12/26/10 - Rick Cusick

Program
Century of Lies

Rick Cusick, High Times editor, Rev Pat Robertson, Heidi Hanford, Mike Moldolf, Neal Deemers of CannaStaff, Jerry Olson & Dan Herrera, Joe Black with EZ Trim

Audio file

Transcript

Century of Lies / December 26, 2010

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The failure of Drug War is glaringly obvious to judges, cops, wardens, prosecutors and millions more. Now calling for decriminalization, legalization, the end of prohibition. Let us investigate the Century of Lies.

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Welcome to this edition of Century of Lies. Well, we’ve got one more show from our visit to Denver and our attendance at the KushCon convention, the world’s largest marijuana exposition. We’ll have several segments from that conference but first, I thought you might want to hear what Pat Robertson has to say about marijuana:

Pat Robertson: Welcome to The 700 Club. Conservatives think “Lock ‘em up, take away parole, throw away the key and let’s have more prisons.” Well, the truth is we’re spending probably more on prisons than we are on education.

America has more people locked up than, I think, other country per capita in the world and it’s not improving one bit. We’re offered some solutions along the way and others are too and now some conservatives are changing their tune.

Woman: Well, they really are, you know that whole concept of lock ‘em up and throw away the key is kind of going out the window. That philosophy is not working. Instead, they’re campaigning to fix the system with FAITH as the focus…

Pat Robertson: It’s got to be a big deal in campaigns. “He’s tough on crime. Tough on crime. Lock ‘em up!” you know and that’s the way these guys ran and they got elected. That wasn’t the answer.

Woman: It really isn’t working and you know–

Pat Robertson: No.

Woman: And they are starting opening in some places faith based dorms where women are really being discipled and you know that in the end, they’re going back out in society, most of them. It’s a wonderful opportunity for the church to lead the way and for them have restored lives and you know that is working tact– commodity.

Pat Robertson: At one time we had probably the largest prison ministry in America with CBN.

Woman: Uh hum.

Pat Robertson: We did it with video and response was huge. Those men and women wanted the Lord but there is something these we have to recognize. We are locking up people that take a couple of puffs of marijuana and the next thing you know they’ve got ten years.

They get mandatory sentence and the judges just say – they throw up their hands and say, “There is nothing that we can do with these mandatory sentences.” We’ve got to take a look at what we’re considering crimes and that’s one of them.

I mean, I’m not exactly for the use of drugs – don’t get me wrong – but I just believe that criminalizing marijuana and criminalizing the possession of a few ounces of pot and that kind of thing – I mean, it’s just – it’s costing us a fortune and it’s ruining young people.

The young people go into prisons and they come into – and they go in as youths and they come out as hardened criminals and it’s not a good thing.

Woman: Exactly.

Dean Becker: No, Pat, it’s not a good thing. The phrase I use here is that the Drug War protects the children until they turn seventeen, when they become meat for the drug war grinder. Now getting back to our coverage from KushCon, this is Rick Cusick, Editor of High Times magazine.

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Rick Cusick: Hey, hey. I’m Rick Cusick and I am the Associate Publisher of High Times magazine and Hightimes.com. I am currently at KushCon in Denver, Colorado and I’m talking on your radio show.

Dean Becker: Well, Rick, this is one fantastic event, really, isn’t it? It shows the diversity of the industry.

Rick Cusick: Yeah, it’s pretty good. It’s an interesting event and there is a lot of people out here. I’m here and we’re doing on April 2nd and 3rd, we’re going to do the High Times Medical Cannabis Cup in Denver, Colorado. That’s what I am out here promoting as a matter of fact the Cannabis Cup is done every year in Amsterdam but we are doing the High Times Medical Cannabis Cup because Denver, is really – I mean, Colorado is really poppin’ at the moment.

Dean Becker: Yeah, we at the Drug Truth Network will try and be here next April but I want to go back to a discussion that you and I were having the other day in the hotel lobby and that is you know I am – I don’t know, I don’t object to incrementalism. I think it’s a worth wile thing

Rick Cusick: Uh hum

Dean Becker: But it’s taken us a hundred years to get us to this edition of the current state of Drug War. I just hope it doesn’t take us a hundred years to slowly undo the madness. Your thoughts?

Rick Cusick: Yeah, well you know, politics and this is a political question. Politics is the art of the possible and it’s true, we’ve been at this a hundred years. The very first anti-marijuana laws were state laws and they were done around 1915 and then it took twenty-two years for them to get a federal law, a tax act, against marijuana.

We’ve been now doing about fifteen years of medicalization. Here in the United States we’ve got fourteen, fifteen states that are medicalized. We’ve got twelve states that are decriminalized and now for the very first time in 2010 we’re talking about legalization. We just missed it in Colorado – I’m sorry – in California.

We’re going to be doing it in 2012 in Colorado and we’re going to be doing it in Massachusetts in 2012 and legalization is going to become the next big deal in the world of marijuana.

I understand how we talk about incrementalism. I’d like to see personally and I know a lot of my brethren and sisters at High Times magazine would people disagree with this but I would like to see all drugs, at least under a medicalization routine rather than a criminalization routine. I think that’s a better way to control dangerous drugs.

I would like to see marijuana legalized, as well as medicalized but legalized across the board. I think it’s the only way to get the most out of medicalization is to legalize it all the way.

Practically speaking, the policies that are under the possible, that’s going to play very quickly. So, incrementalism, which is how we’ve gotten from, you know, a couple of laws in California to fourteen laws in United States and now we’re talking about legalization. That has been a process of incrementalism.

Dean Becker: Yeah.

Rick Cusick: If we’re ever going to get legalization for marijuana and if we’re ever going to get medicalization for the more dangerous drugs, we’ve got to take it one step at a time, in my opinion, get what we can, always keep eye on the prize and keep moving further and further.

I’ll give you an aspect of incrementalism in medical marijuana that most people don’t think about it. I just did a story in our sister publication, High Times Presents Medical Marijuana, about women who have children, autistic children and down syndrome and they give medical marijuana to their children.

These are typically are mothers that have nothing to do with marijuana and they are giving medical marijuana to their autistic children and seeing amazing results. They are not going to get their medical marijuana paid for by their insurance.

If they legalize medical marijuana in every state in the country tomorrow, we still would have another fifteen years of fighting to get medical marijuana accredited for every possible condition it’s useful in and we’d still have to make legalization of marijuana throughout – with the federal government and throughout the United States in order to get insurance to pay for that woman’s medical marijuana.

So, I can’t see any other way but incrementalism, as tough a pill as that night be to take, there’s no another way for us to practice the art of the possible, which is called politics.

Dean Becker: And again as a LEAP speaker and you know we fight to legalize all drugs across the board and to me it’s a bitter pill to swallow that you know. Hell, let’s say marijuana is as dangerous as gasoline, it’s still not as dangerous as prohibition and that’s just really where it boils down to for me.

Rick Cusick: The real – you know, somebody was talking to me this morning to me about this and they were talking about doing a college paper on legalizing drugs and regulating drugs. Would it decrease the violence associated with prohibition?

Their college professor said, “OK, well how about I say legalizing dangerous drugs” and they said they would being pretty hip because they were taking marijuana out of that equation and I got back and I said, “No, no, no. The danger – the violence that’s associated with the Mexican drug cartels is marijuana.”

Dean Becker: Yeah.

Rick Cusick: It’s the marijuana question. It’s the prohibition that causes the violence. It’s the prohibition that cause the danger inherent in these things and that’s true for marijuana as well as it is for other drugs.

We have to decrease prohibition, as much as we can, across the board in my opinion, for not just marijuana but for all drugs and only then can we really start to regulate and mitigate the problems of dangerous drugs: cocaine, heroin, methamphetamines. As long as we keep them illegal we’re going to put them in the hand of the criminals. They’re the ones that are going to be controlling these drugs – drugs that are not dangerous in any way shape and form which, in my opinion, is marijuana.

We need to legalize marijuana so we can all the benefits of medicalization and so that we can stop putting over 800,000 that are getting arrested every year in this country.

Dean Becker: Well, I know High Times has done major exposés on the DEA and the all the subterfuge and corruption in Central and South America and continues to lead the way towards a more logical approach. Any closing thoughts, Rick?

Rick Cusick: Well, I’ll tell you, I worked for High Times now for thirteen years. I bought the first issue of High Times thirty seven years ago, when I was a nineteen year old boy.

It has been a privilege to work this magazine. I’m very well informed of what we do and who does it and it is an honor to work with the people that I do work with. Um, we are a very committed bunch of people and we’re a very, very tight knit staff and good friends.

I thank you for your kind words. I can honestly say from the inside High Times is a really, really good place to work.

Dean Becker: Once again that was Rick Cusick with High Times magazine. You’re listing to Century of Lies on the Drug Truth Network.

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(Upbeat swing music)

It’s a tempest in a teapot
A hurricane in a thimble

Drug War
The lie
That lasts forever!

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Heidi Handford: Hi, I’m Heidi Handford. I have Montana Connect magazine as well as Colorado Connect magazine, the only trade publications for the medical cannabis industry in the nation. I am also business partners with Irvin Rosenfeld with Medical Cannabis Solutions.

Dean Becker: Now Montana is one of the more recent medical marijuana states, right?

Heidi Handford: Actually we’ve had medical cannabis in Montana since 2004.

Dean Becker: OK and if I remember correctly, it got more votes than President Bush at the time right?

Heidi Handford: Oh yeah, we were at 62%.

Dean Becker: Now, I understand that it’s possible if you have a recommendation in another [state], you can resupply yourself as soon as your plane lands. Is that correct?

Heidi Handford: A Colorado patient can go to Montana and be serviced by a Montana caregiver because Montana is a reciprocal state. They are one of four but I am not sure what the other reciprocal states are.

Dean Becker: The point being that with a recommendation from another state, it’s possible to go to Montana and resupply.

Heidi Handford: As long as they have their correct paperwork showing that they are a patient of that other state. Some carriers may service them. Some may not because the way the laws are written. Some people won’t touch it or dance with it. Others may talk to legal counsel some may want you to sign something and show your ID. Well, I’d want to know too.

Dean Becker: Tell me a little more about Montana Connect magazine.

Heidi Handford: Montana Connect magazine is the only trade publication printed in the nation for the medical cannabis industry. It is based on medical and science and no culture.

I want to bring science forward. It’s very important that we have that out there. I am dedicated and committed to having a 60/40% content-to-ad ratio and just I really want to bring medical cannabis to the forefront in a way that we can take my publication and put it in front of the legislature and be ashamed of absolutely nothing

Dean Becker: I think that’s the whole point, really, for many cannabis reformers is that they have nothing to fear from the truth.

Heidi Handford: Right. There is no fear in the truth. It’s just a matter if you can combine the medical with the culture, it all gets convoluted and the science is lost. We can’t lose this fight it’s an incredible – mountain – it’s an incredible science. It’s an incredible method for management. It’s all I use for my pain and my problems. So…

Dean Becker: Now, if folks wanted to learn more about Montana Connect, point them where they can go on the web

Heidi Handford: OK, I have a minimal site for MT. It’s www.mtmagazine.com but one of the big ones is Facebook. Facebook, Facebook, Facebook. It’s immediate. I have Montana Connect on there, Colorado Connect on there. My Medicine: The Book for Irvin Rosenfeld. We have his book on there. We have the Montana Medical Growers association, which is a trade association.

I am the largest cheerleader that they have in Montana and I want to see a Colorado Medical Growers Association started, as well. I’ll be their biggest cheerleader, as well. Anyplace that goes out and starts for my Montana Association and joins them on a national basis and models after with them. Whenever Connect magazine is in that state we’ll be their largest cheerleader because we NEED trade associations, who go out and wear suits to events like this.

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(Upbeat music)

It’s the end of Drug War as we know it
It’s the end of Drug War as we know it
It’s the end of Drug War as we know it
And I feel fine

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Dean Becker: Is it the end of Drug War? Well, it’s really up to you. You’re listening to the Century of Lies on the Drug Truth Network and we’re tuning in to some conversations held the recent convention in Denver from KushCon.

Mike Moldoff: My name is Mike Moldoff from Prescription Lock, located here in Loan Tree in Denver Colorado. We’ve designed a product that safeguards not only – that safeguards prescription medications in the home.

Dean Becker: Now this would work quite well with many of the marijuana dispensaries or “centers” as they call them here they have the little screw on caps and they are “child proof” but not really, in so far as truly protecting it, right?

Mike Moldoff: Um, this product was designed for prescription medications. However, some customers might find other items to safeguard including possibly, maybe diabetic needles or cigarettes or any other kind of materials that are in the house that might be addictive to children.

Dean Becker: OK and – but I mean this has a solid cover prevents it from any type of opening, does it not?

Mike Moldoff: Correct. It’s a deterrent it’s not a failsafe device but it as a designed as a deterrent. Basically, if it is breached by a child, you’ll know that your child has a problem and it’s time for a talk and to address that issue.

Dean Becker: OK and your website, sir?

Mike Moldoff: It’s www.prescriptionlock.com.

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(New Year’s music/Auld Lang Syne)

Should old war criminals be forgot
And never brought to trial
Or should we try and convict
And hang their heads on spikes

For old war crimes, my friends
For old war crimes
For old war crimes, my friends
For old war crimes…

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Neal Deemers: Hi, my name is Neal Deemers. I am Director of Operations for Canna Staff.

Dean Becker: Neal, we’re here at KushCon and I’m looking at your banner, “Qualified employees on day one. Now hiring trimmers, managers, bud tenders, front desk, clerical, master grower sales, marketing, security, kitchen staff, cannabis wellness services and more.” In this economic downtime here, this is probably attracting a lot of folks. Is it not?

Neal Deemers: It is attracting a lot of folks. You will find that this industry is one of the fastest growing industries in Colorado. There are a lot of opportunities for individuals who may already have experience in the industry or a skill set that they take from different experiences in previous work and they’re applying it to this industry,.

Dean Becker: It’s just one more aspect of the diversity of commerce that’s being shown here at KushCon, is it not?

Neal Deemers: It is. It is. You’ll find that there is such a diversity here, whether it’s individuals representing medical marijuana centers, whether it is product manufacturers or even the grow operations. Canna Staff and Canna Counsel is individuals that are representative the business services for this industry.

Dean Becker: You know it’s really become a – it now had dignity it has respect within the community and not seen as some black-market hooliganism at all, is it?

Neal Deemers: Exactly. You’ll find that many of the individuals who originally started to get into this industry was street level dealers or just individual who were just very passionate about medical marijuana and decided to start a business. You will find that these individuals don’t have a business background.

They don’t have that that business skill and when it comes to management or leadership skills they are lacking. So, we come in and we really try and develop a high – highly ethical very professional business and help raise the standards in the medial marijuana industry in Colorado.

Dean Becker: Now, as I spoke of earlier, in this economic downturn can you give us an idea of how many people that you’ve put in positions, through your efforts here.

Neal Deemers: I have. So Canna Staff is a staffing agency for the entire industry. We focus if the value chain, the grower operations, the canters and the kitchens. To date, Canna Staff is our newest division and has been operating for two months. We work with about ten dispensaries – ten business and we’ve staffed probably about fifteen people.

Neal Deemers: And on a number of different areas we’ve put in store managers. We’ve put in bud tenders and front desk, store clerk workers and individuals that can do sales and also trimmers, people who can go into the grow of operation at the time of harvest and they can go with that operation of that business and trim the product.

Dean Becker: As a – so, basically now startup, as a company, the horizons are basically limitless at this point, right?

Neal Deemers: You are correct. We are the first medial marijuana staffing agency out there in the nation. We’re hearing great positive feedback from not only the job seekers but the business owners they are very excited to know that they have a resource to go to really get qualified, competent, professional employees to staff their business and help improve the performance of their business and just the general standard of the industry.

Dean Becker: OK, a website, please?

Neal Deemers: www.cannastaff.net

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(Acoustic guitar music)

You know that I care
What happens to you
And I know that you care
For me too

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Dean Becker: You are listening to Century of Lies on the Drug Truth Network. We’re tuning into the KushCon convention held in Denver a couple of weeks back. You know I care for you.

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I’m sitting here in the booth of the Medical Marijuana of the Rockies and a couple of their spokesmen are sitting with me could I get your name first

Jerry Olson: My name is Jerry Olson. I own it and this is my manager, Dan Herr.

Dean Becker: OK, Jerry and Dan, I was walking by and this is a massive event here with hundreds of booths and I saw the sign talking about the availability of clones. Would you care to speak on that?

Jerry Olson: We have a lot of clones available for soil of hydroponic use.

Dean Becker: What are the differences? What are the reasons for soil of hydroponic use?

Jerry Olson: It’s most just grower preference on way or the other doesn’t necessarily, in my opinion, create better results but I try to provide mediums for all growers.

Dean Becker: Can you tell me what the growth has been like when it was founded and then how it’s progressed?

Jerry Olson: So, I took my business license out about six months after my second liver transplant in June of ’09 and I wanted to help the community with as much as I could, in regards to medicine, information, educational materials, equipment and above all the presence of clones and strains for all the patients out there at their disposal and to just proliferate the industry so that people can heal.

Since then, we’ve – our stores filled out completely and have grown. We have a huge variety if clones. We have a huge variety of strains available for the patients and there is just as much educational material as possible. I want to teach everybody.

Dean Becker: Now for those uninitiated to the concept, why is there a need for the various strains?

Jerry Olson: Various strains provide an access to different reliefs from the cannabis. There are different growing types too. If space restrictions don’t allow for a larger plant, someone can get a strain that stays a little smaller and it might work a little better for them.

Dan Herr: One of the medical aspects is that you have different cannabinoids in different plants. Someone who can’t sleep is going to find a really strong sedative style medicine more popular than someone who is an athlete and someone who wants to be out on the mountain skiing and working and don’t want to be put down but want to have their pain relived and that is where your sativas come in. We have a whole gamut of things coming from the hybrids.

Dean Becker: Now is that why then the idea of the clones that the same strain can be repeated and that medicine can thus be repeated, right?

Jerry Olson: Correct. Correct, people can strain specially and grow what they need and seek what they need at other dispensaries by having a database of strains and its capacity, then we can really encourage different aspects of healing depending on the needs of the patient, you know, because what is wrong with me with my unique disabilities is going to be completely different for somebody who has migraines or who can’t sleep or who is going through cancer.

What I have even notice that it goes even deeper than that. Even people with the same problems get different uptakes of release from different types of cannabis just biologically because they are different.

Dean Becker: Now you know again just touring this KushCon convention here it brings to mind, that it’s working here. Both commercially and progressing with the elected officials, is it not?

Jerry Olson: Yeah I think it’s coming over well there’s a lot of people that are still ignorant with what we are trying to explain to them and to the success with people like myself with two liver transplants is having but it’s coming around.

Then there’s also the economic factor that people, even the people that were against it, can’t oppose and that’s just tax revenue that is available for our whole state. We are doing very well as a state because of this.

Dean Becker: I appreciate you for sharing your thoughts with me. I hope the listeners understand that this industry is not a threat. This industry is progress. This industry growth. Ya’lls website?

Jerry Olson: Mmrockies.com and it’s not a very proliferated website at this moment but we are working on it. We are a growing business. So, you can get our phone number and a map to our store from the website and our email address.

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(Chaotic crowd sounds)

Drugs and terror
World Wars for ever
Drugs and terror
World Wars for ever

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Joe Black: My name is Joe Black and I am with EZ Trim.

Dean Becker: And tell us about EZ Trim. What does it do?

Joe Black: It is a trimming machine for cannabis but it’s different than a lot of the trimmers in the market because it is a 3-in-1 and it is also made locally here in Colorado. It’s a 3-in-1 because you can use it in three different styles of trimming. Whether you use it in a rooter like the grim reaper or a vortex setting like a trim-pro or you can use it as a hand trimmer.

Another feature that ours has that a lot of other trimmer in the marker doesn’t have is that we have a double filter bag with a low micron and high micron bag. While it is trimming the air is actually agitating the leaves in the low micron bag and separating all the crystals off the clippings into the high micron bag, where you’re left with pure keith.

It’s sixty five pounds and it fully adjustable. All motors have adjustable speeds in forward and reverse. You’ve got adjustable height and it comes with a transport bag

Dean Becker: Looks like a bass drum.

Joe Black: It does look like a bass drum. It’s called the Satellite because we feel it looks like a satellite. We’re definitely new to the market here. We have only been on the market for two months and things are looking really well for us.

Dean Becker: Now this machine is necessary because I think in many instances, growers have to pay rather absorbitant rates for trimmers to come in for a weekend and bust down the crop, right?

Joe Black: Right, it does two to four ounces every minute and a half. It does two to four pounds with a two man crew every hour. It does four pounds an hour with a four man crew.

Dean Becker: Now, I know there is no definite average but what does it take a human trimmer to do that type of work?

Joe Black: What it takes me to trim in about two to four hours, it does in two to four minutes, by hand.

Dean Becker: Well OK, ballpark on the price?

Joe Black: The price $1650. We also have lease options and referral programs. It comes with the one year warranty.

Dean Becker: OK and ya’lls website

Joe Black: www.eztrimming.com

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Well that about it from KushCon. All I can tell you is that I saw more wide eyed millionaires and future millionaires than I’ve ever seen before in my life. This is the 21st century gold rush,

s always I remind you there is no truth, justice, logic, scientific fact and no reason for this Drug War to exist.

Please, visit our website: endprohibition.org

Prohibido istac evilesco!

Happy New Year!

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For the Drug Truth Network, this is Dean Becker. Asking you to examine our policy of Drug Prohibition.

The Century of Lies.

This show produced at Pacifica Studios at KPFT, Houston.

Drug Truth Network programs, archived at the James A. Baker III Institute for Policy Studies.

Transcript provided by: Ayn Morgan of www.eigengraupress.com