A sprinkling of pot lessens the chances of smoking causing cancer.

This is the key finding from a major study of the effect of long-term marijuana use, conducted at the medical school of the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) under Professor Donald Tashkin. The study showed that while marijuana smoke damages cells in respiratory tissue, it prevents the damage from becoming malignant. That is, it has an anti-cancer effect.
Tashkin’s reputation has been based on studies and experiments which isolated and identified the toxic components of marijuana. In the late 1990s, through pioneering use of photomicrographs, he showed that marijuana smoke has a damaging effect on cells lining the upper airways. The US National Institute on Drug Abuse then funded his UCLA school to conduct the largest-ever case-controlled study to prove that long-term marijuana use is not just generally damaging but, specifically, increases the risk of lung and upper-airways cancers. Contrary to all expectations, the study exploded the hypothesis.
Tashkin published his results in academic journals. But there has been little response, other than in “alternative” publications. One commentator has compared Tashkin to UN weapons inspector Hans Blix who, sent into Iraq to find something which turned out not to be there, reported his findings honestly, with the result that he was ignored and maligned by the very people who had tasked him to discover the truth.
Tashkin’s data came from 1,212 interviews with cancer patients from the Los Angeles County Cancer Surveillance programme, matched for age, gender and economic standing with 1,040 cancer-free control subjects. Marijuana use was measured in “joint years” – the number of years the patients had been using marijuana, factoring in the number of joints per day.
The result was statistically conclusive that marijuana use was not correlated with the incidence of lung or pharyngeal (pharynx) cancer. While the risk to tobacco users did increase with the number of cigarettes they smoked, tobacco smokers who also used marijuana had a lower risk than those who smoked tobacco only.
Tashkin also conducted a study of general lung function which revealed that tobacco-only smokers had an accelerated rate of decline in function, but marijuana smokers – even if they smoked tobacco as well – experienced the same rate of decline as non-smokers.
“The more tobacco smoked, the greater the rate of decline,” said Tashkin. “In contrast, no matter how much marijuana was smoked, the rate of decline was similar to normal.”
You’d imagine that bodies concerned with public health would be shouting these results at the top of their lungs, that Mary Harney would be on Prime Time advising teenagers, “If you have to smoke, smoke pot”, that the HSE would be handing out leaflets explaining that “Marijuana makes you live longer,” that there’d be billboards at road junctions announcing, “Breathe easier about smoking – add marijuana.”
They won’t do anything of the sort, of course. But we can. If you see a sickly person sucking on a fag outside a pub this weekend, be nice. Pass the joint.

Witches could win the right to hold covens on Catholic premises!
And atheists might have immunity to deface Leonardo’s Last Supper!
So say Catholic bishops across the water.
The British chapter of Merchants of Mumbo-Jumbo (Papal Division) have warned of dire consequences if a Swedish-sponsored equal rights measure comes into force as planned in 2011. The directive aims to curtail discrimination on grounds of religion, disability, age or sexual preference in situations not covered by existing law.
The Roman Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales wants an exemption for religious organisations.
The proposed law could “turn the directive into an instrument of oppression,” explains conference general secretary Monsignor Andrew Summersgill.
“An atheist may be offended by religious pictures in an art gallery,” he worries. And the act could “apply to the activities of a Catholic priest, if, as recently occurred, he were to refuse to take a booking for a Church Hall from a group of witches.”
It’s not the mind-scrambling madness of the monsignor that I find offensive, but the insult to respectable people. I know a number of wanton women who describe themselves as witches — and a nicer bunch of people you couldn’t hope to meet in a forest clearing on a moonlit night. And unlike Catholic priests, they wouldn’t rape your children.

Every day the reasons for voting ‘No’ to Lisbon become stronger.
The Treaty on offer is the same Treaty they tried to bamboozle us into accepting last time. Not a comma has changed, or changed place.
So how come every newspaper feature and news bulletin you read suggests otherwise?
Liars, the lot of them.
Insisting that the people vote again, on the grounds that they voted disobediently first time round, is an insult up with which we should not put — and a gigantic two fingers to the entire notion of democracy.
Now the parasite and loudmouth Michael O’Leary has joined the Yes campaign. QED. Ipso facto. ‘Nuff said.

Bertie Ahern says that he’ll stand for the Dáil again if there’s a general election next summer.
The Mahon Tribunal expects to deliver its report in the spring.
Should Bertie not amend his statement to say that he’ll stand for the Dáil if he isn’t in Mountjoy?

Caught the Mighty Stef’s acoustic set at the new space at the back of Kerr’s Kaff the other weekend.
Dublin mother to junkie son: “Don’t let it steal the sunshine from your smile/Don’t let it steal the mischief from your smile.”
This guy’s the real deal.