Morning Briefs and Outtakes after some Huffing and Puffing at City Hall
From Cheech and Chong's "Up in Smoke", "That doobie should cure my cancer for good".They came by the hundreds to witness government in action from behind the horseshoe on Spring Street.
What brought out this crowd to witness 15 highly paid politicians in action? Budget cuts? DWP rate increases? Cuts in Police and Fire services? A Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa photo op? No, it was all about the Pot dudes and dudettes!!
Speakers in "nickels and dimes" assortments made their way to the podium for their allotted two minutes of huffing and puffing on all sides of the Medical Marijuana issue. Just wondering if any of these speakers provided an "ounce or gram" of reason on the issue?
Some four hours later, the smoke of political retoric cleared and "in rubuff to the city attorney" (part of this morning's LA Times headline), two city council committes went ahead "and voted Monday to approve an ordinance that allows marijuana dispensaries to continue to sell the drug to people with a doctor's recommendation.
From the Times story, The city attorney's office has maintained for a year and a half that Los Angeles has no choice but to ban sales because state law and court decisions are clear that collectives can only cultivate marijuana. That opinion had stalled the council's deliberations because dispensary operators insisted it would force them to close.
As the LA Weekly reports, groups like Americans For Safe Access on Monday stated the courts in California have supported the sale of pot to patients with doctors' approvals and that if the council moves forward with is sales ban it will take City Hall to court. Give me pot or give me death!!
Councilman Dennis Zine for one, is tire of this whole saga. as noted in the Daily News "What I have seen is we are going in circles and are not accomplishing a damned thing." Here is thinking that Dennis needs a puff right about now.
Then, in all the smoke of retoric, came this profound thought from CD 14 Councilman Jose Huizar, Some council members responded favorably to the city attorney's suggestion to consider capping the number of dispensaries. Councilman Jose Huizar proposed a cap of 70, allowing two in each of the 35 community plan areas."Hopefully, that will allow us to control for the over-concentration," he said.
Leave it to Councilman Huizar to come up with a plan to "cut and paste" the excess concentration of pot shops. Maybe he can start in Eagle Rock. That thought alone could cause one to "water the bong and take a big puff".
But back to reality, as the City Council vacillates on the course of action to take in regards to the proliferation of "pot shops" in Los Angeles, The LA Weekly has a must read story how pot shops are marketing to LAUSD students.
The marijuana of today is far more potent that the "Humboldt or Colombian" of the seventies. Thus, students who start with puffs of weed today are more likely to advance to other drugs like liquid meth, which are becoming mega income producers for the Mexican Drug Cartels.
In addition, our public lands are becoming one big giant pot plantation for the Cartels, witness the cause of this summer's La Brea Fire in the back country of Santa Barbara, which was an illegal campfire at a plantation site in the Los Padres National Forest. Mineral King Highway in Sequoia National Park has been nicknamed "Marijuana King" by park rangers who have eradicated many illegal plantations at great harm to the native environment. And in Fresno County this year alone, law enforcement authorities have eradicated over $1,000,000,000 of marijuana from public lands.
This issue is nothing to puff upon for much longer.
OTHER NEWS:
** Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, with his non-profit allies and UTLA backed teacher groups, will compete for control of four campuses, including Jefferson High School, as part of a groundbreaking reform initiative.
The impending face-off emerged Monday as groups inside and outside the Los Angeles Unified School District scrambled to meet a 5 p.m. deadline for applications to run 30 district schools.
In separate news conferences, the union and the mayor lauded their own education records as they marked a milestone in the widely watched reform effort.
After filing "letters of intent" for their targeted schools, the bidders, including charter school operators, now have until Jan. 11 to develop full-fledged proposals.
** The full City Council is expected to confirm Deputy Chief Charlie Beck as the rightful heir to former Chief Bill Bratton's position as LA's "Top Cop". And somewhere, an ex. chief is nodding in approval to the designated choice for ascension to his former position.
** District Attorney Steve Cooley has launched a 24 hour tip line to halt the spread of illegal dog fighting. What about a 24 hour a day tip line for political corruption?
** Do we have to waste column inches for this "duh question"? From the editorial board of the "Daily Moldy Green Sheet" or the Valley's paper of record. Cost recovery: Should L.A. recoup Jackson memorial costs?
What do you think? Should the city try to get $3.2 million back from AEG? If so, how? City Attorney Carmen Trutanich has already been pressuring AEG executives to reimburse the city. But perhaps it makes more sense for the city and AEG to made some sort of trade on behalf of Angelenos. Would a certain amount of free tickets to Staples Centers for Angelenos seem fair? How about a free beer at one of the L.A. Live watering holes? Or free screenings of "This is it" (the Michael Jackson movie has made more than $100 million in global receipts - so far - in which AEG has a stake) at the Hollywood Bowl for a couple weeks?
Or perhaps there's more creative ways for Staples Center to give back to the generous people of Los Angeles.
Send your ideas to opinionated@dailynews.com. Please include your full name, the community or city in which you live and a daytime phone number. We'll print as many as we can in Sunday's Opinionated section.
Your thoughts...................... and you wonder why "news print" is use for dog training or wrapping the "catch of the day".
Labels: "COUNCILMAN LAST SEEN AS JOSE HUIZAR", $460 mil lausd budget cuts, AEG, bill bratton, daily news, Deputy Chief Charlie Beck, mayor antonio villaraigosa, medical marijuana, michael jackson
Posted by Red Spot in CD 14 @ 11/17/2009 05:55:00 AM
30 Comments:
GREAT STUFF RED SPOT. THANKS FOR LETTING US KNOW WHAT IS REALLY GOING ON IN CITY COUNCIL. YOU SHOULD REPORT LA WEEKLY DID STORY SAYING THOSE RESPONSIBLE FOR MARIJUANA SHOPS ARE GARCETTI, REYES AND HUIZAR WHO SAT ON THEIR BUTTS FOR A COUPLE OF YEARS WHILE OAKLAND AND SAN FRANC. CLOSED UP THE LOOPHOLES.
Where is the outrage and where the hell are the Neighborhood Councils who are suppose to be representing the people of this city? How can people sit idily by and allow city council to do nothing about these marijuana shops which bring crime into our areas???? Another good reason to cut their salaries in 1/2.
Idiot erik garsetti trying to speak spanish in city council "su trabajo" is a riot.
Try not to be multicultural if you are not multicultural. Italian and Jewish is not multicultural. They're virtually the same.
8:29 AM
Great point on LA Weekly story
Thanks,
Spot
Howdy. Howyadoin. What it be?
Phil Jennerdoodle isn't answering the question: HOW MANY "RECALL ANTONIO VILLARAIGOSA" signatures do you have?
If you're runnin' fo' the Congress, you best be telling us how you doin' on the project that you made your own.
Speak up son!
Mayor Villaraigosa and a date popped into Thai Sabai in Hollywood.for Thai massages on Sunday afternoon, accompanied by his LAPD detail
Great way to spend our tax dollars with his security detail that cost $450,000 annually
The chickens are coming home to roost as Cindy Miscikowski today.
She was a LOUSY councilwoman who didn't hide her disregard for the public. She caused so much hurt and pain, and when you do this, karma is going to come back and bite your ass.
I feel zero pity for this pathetic and cruel person. May she wallow in her millions.
Karma for Cindy.
Maybe Eric Barf-cetti was trying to say "You'sa work for me".
"The marijuana of today is far more potent that the "Humboldt or Colombian" of the seventies. Thus, students who start with puffs of weed today are more likely to advance to other drugs like liquid meth, which are becoming mega income producers for the Mexican Drug Cartels."
The continued rhetoric that pot is a gateway drug has been refuted over and over yet this myth continues to be spread. Pot is not a gateway drug. The gateway is because people have to purchase it from pushers who likely are pushing other drugs-- the pushers are the gateway- they let their customers sample some of their other wares, get them addicted and voila, they HAVE moved to more dangerous drugs and addiction. It's not the pot that's making them move to other drugs, it's the pushers.
Remove the pushers out of the equation and allow marijuana to be accessed through legitimate outlets, folks won't have access to seriously dangerous drugs which they then become addicted.
Allow marijuana to be accessed legitimately, it takes the profit and control out of the hands of the cartels. It regulates the access of marijuana; tax revenue for cities and the state will increase.
Micsikowski was far worse than any of today's council members. And that's saying something substantial.
fuck cindy. she deserves everything she gets. if you think Weiss made things bad on the westside, check out cindy's record. she was a cm on the take, and whoever said she had disdain for hte public was right. poor ring! he had to live with that BITCH until his last breath. talk about suffering!
And to be add some corrections to the imagery of the main posting, the are not 15 Council members. CD-2 is still vacant and there's only 14.
As for even 14 at this meeting, you need to remember that this was a special joint (and how appropriated) committee meeting of the Planning and Land Use Committee adn the Public Safety Committee. There was at most 8 persons there.
Even one of the CMs commented that they would be in violation of the Brown Act if Jan Perry had not stepped out as one of the CMs NOT on the committee came to speak- possibly Zine but not necessariy so.
And about the 10:06am criticism of Garcetti:
"Try not to be multicultural if you are not multicultural. Italian and Jewish is not multicultural. They're virtually the same."
He is part Latino and not simply the assumed Jewish and Italian that appears to be implied. He's still an "Ivory Tower" "L.A.'s going-green at any cost (to the individuals)" liberal who carries out the smarty-pants image very well. Trust him? Remember he was the one who rushed Prop. B in front of city council before anyone else knew what it was really about.
(and while I'm at it, remember that the whole Council signed off on the 10% Phone Tax deception and the "Ethics Reform- Term Limits" that extended their terms. Watch them all very carefully.
1/2 time, 1/2 pay, do only what you need to do and not get into all the special interests projects - that should be a change implemented and we'd have less wasted time and money instead of letting them become creative in ways to gouge the public and enrich their pals.
in Eagle Rock
10:29, at least he's not using them to shake down a respectable business like AEG while threatening to arrest the CEO's top lawyer and executive, like that Serbian Thugovich. At least Antonio and his friend are contributing to job creation, not intent on driving business OUT of LA to grandstand to idiots like 9:09, who'd rather we get hit with a whammy class-action suit because the Idiot Thugovich and Cooley his owner decide to "interpret" the state law in keeping with their own and 9:09's personal rightwing views, NOT in accordance with the intent of the law, the wishes of the voters of California, or the Courts or Atty Gen'l of the State.
Since we're going to vote to cut council salaries in 1/2 we might as well get this done at the same time. Take away their power because so many people are upset with politicans they'll vote for this.
...go back to the voters for a reversal on the charter change, to get the Chief's position back under civil service protection and selection process.
Persons most responsible for the spread of a jillion pot shops in the City:
1. Council President Eric Garcetti: He's in charge of Council folks. He knew all those exemption requests were pouring in and did nothing.
2. Ed Reyes: Chair of the Planning and Land Use Management Committee. He is in charge of the City Council Committee with most jurisdiction over land use controls of the pot shops. The weak loophole was in the City's ordinances for more than a year and he did NOTHING.
3. Jose Huizar: Member of the Planning and Land Use Management Committee and Masters in Urban Planning from Princeton, and don't you forget it! He watched the exemptions pour in.
4. Jack Weiss: Member of the Planning and Land Use Management Committee. He was too busy trying to run for City Attorney to be bothered with the pot shops spreading throughout the City. Got what he deserved.
Time to cut all the salaries in half. Let's get moving on that.
I agree! FUCK CINDI MISCIKOWSKI! She is responsible for LOTSA westside problems. Zero sympathy! I spit on her misery.
1:13 is "the spitter" who always pops up to support his master Nooch, figures. Anger management issues seem to run in the same circles.
For adults, fennel seeds or tea can relax the intestines and reduce bloating caused by digestive disorders or Modelo Especial consumption
Does anyone know exactly who grows the pot sold in the pot shops?
11:00 seems to think that it's not the cartels.
Who do the shops report their sources to?
And didn't the law that was passed only refer to cultivation by the user or the care provider?
If that was the case why aren't the users all just growing their own plants?
shit no i ain't got no connection to trutanich. but i have plenty of anger against that bitch cindi miscikowski! she ruined the westside with overdevelopment and traffic congestion.
if you hate jerk weiss, you'll loathe cindi. fuck her. she is getting all the bad karma she deserves. fuck her. did you hear me? i said fuck her. i sit in the damn traffic and think how she caused this before jerk ever got on the scene.
3:08, then you can also be mad at Zev, and Feuer, who were the CD5 reps before Weiss. And Koretz can't be any better, believe me. (Cindy was CD11, before Rosendahl/ Flippenthal and whoever. They're ALL the same.)
The real problem is that the area never got the subway back when they should have - in the early 80's the Red Line should have gone through the westside, the same route the MTA is thinking now, from downtown to Santa Monica along Wilshire or Santa Monica Blvd. or combo. This was killed by the SAME people who like you now blame Weiss and the others for the traffic.
They also fought Pico-Olympic partial one way, and think they "won" something but all they've done is keep it gridlocked. (THAT idea was first proposed by Zev, the guy who asked the feds to FREEZE fed funds to the westside for the subway back when every other city with sane leaders was getting and building.)
Meanwhile, it's short-sighted for you and all the old HOA folks from Cheviott to the Jay handels at Tract 7260 etc. to blame Weiss, as though he weren't just a cog along the historical development of the westside into a huge job magnet, with little affordable housing and huge commuters from the San Fern and San Bern Valleys and south bay, everywhere.
You people wanted him to let Century City collapse as it was collapsing, literally empty and falling apart, while city of Santa Monica keeps creating job magnets and traffic anyway, same as West Hollywood to the East - those two cities are booming with tax revenue and hence social services for their residents. Saying NO to everything is NOT public policy. It's just atrophy and anger.
As for your hatred toward Cindy, unless she did something to you personally that was so evil as to deserve this, you need to work on letting go of so much hatred, it must impact your whole life.
Dear 4:59 (aka apologist for Weiss, aka Mrs. Jack Weiss, aka Jack Weiss, aka Jack Weiss's retarded family),
Fuck Jack Weiss
Fuck Cindi Miscikowski, esp today
Fuck you.
You cannot make excuses for their lamest of lame job performance without being called on it. But yes I blame ALL of these idiots, including Bill "I'm just a gay guy with gold in the gutter" Flippenthal. I get that.
But my fury today is reserved for when I heard the name cindi miscikowski, which I hoped I'd never hear again. Just like I hope I never hear the name Jerk "Sneak out the back of Canter's" Wei$$hole.
You want to be a public official, and getting lambasted forever is a possibility if you fuck up the job.
We do not have to list EVERY cd5 cm in order to criticize one of them in particular.
BFD, so they're all culpable. Who cares? I agree that Miscikowski was by far the worst of a bad bunch, except for Weiss, who was a very close second.
Goes with the territory. Whoever said today is karma for Cindi got it right. The DISDAIN that she treated the public with was palpable. As if HER shit don't smell. Believe me, it smelled as badly as her back-room politics. I assure you that I was a LOT closer to it than you are. She deserves to be next, but with a long, brutally painful disease.
Cindy was certainly the worst on a scale that measures disdain for the public.
There's no question about that. I shed no tears for her for what she's done to us on the westside.
Fuck that shit! Jack Weiss was the worst. E-A-S-I-L-Y
Even Weiss's colleagues hated his guts. I will never forget what a SLOB Jack was on his last few weeks in Council, with his open shirt, no tie, and not even bothering to shave.
Weiss hated the public, hated his colleagues and hated his job because it was supposed to be a stepping stone.
That's what happens when you grow up with a silver spoon in your mouth and you get rejected by people who can think for themselves.
Cooley was blabbering on the TV news about how if ANY sales at shops are deemed legal, the Russian mob will continue to dominate the business as doctors and claiming to be "caregivers" to high school kids. (Can the Armenian mob be far behind, then?)
IF that's the case, let him go after these criminals, they would be upto a whole lot more than this. Of course there ARE Russian and Armenian and Vietnamese etc. gangbangers, but this can't become a red herring to the bottom line.
In fact it's Cooley who wants to return the whole sales underground into the hands of the Mexican drug cartels.
He and Tutanich already played the "Mexican red fire ants" scare card and got laughed at - the fire ants are in Texas, and have nothing to do with California pot at legal shops.
They tried pesticides, with Tranivich screaming at that woman at City Hall to spray Raid on her kid's salad and feed him lead - got made fun of as a bully, and he's out of the picture. Hopefully out of any picture to do with L A, finally seen as the moron he is even by Reyes.
How far will Cooley go with this? He opened up a can of worms, the LA Now blog comments go on about how his opponents at the last election including Dep. D A's said and have evidence that he sells justice to the highest bidder, including to Mexican drug cartels.
Why he hasn't gone after the cartels in Huntington, Bell, and the other South Gate area cities, where they set up shop because LAPD is too tough.
Also why he fired his best female anti- toxic polluter D A because she was too close to busting one of his top contributors.
I HOPE the dirt on the DA finally comes out thanks to his over-reaching with his idiot puppet Trutanich on EVERY issue.
What crime do the marijuana shops bring? Please explain with examples and real incidences.
Garcetti speaks perfect Spanish. Why can't he be multicultural?
Whoever you are, I wish you didn't blog here.
Racist hater loser.
2:41, I don't believe I said that it's not the cartels that grow the pot for the dispensaries, although I would never want to believe that was the source of their products. What I did say was "Allow marijuana to be accessed legitimately, it takes the profit and control out of the hands of the cartels. It regulates the access of marijuana; tax revenue for cities and the state will increase."
A true collective is only of those who are caregivers or patients, I don't honestly see why people who are already so ill are going to further risk their lives by purchasing pot that is laced with anything potentially dangerous from unknown or less than savory sources- I'm assuming that the dispensary owners (who are legit) are obtaining their supply from known sources, likely other members of the collective who have cultivated their own.
Cindy miserable? Are you guys nuts?
She is jnow free of the asshole and gets all of the money, isnce he had no kids or anyone wlse to leave it to.
She is a winner and now, as Chair fo the Harbor Commisison, she can go anywhere she wants.
Don't pity her; envy her.
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