He said WHAT????
Yes, marijuana clinics need to be regulated, and, yes, the City Council has zero excuse for their positively absurd slow-dragging on the matter, but what in the world is this about?
Here’s the opening of the LA Times article that explains the newest ill-considered initiative that appears to be coming out of the offices of Mr. Cooley and Mr. Trutanich.
Los Angeles County District Attorney Steve Cooley said today that all the medical marijuana dispensaries in the county are operating illegally, and that “they are going to be prosecuted.”
There are hundreds of dispensaries throughout the county, including as many as 800 in the city of Los Angeles, according to the city attorney’s office. They operate under a 1996 voter initiative that allowed marijuana to be used for medicinal purposes, and a subsequent state law that provided for collective cultivation.
Based on a state Supreme Court decision last year, Cooley and City Attorney Carmen Trutanich have concluded that over-the-counter sales are illegal. Most if not all of the dispensaries in the state operate on that basis….
Okay, so let me get this straight. Our two elected CITY officials have gotten together and, between them, decided to enforce federal law and totally ignore the laws of the state of California, the wishes of the state’s voters AND the official policy of the Los Angeles City Council?
How many ways is this stupid? Tough to count.
Jerry Brown has exactly the right idea. He’s going after the obvious scammers and leaving everyone else alone.
This grandstanding bit of nonsense, however, is NOT the right idea. Not in any way, shape or form.
sigh, still another case where Trutanich presented his views one way to get elected, to get the support of the medical marijuana community, then threw them under the bus, having had no intention of following through in the first place: he and Cooley are using as their rationale for this draconian move a Court decision from last year, way before the electon.
Like with Controller Chick and Gruel over the Controller audit powers dispute, like with how he presented his views about gangbangers. vs. at-risk-youth who he’d have some “real world” balance about vs. his tagging law as written…who knows what else, how many people and activist communities, he used this way. Which as a callous tactic belying character, upsets me more than the stance itself – which does seem counter to the growing movement in California, especially after the Obama administration has been quoted saying it will butt out of th dispute when asked by local municipalities; to sum it up very, very broadly – but as in San Francisco, etc. Sure there are way too many dispensaries and some are bad news, attracting crime and letting high school kids buy pot with the help of shady doctors and so on. We could do with much, much fewer under stricter controls, like in S. F., getting back to the basic purpose of allowing sick people to get what they need legally, and legalizing it precisely so they don’t have to turn again to criminals and the underground market. Taxing law-abiding shops in the process. But this draconian interpretation is so not what he promised – he just proves himself to be an appendage to his mentor DA Cooley again.
I’d been reading about the dismay and shock of the med cannabis community so did a tiny big of research which turned up this article from “aboutmedicalmarijuana.com” edited by Don Duncan, who’s apparently one of the most respected and well-known voices in that community. From May 20th, “LA Advocates Help Elect City Attorney,” with a photo of some of them dressed to the nines and beaming with Trutanich, apparently from his party the night before:
“Medical cannabis patients and advocates helped elect Carmen Trutanich as the new City Attorney on Tuesday…the L A medical cannabis threw its growing grassroots weight behind Koretz and Trutanich in hopes of steering the city towards a more reasonable medical cannabis policy.
“The Greater Los Angeles Caregivers Alliance (GLACA)…helped call voters, walk precincts, and turn out members to elect the two candidates. GLACA members joined Carmen Trutanich, City Councilmembers Dennis Zine and Janice Hahn in U City on Tuesday night to celebrate.
“The election of Trutanich – and possibly Koretz – is good news for medical cannabis supporters. Paul Koretz…has been a long-time champion of medical cannabis rights.
“…Patients and advocates feared Weiss would carry on outgoing City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo’s policy of obstructing progress on implementing sensible medical cannabis policy in the city. Trutanich told GLACA members he would uphold the state’s laws at a neighborhood meeting before the election.”
Could any deception be any more breathtakingly audacious. Well, GLACA and this community got Koretz alright, but he’s irrelevant now, with Zine as Trutanich’s sidekick carrying water for him and Cooley on Council and insisting on this draconian interpretation of law which was clearly their intent all along. This medical cannabis community and its publications like this one have been abuzz recently with disbelief and confusion about what to do next, but with the movement growing on a state level a battle is brewing.
It seems that Tru is the reincarnation of Cheech & Chong’s Sgt. Stedenko — but seriously, if he gets his way, it’s going to be expensive, chaotic and hurtful. L.A. law enforcement at its most traditional, in other words …
C: Our two elected CITY officials…decided to enforce federal law and totally ignore the laws of the state of California….? How many ways is this stupid?
Let’s see. Bull Connor and George Wallace got together and decided to enforce federal law over state and local laws by allowing blacks to eat at the same restaurant counters as whites and allowing a black to enter The University of Alabama?
Finally, I see that you’re really a “state’s righter,” Celeste.
Great, thanks for the heads up. I better go out and buy a giant supply to hold me through the next few months until this madness blows over. I want my grandmother to be able to smoke, regain her appetite and continue to eat while she under goes cancer treatments.
Hmm….maybe I can do a big run for the other folks down at the home since they too need it to continue their life with normality.
For some its a luxury or recreation. For the rest its a necessity.
Oh, man. Talk about glass houses.
If I understand Woody correctly, he was against desegregation (as he’s told us in the past) because he was such a committed believer in states’ rights. White supremacy laws, however unjust, shouldn’t be undone by the federal government, he tells us. The principle of states’ rights is simply too important. However, medicinal marijuana is so outrageous that in this case the rights of the states should be set aside. And so in classic internet form I give you Shorter Woody: white supremacy laws are less harmful than medicinal marijuana.
As an aside, I do think states’ rights claims are often made by those without federal power and are often out of political expedience and not principle. I’ll note that Celeste made no such claim.
Also, I realize people like to make fun of medicinal marijuana and there is truth the argument that there are folks out there with “headaches”, but it is also true that there are very sick people who benefit enormously from medicinal marijuana. Before you answer medicinal marijuana proponents with a joke or snide comment, read this piece about Margo Bauer who uses marijuana to cope with the pains of MS. People like her deserve to be taken seriously.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=111783991
Marvis, great story. The folks down in conservative Laguna Beach are starting to change their minds now that their generation population has reached an age where they too need it for medical purposes.
I’m sure with the aging population, the general public will see the medical benefits.
http://www.scpr.org/news/2009/08/11/seniors-laguna-woods-take-tentative-steps-toward-e/
Everyone in local government needs to get their heads out of their asses. I can go on for ever. I am a dispensary owner, I ran a pre ICO dispensary and was evicted after the DEA letters went out to building owners in 2007. 5 months ago, a dispensary opened up in the same place! WHAT THE FUCK!!!
Mavis, I have never said that I was against desegregation. In fact, I was in the middle of desegregation in the Deep South, and I and every student at my high school acted with class and treated integration as just another day at school. You need to get your information correct.
The current issue of Fortune magazine has a cover article on marijuana and how it’s already legal. I didn’t bother to read the article, but you can look it up.
This federal power to regulate local marijuana is a direct result of liberal jurisprudence – the insane abuse of the Commerce Clause of the Constitution, starting after the FDR court packing threat. In the most recent ruling, SCOTUS in the 90’s held that the federal government had the power to prevent someone from consuming their own home grown marijuana, because by doing so, they avoided purchasing it on the market, which is involved in interstate commerce (thus bringing in the federal power). This is the same reasoning used to give the feds the power to create the entire New Deal (and since) welfare state: they held that a farmer could not grow a little extra crop to feed his family – using the same reasoning.
Unfortunately, we all reap what the liberals sow.
Cooley and Trutanich were on Larry Mantel’s Air Talk today to explain their positions. In a nut shell, it’s that Prop 215 – the Compassionate Use Act, does not allow for the sale of medical marijuana. It can only be distributed to patients who are members of collectives, and the collectives must grow their own marijuana, not buy it from mass manufacturers.
It’s a huge set back for the people who wanted to make money out of the illness of others, and who wanted to be able to supply a much bigger market; the recreational users.
Comments that Trutanich and Cooley are going to be punished at the polls for restricting the supply of marijuana through non-profit collectives, really depends on whether the pot users can overcome the public outrage at the 800 plus pot shops that have sprung up in Los Angeles. In many ways, the recreational marijuana use community has brought all of this on themselves. Clearly the majority of Californians believe that marijuana should be given to the sick and dying patients for whom it offers some relief from their suffering; that’s why we voted for Prop 215. But 215 was never intended to enable a free market for recreational users. If you wan that, pass another proposition.
Cooley and Trutanich’s joint strike force will wipe out most of the illegal pot shops, leaving only the collectives to continue to supply the needy and decide whether they want to share their scarce resources with recreational users who cannot, by law, simply pay for their supply.
In order for the joint strike force has to succeed, they will have to focus on the most egregious violators – the the ones in the San Fernando Valley close to schools would make the best targets as they draw little sympathy from residents. Once the operators of those pot shops are arrested and convicted, the rest of the illegal pot shops will close of their own volition, leaving the collectives to continue to do what they’ve always done, care for the needy. Remember, Prop 215 was called the Compassionate Use Act, not the Commercial Use Act.
Celeste, I seemed to recall that you endorsed Trutanich back in March, maybe taking a cue from who you refer to as “blogfather” Marc Cooper, so I looked at your March 3rd thread and the “bruinsforweiss” commenter who disagreed and exposed Trutanich as a shrewd manipulator seems on the mark, someone who knew their subject. “These 3 are the tip of a Republican gang (with the likes of Dennis Zine) who just put a clever spin on things.” You weren’t the only one who was fooled, the Times’ reasoning referencing his compassionate take on at-risk youth vs. real gangbangers has been shown a sham, the way he wrote the graffiti “hanging” law being only one case in point. The “people’s lawyer” stuff is a soundbite with no bite.
Look, you don’t spend your life as a pro-NRA Republican (endorsed by them), working FOR rich toxic polluters, developing a rep for helping them evade environmental laws, getting your backing from Red Country Republicans and the likes of KRLA rightwing Obama-hater KevinJames and the others – then shed your Republican party designation the year before, carpetbag into the city and call yourself “an environmental prosecutor” just to run — and have any of it mean anything. The only thing that IS a surprise is that so many smart people fell for this guy’s “hale fellow well met” backslapping, big grinning, crude-talking, Harley-riding/ sheriff come to clean up Rawhide – uber-politician- schtick. (This is my clear albeit indirect and “polite” response to Kelvin’s cynical explanation of why it’s okay to do a 180 on his promises to the medical cannabis community: they should have seen it coming.)
Here’s the article that I referenced above.
Fortune – 09/18/2009: How marijuana became legal
Medical marijuana is giving activists a chance to show how a legitimized pot business can work. Is the end of prohibition upon us?
We should smoke-out the dispensaries that act as pushers.
“We should smoke-out the dispensaries that act as pushers.”
Yes. Either that or legalize it. But since marijuana is not, at present, legal, it needs to be tightly and appropriately regulated. The city council has been promising to regulate the dispensaries for three years now. And what has it done? Zip.
WBC, yes I did come out in favor of Trutanich—less because I favored him, but more because I bought the anti-Weiss stuff.
Then when Trutanich was elected I was actually quite optimistic. He hired some good people, several of whom I know and like, and I had a very high hopes.
With each day that passes, however, I become more and more pessimistic.
I listened to all 4 videos, heard Bratton praise Weiss for often being a lone voice criticized by colleagues for recognizing the importance of the anti-terrorism unit at LAPD — politics shouldn’t always be a popularity contest and what made him prickly with some colleagues is likely exactly what would have served him well as city attorney, sticking to his same values and steady course. At least we knew what we were getting. Anyway, with the current city council and Koretz as his replacement saying it’s OK to reduce the force to 9500 since crime is down (BECAUSE of Bratton’s excellent work and in his most valid opinion, BECAUSE of the size of the force and how efficiently it’s deployed); and with an apparent majority now wanting to use the trash fee hikes for the general fund instead of toward public safety (something else Bratton objects to strongly here and elsewhere, an issue that cuts across partisan lines); with Parks and some others “micro-micro-managing” the Chief, with no one on the Council speaking out in Weiss’s place on behalf of LAPD (as opposed to the union, which often opposes the Chief – a dichotomy most voters don’t get); and with the city attorney revealing his true stripes as a wrench in pretty much anything to do with the Mayor, even as Antonio’s struggling to make good on his own campaign promises: I certainly think the city as a whole is a whole lot worse off than if Weiss had won.
— I wish your videocard had held out: I’d have liked to hear in Bratton’s own words, more about the problems as he sees them in this fractious local governing structure, including how/ where the County Supervisors fit in. (Add to that, the odd and strong influence the County DA seems to have on City Attorney’s office now via his surrogates Trutanich, as well as Livesay and Carter…)
I agree with all you’re saying. I really, really, really hope we’ll be proved wrong. But I am not optimistic.
I need to get a SNAP camera AND a bigger memory card for my little point and shoot. I hector my students about being ready with multiple forms of media tools but have clearly not taken my own advice to the degree that I need to.
While it doesn’t have everything, listen to Frank Stolze’s report. He has a little of Bratton’s response to the Park’s question. http://bit.ly/tVXj1
(You’ll see my photo with his report as the battery on Frank’s still camera ran down. So both of us supposedly seasoned pros were not as technically prepared as we ought to have been.)
It’s laughable how WBC and Celeste can have this conversation and not once address the post by Kelvin. I don’t care if the elderly and actual sick patients were allowed to consume marijuana, but looks to me like Cooley and Trutanich are taking the bull by the horns where the council refuses to to a damn thing.
Explain how that’s wrong because their tactics, if adminsitered correctly, will help in the reduction of crime associated with bogus clinics that the council and mayor have refused to act on. They haven’t got a plan or a clue, action’s needed and it looks like that’s what youre going to get.
The lefts answer to any solution offered by the right that makes sense is to ignore it. This board is at times a shining example of that.
Sure Fire, indeed Kelvin’s post was an interesting and good one. (Hi, Kelvin.) And I hope he turns out to be right. I’m worried that he won’t.
You posted that story on the supposed robbery at the one clinic Celeste, many of these clinics pose a serious problem. Somebody has to step up and do something about them and striking fear into the ones that are dirty will accomplish much more than doing nothing like the politicians.
Sure Fire’s right about the City Council being totally neglectful in setting standards, any standards, for implementing Prop 215. One reason for that is the previous City Attorney, Delgadillo, who did not want to take a position on how to implement 215. Another reason was the City Council Members who, like Delgadillo, were more concerned about upsetting the vocal ‘marijuana for all’ lobby, than setting standards.
Trutanich and Cooley have now done what the City Council are too cowardly to do; draw a clear line in the sand. The law of California is clear; medical marijuana can ONLY be distributed to PATIENTS through COLLECTIVES. It cannot be SOLD. Neither Trutanich nor Cooley will take any action against a Collective, however, anyone selling marijuana is going to be prosecuted by Cooley, and the property owner will face forfeiture action by Trutanich.
I also find it really revealing that not one person has said anything about the results of the medical marijuana samples that Trutanich had analyzed by the FDA. Two samples came back with dangerously high quantities of a toxin called Bifenthrin. According to the FDA, the acceptable level of Bifenthrin in herbs is .05 parts per million. One sample had 86 times that level, the other had 1,600 times that amount. Doesn’t anyone care that medical marijuana is being sold to (supposedly) sick people and it contains a massive amount of a toxic substance?
Bottom line. It is clear that a law that was passed to help a small but significant group of seriously ill people has been hijacked by commercial greed. Until the law is changed to legitimize recreational use of marijuana, it will remain available only through legitimate collectives, and it’s Cooley and Trutanich who are making sure of that, not the City Council.
Kelvin/ Sure Fire, I’ve made VERY clear what i think about Trutanich/ Cooley’s about face on the medical cannabis issue, and why. You’re the ones who totally ignore that fact, that when Trutanich was running he told the medical cannabis community ONE thing, that he would uphold state law as they understood it, as the GENERAL public understands it – and now he and Cooley are insisting that “per state law” means that patients have to actually grow the pot themselves and share it in narrowly-defined collectives, while sales of ANY kind are illegal. Everyone who’s remotely objective (which does NOT include you two, especially Kelvin who has some sort of special stake in promoting Trutanich) sees that is an about-face from what he represented would be his views if the community mobilized on his behalf, as they did: you can be darned sure that if he told them what he/ Cooley/ Zine are saying NOW, they’d have organized AGAINST not for him. But lying to individuals and special interest groups to get endorsed and promises things he never intended to keep is par for the course in how Trutanich operates – from Chick to this to…The way Kelvin and all apologists totally brush aside the fundamental ethical issue as though it were nothing, accepting that lying and defrauding people is OK because THEY are doing it for some “greater good” (their rightwing agenda) against some “Evil libruls” is very revealing about how these people and their minions operate. Mind-boggling.
Kelvin’s earlier remark, about starting with targeting dispensaries near schools in the (west) valley (i.e., the most conservative areas and claiming “it’s for the children,”) then working from there, hoping the others shutter of their own accord before they’re busted, suggests the very carefully mapped-out strategy straight from the Trutanich- Cooley playbook, their agenda all along.
As for claiming there were pesticides in some samples: IF that were their prime concern, it would be an argument FOR legalizing shops which abide by the rules as they’ve been understood for years, so that authorities can regulate and monitor them. Driving sales back underground into the hands of criminals who know victims won’t go to the cops or “the law” (which would otherwise be these two, Trutanich and Cooley, the ones who’d prosecute THEM), is what will allow criminals impunity in adding contaminents, charging whatever the market will bear, etc.
(This is a quick reply – by no means extensive, but I’m sure whatever I say is irrelevant to these two as usual.)
As WBC says, Cooley and Trutanich have decided to follow what the law says, not what WBC and what many would like it to say. Prop 215 authorized compassionate use, not commercial distribution. Trutanich promised the medical marijuana community that he would help them, and that’s precisely what he and Cooley are doing; helping the legitimate collectives who campaigned for compassionate use. Nobody in the legitimate community is in a collective to make money, they exist to help desperately ill patients and they, more than anyone, resent the gaudy commercial ventures that have sprung up since Eric Holder’s announcement in February of this year.
The fact that people like WBC say “IF … pesticides were a legitimate concern…” suggests they don’t want to deal with the FDA analysis. The results are fact and at least two samples from different pot shops (one in CD14 the other in CD9) contained dangerous levels of the same substance. An unwillingness to deal with these facts belies the true agenda of the loudest voices of protest; they simply do not care about the unwell, they just want pot for recreational use and that was never the goal of the Compassionate Use Act.
Celeste, you are right to remain skeptical. Skepticism is the sign of a healthy democracy. I think that once the strike force starts arresting the worst offenders and protecting the legitimate collectives, public opinion will be firmly behind Cooley and Trutanich.
I also believe that both Cooley and Trutanich would enforce and abide by a law that sanctioned recreational use, if that law were passed, as it would be the law of the land. Until that time comes, they have to deal with the law as it stands, and it does not permit cash sales in pot shops.
The argument seems to be that the DA should follow something other than the law of California. Prop 215 changed the law as it relates to possession and distribution of marijuana. It did not generally legalize marijuana, that’s why, as news reports today indicate, there is a new effort to legalize marijuana:
SAN FRANCISCO – Marijuana advocates are gathering signatures to get as many as three pot-legalization measures on the ballot in 2010 in California, setting up what could be a groundbreaking clash with the federal government over drug policy.
At least one poll indicates voters would support lifting the pot prohibition, which would make the state of more than 38 million the first to legalize marijuana.
http://www.philly.com/philly/business/top100/20091011_A_push_to_legalize_marijuana.html
Change the law if you want pot sold in stores, otherwise let the DA do his job.
David, the other regular shill for Trutanich and Cooley who pops up to reinforce Kelvin, also trying to deflect the fact that Trutanich (with Cooley’s apparent tutelage as elsewhere) intentionally misrepresented his/their views on the issue, to get them to actively mobilize for him, while intending all along to throw them under the bus as soon as they were no longer needed, and in fact, are an obstacle to their real agenda. The passage I quoted earlier from the aboutmedicalmarijuana.com journal is just one of many, many which makes very, very clear that the interpretation these 2 are claiming NOW is very, very much contrary to how they represented what they would do if elected — that David and Kelvin reflect a view that is the OPPOSITE of the intent of 215.
(Kelvin’s offensive and reading-challenged garbage about how “people like WBC…do not care about the unwell, they just want pot for recreational uses…” is WHY I didn’t respond to him in the first place. This moronic stuff just mires one into the bogs of his level of propaganda which bears no relation to what I actually SAID or believe: I’m arguing against someone who defrauded the medical cannabis community about his views, to use them with the specific intent of doing the opposite of what they understood he would do, as another case of the outrageous voter fraud, as in the case of the Controller issue dragging on – where Chick famously called him a ‘liar and demagogue’ who never intended to keep his words to her; the graffiti “hanging” law, etc…ad nauseum. I NEVER said anything about my own opinions nor am I a member of this advocacy community; as made very clear in the passage I quoted, Trutanich ran claiming that Weiss would be MUCH TOUGHER in his interpretation of the law than Trutanich would be, which is WHY that community supported him instead… and to claim I “don’t care about the unwell” is just disgustingly offensive and gratuitous. To claim that Trutanich/ Cooley care about them by forcing sick patients to grow their own pot instead of sending someone to buy it for them is downright deranged, as the medical cannabis advocacy mags/ blogs/ groups make VERY CLEAR – check with GLACA (Greater L A Caregivers Alliance) and ask them how “grateful” they are for gutting the compassionate use law.)
Maybe David/Kelvin want to read Celeste’s intro a big more carefully, where she is incredulous that these two “have gotten together and, between the two of them, decided to enforce federal law and ingore the laws of the state of California, the wishes of the state’s voters AND the official policy of the City Council.” She’s expressing the INTENT of the voters with 215; semantic trickery to turn the intent upside down is just that. IF Trutanich held the very, very narrow and contrary view he and Cooley are expressing now (which he clearly did if as their shill Kelvin says, they blame Holder’s “announcement in February of this year” for “the gaudy commercial ventures” which have sprung up since), he should have made that very, very clear to GLACA and other medical cannabis advocacy groups that he tricked into working for him, this spring, HAD HE HAD the tiniest bit of integrity.
Neither address the fact that if the pretext of protecting patients from Raid (a can of which Trutanich held in a photo op) getting into some pot sold in shops were their real intent, that would be an argument FOR regulating POT and sellers to avoid patients being victimized by criminals preying on victims afraid to go to cops. (Per #21 above.) But these two like other Trutanich/ Cooley/ Zine shills do not operate with logic, reason, or ethics, but are intent on consolidating power any way they can to carry out their rightwing agenda, having fooled gullible voters and media with their “fancy speeches and soundbites,” (Chick again).
So this isn’t about medical marijuana at all, it’s about sneaking in as much anti-Trutanich propaganda as possible under the guise of broken campaign promises. Well let’s just remind ourselves of when promises were made, and for what reason. It was before the explosive proliferation of greedy pot shops engaged in supplying recreational use pot under the guise of medical need. At the time, there was a discrete, responsible community of collective supplying patients who were desperately in need of relief. That’s the group that Trutnanich supported, because they were legitimate, genuine and not motivated by commerce, rather, compassion.
That changed with Eric Holder’s announcement that the Feds were not going to prosecute the medical marijuana community. That was a relief to the 186 registered collectives in Los Angeles, as well as a handful who had not registered and filed ‘hardship exemptions.’
Following Eric’s announcement there was a flood of mostly meritless hardship exemption applications, followed by pot shops blatantly opening and conducting business.
They provoked a crisis that requires strict adherence to the command of Prop 215, and that’s not a problem for the original, genuine collectives.
It’s a huge problem for the profit-motivated pot shops, and that’s what is the cause of WBC’s rant. He or she cares nothing about the legitimate needs of patients, to him or her, it’s all about taking a snipe at Trutanich for winning a hotly contested election where a democrat was defeated.
It is a shame that once again partisanship is being used to blur the real issues here, and those are organized crime getting into the medical marijuana industry, commercialism in favor of compassion, and toxic substances in Mexican sourced product.
There are only two ways to address these problems; change the law to permit what WBC claims to want, or restrict the supply of medical marijuana to the 186 original collectives who do not engage in sales but only supply to genuine members of their collectives.
There is a move to change the law, and until that happens there is only one choice if the goal is to protect the patients and the public from the ruthless greed and callous poisoning of the profit motivated pot shops. That’s to do what Cooley and Trutanich are doing, and by starting with the most egregious violators of the law.
With every attempt to dig himself out of his hole, Kelvin only digs in deeper and proves how amoral as well as utterly oblivious to logic these people are in their quest to satisfy some rightwing Republican agenda. The only ones acting from a purely partisan point of view are them. Reading their posts makes one feel ill, sort of the verbal and logical equivalent of going on the biggest Six-Flags ride after a big breakfast. You’re darned RIGHT that I think flat-out lying to and defrauding the voters and officials, promising them what you never intended to deliver (your timeline here is WAY off, lousy, transparently unethical attempt to rewrite history) to get endorsements and support belies a fatal flaw of character in someone who is entrusted to enforce the law. All you do is reinforce your group’s unfitness to hold such positions with every post.
Meanwhile, these clowns have managed to mobilize the pro- cannabis community against L A like nothing else, bringing down on all of us class action lawsuits, which WE have to pay for, major protests starting next week at cannabis shops around L A, which all require extra police presence and protection. Which will only mushroom as these two characters have become the focal point for a statewide effort.
Americans for Safe Access blog reports (“Voices from the Trenches,” 10/9) some 100 protesters attended the Montebello photo op (with Trutanich holding that Raid, as a bogus pretext for their real purpose), and describes how they refuted claims that “the City Attorney was working to help patients by only targeting the bad collectives,” with that office’s own flyers and statements.
At this photo op, with Trutanich beaming with his Raid, Cooley said, “‘the vast, vast, vast, majority, about 100%’ of collectives in the county were illegal, and vowed to shut them down,” per the Americans for Safe Access blog.
They continue, “What is surprising is that the DA and CA feel so confident in a legal posture that fundamentally differs from that of California Attorney General Jerry Brown, the L A City Council (MY Interjection here: though with a Zine vs. Koretz dichotomy and the others somewhere in the middle, there is no Council “position” right now), and dozens of other cities and counties that have already adopted regulation — including Oakland, San Francisco, Sebastopol, Berkeley, Santa Barbara, Palm Springs, Laguna Woods, West Hollywood, and L A County.” As these two mobilize statewide opposition and fury, mis-using our precious financial and human resources, harming patients who will be denied safe access so they can shore up their own power base toward some future political ambition, WE all pay in many ways.
Will someone please explain why it’s ‘safe’ to have weed laced with toxins like insecticide? How does ‘legalizing’ pot shops prevent that? I wonder if the real reason why WBC, who seems to be very knowledgeable about the issue, is not dealing with it is because that in order to satisfy the demand for commercially available weed, the pot shops have to buy from the cartels?
If what Kelvin is saying is true about the first wave of arrests being made on the westside where there are pot shops near schools, then the “class action” that WBC talks about won’t get very far. Homeowners in my neighborhood are horrified at the sight of these pot shops, and the thugs who hang around the place look like the very worst kind of criminals. There will be no public sympathy for these people and any class action is doomed before it gets filed.
I know that many people have invested a lot of money in opening these pot shops, but that’s not going to make the public feel sympathetic towards the pot business. The origins of medical marijuana were not business related, and that’s the way it should be. Prop 215 would never have passed if the voters were told that the aim was to have hundreds of pot shops selling poisoned Mexican marijuana near schools.
I think the pot heads have been using a little too much of their own product and have lost touch with the reality of the situation. Homeowners, the voters that count at election time, do not want pot shops on the high street.
I voted for Prop 215 because I believed Paul Koretz when he said it was not an attempt to legalize dope. Now we can see the true agenda, Koretz saying nothing and letting his flunkies do the dirty work for him. It’s interesting that so much is happening now, three and a half years before Koretz faces re-election. Does he seriously think the westside will forgive him for allowing the pot shop explosion? Look at what they did to Jack Weiss!
Now “Jack” accuses me of lobbying for the Mexican drug cartels, being too abjectly stupid to understand a single point I made? Can these people (Jack/ Kelvin/ David/ who knows who else) POSSIBLY be any more proof of how imbecilic the Trutanich/ Cooley camp really is?
WBC still can’t deal with the toxins thing. It it a real problem because it undermines the very reason why Prop 215 was passed – to provide medicinal relief for those for whom conventional medicine offered no solution.
The fact that this medicine is laced with 1,600 times the permissible level of a toxin is an inconvenient truth that cannot be ignored, and readers note there is no logical response posted here, other than a ‘legalize the pot shops’ statement that does not address the issue.
I say let the whole thing play out in court when the first wave of arrests are made, and then we’ll see whether WCB’s class action lawsuit is real. Of course, if WDC understood the first thing about class action lawsuits, he would know that such a lawsuit cannot be brought against a government body. But let’s not let facts get in the way of the issue.
Why not mention the Polanski thing, WDC? That’s always good for a little distraction. Old Roman’s not enjoying the support of the Hollywood elite now they’ve found out that is was a little more sordid than they thought, and my guess is the pot shop people will go the same way once the truth gets out.
Rather than attack the dispensaries, we should jail all the users. Judge King in federal court does this. Judge King’s methods are effective as people who need weed not to vomit up their meds will die when they can’t get weed.
These sick people are a drag on the economy and the sooner they die, the better it will be for the rest of us. Besides deathly ill people are ugly.
Three cheers for Kooley, TrutanviKh and Judge King !!!
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When the Neighborhood Councils were invited to a meeting at City Hall with Trutanvich, he was asked about stopping the corruption in City Hall involving developers, and Trutanvich replied that his role was not to protect the public but to protect the [corrupt] city officials.
The difference between Chicago and LA is that once in a while, Chicago puts its crooks in prison. In LA, the City Atty protects the crooks while depriving the deathly ill of medical treatment.