"Pot Shrinks Tumors; Government Knew in ’74” - Prop. 19 Offers Major Potential for Some Cancer Patients

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Fri, 10/08/2010 - 04:01.

Marijuana in garden in East Cleveland Ohio

As I recently wrote on realNEO, regarding legalizing medical marijuana in Ohio, Governor Ted Strickland “feels that the predominant opinion of the medical community is that there are existing medicines available that provide appropriate patient care. So based on that opinion and the current research, he feels this type of legislation doesn’t seem necessary or warranted.

Yet "tens of thousands of sick people throughout California find relief from scores of ailments by using cannabis because this plant has so many healing qualities", according to Raymond Cushing's posting on Alternet - Prop. 19 Offers Major Potential for Some Cancer Patients.

So who is right... citizen-oriented AlterNet or our Governor, now seeking reelection.

On AlterNet we learn:

What begs discussion on the occasion of California’s historic vote, which the whole world is watching, is that cannabis has been shown in hundreds of laboratory studies over the past ten years not only to be physiologically harmless, but also to be the most potent anti-cancer agent found in nature. No other natural substance holds the cancer-stopping power of cannabis and that's a proven fact.

In addition, cannabinoids, the active ingredients in marijuana, shrink and prevent the spread of tumors far more effectively than synthetic chemotherapy agents, for the simple reason that they destroy cancer cells without damaging healthy cells, a feat that widely prescribed chemotherapy cocktails can't duplicate.

Cushing goes on to provide links to lists of medical studies backing his claims (see article and links below), and concludes:

If cannabinoids are the most potent of all anti-cancer agents, as over ten years of laboratory studies document, then the citizens of California need to think about that before they vote on Proposition 19. Californians who choose to support cannabis prohibition, notably Sen. Dianne Feinstein, chair of the “No on Prop. 19” effort, must also be willing to accept responsibility for restricting their fellow citizens’ access to a harmless substance you can grow in your garden that is proven to destroy, and prevent, deadly cancers.

Ohio Governor Strickland would never be able to provide evidence of his claim "that the predominant opinion of the medical community is that there are existing medicines available that provide appropriate patient care" as that is completely moronic. Fact-o-meter that!

Ohioans who choose to support cannabis prohibition, notably Governor Ted Strickland of Ohio, must also be willing to accept responsibility for restricting their fellow citizens’ access to a harmless substance you can grow in your garden that is proven to destroy, and prevent, deadly cancers.

Prop. 19 Offers Major Potential for Some Cancer Patients


Tens of thousands of sick people throughout California find relief from scores of ailments by using cannabis because this plant has so many healing qualities.


October 4, 2010 
Ten years ago I wrote – and AlterNet published – the very first bylined news story about the active ingredients in marijuana destroying cancerous tumors. The article was entitled, “Pot Shrinks Tumors; Government Knew in ’74.”
 
Much to its credit, AlterNet has archived the story for a decade and the link still gets picked up and reposted to websites around the world. You can read it here.

After I wrote the story, and won a 2000 Project Censored award for doing so, my frustration at not seeing the facts in the article reported and discussed in the mainstream media eventually led to my giving up a 20-year journalism career in disgust.

Now, with California voters on the eve of deciding whether the Golden State will legalize adult cannabis use, I feel the need to point out some important facts that are getting short shrift in the debate over Proposition 19, the “tax and regulate” cannabis initiative.

If California legalizes marijuana, it will be fitting, since California was the very first state in the Union to make cannabis possession and cultivation illegal nearly 100 years ago, back in 1913. Prior to that, cannabis was the active ingredient in many common medicines, for everything from migraines to arthritis to colic.

That’s right: during the 1800s my great-grandparents' generation used to give cannabis extract to their babies to soothe them.

These days, of course, if a person dares to give cannabis in any form to their own child, for whatever reason, they face jail time and having their kids taken away. But that’s a subject for another article.

What begs discussion on the occasion of California’s historic vote, which the whole world is watching, is that cannabis has been shown in hundreds of laboratory studies over the past ten years not only to be physiologically harmless, but also to be the most potent anti-cancer agent found in nature. No other natural substance holds the cancer-stopping power of cannabis and that's a proven fact.

In addition, cannabinoids, the active ingredients in marijuana, shrink and prevent the spread of tumors far more effectively than synthetic chemotherapy agents, for the simple reason that they destroy cancer cells without damaging healthy cells, a feat that widely prescribed chemotherapy cocktails can't duplicate.

Two unlikely journalists have led the way in publicizing research on the cancer-fighting powers of cannabis, filling a ten-year void left by the mainstream media. One is Paul Armentano, a frequent contributor to AlterNet and spokesman for NORML, the nation’s oldest pot legalization organization. Paul’s diligent coverage of every type of cannabis research is exemplified by this article about the potential of cannabis as a cancer treatment and this story about the huge number of laboratory studies already done on marijuana.

The other pioneering cannabis scribe is Granny Storm Crow, the pseudonym of a retired teacher's aide in her '60s who every year publishes a compendium of cannabis research as it applies to a vast range of illnesses, both mental and physical. This year her list of thousands of cannabis studies runs to 420 pages, with research specifically addressing cancer appearing on pages 70-97. You can find it here.

California voters need to know that the plant they are voting on is not just something people like to smoke while watching their favorite YouTube videos. Tens of thousands of sick people throughout California find relief from scores of ailments by using cannabis because this plant has so many healing qualities, in addition to its relatively mild psychoactive properties.

In fact, many medical marijuana users ingest cannabis in forms that do not get them “high” at all, such as skin creams, oils, suppositories and many edible forms of the plant.

Proposition 19 is not just about “smoking weed to get high.” It’s about opening the door to a full, uncensored discussion of the many benefits of marijuana and its botanical cousin, industrial hemp, which were freely cultivated for 400 years in America prior to their ill-conceived federal prohibition in 1937. As Justice Clarence Thomas wrote in a 2005 U.S. Supreme Court opinion, “In the early days of the Republic, it would have been unthinkable that Congress could prohibit the local cultivation, possession and consumption of marijuana.”

If cannabinoids are the most potent of all anti-cancer agents, as over ten years of laboratory studies document, then the citizens of California need to think about that before they vote on Proposition 19. Californians who choose to support cannabis prohibition, notably Sen. Dianne Feinstein, chair of the “No on Prop. 19” effort, must also be willing to accept responsibility for restricting their fellow citizens’ access to a harmless substance you can grow in your garden that is proven to destroy, and prevent, deadly cancers.


Raymond Cushing is a freelance editor and translator.

TGIF - how many people in Ohio will get drunk this evening

TGIF - wonder how many people in Ohio will get drunk this evening, consuming 1,000s of unnecessary calories, worsening their health, and then drive drunk, kill and rape people, commit other violent crimes, etc... usual fat, drunk and stupid Friday night in the land of Pabst Blue Ribbon.

Big surprise big booze is the #1 enemy of legalizing medical marijuana... their industry is fucking evil.

 Disrupt IT

Strickland re-election

Strickland has not responded regarding Plymouth Park Tax Services.

I know which box, if any, I am punching for Governor.

Jennifer Brunner--thank you!

  There is a space on the ballot for a write-in for governor and for the senate--I wrote in Jennifer Brunner.  From Jennifer Brunner:

On Tuesday, I asked you to tell President Obama not to sign HR 3808, known as the "Interstate Recognition of Notarizations Act." HR 3808 would have loosened the process for notarizing foreclosure documents by requiring state and federal courts to recognize  even electronic notarizations. The bill would have created a "trap-door" for banks and their law firms that have not kept required foreclosure paperwork accurately and lawfully.Foreclosure Paperwork

Thursday, the President refused to sign the bill, using a "pocket veto" to send it back to Congress. HR 3808 was a bill that would have set into play dangerous consequences for consumers. It passed the House and Senate under questionable circumstances. The bill was retrieved from the Senate Judiciary Committee, which had let it languish, and it passed the Senate with "Unanimous Consent" -- no debates, no amendments -- in one day. It had passed the House under a suspension of rules in April.

When this seemingly innocuous bill landed on the President's desk, I became concerned because I license Ohio notaries and told you about it. I asked you to e-mail or call the President to tell him not to sign the bill. And contact him, you did. In less than 24 hours after I sent you the e-mail, more than 4,000 of you from our email alone contacted President Obama to tell him about the bill. Many of you alerted countless others, and they called and emailed, too.

This wasn't an easy issue to convey, either. We didn't give you a canned email to send. You wrote and called with your own words and from your hearts. Personally, I received emails and Facebook posts from some of you that you had answered the call to action.

I'm thankful President Obama listened to us and stood up for consumers. Please join me in telling the President "thank you."

I heard the President speak recently about the influence in these midterm elections of laundered foreign money to US corporations and organizations using it to work against candidates they didn't like, as a result of the Citizens United US Supreme Court Decision. I believe that nothing, and I mean nothing, can overcome the power of citizens standing together and for each other. That's what you did. Our President answered, and look what you accomplished.

Please thank President Obama for sending HR 3808 back to Congress unsigned and for standing up for us.

So many of us work hard and try to do what's right. More often than not, we've not been given the break we need or even the benefit of the doubt by large financial institutions. That's why your answer to our call was so important. Together we have strength, and that is the power of democracy.

And let's face it -- if big banks and other large corporations want to be in politics like living, breathing "other" persons, then let's hold them accountable to the same standards  the rest of us have to live up to, starting with following the law before they take our homes. It's only fair.

Thanks for standing up and making your voice heard. It means more than you know.

 

Jennifer Brunner

Jennifer Brunner
Ohio Secretary of State

JENNIFER BRUNNER...write her name in for Governor

That's a wonderful idea!

Write-in Brunner for Governor

Write-in Brunner for Governor - sounds like a plan.

Disrupt IT

I hope the PD can find columnists more competent to address MMJ

I was just scanning cleveland.com and saw Joe Frolik is trying to get down with this whole legalized cannabis thing sweeping the country, with the blessings of both conservatives and liberals...

Medical Marijuana is gaining legal status in America despite the best efforts of neoconservative industrialists like Philip Frederick Anschutz, who now owns the neoconservative Fox News Corp devised Weekly Standard.

It is little surprise his rag would promote alcohol and attempt to diminsh the popular acceptance of Medical Marijuana, as is the intent of a boring, dragged out neopop column in the Weekly Standard Frolik links to today, with the catchline "Take a trip with the Weekly Standard's Matt Labash to Michigan's Med Grow Cannabis College -- I'm not making this up -- for a look at the strange world of medical marijuana."

I hope the PD can find columnists more competent to address the MMJ Issue for citizens of Northeast Ohio than this.

Disrupt IT