Like Bob before him, Drew will leverage his new found influence. Will fans support Carey's causes like they had Barker? This will likeky come down to his views and the show's demographics.

I think more celebrities should speak out on issues they are passionate about. Will I share his views? I doubt it. Will this change how I feel abut him? Nope!

Carey Defends Medical Marijuana Online
 
Nov 2, 9:07 AM (ET)

By SANDY COHEN

LOS ANGELES (AP) - Bob Barker famously closed each episode of "The Price Is Right" with a pitch to spay and neuter pets. His successor is taking a stand on a more controversial subject: marijuana. Drew Carey won't tout toking up on "Price," but he defends the use of medical marijuana in a video posted online Thursday on Reason.tv.

"Smell that smell," the 49-year-old comedian says as he walks into a Los Angeles medical marijuana dispensary. "That's the smell of freedom."

The video is one of 20 Carey will host for the Reason Foundation, a nonprofit educational group whose ideas "some people call libertarian" and whose mission is to "advance freedom," said president David Nott.

Carey offered to produce brief documentaries on topics ranging from traffic congestion to immigration for the foundation's Web site, Nott said.
 
"Drew Carey connects with regular people. ... He has a regular guy's look at things, and that's why this seems like a great thing," he said. "We're interested in freedom across the spectrum, and good journalism about these subjects is important in the world of ideas."

It's Carey's everyman appeal that likely helped him land the coveted job as host of "The Price Is Right." But executives from CBS and Fremantle Media, which produces "Price," had no comment Thursday about Carey's extracurricular work.

Carey also declined to comment Thursday, but he's not shy about his position on medical marijuana.

"I think it's clear by now that the federal government needs to reclassify marijuana," Carey says in the video. "People who need it should be able to get it - safely and easily."

Though medical marijuana might be controversial, media experts and fans of "The Price Is Right" said Carey's political punditry will have little, if any, effect on the stalwart show or the comedian's career.

"Twenty years ago, this would have been career suicide," said longtime celebrity publicist Michael Levine. "But in the early part of the 21st century, a guy like Drew Carey can come out with his position, and it will not injure him."

Shawn Wells, a 32-year-old office worker from Taylorville, Ill., who has identified himself online as a "Price is Right" fan, said in a telephone interview that Carey's political self-expression is "not going to impact me whatsoever."

"In this day and age, where everything is electronic, everybody knows everything about everyone," he said. "Twenty years ago, Drew Carey could have had the same views and nobody would have known or thought anything of it."

Older "Price" viewers could be turned off by Carey's politics, Wells said, "but I don't think it will make a huge difference."

Since Carey is so new to "Price," he's taking a risk speaking out on such a controversial topic, said Bonnie Diczhazy, who runs a "Price Is Right" fan site. People naturally connect him with the show, said Diczhazy, a 38-year-old artist from Cleveland.

But his outspokenness could also earn him new fans.

"The younger generation could learn something," she said, adding that the medical-marijuana video "doesn't affect whether or not I watch the show at all."

"'Price Is Right' is an icon in and of itself," she said. "I don't think (Carey's videos) would stop people from watching."

Carey's mini-documentaries will appear every two weeks through the end of the year on Reason.tv, Nott said. Future topics include eminent domain, school choice and immigration.

Meanwhile, "The Price Is Right" host will continue to close daily episodes with Barker's traditional spay-and-neuter refrain.

http://reason.tv/

http://www.cbs.com/daytime/price/

As an indie, I have to have friends on both sides. There are so few of us, we have to befriend them both. I have even attended events on both sides.

I have given medical marijuana much thought. This issue is much like stem cell research in my view. On this issue, Drew and I agree. I think all the growers should be licensed by the Department of Agriculture.

This will allow us to track how it is grown, where it is grown, the qantity that it is grown in and its use. We need this to aid law enforcement and protect users.

- Paul

You have heard it before and likely thought little of it. Admit it, we have all heard that the earth would run out of water. Orme, TN residents know this to be true.

Tennessee Town Has Run Out of Water
 
Nov 2, 7:09 AM (ET)

By GREG BLUESTEIN

ORME, Tenn. (AP) - As twilight falls over this Tennessee town, Mayor Tony Reames drives up a dusty dirt road to the community's towering water tank and begins his nightly ritual in front of a rusty metal valve.

With a twist of the wrist, he releases the tank's meager water supply, and suddenly this sleepy town is alive with activity. Washing machines whir, kitchen sinks fill and showers run.

About three hours later, Reames will return and reverse the process, cutting off water to the town's 145 residents.

The severe drought tightening like a vise across the Southeast has threatened the water supply of cities large and small, sending politicians scrambling for solutions. But Orme, about 40 miles west of Chattanooga and 150 miles northwest of Atlanta, is a town where the worst-case scenario has already come to pass: The water has run out.
 
The mighty waterfall that fed the mountain hamlet has been reduced to a trickle, and now the creek running through the center of town is dry.

Three days a week, the volunteer fire chief hops in a 1961 fire truck at 5:30 a.m. - before the school bus blocks the narrow road - and drives a few miles to an Alabama fire hydrant. He meets with another truck from nearby New Hope, Ala. The two drivers make about a dozen runs back and forth, hauling about 20,000 gallons of water from the hydrant to Orme's tank.

"I'm not God. I can't make it rain. But I'll get you the water I can get you," Reames tells residents.

Between 6 and 9 every evening, the town scurries. Residents rush home from their jobs at the carpet factories outside town to turn on washing machines. Mothers start cooking supper. Fathers fill up water jugs. Kids line up to take showers.

"You never get used to it," says Cheryl Evans, a 55-year-old who has lived in town all her life. "When you're used to having water and you ain't got it, it's strange. I can't tell you how many times I've turned on the faucet before remembering the water's been cut."

"You have to be in a rush," she says. "At 6 p.m., I start my supper, turn on my washer, fill all my water jugs, take my shower."

During its peak in the 1930s, Orme (rhymes with "storm") boasted a population of thousands, a jail, three schools and a hotel. But those boom times are long gone.

After the coal miners went on strike in the 1940s, the company shut down the mine and the town has never been the same. Not a single business is left in Orme. The only reminder of the town's glory days is an aging wooden rail depot that sits three feet above the eerily quiet streets.

Although changes are coming - cable TV arrived just a few years ago - cell phones still don't work there. The main road into town is barely wide enough for two cars to pass one another. Dogs wander the streets, farm animals can be heard all around town, and kids gather outside the one-room City Hall to ride their bikes.

"It's like walking back in time. It's Never-Never Land here," says Ernie Dawson, a 47-year-old gospel singer who grew up in Orme.

Water restrictions in Orme are nothing new. But residents say it's never been this bad.

Even last summer, as the water supply dwindled, city leaders cut off water only at night. But in August, Reames took the most extreme step yet and restricted use to three hours a day.

Elected in December, he has now spent $8,000 of the city's $13,000 annual budget to deal with the crisis. Most of the money went toward trucking water from Alabama.

He has tried to fill the gaps with modest fundraisers, but it hasn't been easy. A Halloween carnival last week cleared about $375 and a dog show two weeks ago made $300.

The town has received a $377,590 emergency grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture that Reames hopes will be Orme's salvation. A utility crew is laying a 2 1/2-mile pipe to connect Orme to the Bridgeport, Ala., water supply. The work could be finished by Thanksgiving.

"It's not a short-term solution," Reames says. "It is THE solution."

He says the crisis in Orme could serve as a warning to other communities to conserve water before it's too late.

"I feel for the folks in Atlanta," he says, his gravelly voice barely rising above the sound of rushing water from the town's tank. "We can survive. We're 145 people. You've got 4.5 million people down there. What are they going to do? It's a scary thought."

I respect the mayor for making the best of a bad situation. But he the faulty mind set of politicians. Leaching off your neighbor is not "THE SOLUTION."

His "SOLUTION" is to pass the buck. Sure, Bridgeport gets money - so they are pleased. Where do future generations in Urma & Bridgeport get their water.

Conservation should start before the water reaches the tap. The city water supply should include a storm water line. This can be used for sprinklers or toilets.

- Paul