Open Letter to Kimberly Yee

Hello Senator Yee & your staff,

This is Mikel Weisser from Safer AZ (the cannabis reform group who testified on your bill SB1122), speaking as an individual. Our organization has tried to reach out to your office multiple times and failed to receive a single appointment, after over a year of requests. When the people cannot gain the ear of their representatives , how can justice ever be served?

Hopefully by now, you, or your office more likely, should have received extra attention the past couple of days over your efforts to block HB2333, presumably in favor of your own bill, SB1389, neither of which are likely to receive 3/4s vote from the house and senate and so, like your thinly veiled efforts w Kelli Ward on SB1122, it's mostly about the theater of appearing to be an anti-drug warrior in a time when that stance is becoming the equivalent of the new Jim Crow.

I have never understood the mentality of those who wish to dominate and oppress others. I prefer to think that that is not your motivation. With the course of history so clearly working against you, I wonder why you would continue to define yourself so. 

100 yrs from now, people will think of you & your fellow anti-cannabis warriors the same way we think of men like Joseph McCarthy, George Wallace ("Segregation now, Segregation forever!") or of Supreme Court Justice John Marshall Harlan, who argued passionately for the principles of the Chinese Exclusion Act, saying that ethnic group was "so different from our own that we do not permit those belonging to it to become citizens of the United States." 

 I ask you to think how different your actions are from these politicians, all of whom were once in the majority and thought of themselves as heroes of the public good, even as they destroyed the lives of millions and distorted the American Dream in their efforts to stop the progress of time and the will of the people.

Senator Yee, our organization, among many, many other well-informed concerned groups and citizens, have tried repeatedly to educate you on the abuses of power and abuses of the people your work has caused. We have provided extensive documentation,published our own articles, rallied public sentiment, proposed solutions (& provided them to your offices), & conducted multiple legislative interviews, often at great personal expense for suffering patients and victims our unjust laws, in an honest open effort to warn you of this folly of being part of perpetuating the wrong-headed, medically dishonest, corrupt war against cannabis. You have only turned a deaf ear and a cold heart.

This is not leadership, this is oppression. This is not sage wisdom, it's arrogant ignorance and willful disregard of the lives you've been entrusted with protecting. Look to the past, listen to the present and be ready for the future. 

History is passing you by.

--MIKEL WEISSER 3/19/14

Part Two of Mikel's Interview w KTOX shock jock, Luca Zanna: "The 2nd Amendment: This Time It's War!"

By introduction for the rest of the world that does not live in the very red land of Mohave County and the tri-state listening area: Luca Zanna is the survivalist, weapons-enthusiast, right-wing musician and talk show host who leads the attack on liberal values, in our area on his gun-focused radio talk-show, Love, Guns &Freedom.

If you would have asked me to talk about guns I would generally say I am not interested, especially if you asked me to speak about them politically. As a Christian I gave up my guns in my mid-20s and haven't been interested since. But as a citizen I am already sick of politicians trying to enforce their religious values on others.

As far as I am concerned, Guns Rights in America are NOT a crisis, but instead are a falsely hyped political topic devised by the Right to destroy the Left. They are constantly a source of right-wing agitation and the GOP fixation on the issue churns up profits of the gun industry while promoting a toxic atmosphere of fear and anger that keeps the attention away from the true issues: injustice, inequality, improving opportunity and improving life in general. (You know, the “provide for the common defense” and  “promote the general welfare” stuff the Right are always too busy to work on?) So, I was somewhat uneasy about the idea of doing a whole talk show on a subject that is not something I personally am into and I felt was intended to trap me.

The rightwing have turned their obsession w the bounds of personal freedom into a borderline public menace. The extremist language they use to whip their supporters into a frenzy, generally goes unchecked in a crowd fueled by testosterone, misinformation and rage.

 I figured it was time someone put a stop to it, or at least went on record as calling them on their crap. 

So I went into battle.

 In all honesty, though I was more than 50 miles away from Zanna and the KTOX studio in Needles, CA (the photo of us clowning is from my earlier interview taped 2/23/14—available here), though I was snuggled in my office in a comfy chair w a laptop and a cell phone, the intensity of this experience was as physical exhausting and exhilarating as if we had wrestled no holds barred for the whole two hours. No matter what you may think of Luca’s opinions, you can’t fault the man for facility, tenacity or inventiveness. When he realized I’d kept him buffaloed for the whole designated one hour time slot, he brought on two extra guests to try & corral me, but I buffaloed them too. I tell ya, partner, w three of them gunslingers, all w itchy trigger fingers, it took some doing to dodge their figurative bullets, especially when literally discussing ammo.

Zanna may have lost this round in our ongoing debate, but it wasn’t for want of trying. This interview was the hardest and best political war of words I have faced so far and hopefully will stand as a record of my positions on gun control and/or the culture of violence America must overcome if we will ever have true liberty for any of us.

Liberal listeners, take notes of the arguments of the Right and the ways to derail them. (NOTE: in the 2^nd half of the episode where I have three of them kept confounded.) Conservatives, catch a clue: argue the real issues, don’t waste everyone’s time screaming about boogeymen that aren’t actually out to get you. Democrats don’t want your guns, we have our own. We also have the sense to realize we have other problems we HAVE to solve and don’t want to spend all our time reassuring you we aren’t your enemy on this issue.

If we are going to battle, let’s take on the real enemies, the folks who pit us against each other for their profit and our destruction. That is a war worth fighting (though obviously, as a man of peace, I am not advocating violence.) When we stop squabbling country mouse v city mouse and get the cat belled, then we’ll start getting somewhere.

In the meantime enjoy this two hour adventure in telling the right they’re wrong, taped live in high wire talk show techno-color.

The War Against YOU (Dr. Gosar Declares War Against Patients)

(Please understand, I hate hyperbole; so my choice of title is carefully considered)

Yesterday March 6^th 2014, my opponent, Paul Gosar made the news w his new proposed bill: one designed to prevent participants in medical marijuana programs from receiving public assistance.

“Buying your weed with food stamps? Law would nip it in the bud”

http://politics.suntimes.com/article/washington/buying-your-weed-food-stamps-law-would-nip-it-bud/wed-03052014-107pm

Note the way the cutesy title belies the fact that this is a case of a supposed doctor, turning his back on the suffering and punishing the patients for wanting to take medication to ease their suffering. Thanks, Doc. This comes on the heels of me spending the past month battling a bad bill brought by my own state senator, the dishonorable “Doctor” Kelli Ward, who just tried to throw the 40,000 AZ medical marijuana patients under the bus for a bogus hemp bill … twice. You can watch a video report of the legislative battle to protect patients from Ward’s propaganda campaign here.

“Safer AZ Feb. Report: The Truth About AZ's SB1122”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S49lwnlWVNA

Their attacks on social security, the SNAP program, Social Security, education, against women, the poor the immigrants & the LGBT community are relentless and heartless—the government as the enemy of the people. It is a war.

And, it’s waged against you.

Help Me fight back.

Defeat the Hard Right agenda and help America move forward.

CONTACT YOUR LOCAL DEMOCRATIC PARTY TODAY

JOIN THE FIGHT