[This hilarious spoof article has been making the email rounds -author unknown. I have posted the spoof in it's entirety below for your reading pleasure.]

Sen. Essman adds last minute semen ban to marijuana legislation

By CHARLES S. JOHNSON IR State Bureau | Posted: Friday, April 29, 2011 12:00 am | (0) Comments

The last hours of the Montana Legislature were met with harried anticipation in the adjudicative body’s Republican Caucus today in Helena. Legislators rushed to finalize many pieces of legislation including the much debated repeal and review of Montana’s 2004 citizen passed initiative 148 allowing the legalization of Medical Marijuana. Senator Jeff Essman, R-Billings, rushed to add an important Amendment to his SB 428 which would all but end the medical marijuana industry in Montana.

Following a year of contentious and highly public moves by the medical marijuana community to bring the drug into the mainstream, the Republican dominated legislature had vowed to “remove the scourge of Marijuana and its many ills from the state.” The final touches to the legislation to do just that were only finalized today after tearful testimony on the Senate floor by Republican Senator Jeff Essman of Billings where he stated his desire add an outlaw of semen to his bill.

“Gentlemen, we have done a great thing corralling in these dopers and their evil weed, but only today was I made aware of a substance whose danger matches, yes even succeeds that of the scourge of Mary Jane, gentlemen I speak of semen. Yes semen, that most disgusting of fluids… that most common enemy of mankind itself. Now many of my brothers here in this body may be asking why semen, why now?

I’ll tell you why, because just recently scientists have discovered the true properties of semen are harmful beyond what we previously thought. The evils of lust, violence and odd behavior in young men, pollution, high school dropout and human overpopulation are all caused by semen we know for sure. Semen stands right up there with marijuana as one of nature’s great mistakes! But now many of the same properties we can point to in marijuana are being discovered in semen while we do nothing to stop its proliferation. Scientists recently discovered that semen may cause euphoria, alleviate depression and decrease the risks of some cancers. Sounds just like marijuana to me.”

Marijuana advocates and constitutional scholars, who were already critical of Essman’s legislation citing medical privacy concerns and a moralistic tone struck during debate of the bill were dumbfounded by Essman’s move to add semen to the list of substances banned under the new legislation. “I mean, wow, this guy is freakin crazy. I told you these bastards were crazy. Essman’s gone off the deep end now. I mean, how the hell does he expect to enforce this?” asked Marijuana advocate Jim Gingery of the Montana Medical Growers Association.

Constitutional scholars who had already criticized Essman’s marijuana repeal bill citing the privacy concerns with handing over medical records of all marijuana patients in Montana to law enforcement were much more diplomatic in their criticism of Senator Essman’s new Amendments banning semen. “We told the Governor this bill was unconstitutional on its face. Handing over medical records is illegal for anyone to do, but banning a body fluid. That’s ludicrous, this doesn’t have a legal foot to stand on,” said constitutional lawyer and former Montana Supreme court Justice Terry Trieweiler.

Senator Essman and his Republican caucus disagree with the contention that their legislation to ban semen with marijuana is unconstitutional. “First off, everyone has disagreements about constitutionality. It’s just how you interpret it. The Governor’s office, these dopers and the constitutional scholars all have it wrong. We’ve found we can ban any damn thing we want in our state, natural or not. Scientists tell us marijuana chemicals naturally occur in the body and we can ban that, so why not semen? Scientists now know for certain the dangers of semen, especially to women. I mean science don’t lie.”

The scientist Senator Essman speaks of and has used to justify his new amendments linking semen and it’s marijuana like effects is Lazar Greenfield, M.D. Dr. Lazar is a world renowned surgeon and until recently, he served as president-elect of the American College of Surgeons. He’s a professor and a titan in medical science. In an article titled “Gut Feelings” in February’s issue of Surgery News he extolled the therapeutic benefits of semen to women’s health and cited peer reviewed evidence that semen, like marijuana, was known to cause euphoria in those who were exposed to it. He cited evidence from a recent study of semen and its effects on humans. Dr. Lazar was forced to resign after publicly coming out as a semen advocate.

The study Lazar cited was authored in part by Dr. Steven M. Platek, Ph.D, the editor-in-chief of Frontiers in Evolutionary Neuroscience and a co-editor of Evolutionary Psychology whose evidence Essman cites as critical in his link of Semen to marijuana. “They say only 5 percent of the ejaculate is sperm”. Essman says.

Scientists say what’s left is seminal plasma, which is a rich concoction of chemicals, including many that have the potential to produce mood-altering effects derived from hormones, neurotransmitters, and endorphins.

“What is the rest of semen made up of,” Essman asks. “We need to know before we go off half-cocked allowing this stuff into our communities. This sounds just like the evidence we heard on marijuana. It’s got all these unknown chemicals, like a gazillion of them that do all sorts of crazy stuff. If this substance is so therapeutic, then why can’t we take it to a lab, isolate its beneficial properties and prescribe it like any other drug. If semen is so good, let’s let doctors put it in a pill and prescribe it. Until we can do that I want to see it gone from our communities.”

Essman and his Republican counterparts do not expect stiff opposition to their semen ban. “We know this stuff is bad,” added House Speaker Mike Millburn, the most ardent supporter of Essman’s SB 423. “My aunt’s cousin’s daughter’s babysitter told me she’d heard that more and more middle schoolers were experimenting with semen and that in high school semen could be found in almost half of all the kids there. That’s just too much, you expect college kids to have this stuff, but now kids as young as 12. Dangerous stuff, we gotta get rid of it, and the old sock approach aint gonna cut it,” Millburn added emphatically.

The bill heads to the Governor’s desk again today. Stay tuned for updates.