I’ve been keeping up with those of you who have been e-mailing me, but for all others who may be wondering where I have been, let me just say that I’m sorry for waiting this long to check in.

For those of you familiar with me, I am a private person and do not want to get into too many details about my personal life. What I will say, however, is that quite recently I lost two very important people in my life and–combined with other stresses in my life–it made me want to just take a break from all the arguing (though I love it so much) and just focus what little extra time I have in a given week on myself.

With the holiday now passed (though another looming on the horizon), and the semester nearly at an end, I will be back into gear getting things fixed up around here — including a forum, which was also a casualty of recent circumstance.

So for those of you who missed me, I will be back soon. For those of you who didn’t notice… aww. =P

Yours,
Eric

While I was watching it, a light bulb clicked on for a marijuana-related parody that I call, “Marijuana – There’s a Strain for That!”

If you enjoy it, please share it! Aside from the entertainment factor, I think this really makes a point about how versatile marijuana truly is.

In the end, I had an amazing time. I met a wonderful assortment of marijuana activists, entrepreneurs, and plain ol’ enthusiasts. The spoils of my adventure came as an assortment of stickers, fliers, binders, pins, pens, and a few personal souvenirs.

The first thing I did when I got home was begin to go through my photos (I took nearly a thousand) and find the ones that best represented the show, then start writing while everything was fresh in my mind. It took a couple days, but I spent hours and hours writing the post only to have WordPress glitch out, refresh, and delete the entire draft.

Thankfully, the event was fun enough that I still vividly remember everything I wanted to talk about… I just need to exercise these fingers again to share it with you guys. It will be pretty long, so I will chunk it into two parts.

It’s nearly 4:00 pm on Sunday, June 14th, 2009 when I finally conclude my pilgrimage to visit the last day of the THC Expo. I marvel at the amount of people in the parking structure and hurry to join the trickling flow of people into the main portion of the LA Convention Center (LACC).

As I stood in a line of greasy goateed men and skimpy-dressed women, I watched another bee line of people heading up the escalator; one wearing a tie-dyed shirt, another with dreadlocks poking curiously out the bottom of his Rastafarian hat, and all sporting flip flops. It was at this point that I realized I was in the line for an adult-oriented convention being held at the same time.

I scurried across to catch up with the group and finally found the entrance to the THC Expo 2009:

My favorite part had to be the signs that reminded happy convention goers, essentially, that they were still within the bounds of the United States and this was not the time or place to be arrested:

I figure the best way to go about this post is to organize the day into categories. For Part 1:Hemp, Organizations, Favorite Companies/Products; Part 2: Companies/Products, and Fun Stuff.

Hemp

The first thing you saw when you entered the THC Expo was a very long exhibit (I don’t think it would be fair to call it a “booth”) featuring Hemp and all of its historical, fiberous glory:

Presented by the USA Hemp Museum, the exhibit had various products created from hemp, historical documentation, and vintage hemp memorabilia. The curator, Richard Davis, was also on hand to happily answer any hemp related questions one could muster. I was thrilled that this was at the forefront for everyone to see as it helped bring to life not only the versatility and rich history of hemp, but the absurdity of it, only in recent times, becoming demonized.

Another group, Hemp Traders, was on hand to spread awareness of hemp and its related present-day industrial uses. While they only offered a few actual products, they made my day much easier by being the only geniuses selling hemp bags to hold all the hemp swag handed out by various booths. Honestly, if not for the bag I would have had a horrible time trying to juggle all my items; though I could have saved myself $5 if I had just thought ahead enough to bring my own canvas bag… then again, it wouldn’t have been a fancy hemp one. Here is a picture of the two gentlemen manning their station and some of their wares:

Organizations

There were numerous organizations at the expo promoting everything from national awareness to local activist groups. I was very happy to see some of the larger organizations take the time to shake hands at the convention.

One of the first organizations I came across was our friends at Drug Policy Alliance, sporting two gentlemen very happy to engage passerby’s:

I wanted to point out their willingness to engage people because some organizations, which will remain nameless, failed to engage me despite standing right in front reading their pamphlets. I made sure to tell them I was a huge fan of their organization’s founder, Ethan Nadelmann, a man as out-spoken as he is well-spoken.

NORML was also present to sell buttons, hand out fliers, and attempt to recruit more people to their local chapter meeting:

Another vibrant, graphic booth display was presented by the Marijuana Policy Project. Prior to taking photos, I would politely ask if the person minded being in the photo. While many were more than happy to strike a pose, others shied away from being in front of the lens; to be fair, however, I wouldn’t want me taking pictures of me either. Here is their very informative booth:

Favorite Companies/Products

I debated on whether or not I wanted to prefix this with “favorite” because everything I have chosen to write about stood out to me enough to make me want to share it. These companies and products, however, seemed to jump out a bit more to me and I wanted to highlight them.

Easily one of my favorite companies at the expo was Treating Yourself, a magazine that focuses on the medicinal aspects of marijuana. Treating Yourself had a modest booth that relied on this very happy fellow to engage you in conversation:

He handed me a free issue of their magazine and answered my various questions about it. I plan on actually reading it tonight, but I have skimmed through and I can say that I am legitimately anxious to dive in. While the cover borders on the outskirts of conservative, the contents of the magazine strikes resemblance to many other culture-magazines. The main difference is that instead of being about the marijuana culture as a whole, the focus appears to be on issues of importance to medical marijuana patients and supporters; people such as myself. I am really excited to review this magazine and possibly do a feature on the company itself if it is up to my standards.

At 5:06 pm I hung out with a fellow twitterer, Steve Bloom (aka @CelebStoner) from CelebStoner.com, a pop-culture marijuana news site:

A few marijuana-themed social networks/online companies showed up at the expo as well. One of them had another extremely large end-cap booth, lavished with comfy couches, video screens, and music:

AJNAG (”ganja” backwards), is, in their own words, “an activism, resource, and lifestyle network cultivated by the people to help connect… individuals on the… benefits of decriminalization… of [marijuana].” In less dynamic terms, they are an online social network that provides news, blogs, links, and other community resources on cannabis and the “lifestyle”. This might also be another company I take a deeper look into in a future article.

A second web company, WeedMaps.com,was headed by a couple of very friendly fellows who’s names I, quite embarrassingly, can’t recall:

WeedMaps.com offers a wide variety of features for medical marijuana patients; specifically, a Google Maps-driven locator for marijuana dispensaries in the state of California. It is very sophisticated in appearance and function, allowing you to easily enter your zip code to receive local, rated dispensary listings. My favorite feature is their “Patient Answers” section, which appears to be a highly polished, weed-oriented third party spin-off of Yahoo! Answers.

The most unique and specific product I saw was 420 Cam. Don’t let their bland web design fool you, this company is legit. Being quite the computer aficionado myself, I asked technical questions ranging from hardware to encryption and was very satisfied with the answers. In short, if you are not tech savvy enough to set up your own security camera system for your garden, 420 Cam can handle it for you– and then some! My favorite is their iPhone App that allows you to view the status of your garden from practically anywhere. It will also send you alerts and keep tabs on the environment. I’m tempted to get this just to keep an eye on my dog when I am away. Also, just look how happy they were:

And finally, a company that should need no introduction ’round these parts: The Union had its own booth with t-shirts and a couple booth babes. I asked them if Adam Scorgie was at the event and they replied with, “Huh?” I can only assume they were temp-workers, but cute nonetheless.

This concludes Part 1 of my adventure to THC Expo ‘09. Stay tuned for more products, glass, and fun memories in the upcoming Part 2!

Two years ago, my goal was fairly simple: I wanted to create a website that would offer a professional, non-stereotyped source for debunking prohibition myths. It wasn’t until nearly a year later that I actually found direction for how I wanted to take the site and began updating as much as possible.

Though I started the site with simple intentions, I have really been inspired to strive for something more after my interactions with various people within the community. While my focus will remain on debating prohibitionists and providing medical studies as well as information on medical marijuana, I have decided to go forward with the forum idea mentioned previously.

As much as I was hoping to not have to spend too much out-of-pocket to get it running, it looks like I’ll have to dip a bit deeper into my matress to pick up the difference. A special thanks to those of you who have already donated or even those of you who sincerely would have if you could afford it, and I mean that (it’s the thought that counts). I will still keep the donations widget up in case anyone wants to donate after the fact.

Starting tomorrow, I’m going to be on the look out for a good price on a vBulletin license and hope to get it up and running within the month. My goal is to make it easier for the SMtF community to exchange ideas, share stories, and even help me out by offering research and links to manipulative prohibitionists .

What happened to me, you ask? Well, for those of you familiar with the site I really don’t like to give details about my personal life but I feel you deserve some sort of explanation for my absence. In short, I was hit with the perfect storm of summer events including a wedding, birthdays, summer school, etc. On top of that, as I said before, I am a poor college student that capitalizes on the summer to try and make money.

But fear not, for the storm has subsided and I am back to entertain all you folks with my marijuana related ramblings. Though I am currently back in school, I am going to reserve chunks of time each week to do updates, post articles, and write rebuttals; barring extreme circumstances, there shouldn’t be anything to stop me.

Looking forward to picking up where I left off!

Sincerely,
Eric

I wanted to post and apologize for being so quiet lately. Lately I have been spending much of my time doing freelance jobs to pay the bills (I usually load up during the summer), helping a friend plan a wedding coming up very soon, and other miscellaneous errands that have fallen on my lap lately.

I spent literally several hours putting together a post (with pictures) about my experience at this year’s THC Expo only to have WordPress glitch out and delete the draft. Needless to say, it felt like a kick in the face now that I have to redo it (I always find it hard to redo something I felt was great the first time). I will remake it, however, as I met many great individuals that I promised I’d mention on the site.

So for those of you sending me e-mails saying you miss me, and for others sharing nice comments… I really appreciate it. But fear not! These are the last couple weeks of me being extremely busy. Soon it will be back to arguing with prohibitionists and providing fact-filled rebuttals that I’m sure many of you miss .

Sincerely,
Eric

Dear Readers,

My immediate goal for this website was to create a repository of information and articles aiding the marijuana legalization fight. As of the writing of this post, over 41,000 unique individuals have visited this site since March ‘09 and, needless to say, I hope to keep this momentum going.

One suggestion I have heard from readers on numerous occasions was the request for some sort of forum to help grow a community of fact-minded individuals to chat, discuss, share articles, opinions, information, etc. The consensus is that if I do start a forum, I should consider using a product like vBulletin and vBSEO to really help bring more traffic to the website and offer a quality community experience.

The problem is that vBulletin* costs $180 for a license, and vBSEO comes in at $149 for a license. Slightly better news is that used-licenses can be purchased for around $200 for both vBulletin and vBSEO if you look in the right place. While I have been able to keep this site running out of pocket thus far, I just do not have the personal budget to afford the costs of the license (even at the discounted used rate).

While I may not be able to afford it myself, I believe if there are enough of you out there willing to pitch in (or “chipin” in this case), we can pool together the needed funds to purchase at minimum the forum license, and hopefully enough for the vBSEO license as well. A good, trusted friend of mine has volunteered to handle the fund and has set up a ChipIn.com account that should make it a bit easier to orgnize everything.

You may be wondering, “What’s in it for me?” And that is a very fair question.

Other than the benefit of helping ShowMetheFacts.org reach a larger audience, I will offer “VIP Memberships” (a fancy title letting others know you helped pay for the forum + access to additional forums) to anyone who donates $10 or more. If you have any other suggestions of things I can offer, let me know.

Thanks so much for all of your support and please share this with any of your friends who may want to support SMtF.

Sincerely,
Eric

*For those of you wondering why I do not use another forum, or a free forum, I have used many various forum scripts over the years and while each one has its own benefit, I have only been comfortable with vBulletin and find myself having better results when using it.

http://www.amazon.com/Union-Business-Behind-Getting-High/dp/B0025XUTKQ

I’ll make a proper update in the morning =)

Pros:

• Lower taxes
• More money for public utilities, education, transportation, etc.
• Vast reduction in organized crime (as marijuana is currently the life-blood of their organization)
• Increased compassion for individuals unable to afford health insurance or proprietary pharmaceutical prescriptions.
• Vast decrease in availability to minors and children via regulatory obstacles and destruction of black-markets.
• Thousands of new jobs created in the hemp industry
• Ripple effect of the new “gardening hobby” would be felt in stores across the nation
• Reduction in need for foreign oil by replacing many petroleum based products with hemp based products (plastics, oils, etc.)
• Reduction of environmental pollutants as Hemp phases out Cotton for many products (hemp does not require nasty pesticides but can create products more durable and equally soft as cotton).
• Reduction in deforestation as hemp can create more, better paper in less space multiple times in a year.
• Respect for law as a whole will improve as millions of good Americans are no longer labeled a “criminal”.

Cons:

• Law enforcement agencies, such as DEA, will lose large chunks of funding
• Certain corporations will be forced to compete with a very cheap, versatile natural resource (pharmaceuticals, lumber, cotton, and petroleum industries, for example)
• International laws would need to be revised, addressed, and changed to reflect the new legalization of marijuana
• Private Prison industry would lose many of its inmates and thus much of its profits.
• It would be nearly impossible to keep Strawberry PopTarts in stock at any convenience store across America.

The following is my submission for Mr. Hampton’s policy statement about the Drug War (specifically marijuana). While I am aware that most policy statements adhere strictly to descriptions of policy, I feel that marijuana is a very dense issue with a very intricate history. A history that must be taken into account if we are going to make an educated decision about an important issue.

You can vote on my submission here (it is titled “Legalization of Cannabis for the Good of our Citizens”) and read it below.

If you enjoy it, feel free to let @adrielhampton know on twitter.

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Fervor for liberty and hope for a new life, these were the driving forces for many early American settlers’ in their choice to leave all that they knew and had behind. Though passion may have filled the hearts of so many pioneers, it was ultimately the wind which filled their sails–as durable as their spirits–that delivered each man, woman and child onto the shores of a New World. These sails, of course, were made from cannabis.

Indeed, cannabis played an integral part of early American life, exploration, development, and economic activity. It was celebrated by patriots, grown by presidents, and utilized by Americans for the good of America. Unfortunately, for a plant so fundamental to the growth of our country, it would soon become the target of corporations who care more about their profit margins than the health of their nation. An information war was waged against this noble plant and it was soon victimized and made illegal by racially charged fears and ignorance.

In humility, our government would turn again to cannabis and launched its Hemp For Victory campaign during the Second World War, calling for patriotic farmers to grow cannabis in order to aid the war efforts. Years after the last soldiers were laid to rest and the last treaty was signed, the United States would once again turn its back on the plant that had helped it so dearly when Nixon ignored the advice of his own commission, which stated that cannabis should be re-legalized, and waged his war against a plant.

Though, this was not a normal war by any means. It was a war against capitalism and free-market competition. It was a war against nature in favor of proprietary goods. It was a war against information, science, and truth. It was a war against the fundamental, God-given right for an individual to manage his or her own health, body, and mind. It was a war against the very roots of our heritage, culture, and existence. In essence, it was a war against you.

To this day, perpetuated myths and fear-propaganda still taint the minds of so many Americans. Thankfully, however, advances in science and logic have allowed many to see just how helpful and safe cannabis truly is to a variety of people and industries. My friends, we are at a tipping point of freedom in this nation where we have the ability and momentum to right an enormous wrong in our past by RE-legalizing a plant that–by all measures–should be considered an asset of natural resource, if not a symbol of national treasure.

After elected, I vow to uphold my duty to protect the citizens of this great state by moving to legalize cannabis, thus ending the prohibition of reason and war on Californians. Our economy will be given a much needed boost as individuals responsibly and safely purchase taxed cannabis products in a much freer market; money that can be utilized to educate our children, expand our infrastructure, and focus on stopping real crime. Our prisons and legal system will be reserved for only those truly dangerous to the good of society, rather than filled and distracted by victims of social stigma and ignorance. Most of all, our children will be safer as legalization starves the black market of a majority of its cash flow and regulatory obstacles are put in place to truly restrict availability of cannabis products to adults.

Together, we can make a positive difference for the future of California. We can drastically reduce violence, power of organized crime, and costs related to the failed attempts at controlling human nature. We can fight for the rights of our farmers, our sick, our impoverished, and our families. We can support the progress of medicine and the hundreds of thousands of doctors in the United States who deserve the right to fully care for their patients. Best of all, we can do it all with the legalization of a single plant that has already done so much for us and was always there when we needed it. I think we owe it to cannabis, and I think we owe it to ourselves.