Sponsored by

VGoodiez 420EDC
  • Welcome to VaporAsylum! Please take a moment to read our RULES and introduce yourself here.
  • Need help navigating the forum? Find out how to use our features here.
  • Did you know we have lots of smilies for you to use?

Jeff Sessions

Status
Not open for further replies.
Jefferson airplane







Only Jefferson I like.


Love Slick....one of the greatest female rock and roll singers ever. Plus she had some real power in her voice

 
Deflection and selective memory? :disgust:
See....MJ really does hurt your short term memory...see what it did to ole' Jefferson, that stoner dude. LOL
 
Science Calls Out Jeff Sessions on Medical Marijuana and the "Historic Drug Epidemic"

Rolling back protections from federal interference in state legalization laws could worsen the opioid overdose crisis.

Amid a drug crisis that kills 91 people in the U.S. each day, Attorney General Jeff Sessions has asked Congress to help roll back protections that have shielded medical marijuana dispensaries from federal prosecutors since 2014, according to a letter made public this week. Those legal controls—which bar Sessions’s Justice Department from funding crackdowns on the medical cannabis programs legalized by 29 states and Washington, D.C.—jeopardize the DoJ’s ability to combat the country’s “historic drug epidemic” and control dangerous drug traffickers, the attorney general wrote in the letter sent to lawmakers.

The catch, however, is that this epidemic is one of addiction and overdose deaths fueled by opioids—heroin, fentanyl and prescription painkillers—not marijuana. In fact, places where the U.S. has legalized medical marijuana have lower rates of opioid overdose deaths.

A review of the scientific literature indicates marijuana is far less addictive than prescription painkillers. A 2016 survey from University of Michigan researchers, published in the The Journal of Pain, found that chronic pain suffers who used cannabis reported a 64 percent drop in opioid use as well as fewer negative side effects and a better quality of life than they experienced under opioids. In a 2014 study reported in JAMA The Journal of the American Medical Association, the authors found that annual opioid overdose deaths were about 25 percent lower on average in states that allowed medical cannabis compared with those that did not.

Marijuana can be habit-forming, at least psychologically, but the risks are not in the same league as opioids. A 20-year epidemiological review of studies concluded that more than nine out of 10 people who try marijuana do not become dependent on the drug. The review paper, published in 2014, said the “lifetime risk of developing dependence among those who have ever used cannabis was estimated at 9 percent in the United States in the early 1990s as against 32 percent for nicotine, 23 percent for heroin, 17 percent for cocaine, 15 percent for alcohol and 11 percent for stimulants.”

Also, unlike the case with opioids, it is virtually impossible to lethally overdose on marijuana—because a user would have to consume massive quantities in a prohibitively short time. The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) says such a fatal result is very unlikely. Meanwhile, heroin-related overdose deaths have more than quadrupled since 2010. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that from 2014 to 2015 heroin overdose death rates increased by 20.6 percent—causing nearly 13,000 deaths in 2015.

Many heroin users in the U.S. first become addicted to legally prescribed painkillers, and turn to heroin after their pill supply dries up or becomes too expensive. According to the NIDA, nearly half of young people who inject heroin abused prescription opioids first.

And a significant number of pain sufferers would apparently prefer to use medical marijuana instead of prescription painkillers. A study published in July 2016 in Health Affairs explored what happened to Medicare (Part D) painkiller prescriptions after states green-lighted medical marijuana laws, and found that a typical physician in a state with medical cannabis prescribed 1,826 fewer painkiller doses for Medicare patients in a given year—because seniors instead turned to medical pot. There were also hundreds fewer doses prescribed for antidepressants, anti-nausea medications and antianxiety drugs.

The science on the benefits and risks of medical marijuana is far from settled, largely because conclusive research remains so difficult in spite of the drug’s popularity and apparent promise. Sessions’s DoJ oversees the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, which has long kept marijuana listed in the nation’s laws as a Schedule I drug, meaning it is officially declared devoid of any currently accepted medical use and has a high potential for abuse. This federal status hobbles researchers’ abilities to obtain marijuana and conduct comprehensive studies on its potential benefits, even though so many states have defied federal prohibition and the cannabis industry is booming. The DoJ did not respond to a request for comment by the time of publication.

Session’s congressional letter, which was dated May 1, was obtained by Massroots.com and also confirmed and reported by The Washington Post on Tuesday. The letter urges lawmakers to remove the legal impediment that keeps his office from spending cash on interfering with state medical marijuana programs, a safeguard for dispensaries formally called the Rohrabacher–Farr Amendment. That provision expires at the end of September, and would have to be renewed to remain the law of the land—a timeline that guarantees medical marijuana will be discussed in Congress in the coming months.

W. David Bradford, a health policy expert at The University of Georgia who studies medical marijuana policies, says failing to renew the provision “would throw a lot of uncertainty into the [medical cannabis] industry and cause disruption for patients.” Bradford, who was the senior author on the Health Affairs study, also links the amendment’s fate to the opioid crisis: “Anything we can do to divert people away from initial opiate use,” he says, “will divert them away from the potential for misuse and death.”
 

AG Jeff Sessions Called Out by Oregon Senator

On Tuesday, United States Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) called out U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions – not once, but twice. First, Wyden interrogated the Atty. Gen. over his recusal from the ongoing Russian probe, then he issued a statement responding to Sessions’ request of congressional leaders, rebuking the AG’s request that the DOJ be allowed to prosecute medical marijuana providers as they see fit.

Per Sen. Wyden’s website, the Oregon Democrat noted approximately 90% of all U.S. states allow for some formal legal marijuana – and that it’s time for the elected officials to represent their constituents.

“Voters in Oregon and other states that have chosen to legalize marijuana should not have their votes thrown in the trash by this administration. It’s past time for Congress to stand up to this administration and begin to responsibly address our outdated federal marijuana laws.”

The primary sponsor of the 2017 Marijuana Revenue and Regulation Act, Sen. Wyden has been an integral part of a bipartisan effort to reform our obsolete federal marijuana laws. Perhaps a little indignant from his earlier encounter before the Senate intelligence committee – Sen. Wyden put Sessions on blast.

“Jeff Sessions is again showing he only values upholding states’ rights when he thinks the state is right. Any attempt to waste taxpayer dollars by going after law-abiding citizens would run contrary to the science on marijuana, not to mention basic common sense.”

Per the most recent Quinnipiac poll, Americans support medical marijuana by approximately 94%, and an additional 60% support the legalization of this peaceful herb.

Ole' Jefferson is having a rough week, don't cha' think? Couldn't happen to a nicer fascist. :clap:
 
Wolf: I'll Protect Medical Marijuana Patients from Jeff Sessions

sessions-wolf-940x540.jpg

Pa. Gov. Tom Wolf isn’t happy with a letter that surfaced this week from Attorney General Jeff Sessions.

The letter, which Sessions sent to congressional leaders in May, seeks to undo federal medical-marijuana protections. Sessions asked Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, House Speaker Paul Ryan, Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi to alter a 2014 amendment to allow the Department of Justice to use funds to prevent states from allowing the use, distribution, possession or cultivation of medical marijuana.

Sessions attempts to tie medical marijuana to the opioid drug epidemic, though studies show that opiate deaths and overdoses are actually less common in states that have medical marijuana laws.

Wolf has responded to Sessions’s request with his own letter to the attorney general. In his memo, Wolf references the “bipartisan and medical consensus for medical marijuana in Pennsylvania,” where “we have taken very careful and deliberate steps to implement the law so that those who are suffering can get relief while ensuring that the state is a responsible steward of the program.”

The governor warns that he would “seek legal action to protect our residents and state sovereignty” if Sessions continues to “pursue this federal shift and Congress were to agree.”

Here’s the full letter from Wolf to Sessions:

“Dear Attorney General Sessions:

Last year, the Pennsylvania General Assembly passed bipartisan legislation to legalize medical marijuana that I was proud to sign into law. The legislation was the result of conversations with Republicans and Democrats and fierce advocacy from families of children who were stricken with terrible illnesses that could be helped by medical marijuana.

We talked to kids who suffer dozens of seizures each day. We met veterans who have seen absolute terror and seek relief from the effects of their post-traumatic stress. We approached the responsibility of providing relief to the people of Pennsylvania very thoughtfully.

Since I signed the legislation, we have taken very careful and deliberate steps to implement the law so that those who are suffering can get relief while ensuring that the state is a responsible steward of the program.

Given the bipartisan and medical consensus for medical marijuana in Pennsylvania and many other states, I am disturbed to know that you are actively pursuing a change in federal law to go after medical marijuana suppliers.

We do not need the federal government getting in the way of Pennsylvania’s right to deliver them relief through our new medical marijuana program.

Your action to undo the protections of the Rohrabacher-Farr amendment, which prevents the use of federal funds to disrupt states’ efforts to implement “their own State laws that authorize the use, distribution, possession or cultivation of medical marijuana” is misguided.

If you seek to further disrupt our ability to establish a legal way to deliver relief of medical marijuana to our citizens, I will ask the Attorney General of Pennsylvania to take legal action to protect our residents and state sovereignty.”

Go Gov. Wolf! Ole' Jefferson is going to be in for such an ass kicking if he follows up on his misguided and ignorant statements of policy.

:thumbsup::torching::nunchuks:
 
Colorado officials give cold shoulder to Sessions request to let federal prosecutors target medical marijuana industry
U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions wants Congress to allow federal prosecutors to target legal medical marijuana providers, but Colorado officials and members of the state's congressional delegation say they like things the way they are.

In a May 1 letter to congressional leaders made public this week, Sessions asks lawmakers to nullify the Rohrabacher-Farr Amendment, named after its initial sponsors, a bipartisan budget measure in place since 2014 that forbids the feds from interfering with the medical marijuana industry in certain states where it's legal.

Sessions argues that it would be "unwise" to hamper the Department of Justice from enforcing federal narcotics law, "particularly in the midst of an historic drug epidemic and potentially long-term uptick in violent crime."

Trump administration officials have suggested the federal government could begin cracking down on the marijuana trade in states where it's legal, although the administration has encountered fierce push-back from states, including Colorado.

In the letter to Congress, which was first reported Monday by MassRoots, a marijuana-related news site, Sessions charges that drug traffickers "already cultivate and distribute marijuana inside the United States under the guise of state medical marijuana laws." He points to a recent set of indictments alleging the holder of a Colorado medical marijuana license was the ringleader of a criminal conspiracy to ship marijuana out of state.

Colorado's governor, a Democrat, and top law enforcement officer, a Republican, however, told Colorado Politics on Wednesday they believe the prohibition on federal interference with state medical marijuana laws makes sense and expect it will stay on the books.

In addition, two Republican members of Colorado's congressional delegation, including a former prosecutor, said they support the amendment.

"Throughout the period of legalization in Colorado, we have worked to build and maintain a regulatory structure that protects public health, public safety, and other law enforcement interests," Gov. John Hickenlooper's spokeswoman, Jacque Montgomery, told Colorado Politics. "We have maintained a collaborative relationship with the federal government as we've built Colorado's existing regulatory structure. Rohrabacher-Farr plays an important role in our collaborative relationship, which we hope will continue."

Attorney General Cynthia Coffman suggested that Sessions' argument, far from supporting his position, demonstrate that the system is working in Colorado, which legalized medical marijuana in 2000 and became one of the first jurisdictions in the world to legalize recreational marijuana in 2012 when voters approved Amendment 64.

"General Sessions correctly notes that Colorado is aggressively prosecuting individuals who commit crimes under the cover of Colorado's medical marijuana laws," Coffman told Colorado Politics. "However, his comments appear on their face to be a blanket repudiation of all marijuana and state control of its growth, sale, and use, even where regulations and enforcement are effective. I anticipate Congress will stand by its rider on the Department of Justice appropriation in deference to states' rights, but the legalized pot discussion is far from over."

In all, 29 states and the District of Columbia allow medical marijuana, and recreational marijuana is legal in eight states and the District of Columbia, although federal law still classifies it as an illegal, controlled substance.

U.S. Rep. Mike Coffman not only swung back at Sessions and his request but doubled down on a proposal he aired earlier this year to restrict the Justice Department from targeting the recreational marijuana trade in states where it's legal.

"The voters of Colorado made a decision to legalize marijuana, and I will continue to do everything I can to defend that decision to include supporting an appropriations amendment that would prohibit the expenditure of any funds for the purpose of enforcing federal marijuana laws against a state that has legalized marijuana," Coffman told Colorado Politics.

U.S. Rep. Ken Buck, the former Weld County district attorney, had a succinct response to Sessions.

"I have read the Attorney General's letter and considered his reasoning, and I continue to support the Rohrabacher-Farr Amendment," Buck said.

Yep, looks like ole' Jefferson is really ain't making too many friends this week.
 
I once got a piece of advice from a friends father who was an elected county bureaucrat back home. "When in trouble throw a few of your opposition's nuts into the fire." I suspect that a similar thought may have crossed Sessions mind as a way to rally the base. Upside MJ been around a lot longer then he has.
 
From a mid-size PA newspaper editorial page. What I like about it is that this is not a major news outlet and so is pretty representative, I think, our our country (than say the LA Times) and states its views of Sessions' in fairly plain English. Poor ole' Jefferson is getting a lot of noogies this week, yeah? LOL

Jeff Sessions' bad trip on marijuana policy | Editorial
U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions' belief that "good people don't smoke marijuana" isn't just archaic. It's fueling what could become an all-out assault by the Justice Department to close dispensaries and turn back the marijuana clock in states that have legalized its recreational use.

And what of the many thousands of sick people who use medical marijuana?

What of the children who can't control their seizures with prescription medicine, but find relief in a non-smokable, non-euphoric form of cannabis?

What of veterans coping with post traumatic stress disorder, who find themselves at legal odds with the nation they defended?

What of people suffering from a wasting syndrome, the side effects of chemotherapy, or the sight-robbing effects of glaucoma?

Are they bad people?

The American people know the answer to this. By huge margins (94 percent, in a recent Quinnipiac poll) they support legalization of medical marijuana, and by lesser but significant majorities (61 percent, in a recent CBS poll), for recreational use. The numbers go higher when pollsters ask if the federal government should force Colorado, Washington, California and other states to abandon their regulated pot programs.

Sessions wants to enforce the federal law that recognizes marijuana as a Schedule 1 drug, on a par with heroin and cocaine. Last week it was disclosed that he has medical marijuana in his sights, too.

In a month-old letter made public Monday, Sessions asked Senate and House leaders to revoke the Rohrabacher-Farr amendment, a 2014 measure that prohibits the federal government from clamping down on states that passed laws legalizing medical marijuana.

The rationale?

"The (Justice) department must be in a position to use all laws available to combat the transnational drug organizations and dangerous drug traffickers who threaten American lives," Sessions said, noting that medical marijuana use coincides with a deadly drug crisis and what he foresees as an increase in drug-related crime.

This is the point where readers may ask: What is our attorney general smoking?

The addiction/overdose epidemic gripping the nation has everything to do with the supply of prescription painkillers and heroin. Not marijuana. The nation's top law enforcement officer knows that violent crime in the U.S. has been steadily declining for years.

It's fair to ask why Congress hasn't done more to curtail the flow of legal opioid painkillers and make more programs available to treat addiction, to keep drug users out of the criminal court system.

On this issue, states are light-years ahead of Washington -- not just in seeing "what works" in evaluating the curative powers of a weed, but in burying the myths of a failed drug war in trying to get a handle on the opioid crisis.

Pennsylvania and New Jersey have limited, fairly restrictive medical marijuana programs. Both states also have initiated campaigns to counter an opioid plague. On these issues, at least, there is a consensus that transcends deep partisan divides.

Except in the Trump administration. While candidate Donald Trump expressed a willingness to let states do their own thing on marijuana, President Trump seems ready to sign off on a drug war between the federal government and the states.

After he learned of the attorney general's intent, Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf fired off a letter to Sessions, defending Pennsylvania's medical marijuana program and threatening to sue if the federal government intervenes.

Regardless of what anyone thinks about marijuana, undoing the advances on legalization -- as decided by voters and legislatures -- is an invitation to accelerate a cultural war already cleaving the nation. In the case of medical marijuana, it would be an act of cruelty.

Members of Congress need to uphold the Rohrabacher-Farr amendment, keep Uncle Sam out of the states' marijuana reforms -- and let the weight of history and millions of ruined lives provide the direction.
 
Science Calls Out Jeff Sessions on Medical Marijuana and the "Historic Drug Epidemic"

Rolling back protections from federal interference in state legalization laws could worsen the opioid overdose crisis.

Amid a drug crisis that kills 91 people in the U.S. each day, Attorney General Jeff Sessions has asked Congress to help roll back protections that have shielded medical marijuana dispensaries from federal prosecutors since 2014, according to a letter made public this week. Those legal controls—which bar Sessions’s Justice Department from funding crackdowns on the medical cannabis programs legalized by 29 states and Washington, D.C.—jeopardize the DoJ’s ability to combat the country’s “historic drug epidemic” and control dangerous drug traffickers, the attorney general wrote in the letter sent to lawmakers.

The catch, however, is that this epidemic is one of addiction and overdose deaths fueled by opioids—heroin, fentanyl and prescription painkillers—not marijuana. In fact, places where the U.S. has legalized medical marijuana have lower rates of opioid overdose deaths.

A review of the scientific literature indicates marijuana is far less addictive than prescription painkillers. A 2016 survey from University of Michigan researchers, published in the The Journal of Pain, found that chronic pain suffers who used cannabis reported a 64 percent drop in opioid use as well as fewer negative side effects and a better quality of life than they experienced under opioids. In a 2014 study reported in JAMA The Journal of the American Medical Association, the authors found that annual opioid overdose deaths were about 25 percent lower on average in states that allowed medical cannabis compared with those that did not.

Marijuana can be habit-forming, at least psychologically, but the risks are not in the same league as opioids. A 20-year epidemiological review of studies concluded that more than nine out of 10 people who try marijuana do not become dependent on the drug. The review paper, published in 2014, said the “lifetime risk of developing dependence among those who have ever used cannabis was estimated at 9 percent in the United States in the early 1990s as against 32 percent for nicotine, 23 percent for heroin, 17 percent for cocaine, 15 percent for alcohol and 11 percent for stimulants.”

Also, unlike the case with opioids, it is virtually impossible to lethally overdose on marijuana—because a user would have to consume massive quantities in a prohibitively short time. The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) says such a fatal result is very unlikely. Meanwhile, heroin-related overdose deaths have more than quadrupled since 2010. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that from 2014 to 2015 heroin overdose death rates increased by 20.6 percent—causing nearly 13,000 deaths in 2015.

Many heroin users in the U.S. first become addicted to legally prescribed painkillers, and turn to heroin after their pill supply dries up or becomes too expensive. According to the NIDA, nearly half of young people who inject heroin abused prescription opioids first.

And a significant number of pain sufferers would apparently prefer to use medical marijuana instead of prescription painkillers. A study published in July 2016 in Health Affairs explored what happened to Medicare (Part D) painkiller prescriptions after states green-lighted medical marijuana laws, and found that a typical physician in a state with medical cannabis prescribed 1,826 fewer painkiller doses for Medicare patients in a given year—because seniors instead turned to medical pot. There were also hundreds fewer doses prescribed for antidepressants, anti-nausea medications and antianxiety drugs.

The science on the benefits and risks of medical marijuana is far from settled, largely because conclusive research remains so difficult in spite of the drug’s popularity and apparent promise. Sessions’s DoJ oversees the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, which has long kept marijuana listed in the nation’s laws as a Schedule I drug, meaning it is officially declared devoid of any currently accepted medical use and has a high potential for abuse. This federal status hobbles researchers’ abilities to obtain marijuana and conduct comprehensive studies on its potential benefits, even though so many states have defied federal prohibition and the cannabis industry is booming. The DoJ did not respond to a request for comment by the time of publication.

Session’s congressional letter, which was dated May 1, was obtained by Massroots.com and also confirmed and reported by The Washington Post on Tuesday. The letter urges lawmakers to remove the legal impediment that keeps his office from spending cash on interfering with state medical marijuana programs, a safeguard for dispensaries formally called the Rohrabacher–Farr Amendment. That provision expires at the end of September, and would have to be renewed to remain the law of the land—a timeline that guarantees medical marijuana will be discussed in Congress in the coming months.

W. David Bradford, a health policy expert at The University of Georgia who studies medical marijuana policies, says failing to renew the provision “would throw a lot of uncertainty into the [medical cannabis] industry and cause disruption for patients.” Bradford, who was the senior author on the Health Affairs study, also links the amendment’s fate to the opioid crisis: “Anything we can do to divert people away from initial opiate use,” he says, “will divert them away from the potential for misuse and death.”
Session's?
Really?

ELMER FUDD
hypWPNh.jpg

SESSION's is no NAPOLEON
 
I've mentioned before that Jeff Sessions believes in 80's style incarceration and enforcement and isn't willing to let go of these notions. His history during the Reagan years needs to challenged as well. :twocents:

I remember him being asked about the Rohrabacher–Farr amendment and it's significance when he was testifying before congress for the position and other points that he is now trying to turn back.

Hopefully, they will refer to his earlier testimony at some point and refresh his memory as to what path they did not want take when they questioned him in the first place.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Sponsored by

VGoodiez 420EDC
Back
Top