In Drug War, Tribe Feels Invaded by Both Sides
By ERIK ECKHOLM
Published: January 24, 2010

SELLS, Ariz. — An eerie hush settles in at sundown on the Tohono O’odham Nation, which straddles 75 miles of border with Mexico.

Few residents leave their homes. The roads crawl with the trucks of Border Patrol agents, who stop unfamiliar vehicles, scrutinize back roads for footprints and hike into the desert wilds to intercept smugglers carrying marijuana on their backs and droves of migrants trying to make it north.

By the bad luck of geography, the only large Indian reservation on the embattled border is caught in the middle, emerging as a major transit point for drugs as well as people.

A long-insular tribe of 28,000 people and its culture are paying a steep price: the land is swarming with outsiders, residents are afraid to walk in the hallowed desert, and some members, lured by drug cartel cash in a place with high unemployment, are ending up in prison.

“People will knock on your door, flash a wad of money and ask if you can drive this bale of marijuana up north,” said Marla Henry, 38, chairwoman of Chukut Kuk district, which covers much of the border zone.

The tightening of border security to the east and west, which started in the 1990s and intensified after the Sept. 11 attacks, funneled more drug traffic through the Tohono O’odham reservation, federal officials said, and especially more marijuana, which is hard to slip through vehicle crossings because of its bulk.

A record 319,000 pounds of marijuana were seized on the reservation in 2009, up from 201,000 pounds the previous year, along with small amounts of cocaine, heroin and methamphetamine.

Hundreds of tribal members have been prosecuted in federal, state or tribal courts for smuggling drugs or humans, taking offers that reach $5,000 for storing marijuana or transporting it across the reservation. In a few families, both parents have been sent to prison, leaving grandparents to raise the children.

“People are afraid that if they say no, they’ll be threatened by the cartel,” Ms. Henry said.

If residents of remote villages tried to call the police, she said, help might not arrive for two hours or more.

At the same time, some residents are angry at the intrusion of hundreds of federal agents, including some who stay for a week at a time on bases in remote parts of the reservation. The surge in agents who cruise the roads has meant more checkpoints and tighter controls on a border that tribal members, 1,500 of whom live in Mexico, once freely crossed.

The once-placid reservation feels like a “militarized zone,” said Ned Norris Jr., the tribal chairman, who also says the tribe must cooperate to stem the cartels. “Drug smuggling is a problem we didn’t create, but now we’re having to deal with the consequences.”

Many residents say they live in fear of the smugglers and hordes of migrants who lurk around their homes, and also of being subjected to a humiliating search by federal agents.

The elderly avoid the desert, even in the daytime, because they might stumble upon a cache of marijuana or drug “mules” hiding in desert washes until dark.

“We can’t even go out to collect wood for the stove,” said Verna Miguel, 63, who was traumatized three years ago when a group of migrants forced her to stop on a road, beat her and stole her vehicle.

“We’ve always picked saguaro fruits and cholla buds,” Ms. Miguel said, using such desert products for consumption and rituals. “But now we don’t dare do that.”

Until recently, the reservation’s international border was porous, defended by three strands of barbed wire. Over the last two years, it has been lined with metal posts and Normandy-style barriers to stop the trucks that used to barrel through and head for Phoenix.

Federal officials describe the rise in drug seizures on the reservation as a sign of growing success on what had long been a vulnerable section of border. Barriers and surveillance have forced most of the smugglers to enter on foot rather than in vehicles and spend hours or days sneaking through the reservation, making them more vulnerable to detection, said Agent Robert Gilbert, chief of the Tucson sector of the Border Patrol.

But the large busts, here and elsewhere on the border, are also a measure of the continued trade and profits reaped by the cartels.

“The cartels use the profit from marijuana to purchase cocaine in Colombia and Peru and the ingredients for meth and heroin from other regions,” said Elizabeth W. Kempshall, special agent in charge of the Arizona office of the Drug Enforcement Administration. “So marijuana is the catalyst for the rest of the drug trade.”

The drug smugglers, mainly working for the Sinaloa Cartel, officials said, place scouts for days at a time on mountainsides, with night-vision goggles to monitor movements of the Border Patrol. The scouts communicate with Mexican or Indian guides using cellphones or two-way radios with rolling codes that cannot be intercepted, said Sgt. David Cray of the tribal police force, which has spent major amounts of money on border issues. During the day, the scouts hide in caves or under camouflage.

The Border Patrol has its own spotters and trucks with infrared video cameras that detect heat miles away. The tribe has agreed to electronic surveillance towers that in coming years will make a “virtual fence” across their lands.

Many agents spend their nights “cutting for sign,” a tracker’s term, making slow drives on dirt roads in search of footprints.

One recent chilly night, a Border Patrol spotter detected eight white dots on his screen moving steadily north, not meandering the way cows or wild mules do. With a laser beam he fixed their coordinates at a spot five miles from his mountaintop post.

Two agents in four-wheel-drive vehicles set out over a rutted ranch track, then hiked through half a mile of mesquite, cholla and prickly pear to intercept the group. Six escaped, but two Mexican men were captured with seven burlap packs, each filled with 50 pounds of marijuana that sells wholesale for $500 or more per pound.

For the agents, it was a good night’s work. “This is what we live for, stopping drugs,” said an agent who hiked in shortly after the bust to help bring in the smugglers and the contraband.

But many tribal members see the federal presence as a mixed blessing at best.

Ofelia Rivas, 53, of Meneger’s Dam Village is an Indian rights advocate and a rare border resident who agreed to speak to a reporter. She said that most families in border villages, including her own, had had a relative imprisoned for drug offenses, but that such individuals should not be blamed for the lack of legal jobs. Ms. Rivas has criticized tribal leaders for acquiescing to what she calls an oppressive federal occupation.

Federal law officials praise the tribe for its cooperation, and the Border Patrol has fielded community relations officers to minimize frictions.

Even Mr. Norris, the tribal chairman, said he had been stopped and questioned. “Quite frankly, the people are getting sick of it,” he said of the heavy outside presence. But he added that the smuggling was beyond the tribe’s ability to control.

“I hope in my lifetime we can go back to the way it used to be,” Mr. Norris said, “where people could go and walk in the daylight on our own land.”

In another effort to change federal policy on medical marijuana, Congressional Representative Barney Frank (D-MA) introduced the “Medical Marijuana Patient Protection Act,” HR 2835, late yesterday. The bill, which was co-sponsored by 13 bipartisan Members of Congress at the time of introduction, would change federal policy on medical marijuana in a number of ways. Specifically, the Act would change marijuana from a Schedule I drug, classified as having no medical value, to a Schedule II drug, which would recognize marijuana’s medical efficacy and create a regulatory framework for the FDA to begin a drug approval process for marijuana. The act would also prevent interference by the federal government in any local or state run medical marijuana program.

Although similar versions of the Act have been introduced in previous Congressional terms, the Obama Administration’s willingness to change federal policy on medical marijuana creates a new political context and may facilitate passage of this important legislation. “We are encouraged by the federal government’s (more…)

So everybody that uses cannabis has pretty much heard of the achronym THC. THC plays the biggest role in cannabis potency however it is not even close to being the sole player. There in fact is several known Cannabinoids responsible for the effects that marijuana has. THC, CBD, CBN, THCV, CBC, CBL etc… You can read this article for most of the info but I am just going to go over the first three since they are the ones being documented by most of the seed companies out there.

THC: Tetrahydrocannabinol. Produces the cerebral floating fealing found in good Sativas. May induce a psychoactive response if injested in large enough quantaties. THC has been synthiticly derived and is dubbed ‘Marinol’. Marinol has little medical applications and is largley discredited due to it’s leagthly response time (2-3 hours after ingestion). THC will not create any sleepiness in the user.

CBD: Cannabidiol. CBD is really just an enhancer to THC. Without THC, CBD has little to no effect. In a marijuana strain that is high in CBD the user will feel sleepy, hungry and genrally ‘out of it’ . CBD is responsible for the numbing body sensation that can occur when laying down. Primarly found in Indica’s, CBD is most noted for it’s ability to leangthen the effects of THC. A strain high in CBD may keep the user medicated for sometimes twice as long! Chocolate has also been claimed to increase the duration of cannabis effects. CBD has also been toted as being a very promising cancer killer.

CBN: Cannabinol. CBN is the little brother of all the cannabinoids. It doesn’t carry potent mind bending effects like THC and CBD but it has it’s place. Just like steel oxidizes to create rust, THC oxidizes to create CBN. CBN does increase the leangth of a users experience but not nearly as much as CBD. CBN is noted for it’s ability to make a user feel confused and dizzy. A strain high in CBN will induce a sleepy hangover that is usually unwanted. For the most part, CBN should be kept to a minimum of 0-.5% since it’s usually a result of exposure to air.

Justices reject appeals from San Diego and San Bernardino counties seeking to throw out the state marijuana law. Patients likely will be able to seek ID cards showing they’re eligible to use the drug.

The Supreme Court rejected appeals today from two hold-out counties in Southern California that object to the state’s 13-year-old medical marijuana law and claimed it should be struck down as violating the federal drug-control act.

Without comment, the court turned down the pair of appeals.

The action likely will clear the way for patients in San Diego and San Bernardino counties to seek county-issued identification cards that show they are eligible to possess and use marijuana.

These identification cards have been required under state law since 2004, but the two counties have refused to issue them. Their lawyers had asserted the state’s authorization for using medical marijuana conflicted with the zero-tolerance policy set by federal law.

“Our theory is that a state law which authorizes people to violate federal law is preempted” and, therefore, unconstitutional, Thomas Bunton, a deputy county counsel in San Diego, said last week.

Federal officials have continued to insist that all use of marijuana is illegal, even in states such as California. However, Atty. Gen. Eric Holder said recently that the federal government will not devote great effort to prosecuting low-level marijuana cases.

Lawyers for San Diego and San Bernardino counties had gone to court seeking a clear ruling on whether the state law violated the federal drug law. San Diego NORML, a marijuana advocacy group, had threatened to sue the county in 2005 for not complying with the state law by refusing to issue identification cards.

Last year, a state appeals court upheld the California medical marijuana law and said it was not rendered void by the federal drug law. The California Supreme Court refused to hear an appeal from the two counties.

However, both counties appealed to the Supreme Court, but their appeals were dismissed today.

Graham Boyd, director of the ACLU’s Drug Reform Law Project, said today’s order “marks a significant victory for medical marijuana patients and their advocates nationwide.” It dispels any remaining doubts that the state laws are valid, he said, and it “leaves ample room for states to move forward . . . with independent medical marijuana policies.”

Since California’s voters adopted the Compassionate Use Act in 1996, 12 other states have approved measures permitting medical use of marijuana. The others are Alaska, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington. The New Hampshire Legislature passed a similar measure recently that awaits action by the governor.

The federal government, however, has continued to insist that the sale or use of marijuana is illegal under the Controlled Substances Act. This 1970 law designates marijuana as a Schedule I drug that has “no currently accepted medical use” in the United States.

Federal authorities also have asserted they can arrest and prosecute all those who use or sell marijuana in California and other states that have authorized medical use of the drug.

Four years ago, the Supreme Court ruled that Congress and the federal government had the constitutional authority to regulate the sale and use of marijuana under its power over interstate commerce. The 6-3 decision, in the case of Gonzales versus Raich, rejected the claim that personal use of homegrown marijuana was off limits to federal authority. But the court did not rule then on whether the state’s law allowing medical use of marijuana was void because it conflicted with the federal drug-control law.

In its appeal, San Diego county’s lawyers had questioned whether the California law authorizing medical use of marijuana “is preempted under the Supremacy Clause” of the Constitution by the federal law forbidding all use of marijuana.

Don’t get me wrong because i’m glad to see any progress for marijuana what so ever, but when i think about the california medical industry i can’t help but be disgusted. Why couldn’t california have program similar to the OMMP?

Why is marijuana practically legal but extremely over priced? God if lived in california i’d probably be spending 400 dollars a week on pot. The states capitalistic elitist approach to marijuana reform makes no sense to me, it’s almost a step backwards. If this trend continues soon enough marijuana will be legal altogether, the market dominated by massive corporations, and the prices, OUTRAGEOUS.

EXACT QUOTE FROM NORML’S WEBSITE

(im sure they wont mind me spreading this fantastic information)

U.S. Attorney General Says Justice Department Will No Longer Interfere With States’ Medical Pot Policies

February 26th, 2009 By: Paul Armentano, NORML Deputy Director
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Score one for the good guys!

Earlier this month, new U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder promised a clean break from the policies of the Bush administration. Yesterday, during a live interview on C-Span, he affirmed that this change includes ending the DEA raids of state-authorized medical marijuana providers!

Responding to a reporter’s question regarding the DEA’s recent actions against several California medical cannabis providers, Holder stated: “What the President said during the campaign . . . will be consistent with what we will be doing here in law enforcement. . . What [President Obama] said during the campaign . . . is now American policy.”

You can watch the video of Attorney General Holder’s remarks here.

Holder’s statement marks a dramatic shift in U.S. drug policy, and is a major victory for the 72 million Americans who reside in states where the use of medical cannabis is legal! It also lends support to the ongoing efforts in Minnesota, New Jersey, and Rhode Island — each of which are debating legislative proposals to make the production and distribution of medical cannabis legal under state law.

At this time, NORML would like to personally thank those of you who responded to our request to contact the Attorney General’s office and urge Eric Holder to call off the DEA raids. Your phone calls and e-mails have helped to change U.S. marijuana policy!

So go ahead and give yourself a pat on the back. And while you’re at it, click here to thank the new Attorney General for supporting the will of the people and the health and welfare of seriously ill patients.

“Change we can believe in?” Yes it is, and it’s about time.

Posted in: News.
Tagged: california · drugs · legalization · marijuana · News · Politics · pot · recession ·reefer · war on drugs

The diversity of flavors that various strains of marijuana possess are undoubtedly something of marvel; from the citric and tangy taste of Jack The Ripper to the earthy and sweet taste of Grand Master Kush, marijuana grows with an abundant variety of palette stimulating flavors.

Although the pure taste of marijuana alone is more than suffice, I do enjoy the occasional flavored rolling paper or gutted cigar wrap. However not all flavored rolling papers or wraps actually taste like the flavors they advertise-none the less-I’d like to know:

What is the best tasting rolling paper you have smoked with? (If you don’t use wraps or papers to use your medicine feel free to input your method of use.)

In terms of flavor, I personally enjoy and recommend the smooth and minty taste of Icy Mint Optimo Cigar paper.

Landrace seeds are seeds that have been grown locally in an area for…well…a long time. They are seeds that have been grown in a isolated area for several hundred generations. The longer the plant spends in that area the more acclimated it becomes to that environment. As plants breed they evolve to grow better in their environment, gaining and losing attributes giving it its own uniqueness.

All the wonderful cannabis grown today is basically a cross of maybe 10 different base genetics (South Indian, Brazilian, Laos, Cambodian, Mexican, Afghanistan, China, Russia etc). Each area providing its own unique characteristics to produce the quality we get today. These genetics all came from landrace seeds that breeders identified for certain qualities. For instance, pure Citral is a strain that came from the Pakistani town of Chitral and easily identified by its strong lemon citrus smell/flavor. Any strain with a distinct lemony citrus flavor (Super Lemon Haze anyone) has probably been derived from the original landrace seed from Chitral Pakistan. Hindu Kush is almost pure landrace and was pulled from the Hindu Kush mountain range. Its famous for its potent indica high and copious resin production.

Breeders are constantly searching new areas for landrace genetics that offer something new to our ever-expanding strains. Once a landrace seed has been selected, it has to be stabilized. This is the process of crossing desired phenotypes (of the same plant) to achieve a plant that produces uniform and consistent babys. An un-stabilized cannabis plant can have several phenotypes that can be for the better or the worse. AK-47 has a very cherry phenotype that is absolutely amazing. You may get one of these phenos after buying several packs of non-feminized seeds.

The big hit on the market today is auto-flowering strains. These strains are landrace seeds from taken from the northern hemisphere where days may have 24 hours of light. Well obviously a plant is never going to flower on 24 hours of light (since Indicas and Sativas rely on the shorter days of the years end to flower near the equator). These northern hemisphere plants basically got thrown into the ‘other’ Cannabis category named Cannabis Ruderalis. Ruderalis simply flowers after two or so weeks of growing since it has no idea what time of the year it is. Outdoor growers are reading this going…”wait…I don’t have to build a light deprivation green house to yield more than once a year”. This is indeed a fact. The problem is that Ruderalis in its native environment produces NO THC.

Breeders identified this two week flowering trait and thought “This would be awesome for outdoor growers if it got you medicated.” I don’t know exactly who (probably Dutch Passion) made the first but somebody stabilized a cross of Cannabis Ruderalis and Cannabis Indica/Sativa that produces a good amount of THC. Two months from seed to harvest pushing 5+% THC. The plants are small but with a complete grow time of two months what can you expect. Now that the genes are stabilized watch for some unique auto-flowering strains.

Here is the latest case on medical marijuana concentrates in California. According to the ruling, all chemical extracted THC from Marijuana is Illegal. Which means, any THC extracted using Butaine,  alcohol, or any other type of chemical is not prohibited. Here is the full case hearing:

Niall Patrick Bergen appeals from the judgment entered following his plea of (more…)