliating search, detention, tickets, fines, arrest, incarceration, and a criminal record.

Our friendly Beehive State – How can we help you, Utah?

But when I was stopped in Utah because my assistant looked and smelled like a pothead, the cops didn’t approach me with much nuance. Being cuffed and sat on the side of the freeway while cops riffled through all my belongings felt pretty binary – I was a criminal, they were cops. The cell I sat in for six hours seemed to me far more loathesome than whether the wrong land owner made a profit selling marijuana.

I’m also accused of not seeing the big picture – that establishing Ohio legalization will set bad precedent or the Ohio operators will present a negative model of legalization replete with cartoon characters that forestalls progress elsewhere.

I get that, too. Issue 3 using the Buddie cartoon mascot is abominable public relations for Ohio and the rest of the nation trying to legalize. [UPDATE: Issue 3 specifically mandates a 7-member cannabis commission appointed by the pot-hating governor to set all marijuana regulations… so you need to believe 4/7ths of them would support allowing pot shops to advertise with cartoon mascots.] The idea that some future rich guys may duplicate this model to buy another legalization amendment elsewhere is certainly a possibility. (Oh, no, there may be more states where I’m not treated as a criminal and I don’t have to buy from criminals! Please, rich guys, head to Idaho!)

No is the saddest experience you’ll ever know…

But I believe the biggest public relations boost we have is the tide of inevitability. Notwithstanding Oregon’s 2012 failure (the kind of wide-open, grower-friendly legalization the Ohio opponents seem to prefer), we are 4-0 with well-regulated, well-funded legalization campaigns in two successive elections.

My colleagues assure me that in the wake of an Ohio loss, they’ll tout how Ohioans are ready for legalization, based on polls, but rejected this legalization’s business plan. I hope they’ll be able to out-shout Kevin Sabet, who will be on endless loop explaining on TVs everywhere how legalization is not inevitable, how only the kooky leftie-liberal westerners support it, how sensible Ohioans recognized a buyers’ remorse on legalization.

That stance would be more defensible if I saw any of the major reform groups marshaling resources for a 2016 Ohio legalization fight, but they’re all focused on California primarily, Nevada and the other 2016 states secondarily, with tertiary interest in some friendly state legislatures, like Rhode Island or Vermont. Ohio’s not even on the radar.

So, I should remain a criminal and shop from criminals in Ohio until… when? When one of the grassroots groups that are broke or in debt and can’t even amass signatures for medical marijuana find $20,000,000 to place True Legalization™ on the ballot?

I met him in a cell in New Orleans, I was down and out…

Sometimes in reading the complaints of my colleagues, I’m taken aback by the sheer reverence and deference to illegal pot growers. Those brave pioneers, I’m told, sacrificed and risked to grow the marijuana throughout prohibition and they should be rewarded with riches in the legal paradigm of marijuana… not the investors who actually make legalization happen.

I don’t share that view. The pot growers and dealers got paid. Whatever risk they faced from cops and prison was reimbursed by charging us tokers $300/ounce or more for something it cost them $12.50 to $25 per ounce to grow. For every one of them who made money and got arrested, there were seven of us who paid money and got arrested.

Did those growers and dealers contribute to ending my criminality? Some did by donating some of their windfall to NORML, MPP, DPA, or a legalization campaign. But the vast majority never did, recognizing that legalization means the end of their sleep-til-noon, play-in-dirt, tax-and-reg-free, all-cash-income. Furthermore, when chances to end my criminality arose in California and Washington, those growers and dealers were some of the loudest opponents and even used profits from our consumer weed buys to keep us criminals. Why should I be concerned about how the people who exploited my consumer risk at great profit make out after I’m no longer desperate enough to buy from them?

I grew up a toker in Idaho. My growers and dealers weren’t friendly families of Northern California or Southeast Ohio hippies just trying to earn a living. My growers and dealers were directly affiliated with the Mexican Mafia. I’ve seen bullets fly over weed deals and alleged snitches in the hospital. Friends of mine are still in the Idaho State Penitentiary over weed.

Every state that legalizes is one state closer to Idaho legalizing. Maybe that will happen before my parents die, so I don’t have to look over my shoulder when I visit them. Every drive I make to Nampa, Idaho, just 35 miles over the Oregon border, is 35 miles of driving where any traffic accident or police encounter could mean a DUID charge, because I’ve always got some active THC in my system.

Sit beside the breakfast table – Think about your troubles

Speaking of which, maybe part of why I’m so determined on this Ohio thing is because I already had to come to a very difficult moral decision in supporting Washington’s I-502. I’ve always said I’ll support any legalization that improves the status quo for marijuana consumers.

The trouble for me was that I-502 was a bit of a wash. It improved my status quo for possession and shopping, but degraded my status quo for driving, and maintained the status quo for home growing (none). In the very beginning, I was actually anti-I-502. But after speaking with my colleagues in major reform organizations that were pumping millions of dollars and tons of airtime in support of I-502, I was convinced that these compromises were necessary to get the win, that the win was so monumental it would overshadow the negatives, that we’d eventually fix the negatives.

I’m glad they convinced me, because they were right. Legalization changed everything. A loss coupled with Oregon’s would’ve left Colorado as some sort of fluke. Alaska and Oregon likely wouldn’t have attempted 2014.

So I’m perplexed as to why those anti-consumer sacrifices were worth it, but I’m supposed to reject a pro-consumer legalization in Ohio because it’s anti-dealer?

Originally, there was no home grow under Ohio’s plan, and I was ready to be vocally against it for that reason. Locking up commercial growing with no home grow remedy may have been odious enough to earn my disapproval. But to complain about ten commercial farms when there will be tens of thousands of home grows seems very Chicken Little to me.

Hate oligopolies? Don’t buy from them. Grow your own. Buy from a friend who grows his own. You know, like you do now under prohibition, but without the threat of harassment, tickets, and arrest.

Said, Doctor, ain’t there nothin’ I can take, I said, Doctor, to relieve this bellyache?

Then there’s the medical marijuana aspect. For years now, I’ve watched as medical marijuana laws have gotten shittier and shittier. We go from California’s quasi-legalization, to home grows and dispensaries, to dispensaries only without home grow, to dispensaries that don’t dispense whole plant, to states that only allow CBD oil if you smuggle it in from out-of-state. And at every stage in every state, major reform orgs sold me on the idea of incrementalism, that legislative states require more sacrifices and compromises, that eastern voters are more reticent, that any baby step forward is progress and, most of all, used like a cudgel to beat back any legitimate complaints, patients can’t wait!

But now, apparently, patients can wait if the wrong people profit. Now the trembling epileptic kid’s parents can keep risking the felony for cannabis oil, because a cartel (not Pfizer, GlaxoSmithKline, or Merck) will profit. Now the Stage 4 cancer patient should just hang on until… whenever someone ponies up $20,000,000 to legalize his medicine.

Why is a cartel of 10, 6, 5, 4, or 2 rich growers selling cannabis medicine in eastern legislative medical marijuana states an acceptable compromise, but 10 pre-owned farmlands with numerous lessees growing cannabis medicine not acceptable? One colleague tells me those compromises were necessary because they’re not initiative states, but apparently, nobody was putting up any initiatives in Ohio until Issue 3 made their compromise. Looks like that compromise was necessary, too, since Soros/Lewis/Sperling weren’t funding anything there in the near future.

You read that in some magazine? – Next thing you’ll say the earth’s not green

Finally, some are upset at what they perceive to be name-calling. Specifically, “prohibitionists”. Many longtime marijuana reformers who’ve done great work that I respect deeply take umbrance to being called a “prohibitionist”, feeling it unfair for me to call them such when they support legalization in general, but not this legalization.

But what is the proper term for someone who votes against legalization and, in doing so, maintains prohibition? What do you call someone who joins Kevin Sabet, cops, prosecutors, jailers, rehabbers, and drug testers in voting to maintain the status quo that funds those entities by ruining cannabis consumers’ lives? The ballot doesn’t have marks for “YES, NO, and NO, BUT”. It has marks for “end prohibition” and “keep prohibition”.

It reminds me of the joke about the guy who complains he built a thousand bridges, but nobody calls him Larry the Bridge Builder, but fuck one goat and what do they call him?

Unlike the joke, however, just because you’re a prohibitionist on this one legalization vote doesn’t mean you’re a prohibitionist forever. Indeed, on November 4, whether Issue 3 fails or succeeds, I’ll count many of you as legalizers again as we work on 2016’s efforts in six states (assuming you don’t find business faults in those). But should it fail, I will be reminding every person ticketed or arrested and every patient that suffers or dies until the next legalization comes along in Ohio that I have never fucked the goat.

The Silence of the Lambs

You wouldn’t know it by reading the news or by viewing the webpages of major marijuana reform and medical marijuana groups, and if you did, some would offer no endorsement. But tomorrow, we are just three weeks away from residents of Ohio voting whether marijuana shall be legal for all adults to possess, use, cultivate, and process.

The Buckeye State might be legalizing both adult use and medical marijuana, in 2015 no less, a year before California might and easily five years before anyone would’ve predicted even talking about it. Why isn’t every drug law reform group making their get-out-the-vote push and shouting it from the rooftops?

After all, just three years ago the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) and the Marijuana Policy Project (MPP) gave full-throated endorsements of Washington’s I-502. Drug Policy Alliance (DPA) funded most of I-502. That imperfect marijuana legalization initiative retained possession felonies at over 40 grams, retained criminal penalties for personal cultivation, and instituted a junk-science 5-nanogram per se DUID limit that all three groups vehemently oppose.

This week in 2012, NORML’s webpage featured an above-the-fold slide highlighting the former law enforcement officials who appeared in two TV commercials in support of Washington’s upcoming legalization vote. But NORML made no reference that I can find to two TV commercials featuring a retired former Cincinnati police captain supporting Ohio’s legalization next month.

In fact, late night comedy host Stephen Colbert has given more attention to legalization in Ohio than any of the major marijuana legalization organizations.

Damning With Faint Praise

NORML’s mentions of a marijuana legalization vote imminent in Ohio included founder Keith Stroup’s July blog on the issue, where he leads with the critics’ opposition to the initiative, offers some context versus other legalization plans, and gives a half-hearted assurance that NORML will likely endorse the initiative. Then in September, NORML announced its endorsement of 2015 marijuana legalization in Ohio as “A Bitter Pill to Swallow”, because it is an “Investor-Driven Initiative”.

That hardly makes you want to run to the polls and vote yes, does it? Not like NORML’s endorsement of I-502 in 2012, which promised “For the next nine months national NORML and its dozen in-state chapters will provide logistical, strategic, communications and fundraising support for Initiative 502” and had its advisory board member Rick Steves touring the state and pouring in hundreds of thousands of dollars in support. In 2015, not only is National NORML barely tepidly supporting legalization in Ohio, their state affiliate is openly fighting against 2015 marijuana legalization in Ohio.

MPP’s board has decided to be officially neutral on 2015 marijuana legalization in Ohio, but last week Dan Riffle (speaking for himself as a non-pot-smoking former prosecutor in Ohio and not as MPP’s Federal Policy Director) was the opposition argument to 2015 marijuana legalization in Ohio to my supporting argument in a recorded discussion for This Week in Drugs with Sam Tracy and Rachelle Yeung. Certainly, listeners will appreciate the nuance that Riffle’s not speaking for the neutral MPP.

DPA has also remained virtually silent on 2015 marijuana legalization in Ohio. But DPA head Ethan Nadelmann has said the initiative “sticks in my craw” because “what we’ve unleashed now is for-profit interests, big business interests, with no connection to this movement….” But my sources tell me DPA might get behind the California legalization efforts of for-profit entrepreneurial billionaire Sean Parker, the big-business interest who founded Napster and invested early in Facebook. I don’t recall what Parker’s connection to this movement is, but Facebook has certainly been unfriendly to the movement.

When Business Plans Trump Civil Rights

The part that’s sticking in the craw of NORML, MPP, and DPA is not that the 2015 marijuana legalization  in Ohio would include the same personal public possession (1 ounce) as CO/WA/OR/AK; not the same 4 mature plants and 8 ounces at home as OR, 1 more mature plant than CO/AK, and 4 more than WA; not the legalization of an ounce of concentrates, equal to CO/OR/AK and four times WA; not the same type of legal pot shops to shop in and own, potentially more in OH than in CO/WA/OR/AK combined; not the same type of testing and processing facilities one could own to protect the public; not the establishment of a medical marijuana program that meets or exceeds those in CO/WA/OR/AK; and not the taxes that are roughly between what CO and WA have established. The Big Three drug reform orgs are happy with those parts.

It’s the grow part they don’t like. The 2015 marijuana legalization in Ohio designates ten plots of land totaling over 13,000,000 square feet as the only places legal commercial cannabis growth, cultivation, and extraction can take place. Those ten plots are owned by the ten investment groups that have sunk $2,000,000 each into this legalization campaign. To the reform organizations that have passed prior legalization laws thanks to the largess of three philanthropic billionaires, this legalization plan amounts to an oligopolistic money grab that limits commercial cannabis cultivation land to just a few rich people.

Their opposition to a few rich people in control of growing shouldn’t be confused with the medical marijuana laws eagerly supported by these same drug reform orgs. Laws like Connecticut’s that only allow a maximum of ten growers and require a $25,000 non-refundable application fee and $2,000,000 in escrow. Or New Jersey’s that allows only six growers. Or New York’s that allows only five growers. Or New Hampshire’s that allows only four growers.  Or Minnesota’s that allows only two growers. For some reason, a handful of wealthy people getting rich selling marijuana (or non-smokable marijuana products in Minnesota and New York) to patients isn’t reason enough for the marijuana law reform organizations to avoid promoting or to outright oppose those laws.

Ohio’s grow oligopoly isn’t even as restrictive as those five medical marijuana states. While those states limit medical marijuana cultivation specifically to the holders of 10, 6, 5, 4, or 2 licenses, Ohio is limiting cultivation to ten already-owned plots of land. There is no limitation on how many licensed growers may be cultivating those 13,000,000 square feet. Already the owner of the Licking County property has agreed to lease 15 acres of it for a medical cannabis research facility. The owners of four properties have assured the Ohio Rights Group that they will be leasing to multiple artisanal small grows.

That flexibility is confirmed by the amendment itself, which states, “[no laws] shall prohibit the creation of transferrable and recordable legal descriptions or separate tax parcel numbers for any of the [grow sites].” It also allows the grow sites to “expand its structures and related operations to adjacent real property”. Best of all, unlike the licenses issued in other legal states, which can be subject to the whims of state and local lawmakers and regulators, these plots of land are constitutionally protected for the right to cultivate commercial cannabis. Furthermore, after four years, if these 13,000,000 square feet aren’t producing enough quality cannabis to satisfy demand, the state may open up more land for commercial growing.

Patients Can’t Wait!… Unless They’re Ohioans

Then there’s the medical marijuana part that you’d think Americans for Safe Access (ASA) would be trumpeting. Currently in Ohio, an adult with cancer or a child with epilepsy who needs concentrated cannabis oil can earn a misdemeanor with 30 days in jail for possession of a single gram or a felony with a year in prison for two grams. The initiative Ohioans are voting on in 22 days would legalize possession of a full ounce of such oil. Unlike any of the other 23 medical marijuana states, Ohio would allow “a patient with a medical marijuana certification [to] self-administer the medical marijuana” in the workplace, and unlike most of the 15 states that have passed cannabidiol-only oil laws, patients would have numerous locations in-state to buy it. But ASA’s Ohio advocacy page is silent on 2015 medical marijuana legalization in Ohio.

So, to recap:

• NORML, MPP, & DPA enthusiastically supported Washington’s I-502, which retained 40 gram felonies, forbade home cultivation, and established a per se DUID limit so low medical marijuana patients and frequent adult consumers can never legally drive.
• NORML, MPP, DPA, & ASA gave thumbs-up to medical marijuana laws in Connecticut, New Jersey, New York, New Hampshire, and Minnesota that limited grow sites to ten or less, all in the hands of a wealthy oligopoly, in states where patients aren’t allowed to cultivate their own plants.
• NORML, MPP, DPA, & ASA are lukewarm, neutral, or silent on Ohio marijuana legalization that would be superior to Washington’s I-502 and superior to the most recent medical marijuana laws, because the wrong oligopoly gets rich.

Since when did the marijuana legalization movement stop being about the civil rights of cannabis consumers to be free from prohibition and start being about the right way to enrich cannabis growers?