Harborside: We DO NOT support legalizationPosted by Mickey Martin on December 2nd, 2011

In what I can only call one of the most dumbfounding statements I have ever heard, the operators of Oakland’s “World’s Largest retailer of cannabis on the planet,” Harborside Health Center, declared on The O’Reilly Factor on Wednesday that they “DO NOT support legalization of cannabis for recreational use” It was unequivocal and not to be mistaken as someone who misspoke. Check it out:

Bill O’Reilly proceeds to hammer the Deangelo brothers, who do their best to dump meaningless rhetoric into the conversation, only to have Bill-O the clown beat the shit out of them at every point. I felt sorry for them. I have no idea why they would choose to do this interview, other than they believed that they could increase viewership for their WEED WARS program on Discovery Channel (which was horrible in its own right. More to come on that.) But after making several lackluster statements and fumbling their words repeatedly, Bill O’Reilly chalenges them….he says, “C’mon. You know this is Quasi-Legalization.”

This is when Andrew Deangelo, the General Manager of Harborside- in a moment of clarity and confidence absent in the rest of the interview- says, “Bill….we will say right here on this show WE DO NOT SUPPORT THE LEGALIZATION FOR RECREATIONAL PURPOSES.”

Let me be the first to say “GO FUCK YOURSELF, ANDREW.”

What the fuck, yo? Did you lose your mind, soul, and honor all right there in the Fox News studio? From where I was sitting it looked like you did. You threw every person who does not feel that they are ill or in need of “health and wellness” medication straight under the bus. The only explanation I can come up with is that you are a coward and are bowing to the fears of the IRS and the right wing antagonist Bill O’Reilly; and in this moment of weakness you uttered these words in an effort to stop the bleeding…..at least that is what I hope. I would like to believe you just misspoke, or said something you truly do not believe in an effort to find some support in an interview that was spiraling out of control. Otherwise you are just an asshole.

Let us be clear….IF YOU DO NOT SUPPORT LEGALIZATION THEN YOU SUPPORT ALL NON-MEDICAL USERS OF CANNABIS BEING CRIMINALS. Period. End of story. No sugar-coating things. You are a PROHIBITIONIST.

You could have used Dr. Lester Grinspoons most eloquent statement that  ”…until cannabis is legal all patients will never truly be safe”; or you could have simply taken a non-position as ASA has in the past. You could have acknowledged the abuses in the system and made a very powerful statement against the Drug War by simply stating “When the choice is between lying to your doctor and going to jail it is not surprising many recreational cannabis users fudge an illness to avoid being a criminal.” There ere any number of better responses than telling the world that the “World’s Largest retailer of cannabis on the planet does not support legalized cannabis.” If you guys want to be the ambassadors for this industry, how about growing a sack of nuts before you go doing Fox News interviews?

While this was the bombshell for the interview, it was also hysterical to see the flamboyant Steve Deangelo regulated to a squirming caricature of himself who spoke so fast to get his words in that he did not even sound like he believed his own contrived lines of bullshit. When Bill-O referred to his “investigative report on how easy it was to get a recommendation for cannabis,” Steve stated that he was “Just as shocked and outraged as you, Bill…which is why we opened Harborside.” WTF? No…you opened Harborside to be the world’s largest pot dealer…and I guess you have succeeded?

I am sure this was the first time that Steve ever came to the realization that maybe…just maybe…some of those 94,000 “patients” he serves are not really sick at all. He tries to play it off in the interview declaring “We do not have the medical training to know that” and “you do not have to be on death’s door to need medicine”; but the real issue is that the cat is out of the bag and until the “leaders” of this movement acknowledge the problem and address it like grown-ups we will continue to see people believe our whole industry is full of shit. I mean even the clerk that they follow around on your show understands and acknowledges that in the first episode…..why can’t you?

Since I am pretty sure that I burned the Harborside bridge a while ago, I will not mince words here. If you believe that only people with medical conditions should be allowed to access cannabis and you “DO NOT SUPPORT LEGALIZATION FOR RECREATIONAL PURPOSES” then you are part of the problem. You are in support of the drug war. You are in a different movement than me. You are NOT fighting for cannabis freedom. You are a prohibitionist pressing forward the idea that people need a doctor’s note to use cannabis, and clearly stating that those who do not meet the medical criteria for cannabis use are CRIMINALS. That is unacceptable by any measure.

I am appalled, disgusted, and dismayed at this development. Some have said, “Oh Mickey…you know they are just saying that because of the IRS and the TV show.” Yeah…well I guess a person’s honor and self-respect DO have a price tag, now don’t they? It is a sad day when the World’s Largest retailer of cannabis on the planet does not support cannabis use by the MAJORITY of cannabis users and goes on National TV to make this declaration.

Like Pauly in Goodfellas, “Now I must turn my back on you….” You are an enemy of cannabis freedom and I just do not get that shit….Good luck with your weak ass show….