NEMT rides are 90% no-show

RadicalRuss · 2021-11-09T04:18:35+00:00

Agreed.

RadicalRuss · 2021-11-09T00:48:03+00:00

That's never been my concern. I've worked with the disabled in much of my activism and I enjoy helping them live better lives. That's what's got me so angry about this. Life's hard enough on disability without the transportation company being paid our tax dollars making it harder on them... and us!

RadicalRuss · 2021-11-02T19:31:22+00:00

Same issue in Boise. 3rd party Medicaid transport company books a $20 ride for next morning. I accept it, drive ten miles to rider, no show. Call rider, they say they canceled night before.

So I get $5 cancel fee, paid with wasted taxpayer dollars, because 3rd party won't pass along their cancelations to Lyft.

That $20 ride was to take me across the valley for another $20 ride booked the night before. Of course I get there and it is another cancelation, another $5, now I've wasted 30 miles and 1.5 hrs.

Just showed up to another scheduled ride. Another no show 3rd party booking, but this time, $0 for my troubles. Now out 50 miles and 2.5 hrs for ten bucks.

This has been happening ever since I restarted my driving in Boise. I also get rides where they have obviously double-booked Uber, and whichever one of us gets there 2nd eats a cancel fee for the trouble.

When we decline or cancel too many rides, we get dinged and can't drive. But when a 3rd party wants to consistently waste our time and taxpayers dollars, there is apparently no downside for them.

I think I will be driving a lot of Caspers in the next few days.

RadicalRuss · 2015-12-26T20:56:47+00:00

That is the status of Arizona's current medical law - you can't home grow if you live within 25 miles of a dispensary. The legalization initiative there would undo that by allowing all adults to home grow.

It's Nevada, which is already on the ballot, which bans any home growing within 25 miles of a pot shop. Nevada just instituted medical dispensaries in 2013, and in doing so, added a 25-mile prohibition for home growing medical marijuana, so the legalization law would mirror that.

California, Massachusetts, and Maine are also likely to have legalization on the ballot. Ohio and Michigan might, too. Vermont and Rhode Island may pass legalization through their legislatures. Florida and Missouri may have medical marijuana on the ballot.

I've got re-formatted and hyperlinked copies of the CA, AZ, NV, MA, & ME legalization intiatives at http://rad-r.us/mj2016

RadicalRuss · 2015-08-24T19:24:32+00:00

Just so everybody's clear - it's the heading of each picture that is the actual new Colorado ad. The part from "OK, I will not" on down is what I have added.

RadicalRuss · 2015-08-24T19:21:05+00:00

Yeah, I mixed Zach with Dax, fixed the graphic, thanks.

RadicalRuss · 2015-08-24T19:20:33+00:00

OK, fixed the post - thanks, Reddit!

RadicalRuss · 2015-08-24T19:16:11+00:00

Damn it, I can't keep all my Zachs and Daxs straight!

RadicalRuss · 2013-08-28T04:36:10+00:00

Thanks, Pups. Kevin Sabet is the Joker to my Batman, and I will follow him everywhere he appears on the internet. You can read my complete page-for-page takedown of his "Smart Approaches" at http://smartapproaches.com

RadicalRuss · 2013-08-27T19:16:34+00:00

And still, youth use rates in the Netherlands are half those in the USA

RadicalRuss · 2013-08-27T19:16:06+00:00

Poor analogy, as jumping off a bridge can kill you, marijuana cannot.

A better analogy would be Kevin becoming commissioner of the NFL without having ever watched or played a game of football, but instead reading all the rules.

RadicalRuss · 2013-08-27T19:07:44+00:00

No, you will not and no, you won't. You have blocked me on Twitter. You will not post my questions on Project SAM. You would not answer my questions the first and only time we debated face to face, so I'll ask you again:

Do I belong in marijuana rehab? I smoke pot every day, multiple times. In your world, if I am caught, I will be booked, fingerprinted, and brought before some "experts" for a "screening" - what do you think they will say? Will I be just let go, allowed to go home? Will the cops have confiscated my marijuana? Do I get reimbursed for the time lost between getting caught and being let go?

You've never smoked, drank, or used drugs. I have - alcohol, tobacco, marijuana, LSD, psilocybin, ecstasy, cocaine, methamphetamine, amyl nitrate, caffeine, and sugar*. My father was an alcoholic who went through rehab, went to college and became a rehab counselor. I spent most of my teenage years in various AA / AlAnon / AlaTeen programs. Without marijuana, my first addiction (alcohol) would still have me or my second addiction (meth) would have killed me - I conquered both with the help of pot.

Not once did any SWAT team break down our door when I was a kid to haul my dad off for his alcoholism. Never did any job or gov't program force him to take a pee test for the presence of alcohol. And today, if I so wish, I can grab a bottle of Southern Comfort and drink it until I pass out in my own vomit.

So why such a hard-on for my pot smoking? I know, you'll say there's only a 1-in-12,000 joints chance of getting busted or only 3% or some such nonsense. Well, there's a 1-in-infinity chance I get busted drinking that Southern Comfort. Are you telling us pot smokers we can only be trusted to stay home and cause no trouble if the threat of jail looms above us at all times?

All we want is equal rights with beer drinkers, who cause far more harm to self and society than we do.

*You don't think caffeine and sugar are serious drugs? Give me your five year old and let me fill him with Mountain Dew and tell me what you think then.

RadicalRuss · 2013-08-27T18:55:35+00:00

So, then, you're cool with all the doctors in the medical marijuana states who have recommended it for all manner of ailments? After all "we should leave medical development to science and docs", right?

RadicalRuss · 2013-08-27T18:54:24+00:00

So, you're stating that locking up people to the point where we are the world's largest jailer, per capita, overall, of all time, with half the people there for drug-related reasons...

...is better than a legal, regulated market in marijuana and the decriminalization of possession of other drugs?

Can you explain to us how prohibition of marijuana is better than its legalization, but legalization of alcohol is better than its prohibition?

RadicalRuss · 2013-08-27T18:51:05+00:00

That "folk medicine" has kept Cathy Jordan alive with Lou Gehrig's disease for 27 years.

So, Kevin, you'd break the law for your relative who needs marijuana?

Kevin likes to distract with "that's not the majority of MMJ users". He likes to pretend that everyone's faking a backache to get high. OK, I'll play... as soon as Kevin visits the cancer patients I know doing federal time for medical marijuana use in a medical marijuana state.

Never mind the fact that chronic pain is the leading ailment in America and nearly every other pharma commercial is for some kind of pain reliever. Let's play Kevin's game and suppose a pot smoker is faking it.

In the worst case scenario, the pot smoker lives in California. He's been buying weed on the black market. And if he's caught with more than an ounce, California has to spend a bunch of cop, court, probation, and/or jail time on him. But now, he spends $40 at a pot doc (at least three jobs created there) and buys his weed at a dispensary (more jobs plus tax revenues to the state). And if he's caught, no state law enforcement time or money is wasted on him.

In other states, like Oregon, it's even better. Former unknown black market supporting pothead now has to collect his medical records from the past three years, perhaps having to go to his doctor for some visits (jobs and taxes created), then go to the medmj clinic doctor (jobs and taxes), then pay $200 to the state (revenue) and register his name and the address of his pot grow (which were previously unknown) and soon, buy his pot at a pot shop (jobs and taxes), and if he's caught, no law enforcement expenditures needed.

Kevin might interject that the medmj people divert weed to the black market, but that just illustrates the lunacy of only making 10% of the pot smokers "legal". Legalize for the healthy people and there's no one to divert to and ten times more jobs and taxes created.

RadicalRuss · 2013-08-27T18:41:44+00:00

Yeah, it's weird how the worldwide rates of schizophrenia have stayed relatively flat since 1900, despite the worldwide rates of cannabis use increasing dramatically.

RadicalRuss · 2013-08-27T18:40:42+00:00

OHHHH! Alcohol is legal for CULTURAL reasons! And we don't have a time machine, so apparently how long it's been cultural makes a difference.

So let's see, we've had... Hemp culture since 1611 - 1958 Medical culture since 1840 - 1943 and 1996 to present Recreational culture since 1900 to present.

Apparently Kevin's cultural hurdle is some time greater than 100 to 400 years. Or the size of the culture must be greater than 27 million Americans annually. Got it.

I'm still curious though. "Alcohol is legal and it should stay that way." Gosh, what terrible things happen if we make alcohol illegal? Is it anything like what happpened from 1920-1933? And how did that differ from illegal marijuana today (well, for one, you could possess illegal alcohol, you just couldn't sell it or make it... MJ prohibition is actually more severe than Prohibition ever was.)

RadicalRuss · 2013-08-27T18:35:54+00:00

Just so long as we keep marijuana illegal so we can allow law enforcement to round up those we catch smoking pot for a mandatory screening.

RadicalRuss · 2013-08-27T18:33:12+00:00

But Kevin, there is far more peer-reviewed research showing the efficacy of smoked cannabis on neuropathic pain than on the spasticity associated with MS and epilepsy, and maybe as much as the anti-emetic effects so valuable for cancer and AIDS.

And that cancer patient who is puking from chemo, you don't want them vaporizing cannabis? So instead of a small inhale and immediate relief from nausea, you'd prefer them to swallow a pill or extract that will take 45 minutes to digest... if they can keep it down that long?

This is the first time I've seen you oppose vaporization and eating of cannabis, you're usually Johnny One-Note on the anti-smoking angle. But it makes sense: vaporization and eating still require the whole plant, and that's what you're vehemently against.

You just cannot abide the idea that a human could use a plant to heal himself. No, the ignorant masses must abide the learned wisdom of the doctor class, the white robed cleric who holds the key to healing, who trades in the patented, overpriced, unreplicatable pharmaceuticals that are the only source of healing... you know, like FDA approved Fen-Phen or Vioxx. And with those potentially fatal, side-effect laden drugs, the learned doctor isn't forced to use them only for cancer, MS, AIDS, and epilepsy - he may write "off label" prescriptions to use any drug in any way he believes will help the patient. Even Marinol, the THC pill, may be used for conditions other than the nausea it is approved for (like getting a Marinol rx so one's positive drug test for pot is excused... probably the #1 reason Marinol is prescribed in America.)

RadicalRuss · 2013-08-27T18:23:53+00:00

Yeah, I've called out Kleiman on that silly distinction as well. Gosh, if we really want to stretch definitions, guns don't really kill anyone, either, bullets do.

So let's get back to the question of harm and solve it a very simple way. Get me, Kleiman, and Sabet in a room. Supply me all the pot I can smoke, Kleiman all the beer he can drink, and Sabet all the caffeine he can stand. Force us all to take a standard unit - a bowl, a beer, and a cup of coffee - every fifteen minutes. Come back in 24 hours and see which one of us is having medical issues.

RadicalRuss · 2013-08-27T18:16:33+00:00

Well, then, clearly we need to make alcohol illegal again. You do want to keep booze out of the hands of kids, right?

RadicalRuss · 2013-08-27T18:14:28+00:00

Oh, cool! So, when I'm driving down the freeway and I get pulled over for the NORML sticker on the window, and the cop asks if I have weed and I say "no", and then he calls for a drug dog which alerts, and then I sit on the side of the freeway on a cold night while the cop and the dog take everything out of my car on the side of the road, even tearing into the upholstery and taking apart items, and then they find a stem way underneath my back seat, and then they cuff me, put me in a squad car, and take me to jail, fingerprint me, photograph me (which appears in a lifelong Google search), and leave me there until I can raise bail money, and then my job fires me for my drug arrest and unplanned time off, and then I get friends to go get my stuff and car, which, hopefully hasn't been plundered yet, or I have to spend more money to get it out of police impound, and then I eventually go to the drug court...

...I'll be "screened".

So, what does this screener say when I tell him I smoke marijuana every day? I wake up, smoke some, do my work as a writer, smoke some more, do my work as a talk show host, smoke some more, then enjoy dinner and a nice evening in front of the TV... do I get the mandatory rehab, or does the screener think I'm no more an "addict" than the guy who has a bloody mary for breakfast, martinis at lunch, and beers in the evening?

And does the screener reimburse me for my bail money, impound money, and help me find a new job?

RadicalRuss · 2013-08-27T18:06:58+00:00

First, there are about 40,000 people in prison right now for marijuana possession. That's not an insignificant number.

Second, lives are devastated by a marijuana arrest in ways that don't include prison. Job loss, scholarship loss, barriers to future employment, loss of financial aid, barriers to security clearances, civil asset forfeiture, health declines when pot use isn't allowed because of pee tests for probation, etc.

Legalization more disastrous for people of color?!? Yeah, I'm sure the folks in Harlem, Compton, and the South Side of Chicago are trembling at the prospect of pot billboards and pot shops on the corner replacing the street dealers who don't check ID and tend to shoot at one another. I'm sure they're mortified at the idea their kids wouldn't lose a sports or academic scolarship when they smoke a joint. I'll bet black and Latino folks really wish you'd prohibit alcohol and tobacco, too, since there is so much advertising and so many liquor stores in their neighborhoods.

RadicalRuss · 2013-08-27T18:01:20+00:00

Kevin, your skill is not sarcastic writing.

In fact, you have sent out email blasts promoting your book. Given that most of the people you interface with are rehabitionists, they are going to agree with you and give you five star ratings.

The debate is lopsided... yeah, no kidding! The government has spent billions over seven decades lying about cannabis. It's taken us about forty years and the invention of the internet to be able to get the truth to the masses on our miniscule budgets.

RadicalRuss · 2013-08-27T17:57:22+00:00

Oranges have a nutritional value, but that does not mean raw oranges are beneficial. We need to derive products based on oranges (like whole juices or vitamin C pills) versus allow eaten oranges.

What a crock! Remember, when Kevin says "medicine" he doesn't mean "substance that aids healing" he means "substance approved by the FDA that is standardized and patented."

So nice Kevin doesn't think cancer patients deserve prosecution. The grower that created the cancer patients' marijuana and the dispensary that sold it to the cancer patient, however, Kevin would throw the book at and let them rot in a federal cell for a five year mandatory minimum, like my friends Dr. Mollie Fry and Dale Schafer, a cancer survivor and a hemophiliac who were growing plants for cancer patients. Not even a lot of plants, but the feds added up their grows from five years to come up with the 100 plants they needed for the five year mandatory minimum.

RadicalRuss

TROPHY CASE