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Sweet Home CannaBama - AL Economic Impact
Recorded: March 31, 2025 Duration: 1:03:18Space Recording
Short Summary
The conversation revolves around legislative challenges and public perceptions affecting the hemp industry, highlighting trends of misinformation, economic impact, and civic engagement. Discussions also touch on the growth potential of the hemp market and the societal shift towards individual freedom in substance use.
Full Transcription
The End We don't need him around anyhow. But sweet home, Cannabama's got a different sound.
Where cannabis knowledge is spread all over town.
Jennifer Boozer's on the airwaves, you know it's true.
FM Tough, want to search for on fire, she's got the crew.
Talking about hemp and CBD with a rebel yell.
Educating folks and doing it well.
Sweet home, Canabama, where the weed grows high.
Sweet home, Canabama, beneath the southern sky.
Sweet home, Canabama, where the knowledge flows.
Sweet home, Canabama, where the good times grow.
Now, Citizen Green face on something special Invited sweet home, Canabama, to this sphere
Reaching vets with wellness, that's their aim
Spreading the word, easing the pain
And just this car's calling, they recognize the thing
Sweet home, Canabama's gonna play the game
With these intentions and connections, they'll take the stage
A new era's dawn, then turn to the new page
Sweet home, Canabama, where the weed grows high
Sweet home, Canabama, beneath the southern sky
Sweet home, Canabama, where the knowledge flows
Sweet home, Canabama, where the good times grow
From Mobile, Alabama, the message rings so clear We'll be right back. Sweet home, Canabama, beneath the southern sky
Sweet home, Canabama, where the knowledge flows
Sweet home, Canabama, where the good times grow
Roll on, Canabama, roll on
Spread the word, let your freedom so be known
Sweet home, Canabama.
Yeah.
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Take your cell phone down to St. Francis Street
When the day's got you down and there's too much pain in your feet
Gotta lay down there, got everything you need
Take me to the Can-A-Bama Queen Everything you need Hamilton, I cannot bear my queen
She'll turn that frown upside down
Tell that old headache to pack up and head out of town
Move over our practice
Cause you ain't what I need
Take me to the Can-O-Bama Queen
Take me down to the Can-O-Bama Queen
Oh good Lord
Take me down to the Can-O-Bama Queen Oh good Lord Take me down to the Canabama Queen
She's got every style of CBD
Take me to the Canabama Queen
Take me to see it baby
God save the Queen Take me to see it, baby.
God save the queen.
Belief and the law, standing strong, standing tall.
From the roots to the rules, we uncover it all.
Truth and justice, the plan's divine.
Canabama's here, it's education time. you Thank you. or ask them Welcome to the show, everybody.
I'm your host, Jennifer Boozer, owner and founder of Canabama and downtown Mobile, Alabama.
We are located at 558 St. Francis Street. Our phone number is 251-255-5155.
Our website, which is brand new, by the way, still working on the links and stuff, but you can go
look how pretty it is at cannabama.com. Thank you, Michael, for that. And let's see, what else?
Social media, Sweet Home Cannabama pages on Facebook,
Instagram, X, YouTube, TikTok, LinkedIn.
We're all over the place trying to be anyway
until they ban us.
I'm in Facebook jail.
So if anybody follows me personally
and has been wondering why I haven't been,
you know, kamikaze posting the last few days,
I'm in Facebook jail.
And it was for a sentence
that was completely innocuous.
But I don't know, somebody maybe reported me. So I can't post till after 420.
Someone needs some help on that. And speaking of 420, we have that coming up. We are doing that
again this year. I know we kind of had a little last minute planning. But with this legislative
session, we have been insane. And on top of that of that mardi gras regular life and it's been pretty crazy around here
but we are having 420 canabama again at canabama in downtown we're doing block party style again
i want to say uh thank you to our sponsors that is shake the field Field, Alabama Forward, the Slurp Society, which our good friend Tyler Powell, who used to help with the show, be on the show.
He is now co-owner of the Slurp Society, and I'm really, really excited for him.
He's going to be here next week to talk about why they're sponsoring 420.
Healthy Harvest CBD, our good friend Ocean,
and he is having a comedy event at Cedar Street Social
at 8 o'clock on 419, right after our event is over.
So we're going to kind of wrap things up in time for everybody
to shift over a block to Cedar Street Social right around the corner
and enjoy a comedy show sponsored by Healthy Harvest.
We will be there.
Pinnacle Hemp, and they are helping sponsor our dab bar.
East Bay Alternatives is helping sponsor our blunt rolling competition.
And East Bay Alternatives is our good friend, John Fisher, who has been on the show,
finally got his business license, decided to leave his legal practice. and he has started opening his own hemp retail store in Fairhope.
So if you're in that area, go check out East Bay Alternatives.
As soon as they are open, I'm sure they will have an announcement soon about that.
And they will be attending 420 as well, so we'll be able to get to know them as our neighbors.
And Rock and Roll-Offs is providing the porta-potties,
hand-washing stations, all that good stuff, and Honeycomb Hydro for all of the graphics,
the digital work, the video, and of course, Michael for helping produce the show. So yeah,
we are going to have so much fun stuff. People, you'll be able to register a vote.
You will be able to talk to any one of us about policy in this legislation. We would really like to think
that all of this will come to an end before April the 20th, but we're going to plan for it not to.
And we're just going to get together like we always do. We're going to consume,
we're going to celebrate, we're going to advocate, we're going to educate,
and we're going to do that as a unified group. So that goes well with our motto, educate, advocate, unify, and celebrate.
So come down to Canabama on 419 for our 420 celebration.
We are not doing it on 420 this year because that is Easter Sunday,
and I will be at church with my family.
So, yeah, and then the comedy show.
We're going to have speakers, DJ, live music, food trucks, snow cone truck,
a blunt rolling contest.
You want to get registered for that. And, yeah, it's trucks, snow cone truck, a blunt rolling contest. You want to get registered
for that. And yeah, it's always a lot of fun and we don't have any alcohol. It's family friendly,
pet friendly. So plan on coming out and enjoying that with us. It's free to the public. Anybody's
welcome. So yeah. So also other 420 events going on around the state.
Uh, there is the Springville 420 camp out in Springville, Alabama.
Uh, our good friend Dave Thomas is hosting that.
And the Alabama Cannabis Coalition is, uh, is going to be there.
You'll have an opportunity to get to know Marty and some of the other members.
And, uh, I always enjoy getting to have a good conversation with Dave Thomas and I will get up to that campground eventually. But they're
doing that from the 18th through the 20th. And that is in Springville, Alabama. They have primitive
camping, fishing, smoke and karaoke. So it sounds like a whole lot of fun. I know that in Huntsville
at Green Lady, there's a 420 event. I don't have a lot of details on that. I know a lot
of our retailers and processors are probably watching, and I'm going to encourage those
guys to throw any 420 events or 420 sales at your stores or on your websites into the comments so
people can take advantage of those events in those areas. So yeah, we, oh, y'all, it's my birthday this week. I almost forgot. I actually
wrote it down in my notes. Happy birthday to me because I keep forgetting. But yes, I will be 47
on Thursday. So I'm just glad it's not on Wednesday because we're going to Montgomery
again. And we have a meeting with the House Health Committee at 1030 a.m. on Wednesday.
And then at 230, we have a Senate meeting for SB 255. Those are two new bills that we found out
about the last time we were in Montgomery. And so that's kind of what we're going to be talking
about here on the show um are we still having technical
difficulties with the guest okay all right well i think we were having technical difficulties but
they fixed it so tonight i want to bring back on the show someone we had as a short guest on a
segment but we talked about him last time about he him being the champion of the Senate hearing that we went to as a speaker and really go into bat for us as a whole industry.
Carmelo Parasolini is owner of Green Acres Organic Farms, which is a hemp grown processing company.
And then the apothecary in which is his dispensary in Florence, Alabama, which happens to be the home of, okay, the home of
Senator Melson from the Senate Health Committee. So are you there? I'm here. I don't think the
video is going to work, but I'm here by phone if you guys can hear me. Okay, that's fine. We can
hear you. And if we can figure out the video part, we will. If not, they can just look at my sweet face.
They're not missing anything.
I disagree.
Okay, so HB 445.
Okay.
I keep getting notes handed to me.
HB 445 is the newest bill, hemp legislation.
We have gone through 132, 182, then 132 became 237, and it failed at a 444 vote.
Now we have this bill, HB 445, which means it's not in the Senate, it's in the House.
So we are going to a brand new committee Brand new legislators on that committee
Brand new bill sponsor
Brand new bill
So let's get into that Carmelo
Yeah so
Yeah we're going to have a whole new
You know a whole new committee
So hopefully
We'll be able to go in there Wednesday
And give them some
Give them some tips and educate them on some of the dangerous overreach that HB 445 is trying to implement.
One thing off the bat, I don't know if you read that little op-ed, but they you know, they were highlighting 235 cases
involving Delta-8 in 2023.
Right.
And 40% of those were involving children
age 6 and under, which
I think everyone's stance here is
children should not get their hands on this.
100%.
Obviously.
I don't think there's anybody arguing for that.
But, you know,
a way they're kind of misconstruing data, you know, those cases only represent 0.018%
of Alabama's 1.3 million residents under 21. And importantly, no deaths occurred. So,
you know, a lot of this, I feel like it's just fear mongering.
Absolutely.
I've said that all along, you know, and I've even gone to the extreme to say that as a mother of a deceased child, I live that fear that every parent has.
And it disgusts me for them to use that type of fear mongering against parents to manipulate a situation.
And again, at the end of the day, if you have a bill that's good and necessary and is actually going to help people, you don't have to make things up and you don't have to fear monger.
That's right. And I have two young children at home, two beautiful boys.
And, you know, we don't keep stuff like this in the house.
We keep it away from children.
I think that's something that parents need to understand is, like, they need to be educated.
You know, you're not going to leave a bottle of whiskey with them.
You're not going to leave your pain pills out.
You're not going to leave a loaded gun out.
Right.
Everything has consequences, and we need to take responsibility for that.
And, you know, on the flip side, we're talking about a substance that has no death attributed
to it.
Right.
You know, unlike substances like tylenol, alcohol, existing chemicals, opioids, cannabinoids
do not cause overdose death.
Right.
And a lot of these products, at least, you know least my products, I'm sure a lot of your products.
Carmelo, I'm sorry.
I got to interrupt you.
We're going to commercial, but we're going to pick up right there with toxic substances.
When we come back from the break, stay with us.
At Cannabella, we believe that CBD is for everyone.
Our demographic is human.
There's no race, age, gender, socioeconomic, education, or religious difference in our chemical and electrical systems.
Let no human be excluded.
We work hard to create an environment of learning.
Our goal is to bring together all people in need of help.
While celebrating each moment of relief, educate, advocate, unify, and celebrate.
Find us at cannabama.com, Facebook, and Instagram.
Hey, Alabama football fans.
Are you headed up to T-Town this fall for the game?
If you forget to come by Cannabama first, you can shop at Tuscaloosa's first hemp dispensary,
Freedom, CBD, and Wellness on 15th Street, just a mile up from campus. to come by cannabana first you can shop at tuscaloosa's first hemp dispensary freedom cbd
and wellness on 15th street just a mile up from campus they have the largest selection of products
in west alabama and are ready to hemp you out with all your tailgate needs follow freedom cbd
and wellness on facebook instagram and tikt. Native Black Cultivation is a true pioneer
in Alabama's cannabis industry.
As the first medical cannabis company
to harvest in the state,
they're committed to producing quality,
sustainable cannabis.
Native Black Cultivation blends integrity,
innovation, and inclusivity
to ensure every product from the farm
meets the highest standard of quality and safety.
Their mission extends beyond cultivation, focusing on social and economic change
through education and community engagement.
Visit NativeBlackCultivation.com to learn more.
Mullins Lobbyist Firm is Alabama's frontline lobbyist team specializing in cannabis, autism, epilepsy, and small business.
We fight for you in Montgomery. For information on current and future federal and state legislation, including S-4226 Cannabis Administration
and Opportunity Act and S-980 Industrial HIP Act Farm Bill 2024, visit the website
MullinsLobbyistFirm.com and follow us on social media. Is there a cause or issue you want to see
changed or would like to get support for? Let us help you. Email al4medicalcannabisfreedom at gmail.com. Welcome back to Sweet Home Cannabama. Now with all the
information you want about cannabis, here's your host, Jennifer Buzer. Welcome back, everybody.
Tonight we're talking with Carmelo Parasolini from Florence, Alabama. Before the
break, you were just getting into testing standards for alcohol and tobacco, you know,
all these things that are also toxic that are not regulated nearly as heavily as what this bill
would do to hemp. For sure, yeah. I mean, we're HB 445. It's addressing a statistically rare issue
using fear-based messaging instead of evidence-based policy. I touched on this
at the last Senate hearing, but if safety is truly the concern, energy should be focused
on educating parents, enforcing existing age restrictions, and regulating product presentation rather than banning an entire legally legal industry.
And if we're not going to require the same testing standards for alcohol and tobacco,
substances well documented to cause death and disease.
Meanwhile, a non-lethal plant is treated as a public health threat.
health threat. The approach
The approach is inconsistent, un-certificate, and unjustified.
is inconsistent, un-scientific, and unjustified.
Right.
Right.
Well, and you can even say about, I mean,
alcohol and cigarettes kill people
and they cause disease, but alcohol
also causes accidents.
It causes violence.
I mean, it literally will
break down an entire family
and destroy a life.
I've talked to many police officers
who have told me personally, I'd rather deal with someone on cannabis than alcohol any day.
I've heard that too.
Back to alcohol and tobacco, let's talk about cancer.
Cancer is, I believe it's number two or number three, number three killer in the state of Alabama.
10,600 Alabamians died from cancer in 2024.
Wow.
Many linked to environmental exposures, unregulated food additives.
Why is it the legislature focusing on improving food and water safety for our children?
Right.
I think it's truly about the children.
Right.
These issues impact every single family, and hemp is facing stricter scrutiny than our food and water supply, which is not acceptable to me.
Right. And I mean, down here where I'm at,
we've got brown and yellow water in Sarah land.
We've got non-potable water a lot of times, you know, and it's nasty.
And we all know they put chlorine and fluoride and God knows what else in the
water system.
Yeah. Yeah. That's a, yeah, yeah i could talk i could talk a few hours on
a water supply oh i'm sure i'm sure uh yeah but uh yeah i mean you know they want to talk about
synthetic you know synthetic cannabinoids um you know cannabinoids from medical cannabis
recreational cannabis all contain the same active compounds, but in different formulations and concentrations.
Right.
So whether natural or synthetic, these cannabinoids provide the same therapeutic benefits as demonstrated by the FDA's approval of Marinol.
Right.
And that's a synthetic form of Delta-9 THC.
form of Delta-9 THC. So the fact that synthetic THC is FDA approved further underscores that
Right.
synthetic cannabinoids are not inherently harmful. And if we allow citizens to legally
purchase known killers like alcohol and tobacco, both of which we all know have proven harmful
side effects and lead to countless deaths every year. It's difficult to justify opposing cannabis derivatives,
which have been shown to be far, far safer.
In fact, cannabis and its derivatives are far less harmful than main legal
substances on the market now.
Right.
And offer a wide range of benefits for a lot of people.
Right.
Well, I would venture to say that maybe a synthetic cannabinoid is probably
better for you than, say, equal, you know, aspartame, Splenda, all the other, you know, I think, and I don't know if it still does, but I can remember at least at one point reading the word formaldehyde on a soda can.
Right. I mean, we can trust people to make decisions about substances like alcohol and tobacco, but, you know, I think we should be able to trust them to make informed choices about hemp and cannabis.
Right.
Especially given the substantial body of evidence.
Right.
According to safety and ecstasy.
Well, I mean, let's take it a step further. You get a piece of paper from your doctor. I used to get them once a month. They would give me 180 opioid pain pills a month.
Right, right.
And nobody sat at my house and told me how I could or couldn't use them.
You know, nobody sat and babysat me or said,
no, you can only have one a day because we don't trust you.
No, they gave me 180 Lortab 10s like it was nothing.
You know, and this is getting more scrutiny than that.
And also pharmaceuticals, and I'm not a huge fan, but sometimes they have their place.
They definitely have their place.
If I'm having surgery, put it in my vein.
You know what I mean?
If you're going to cut on me,
I want the drugs. But
they are synthetic. All of them.
Right? Yeah, and they're
synthetic. Insulin and
all of it. You can't
patent a plant. You can't make
them, you know. Exactly.
You can't.
It's
pretty sad. So if you
can get a prescription for 90,
30 milligram Oxycontins and go home and be trusted to make an adult decision on
how to use it,
the same should apply.
I mean,
that applies to alcohol once,
once you,
I don't even think they should be in the,
they shouldn't even be in the same category.
Well,
they shouldn't,
but if they want to keep throwing it in there in the same category, let's go there.
Right.
Let's go there.
You know, also, let me go here through my notes.
There's a point I want to talk about.
Let's see here.
Where is it?
Okay, so I've done lost my study.
Okay, here we go. An arbitrary THC cap, you know.
Oh, yeah.
An arbitrary five milligram THC cap, which it wants to be regulated like alcohol.
It comes in, you know, alcohol comes in varying strengths. We have low-percentage beer, wine, liquor.
We got PGA.
We got, you know, pure grain alcohol, which is super concentrated and low concentrated beer.
Why are you going to put an arbitrary cat?
Well, and like we made the point a few shows ago,
that even non-alcoholic beer is defined by a trace amount of alcohol being allowed in it.
It's the same as a CBD product.
It's like our non-alcoholic beer.
I've even seen memes that say CBD is our non-alcoholic beer i've even seen memes that say cbd is the
non-alcoholic beer weed but but there's still a trace of thc and a lot of it and it's the same
for non-alcoholic beer you could uh compare it to that because even non-alcoholic beer is allowed to
have a tiny percentage of alcohol that's a trace you would never feel it but it's still there
that's a trace you would never feel it but it's still there. Right. Golly so I've
touched base on this before but we have, we provide hemp derived cannabinoids to
folks with cancer, Parkinson's, people with suffering through seizures and a lot
of those folks we offer to at no cost. Right. And they claim they get
significant relief from that. Right. This bill would jeopardize that.
And here we are.
We're focusing on hemp right now, and we're going on four years with a failed medical cannabis program.
How are we not putting all this energy to fixing that bill to get patients access to this plant? So they passed it knowing that, okay, it had medical, it had medical effects,
medical properties, medicinal properties. Yet here we are four years later where we, we, we put
together the country's worst medical program. Oh yeah. Embarrassing. Embarrassing. It is so
embarrassing. It is. And there was, there was, I could talk two hours on that.
You know, we were an applicant.
We've been doing this for going on six years.
And yeah, I mean, we're giving it to people who don't even have businesses in Alabama.
We're giving it to folks who haven't processed anything in Alabama yet.
yet and it's just
And it's just not a good look for Alabama.
not a good look for Alabama.
Nope.
We can talk more
about the over-regulation of
cannabinoids. We're going to want to regulate all
or they're wanting to regulate
all non-psychloractic compounds like CBD,
CBG, and CBN. Right.
Treating them as intoxicating substances
without scientific basis.
Yeah.
It's threatening hemp farmers' livelihoods,
potentially criminalizing compliant farming operations.
So it's...
Well, and it's in total contradiction to federal law, right?
I mean...
Correct.
It's crazy that they call us unregulated.
Now, we've acknowledged that we are regulated.
We follow federal and state regulation.
It's not our fault that there aren't enough rules for everybody on the books,
but we follow these self-imposed rules because we don't want, like I said,
even the appearance of impropriety.
But this is completely contradicting federal law.
But they're not even self-imposed laws.
I mean, I've had to get manufacturing licenses.
I've had to get...
Right.
Well, yes, I guess I'm speaking retailers.
Retailers aren't allowed to have a license.
I'm not going to say retailers don't get licenses or don't have to have a license.
Retailers want a license.
They just won't make one for us.
I've been asking for a license since 2019.
I mean, you have a retail.
That's the beauty of what the 2018 Farm Bill did.
As long as we're making products that are below 0.3% dry weight basis,
that means you guys can sell this commodity through your retail license.
And they're already collecting, you know,
they're already collecting tons of tax revenue on these products.
And the whole name of the show is economic impact study.
I haven't even touched on that yet, but we're getting there.
We're getting there.
We're talking about, we're talking about, you know,
well, the, all of these things are what we'll create i mean we've
talked we talked about this earlier they took the word ban out of 132 and made it this whatever all
this these 60 something page bills this is absolutely a backdoor ban you know a lot of the
measures that they want to put in place would make it impossible or nearly impossible,
especially for retailers. I don't know how it would affect processors and farmers, except
there's the trickle down of where would their products go? Because if the store is all closed,
then everybody closes, you know, and, and it's, it's insane. Yeah.
I don't know.
I feel like there's definitely agendas at play here,
whether it be, you know, big pharma, big tobacco, or alcohol.
It's several bigs.
If you ask me, it's several bigs.
Alcohol cells are trending downward.
They are.
I hear some music.
Yes, we got to go to the break. When we come back, we'll pick right back up
with Carmelo Parasoliti. Very good.
Stay with us.
FM Talk 1065. We'll be right back. cloudy with highs around 80 and the outlook for wednesday farly cloudy again with highs of the lower 80s this is meteorologist dr bill williams for fm talk 1065 fm talk 1065 the gulf coast
weather authority i'm rosanne haven from wkrg news 5 the case of a woman accused of killing a former Mardi Gras queen in a drunk driving crash now moves to a grand jury.
Spencer Strickland was indicted today for murder in the death of Catherine Smith.
She was originally charged with reckless manslaughter.
Investigators say Strickland ran into Smith's vehicle after running the light at Airport Boulevard in McGregor Avenue in September. A stormy Monday on the Gulf Coast,
a batch of thunderstorms brought heavy rain, strong winds, heavy downpours, causing Fish River
and Sticks River to overflow in Baldwin County. And a tornado in Dothan today injuring students
and causing significant damage to Dothan Preparatory Academy. The roof fell through.
Surrounding neighborhoods were so severely damaged,
police kept traffic from the area.
I'm Roseanne Haven from WKRG News 5.
Local coverage you can count on.
Hey, Alabama football fans.
Are you headed up to T-Town this fall for the game?
If you forget to come by Cannabana first,
you can shop at Tuscaloosa's first hemp
dispensary, Freedom CBD and
Wellness on 15th Street,
just a mile up from campus.
They have the largest selection of
products in West Alabama
and are ready to hemp you out
with all your tailgate needs.
Follow Freedom CBD and Wellness
on Facebook, Instagram
and TikTok.
Roll Tide.
Native Black Cultivation is a true pioneer in Alabama's cannabis industry. As the first medical cannabis company to harvest in the state, they're committed to producing quality, sustainable cannabis.
Native Black Cultivation blends integrity, innovation, and inclusivity to ensure every product from the farm meets the highest standard
of quality and safety. Their mission extends beyond cultivation, focusing on social and
economic change through education and community engagement. Visit nativeblackcultivation.com
to learn more. Mullins Lobbyist Firm is Alabama's frontline lobbyist team specializing in cannabis,
autism, epilepsy, and small business, we fight for you in Montgomery.
For information on current and future federal and state legislation, including S-4226 Cannabis
Administration and Opportunity Act and S-980 Industrial HIP Act Farm Bill 2024, visit the
website MullinsLobbyistFirm.com and follow us on social media. Is there a cause or issue you want
to see changed or would like to get support for? Let us help you. Email al4medicalcannabisfreedom at gmail.com. At Cannabella, we believe that CBD
is for everyone. Our demographic is human. There's no race, age, gender, socioeconomic,
education, or religious difference in our chemical and electrical systems. Let no human be excluded.
We work hard to create an environment of learning.
Our goal is to bring together all people in need of help while celebrating each moment
of relief.
Educate, advocate, unify, and celebrate.
Find us at Cannabama.com, Facebook, and Instagram.
Welcome back to Sweet Home Cannabama. now with all the information you want about cannabis
here's your host jennifer buzer welcome back everybody tonight we were talking with carmelo
parasolini from florence alabama he is the owner of green acres organic farms and the apothecary
dispensary there in florence and so we're talking about HB 445,
the latest piece of hemp
regulatory legislation,
also known as
nightmare, that we are
having to deal with.
I have to say, it's better
than SB 132, where it was
going to be classified as a controlled
one substance. Well, right.
Heroin. Right, we're not hanging out with heroin. So I guess, yes, let's be positive.
Yeah. Okay. So one thing
that I noticed was increased
testing requirements. Tell us about that.
Yeah. So, I mean, well, first off, I'm not against testing products. I don't want to sound
No, you're a processor. You literally, that's half your job. We spend probably close to probably
$50,000 to $60,000 per year just in testing our products with our BEA certified lab. The, the issue I see is, okay, we want ABC to regulate it,
yet these are not required of tobacco and this is not required of alcohol.
Right. So why are we requiring it on, you know, why is hemp under the,
under the microscope when hemp does not cause death, whereas alcohol and tobacco does cause death.
Right.
It's, you know, it's a contradiction and, you know, it makes my brain swell when I think
about it.
I just, you know, I really don't get it unless there's some form of ulterior motive at play
here to outlaw these products.
Right.
Well, I mean, like I said, you know, they're, they're not banning it,
which they think we should be grateful for. You know, 132 was an all out ban putting us in
the category with heroin and, and that was thrown out there. And I said, that's like saying to your
wife, honey, you hurt my feelings with divorce papers, but it did start a conversation. However, it hasn't been terribly productive
as far as getting anything done.
I'm very confused, too, because I keep hearing
these senators talking in articles
how they have all these folks reaching out to them and
talking to them about all these issues with these kids.
Yet anytime we call them, it's, you know, we don't get calls back.
We don't get any answers.
We don't get our emails responded to.
Right.
Well, and like I said last week, if I was the parent of a teenager who ate a gummy that they bought from a vape shop or wherever they got it and was looking
at a $50,000 hospital bill, which I still do not believe happened. But anyway, but if I was,
if I was looking at a $5,000 bill, I would, you couldn't keep me out of that Senate hearing.
You couldn't keep me. Where's the superintendent? because now this latest article that melson was
in he said he keeps getting calls what does that mean it's super vague there's no details there's
no data there's no information that we can check they're just saying things and we know
that some of them have said some things that are 100,000% not true.
I have to laugh.
You know, you got to laugh or you'll go crazy.
But they finally did give us some data.
They did give us some data. And they let us know that 0.018% of Alabamians under 21 were affected with no death.
Now, can somebody find the percentage of children under six
who accidentally ingest alcohol or Tylenol or drain cleaner
or parental responsibility, you know?
Correct, correct.
I reached out to the Alabama Poison Control today.
I called twice and left my name and number,
and they reassured me someone
was going to get back with me today because I wanted to know more about these numbers so I
could give a more educated response to it. But I'm just going by what these senators gave me.
And again, trying to manipulate percentages and numbers in misleading ways, that is a red flag to me. And that is... Right. Again, why do you have to do that if you have a good bill with great intentions
and nobody's going to get hurt and this is definitely what the people of Alabama need,
then why do you have to make stuff up? Why do you have to exaggerate and fear monger
and throw out vague things? And I understand that some of these people are used to
people just taking their word for it some of them are doctors and and we know how most people view
the authority of doctors and that's the same with elected officials somehow they stop being
normal people and they become these higher standards we look to. And no, they're just human, just like us.
Look at where, you know, trusting their data and trusting their science has gotten us in the last six years.
What our country has gone through.
Exactly.
And if we want to talk about safety and efficacy, let's talk about some of the pharmaceutical vaccines.
Let's talk about some of the pharmaceutical drugs that have a, you know,
that come with a black box warning. One of the FDA's most serious warning that can cause death.
We'll never see a black box warning on a cannabis product. It just doesn't, it's not going to happen.
But yet there's people who will push things that are more deadly while we're trying to ostracize a plan, criminalizing a plan.
Right.
It's just, it's silly to me.
It's silly to me.
It is silly.
But when you think about it, if you owned a hospital or a pharmaceutical company or a health insurance company, all the scams involved here, you know, it's going to cut into your business if people stop consuming a toxin that is literally
making them sick and making their bodies break down and and breaking them down mentally
emotionally finding every way you can break down a human being and if cannabis is is overtaking
that in any way people are not only going to stop consuming the toxin and you're going to lose money there, they're going to not get sick in the same ways, if at all, because they're
not ingesting a literal toxic substance.
But that's what everybody wants to have at a celebration, having a baby, getting married,
retiring, let's get drunk.
Right.
Make it make sense.
Hey, you know, I'm all for people's right to choose well yes exactly and but you know what they're they're they're wanting to choose something
that's more deadly and dangerous that's their right as an american that's their that's right
of choice i mean you want to talk about miracles uh you know mother mary went to jesus as the
first miracle and said hey hey, we need to
get this party going. We need some
water into wine.
That was the first miracle.
I'm never going to say
down what someone
wants to consume as a
red-blooded, free American.
My favorite joke about that from a
comedian was like, you know, Mary
came to Jesus and said, hey, oh, we got squatter to serve all these people.
And he was like, keep the party going.
That's right.
That's right.
It's a celebration, you know.
Exactly.
But, yeah, it's, you know, we can trust people.
We can trust people to go buy those things.
We can trust people with all these other things.
Right.
We can trust people to, you know. You want to talk about dangerous.
Should we outlaw cars?
We should outlaw scooters
in downtown areas.
Those electronic scooters are death
traps.
Some of the best people
said it best.
You mean dangerous freedom
over...
Under that token, you could say we could just brick up
the bank head tunnel underneath mobile bay because somebody's rv gets you know their head knocked off
every couple weeks around here that's dangerous you know let's come on we can't all live in a
bubble suit right and parental responsibility is a big deal. I, you know, one of my favorite stories
about Isaiah, he's sitting next to me when he was still in diapers and adorable, he would walk over
to the socket, the, the, the, the plug in the wall, and he would hold his finger up to it and turn
around and smile and look at me and I would, don't you do it. But I knew that if he got too close to it, it was my job to say, no,
this is, and put the little plug in there to keep his little fat fingers out of it.
But he knew he was doing something wrong and he was set, he was waiting for me to stop him.
And that's our job as parents. You know, you have to take some responsibility at some point.
And, you know, when you, when you got 16, 17, 18-year-old kids using fake IDs or just going and trying to buy these products illegally, that's an issue too.
But again, kids are doing that with tobacco.
Kids are doing that with alcohol.
It shouldn't be done.
This is the reason we're going to ban hemp. In that case, we should be banning alcohol. It shouldn't be done. But why are we, you know, this is the reason we're going to
ban hemp. In that
case, we should be banning alcohol.
In that case, we should be banning tobacco.
You can't have this conversation about hemp
in a vacuum.
It's just not a thing.
You've got to look at the broader
scope of it, especially since they're determined
to regulate
this separately, might I add,
under alcohol and nicotine.
Why would the THC in a drink be any different at all from in a gummy or a vape or anything
else?
It's the same thing, guys.
It's the same thing.
It doesn't make sense.
We have a Republican majority right now.
I was raised a Republican.
I was raised to conserve things.
We're supposed to conserve our rights.
Less government, all that good stuff.
Less government interference, less government regulation.
We have a Republican majority right now,
and we can make some common sense legislation that makes sense that
can get more funding for the state that can keep the constituents who want this yep keep this here
for them we can't you know they're so you know well they're going to be less of a i mean let's
talk about the fact that these some of these people that have gone through conventional medicine
and and been failed by that system
because we're dealing with, again, synthetic chemical compounds, single synthetic chemical
compounds flooding the body and the brain that the body and brain are not made to fully process
and all the side effects and all the things. Some of these people will have to go to the doctor
less. They will have less mental health issues, less days off work, less breakdowns, less a chance of having mental health issues, emotional issues and physical issues.
If they're maintaining their quality of life naturally by their own standard and their own choice.
And we know people are doing that by the hundreds in my shop.
You know, every week we've got hundreds and hundreds of people that come through and they've made a choice.
And the vast majority of them are there because everything else they tried has failed and they can't sleep.
They can't think straight and they cannot cope with their pain.
When we come back.
Sorry, Carmelo.
When we come back from the break, we're going to finish
up with Carmelo Parasoliti. Stay
with us.
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Welcome back to Sweet Home Cannabama. Now with all the information you want about cannabis,
here's your host, Jennifer Boozer. Welcome back, everybody. You're listening to Sweet Home Cannabama right here on FM Talk 106.5 every Monday night live at 7 p.m.
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Let's get back to the conversation.
Carmelo Parasoliti from Florence,
Alabama. We were just talking about all the things that are wrong with HB 445. And we're doing that
so that the listeners who, and by the way, you guys, these senators told us the other day, sorry,
I'm sweating. It's so hot in here. The senators very vocally acknowledge the flood of emails and calls. So we need you
to keep doing that. But we've got a new committee. So that's the House Health Committee. I'm counting
on my friends listening, Marty and Sonia and Melissa, somebody throw those House Health
Committee names and numbers up there. The Alabama Cannabis Coalition, Alabama Hemp and Vape Association, and the Alabama Hemp
Trade Association all have calls to action that have the same information.
So whatever group you're a part of or whichever one you want to join or all three, there is
information for you to be able to professionally and politely and accurately send an email or make a call to your representatives in the House Health Committee
so that they know why you want them to vote no.
That's as important as telling them no.
Then you need to give them a reason.
And you can list any of these reasons, but please feel free to add your personal stories, too,
because, you know, some people say those stories don't matter.
We know they do. Maybe not to all of them. The ones with an agenda, they don't care.
Obviously, this legislation is obvious. Screw you, Alabama.
I'm sorry, but I'm not going to miss my words. This is 99 percent of the state.
We don't care what you have.
Right.
I mean, also we should probably touch base on how like some of these senators from
the last committee,
like Senator Sam,
you know,
he appeared on the local Dale Jackson show where he cared,
characterized those opposing SB 132 is dope pushers.
Right.
Who are celebrating its defeat.
In reality,
it wasn't,
you know,
dope pushers or drug dealers,
but it was Senator Sam's own constituents,
including cancer survivors, local business owners, farmers,
people suffering from seizures,
who were celebrating the defeat of SB-132.
This rhetoric is not only harmful,
but discredits the hard work of individuals like you and me,
who are providing safe, legal, and beneficial hemp-derived products in the community.
And it seems that despite our progress,
the Alabama Temp industry still faces significant challenges,
even when it comes to public perception and legislative roadblocks.
That recent defeat in SB 132 was because of people who called in
and the constituents made their voices heard.
Absolutely.
And it highlighted the growing tensions with lawmakers choosing to mischaracterize legitimate industry professionals.
Right.
Dope pushers.
Well, and even if you want to go, like in Mobile, if you want to go and talk to your local senator representative,
you want to go sit down with Vivian Figures or Barbara Drummond
or somebody like that, call them up. Go stop by their office. Make an appointment. Say, hey, I
would love, as your constituent, I would love to talk to you. And there's, I can't think of any
reason other than them being in Montgomery on certain days that they wouldn't be willing to
hear you out. And even if they're not on the committee, they know somebody who is. And eventually,
if it gets out of committee, they all have to hear it.
So eventually, we need to talk to all of them.
I agree.
Yeah, I agree.
Everyone just reach out to your own rest.
But that kind of rhetoric distorts the truth.
It does.
It undermines the work of countless farmers and processors and retailers.
Right.
And we're committed to providing quality tested products that include the health,
that improve the health and well-being of Alabama citizens.
And maybe it's time for politicians to start listening to their constituents,
those who rely on hemp products for, man, they relied on pain management
for their business and for their health.
And Alabama deserves better than fear-mongering and misinformation pushed by senators.
It deserves evidence-based policy that supports the hemp industry and the people it
serves. Well, and correct me if I'm wrong before we move on to the economic impact, because I
definitely want to talk about that, but this doesn't have any restriction on online sales
from out of state, correct? Don't say anything about that. Geez. I don't think it does because none of these bills have.
None of these bills have, which means
yeah, which means
your 13-year-old now instead of walking
or your 15-year-old instead of having to
score a fake ID
or get the homeless guy out front of the
station to go in and get it for them,
now they can just go online and
click, yes, I'm 21.
Because who's going to check? So there goes your argument about safety for children right there.
Then all the money is going to go to God knows where. And then the tax revenue, the jobs,
all of that money will go out of the state, just like lottery, gambling, and everything else
besides Alabama football that we want to suck
at um let's talk about economic impact because at the end of the day money talks I know I mean
our friends in Texas let me give this as an example our friends in Texas who are even further
under the gun right now than we are although it is turning around for them, it looks like. But their lieutenant governor is determined,
I would dare say more determined than Senator Nelson, to get
this hemp ban. I mean, they are just crucifying it
in this huge state of Texas. $8 billion
industry with a B.
Yeah. And he's still willing to trash the whole thing.
Despite the millions of people that own small businesses from the farms to the processors
to the retail stores in a massive state like Texas.
I can't even imagine the number of consumers in Texas.
I can't even imagine the number of consumers in Texas.
And Texas has always been tough.
I can remember selling full spectrum oil to people traveling back from Florida to Texas because they couldn't sell anything but CBD isolate.
So we don't want that to happen here.
And I know we don't have the population of Texas.
the population of Texas.
But if Texas has $8 billion worth of CBD and THCA products being sold,
we've got to have a good enough chunk here that people would be shocked.
We could capitalize on all of this as a state.
If you don't like it, no one's forcing you to participate or buy it.
Right.
But I don't like alcohol.
That's exactly right.
But I'm not out here lobbying to get alcohol removed from stores.
Right.
Because so many people enjoy alcohol and they should have that choice.
Yeah.
That's right.
Right.
That's right.
It comes down to choice and freedom.
And basically what these senators who are introducing bills like this are
saying is they know better than you.
They know better than you.
And,
and,
and we're,
we're going to make,
you know,
it's ridiculous.
We're all adults here.
And well,
at points,
at points,
especially after the dope pushers thing and what,
what Senator Govan said about how they got were trying to
get rid of the negativity surrounding 132 because of all the press and stuff we had generated
oh you just changed the bill number trick them yeah they think we're as stupid as people outside
of alabama you know the people that that are outside of alabama that think we're all dumb
we all share one full set of teeth and we marry our cousins our legislators don't even
think that highly of us that's how this has made me feel they really do they can't even know
that that they have gained the system to where nobody has a choice anymore we don't get to vote
on issues so once they get elected and and i mean hell half of them are unopposed every year and
they sit there for 30 years they They've got it made in Alabama.
So they're not even worried about insulting us and lying and making stuff up because, hey, who's going to do anything about it?
Right. And the economic impact is really where it's at, because for me, it's my livelihood.
It's your livelihood. We have children. We have futures.
We love what we do and we have great businesses and great customers.
Why should that all be over with?
If there wasn't a market for it, I could see it.
And if there was people dying from it, I totally get it.
But they're trying to distort data to paint their picture the way they want it to look.
And if you look at all the context, it's actually kind of ridiculous they made
that claim, but they knew that, you know, that little percentage there
would look good in a headline. And when you break it down, it's
bullshit. Yeah. Well, we're out of time. I do want to add that I
don't think Senator Melson was counting on how much
of a conversation he was going to get out of 132's original language.
I don't think he bargained for what he's getting now.
And that makes me really proud.
I want to say to all my colleagues and to you, Carmelo, thank you so much that we get the privilege to fight this fight together.
Thank you for being on the show.
You guys look for the Apothecary and Green Acres
Organic Farms on social
media. Google it. All that
good stuff. Thank you so much for being here. We'll see you
next week on Sweet Home Canabama.
Have a good night. I love you. Don't miss the fun, don't miss the chance
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