San Onofre Surf Beach

Neonz Hot Linkz

2010-02-28T10:08:00.000-08:00

Blogger FTP Service Closed

2010-02-24T06:18:00.000-08:00

Whats up? Why you ask? coming soon Blogger FTP service will be closing, as it is only used by .5% of users. due to the fact that I have neither the a) time nor the inclination, to a move all these posts, or b) inclination break them all in the prossess, I have decided to let this blog die here. if you want to go to my blogspot hosted blog, please visit

http://neonzhotlinkz.sanonofre.com/

WE SAVED TRESTLES! For you and your kids.

Thank you to all my surfer friends,

San Onofre Surf Beach Blog Now Closed.

I would like to thank the fine folks at the TCA for getting me blogging.

I would like to thank the team over at Seirra Club, The NRDC, The team at Surfrider

I would like to thank our entire Ohana at San Onofre State Beach and especially Mr. Huell Howser.

For Saving A HUGE part of Our California's Golden Park.

To view the 2000 plus posts (one post at a time, one day at a time) in my archives please visit,

http://www.sanonofre.com/blog/2003/
http://www.sanonofre.com/blog/2004/
http://www.sanonofre.com/blog/2005/
http://www.sanonofre.com/blog/2006/
http://www.sanonofre.com/blog/2007/
http://www.sanonofre.com/blog/2008/
http://www.sanonofre.com/blog/2009/
http://www.sanonofre.com/blog/2010/

So long and thanks for all the fish!

.5%

NeoN D. SuRFeR
.

San Onofre Surf Beach

2010-02-03T11:36:00.000-08:00

Take a trip back in time, to where Tubesteak, Mickey Dora, and Gidget ruled... San Onofre Surf Beach, you can almost smell the Ohana.

From The Front Lines Of The Toll Road War

2010-02-01T10:15:00.000-08:00

Thousands of people have signed petitions against extending a toll road through San Onofre State Beach. The California Coastal Commission has rejected the developer�s $1.3 billion proposal. And the U.S. Commerce Department shot it down a year ago today.

That hasn�t deterred the project�s leaders, who are quietly but actively angling for a breakthrough after spending about $200 million and more than 20 years on their mission to relieve traffic congestion for a growing southern Orange County. In the past 12 months, they�ve met with dozens of interest groups; visited military officials and lawmakers in Washington, D.C.; and set aside nearly $12 million to keep the issue alive.

�Throwing in the towel is not an option.� said Peter Herzog, mayor pro tem of Lake Forest and chairman of the developer, the Foothill/Eastern Transportation Corridor Agency.

His opponents also remain vigilant. �We are just hyper-aware,� said Stefanie Sekich, a San Diego-based campaign specialist for the Surfrider Foundation.

That was hardly the case a decade ago, when surfer Jerry Collamer first heard about plans to build the tollway extension. He feared that lengthening state Route 241 from Rancho Santa Margarita to northern San Diego County would damage the park�s internationally known wave breaks at Trestles, so he started talking to fellow surfers.

No one seemed to care.

�I just got so upset with the whole process that I was going to quit,� said Collamer, a writer and former advertising executive in San Clemente.

Then an offhand remark one summer afternoon turned his fruitless campaign into a tidal wave of activism. The resulting grass-roots lobbying is credited with helping to defeat the toll-road proposal last year.

The Commerce Department�s decision was a major victory for conservationists, who wanted to preserve Trestles and a nearby campground, and American Indians seeking to preserve sacred tribal sites in the park.

For Foothill/Eastern, it was a devastating setback in part because the project�s backers had thought President George W. Bush�s outgoing administration would rule in their favor.

This week, Herzog declined to offer specifics such as what alternate routes are being considered.

�There is nothing set in any way, shape or form,� he said. �We are looking at a host of concepts. I don�t even call them options at this point.�

His agency has five more years to sue the Commerce Department in hopes of overturning its ruling. �We aren�t pursuing any legal action at this time,� said Foothill/Eastern spokeswoman Jennifer Seaton.

The toll road�s proponents remain confident that Route 241, which sits east of Interstate 5, will be extended in a southwest alignment from Oso Parkway to perhaps the freeway.

�It�s going to happen,� said Kristine Thalman, chief executive officer of the Building Industry Association chapter in Orange County. �I guess things have to get so bad (with traffic) before people will finally get behind something that�s absolutely necessary.�

She blamed last year�s loss partly on exaggerations made by opponents.

�I really hope in this next go-round that the environmental groups promote factual information � don�t use scare tactics,� Thalman said.

Collamer conceded that his anti-tollway efforts started with a bit of hyperbole, but said the underlying concerns about water pollution and altered wave patterns at Trestles are valid.

�One day at the parking lot I said: �Have a great surf trip. It will probably be your last one,�?� said Collamer, recalling a conversation with a stranger at Trestles in the early 2000s.

For reasons Collamer still can�t explain, his warning struck a nerve with the beach-goer. Within an hour, he was surrounded by outraged surfers, and the Save Trestles movement took off.

�From a marketing standpoint, we had it,� Collamer said. �All we had to do was put it in big, bold type and never ever change the message. That is basic advertising. That is what I learned on Madison Avenue.�

For the next three years, he set up an �office� � a card table and banners � at the famed beach on prime surfing days. He distributed bumper stickers and gathered names for an e-mail list.

The Surfrider Foundation eventually took over the Save Trestles campaign. It also teamed up with other advocacy groups to form the Save San Onofre Coalition and spread their message to tens of thousands of members.

Opponents of the toll-road project made several lobbying trips to Sacramento and gave Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger a surfboard signed by 2,000 people who wanted to protect San Onofre State Beach, one of the state�s most popular parks.

Transportation officials countered by touting their preferred pathway � a 16-mile connector that would reach Basilone Road on Camp Pendleton � as the option that would do the least damage to homes and the environment. They also said it would cut rush-hour travel time on Interstate 5 by more than half, an appealing prospect to drivers who regularly face jams near the San Diego-Orange county line.

But the California Coastal Commission voted 8-2 against the San Onofre alignment during a raucous meeting in February at the Del Mar Fairgrounds, concluding that it�s inconsistent with the Coastal Act. More than 3,000 people packed the meeting hall, making it the largest hearing in the agency�s history.

�There is no question that public participation was a major factor� in the commission�s decision, said Mark Delaplaine, a staff member for the commission.

Foothill/Eastern�s leaders appealed to the Commerce Department, which oversees the U.S. Coastal Zone Management Act. The federal officials shocked both environmentalists and developers when they also snubbed the project late last year.

The Commerce Department said the extension wasn�t essential to national security, as proponents argued, and it cited at least one other viable route: an 8.7-mile path from Oso Parkway to Avenida La Pata in San Clemente.

Orange County transportation officials were furious, but they have opted for further dialogue instead of suing. Their search for a new route is complicated by physical obstacles such as housing projects, hilly terrain, wildlife areas and military property.

�We are kind of in listening mode,� Foothill/Eastern�s Seaton said. �It�s not like we had a second option that was ready to go.�

Foothill/Eastern set aside $11.9 million this fiscal year, which started July 1, for engineering, environmental studies, legal work and outreach related to the extension. It had spent about $1.6 million through October.

Last month, the agency�s leaders went to Washington, D.C., for talks with military commanders and legislators such as Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif.

Larry Rannals, the community-plans officer at Camp Pendleton, said the tollway delegation also visited base brass in recent months to discuss a �conceptual new alignment.�

He said Camp Pendleton officials won�t support any proposal that interferes with military operations. �This essentially � would require that this roadway be located somewhere within that portion of the base which is currently leased� to California State Parks, Rannals said.

And any such route probably would create another high-stakes showdown with conservationists. An army of opponents is ready and watching, said Sekich with the Surfrider Foundation.

�We have conversations regularly to work in concert and keep an eye on the park and any future plans that the toll-road agency might have,� she said.

Mike Lee: (619) 293-2034; mike.lee@uniontrib.com

Happy New Year San Onofre

2010-01-01T19:46:00.000-08:00

2010 Make it happen.

It's Christmas Eve - Blink 182

2009-12-24T09:21:00.000-08:00

It's christmas eve and I've only wrapped two fuckin' presents
It`s christmas eve and I've only wrapped two fuckin' presents
And I hate, hate, hate your guts,
I hate, hate, hate your guts,
And I'll never talk to you again,
unless your dad will suck me off
I'll never talk to you again
unless your mom will touch my cock
I'll never talk to you again
ejaculate into a sock
I'll never talk to you again,
I'll never talk to you again
It's Labor day and my grandpa just ate seven fuckin' hot dogs
It`s Labor day and my grandpa just ate seven fuckin' hot dogs
and he shit shit shits his pants.
He's alway's fuckin' shittin his pants
And I'll never talk to you again
unless your dad will suck me off
I'll never talk to you again
unless your mom will touch my cock
I'll never talk to you again
ejaculate into a sock
I'll never talk to you again,
I'll never talk to you again.

HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

Rip Curl Ricki's Inspirational Journey

2009-12-21T10:59:00.000-08:00

Surf dog Ricochet (Rip Curl Ricki's) inspirational journey from service dog training, to turning disappointment into a joyful new direction, to surfing with quadriplegic surfer, Patrick Ivison, to fundraising for charitable causes. She is currently leading a fundraiser for a six year old boy named Ian who suffered a traumatic brain injury in a horrific car accident that claimed the lives of his parents. If you'd like to help Ricochet help Ian, please go to http://www.ripcurlricki.com To follow her on Facebook... search for "Surf Dog Ricochet" or click here http://www.facebook.com/#/pages/Surf-Dog-Ricochet/178108649370 Thank you for watching, and donating to her charitable cause.

Time To Save San Onofre Again

2009-12-20T08:49:00.000-08:00

The Toll-road war isn�t over Folks, Please FOLLOW @Surfrider & prep for next battle!

Acid Test

2009-12-16T09:51:00.000-08:00

Acid Test: The Global Challenge of Ocean Acidification

Dan Aykroyd Is An Alien

2009-12-14T10:05:00.000-08:00

You are an alien...

A Boy and His Dog

2009-12-09T16:47:00.000-08:00

Politicians had finally solved the problem of urban blight...

Waking Life

2009-12-05T05:40:00.000-08:00

A boy has a dream that he can float, but unless he holds on, he will drift away into the sky. Even when he is grown up, this idea recurs. After a strange accident, he walks through what may be a dream, flowing in and out of scenarios and encountering various characters. People he meets discuss science, philosophy and the life of dreaming and waking, and the protagonist gradually becomes alarmed that he cannot awake from this confusing dream...

Starwarz Loy Flying San Onofre

2009-12-03T06:07:00.000-08:00

Stawarz with yet another beach pass from above our favorite local surf spot, San Onofre Surf Beach, Soundtrack: Message From Art, Live! by The Joe LaBarbera Quintet

RiP A Remix Manifesto

2009-11-15T20:19:00.000-08:00

Immerse yourself in the energetic, innovative and potentially illegal world of mash-up media with RiP: A remix manifesto. Let web activist Brett Gaylor and musician Greg Gillis, better known as Girl Talk, serve as your digital tour guides on a probing investigation into how culture builds upon culture in the information age.

Viva La Pata

2009-10-31T09:18:00.000-07:00

VIVAL LA PATA! Connect San Clemente to the rest of the OC.

Hi Mayor. What is the latest with getting La Pata to go through please? We believe it would ease traffic tensions and give the San Clemente residents alternative means to exiting/entering the area. It's a safety issue also. It wouldn't be prudent to have the entire city have to vacate from the 5 freeway. Also, I believe that the new Target center would like to push for it too. -Kathryn

Hi Kathryn. The La Pata extension has been in the spotlight this month. It could be because of its promise of more direct access to San Juan Hills high school. In an earlier blog this month, I mentioned that funding is unclear. It looks like about $32mm is identified, and $75mm+ needed to build the link. Permission has been granted to proceed with an Environmental Impact Report (EIR, required by the California Environmental Quality Act. La Pata's apparently will take 15 months). A December "scoping" meeting is on the books, and would be a place for residents and others to have a voice. The exact date will be publicized by the County. Harry Persaud in the Orange County Public Works department is the go-to guy for this important project (714) 834-2694. I regret to report that 2013 is still the official estimated completion date. -Lori

Marijuana's not the gateway drug via Nick Hernandez

2009-10-29T04:20:00.000-07:00

California NORML estimates that a legal market for marijuana could yield the state $1.5 - $2.5 billion. A basic $1 per joint excise tax would yield about $1 billion to the state, while the state would save over $150 million in enforcement costs for arrests, prosecutions and prison. Additional benefits would accrue from sales taxes and spinoff industries. Total retail sales of marijuana would be on the order of $3-$5 billion, with total economic impact of $8-$13 billion including spinoff industries such as coffeehouses, tourism, and industrial hemp.

CA Supremes Say No To A Nude San Onofre

2009-10-24T06:46:00.000-07:00

The California Supreme Court decided not to hear a naturalist group's appeal to keep a beach in San Diego County clothing-optional, a lawyer said.

Attorney Allen Baylis, who is fighting for a clothing-option section at San Onofre State Beach, said the court's decision was a disappointment in the wake of the parks department's ban on nudity at the public beach, the Orange County (Calif.) Register said Thursday.

"The thing about it is that the parks department has the legal authority to either designate clothing-optional areas or prosecute people who want to enjoy clothing-optional recreation � and they feel the public is best served by prosecuting naturists rather than accommodating them," Baylis said.

Officials with The Naturist Action Committee and Friends of San Onofre Beach said despite the court's ruling, they would continue to push for a clothing-optional area, the Register reported.

"This is a tremendous setback," the unidentified officials said in a written statement. "But the battle has not ended."

Surfrider Foundation 25th Anniversary Gala

2009-10-07T04:20:00.000-07:00

Are You Ready To BUMP! Let's Do The SEA Bump! Come join us at the Surfrider 25th Anniversary Gala!

The Union

2009-10-01T04:20:00.000-07:00

Ever wonder what British Columbia's most profitable industries are? Logging? Fishing? Tourism? Ever think to include marijuana? If you haven't, think again.

Big Media's Complicity In Maintaining Marijuana Prohibition

2009-09-30T04:20:00.000-07:00

Here are five recent stories the mainstream media doesn't want you to know about marijuana:

1. Marijuana Use Is Not Associated With a Rise in Incidences of Schizophrenia
Over the past few years, the worldwide media, as well as federal officials in the United Kingdom, Canada and the U.S. have earnestly promoted the notion that smoking pot induces mental illness.

Perhaps most notably, in 2007 the MSM reported that cannabis "could boost the risk of developing a psychotic illness later in life by about 40 percent" -- a talking point that was also actively promoted by U.S. anti-drug officials. So, is there any truth to the claim that pot smoking is sparking a dramatic rise in mental illness? Not at all, according to the findings of a study published in July in the journal Schizophrenia Research.

Investigators at the Keele University Medical School in Britain compared trends in marijuana use and incidences of schizophrenia in the United Kingdom from 1996 to 2005. Researchers reported that the "incidence and prevalence of schizophrenia and psychoses were either stable or declining" during this period, even the use of cannabis among the general population was rising.

"[T]he expected rise in diagnoses of schizophrenia and psychoses did not occur over a 10-year period," the authors concluded. "This study does not therefore support the specific causal link between cannabis use and incidence of psychotic disorders. ... This concurs with other reports indicating that increases in population cannabis use have not been followed by increases in psychotic incidence."

As of this writing, a handful of news wire reports in Australia, Canada, and the U.K. have reported on the Keele University study. Notably, no American media outlets covered the story.

2. Marijuana Smoke Doesn't Damage the Lungs Like Tobacco
Everyone knows that smoking pot is as damaging, if not more damaging, to the lungs than puffing cigarettes, right? Wrong, according to a team of New Zealand investigators writing in the European Respiratory Journal in August. Researchers at the University of Otago in New Zealand compared the effects of cannabis and tobacco smoke on lung function in over 1,000 adults.

They reported: "Cumulative cannabis use was associated with higher forced vital capacity [the volume of air that can forcibly be blown out after full inspiration], total lung capacity, functional residual capacity [the volume of air present in the lungs at the end of passive expiration] and residual volume.

"Cannabis was also associated with higher airways resistance but not with forced expiratory volume in one second [the maximum volume of air that can be forcibly blown out in the first second during the FVC test], forced expiratory ratio, or transfer factor. These findings were similar amongst those who did not smoke tobacco... By contrast, tobacco use was associated with lower forced expiratory volume in one second, lower forced expiratory ratio, lower transfer factor and higher static lung volumes, but not with airways resistance."

They concluded, "Cannabis appears to have different effects on lung function to those of tobacco." Predictably, the scientists' "inconvenient truth" was not reported in a single media outlet.

3. Cannabis Use Potentially Protects, Rather Than Harms, the Brain
Does smoking pot kill brain cells? Drinking alcohol most certainly does, and many opponents of marijuana-law reform claim that marijuana's adverse effects on the brain are even worse. Are they correct? Not according to recent findings published this summer in the journal Neurotoxicology and Teratology.

Investigators at the University of California at San Diego examined white matter integrity in adolescents with histories of binge drinking and marijuana use. They reported that binge drinkers ( defined as boys who consumed five or more drinks in one sitting, or girls who consumed four or more drinks at one time ) showed signs of white matter damage in eight regions of the brain.

By contrast, the binge drinkers who also used marijuana experienced less damage in 7 out of the 8 brain regions. "Binge drinkers who also use marijuana did not show as consistent a divergence from non-users as did the binge drink-only group," authors concluded. "[It is] possible that marijuana may have some neuroprotective properties in mitigating alcohol-related oxidative stress or excitotoxic cell death."

To date, only a handful of U.S. media outlets -- almost exclusively college newspapers -- have reported the story.

4. Marijuana Is a Terminus, Not a 'Gateway,' to Hard Drug Use
Alarmist claims that experimenting with cannabis will inevitably lead to the use of other illicit drugs persist in the media despite statistical data indicating that the overwhelming majority of those who try pot never go on to use cocaine or heroin.

Moreover, recent research is emerging that indicates that pot may also suppress one's desire to use so-called hard drugs. In June, Paris researchers writing in the journal Neuropsychopharmacology concluded that the administration of oral THC in animals suppressed sensitivity to opiate dependence.

Also this summer, investigators at the New York State Psychiatric Institute reported in the American Journal on Addictions that drug-treatment subjects who use cannabis intermittently were more likely to adhere to treatment for opioid dependence.

Although a press release for the former study appeared on the Web site physorg.com on July 7, neither study ever gained any traction in the mainstream media.

5. Government's Anti-Pot Ads Encourage, Rather Than Discourage, Marijuana Use
Sure, many of us already knew that the federal government's $2 billion ad campaign targeting pot was failing to dissuade viewers from toking up, but who knew it was this bad?

According to a new study posted online in the journal Health Communication, survey data published by investigators at the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania found that many of the government's public-service announcements actually encouraged pot use.

Researchers assessed the attitudes of over 600 adolescents, age 12 to 18, after viewing 60 government-funded anti-marijuana television spots. Specifically, researchers evaluated whether the presence of marijuana-related imagery in the ads ( e.g., the handling of marijuana cigarettes or the depiction of marijuana-smoking behavior ) were more likely or less likely to discourage viewers' use of cannabis.

Messages that depict teens associating with cannabis are "significantly less effective than others," the researchers found. "This negative impact of marijuana scenes is not reversed in the presence of strong anti-marijuana arguments in the ads and is mainly present for the group of adolescents who are often targets of such anti-marijuana ads ( i.e., high-risk adolescents )," the authors determined. "For this segment of adolescents, including marijuana scenes in anti-marijuana ( public-service announcements ) may not be a good strategy."

Needless to say, no outlets in the mainstream media -- many of which donated air time to several of the beleaguered ads in question -- have yet to report on the story.

Surfers As Evolved Human Beings

2009-09-29T04:20:00.000-07:00

Timothy Leary who in an interview by Steve Pezman, now the publisher & editor of Surfers Journal, spoke at length about surfers as being at the leading edge of human evolution. Leary thought that humankind was evolving toward a state of purely aesthetic being, and that surfers were closest to that purely aesthetic way of being than any other group of people. The thinking went thus: man had evolved around city-states dedicated to storing more food and symbols of wealth than he needed for daily reproduction. Riddled with fear and loathing of what lay immediately in the future, he began to assume that the more stuff he could store, the more successful he was as a person.

For Leary, that was an entirely faulty consciousness. He saw that really, the transcendent Dance, the beautifully meaningless yet profoundly life-affirming celebration of the present, should be placed higher than all else. He regarded the group of people in this modern age who had dedicated themselves to the Dance most radically were the tribe known as surfers. What�s more, the truly dedicated surfer designed his entire life around the moment of the ridden wave and thereby had transcended the base, ancient necessities of feeding, clothing and housing himself. Therefore, the surfer was the very definition of the evolved human being. Without status, without outward displays of achievement, the surfer lived with the past exploding behind him, and the future walling up and twisting, begging to be created before him. No better metaphor for surfing as modern primitive, and no better validation for surfing as a noble way to live.

DMT: The Spirit Molecule Documentary

2009-09-27T04:20:00.000-07:00

In 1990, I began the first new human research with psychedelic, or hallucinogenic, drugs in the United States in over 20 years. These studies investigated the effects of N, N-dimethyltryptamine, or DMT, an extremely short-acting and powerful psychedelic. During the project's five years, I administered approximately 400 doses of DMT to 60 human volunteers. This research took place at the University of New Mexico's School of Medicine in Albuquerque, where I was tenured Associate Professor of Psychiatry. I was drawn to DMT because of its presence in all of our bodies. Perhaps excessive DMT production, coming from the mysterious pineal gland, was involved in naturally occurring "psychedelic" states. These might include birth, death and near-death, psychosis, and mystical experiences. Only later, while the study was well under way, did I also begin considering DMT's role in the "alien abduction" experience. The DMT project was founded on cutting edge brain science, especially the psychopharmacology of serotonin. However, my own background powerfully affected how we prepared people for, and supervised, their drug sessions. One of these was a decades-long relationship with a Zen Buddhist training monastery.

The Spirit Molecule examines what we know about psychedelic drugs in general, and DMT in particular. It then traces the DMT research project from its earliest intimations through the maze of committees and review boards to its actual performance.

Our research subjects were healthy volunteers. The studies were not intended to be therapeutic, although all of us believed in the potentially beneficial properties of psychedelic drugs. The project generated a wealth of biological and psychological data, much of which I have already published in the scientific literature. On the other hand, I have written nearly nothing about volunteers' stories. I hope these many excerpts from over 1000 pages of my bedside notes provide a sense of the remarkable emotional, psychological, and spiritual effects of this chemical.

Problems inside and outside of the research environment led to the end of these studies in 1995. Despite the difficulties we encountered, I am optimistic about the possible benefits of the controlled use of these drugs. Based upon what we learned in the New Mexico research, I offer a wide-ranging vision for DMT's role in our lives, and conclude by proposing a research agenda and optimal setting for future work with DMT and related drugs.

The late Willis Harman possessed one of the most discerning minds to apply himself to the field of psychedelic research. Willis, earlier in his career, had published the first and only scientific study using psychedelics to enhance the creative process. When I met him 30 years later in 1994, he was president of Institute of Noetic Sciences, an organization founded by the sixth man to walk on the moon, Edgar Mitchell. Mitchell's mystical experience, stimulated by viewing the Earth on his return home, inspired him to study phenomenon outside the range of traditional science, which nevertheless might yield to a broader application of the scientific method.

During a long walk together along the central California coastal range one day, he said firmly, "At the very least, we must enlarge the discussion about psychedelics." It is in response to his request that I include highly speculative ideas and my own personal motivations for performing this research. This approach will satisfy no one in every respect. There is intense friction between what we know intellectually or even intuitively, and what we experience with the aid of DMT. As one of our volunteers exclaimed after his first high dose session, "Wow! I never expected that!" Or, as Dogen, a thirteenth century Japanese Buddhist teacher said, "We must always be disturbed by the truth." Enthusiasts of the psychedelic drug culture may dislike the conclusion that DMT has no beneficial effects in and of itself; rather, the context in which people take them is at least as important. Proponents of drug control may condemn what they read as encouragement to take psychedelic drugs and a glorification of the DMT experience. Practitioners and spokespersons of traditional religions may reject the suggestion that spiritual states can be accessed, and mystical information gained, through drugs. Those who have undergone "alien abduction," and their advocates, may interpret as a challenge to the "reality" of their experiences my suggestion that DMT is intimately involved in these events. Opponents and supporters of abortion rights may find fault with my proposal that pineal DMT release at 49 days after conception marks the entrance of the spirit into the fetus.

Brain researchers may object to the suggestion that DMT affects the brain's ability to receive information, rather than generating those perceptions themselves. They also may dismiss the proposal that DMT can allow our brains to perceive dark matter or parallel universes, realms of existence inhabited by conscious entities.

However, if I did not describe all the ideas behind the DMT studies, and the entire range of our volunteers' experiences, I would not be telling the entire tale. At best, The Spirit Molecule would have little effect on the scope of discussion about psychedelics; at worst, the book would reduce the field. Nor would I be honest if I did not share my own speculations and theories based upon decades of study, and listening to hundreds of DMT sessions. This is why I did it. This is what happened. This is what I think about it. It is so important for us to understand consciousness. It is just as important to place psychedelic drugs in general, and DMT in particular, into a personal and cultural matrix where we do the most good, and the least harm. In such a wide-open area of inquiry, it is best that we reject no ideas until we actually disprove them. It is in the interest of enlarging the discussion about psychedelic drugs that I've written The Spirit Molecule...

RICK STRASSMAN�S OVERVIEW FROM HIS BOOK DMT: THE SPIRIT MOLECULE

Supreme Court Lets Medical Marijuana Grow

2009-09-25T06:57:00.000-07:00

LET FREEDOM GROW! CA Supreme Court Lets Landmark Medical Marijuana Cultivation Ruling Stand!

Appellate court ruling protects collective cultivation and affirms civil actions by patients

The California Supreme Court yesterday refused to review County of Butte v. Superior Court, a landmark appellate court ruling that protects the right of medical marijuana patients and their primary caregivers to collectively cultivate. The landmark ruling by California's Third Appellate District Court also affirmed a patient's ability to take civil action when their right to collectively cultivate is violated by law enforcement. The Butte County case involved a private 7-patient medical marijuana collective in Paradise, California.

The nationwide medical marijuana advocacy group Americans for Safe Access (ASA) filed a lawsuit in May 2006 on behalf of 56-year-old David Williams and six other collective members after Butte County Sheriffs conducted a warrantless search of his home in 2005. Williams was forced by law enforcement to uproot more than two-dozen plants or face arrest and prosecution. Contrary to state law, Williams was told by the Sheriff that his collectively cultivated medical marijuana was illegal.

"By refusing to review this case, the California Supreme Court sends a strong message that local law enforcement must uphold the medical marijuana laws of the state and not competing federal laws," said Joe Elford, ASA Chief Counsel and the attorney that litigated the case on behalf of Williams. The appellate court ruling from July 2009 concluded that, "[T]he deputy was acting under color of California law, not federal law. Accordingly, the propriety of his conduct is measured by California law."

In its landmark decision, the appellate court asserted that the Compassionate Use Act of 1996 is not simply an affirmative defense to criminal sanctions: "[W]e see an opportunity for an individual to request the same constitutional guarantee of due process available to all individuals, no matter what their status, under the state Constitution. The fact that this case involves medical marijuana and a qualified medical marijuana patient does not change these fundamental constitutional rights or an individual's right to assert them."

The appellate court ruling upheld Butte County Superior Court Judge Barbara Roberts' ruling from September 2007, in which she states that seriously ill patients cultivating collectively "should not be required to risk criminal penalties and the stress and expense of a criminal trial in order to assert their rights." Judge Roberts' ruling also rejected Butte County's policy of requiring all members to physically participate in the cultivation, thereby allowing collective members to "contribute financially."

ASA filed the Williams lawsuit after receiving repeated reports of unlawful behavior by Butte County law enforcement, as well as by other police agencies throughout the state. After uncovering Butte County's de facto ban on medical marijuana patient collectives, ASA decided to pursue the case to show that collectives and cooperatives are protected under state law.

Further information:
CA Supreme Court disposition (Case # S175219): http://www.courtinfo.ca.gov/courts/supreme/actions/SL092309.PDF
Ruling by California's Third Appellate District Court: http://AmericansForSafeAccess.org/downloads/Butte_Appellate_Decision.pdf
Information on Butte Case: http://AmericansForSafeAccess.org/Butte

Americans for Safe Access is the nation's largest organization of patients, medical professionals, scientists and concerned citizens promoting safe and legal access to cannabis for therapeutic use and research.

Dear District Attorney Dumanis

2009-09-15T04:20:00.000-07:00

Everyone is entitled to their own opinion about medical marijuana. However they are not entitled to their own facts. As someone who played a key role in the Prop. 215 campaign, I must correct several false and misleading statements issued by you recently.

Ms. Dumanis, we want to look up to our District Attorneys and believe what they tell us. When opinions are being passed off as facts on an official DA website, such actions are viewed as a direct threat to public health and safety by the patients, physicians, nurses, lawyers, and scientists who support The American Medical Marijuana Association (AMMA).

For example, you insist on misquoting Prop. 215, with respect to Caregivers. What the Compassionate Use Act actually says is health �OR� safety, not �AND� safety yet you continue to create a strawman argument, based upon this misrepresentation. Furthermore, you use this phony standard to raid and arrest collective members which is completely unreleated.

Another example you have repeatedly asserted, �The pro-medicinal argument is reserved for SERIOUSLY ILL patients.� Then, you criticized those who use it for anything less serious than Cancer or AIDS, telling the public, �This isn�t what the voters voted for.�

Actually, that is exactly what the voters were told would happen if they voted �YES� for Prop. 215. If you refer to the official Analysis of Proposition 215 by the Legislative Analyst, the voters were told, �No prescriptions or other record-keeping is required by the measure.�

In addition, the voters were reminded by the Legislative Analyst that this initiative also covered, �any other illness for which marijuana provides relief.�

(Source: http://vote96.sos.ca.gov/BP/215analysis.htm)

In the ballot Argument Against Prop. 215, James P. Fox, President, California District Attorneys Association solemnly warned voters that if Prop. 215 passed, it would �legalize marijuana�:

�This initiative allows unlimited quantities of marijuana to be grown anywhere � in backyards or near schoolyards without any regulation or restrictions. This is not responsible medicine. It is marijuana legalization.�

(Source: http://vote96.sos.ca.gov/BP/215noarg.htm)

The fact is that when the People of California wrote and passed Proposition 215, the Compassionate Use Act, it was intended to fully exempt patients from criminal prosecution.

Attorney General Dan Lungren even said so when he wrote his official Title and Summary to Prop. 215 and told the voters in their 1996 Voter�s Handbook:

�Exempts patients and defined caregivers who possess or cultivate marijuana for medical treatment recommended by a physician from criminal laws which otherwise prohibit possession or cultivation of marijuana.�

(Source: http://vote96.sos.ca.gov/BP/215.htm)

Nowhere in the official Title and Summary or in the text of the Compassionate Use Act does it say anything about an affirmative defense or any limits or restrictions.

It was Lungren who fraudulently changed his official Attorney General�s interpretation after the election from, �Exempts patients and defined caregivers� to his personal, �narrow interpretation� which told law enforcement they could go ahead and arrest anyone who had �too much for personal use.�

Lungren also immediately called a statewide �All-Zones Meeting� to discuss and coordinate how police could gut Proposition 215 and ignore the new law. The gist of his �narrow interpretation� was relayed to law enforcement officers throughout California by their professional associations and through official channels.

Lungren also met with and coordinated his attack on the CUA with federal officials. Finally, in the action plan he released on December 30, 1996, ONDCP �Drug Czar� Barry McCaffrey made Lungren�s policy explicit:

�State and local law enforcement officials will be encouraged to continue to execute state law to the fullest extent by having officers continue to make arrests and seizures under state law, leaving defendants to raise the medical-use provisions of the proposition only as a defense to state prosecution.�

The affirmative defense strategy allowed opponents of medical marijuana to achieve what they couldn�t on election day � a fraudulent interpretation that allowed LEOs to continue arresting and charging people as if Proposition 215 had never passed.

Regretably you have repeatedly and falsely stated you opinion that:�Federal law supersedes state law.� However, the fact is that the court has ruled against arguments that police are generally charged with enforcing �the law of the land,� including federal laws. Here is what the 4th District Court of Appeals had to say about this matter:

We appreciate these considerations and understand police officers at all levels of government have an interest in the interdiction of illegal drugs,� Bedsworth wrote. �But it must be remembered it is not the job of the local police to enforce the federal drug laws as such.�

By complying with the court order to return Kha�s pot, Bedsworth added, Garden Grove officers �will actually be facilitating a primary principle of federalism, which is to allow the states to innovate in areas bearing on the health and well-being of their citizens.�

�The upshot of Raich is that the federal government and its agencies have the authority to enforce the federal drug laws, even in a state like California that has sanctioned the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes. However, we do not read Raich as extending beyond this particular point, into the realm of preemption. The Raich court merely examined the validity of the CSA under the Commerce Clause; it did not go further and examine the relationship between the CSA and the CUA�Raich �neither declared (the CUA) invalid on preemption or any other grounds nor gave any indication that California officials must assist in the enforcement of the CSA.�].) Consequently, the high court�s decision did not sound the death knell of the CUA in state court proceedings. (Cf. People v. Wright, supra, 40 Cal.4th at p. 89, fn. 5 [noting the parties in that case both agreed Raich is not implicated in deciding �the applicability of the CUA to state criminal charges�].)9

The fact is, �the structure and limitations of federalism . . . allow the States ��great latitude under their police powers to legislate as to the protection of the lives, limbs, health, comfort, and quiet of all persons.�� [Citation.]� (Gonzales v. Oregon

This decision was challenged by varous law enforcement organizations who brought the matter before the California Supreme Court which refused to hear the case. LEO�s then appealed to the US Supreme Court, which also refused to hear the case, upholding this California decision as the law of the land.

Statements that federal law supercedes state law, also places you, and every other state official who uses this bogus argument to attempt to nullify the will of the People of California in direct conflict with our California Constitution, the highest law in our state.

According to the California Constitution such actions are clearly prohibited. Under Article 3, Section 3.5 (c):

�An administrative agency, including an administrative agency created by the Constitution or an initiative statute, has no power: �To declare a statute unenforceable, or to refuse to enforce a statute on the basis that federal law or federal regulations prohibit the enforcement of such statute unless an appellate court has made a determination that the enforcement of such statute is prohibited by federal law or federal regulations.�

(Source: http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/.const/.article_3)

The US Supreme Court has had three opportunities to declare the Compassionate Use Act unconstitutional yet they have not only refused to do so their legal decisions have clearly upheld that the People of California had every right to pass and enforce the CUA as a state law.

One more fact that everyone must understand about the Compassionate Use Act: The California Constitution also requires that any changes to a voter initiative must be submitted to the voters of the state and approved by them. Thus, no Board of Supervisors, nor Sheriff, nor District Attorney, nor San Diego District Attorney, nor Legislature, nor Attorney General, nor Governor has the legal right to change the state�s medical marijuana law. Only the voters can change or modify this law.

Sick, disabled and dying patients throughout San Diego county are still being raided by SWAT teams, arrested, jailed, humiliated, treated like criminals, bankrupted, children abducted by CPS and made even sicker, because of those who are still deliberately opposing this law thirteen years after the People of California voted to exempt patients and caregivers from criminal penalties and sanctions.

It is time to separate opinion from fact and uphold the Compassionate Use Act as it was written and passed by the People of California.

District Attorney Dumanis, the lives of sick, disabled and dying patients are in the hands of dedicated and otherwise well-intentioned public officials like yourself. Those who read your words on an official DA website need to hear directly from you that the information you gave them was wrong and is actually part of an carefully crafted plan hatched by Attorney General Dan Lungren, under color of law, to subvert a law that prosecutors don�t like.

We hope you will do the right thing and publish a retraction to your unfortunate and harmful statements.

Let freedom grow,

Steve Kubby
AMMA Executive Director

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2009-09-14T08:50:00.000-07:00

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