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PaperclipPerfector  7mo ago (text post)   3384 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for June 22, 2025

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

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Thank you! I haven't remembered all the details from 20 years ago (the anniversary this month!). Re-reading it, the especially evil part is that the weed in question was absolutely undoubtedly for personal consumption, to treat a severe debilitating condition, with medical approval and supervision, allowed by state law - and yet Feds were absolutely adamant torturing a couple of women to death is what is right and proper to do.

And the dissent was all conservatives. The Democrats were happy to throw chronic pain patients under the bus in order to preserve an obviously wrong interpretation of the Commerce Clause because it's the source of the Federal Government's power to regulate purely intrastate affairs.

Did they die?

As far as I know, they did not, and continued to use cannabis despite the loss of this case. Eventually the policy of USDOJ changed to a less insane one towards medical marijuana patients (thanks Obama), so the feds stopped harassing them. The SCOTUS decision, however, remains as another milestone in the long road from the limited federalist government to "you got only the rights that the feds want to give to you".

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