Marijuana Has No Accepted Medical Use, DEA Decrees

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The feds have spoken: marijuana has no legitimate medical use and will continue to be classified as a hard drug. This decision comes nine years after medical pot advocates asked the federal government to reclassify marijuana to reflect growing evidence that it has beneficial medical properties. DEA to medical weed advocates: "No way, hippies." On the other hand, this isn't all bad news for the medical marijuana folks, since now they can start appealing the decision.

The Coalition for Rescheduling Cannabis filed a petition in 2002 to reclassify weed, and nothing happened. This spring, they filed a lawsuit demanding that the DEA finally attend to the request. The DEA sent them a big "no" on June 21, and their response was published yesterday.

The LA Times quotes Joe Elford, the chief counsel of Americans for Safe Access: "We have foiled the government's strategy of delay, and we can now go head-to-head on the merits." Yeahhhh! But then they also quote him saying "One of the things people say about marijuana is that it gives you the munchies and the truth is that it does, and for some people that's a very positive thing."

And the above quote is a good illustration of one reason we're not going to get widespread access to medical pot in this country for a long, long time. As long as medical marijuana advocates continue to toss around stoner terminology, squares will continue to think of the harmless plant as a drug and associate it with various societal ills, and no progress will be made. "Munchies," dude? You're a lawyer. Damn.

[LA Times]

[rgray@villagevoice.com] [@_rosiegray]

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jewAvarice
jewAvarice

This article paid for by the jewish pharma companies who are poisoning people with chemicals.

William King
William King

it will be legal once bigpharma has the "legal" patents.  there are hundreds of acres being used for gmo crops, and the laws will be changed once the lobbyists begin throwing money around washington.

Epac
Epac

Sad to say, but you are 100% correct. In the end, it's all about the $$$$...

Tom Hyland
Tom Hyland

Type your comment here.

  A focus upon marijuana and why it became illegal is a testament to the underlying treachery the government will foment in the pursuit to serve corporations and punish the people.  Congress voted for its illegality in 1937 because it would have injured the profits of William Randolph Hearst, the newspaper baron. The Decorticator, invented in 1935, was the scientific breakthrough that would cheaply process hemp into paper. The devise was unveiled on the front cover of the June 1935 issue of Modern Invention as the "miracle machine" and hemp was forecast as "America's first billion dollar crop." 

  In over 70 years since the criminalization of marijuana most people are entirely unaware that hemp was once an integral commodity that helped build this nation. Both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution are penned upon hemp paper. The sails of ships, the ropes that hoisted them into place, and the canvas of the covered wagons were made of hemp. The first Levis were woven from this fiber, which was the major crop grown by Washington, Jefferson, and many other farmers who planted this basic staple of existence.

   However, William Randolph Hearst produced newspapers and was heavily invested in the sulfuric-pulp process that makes trees into paper. He owned forests, too. He supplied his own businesses with paper and sold paper to other companies across the country. This invention had him very worried so he personally began writing propaganda essays in his papers decrying marijuana as a public health menace that turns normal people into ax-wielding mass murderers.

   Andrew Mellon, much wealthier than Hearst and also an investor in the sulfuric-pulp paper industry, was the Secretary of the Treasury at the time. Also, Mellon was chairman of the Mellon Bank, which was the main source of finance for DuPont Chemical which held the patent on the sulfuric acid wood-pulping process. DuPont had just invented nylon and rayon and they never wanted to see another rope made from hemp ever again.

   Mellon was the key instigator in creating a new government agency called the Bureau of Narcotics and he placed Harry Anslinger, married to Mellon's niece, as its first director. Anslinger testified before Congress, reading actual Hearst-written articles, about how this dangerous weed drives people insane and turns them into violent animals. Doctors and scientist's testimony contradicted Anslinger's when they provided proven studies that marijuana actually causes users to become quite serene and contemplative. Anslinger then reversed his angle of attack completely and said, "Marijuana causes its users to become so peaceful and pacifistic that in the future American boys will not want to fight in our wars." Congress voted and marijuana has been illegal ever since.

   The former governor of New Mexico, Gary Johnson, has said... "If you're smoking pot the only thing you're likely to attack is a bag of potato chips." In over 80% of violent crimes, alcohol abuse is a primary ingredient. And here's a bit more info regarding this sulfuric-pulp paper making process.... the amount of fiber harvested from one acre of hemp, which takes only one season to grow, is equal to the amount harvested from five acres of trees that take 30 or more years to grow. The sulfuric-pulp process is one of the leading contributors to our green-house atmosphere and acid rain problems, while the Decorticator hemp-processor adds nothing at all.

  In America alone, each year approximately 400,000 people die from tobacco use. About 100,000 die annually from the effects of alcohol. 20,000 die each year from taking legal drugs. Caffeine is the cause of  2,000 deaths and aspirin kills about 500 each year. There is no known incident in medical history that a person had died from marijuana. It is long past time that we legalize hemp, we legalize marijuana, and get over this destructive policy that has created more than half the population of our jails. America leads the world by far in the percentage of jailed citizens and 60% of the imprisoned are nonviolent offenders. Non-violent drug convictions account for over a fourth of the imprisoned population. 

 http://tinyurl.com/3qt3lws

Barton
Barton

The DEA is following the Controlled Substances Act very closely here. To remove marijuana from the list of Schedule I substances, it would have to overcome several obstacles. First, is marijuana a widely abused drug, or a drug with a huge potential for abuse? Second, is there conclusive evidence that marijuana has specific medical benefits? Third, is marijuana very safe and does it have predictable chemistry and function?

Marijuana is a widely abused drug, there's no doubt about that. Marijuana also is unpredictable, with samples ranging widely in their chemistry and in their effect. On the "medical" front, marijuana does seem to help in a variety of conditions -- but even in the literature on the medical benefits of marijuana, the evidence is inconclusive. The DEA notes that most researchers in this field do not believe that we know enough about the substance's effects in the body.

The DEA is not likely to go against the Controlled Substances Act which gives it its mandate and which defines its parameters. Marijuana should be legalized by a route other than hoping that the DEA sneaks it past the CSA -- Representatives Paul and Frank are pushing ahead with legislation to legalize marijuana on a national level and let states deal with it individually. We should support the bill, HR 2306.

Dude
Dude

BullCrap, use does not equal abuse.Both the Schaffer Commission and Judge Francis Young told the government the truth about Cannabis Years ago, and the feds decided to ignore the Truth, don't suffer any illusion that your federal government is interested in the truth. The bill that is being proposed only asks for hearings to Talk about rescheduling, Lamar Smith from Texas has said he will not let it get to a hearing, So much for truth seeking.

D.
D.

Actually, the DEA is doing exactly what it should...to protect it's bloated, stupid budget.  Without the easy targets that are smokers and growers, the DEA would look even less capable of doing what it was intended to do, and all of those comfy bureaucrats and raging, testosterone-addicted "enforcement officers" would have to find a way to actually, you know, fight some crime.

Yap Yaphank
Yap Yaphank

One use of a slang term does not make invalid all the work being done to forward the movement for the medicinal use of marijuana.  The DEA is obviously getting it wrong on this issue.  As far as inappropriate slang entering the common vocabulary, one of the oddest is "Homegrown" as in "Homegrown terrorist."  "Homegrown" was always a term for shitty pot that someone grew in the alley.  "Homegrown" was always weak, horrible tasting and so on.  Anyway, the struggle continues and eventually, I hope, the medicinal and social use of this ancient, honorable plant will be completely decriminalized 

Clifton Middleton
Clifton Middleton

Free Market Hemp means jobs, millions of jobs growing, processing and manufacturing hemp based products. This is something citizens can grow and produce in every state. How long will the propaganda and lies of Reefer Madness be able to resist the only practical solution to replace foreign oil and restore the economy. Our founding fathers smoked, bought, sold, grew and even used hemp as money. The media conspired with self serving, check sucking government bureaucrats to create the lies about smoking marijuana so now they need to set the record straight, salute the flag and know that the first flag was made from hemp grown by the patriots defending our very origin. Hemp is more American than the apple pie because that is how the founders obtained economic freedom and the real courage to stand up to a powerful and stiff necked tyrant. We did it before and we can do it again, Plant It Everywhere  

MaryAnn
MaryAnn

I agree. Use a statement written by md's and researchers, not surfer vernacular. Ahh dude I'm sooo stoked that weed can be sold legally with a prescription -just doesn't work.

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