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State Lawmakers Critical Of Federal Crackdown On Marijuana

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- Two California lawmakers want to know why the Obama administration is cracking down on the state's medical marijuana dispensaries so they can craft legislation to address the federal government's concerns.

At a news conference Wednesday, Assemblyman Tom Ammiano and Senator Mark Leno condemned the recent decision by the four federal prosecutors in California to go after pot club operators and their landlords as illegal drug traffickers. Ammiano called the move "a 1930s-era reefer madness reaction" to a substance that enjoys popular support and widespread therapeutic use.

The two San Francisco Democrats say they want to put into law a set of guidelines the attorney general's office drafted two years ago requiring dispensaries to be run as nonprofits. But they said they do not know if that alone would assuage the feds.

(Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)

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