07/13/12 – Paul Armentano – The Scott Horton Show

All right, y'all.
Welcome back.
I'm Scott Wharton.
Our next guest is Paul Armentano, Deputy Director of NORML, the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws.
And somewhere here I actually have a better bio than that.
He's the Deputy Director of NORML and the NORML Foundation.
That's about it.
Okay, great.
Welcome to the show.
How are you doing?
I'm doing well.
Well, good.
Lots of big news in the war on drugs, and particularly the war on pot lately.
It's an issue I don't cover nearly enough on the show, but I should.
And so how about starting right now?
I'm going to turn over a new leaf, and we'll talk about the war on drugs, particularly in this case, medical marijuana.
Two articles of note here, out of many, I'm sure.
This one at Alternet.
There's been a tectonic shift on marijuana across the U.S., except in Washington.
And then this other one is called Fed's Target Harborside Health Center, California's largest, most prominent medical cannabis dispensary.
And that one is at blog.
NORML.org.
So let's start with that, this raid and asset forfeiture of one of the longest, most established medical pot clinics in the Bay Area, correct?
Yes, indeed.
And the federal government's threat to seize the property of Harborside Health Center is really simply the latest action in what has been a consistent trend, particularly over the last couple years, for this administration to, on the one hand, publicly say that it's not interfering in state medical marijuana laws, while on the other hand, it is running roughshod over state medical marijuana laws.
Yeah.
Well, you know, it's just like the FCC.
The Republicans completely left Pirate Radio and Austin alone for eight years, and then the Democrats, you know, in the Clinton years, as soon as Barack Obama came into power, blam.
Here comes the crackdown.
Sort of like the escalation of the Afghan war.
They're trying to prove what tough guys they are.
Do you respect them more now?
Well, what's so ironic about this is that many of the most prominent and largest medical marijuana-related dispensaries and facilities in California, they not only survived, but they thrived during the G.W. Bush administration, whether we're talking about Oaksterdam University or the Berkeley Patients Group or Harborside Health Center, but these same institutions will be lucky to survive Obama's first term.
And as I said, what's really so notable about this is that just last month, the Attorney General, Eric Holder, was testifying before Congress.
He was asked specifically by members of Congress whether the policy of this administration was to take a hands-off approach to those that are compliant with the medical marijuana laws of their states, of which we now have 18 states that recognize the medical utility of cannabis.
And Eric Holder told Congress flat out that this administration is not targeting those unless they are afoul of state law.
And that is simply not true.
This administration cannot even admit that it is going after individuals who are compliant with the medical marijuana laws of their states, but they have been doing so consistently almost since this administration took office.
Well, now, maybe, like the Praetorians, the DEA have just gone rogue.
You know, I've heard that theory, and clearly the DEA is involved and is pushing for this sort of a crackdown, but you need to look and see how coordinated it ultimately is.
We know that the Department of Justice...
Wait a minute, wait a minute.
Do you really have Democrats saying that poor Eric Holder can't control the DEA, and that's their defense of this administration?
Seriously?
Oh, sure.
I've heard that excuse given a number of times.
Because that was just being ridiculous, you understand.
But it overlooks the fact that several months ago, the ATF issued a bulletin saying that no licensed dealer of firearms could sell a firearm to someone who has a registration to use medical marijuana.
It overlooks the fact that the Department of Treasury has gone after banks that have accounts with these institutions and have caused the banks to no longer accept accounts from medical marijuana-related dispensaries or other institutions.
It overlooks the fact that, as I mentioned, we have the Department of Justice sending out these civil asset forfeiture letters and threats to literally hundreds of dispensaries in states like California and Colorado that allow these sort of activities to take place.
This is literally a well-coordinated effort of a whole alphabet soup of different federal agencies.
And obviously, it's got to be coordinated all the way at the top.
Yeah.
So, is there anything that the states are doing at all to defend these businesses from the feds?
It's interesting, because we've seen, even within the last couple months, the lawmakers in Connecticut just recently enacted legislation that said, we as a state are going to acknowledge the medical use of marijuana, and we're going to license individuals to produce and dispense medical marijuana.
Rhode Island, just a few weeks ago, passed legislation saying, we as a state are going to license and dispense individuals and institutions to distribute medical marijuana.
Vermont is taking applications to do so.
So, we've seen a number of states that simply are bucking what the feds are doing and saying, we're just going to go ahead and do this, and essentially drawing a line in the sand and daring the federal government to intervene.
Now, in many of these states, the federal government has not intervened.
It may surprise a lot of your listeners to know that Maine, for instance, gives licenses to individuals and institutions to grow and dispense medical marijuana.
Maine's been doing this for some time.
The federal government, maybe they're not aware it's going on in Maine.
Maybe they don't care.
I don't know.
I've never seen any clear articulation from this administration as to what their policy even is regarding medical marijuana.
New Mexico, for many years, has licensed individuals and institutions to grow and dispense medical marijuana.
And as I noted, a number of other states are getting involved in this process as well.
Meanwhile, the federal government is largely fixated on California.
Well, what's really the point?
Just trying to make an example out of somebody or it's a particular agent's beef or what's going on?
Well, it's here, you know, clearly an instance where we have compassion and common sense coming up against the decades of drug war orthodoxy.
And predictably, when those two collide, it is the drug war that trumps science, that trumps compassion, that trumps common sense.
That's the way this policy has been for decades, and that's the way this policy seems to be moving forward.
Despite the fact that, as I discussed in the recent article you cited on Alternet, when you look at the national public polling on this issue, it couldn't be any clearer that the public itself is fed up with this behavior, that the public itself wants to end the federal government's drug war, at least as it pertains to marijuana, whether it's medical marijuana or simply somebody who wants to use marijuana for their own personal use.
The public couldn't be any clearer on this, and Washington or those inside the Beltway for whatever reason, are refusing to get that message.
They're playing from a playbook that's 20 years old.
Older than that, even.
Maybe.
Richard Nixon.
Alright, so it's Paul Armentano.
Tano?
Which is it?
I'm sorry.
Tano.
Tano.
Paul Armentano, and he's at NORML, the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, NORML.org, and they've been doing really good work on this issue for a long, long time, of course.
We're about to have to take this break.
Could you tell us real quick how people can support NORML, and then when we get back we'll talk a little bit more about some of the recent federal action.
Sure.
They can go to our website at www.
NORML.org and click on the button Act, which will let them donate.
Act.
Right there.
So that you can take part.
The National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws.
Hold it right there, Paul.
We'll be right back after this with Paul Armentano.
Tano?
All right, y'all.
Welcome back.
I'm Scott Horton.
Website is ScottHortonShow.com.
ScottHortonShow.com/donate.
Got your monthly subscriptions and all that.
All right, we're talking with Paul Armentano.
Right?
Yes, you got it.
Okay, good.
Sorry.
He's from NORML.
What is it?
Deputy Director or something?
At NORML.
And we're talking about Barack Obama and Eric Holder and the federal police's war on perfectly legitimate medical marijuana businesses, dispensaries, and I presume, you know, whatever patients happen to be there when the goon squad shows up.
What madness is this, really?
What's behind this?
I mean, it seems like it's really bad PR for the Democrats.
It's not like it's going to make Republicans vote for him or something.
Obama.
You know, you're correct.
It's out of sync with public opinion.
And it's out of sync with the public opinion of individuals of every political ideology.
Democrats, self-identified independents, self-identified Republicans.
Nobody likes this policy.
It's out of sync with what Obama's own people, including Obama himself, said is going on.
When President Obama was a candidate, he said he would not be using Justice Department resources to target individuals who are compliant with the medical laws of their state.
As I noted earlier, Eric Holder, just a month ago, was before Congress basically saying that this is all a figment of our imagination, that the federal government isn't going out and engaging in these sort of activities like it did this week with Harborside Health Center, but we know that's not the case.
So it is fairly inexplicable to try and come up with an explanation as to why the administration is doing what it's doing.
They're clearly so embarrassed by this that they either say no comment when they're asked directly to comment on these sort of activities, or they claim, as Holder did, they simply say they're not taking place at all and we know full well that they are.
My only personal theory is that it simply comes down to, as I said earlier, continuing this drug war orthodoxy.
For decades, the federal government has claimed that marijuana has a high potential for abuse, it has no medical utility, and it's so dangerous that it couldn't even be used within a supervised routine of medical care.
They say there's no way to control marijuana in a regulated market, they say there's no way to establish quality controls regarding what's in the product, and then you have somebody like Harborside Health Center come along in California that blows all of those myths to smithereens.
It shows that, in fact, we can control and regulate the distribution of marijuana.
It shows that marijuana does have medical utility, that we can control the quality of the product, that it doesn't have a high potential for abuse, and that's not particularly dangerous, particularly relative to the harms that we know are caused by tobacco, by alcohol, by prescription pharmaceuticals.
And the federal government says, wow, if we allow these operations to continue, then the entire jig is up.
Then the American public can see right before them that everything we've claimed about marijuana and our marijuana policy is a lie.
So the federal government's response isn't to repudiate their position, but it's to try and close down, target and close down those that are establishing that the drug war is a farce.
And that's what they're doing.
Well, I don't know what all evidence you have for that, but I sure like your theory.
Sounds right to me.
Then, of course, there's also the whole thing, I don't know how much percentage-wise, who gets what, but it seems like a lot of property this way.
And I know when we're talking about state police or local cops, you can always look for who they target by who had a nice piece of land in the first place.
Oh, no doubt.
Obviously, when it comes to asset forfeiture, law enforcement has a vested interest in carrying out these activities because they get to divvy up the profits from the assets that they seize.
And as I'm sure many of your listeners know, the burden of proof is far lower in an asset forfeiture proceeding because this is a civil action that is brought by law enforcement, not a criminal action.
So because it's a civil proceeding, the state does not have to establish proof beyond a reasonable doubt.
They simply have to establish a much lower burden of proof that shows that there's some preponderance of the evidence to indicate that the property was involved in the facilitation of the crime.
Because keep in mind, the civil action is not against a person, it's against an actual piece of property that, of course, is not allowed due process, is not allowed a right to an attorney.
It's the property itself that the federal government is claiming is involved in a crime, and they have this very low burden of proof to meet.
This is why asset forfeiture overwhelmingly is very successful for the state.
They generally win virtually every asset forfeiture case that they bring.
Yeah, well, and that's the thing, right?
A lot of times, at least so I've heard, people can't even find a lawyer who's willing to try to sue them.
I mean, so you have somebody who owns enough, has enough wealth that when they come and take a lot of it, he's still got enough to try to sue, even though he knows the burden is on him, to now try to sue and prove that his property is not guilty and get his property back, he can't even find a lawyer who's willing to try it because the odds are so stacked against it.
Why bother?
Exactly, and I believe, unless the law has changed recently, that in order to contest the proceedings, the owner of the property has to put up 10% bond of the value of the property within a couple weeks after the forfeiture action's taken place to even contest the action.
So you're talking about a $5 million property.
Unless the owner of that property has about $500,000 readily available, then the action just takes place uncontested.
Yeah, I mean, people have got to just see that for what it is.
It's just outright gangsterism.
I mean, who cares if they got a shiny plastic badge on or not?
I mean, come on.
That's just stealing.
Yes, exactly.
And in this case, you know, it's been so interesting...
Hang on, one more thing real quick I'll say.
When I first was learning about politics, I learned about the drug war, and particularly about asset forfeiture, and that was one of my clues when I was a teenager.
That, like, something is really, really wrong here, because I could see how something like this could be created, but then the self-correcting system is supposed to correct it, and yet this continues on.
And of course, at the same time, I'm learning that the CIA is bringing all this cocaine in from the Contras to pay for things.
Anyway, so, point being that I've also met a lot of people who said that was when they knew that something was really wrong.
Somebody had cash at the airport, and the cops just took it from them.
And they went, wait a minute, this is America, which is supposed to mean, by definition, you can't just do that.
And yet, no.
By definition, you can just do that if you're the cops in America now.
That's how it is.
Yes, that's how it is.
And in this case, like I said, it should be a really tough lesson, but an important lesson for the public to see.
That the federal government, at least when it comes to the drug war, it does not care what the American public thinks on this issue.
It has so little regard for state law, and it has virtually no regard for the truth.
Even in this particular case, the U.S. attorney for Northern California that brought this proceeding, she put out a statement saying, well, we're taking this action because we hear that Harborside is so large that it must, by definition, be flouting state law.
But if you look at the court papers that were filed by the federal government, they make no allegation that Harborside Health Center is in violation of state law.
Instead, it says this operation is in violation of federal law.
They can't even be honest when they're trying to tell the American public about why they're doing what they're doing.
Well, and it sounds like the way you're paraphrasing them using the term, by definition, what they mean is they don't have any specific example, and no, the law doesn't ban size getting above X amount.
It's just that if it's this big, there must be something.
That's what they're saying.
That is what they're saying.
People are familiar with the phrase, too big to fail.
In this case, the federal government is saying that Harborside is too big to succeed.
Yeah, 100,000 members, you say.
Exactly.
And now here's the thing about this, too.
It's not just some wonky policy discussion that we're talking about here.
We're talking about sick people.
We're talking about, in many cases, correct me if I'm wrong, we're talking about chronic pain, and we're talking about chemotherapy can't keep nutrients down, that kind of stuff, who are being denied their medicine now, who have to figure out something else while they're sick, if they're lucky.
There was a press conference yesterday held on behalf of the owners of Harborside Health Center, and we had representatives of the California Assembly there that were standing with the operators of this club.
We had members of the Oakland City Council, which had licensed Harborside.
They had a city license to operate.
We had the mayor of Oakland that was there.
We had members of the California Board of Equalization there.
The point is that there was this great outpouring of support from the local community and local politicians.
Where was the DEA's press conference?
Why were they not announcing the fact that they could found this major drug dealer?
They have nothing to say.
Paul, I'm sorry, we gotta go.
Paul Armentano, everybody, normal.org, scowhortonshow.com.
Take care.