I hope someone will run against her in 2020. If she even gets elected and not impeached before that.

Look at this past primary. It took forever for anybody realistic to actually try to challenge her, and that was without a Democratic incumbent.

for a change instead of a bad reason like every other time.
It seems that for every stance she is firm on you can find a video of her being firm against it.
Because integrity..

?t=17m23s



video from 17:20 to 19:17

... prohibition of alcohol, so her hesitancy about full-on national legalisation is unsurprising to me.

More than the promise to get the DEA schedule changed just for research, I think such a change will make doctors more confident about prescribed MMJ, and so support more state initiatives without fear they're going to get in federal trouble for prescribing it. So I am happy to see that as a goal on the national level.

I am not trying to sound like a stick in the mud myself, but with any medicine, be it plant-based or pharmaceutical, there are potentials for interaction, and especially if MMJ is prescribed for mental health issues (some strains seem to help depression, otheers with social anxiety), there ARE potentials for interactions. St. John's Wort, another plant thatvcan help some people, has been responsible for many cases of adverse effects.

There's also the issue with children, who desperately need the help now but do need to be studied while they are getting that help. Families dealing with intractable seizures in their children do need to let their children's reactions to both CBD-only and CBD/THC oil preparations be studied while getting the treatment, because it will help other families know which preparation will likely help their kids the most. Without studies, those desperate families are at risk of being preyed on my people who don't regulate their product because they are so desperate to help their kids. Even in states unwling to allow MMJ for adults, programs that keep families from having to be medical refugees in exchange for letting their children get ghe treatment and be studied at the same time would be a giant step forward.

I definitely think recreational pot is safer than recreational alcohol. But I will be surprised if she comes to that belief quickly, if at all.

If Hillary really believes in "evidence", the evidence that Prohibition didn't work is fairly hard to ignore.

Prohibition certainly didn't work, but the reason people supported it was the damage alcoholism did to families, particularly women and children.

So given her prior record of trying to protect children with ratings on video games, etc, and her other policies reminisce of the "protect the kids", I never really expected her to start saying that blunts were cool. I expect part of the "evidence" she is waiting for from CO and WA are how succcessful the recreational use states are at actually keeping it away from kids, not just tax revenue.

and that's the bottom line.

I'm not sure bringing up a past war on videogames is going to help in that regard. She also tried to protect Americans from the dangers of flag burning. Her husband tried repeatedly to save us from nude pictures on the internet. It's not like we haven't already had more than a few boatloads of muddle-headed "protect the children" arguments used to justify every damn piece of bad authoritarian legislation, even to this day with NC's bathroom panic.

Perhaps its time to have a clearly articulated vision of, yes safety is important but the right of consenting adult citizens to make their own damn decisions about their own damn bodies is important, too. "Tradition" be damned.

And keeping it away from kids is a specious argument against legalization. I don't know what it was like when you were a kid, but it was always easier for me to get weed in high school than it was alcohol, and this was in a state that still arrested people for it.

.... ripped off if I decided to smoke in college and someone tried to sell me ditchweed as sensi.

I may be old-fashioned, but I really don't think teenagers should be getting high recreationally. Brains are still developing during that time.

Kids with legitimate medical need for cannabis is a different ballgame, where particularly with the seizure treatment issue, the continuous seizures are doing far more damage to the child's brain than cannabis could.

to obtain than we did alcohol, which was legal and regulated.

But what, am I gonna lie? Hell, for all I know, it saved my life. My old man smoked camel unfiltereds- you know, because "real men" didn't use filters- and not too surprisingly, died of lung cancer.

Well, back when my gang of high school droogies was beginning to dabble in things like cigarettes, there were only 3 of us who never became smokers; cigarette smokers, that is. And it was because the 3 of us were way too busy smoking something else.

Funny thing is, that something else was a relative piece of cake to quit, when the time came. Not like nicotine, which I know I would have had a helluva time kicking if I had ever picked it up as a real habit.

So who knows. Farmers Luck, and all.

... than it was to find someone willing to go to jail to buy you booze or cigs.

I know in the end kids are going to do what they will do. For me, I had a father who exemplified the saying "If you can't be a shining example, be a dire warning". I took the dire warning while a teen.

Doesn't mean I dislike cannabis as an adult. But I do worry about not being able to be honest with my doctors that I occasionally smoke it, though. I'd much rather a nice indica than having to take Ambien or Trazodone for sleep. But my sister gets the opposite effect when taken for the purposes I indulge.

Also, I dont want to see the same type of advertising we see for alcohol. It does not need to be glamorized. (I have no idea if/how it's advertised in Colorado/Washington now)

decriminalization. Which won't happen until more old goobers die off. Pretty soon, but too late for this campaign.

Clinton's stance on marijuana could be a major issue in the 2016 election, as support for legalization grows. A 2013 Gallup poll found that 58 percent of Americans favor legalization. For those ages 18-29 the percentage of people who support legalization is 67 percent.

In terms of Clinton's stance on the issue, advocates are skeptical.

"She is so politically pragmatic," Alan St. Pierre told CNN. St. Pierre is the director of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws. "If she has to find herself running against a conservative Republican in 2016, I am fearful, from my own view here, that she is going to tack more to the middle. And the middle in this issue tends to tack more to the conservative side."

During the 2008 election Hillary Clinton was not in favor of decriminalization, which is a step below legalization. Since then, however, her views have become watered down and vague.

"I'm a big believer in acquiring evidence," Clinton told NPR affiliate KPCC in July of 2014. "And I think we should see what kind of results we get, both from medical marijuana and from recreational marijuana, before we make any far-reaching conclusions. We need more studies. We need more evidence. And then we can proceed."

She issued a similar refrain during a town hall discussion with CNN's Christiane Amanpour. "On recreational, you know, states are the laboratories of democracy. We have at least two states that are experimenting with that right now," Clinton said in reference to Colorado and Washington, which legalized marijuana "I want to wait and see what the evidence is."

In the same interview Clinton addressed the issue of medical marijuana saying: "At the risk of committing radical candor, I have to say I think we need to be very clear about the benefits of marijuana use for medicinal purposes. I don't think we've done enough research yet, although I think for people who are in extreme medical conditions and who have anecdotal evidence that it works, there should be availability under appropriate circumstances. But I do think we need more research because we don't know how it interacts with other drugs." Medical marijuana is currently legal in 23 states and in Washington, D.C.

The former Secretary of State, however, is not likely to try the drug herself. "I didn't do it when I was young, I'm not going to start now," she told Amanpour.

Continued: http://www.attn.com/stories/1403/hillary-clinton-five-things-2016

Ahem.. Superpredators and Iraq, neither of which had any evidence, both of which turned out to be disasters that Clinton supported/voted for.

on marijuana is everywhere she's wishy washy.

For my sister, who would prefer to use it for relaxation than her current pharmaceutical regimen, all it does is make her panic attacks worse and then put her to sleep after she cries for several hours.

Why? Could it be that it's interacting with another medication? Could it be that it's just not the drug for her? Could it be she needs a strain with a different cannabinoid profile, maybe one with more of an Indica base?

Tbe evidence we have right now is case study evidence, not controlled studies with different strains to see which are more effective forr specific conditions. At the same time, placebo-controlled studies when kids are suffering from uncontrolled seizures breaks ethical guidelines, because a placebo group when the case study evidence for children with uncontrolled seizures is wrong (withholding medication that really could help, instead of testing by groups using different strains or preparations is far more ethical.)

Plant for decades.

I mean, im flabbergasted by the whole thing.. In my day if you could smell it before you opened the bag, it was good. But the people in the nascent cannabis industry are very - many of them- focused on the science of the stuff, CBD vs THC, terpenes, etc.

Its way over my head, but i find it fascinating. I believe many people get anxiety relief through the higher CBD, lower THC strains.

Im not opposed to big pharma doing research Also, but it is disingenuous to argue that a move from schedule I to II - which, like i said, would leave the conflict btw. Federal and state law intact and unresolved - is the only or even best way to open that door.

And the people who have developed an expertise and body of knowledge around this plant, shouldn't be shut out. Right now a big issue out here is getting legal cannabis businesses able to access the banking system; you know, like opening up bank accounts instead of having to carry huge bags of cash. I have to believe HRC is not hostile to this, particularly given that our governor who is an enthusiastic defender of our legalization rollout has endorsed her... But it is anothet question of importance to states that have legalized.

About the only issue Hillary is unequivocal on is war. She is for them.

this would be something to get on the platform. Maybe pull in a few libertarians as well.

... the private prison industry.

What's so hard to understand?

who goes to the Times and doubles down on her votes to put both recreational and medical users in prison.

The simple, "mathematical" (since people are so fond of math) reality is, once Colorado, an important electoral swing state, became the first to fully legalize, the prohibitionists were well and goodly fucked. Besides, people all over the political spectrum- George Will, for fuck's sake- have recognized the futility of the drug war - and Cannabis is Drug War Public Enemy #1 - for years.

So the truth of the matter is, there are limits to how much ANY executive is gonna be able to do to put the brakes on states making their own mind up on this. There simply aren't the federal resources to arrest every pot smoker west of the Mississippi, as much as Chris Christie and Debbie Wasserman Schultz may wish it were so.

So Clinton is doing what she usually does, giving reasonable-sounding half answers which are better than nothing, but aren't exactly the sort of leadership which will motivate, say, young pro-legalization voters to the polls in great numbers. Changing it from Schedule I to II along with a verbal commitment not to come in and overturn the 4 (and counting) recreational legal states, or the, what, half of the states that have medical, now.. that's better than nothing but of course it still leaves the conflict between federal and state law intact, and leaves all the states with recreational or medical legality at the mercy of whoever happens to be running the executive branch and DOJ.

Now, like I said, it's not terribly feasible for the feds to shut the whole thing down, but they could make things a pain in the ass for those states- OR they could acknowledge reality, and science, and the fundamental liberty of our citizens, and do what Sanders has suggested, namely deschedule it federally.

Lastly, on the whole "just like prohibition" thing. De-scheduling it federally would not mean across-the-board legalization nationwide, AFAIUI. I believe states would still be able to outlaw it individually.

That is the breakthrough, IMO. When people realize the monies to be made in public coffers through taxation and private coffers by opening up banking and insurance etc, all of a sudden, they become HUGE proponents of the "possibilities of helping people".

Another reason not to vote for her.

then she will claim she was on the correct side all along -- Like $15/hr min wage or gay marriage.

There is split among conservatives now about marijuana sentencing -- some don't want to pay $60K per year to lock up black people. If those people are writing checks or doing favors for Hillary then she will magically evolve on this issue.

hr min wage, before she found out it was unpopular.

On a side note, we used to have a week's worth of drug scare training when I was in school and the only theme I can remember is that "Marijuana affects everyone differently." I had to call bullshit on that when I started smoking it in high school...

Affects everyone differently? Put 50 pot smokers in a room together and tell them to talk about their experiences with weed. It won't be 2 minutes before someone says "I've done that!".

But it's not a deal-breaker of an issue.

and the failed WOD, to anyone who is not profiting from massive incarceration and enabling cartels to flourish. These people are still living in the 90s, the end of the last century.

Bernie Sanders is the only one willing to bring in the 21st century for real.

Further, after legalization, Washington voters are as supportive of the law as they were before - no buyers remorse here.

http://www.drugpolicy.org/news/2015/07/marijuana-legalization-washington-state-one-year-status-report

fracking and war and debt and tax reform and immigration reform and voter suppression. And, I admit that everyone I know who wants marijuana has it. I am on the left coast so probably I am out of touch with the situation in other places.

because of shitty politicians like Hillary. There are thousands upon thousands of ailing people that legal marijuana could help.

It's one of my top important issues.

of possession of marijuana?

Hillary has been getting such strong support from Afr Ams. Are they aware of the differences between Hillary and Bernie on this issue?