Always up on the news, Jay Leno's writers noted a reference to medical marijuana user and advocate, beauty queen Georgine DiMaria, in the Washington Post. "Smoking to treat asthma? Isn't that like eating Taco Bell to cure diarrhea?" Leno quipped. DiMaria, who vaporizes, calls Leno's joke "both naive and false."
Georgine DiMariaIt all started with Kathleen Parker's "Reefer Sanity" column in the Oct. 21 Post in which Parker wrote, "In April, the 2006 Miss New Jersey, Georgine DiMaria, outed herself as a stealth marijuana user to treat her asthma."
Leno's joke went one step further when he added: "If Miss New Jersey wants to help her breathing, move out of New Jersey!"
DiMaria, who is on the board of Directors of NORML New Jersey, fired back:
"While I am thrilled that Mr. Leno took notice of my use of cannabis therapy, his facts about my personal usage of medical marijuana and comments about marijuana, in general, are both naive and false. As a life-long severe asthmatic, living with a debilitating disease and staring death in the face almost every day of my 25 years, I know firsthand how important finding a miracle drug can be... Used responsibly in its purest form through either vaporization or ingestion, marijuana has saved my life numerous times, and has the potential to do just that for so many others... Even though Mr. Leno’s remarks about my personal use were seriously misinformed, and while he took a tiresome shot at New Jersey’s air quality, his comments are positive in that they are yet another indication of just how mainstream medical cannabis has become.