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Submitted by Bill St. Clair on Sat, 10 Feb 2001 11:53:10 GMT
I'm on Julian Heicklen's mailing list. I got this today. Good news!


From: jph13@psu.edu [mailto:jph13@psu.edu]
Sent: Thursday, July 27, 2000 10:46 PM
To: jph13@psu.edu
Subject: Progress report

Hi:

I thought that I would write a progress report about our activites in Centre County. We started the weekly Marijuana smoke Outs in January, 1998. We have held them every Thursday (with two exceptions) since then. It has been a long, slow campaign, but here is what has happened.

1. Peter Marshall, the Borough Manager of State College, had Diane Fornbacher and me arrested for using a bullhorn. He since has told me that he now favors medical marijuana, after reading our ads in the 1999 campaign. His lawyer in our recent lawsuit told my lawyer that Marshall likes us and thinks that we are an asset to the community.

2. District Magistrate Bradley Lunsford is one of the chief drug warriors in Centre County. He has found me in contempt of court twice, and I am suing him for $1.5 million. Two weeks ago, he and I were talking. He now sees decriminalization of marijuana as a viable option. He is a Republican. He told me that the Libertarian Party is what the Republican Party should be.

3. Joe Filko is an editorial writer for the Centre Daily Times. He is another of the chief drug warriors in town. He has written in the newspaper that I should be put in a net and carted away. A few weeks ago, when I was collecting signatures, he met me on the street, introduced himself to me, and said that drugs should be legalized, but not now.

4. Dr. David Werner is one of the leading ophthamologists in Centre County. He is a former Chief-of-Staff of the Centre Community Hospital. He was elected to that poisiton three times. He now comes to our Marijuana Smoke Outs every Thursday and holds a sign.

5. Gary Cattell is the Willard Preacher, who preaches the gospel on campus every day. He believes that drugs should remain illegal. We became friendly when the University tried to drive him from the Willard Building, and I intervened on his behalf. We held public debates at the Willard Building. The police attended, but did not interfere. His brother intends to vote Libertarian in November. His father is considering joining the Libertarian Party.

6. When we first started our Marijuana Smoke Outs, counter protests were led by Martin Austermueller, a student on campus. He now is the campus representative for the Drug Reform Coordination Network.

Folks, this is the way real progress is made. The six people above do not agree with everything that we do or even most of what we do. But we are slowly winning them over on some positions. We must welcome them when they join us on some issues and respect them when they disagree with us. You know, it is possible that we are wrong on some issues or aspects of them, heretical as that may seem.

Best wishes-Julian

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