Medical marijuana caregiver numbers much lower than previously thought

 @dm_co "No I like the "de-scheduling" plan better. Where is the poll for that?"

In the "Giant Step Forward" file ...

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 @RobertChase "While it is true that the Memorandum does make a nod to caregiving (and I have mischarcaterized the Memorandum's potential effect on caregivers providing medicine for their sick spouses)"

Translation  from the equivocating language of Planet Chase = I, Robert Chase, was WRONG! ... again.

hth.

 @DonkeyHotay

From the Cole Memorandum:

"Persons who are in the business of cultivating. selling, or distributing marijuana, and those who knowingly facilitate such activities, are in violation of the Controlled Substances Act, regardless of state law. Consistent with the resource constraints and the discretion you may exercise in your district, such persons are subject to federal enforcement action, including potential prosecution. State laws or local ordinances are not a defense to civil enforcement of federal law with respect to such conduct, including enforcement of the CSA. Those who engage in transactions involving the proceeds of such activity may also be in violation of federal money laundering statutes and other federal financing laws."

While it is true that the Memorandum does make a nod to caregiving (and I have mischarcaterized the Memorandum's potential effect on caregivers providing medicine for their sick spouses), its limitations on caregiving imperil most people who are caregivers under Colorado's Constitution.

 @RobertChase 

Little Minds of Little Courage beg for Little Freedom.

Stay Little.

 @dm_co " Irrelevant analogy"

Channeling Yogi Berra ...

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 @DonkeyHotay  @dm_co Again, a poll showing 50% support for some form of legalization in some degree does not begin to suggest that people who use cannabis are in any position to dictate the terms of legalization -- you constantly urge on the politically clueless to that unreasonable conclusion.

 @dm_co 

Preemptively Surrender to The Man!

Especially when the polls are showing 50%+ favoring LEGALIZATION ...

... put up a pathetically weak, dysfunctional, unsustainable, amendment that provides no actual benefit to real-world marijuana users or growers and continues 99.99% of criminal prohibition -- but dip that festering turd in imitation chocolate syrup and serve it up as delicious "legalization" to the munchie-hungry stoners.

Then stomp your feet for a self-destructive Re-scheduling of Marijuana to celebrate your "victory".

Winning !!

 @dm_co 

Coffee has an immediate and potent effect on the psyche.

Nutmeg has an immediate and potent effect on the psyche.

Surrender Early ... Surrender Often.

Resistance is Futile ... You will be Assimilated.

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 @RobertChase falsely claimed "To the contrary, the Cole Memorandum indicates that it is not a priority of the Injustice Department to persecute seriously ill patients -- caregivers have been excluded from whatever protection is afforded by these utterances from those perverting justice in our Land."

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From the Cole Memo -- "A number of states have enacted some form of legislation relating to the medical use of marijuana.  Accordingly, the Ogden Memo reiterated to you that prosecution of significant traffickers of illegal drugs, including marijuana, remains a core priority, but advised that it is likely not an efficient use of federal resources to focus enforcement efforts on individuals with cancer or other serious illnesses who use marijuana as part of a recommended treatment regimen consistent with applicable state law, or their caregivers.  

The term "caregiver" as used in the memorandum meant just that:  individuals providing care to individuals with cancer or other serious illnesses, not commercial operations cultivating, selling or distributing marijuana."

***********************************************************

Once again, Robert Chase gets caught cold LYING and FABRICATING utter BULLSHIT regarding his fantasies about marijuana law.

Have you NO SHAME ??

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 @dm_co  

Under FULL LEGALIZATION it would be no more valuable than any other mass-produced agricultural commodity -- even less than tobacco as it grows in a wider environment.

 @DonkeyHotay To the contrary, the Cole Memorandum indicates that it is not a priority of the Injustice Department to persecute seriously ill patients -- caregivers have been excluded from whatever protection is afforded by these utterances from those perverting justice in our Land.  As a practical matter, the Feds do not go after caregivers, but their official policy puts every single person involved with medical cannabis other than the sickest patients at risk.

 @dm_co  @nope 

It's the reason why Private Caregivers exist ... to provide "medicine" to those patients who lack the skill, time, or ambition to grow their own.

 @dm_co  -- "A20 is not permanently etched into the Constitution"

Reality Check ... so where is it etched?

A "memo" based upon the pragmatic use of Federal law enforcement resources ... based upon prudent public policy.

The Feds were not targeting individual patients or private caregivers operating within State law even before the Ogden memo -- even under the fascist Bu$h administration.

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 @J_D_ 

The Clue Train has left the station ...

... and you left your tickets at home, again, JD.

 @dm_co 

So I've got to lead you to water and drink it for you?

 @dm_co 

Without passion ... what is life?

.

 @dm_co 

HipTip: The Feds have maintained -- both in clearly stated policy AND practice -- that they are not targeting INDIVIDUAL Patients and their PRIVATE Caregivers who are in compliance with their state laws and not grossly exploiting the system for pecuniary gain.

They have maintained that they will continue to target COMMERCIAL Dispensaries and Large Scale Growers and other Interstate Distributors.

 @dm_co 

If you build your political movement upon DELIBERATE LIES, DECEPTIONS and FRAUD upon the Electorate ...

... prepare to reap the whirlwind when they fire back and send you packing back to the days of "Just Say No".

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 @dm_co 

I got my Adderall from my GP ... no lying required.

hth.

ps: you only have to be 18 -- not 21 -- to get scrips from your physician, yet the fools and tools promoting the absurd A64 think marijuana is far too dangerous to allow adults <21 any legal access whatsoever.

Talk about mixed messages.

 @dm_co 

So you support the willful and deliberate deception of the Electorate, and the gross abuse and perversion of what was originally a great humanitarian gesture to those suffering in true medical need, all for the pecuniary gain and personal pleasure of selfish stoners and the avaricious big $$ dispensary cartels?

And you think there won't be even more legal, political and public blowback from this not-so-subtle misuse and abuse of A20?

What next? -- hijacking UNICEF food caravans to resell to the highest bidder?

 @RobertChase 

Yet, here you are.

.

 @J_D_ 

So you admit that the A64 pimps are lying liars, eh?

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 @RobertChase "even if all patients were 18, it probably would not have political repercussions"

ROTFLMAO !!

Perhaps in the fantastical universe of Planet Chase.

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@DonkeyHotay

@DonkeyHotay

Ridiculous!  Now you insinuate that the CDPHE is abetting the recreational use of cannabis by publicizing the average age of patients instead of their median age.  You need to learn how to construct an argument instead of constantly hinting at what you know you cannot reasonably assert directly.

The fact that many patients do not require cannabis to survive is not probitive of the entire program being a sham, and you know it!  Our medical cannabis amendment is broadly written, and it does not second-guess doctors' determinations.  Patients who use cannabis and the entire extraconstitutional apparatus set up by the General Assembly are doing no harm -- not to themselves, and not to society as a whole; the opposite is the case.  Patients in metro Denver and Colorado Springs at least have ready access, and very few dispensaries have run afoul of the Law -- there is no problem with the program.

Having said that, I would prefer that a sharper line exist between the medical and recreational use of cannabis.  While some proponents insist that all use is medical, I do not see this argument as carrying the day in the fight against Prohibition.  What Colorado is learning from its medical cannabis system is that the use of cannabis, medical or otherwise, causes no problems whatsoever, other than raising the question of what to do with all the prohibitionist parasites still preying on society.

 @DonkeyHotay You may be the only person in Colorado who believes that the data is of critical importance, so it would behoove you to pursue it.  As far as I am concerned, your latest little gambit has failed utterly, and you can post the BS above another thousand times; it is not worth responding to it.

 @johnnyhammersticks I missed your reference to a 700-year-old man, and your statement that the median and average are "similar" (rather than stating that the median is probably close to the mean) misled me.  Your description of this as a red herring is dead-on -- even if all patients were 18, it probably would not have political repercussions, and the likelihood that the median age is somewhat less than the mean age of 42 does not begin to validate Donkey's ravings about "a massive FRAUD and a SHAM".

 @johnnyhammersticks 

If you "know statistics" then you know that "the average" is a meaningless demographic.

It's the MEDIAN that has any statistical import.

If you're so certain that the variance in this instance won't be more than 5%, they why are you and the MMJ pimps so afraid to release and use the MEDIAN age w/ sex differentiation ?

 @RobertChase 

The failure of the pro-MMJ crowd to release or use the relevant statistic -- MEDIAN age, with gender breakout -- belies the reality of what they fear to disclose, and what you and every honest participant and observer of the "industry" knows --

-- The VAST MAJORITY of "patients" in Colorado are in fact Recreational Stoners hiding behind and abusing the intent of A20 as a pretense to simply get high. To the detriment of the few honest bona-fide sick and suffering patients.

It's a massive FRAUD and a SHAM, and you know it. That you countenance it is a reflection upon your character, or lack thereof.

.

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 @johnnyhammersticksLearn what "median" and "average" mean and you will be equpped to enter the discussion; they are both measures of central tendency -- numbers that indicate what the center of a set of data is.  The average is the sum of all the data points divided by the number of data points; the median is that element out of the data set such that an equal number of data points are below and above the median (which only has meaning if there are an odd number of data points; if there are an even number of data points, the median is the average of the two data points which are in the middle of the data set when the points are arranged in order).

If you're still reading, the reason to use the median in preference to the average is that it better represents a point in the middle of the data set.  Suppose that Colorado had seven medical cannabis patients and that their ages were 18, 19, 19, 21, 42, 89, and 100, respectively -- the average age of the patients would be (18+19+19+21+42+89+100)/7 = 44, but their median age would be just the number in the middle when they are arranged in order, or 21; in this case, the average is more than twice the median!  Donkey's motivation in demanding the median instead of the average is that he supposes that a large number of young recreational users are being outweighed in the average by fewer, much older patients -- he thinks that the median age of patients would reveal that very many are young (and inferentially, recreational users).

 @johnnyhammersticks 

Go learn Statistics 101 and get back to us when you comprehend the difference between the mean and median, and why the median is the more significant stat in a demographic age or earnings group.

Why are the MMJ shills and pimps afraid of disclosing the median age vs. their irrelevant "average" age ?

Doesn't fit their talking points? ... or more accurately Prevarication Points.

 @dm_co 

At least you have enough intellectual honesty to admit that "medical" marijuana is a SHAM in Colorado.

 @dm_co 

The bean counters at the CDPHE should have it.

Just be sure the clueless clerk you speak with comprehends the difference between "average" aka mean, and MEDIAN age.

And if you're out there digging for facts and truth, the liars promoting A64 could use some help finding any mythical 3-plant farmers who've been arrested in Colorado ... they would actually need to uncover 10,000 of them ... since that's one of THE BIG LIES they spewed -- and the lap-dog media regurgitated without question -- about how many arrests that A64 would prevent ... every year!

Godspeed.