Tuesday, October 21, 2008

Going Out In Style

I meant to link to this a few days ago. I thought the last paragraph of the letter was the most interesting part. For the past few months, I've been buying hemp nuts and milk at a health food store. They taste great and are extraordinarily healthy -- among the healthiest foods on the planet, actually. Logically, hemp should have nothing to do with the completely separate issue of marijuana. Hemp is not pot (and I don't have a strong opinion either way on the legal status of the latter). But if not for a Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals decision in 2004, the sale of hemp-based food would be illegal. Cultivation in the U.S. is still illegal; incredibly, the products sold legally in U.S. stores must be imported from Canada.

For more on the nutritional and legal background, here's the Wiki entry. And for a broader perspective on the politics of healthy eating, here's a good article.

18 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

That can't differentiate hemp from pot from their helicopters. Same heat signature. That is why it is illegal. The fed has to wage its "war on drugs". Like its "war on poverty" and its "war on terrorism"...hahaha...how many losing wars can we wage at once?

10/21/2008 11:10 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

so, let's get this straight. first you liked kerry in '04. then, you're horrified not only by the bushes but also by the mccain/gramms of the world. then, THEN, you seem to like obama. now, you're eating hemp. ummm... time to lose the "i'm a life-long conservative" in your bio, dude. just sayin'.

10/21/2008 11:12 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I don't see why voting for Obama (if indeed our host plans to do so) gets you kicked out of the conservative club. I am an actual liberal and Obama is the junior Senator from my state, so I've known about him for quite some time. He's not a liberal. He's actually just a tad right of center from my perspective. I like him though, because even when I disagree with his stand on an issue, I know he's thought out his position and can defend it.

10/21/2008 11:26 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I dunno, elfranko, if Milton Friedman could (and often did) say the war on drugs was a disastrous sham, I suspect CR saying he doesn't mind hemp products isn't exactly going against at least some part of conservative thought.

(Of course, now I'm imagining Freedom to Choose 2008: Know Your Hemp, which I strongly suggest CR should pitch as a TV series somewhere.)

10/21/2008 11:26 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I got to the part were the writer says this country hasn't had a great philosopher since Adam Smith and began to wonder.

The letter sounds like a hoax, and like much else you find in health food stores, the hype about hemp is just that...

10/21/2008 11:28 AM  
Blogger The Cunning Realist said...

Elfranko: please direct me to the chapter in The Compleat Conservative that endorses economic ruin, geopolitical disaster, and bad food.

10/21/2008 12:03 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Hemp is a gateway food. Next thing you know, you'll be eating granola and tree bark.

10/21/2008 12:27 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I don't mind the US being a crazy country.. I just wish you didn't have so much influence/power over the rest of us.

10/21/2008 12:34 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

haha...I stopped for a second there also...but he did say Thomas Jefferson first...just to clarify. Sorry...but he is legit. And funny. And spot on about everything he said in that letter.
http://ftalphaville.ft.com/blog/2007/09/27/7666/having-a-lahde-the-410-per-cent-man/

10/21/2008 12:57 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The trouble with Adam Smith is that he was Scotish..

10/21/2008 2:23 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

ummm...duh

10/21/2008 3:58 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

What about hemp clothing? At a local mega-grocery store, they sell boxes of cake mix, brownies, made with hemp.

I'm more worried about "food" products from China. I was at a Walmart and was deciding what type of evaporated canned milk to buy. Walmart had their "own" brand. I looked at the label and it said made in China. This was the same time babies in China were dying from contaminated milk. Icks! I decided to skip the purchase.

Our local representative said that American's shouldn't buy prescription drugs from Canada because the FDA can't control the quality, and then on the other hand we are getting all this questionable, potentially deadly, unchecked food from China and around the world.

Yes, it is corporations controlling access. And the name of the game is, "pay to play." Many politicians say they want people to "be on their own", yet they cripple the very people. I often think of all the knowledge and abilities we lose over time, because corporations want control. I'm pretty sure Mother Nature knows more than corporations :-)

I went through a box of books and papers that belonged to a relative. Inside were notes on taking care of oneself. The time period would be 30-60's. They didn't buy drugs or run to the doctor. They managed on their own.

Ever walk into a dollar store and see the "food" products. Icks!

Wouldn't hemp be a viable alternative for tobacco farmers so they could keep their farms?

Good reading - Beating the Food Giants"

"Trade Secrets" - about the Chemical burden on our bodies. Done by Bill Moyers.

This is Cancer Awareness month. They beg for money for treatment, but they never talk about the causes.

10/21/2008 6:50 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

ALOHA !!

Legalize it! Make lobbyists illegal!

I can attest the area where I reside on the Big Island was quite wealthy when pot was not policed. Once pot was policed the major growers moved to Oregon and now everyone here is on welfare and food stamps!

Who won and what exactly did they win?

No more WARS on NOUNS!!! Isn't it obvious yet?

10/22/2008 2:08 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Wow, he's my new favorite (former) hedge fund manager! He is right about dumb-ass rich-kid Harvard MBA's. He's right about the corporate stranglehold on our government and media. And he is damn right about hemp.

Hemp is possibly the most useful plant on earth. It can be used to make textiles, paper, food, oil, and biodegradable plastic. It grows almost anywhere, without pesticides.

Marijuana is mostly harmless. Yes, people can develop abuse problems with it. However, the smoke has not been linked to cancer or lung disease. If it's price weren't inflated by it's illegality, it could be eaten instead of smoked anyway. It has been shown to have medicinal uses. It has effectively no over dosage and has minimal interaction with other drugs.

Cannabis is a useful, renewable industrial resource, and a safe medical and psychoactive drug. Keeping it's use illegal is the height and depth of stupidity. As the late Bill Hicks said, "Marijuana grows naturally upon this earth. Doesn't making Nature illegal seem, I don't know, unnatural?"

10/22/2008 10:46 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

hahaha...that is correct. They have made knowingly growing a plant illegal. But of course...maybe the joke is on us. After all if the government catches you growing pot..or even just decides they want your property...they can storm into your home and shoot you...claim you are a drug dealer...steal your bank accounts and your property...and if that doesn't work out...just take the property when your heirs can't afford the tax payments.
Of course...that would never happen here. haha

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_P._Scott


Later, the lead agent in the case, sheriff's deputy Gary Spencer and his partner John Cater posed for photographs arm-in-arm outside Scott's cabin.[4]

Despite a subsequent search of Scott's ranch using helicopters, dogs, searchers on foot, and a high-tech Jet Propulsion Laboratory device for detecting trace amounts of sinsemilla, no marijuana -- or any other illegal drug -- was found.[5]


[edit] The fallout
Scott's widow, the former Frances Plante, along with four of Scott's children from prior marriages, subsequently filed a $100 million wrongful death suit against the county and federal government. For eight years the case dragged on, requiring the services of 15 attorneys and some 30 volume binders to hold all the court documents. In January 2003, attorneys for Los Angeles County and the federal government agreed to settle with Scott's heirs and estate for $5 million, even though the sheriff's department still maintained its deputies had done nothing wrong. [5]

Michael D. Bradbury, the District Attorney of Ventura County conducted an investigation into the raid and the aftermath, issuing a report on the events leading up to and on October 2, 1993. [1] He concluded that asset forfeiture was a motive for the raid. [6][7]

The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department issued their own report in response, clearing everyone involved of wrong doing while California Attorney General Dan Lungren criticized District Attorney Bradbury. Sheriff Spencer sued D.A. Bradbury for defamation in response to the report.[4] The court ruled in favor of Michael Bradbury and ordered Sheriff Spencer to pay $50,000 in Bradbury's legal bills. [8]

10/23/2008 1:41 AM  
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