Letters for October 27, 2011

Cleaning up the mess

Re “The marijuana mess” (Editorial, Oct. 20):

Is the U.S. Department of Justice working for the drug cartels? You really have to wonder. First you have the “fast and furious” gun deals, then you have the grenade builder, and now they’re going after the legal, taxpaying medical-marijuana dispensaries and forcing their clients back to the drug cartels!

David Gendreau
Berry Creek

Your editorial pointed out that arguments can be made for both legalizing cannabis (marijuana) or cleaning up the mess resulting from Proposition 215. Actually, the only way to fix problems associated with 215 is to completely legalize the plant. Support for ending cannabis prohibition, persecution and extermination is growing at an eye-opening rate. Be patient, and voters will fix the problem at the election booth in 2012.

Stan White
Dillon, Colo.

Federal entrapment

Re “Dispensary calls it quits” (Downstrokes, Oct. 20):

I am a 215 patient who has been affected by Chico’s co-op closing down, as have around some 5,999 other patients. If you have been affected or are going to be affected by this ridiculous action, please contact me! Let’s mobilize and do something about this! Call me at 588-2970.

I love my country and my state of California, but I hate what the government has been doing, is doing and will continue to do to our state and country!

Michael Dracul
Chico

If the federal government, for whatever reasons, wants to eliminate cannabis from our diets, they should have filed suit in a court of law when Proposition 215 first passed. For them to wait 15 years for the industry to thrive to the point where there were more than 2,000 legal dispensaries operating, and then to pull the rug out from under them, is unconscionable.

When you take into consideration President Obama’s campaign promise to not devote the Justice Department’s resources to bothering states that have medical-cannabis programs, and the Odgen memo saying basically the same thing, what you have is pure entrapment. This whole situation is totally unfair to all of the thousands of collectives that have poured their hearts and souls and finances into these establishments.

Medical-cannabis patients, who are no different from you or me, are tired of being treated like second-class citizens simply because they have discovered, and are taking advantage of, this plant’s wonderful therapeutic power. By destroying dispensaries in California, law enforcement is in effect forcing them to become criminals as they hit the streets trying to supply themselves.

In the meantime, these federal agents have done absolutely nothing to curb the supply or demand. They’ve only succeeded in strengthening the cartels, eliminating jobs and costing the state millions of dollars in lost tax revenue.

Our government has failed us by not taking the time to think this through.

Robert Galia
Chico

Editor’s note: Mr. Galia ran North Valley Holistic Health, Chico’s sole surviving medical-cannabis dispensary until it announced it was closing last week.

Court injustice

In my divorce case, I have been treated horribly unjustly by our justice system in all areas: settlement, support, and the most grievous, custody. I’m not alone.

If this has happened to you and you need help, please contact the Center for Judicial Excellence and fill out its survey. You’ll do a phone interview, and they’ll take the information to Washington, D.C.

The Judicial Council is asking for public feedback, so write to it also. I was able to speak to an attorney who was surprised there are no court reporters in family law in Butte County (the only county).

Another important group is the California Protective Parents Association. Fill out its survey and join. Its motto is: Stop court crimes, restore justice, accountability.

The National Coalition for Child Protection Reform is also attempting to expose and restore justice. It has a lot of excellent articles.

A huge movement is under way nationally to change a system that is now about profit. You can put your story on the Internet, even if your case is settled. If we unite, we can make changes. Marin County did, after the Elkins case was exposed.

Vickie Van Scyoc
Paradise

Café Culture’s closing

Thank you to Praveen Ram and Greg Fletcher for their vision and long hours of work to create a multicultural center of art, music and dance at Café Culture.

I’m sorry that our community couldn’t step up to the plate to make the center profitable so it could stay open. I’m sorry our police chief wrote a letter to Alcoholic Beverage Control opposing a beer-and-wine license. I’m sorry drunks broke windows at Café Culture. I hope someone buys the business to keep the vision alive.

Again, thanks to Greg and Praveen for the rich variety of performances they brought to Chico and the space they provided for so many dance and other classes, including EarthHaven’s free energy balancings. Their leadership will be greatly missed.

Gayle Kimball
Chico

Editor’s note: For more on Café Culture’s closing, see Arts DEVO on page 40.

Smoke-free parks

We are eighth-graders at Chico Junior High School, and we are a part of the K.L.E.A.N. (Kids Leading Everyone Against Nicotine) organization. We recently went to Five-Mile to clean up cigarette butts in order to keep our parks clean and safe. We found enough cigarette butts to fill up about one sandwich bag. That amount is definitely enough to prove that people smoking in a place where many families spend their afternoon is a horrible thing.

It’s bad enough that people hurt themselves by smoking, but when they are affecting the rest of us (kids or adults), it shouldn’t be tolerated. Making parks smoke-free would be the first step in helping the lives of many in our community, and we hope that we can all do our part to keep the parks smoke-free.

Lexi Gremminger

Cecilia Taresh
Chico

Blockage in the Senate

Our nation is becoming focused on the 2012 elections, with issues hotly debated in Congress.

Mitch McConnell, Republican leader in the Senate, recently stated that President Obama’s failure to produce jobs was despite his two years in office, when Congress gave him everything he wanted.

Although the House did have a Democratic majority during those first two years, in that same period McConnell’s Senate was able to stop legislation by requiring a super-majority of 60 votes to even debate. The rules now in effect allow the minority to filibuster without even filibustering.

In the past, senators could talk a measure to death by holding the Senate floor. Nowadays, they need only register an intent to filibuster, requiring Senate Democrats to produce 60 votes on any measure. Republicans have repeatedly used this tactic to defeat legislation proposed by President Obama to help the struggling economy in these precarious times.

The solution is to elect Democrats in 2012, beginning with the presidency. Obama’s jobs bill would start us on the road to recovery. It happened during Clinton’s administration, and will certainly happen again if we give Democrats a strong majority.

Robert Woods
Chico

Correction

In our Oct. 13 listing of Klean Kanteen as third-place winner in the Best of Chico readers’ picks category of Best Green Innovator, we misspelled the company’s name. Our apologies.—ed.