SmokeDog420
New Member
Dale Gieringer of California NORML, a co-author of Prop 215, was among the organizers who filed papers in Oakland Feb. 19 to get a "tax-and-regulate-cannabis" initiative on the city's November ballot.
C-Notes: What are you trying to achieve?
Gieringer: The Oakland Cannabis Revenue and Regulation Ordinance directs the city to establish a system of regulated and taxed cannabis distribution for adults as soon as possible under California law. It will call on the police to make arrests for private adult use their lowest priority. "Private adult use" is the key.
C-Notes: California has only legalized "medical use." Your initiative is basically a way to tell the politicians: "Aduts should be allowed to use in private settings, even without a doctor's approval." Which is bold -but merely symbolic.
Gieringer: It's the first resolution to our knowledge that calls for outright legalization. Come to think of it, the Nevada and Alaska initiatives and Jack Herer's old hemp initiatives all called for legalization, though they went down in flames. The Oakland initiative is somewhat different in that it suggests an Amsterdam model, with the specific object of keeping pot off the streets, out of the hands of dealers, and away from kids. The other difference is that, hopefully, it won't lose.
C-Notes: Who's backing it?
Gieringer: The Oakland Civil Liberties Alliance is the PAC running the initiative campaign. OCLA [pronounced "Okla"] has received a start-up grant from MPP [the Marijuana Policy Project] and additional support from local donors. We need to raise substantially more to fund the ballot drive. The OCLA board consists of Joe DeVries [aide to Alameda County Supervisor Nate Miley], Mikki Norris [veteran activist], Richard Lee [club proprietor] and me, with the consultants being Progressive Communications -Rebecca Kaplan, Clare Lewis et al. We have also had help from DPA and other local Oakland activists.
C-Notes: How much money has been spent to date?
Gieringer: I couldn't say. It's been a couple of months now since OCLA actually got formed and the papers filed... It's a project that's going to cost, probably, more than a hundred thousand dollars. We need to raise another thirty thousand to fund the petition drive.
C-Notes: And O'Shaughnessy's [the journal of the pro-cannabis doctors, edited by yours truly] has to beg to pay the printer! Why do you think this initiative is worth the money, Dale? Why do you think it's a good idea?
Gieringer: One reason all of us think it's a good idea is that the poll results were so fantastically good.
C-Notes: Isn't that the tail wagging the dog? To do an initiative because a poll shows you'll win? Polling is for people who don't have a working-class perspective or working-class friends. It's a racket.
Gieringer: Then you don't belong in politics. Polling is pretty essential. When you need to raise money, you need to be able to show your funders what the prospects are for victory, what the weak spots are-
C-Notes: -According to the poll. You're assuming that it's a valid science.
Gieringer: Of course it is... Every poll that we took for Prop 215 was instrumental in our figuring out how to word that initiative properly.
C-Notes: That's interesting. What did the polls tell you to cut? What did they tell you to add?
Gieringer: They told us not to put in plant numbers.
C-Notes: Anybody could have told you that. It raises a confusing image and all kinds of unanswerable questions about weight and drying and dosage. No need to go there.
Gieringer: The polls showed that the concept of growing your own medicine - -cultivation-was not the most popular thing. People do not respond favorably to the notion that people should be able to grow their own medicine. They respond more favorably to the notion that they should be able to "get" such medicine. So if we wanted to get more popular, we would have not referred to cultivation at all.
C-Notes: According to your pollster. But during the course of a campaign, there's quite a lot you can achieve in the way of education.
Gieringer: The way you do that is you ask the poll question, and then you throw a lot of statements at them in the poll -campaign-pitch kind of things- and then you ask the question again, and you see how the response changes, and it almost always does. You get a swing of a few percent in there and that's an important thing to take into account.
C-Notes: Okay, so what was it that your polls revealed about Oakland voters?
Gieringer: People really like the idea of cannabis being controlled and regulated somehow, and the concept that having licensed places will help control it in a way that it's not controlled now...
C-Notes: Did it ever occur to you that you're creating a bureaucratic nightmare? That the shopkeepers will soon be longing for the good old days of anarchy?
Geiringer: It'll be like the Alcoholic Beverages Commission.
C-Notes: My point exactly.
Gieiringer: We want to put the people of the city on record in favor of legal cannabis for adult use. We're saying what we mean. Not "We've got to make it available for sick people who need it" or "We've got to reduce the number of non-violent prisoners," or "We want to decriminalize it." We never talk about the real solution to the problem, which is to legalize it outright.
C-Notes: But you're talking about "Regulate and Tax."
Gieringer: That's what legalization is.
C-Notes ( just getting it ): Oh. Well, why not use the word "Legalization?"
Gieringer: That doesn't do so well in the polls.
C-Notes: I don't believe it! It's all how you say it. And who's saying it... I don't believe that the reference to cultivation cost Prop 215 any votes. The right to cultivate is the right to garden. I also think Prop 215 would have won just as big if it had included the right to distribute. Todd McCormick says it was a poll that convinced you not to.
Gieringer: To be truthful, we never even tested the word "legalization" in our own polls. We didn't do so because the word has fared so badly in other folks' polls. It appears to conjure up the notion of alcohol & tobacco and how they are promoted, mass marketed and advertised. People don't like that.
I think our message will ring truer than what many Oakland public officials are saying, namely that "marijuana is fine for medicine, but we don't want to countenance adults actually sitting down to enjoy it." The people of Oakland have matured way beyond the point where the politicians believe they're at. Most Oaklanders are ready to accept an adult using cannabis without a doctor's prescription.
C-Notes: ( awash in self-pity ) I'm all for you. It's just money-envy. Greenness envy.
Gieringer: I'm sorry that newsprint is going the way of the dinosaurs. Truthfully, no sarcasm intended.
Pubdate: Wed, 03 Mar 2004
Source: Anderson Valley Advertiser (CA)
Column: Cannabinotes
Copyright: 2004 Anderson Valley Advertiser
Contact: ava@pacific.net
C-Notes: What are you trying to achieve?
Gieringer: The Oakland Cannabis Revenue and Regulation Ordinance directs the city to establish a system of regulated and taxed cannabis distribution for adults as soon as possible under California law. It will call on the police to make arrests for private adult use their lowest priority. "Private adult use" is the key.
C-Notes: California has only legalized "medical use." Your initiative is basically a way to tell the politicians: "Aduts should be allowed to use in private settings, even without a doctor's approval." Which is bold -but merely symbolic.
Gieringer: It's the first resolution to our knowledge that calls for outright legalization. Come to think of it, the Nevada and Alaska initiatives and Jack Herer's old hemp initiatives all called for legalization, though they went down in flames. The Oakland initiative is somewhat different in that it suggests an Amsterdam model, with the specific object of keeping pot off the streets, out of the hands of dealers, and away from kids. The other difference is that, hopefully, it won't lose.
C-Notes: Who's backing it?
Gieringer: The Oakland Civil Liberties Alliance is the PAC running the initiative campaign. OCLA [pronounced "Okla"] has received a start-up grant from MPP [the Marijuana Policy Project] and additional support from local donors. We need to raise substantially more to fund the ballot drive. The OCLA board consists of Joe DeVries [aide to Alameda County Supervisor Nate Miley], Mikki Norris [veteran activist], Richard Lee [club proprietor] and me, with the consultants being Progressive Communications -Rebecca Kaplan, Clare Lewis et al. We have also had help from DPA and other local Oakland activists.
C-Notes: How much money has been spent to date?
Gieringer: I couldn't say. It's been a couple of months now since OCLA actually got formed and the papers filed... It's a project that's going to cost, probably, more than a hundred thousand dollars. We need to raise another thirty thousand to fund the petition drive.
C-Notes: And O'Shaughnessy's [the journal of the pro-cannabis doctors, edited by yours truly] has to beg to pay the printer! Why do you think this initiative is worth the money, Dale? Why do you think it's a good idea?
Gieringer: One reason all of us think it's a good idea is that the poll results were so fantastically good.
C-Notes: Isn't that the tail wagging the dog? To do an initiative because a poll shows you'll win? Polling is for people who don't have a working-class perspective or working-class friends. It's a racket.
Gieringer: Then you don't belong in politics. Polling is pretty essential. When you need to raise money, you need to be able to show your funders what the prospects are for victory, what the weak spots are-
C-Notes: -According to the poll. You're assuming that it's a valid science.
Gieringer: Of course it is... Every poll that we took for Prop 215 was instrumental in our figuring out how to word that initiative properly.
C-Notes: That's interesting. What did the polls tell you to cut? What did they tell you to add?
Gieringer: They told us not to put in plant numbers.
C-Notes: Anybody could have told you that. It raises a confusing image and all kinds of unanswerable questions about weight and drying and dosage. No need to go there.
Gieringer: The polls showed that the concept of growing your own medicine - -cultivation-was not the most popular thing. People do not respond favorably to the notion that people should be able to grow their own medicine. They respond more favorably to the notion that they should be able to "get" such medicine. So if we wanted to get more popular, we would have not referred to cultivation at all.
C-Notes: According to your pollster. But during the course of a campaign, there's quite a lot you can achieve in the way of education.
Gieringer: The way you do that is you ask the poll question, and then you throw a lot of statements at them in the poll -campaign-pitch kind of things- and then you ask the question again, and you see how the response changes, and it almost always does. You get a swing of a few percent in there and that's an important thing to take into account.
C-Notes: Okay, so what was it that your polls revealed about Oakland voters?
Gieringer: People really like the idea of cannabis being controlled and regulated somehow, and the concept that having licensed places will help control it in a way that it's not controlled now...
C-Notes: Did it ever occur to you that you're creating a bureaucratic nightmare? That the shopkeepers will soon be longing for the good old days of anarchy?
Geiringer: It'll be like the Alcoholic Beverages Commission.
C-Notes: My point exactly.
Gieiringer: We want to put the people of the city on record in favor of legal cannabis for adult use. We're saying what we mean. Not "We've got to make it available for sick people who need it" or "We've got to reduce the number of non-violent prisoners," or "We want to decriminalize it." We never talk about the real solution to the problem, which is to legalize it outright.
C-Notes: But you're talking about "Regulate and Tax."
Gieringer: That's what legalization is.
C-Notes ( just getting it ): Oh. Well, why not use the word "Legalization?"
Gieringer: That doesn't do so well in the polls.
C-Notes: I don't believe it! It's all how you say it. And who's saying it... I don't believe that the reference to cultivation cost Prop 215 any votes. The right to cultivate is the right to garden. I also think Prop 215 would have won just as big if it had included the right to distribute. Todd McCormick says it was a poll that convinced you not to.
Gieringer: To be truthful, we never even tested the word "legalization" in our own polls. We didn't do so because the word has fared so badly in other folks' polls. It appears to conjure up the notion of alcohol & tobacco and how they are promoted, mass marketed and advertised. People don't like that.
I think our message will ring truer than what many Oakland public officials are saying, namely that "marijuana is fine for medicine, but we don't want to countenance adults actually sitting down to enjoy it." The people of Oakland have matured way beyond the point where the politicians believe they're at. Most Oaklanders are ready to accept an adult using cannabis without a doctor's prescription.
C-Notes: ( awash in self-pity ) I'm all for you. It's just money-envy. Greenness envy.
Gieringer: I'm sorry that newsprint is going the way of the dinosaurs. Truthfully, no sarcasm intended.
Pubdate: Wed, 03 Mar 2004
Source: Anderson Valley Advertiser (CA)
Column: Cannabinotes
Copyright: 2004 Anderson Valley Advertiser
Contact: ava@pacific.net
