As American as Apple Pie, but Still Schedule I

As American as Apple Pie, but Still Schedule I

As has been well documented, I smoked pot as a kid, and I view it as a bad habit and a vice, not very different from the cigarettes that I smoked as a young person up through a big chunk of my adult life.  I don’t think it is more dangerous than alcohol   - POTUS Obama

By J.M. Hamilton (9-4-2016)

Cannabis is as American as … well… apple pie.   Our founding fathers (Washington, Jefferson, Madison) not only grew hemp (cannabis’ industrial grade cousin), but many of the nation’s leaders ingested it or smoked it.  The bellicose Andrew Jackson, along w/ Zachery Taylor, is said to have enjoyed a pipe full with his troops.  (If only Mr. Jackson had vaped a few hits of Mary Jane before he sent the Cherokee on the Trail of Tears, which resulted in Native-American genocide, perhaps things might have turned out differently?)  President Kennedy smoked cannabis to relieve back pain, as a result of a WWII injury.

The last three U.S. Presidents have all admitted to smoking marijuana.  President Obama said he didn’t think cannabis was any more dangerous than alcohol; and the POTUS is partially right, alcohol is far more dangerous than marijuana, but more on this later.

What’s none too shocking is that the DEA (a government entity that reports up to the Justice Department, which reports to the Executive branch) recently decided to maintain cannabis as a Schedule I drug, that is to say, highly harmful to the American public w/ no redeemable medical value.  Shockingly, opioids and pain pills, and the national epidemic of drug overdoses opioids have created, remain a Schedule II substance.  Now having the DEA rule on this matter presents something of an inherent conflict of interest, akin to asking the lobbying group, the American Petroleum Institute, whether or not the Oil and Gas Industry should continue to enjoy billions in tax breaks.

The DEA’s decision to maintain cannabis as a Schedule I substance also presents a Catch -22, since it’s much harder to test Schedule I labeled drugs to determine medicinal value. 

Since Richard Nixon declared the war on drugs, the U.S. has spent a trillion dollars on prohibition.  The Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) is at the tip of the spear, and on the receiving end of billions in government largess to fight this failed war.  Hence the conflict of interest of having the DEA make the decision on cannabis scheduling, and the resulting impact upon DEA funding. 

Fortunately, the American people already know what the elite, the warrior class, and the medical community say they don’t know: marijuana not only has medicinal benefits, but is a far safer alternative than alcohol, opioid based pain medication, and tobacco. 

Of course, Big Pharma and assorted beer and liquor distributors throughout America already know  - the effectiveness of cannabis in treating pain, epileptic seizures, reducing nausea for cancer sufferers, in shrinking tumors, as a possible treatment for PTSD, and recreationally, as a safer alternative to alcohol consumption – and its why they lobby so hard against legalization.  The bottom line is the bottom line, and cannabis legalization means a hit to Big Pharma’s, Big Tobacco’s, and beer & liquor manufacturer’s and distributor’s profits.  Hence, the endless campaign to malign and vilify the drug.  (Note:  The National Cancer Institute, a Federal government agency, also seems to disagree w/ the DEA’s findings against cannabis' medical potential.)

Twenty-five states have legalized cannabis for medical use, several states have legalized it for recreational use, and more states have simply decriminalized the drug.  The majority of Americans support legalization for medical use.  Even the VA's doctors are now permitted to prescribe cannabis for our nation’s veterans, in states that have authorized medical use.  And cannabis legalization, medical or recreational, is on the November 2016 ballot in nine states.  Watch the California referendum closely, as Cali goes so goes the nation - eventually. 

I’ll hazard another guess - despite the big money lobbying efforts of Big Pharma, Big Tobacco, Big Alcohol, and Sheldon Adelson, casino magnate – cannabis legalization efforts will pass in the majority of these states.  (Note, there appears to be a demographic component to these legalization initiatives: States w/ older voters, say Arizona and Florida, will likely prove more challenging for pro-legalization forces.  Looks like the geriatric crowd has bought into four to five decades of fear-mongering; even though the older demographic would likely be the largest beneficiary of legalized medical cannabis, both in terms of drug efficacy and the curtailment of out of pocket pharmaceutical expense.)  Have you seen how the Super-Villains of Big Pharma have been jacking up the price of medicine recently?

The irony in all this is President Obama, for the most part, got it right.  Cannabis, when matched up to alcohol, pain pills, heroin, and tobacco is much safer.  As noted in Vox:  

Overdose on heroin? You might die. Overdose on cocaine? You also might die. Alcohol? The same.

But marijuana? You won’t die.

Compare that to tobacco, which the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) links to 480,000 deaths each year. Or alcohol, which the CDC links to 88,000 deaths each year. Or opioid painkillers and heroin, which were linked to nearly 29,000 drug overdose deaths in 2014.

The total number of marijuana overdose deaths, meanwhile, is zero.

As noted in the same Vox piece, and as exhibited by an Omaha man, who unknowingly ingested his adult children’s pot brownies, you just might call the house cat, “bitch.”  But in another Vox piece, the writer cites the CDC about the harm & mayhem society’s legal drugs cause on a daily basis:

The available data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) shows tobacco, alcohol, and opioid painkillers were responsible for more direct deaths in one year than any other drug. 

Alcohol-caused health problems, such as liver disease, led to more than 30,000 deaths in 2014. But that actually undercounts the number of deaths caused by alcohol: When including other causes of death like drunk driving and homicides, the toll rises to 88,000 per year.

Nearly 42,000 of the total 480,000 deaths from smoking are caused by secondhand smoke.

One might think that if the DEA really cared about Americans, and not about their budget, they’d list alcohol, opioids, and tobacco, as Schedule I drugs, and knock cannabis down a notch or two.  Then again, it was - the Godfather of the Drug War - Richard Nixon’s own commission (the National Commission on Marihuana and Drug Abuse) that recommended marihuana legalization in small amounts.  Nixon crushed and buried that recommendation, post-haste.

You see, beyond the money Big Pharma, Big Liquor & Tobacco make off of keeping cannabis criminalized, there’s a racial, or arguably a racist, component to keeping cannabis Schedule I.  Mr. Nixon, some may recall, had created the Southern Strategy, a political strategy that encouraged traditional Southern White democrats – angry over Demo passage of civil rights legislation in the 60s – to convert over to the GOP.  During the 60s and 70s marijuana was more closely associated with minority usage and distribution.  And so when Mr. Nixon waged his drug war, he was also waging a war on minorities and minority voters (as prisoners and convicted felons are, or are often, disenfranchised).  And POTUS’ Reagan and Clinton took the drug war and ran it further up the field, cracking down even harder – largely at the minority population’s expense.

It’s no accident then that minorities are far more likely than whites to be locked up for drug possession and distribution.  It’s no accident that America has the largest prison population in the world.  It’s also no accident that law enforcement, and private prison corporations, have lobbied heavily against the decriminalization of cannabis, and stand to gain financially by keeping pot on Schedule I.

So what have we covered so far in the DEA’s recent decision:  quite possibly, the DEA’s naked self-interest; a money grab by Big Alcohol, Pharma, & Tobacco or preservation of the status quo and profits; the commercialization of “legal” drugs that are far more dangerous to society, than all the illegal drugs combined; and a decision that is responsible for the perpetuation of the mass incarceration state and a thriving privatized prison industry?  And don’t forget the U.S. police state (local, state & federal) is armed to the teeth, w/ cutting edge military and surveillance technology.  Yep, the MIC and the Surveillance state contractors also have zero incentive to see cannabis made legal.  

Per the Huffington Post: Despite an increased emphasis on treatment and prevention programs in recent years, the Obama administration in its 2013 budget still requested $25.6 billion in federal spending on the drug war. Of that, $15 billion would go to law enforcement, interdiction and international efforts.

But wait, there’s more because as we all know… despite the aforementioned information, cannabis is the demon weed.

·      There’s a body of research that shows that pain pill abuse and overdose decline where cannabis is legal.

·      Medicare prescription drug savings, in the 17 states where cannabis is legal (the study covered a period through 2013), is estimated at 165 million dollars. The authors of that study also estimated that had cannabis been legal in all fifty states Medicare would have enjoyed a half billion dollar savings.

·      From ’96 through ’14, Purdue enjoyed $27 billion in sales from painkillers… painkillers that have now sparked a national heroin epidemic.

·      Employers also stand to gain from legal cannabis.  Early studies suggest there is less employee absenteeism in states that have made the drug legal.

·      Another study shows that cannabis abuse and dependency is down in states that have made the drug legal.

·      Another study shows that in Colorado marijuana use has not climbed among teens.

·      Drug related crime is down in Colorado.

·      There is less domestic violence in families where the adults smoke marijuana.

Funny, I didn’t hear the DEA mention any of these studies or findings.   Time doesn’t permit me to go into the foreign policy aspect of the failed Drug War (quick thoughts are: the Drug War is mostly fought on foreign soil, which explains why many of our Latin American neighbors have recently legalized, or are more open to cannabis legalization; Afghanistan – under U.S. occupation - remains the biggest producer and purveyor of heroin and opium; and it’s been pretty well documented that the CIA stood by, while crack cocaine was introduced to the Southern California black community, in order to finance Reagan’s war against communism in Central America during the 80s). 

Okay got to wrap this up…

I’m not pretending for one moment that cannabis is a panacea for all that ails America.  Yes, it would give our farmers a cash crop; yes, it would wipeout substantive swaths of organized crime; yes, it would give revenue hungry states another income source; yes, decriminalization would cut the expense of a hyper-militarized police & mass incarceration state; yes, there would be less overdoses from the poison Big Pharma and Liquor distributors, and merchants, sell to the American people, daily.

But what about the profits from these legal and legitimate industries: Big Pharma; Liquor & Wine; Defense contractors & Private Prison contractors?  They desperately need this Drug War to be maintained.  Quarterly income statements demand it.

At the end of the day, whether you are a libertarian or liberal, GOP or Dem, fiscal conservative or social-democrat/green, there’s gotta be something about the DEA’s decision that, hopefully, upsets you on some level.   In pulling this piece together, the deeper I went on research…  well, let’s just say it’s disappointing.  The DEA’s position and decision speaks to the rank dysfunction that Americans see in Washington on a daily basis… where moneyed interests and the politics of the status quo (in lieu of the “change,” we thought we were voting for) triumph over common sense and the national good.

Copyright JM Hamilton Publishing 2016