Last week’s contest was won by Clara. It was Langley, BC.

For this week’s contest, we’ll once again switch over to using Google’s new 45 degree views. This is a random location somewhere on earth, good luck!

With the passage of I-502, I’m hoping to get back into some more regular blogging here. I’ve waited a long time for this day, and now that it’s here, I want to closely follow how this all plays out. Here are some of the early developments in this new era:

– You’ve probably already seen the news that King and Pierce Counties have dismissed 220 marijuana possession cases. But at the end of that post from Jonathan Martin was another interesting nugget:

Earlier this week, the chief criminal deputy prosecutor in Spokane County, Jack Driscoll, appeared to take a more conservative position. He told the Spokesman-Review that, even after Dec. 6, the only marijuana which was legal to possess was pot sold in the state-licensed stores called for in I-502. Those stores won’t be created for at least a year.

“The only thing that is legal is selling marijuana through those stores,” Driscoll said. “That will be regulated by the state. You can’t under this initiative have an ounce of marijuana that doesn’t come from a state-issued provider. You still can’t have black-market marijuana.”

Looking forward to the first judge who gets to laugh out loud at that argument.

– One of the most interesting things to watch now is the international reaction to what Colorado and Washington voters have done. Especially in Mexico, where over $1,000,000,000/year pours into the pockets of drug gangs from the illegal marijuana trade.

– NCAA student-athletes in both Washington and Colorado still won’t be able to use marijuana, even if they’re over 21. Last year, Pullman police arrested several Washington State basketball players for pot possession. Considering that underage use is still illegal, that’s likely to keep happening.

– Of course, even with the passage of marijuana legalization, reefer madness isn’t going to just disappear. This gem – from the New York Daily News, but featuring a “chemical dependency professional” at Argosy University in Seattle – is about how this initiative will somehow cause Boeing and Microsoft to suck at building planes and software unless the feds intervene. As someone who worked at both companies in my 20s (quite successfully) while also being a regular marijuana consumer, I’m not sure I even know how to start making fun of that. It’s a good reminder that even though initiatives can fix a broken policy, they can’t fix stupid.

Tuesday’s election results in Colorado and Washington were historic. Marijuana prohibition has been dealt a serious blow, and the effects are being felt worldwide. A destructive and misguided global prohibition policy that the U.S. has aggressively used the U.N. to implement for decades is now being seriously challenged by two of its own states.

But how is this going to play out here? A lot of folks believe that the federal government will use whatever power they have at their disposal to prevent Washington from regulating the trade – and threats of action alone will stop the Liquor Control Board dead in its tracks. Others think the federal government doesn’t have the stomach for such a messy fight and will allow limited state control (as they’ve done for medical marijuana in states with regulated dispensaries, like Colorado). And others think this will end up being fought in the courts for years with regulations on hold until judges rule on it.

I don’t really know what the federal response is going to be, but the reality here in Washington is that on December 6, people aren’t going to be worried about getting arrested for buying, possessing, or using pot any more. And in Seattle, the dispensaries (which already operate outside of state law by selling directly to medical marijuana patients) probably won’t mind selling to those people for a few extra bucks. Already, there have been several stories of people going into Seattle’s dispensaries these past few days thinking that they no longer need a medical marijuana authorization to sample the wares.

So what happens then? The regulatory model won’t be implemented until the end of 2013. But no one in Seattle is likely to care that a legal marketplace is taking shape in the meantime. The city attorney was a co-sponsor of I-502. The mayor and the entire 9-member city council all strongly support it and have long felt that marijuana should be sold in regulated dispensaries. The two candidates for King County Sheriff this cycle were fighting over who supported I-502 more. And Jenny Durkan, the U.S. Attorney for Western Washington, has only shown interest in going after folks in the medical marijuana industry who engage in intra-state trafficking or who set up shop too close to schools (which is now regulated by I-502), even though Seattle’s dispensaries have technically been afoul of the state law all along. All the way up the chain, there just isn’t much of an appetite for a fight. The city will just make sure dispensaries are licensed, zoned, paying taxes, following food and safety laws, and checking customer ID’s and all will be well.

But outside of Seattle is probably a different story. The U.S. Attorney for Eastern Washington has been far more aggressive about enforcing federal law. Tacoma and Pierce County law enforcement are notoriously anti-pot and could very easily demand that no dispensaries operate before regulations are written. Other communities around the state rushed to ban collective medical marijuana gardens once the legislature allowed them, even though they technically weren’t allowed to. These same communities might even go as far as calling in the DEA in order to keep state regulated dispensaries from opening.

My best guess at what will happen is that Seattle will become an island of regulated sales for a while, and folks from around the state (and probably beyond) will drive here for their ounce and go back home. At some point, there will be an attempt by the federal drug war apparatus to shut it down, but I don’t see it succeeding. They couldn’t stop the medical marijuana trade, and they won’t be able to stop this either.

There’s a lot of disillusionment with the state of our political system right now. We have two major parties that are largely beholden to powerful economic interests who’ve figured out how to funnel taxpayer money into their own pockets. We have a massive – and largely privatized – military that kills and maims innocent civilians across the globe with almost no oversight. We have the most people living behind bars (by far) of any country in the world, continuing to grow with an immigration crackdown that has continued largely under the radar. And our electorate is largely tuned out, not even able to muster the ability to demand that the two main candidates for president present a clear vision of how to deal with climate change, something that looms as potentially the most dangerous thing we’ll deal with in our lifetimes.

Yet this year, in this state, we got the chance to take two small steps forward. Voter initiatives are often cynical attempts to con voters into voting against their own economic interests. I-502 was a reminder of why they serve a real purpose. It was a genuine effort – decades in the making – to demand that government stop its foolish and wasteful crusade to keep adults from enjoying a recreational drug that’s been used by humans for thousands of years. This Tuesday, we’ll make it official. Marijuana prohibition’s days are numbered. Change is coming.

And Washington is set to become the first state (hopefully with several others on Tuesday) to end marriage discrimination at the ballot box. If only people who were personally affected by either of these initiatives cared, they wouldn’t have a chance. But more and more people are beginning to recognize the value of standing up for the rights of others, even when they involve rights you don’t ever plan to exercise yourself.

Thanks to all the folks in both the I-502 campaign, the R-74 campaign, and everyone who’s worked over the years to bring reform to where we are today. These seem like small steps compared to some of the challenges we face, but these are big victories that can give us the confidence to know that positive change can happen. And as people who’ve fought for years for gay rights and drug law reform can tell you, it’s a long battle with many setbacks. Tuesday can’t come soon enough.

Last week’s contest was won by milwhcky. It was the park in Arvada, CO where the body of Jessica Ridgeway was found.

This week’s contest is a random location somewhere on earth, good luck!

Last week’s contest was unsolved as of Thursday night. It was in Yakima.

This week’s contest is related to something in the news from October, good luck!

Last week’s contest was won by milwhcky. It was Birmingham, Alabama.

This week’s is somewhere in Washington state, good luck!

Last week’s contest was won by milwhcky. It was in Pittsburgh.

This week is normally a TV show or a movie, but since I don’t watch a whole lot of TV shows and movies, I’ve managed to run pretty thin on ideas. Instead, I want to try out something new. Google maps has started to integrate their own low-level views into their maps (I’m guessing they’ll get sued by Microsoft if they call them “Bird’s Eye Views”). I’ve been checking them out and despite having less coverage, they have better picture quality and they’ve got a few far-flung places that Microsoft doesn’t have yet. When I started doing these, I really hoped that it wouldn’t be too long before much more of the world had these maps, but there hasn’t been a lot of updating recently. And I’m starting to think that Google may get there faster.

So let’s consider this one a trial run. The view below is from the Google Maps page, which is also linked from the picture itself, good luck!

Last week’s contest went unsolved was won by wes.in.wa yesterday! It was in Dundee, Scotland.

This week’s is another random location somewhere on earth, good luck!

The I-502 campaign picked up a somewhat unexpected endorsement today. Republican Senate candidate Michael Baumgartner:

Republican U.S. Senate hopeful Michael Baumgartner on Wednesday endorsed Initiative 502 to legalize retail sales of pot, calling the war on the illicit drug a matter of national security.

The freshman state senator, who is challenging Democrat Maria Cantwell, worked several years ago for a State Department program in Afghanistan to help farmers grow wheat instead of opium poppies.

He said his experience in Helmand province — and watching the U.S.-funded efforts to eradicate Mexican drug cartels — convinced him criminalizing marijuana for adults only enriches traffickers and takes law-enforcement efforts from pursuing organized crime.

As soon as I saw someone with Baumgartner’s resume getting into this race as a Republican I was curious where he’d fall on this issue. Now we know. He appears to have a better grasp than his challenger, Maria Cantwell, who put out a statement against I-502:

Asked for Cantwell’s position, spokesman Kelly Steele emailed this: “While I remain a strong supporter of our state’s medicinal marijuana laws, I don’t believe it should be legalized for recreational purposes based on concerns expressed by law enforcement and the current drafting of the initiative. Whatever the result, I will honor the will of the voters’ decision in November.”

This issue should be a no-brainer for Democrats to support. Nearly 60% of Washington voters support some form of legalization, and even higher numbers of liberals and Democrats do. The severe racial, civic, economic, and environmental impacts of marijuana prohibition are well understood by large numbers of left-leaning voters. Yet both Cantwell and Inslee continue to alienate a big part of their base by remaining on the far right fringe on this issue. For Cantwell, her lead is probably insurmountable anyway, but Baumgartner is showing how a smart Republican might be able to win a closer race in this very blue state.

Last week’s contest was won by milwhcky. It was the town of Sierra Blanca, TX, where Fiona Apple was arrested by a “border” patrol for possession of hash.

This week’s contest is a random location somewhere on earth, good luck!

Last week’s contest was won by milwhcky. It was in Port Orchard.

This week’s is related to something in the news from September, good luck!

Last week’s contest was won by milwhcky. It was the north Oahu beach where scenes from the show “Lost” were filmed.

This week’s location is somewhere in Washington state, good luck!

I’ve been pretty critical of I-502, the initiative that legalizes possession of up to an ounce of marijuana for those 21 and over and regulates its production and sale. I’m not happy about the unscientific DUI provisions (which I think will be abused in order to continue the typical drug war harassment of minority youths and others), and I worry that the high taxes imposed within the supply chain – along with the continued ban on non-medical private growing – will continue to encourage a rogue “medical” marijuana industry, where sketchy doctors get paid to put recreational smokers on the path towards cheaper tax-free homegrown marijuana. If we’re going to be pioneers and establish a regulatory model that can serve as an example for other states, that makes me nervous.

Those problems aside, passing I-502 this November has the potential to be a massive game-changer in the history of drug prohibition in this country. The conventional wisdom is that any statewide vote to legalize marijuana will go as far as statewide efforts to legalize hemp farming (which is legal in several U.S. states, but still successfully pre-empted by federal law). On the other hand, we’ve seen statewide efforts to legalize medical marijuana successfully push back against the federal ban to the point where dispensaries have become public and even prominent.

Passing I-502 brings that conflict out in the open, and there’s good reason to believe that the dynamics would be similar to what’s happened with medical marijuana. As legalized medical marijuana became a reality in a number of states, it became clear to public officials that this legal market should be regulated, rather than continually driven underground. This led to greater and greater pushback from state and local governments. And even though both idiots running for governor this year oppose I-502, this reality will be clear to them if it passes and there are hundreds of thousands of law-abiding recreational marijuana users who constitute a very above-ground marketplace.

I’ve been disgusted at times by both sides in the I-502 debate. Pro I-502 voices have often been far too dismissive of the potential problems with the DUI provisions and have been far too prone to make things up about the folks in the medical marijuana community who oppose it. Opposition to I-502 in the medical marijuana community has very little to do with greed. It has far more to do with paranoia.

Folks who’ve been staring into the gun barrel of the drug war apparatus for years see the numerous aspects of I-502 that are meant to appeal to moderate voters and instead see loopholes that will allow the persecution of marijuana users to continue. As a result, the anti I-502 crowd has devolved into some grand delusions and have completely lost touch with the more nuanced reality of this initiative.

This initiative arguably isn’t crafted as well as it should have been, but it still has the potential to make important history this fall. In some ways it already has, by picking up the kinds of endorsements that these types of initiatives normally don’t receive. But a big win in November is the kind of endorsement that elected officials here and in D.C. won’t be able to ignore.

Last week’s contest was won by wes.in.wa. It was Coeur d’Alene, ID.

This week’s is related to a TV show or a movie, good luck!