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War and Weed Observation: I always seem to write these things on paper, or at the very least, nearly complete them in my head, before I put hands to keyboard and type them into the computer. I just can�t seem to get honest and organic and in the moment and flow the same way without the thoughts going from head to heart to hand. (Easy Trivia: What was the source of that great quote flashed on the screen at the end of Madonna�s "Express Yourself" video, which by the way, I find uber-hot, "Without the heart, there can be no understanding between the hand and the mind"?) Yes, indeed, I am Old School. It seems, once again, particularly appropriate that I am listening to PJ Harvey howling, "I�m scared baby / I wanna run / This world�s crazy / Hand me the gun / Baby, baby, / Ain�t it true / I�m immortal / When I�m with you / But I want a pistol / In my hand / I wanna go to / A different land." One of today's TIMES (New York, of course, the only one that matters) headlines: France tells the U.S. (and they�re right, by the way, as I believe the French so often are -- savoir-faire, laissez-faire, fais comme chez toi, ca ne fait rien ... They've been there for a LONG time, and they understand beauty and love and resilience like no one else; upstart Americans could take a lesson or two) that a war with Iraq is not yet warranted. WHY must we be in such a rush to destroy?! I'm a Scorpio, and even I don't feel that, and everyone KNOWS how we love to fuck shit up! Also in this issue, yet another design proposed for the replacement World Trade Center (Everyone seems to think he/she knows what should go there), this one a futuristic thing, based on an Antonio Gaudi sketch, of which I'm rather fond because it speaks to where we were told we'd be by now, back in the 80s. And why aren't we there? Why don't I have a personal jet-pack with which to fly the three miles from my apartment to my office, floating, gliding past above the freight-yards and apartments and offices, powered by hemp, and completely averting road-rage via the thrill of personal flight? Why, when I encounter a traffic jam, am I not yet able to switch my car (quite small and light, anyway, a 2000 Toyota Celica GT-S, carbon blue, if you care) into "hover" mode and simply bypass the inconvenience? Perhaps because we are too interested in maintaining the status quo, increasing profits for large corporations by toeing the party line, sticking with "what works" (which as we all know, decidedly does NOT work), attempting to outdo, subdue, or annihilate our neighbours, and prosecuting marijuana growers. Another front-page item in today's TIMES: Ed Rosenthal, a long-time researcher into the beneficial effects of marijuana, has been arrested and is being prosecuted in Federal Court, the laws of which are in head-on conflict with the laws of the State of California, where he was growing plants and supplying community medical establishments with said substance. Rosenthal has been researching the benefits of various sorts of marijuana in the alleviation of the pain and symptoms associated with depression, cancer, AIDS and a number of other ailments since the 1960s, and now, because the current administration in the District of Columbia has its head so far up its ass that it doesn't know the difference between the two, a humanitarian publisher stands a chance of spending as much as ten years in federal prison for the very work that makes him a hero. I do not say this merely because I enjoy smoking up, but also because I have experience of its efficacy, in small doses and carefully regulated, in mitigating chronic and severe depression.) It is utterly ludicrous that the puritanical government of this nation clings to an archaic social taboo and refuses to see the potential benefit to its people of the legislation and regulation (in like fashion to that of tobacco and alcohol, both of which, by the way, are more physically addictive than marijuana -- further, consider the potential of alcohol to lead to violence, versus the peaceable and happy state induced by the moderated usage of marijuana -- a potential solution to the violence in the Middle East?) of the production and distribution of cannabis. And who would think they'd pass up the opportunity to levy a tax on something?! From a legal standpoint, though, the citizens of California have voted to legalise Mr. Rosenthal's activities. The City of Oakland has even deputised him as an officer in order to shield him from prosecution. Now, I'm not sure where the feds are granted the right expressly to legislate which substances are legal or illegal (and in this case, we're talking about something that occurs in nature, folks, but more on that later), but Amendment 10 to the Constitution of the United States reads, "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the People." The People have spoken; the State has followed suit. Sounds like California has sovereignty here. (Let me here warn against religious objections to marijuana as I would warn against such objections to alcohol consumption on a scriptural basis. I'm a Yale-educated Anglo-Catholic with his brain fully engaged, thanks, and I know my scripture. What is marijuana? A plant. Who created the Earth and all that therein is? You betcha: God. From the Book of Genesis, Chapter One (King James Version): "11 And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so. 12 And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was good. 29 And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat. 30 And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so. 31 And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good." Indeed.) And yet Judge Charles Breyer has ruled that the medical purpose of Rosenthal's research, as well as the fact that it was approved by the citizens, the City of Oakland and the State of California, cannot be admissible at trial. Head? Ass? Who can tell the difference? Given my ongoing frustration with "the way things are" in this country and the unwillingness of those in whom we have vested power to hear and do the will of those who placed them in positions of authority, I begin to wonder if the citizenry should exercise their rights under the Second Amendment, form a militia, and take back the government by force. (Jefferson was a genius. From the Declaration of Independence: "That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.") A question: Is it indeed, and then furthermore, should it be illegal for me to compose and perform a song entitled, "Kill the Monkey in the White House (before He Destroys the World)"? (Go read Amendment One.) Don't get me wrong: I believe Saddam is an evil man, as is Jong-Il (and "evil" is a word I do not use lightly), but as it appears the powers of the Middle East merely want to be left alone, why not simply do that, leaving them utterly alone and to their own prehistoric devices to starve? Yes, I know there are a great many arguments against that theory. Emigration to Canada, however, is looking mighty good these days... (Snow...Hockey...Beer...Eh?) r
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