Aspen Goes Up In Smoke

The NORML Conference starts in Aspen today. A lot of great people working towards a great cause.

Yes, people probably will smoke pot this weekend amid the Aspen legal seminar sponsored by the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws.

But that is not allowed during the seminar - two days of serious talks on criminal defense issues including drugs, alcohol and terrorism.

"People are doing business," NORML founder and legal counsel Keith Stroup said. But he said, "There's probably a significant amount of marijuana smoking going on at social events."

Washington-based NORML has a trademark, annual legal seminar around December in Key West, Fla., but it plans to make Aspen its annual off-season summer seminar site.

This is the second year in a row the group has come to the mountain town, and the seminar features a bit of, ahem, experimentation this time: In addition to 43 attorneys, a record 41 pro-marijuana activists have signed up, Stroup said Friday.

The featured speaker Saturday is Tommy Chong, half of the humorous pot-smoking duo, Cheech and Chong, from the 1978 movie Up in Smoke. Chong was arrested in 2003 as part of a crackdown on drug paraphernalia sold over the Internet. He was sentenced to nine months in prison

Rocky Mountain News