The Union: The Business Behind Getting High Page #10

( Ian )

are charged with pot possession.

That's nearly a million people,

and whether you go to jail

or not,

your life

is in serious trouble.

And that number of annual

arrests for marijuana

now rivals the number of arrests

for murder, rape, robbery,

and aggravated assault...

combined.

You willnever

get over a conviction.

A conviction will track you

every day

for the rest of your life.

For instance, you remember

that guy that used to smoke

but didn't inhale--

former President Bill Clinton.

This is not a big issue

with me.

I never even had a drink

of whiskey till I was 22.

Now, if Mr. Clinton handed me

that marijuana cigarette

when he was standing

in a circle with us,

it wouldn't have mattered

whether he had inhaled or not,

he would have become a dope

dealer, wouldn't he ?

Just like all those other people

that went to jail,

never to be an attorney,

much less the president

of the United States.

But the marijuana laws

protect us.

They make our lives safer.

They send us

the correct moral message.

That's how 19

out of 21 nations

have gone down the drain

before us.

Internal decay.

The breakdown of moral,

ethical

and religious principles.

If you've been caught,

a young person in the U.S.,

with so much as one

marijuana cigarette,

you can't get a loan

or a grant from the government

to go to college.

If you've been convicted of

murdering somebody

or raping someone,

no problem, you go right down,

they'll give you the loan.

I guess the message is it's okay

to rape and murder and pillage,

just don't smoke a joint

afterwards.

( Tod )

First thing that

John Ashcroft did after 9-1-1,

sent out a strike force

to take down

the LA Cannabis Buyers Co-op.

That really helped national

security a great deal.

And what else

helps national security ?

Taking down top criminal

targets.

In 2003, the U.S. government

put aside money to do just that.

of Osama bin Laden,

$15 million each

for the whereabouts

of Uday and Qusay Hussein,

Saddam's sons,

and a $12 million budget

to go after one of the most

dangerous men of all...

this man.

( host )

Can you tell us what exactly

you were charged with ?

I was charged with conspiring

to sell paraphernalia.

Operation Pipe Dreams

was a brainstorm of

Attorney General John Ashcroft.

The Internet has been

illegally utilized

to sell these illegal products

and to facilitate large

illegal businesses

operating in the open.

A sting operation

that busted people

for selling paraphernalia

to a particular county

in Pennsylvania

where they were

willing to prosecute.

( Tommy )

Because there's two states,

Pennsylvania, Iowa--

"Void where prohibited" ?

Well, it was prohibited to send

it to Pennsylvania and Iowa.

A man like yourself that is

an established actor,

comedian--

you're not a criminal.

Why do you think

they targeted you ?

Well, because our movies were

number-one rentals in America.

What our movies did was

really show the hypocrisy

of the pot laws.

In fact, when I went to jail,

they added in the transcript

that our movies have influenced

children for 30 years

and will continue

to do so forever.

Therefore,

I should go to jail.

You gotta remember,

they were going into Iraq,

and they needed some diversion

as far as headlines go,

and they equated the

billion-dollar paraphernalia

business with aiding

terrorists.

This was a legitimate company,

paying taxes.

I was just

the face on the bong.

They chargedme.

I had nothing to do

with the company.

I never shipped

anything to anybody.

( Craig )

It wasn't even his company,

he just loaned his name to it.

Operation Pipe Dreams.

Only one person--

Tommy Chong-- went to jail.

But if I didn't plead, they

threatened my son and my wife.

Tommy stands up and volunteers

to go to jail.

Says, "Yeah, okay,

that's my paraphernalia.

Leave my wife and kid alone,"

he's protecting his family.

What kind of force was used in

the day you were arrested ?

There was over

Visors, automatic weapons,

helicopters overhead.

They had news trucks,

Fox News trucks, outside.

They had the media

on the ready.

This was

a photo-op for everybody.

They asked, you know,

do I have any drugs ?

I said, "Yeah, I got pot,"

you know.

And they wanted to know

where it was, so I told them.

They said, "Well, it's not

really a drug bust."

I said, "Well, then what the--

are you doing in my house ?"

Then they said,

"It's about bongs.

We're bringing down all the bong

companies in America."

And with Tommy safely

behind bars for nine months,

the United States drug war

reset its sights,

this time across borders.

In downtown Vancouver, just

outside the U.S. consulate,

a bunch of people had gotten

together and were having a rally

for this guy named

Marc Emery.

He had evidently

been selling seeds--

marijuana seeds--

to the wrong people.

Let me tell you,

the DEA wants me

because I am very good

at what I do.

Well, obviously I'm the most

dangerous man alive.

Like, really.

No wonder I'm facing life

imprisonment without parole

for something that no one's ever

gone to jail for here in Canada.

No one's ever gone to jail for

seeds, not even for a day.

Marc and two of his employees

are facing life in prison

in the United States--

not Canada, the United States--

for selling marijuana seeds

over the Internet.

Vancouver Police

came in here

with a warrant

for an extradition,

but we were taken then to North

Fraser Correctional Center,

Correctional Center

of the Year 2002.

Beautiful facility.

Marc Emery has gotten in

the face of the United States.

( Kirk )

The U.S. sees Marc Emery as

a major political threat

to its anti-cannabis agenda.

( Dana )

In a press release from

Karen Tandy, head of the DEA,

she said that this is not only

the end of marijuana

trafficking,

but it's a blow to the

marijuana-legalization movement.

I gave just under $4 million

away over 11 years

to Supreme Court challenges,

ballot initiatives,

political parties,

you know,

drug-addiction clinics.

Well, if you're the DEA,

who the hell do you think

you're gonna go after,

first and foremost, and as

viciously as you can do it ?

I think they even

admitted it themselves

on the day of the raid.

The DEA announced,

you know...

"He's a legalizer.

"We're shutting down one of

the biggest legalizers.

"The legalization movement

"won't have a pot of money

to draw from.

Ha ha ha ha."

Marc Emery has never gone

to America and sold a seed.

He does it all from here

by mail order,

and it's akin to

Canadians ordering, you know,

a machine gun from

somewhere in America.

It's against the law,

and if we receive it here

in Canada,

they come and arrest us for

receiving the machine gun.

They don't go to America

and say to Colt,

"Hi, we're arresting you

'cause you sent a machine gun

to someone in Canada."

No one's been sentenced

to any time in jail

in the history of Canada,

in 35 years we've had this law.

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