National cannabis orgs are predicting passage of ballot initiatives in Oklahoma and Utah.
[Note: the formal certification status of the “Utah Medical Cannabis Act” won’t be known for weeks yet. But unlike the Utah Medical Ass’n, we at least know its name.]
[UMA’s statement purposely and unprofessionally calls it the “Utah Marijuana Initiative,” changing the scientific plant name to the slang name the government chose in 1937, and worse, leaves out that the Act is medical. UMA bills itself UT’s leading physician organization – while repeatedly stooping to bush league, adolescent dissing tactics. UT’s doctors and those listening to them based on their previous reputation – like LDS leadership – deserve better..!!]
There article notes other states have seen church opposition, but not in a state with a population so concentrated in a single religion.
Still, the LDS church has already expressed disapproval in recent years and has only seen increasing member support, now around 2/3, a sign that as long as it hasn’t been declared a matter of doctrine, members are feeling free to keep their own counsel.
Before his elevation, the current church president stated the church has no official position (see our recent blog of Robert Gehrke’s column), so the matter depends on how vigorously – having let people know their concern and preference – authorities decide to insert themselves into the debate or not.
In either case, as the debate has been framed, much depends on how strongly members agree UMA has made a convincing anti-initiative case.
(Spoiler alert: #UMA has done no such thing.)
The article also shows something else UMA is wrong about: Even ruby red OK’s proposal is more expansive in many ways than UT’s.
“Nathan Frodsham, a 45-year-old married Mormon father of three, is hoping the measure passes so he can get off opioids and back to using the [doctor-recommended] vaporized form he used in Seattle for painful osteoarthritis in his neck.
Frodsham wasn’t discouraged by the church statement, which he notes doesn’t go as far in opposition as when the church explicitly asked members to vote against full marijuana legalization in Arizona and Nevada [a very different matter not in play in Utah in any way!]. He said marijuana is a natural plant and that the religion’s health code doesn’t single out cannabis as being prohibited.
‘I think there’s some room for interpretation on this,’ said Frodsham.”
Hopefully some dialog with member advocates and actually knowledgeable, objective physicians may prevent a campaign donnybrook.
As long as possible TRUCE will advocate on scientific and evidence-based grounds. Shifting the debate to the proper role of church and state would cause the real issue – patients’ ned for and benefit from a real medical cannabis program – to get sidetracked – and solve nothing, as that’s not on the ballot.
More in the artice….
#MMJ #UTpol #OKpol #TRUCE
See full article – Medical marijuana push spreads to Utah, Oklahoma
