"Will you arrest me and my doctors if I get medical marijuana?" question asked Mitt Romney

Romney turns back on patient who asks about medical marijuana

by David Edwards and Muriel Kane, The Raw Story
October 9th, 2007

At a campaign stop in Dover, NH, Mitt Romney was asked about medical marijuana by Clayton Holton, who has muscular dystrophy. "I have the support of five of my doctors saying I am living proof that medical marijuana works," Holton told Romney.

Romney suggested he use synthetic marijuana instead, but Holton said, "I have tried it and it makes me throw up."

He then asked, "Will you arrest me and my doctors if I get medical marijuana?"

"I'm not in favor of medical marijuana being legal," Romney told Holton curtly, then deliberately turned his back on him to say "Hi, how are you" to other members of the audience.

http://www.safeaccessnow.org/article.php?id=5141
...............
Dear Mr. Romney, will you arrest me?

by Mike Overson, Editor, The Eagle (College of Eastern Utah)
October 11th, 2007

Over the weekend I was watching Fox News Network when a story caught my eye. Various people were interviewing Mitt Romney, republican presidential hopeful, when one man’s question caught my attention. The man asked whether or not Romney would arrest him as well as his doctors because of medical marijuana usage.

“I don’t support medical marijuana” was Romney’s response.

Answer the question though, whether you support the states’ rights to govern themselves is not the question. Will you in your presidency, if elected, continue to crackdown on doctors that are convinced this plant is a natural beneficial way to cope with cancer and other ailments? What about those patients who do not show signs of improvement except when marijuana is used? It seems to me that as a voter and more importantly an American, I have the right to know where potential leaders stand on this and other issues. For the sake of being fair, I would implore all candidates to answer that question as well.

For too long the federal government has had free reign over the states. Medical marijuana is a huge topic of debate in this election. The time of “stupid pot-heads” is coming to an end. People are fed up with being stepped on, abused and ignored. More and more states are ratifying their own laws concerning this.

But how is it that the feds continue to abuse their limitless resources and get away with anything badges? I think it is appalling the president has to ask Congress for money to support our troops. If anyone should get what they need and not have to wait for our country’s “democratic” process to decide its fate, the military should be it. How is it that the Drug Enforcement Agency has a blank check? If you are the DEA and you need money to bust non-violent drug offenders you don’t ask, you sometimes give receipts after the fact. Only when pressured will the DEA publicize its spending. While our troops across the world need better armor they have to wait to maybe, just maybe get new equipment before their deployment ends.

But back to arresting people with legitimate licenses. As long as patients abide by laws set forth by their resident state, the federal government should step back and let the state worry about the pandemic this issue created. With all those patients using this devil substance in the privacy of their own homes, I’m waiting for these cancer ridden citizens to start pillaging different cities. Twelve medical states are bravely doing what no one else is daring to do. Sticking it to the man.

While the DEA continues to raid pharmacies in hopes of crushing what it sees as a peasant rebellion more and more people are getting these licenses and supporting the movement, which is medical marijuana.

The majority of the DEA’s endless power comes from the administration’s lack of caring. If a president doesn’t care that hundreds of thousands of people are being incarcerated for simple marijuana possession charges, then the DEA will continue to be government thugs with no fear of repercussion. My hope is this, one day the people of America will care about who leads them; who makes the laws, who enforces laws and who decides that pursuing happiness is wrong if a certain substance the government chooses is illegal is used.

So, Mr.. Romney, will you arrest that man and thousands like him? Will you condemn people to a life in prison for not obeying federal laws? Why is it that states have to bend to the power of the federal government? Shouldn’t states have rights to decide constitutional matters?

If someone disagrees with my point of view then I am happy. This country guarantees a right to say what you think. If that right is not taken advantage of then this country will soon end up like countless others around the world. Places where free speech is looked down upon almost as much as women in some religious countries. If the United States of America ever ends up like those places, the world will be hell on Earth.

Send Mike Overson a comment at m.overson@ceu.edu
http://www.safeaccessnow.org/article.php?id=5136
......................
Hazy stances

by Amanda Lowry, Indiana Daily student
October 11th, 2007

I personally believe that there should be a requirement that every politician who runs for public office must have smoked pot at some point. Even if that experience doesn’t make the politician want to legalize it, he or she will at least realize how dangerous it isn’t.

My position on this issue was only strengthened this week after watching a CNN video of Mitt Romney, in typical 2008 Republican front-runner style, dismiss a multiple sclerosis sufferer advocating that medical marijuana arrests be stopped. The MS sufferer caught Romney on camera and explained to him that, although he is against legalizing marijuana, the smoked form of the drug is the only pain reliever for his lifelong illness that he can use without getting sick.

His question, then, was “Will you arrest me and my doctors if I get medical marijuana prescribed to me?”

Romney dodged the question, answering, “I’m not in favor of medical marijuana being legal.” After that, he returned to his mission of shaking hands with as many rally attendees as possible, ignoring journalists who pressed him to answer the man’s question.

Romney’s attitude toward the MS patient exemplifies the 2008 Republican front-running presidential candidates’ chronic dodging of the issue of medical marijuana arrests and raids on medical marijuana dispensaries, which have been common since the U.S. Supreme Court decided Raich v. Vernon in 2005. The verdict allowed federal officers to arrest sellers and users of medical marijuana, regardless of individual state laws.

Determined to at least appear concerned for everyone’s well-being, the candidates have tried to make their anti-medical marijuana stance appear justified through pointing out the drug’s safety issues, health risks and its potential to proliferate recreational drug use.

But that appearance falls apart when someone brings up the topic of medical marijuana arrests and dispensary raids. Standing firm in the belief that cancer patients and well-meaning doctors should be tossed in the slammer doesn’t exude that same sense of compassion about public health.

So to avoid the hypocrisy, the candidates draw attention away from the arrests and toward the drug’s risks.

When a woman at a New Hampshire conference last week asked John McCain whether he would legally allow her use of medical marijuana, he replied:

“You may be one of the unique cases in America that only medical marijuana can relieve pain from ... Every medical expert I know of, including the (American Medical Association), says there are much more effective and much more, uh, better treatments for pain.”

And last week at another conference, when a woman asked Rudy Giuliani about his position on the raids, he, too, avoided the topic and talked about the FDA’s evaluation of cannabis alternatives.

The health and safety issues medical marijuana presents are important topics for political discussion. But the discussion that needs to come first is the one about people who are getting arrested for trying to put themselves out of agony while hurting no one else – and how to stop those arrests.

http://www.safeaccessnow.org/article.php?id=5137