This could not have happened even a year ago.
Gil Kerlikowske, the United States Drug Czar, has backpedaled on his pronouncement that marijuana "is dangerous and has no medicinal benefit."
His original statement was made to The Fresno Bee on July 22. But in a little-noticed interview with Komo 4 News in Washington earlier this month, Kerlikowske was given a second chance to address the question.
As pointed out by Jacob Sullum at Reason, the nation's top official on drugs excused his statement by blaming the weather:
"We had been hiking in 107 degree weather in the Sierra Nevadas and when we came down ... The question was in reference to smoked marijuana and as you know, smoked marijuana has not been shown by the FDA to have that, to show medicinal value. And that ... This is a medical question and that's where we're gonna leave it."
So, specifically, he believes marijuana burned then inhaled has no medicinal value, but other modes of delivery may.
The qualification does make sense, given that the FDA has approved human trials for Sativex, a liquid form of THC -- the active ingredient in marijuana -- that can applied under the tongue or as an inhaled mist. Maker GW Pharmaceuticals said it is developing the drug "as a treatment for patients with advanced cancer whose pain has not been adequately relieved by optimized treatment with strong opioid medications."
It's also worth noting that the federal government has run a medical marijuana program since the 70's, called the "compassionate investigative new drugs" initiative. Only about 30 people were ever enrolled, and among them fewer than 10 survive today. Every month, each member of the program is given a tin can of some 300 rolled marijuana cigarettes. To smoke.
Paid for and grown by the U.S. Government.
The continued existence of this program makes even Kerlikowske's backtrack ring hollow. Of course, it's still notable as a public shift for the still-new drug czar.
In February, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder announced the federal government would no longer raid medical marijuana dispensaries in states that have voted to allow doctors the right to prescribe the herb to their patients.
During the interview, Kerlikowske added that marijuana legalization is not in his vocabulary, but that the main focus of his office going forward will be prescription drugs, which he said kill more Americans than gun violence each year.
-- Stephen C. Webster
Here's the video from Komo 4 News:
Medical value?
Yes, and from smoked, vaporized & edible forms.
Non-toxic recreational joy for the hell of it?
Why not?
Remember: Obama smokes cancer sticks, but won't pardon those in prison for growing/selling/using the same flower he admits to having used.
PARDON THE PRISONERS OF THE DRUG WAR, OBAMA, OR JUST ADMIT THAT YOU'RE NOTHING BUT A CORPORATIST PAWN!
I was thinking about Kerlikowske this weekend as I smoked a joint in Myrtle-Edwards park in front of police at Hempfest (hempfest.org). He is moderatly cool but this comment really pissed me off. I am glad that he backpedaled seeing as Seattle is a veritable Amsterdam.
How can you call this the land of the free
Whey you throw people in jail for just smoking weed?
How can you call this the land of the free
When you throw people in jail for just smoking weed?
It is disheartening when a public figure prefers a political talking point to the twist the evidence of medical studies done all over the world for positive relief from a variety of ailments using cannabis. It is worse because he believes himself to be infallible, and he believes himself to be correct.
The FDA program is for "smoked" marijuana. He is ignorant of his own country's policy. He included medical marijuana in his discussion of "overdoses". There are no case histories of medical marijuana overdoses, and we must conclude two things about the "czar". He is ignorant of the facts, and he is lying. This is not comforting to those of us that thought the dark ages might have ended.
The Merck Manual describes smoked Marijuana as being pretty much harmless physically.
Even the DEA's own judge Francis Young, after reviewing the evidence on both sides, declared that the Cannabis plant "has a currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States, that there is no lack of accepted safety for use of it under medical supervision and that it may lawfully be transferred from Schedule I to Schedule II."
http://www.fcda.org/judge.young.htm
Then there's the ludicrous equating of Marijuana with Hemp. Because the Federal Government is unable to distinguish between Sativa and Indica, the US, which is the worlds largest importer of hemp products, has no way of profiting from this entirely import-based industry.
I think we need a new Drug Czar. And a repeal of the Federal laws regarding cannabis.
Yeah, sure, as long as GW Pharmaceuticals gets a windfall it's called medicine, but grow your own and self-medicate and you're a fucking criminal and there's no medicinal value. What bullshit.
You so-called drug warriors must think we all just fell off the turnip truck.
Backpedal, motherfucker. The natives are restless.
LEGALIZE!
I'm just flabergasted that they get 300 j's a month. That's 10 joints a day!! OMG!!
now that mexico has decriminalized drugs, do you suppose it will have an effect on U.S. drug policy?
we should at least get something for that 1.4 billion we just sent to them.
[...] http://rawstory.com/blog/2009/08/obamas-drug-czar-blames-hot-weather-for-medical-marijuana-slip/ [...]
Hopefully America will follow suit with Mexico in the "decriminalization" of small amounts of drugs. I think the whole "war on drugs" is a scam to collect money for private prisons and whatnot. Give it a rest.
[...] http://rawstory.com/blog/2009/08/obamas-drug-czar-blames-hot-weather-for-medical-marijuana-slip/ [...]
PUH-LEEZE. Yeah, they said they'd stop raiding dispensaries, but they keep right on raiding. Oh yeah, and don't believe the hype that they're just confiscating the weed and not making arrests. They're making arrests and pursuing prosecutions. Funny thing, in L.A. they just allegedly ended the loophole in the moratorium that banned further opening of cannabis clubs, that ended up having the opposite effect of actually putting one one damn near every street corner. Hell... they even turned the KFC around the corner into the King oF Cannabis dispensary, which is right across the street from another one, which is either a separate dispensary, or the grow facility OF the KFC dispensary. Then there's three more right around the corner, not to mention. one a block and a half from Hamilton High. So NOWWWWW... that they're everywhere, they can take their pick and just pop them all one by one. New ones will pop up, then they'll pops a few more... It's almost as if prop 215 and prop 420 were actually nothing more than a scheme to get pot smokers to more or less snitch them out. What's even dumber is that they really PERMEATE the college campuses with coupons, flyers, and bulletins that offer free weed to first time customers, with doctors on-hand or around the corner to give the prescriptions. YEAHHHHH!!!! It's all fun and games, and going to the Willie Wonka's Weed Warehouse stores, and getting the pick of the finest product. But then guess what... after you graduate, it's ON YOUR RECORD. What's the matter pendejos? Did you forget that you would have to get a job after school?? Do you really think that won't come up on a background check? There's my $0.02
How about you're just a lying asshole Mr. Drug Czar and we'll leave it at that.
I live in West LA - right near UCLA - walking distance and in Westwood Village there is a medical marijuana store on almost every block.
There are only 4 surviving patients from the IND program. Two of them live in my state. I am friends with one and have met the other. Currently they are suing the Federal and State government to remove Marihuana (the govt's spelling not mine) from ScheduleI along with Carl Olsen who is not an IND patient but has been fighting the placement of cannabis in Schedule I for 15 years. I use inhaled cannabis vapors to control chronic nausea and vomiting from Diabetic Neuropathic Gastroparesis. Cannabis, smoked, eaten or vaporized is the safest therapeutically active substance in today's pharmacopoeia. Cannabis is medicine, accept it and get over it.
Obama has been a HUGE disappointment.
My only consolation is that either Hillary or McCain would have been even worse.
He said he was suffering from the heat...I think he was high. lol
"So, specifically, he believes marijuana burned then inhaled has no medicinal value, but other modes of delivery may." - Perhaps not, although I doubt it. What it does do is get you high. and thats all that really matters, not what small animal died in Gil's ass and made him so cranky.
Everyone get a copy of The Emperor Wears No Clothes, by Jack Herer, read it, and pass it around.
By far one of the lamest appointments (almost Bush like appointments), that President Obama has made, well second to Biden, well then again there's .........
"Veritable Amsterdam?" Seattle?!?! Maybe if you're white, considering that most marijuana convictions (from possession to distribution) are black people. u
Excuse the 'u', cat on keyboard!
You damn druggies are all losers.
You let a bunch of pot smokers loose on the damn streets driving high as a kite and then they kill a bunch of folks you will think twice about your BS legalization of drugs. Screw you aholes. You bunch of dope headed idiots. Thats why Obama is so stupid. His brain is fried form coke and pot.
No wonder he want show his college records.
San Fran is a freak show in itself. You don't need to go to a fair to see the freaks.
Look at the Nancy Pelosi freak. She is an old HIPPIE POT SMOKER.
She took on the whole football team back in her day.
get over it obama we all know your a hypocrit. we allso know that canibas is medicanal. i have whatched it keep cancer in my family dormant or from spreding rapidly now for over 30 years. and yet i was busted for using it for pain when i had been illegaly cut of of my muscle relaxors and pain killers buy a local doctor here where i live now . and i spent 4 monthes in jail and over 2 years on probation for it i am still on probation for smoking it in my own home. i wasnt even behind the wheel of a car! why because i have sevear degenerative disc dissease in my entir spine at the young age of 37. and how did this disease develope?from being sevearly beaten as a child buy a step dad who had been in the vietnam war. and then later buy my exhusband of whome was being given methanphetamine injections to stay awake during his 24 hour watch on a milatary ship and then came home all doped up and beat the sh*t out of me as he was coming down.
[...] The Raw Story » Obama's drug czar blames hot weather for medical … document.write(''); Share and Enjoy: [...]
@pakkal: Nice link to the Merck, and allow a clarification...
The gov't cannot easily distinguish [e.g., from a surveillance plane] between industrial hemp [male plant, less than 1% THC] and the female [indica and sativa strains included, loaded with THC]. They're both hemp, and your understandable error may have its origins in an historical "psyops" campaign designed to create that type of confusion.
Back in the early 20th century, when W.R. Hearst et al got in bed with the chemical/cotton industrialists, they promulgated the name "Marijuana" to confound the public's understanding of the trusted hemp, the male of which is a superior source of textiles & food [plus grows quickly with little water, has no natural enemies save man, so requires no toxic pesticides]. It was an abundant source for making books [paper in good shape for hundreds of years!], clothes [superior sailcloth & ropes], lubricants [from the seed hulls] & food [the seeds are a powerhouse food unto themselves]...
None other than Geo. Washington -- perhaps the most successful hemp farmer our country has seen -- urged early Americans to plant the hemp seed and grow it everywhere. In fact, hemp is such an extraordinarily valuable resource that at one point in the early US colonies is was illegal NOT to grow it.
BTW, industrial hemp is cultivated & harvested now in 30 industrialized nations, including Canada, Japan and the EU. So why not here....? Connect the dots: What would happen to the profits of those who make patented THC drugs -- like Sativex from GW Pharma now in FDA trials -- if millions of Americans were set free to grow their own plants & self-medicate for glaucoma, nausea, MS, menstrual cramps, depression, back pain, Lupus....
Kirlikowske is pissin' in the wind on this one. Hoped it cooled him down after his hot hike.
Marijuana is VERY bad for you. It will give you pimples on the bottom of your feet and cause terminal masturbation.
If you are in possession of even a small amount of this insidious substance, you should safely rid yourself of it, right now. Send your cannabis to the Zoot Mantis Cannabis Destruction Facility. Me and my staff will quickly and safely guarantee that all marijuana will be properly disposed of in an efficient and completely sanitary fashion.
This Obama puppet will continue the war on drugs just like Bush, just like Clinton, just like poppy Bush.....just like Nixon.
The war on drugs is really a war on the people, waged by our government on behalf of numerous big business interests.
Now that real fascism took hold under Bush, Obama is finding it easier to accelerate our decline and the end of democracy for good.
It is so tragic that many here still trust Obama, fools!
This is a good summary of the first six months.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14604
Let it be said here that Martha is an idiot and nobody says it better than Martha:
"MARTHA
You damn druggies are all losers.
You let a bunch of pot smokers loose on the damn streets driving high as a kite and then they kill a bunch of folks you will think twice about your BS legalization of drugs. Screw you aholes. You bunch of dope headed idiots. Thats why Obama is so stupid. His brain is fried form coke and pot.
No wonder he want show his college records.
San Fran is a freak show in itself. You don't need to go to a fair to see the freaks.
Look at the Nancy Pelosi freak. She is an old HIPPIE POT SMOKER.
She took on the whole football team back in her day."
That picture of a Pig must bet our Drug Warrior in Chief. F#ck the Pigs
This is just another example of Obamas bullshit lies he told us all!
He has broken every promise that he made to us in his campaign!
Just goes to show you that the president is'nt in control of jack!
The goons in the CFR, Bilderberg, and the Tri-Lateral commission control everything, and the last thing they want is a substance to be legalized or decriminalized that opens your mind and makes you see how you are being fucked every day.
Time for the revolution to begin!!
We have the power to change what we want to..
Don't be frightened by them..that is there control!
Obama is already practicing secret rendition as of this week..
He is opening secret prisons around the world
He is forcing vaccines
(He) meaning the powers that control him!
If he really started to make changes..or attempt to..he would be killed by those powers just like JFK was!
So...get ready folkes cause the shit is gonna hit the fan real soon and it is gonna hit hard!
Prepare yourself and your family
Fuck the NWO
What the fuck?
Over
Federal, state, and county laws also impose strict controls regarding where these products can be legally purchased. Adults may legally produce certain types of alcohol, like beer and wine, privately in their home — if their production is intended for their own personal consumption and not for sale to the public.
Legalizing weed is the ONLY way we can avoid a violent near future. L.A. is living proof of that. If not for the weed dispensaries and the JOBS they create, L.A. would have rioted itself into martial law by now. How many decent paying jobs does each pot shop represent? Not only are the store attendants not in the unemployment lines, but think of how many are employed by the growers? How many jobs making ballasts, lights, pumps, tubing, humidifiers. and the skilled jobs, like electricians, botanists, greenhouse builders, HVAC? There is NO reason the finest pot and hash in the world could not be a point of American pride, AND JOBS!!! Hell, pot tourism ALONE would easily be worth BILLIONS per year!!!
So let's see, just from legalizing and regulating pot, we take over 80% of the drug cartels funding(effectively ending the violent cartels.), create MILLIONS of decent jobs, save BILLIONS a year on downsized law enforcement, save BILLIONS more in emptied prisons that can now more effectively incarcerate murderers, rapists, and child molesters, use the taxes on pot to fund the most lavish healthcare program on the planet, and keep people at home and off the streets calm and happy through the worst of this economic downturn....
You gotta be high if you want to keep this stupid drug war going.
DENNIS KUCINICH IN 2012!
Nuf said.
"During the interview, Kerlikowske added that marijuana legalization is not in his vocabulary, "
Gil Kerlikowske needs to: Get a new dictionary.... or Better still: get a new job.
It's a terrible thing to say, but... I couldn't help but read everything Martha typed as though she were saying it with a deep, almost unintelligible southern accent.
It isn't just Southern white evangelical republican women who spout that crap to the blogoshere, it's men posing as women( repressed republican cross-dressing hypocrites) Call this what it is.... a dying generation of ignorant white male dominated culture that won't accept the future they created. Society has evolved and will soon leave them behind....good riddance, die off and we'll rewrite the history books with the truth after the majority of them passes on in the next two decades. The legacy of a wasted planet and it's diminishing resources is the true legacy here. May Bush-Cheney and Tom Delay and all of their combined following drink the poisoned water they help create, and one day confront the reality that befalls the world that the rest of us live in.......
The FDA is wholly in bed with Big Pharma and American Corporations. The right-wing, over the past few decades, has removed it from the role of protecting the public and making sound medical pronouncements.
The proof is in the pudding.. as noted in that THC _obviously_ chemically interacts with the brain and various systems, and in _obviously_ medically beneficial ways. There is only 1 question that would need to be answered to put a LOT of debates to a close, but those debates need to stay open while Big Pharma and those waging the drug wars continue doing thing thing. That one question is, does THC remain in tact and chemically active after being burned and inhaled from cannabis. Seeing as how you "get high" from smoking it, and the claim is that being "high" is the chemical action of THC, the question is answered and the debate should be closed.
Cannabis has medicinal benefits, even when smoked.
But the FDA, the pro-corporate arm of the Government charged with our food and drug safety, will not acknowledge that reality. That allows IDIOTS and LIARS like this douche to hide behind that agency by saying "the FDA hasn't confirmed this, so.. uh.. ".
This is exactly why this country is fucked, and won't be getting better any time soon. Corporations don't care about you or your health, they care about maximizing their profits... even if it kills you. That means the information we hear, and the policies that are put in place will be spun to make the general public _think_ they are good, but the truth will almost always be something different.
And this idiot saying "uh, it was hot!" is a perfect example how fucked we are.. people will buy it. Hey, douche.. if being hot turns your brain off, you probably shouldn't be in charge of such an important office.. ya think?
Kerlikowske presided over the most corrupt, and most physically violent police force west of the Mississippi River as the chief 'punk' in Seattle, and has no credibility except as a boot licking, bone smoking stooge of ungodly proportions.
I wouldn't take anything that comes out of his feckless corrupt face as being reality, let alone verifiable fact or good sense. He's another pile of shit just like Janet Napoletano.
Obombaton sure can pick some winners. He might as well have appointed Timothy Leary if he'd been alive, or Charles Manson, as his mostly figurehead, wholly corrupt, drug czar.
Debaters debate the two wars as if Nixon’s civil war on Woodstock Nation didn’t yet run amok. One needn’t travel to China to find indigenous cultures lacking human rights or to Cuba for political prisoners. America leads the world in percentile behind bars, thanks to ongoing persecution of hippies, radicals, and non-whites under banner of the war on drugs. If we’re all about spreading liberty abroad, then why mix the message at home? Peace on the home front would enhance credibility.
The drug czar’s Rx for prison fodder costs dearly, as lives are flushed down expensive tubes. My shaman’s second opinion is that psychoactive plants are God’s gift. In God’s eyes, it’s all good (Gen.1:12). The administration claims it wants to reduce demand for cartel product, but extraditing Canadian seed vendor Marc Emery increases demand. Mr. Emery enables American farmers to steal cartel customers with superior domestic product.
The constitutionality of the CSA (Controlled Substances Act of 1970) derives from an interstate commerce clause. This clause is invoked to finance organized crime, endanger homeland security, and throw good money after bad. Official policy is to eradicate, not tax, the number-one cash crop in the land. America rejected prohibition, but it’s back. Apparently, SWAT teams don’t need no stinking amendment.
Nixon promised the Schafer Commission would support the criminalization of his enemies, but it didn’t. No matter, the witch-hunt was on. No amendments can assure due process under an anti-science law without due process itself. Psychology hailed the breakthrough potential of LSD, until the CSA halted all research. Marijuana has no medical use, period.
The RFRA (Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993) allows Native American Church members to eat peyote, which functions like LSD. Americans shouldn’t need a specific church membership to obtain their birthright freedom of religion. Denial of entheogen sacrament to any American, for mediation of communion with his or her maker, precludes free exercise of religious liberty.
Freedom of speech presupposes freedom of thought. The Constitution doesn’t enumerate any governmental power to embargo diverse states of mind. How and when did government usurp this power to coerce conformity? The Mayflower sailed to escape coerced conformity. Legislators who would limit cognitive liberty lack jurisdiction.
Common-law must hold that adults own their bodies. The Founding Fathers decreed that the right to the pursuit of happiness is inalienable. Socrates said to know your self. Lawmakers should not presume to thwart the intelligent design that molecular keys unlock spiritual doors. Persons who appreciate their own free choice of path in life should tolerate seekers’ self-exploration.
Simple majorities in each house could repeal the CSA. The books have ample law on them without the CSA. The usual caveats remain in effect. You are liable for damages when you screw up. Strong medicine requires prescription. Employees can be fired for poor job performance. No harm, no foul; and no excuse, either. Replace the war on drugs with a frugal, constitutional, science-based drugs policy.
Criminal Records Background Check...
Great post. Gives me what I have been looking for...
There are just so many reasons it should be legalized these bitches arent seeing and it's right in front of their eyes!! To get started, if weed was legalized then we would have more money in our dying economy, and the arrest rates not to mention the drug dealer population would both take a drastic plunge!! we would not have so many people marked as a criminal drug dealer for merely furnishing marijuana to those who need it aisle their physical problems, if tobacco and alcohol are both legal being the most rampant killers out, then why not marijuana? We should legalize the green but criminalize the people that get in a car drunk and kill innocent bystanders that are not. Rapists, terrorists, and fuckin baby killers are left to roam the streets because johnny law is busy filling out paperwork and slapping the cuffs on somebody for carrying a dime bag of marijuana not hurting anyone or causing any trouble or problems but carrying a little personal marijuana, which is basically the factor that enables criminals to strengthen their wallet and pocketbook. If weed was legalized then that would put a very large majority of dealers out of business and therefore be one less crime that can be committed and shut down the funding of guerrilla growers in countries such as Columbia and Mexico that rely on marijuana remaining illegal so they can still control the market and what crime we commit when we are searching to purchase a small amount of personal marijuana to be smoked in the privacy of our own homes. 2012 is rolling up very soon and unless we can bring forth a new meanings of existence where we can rely more on our earth and stop putting all this poison into the land and our bodies, open our eyes and see the big picture.
I dont understand what the big deal is... NO ONE HAS EVER DIED FROM MARIJUANA. It is way safer than alcohol!!!! Legalizing marijuana would be great for our economy. It would generate SO much revenue for America and also cut down on prison and jail overpopulation. I dont even smoke weed and I think it is a great idea.