Americans for Safe Access (ASA) Executive Director Steph Sherer and I are visiting eleven cities in California between August 19 and September 1. You can see when we will be near you online and download fliers to help spread the word. Our goal is to educate, empower, and mobilize the grassroots base of support for medical cannabis! We will be hosting free trainings and  stakeholders meetings in each city. We will also be meeting with organizers, community members, and elected officials to push the local, state, and federal agendas forward. Make plans to see us this month!

Get your tickets now for ASA’s Summer Solstice Banquest & Bash on Friady, June 17, in San Francisco. It’s going to be an amazing event. The venues are fantastic: a house modeled after the Starship Enterprise that has a beautiful rooftop patio overlooking downtown San Francisco; and SPARC, one of the city’s finest patients’ collectives, has won several interior design awards and was featured in the NY Times Style section. There will be fire spinners, dance performers, DJs and other musical guests. And dinner will be prepared by celebrity chefs. Get your tickets now. this will sell out. Sponsorship opportunities are available. Contact kathry@safeaccessnow.org for more information. Not in San Francisco that weekend? This event will be worth a trip, but you may also want to be in the city that weekend for Dealflow Media’s Marijuana Conference.

The contemporary medical cannabis movement has its roots in the community response to the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the San Francisco Bay Area in the 1980’s and 1990’s. AIDS patients and advocates had to fight hard for research and access to treatment – and even harder to dispel stigma and misinformation. It was only natural that people using medical cannabis to treat the symptoms of HIV/AIDS would bring the same tenacity to the fight for that medicine. Those early crusaders helped change the world for medical cannabis.

We can help honour this heritage and keep pushing forward in the global fight against HIV/AIDS today. Organizers all over the world are organizing events to commemorate World AIDS Day 2010. Have a look at the events calendar, sign a pledge to help end AIDS, or find you own way to join the fight.

Read more about the therapeutic use of cannabis in “HIV/AIDS and Medical Marijuana,” published by Americans for Safe Access (ASA).

“Like most of the country, we had mixed feelings about the mid-term elections. No matter what side of the aisle you’re on, there were gains and concessions, reliefs and disappointments. But there was one race that changed everything—one election that leveraged our movement so greatly things will never be the same.   

If you don’t live in California you may not have heard much about the race for Attorney General. Steve Cooley was running for AG with the most blatant anti-patient platform this country has ever seen. Hand picked by the cops and funded by rightwing political strategist Carl Rove, Cooley made no small effort to let voters know that if he were elected he would do everything in his power to eradicate medical marijuana for California…”

 Read the entire post on the ASA blog.

“Las Vegas, NV — The federal Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) conducted raids earlier today on at least five medical marijuana dispensaries in Las Vegas, Nevada, and reportedly seized patient and financial records, but made no arrests. According to the Associated Press, Natalie Collins, spokeswoman for the local U.S. Attorney’s office said that the federal search warrants and “supporting affidavits stemming from what she called ‘an ongoing law enforcement operation’ were sealed by federal court order.” The dispensaries raided today by federal agents and local police included: Happiness Consultant, Salvation Haven, Nature’s Way, Organic Releaf, & Holistic Solutions…”

Read the entire press release on the ASA web site.