Ron Paul locks up the stoner vote

Image by Gregory Jordan via Flickr

Just kidding with the title. Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul is promoting hemp during North Dakota campaign stops. He isn't talking about the kind you smoke. Rep. Paul is promoting industrial hemp.

BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) - Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul praised hemp as an alternative crop and said a free-market approach would protect the nation's environment Monday during North Dakota campaign stops that drew hundreds of cheering supporters.

North Dakota, which is holding Republican presidential caucuses March 6, is one of 13 states with a caucus or primary from Feb. 28 to March 6. North Dakota has 28 delegates to the Republican National Convention in August, although the caucus results will not dictate how any of them vote.

Paul campaigned in Williston, Dickinson, Jamestown and Bismarck on Sunday and Monday, following rival Rick Santorum's swing through Fargo, on the Minnesota border, and the northwestern oil-country town of Tioga last week.

In Jamestown, about 100 miles east of Bismarck, Paul was critical of the federal government's ban on the cultivation of industrial hemp, a crop that is related to marijuana but does not have its mind-affecting properties.

Industrial hemp is grown in neighboring Canada and other countries, where it is used to make paper, lotions, clothing and biofuels.[...]

"There is no reason, in a free society, that farmers shouldn't be allowed to raise hemp," Paul said during a Jamestown appearance that drew about 300 people. "Hemp is a good product." Keep on reading...