(ONDCP) Marijuana legalization, for any purpose, remains a non-starter in the Obama Administration. It is not something that the President and I discuss; it isn’t even on the agenda. Attorney General Holder issued very clear guidelines to U.S. Attorneys about the appropriate use of Federal resources. He did not open the door to legalization.

Regarding state ballot initiatives concerning “medical” marijuana. I believe that medical questions are best decided not by popular vote, but by science. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which studies and approves all medicines in the United States, has made very clear that the raw marijuana plant is not medicine, and any state considering medical marijuana should look very carefully at what has happened in California.

Legalization is being sold as being a cure to ending violence in Mexico, as a cure to state budget problems, as a cure to health problems. The American public should be skeptical of anyone
selling one solution as a cure for every single problem. Legalized, regulated drugs are not a panacea—pharmaceutical drugs in this country are tightly regulated and government controlled.
yet we know they cause untold damage to those who abuse them.

To test the idea of legalizing and taxing marijuana, we only need to look at already legal drugs — alcohol and tobacco. We know that the taxes collected on these substances pale in comparison to the social and health care costs related to their widespread use.

You know, for someone who says he doesn’t discuss marijuana legalization, it seems he sure has a lot of things to say about marijuana legalization.

Just one of the victims of an FDA "studied and approved" drug.

We’re all for the FDA studying the medical efficacy of marijuana, but every time we try to make that happen, NIDA and the DEA block those efforts.  “Marijuana’s not medical,” they say.  We say,”Hey, we’ve got hundreds of thousands of people who say they’re getting medical relief.  Can we at least study that?”  They say, “No.”  “Why not?” we ask?  “Because marijuana’s not medical.” “But we’ve got all these studies…” “Nah nah nah nah, we can’t hear you, marijuana’s not medical, nah nah nah!”  Besides, the FDA studied and approved thalidomide, Phen-Fen, and Vioxx, so excuse us if we don’t put a ton of credibility into that agency telling us how horrible marijuana is.

Should the people in a democracy be allowed to vote on what substances they are allowed to use as medicine?  Why not?  The acts in the early 20th century that were passed to regulate the “snake oil salesmen” occurred in a time when we didn’t have widespread communications like now.  If someone tried to sell an ineffective or dangerous tonic these days, he’d be out of business faster than you can say “Twitter”.  It’s not like we see a widespread call for votes on medical cocaine or medical methamphetamine… oh, wait, I forgot, those drugs are medical and any doctor in the US can prescribe them, but not a non-toxic herb.  Besides, if a company like “Extenze” can sell a pill claiming to make my penis bigger, so long as they put “These statements have not been evaluated by the FDA. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease,” I can’t for the life of me figure out why we need FDA approval for a plant.

Furthermore, most people don’t realize that a large proportion of the drugs the FDA does study aren’t approved for the way they are being prescribed:

Off-label use is the practice of prescribing pharmaceuticals for an unapproved indication.  Off-label use of medications is very common. Up to one-fifth of all drugs are prescribed off-label and amongst psychiatric drugs, off-label use rises to 31% (Radley, et al. 2006). New drugs are often not tested for safety and efficacy specifically in children. Therefore, it is believed that 50-75% of all medications prescribed by pediatricians in the U.S. are for off-label applications.

Once again, the specter of the “People’s Gaypublic of Drugifornia*” is brought out to scare people, as if dispensaries in California have led to widespread looting, riots in the streets, cats and dogs living together, and disasters of Biblical proportion.  Yes, let’s look at California, where the state is raking in money on dispensary sales taxes and at least 300,000 people who used to support black market drug dealers no longer are.  Let’s look at Oakland, where a nine-block area of town went from being a run-down dilapidated crime-ridden slum to a tourist-friendly rejuvenated business district called “Oaksterdam”, and the city is raking in $18 per $1000 in sales there, compared to $1.20 per $1000 for all other businesses.  I was just in California at a Smokeout where at least 30,000 people were gathered, some (most?) smoking pot, and I didn’t see one fight or step in one puddle of puke.

Using California to scare people about what happens when a state legalizes marijuana for sick people is sort of like warning people not to buy a Macintosh because Commodore PETs are slow.  Why doesn’t Kerlikowske warn people to look very carefully at what has happened in Oregon, Washington, Alaska, Hawaii, Colorado, New Mexico, Montana, Nevada, Rhode Island, Michigan, Vermont, and Maine?  Doesn’t he think those states looked very carefully at California?  Or for that matter, Minnesota and New Hampshire, which passed medical marijuana this year, only to lose to a governor’s veto?

Finally, how long are they going to push the logically-flawed talking point that alcohol and tobacco abuse cost far more to society than the taxes they bring in, so we shouldn’t tax and regulate marijuana?  It’s like saying boxing and playing football hurt your body more than the value of the exercise helps, so you shouldn’t take up swimming to lose weight.  News flash, Gil: alcohol and tobacco kill half a million Americans a year and lead to chronic care diseases that cost a ton of money, but marijuana does not.  And guess what else?  Marijuana is already in widespread use and you’re collecting ZERO in taxes for it now!

Isn’t it telling when you read these ONDCP missives that they don’t ever seem to mention what the serious harm is from marijuana smoking that will cost society so much?  That they never seem to have any statistics, estimates, or even guesses at how much marijuana smoking costs society right now?  Here, Gil, I’ll get you started:

CostOfPotToSociety = (11,000,000 * OnceAYearCost) + (10,000,000 * OnceAMonthCost) + (4,000,000 * OnceAWeekCost)

Now we have no idea what a pot smoker costs society, but let’s say the OnceAMonthers cost 12 times what a OnceAYearer costs, and a OnceAWeeker costs 52 times that.  Call a OnceAYearer “X” and our equation would be:

CostOfPotToSociety = 11,000,000X + (10,000,000X * 12) + (4,000,000X * 52) = 339,000,000X

This obviously a flawed equation in more ways than I can count (for example, a daily pot smoker might cost much more to society than 52 times a once a year smoker), but at least it gives us something tangible to discuss. Right now, pot costs us $339,000,000X and we’re getting back $0 in taxes.  Seems to me if you figure out X, you just tax pot at X and you’ve covered your costs. Should more people smoke pot when it is legal and some who don’t smoke pot start, costs increase, but so do tax revenues.

Then, of course, you have to calculate the benefits of not busting pot smokers, which are numbers we can evaluate now.  We spend about $7,000,000,000 a year arresting people for marijuana.  So if X < $20.65 — that is, if one person smoking a joint once a year costs society less than twenty bucks, legalization itself will break even or exceed the current costs of tokers based on the criminal justice savings alone.

Next, let’s figure out what alcohol costs society and calculate the savings we’d achieve if even 5% of alcohol drinkers switched to marijuana.

Next, let’s figure out how much more productivity and less health care costs we achieve if even 5% of pharmaceutical users can cut their need for opiates and benzodiazepenes by a third to a half.

Finally, we haven’t even begun to discuss how legalized marijuana also means legalized hemp, and the jobs, businesses, taxes, environmental savings, and nutritional health that will add to the equation.

*Thanks for the hip reference, 30 Rock!

(Mother Jones) AMONG OUR LEADERS in Washington, who’s been the biggest liar? There are all too many contenders, yet one is so floridly surreal that he deserves special attention. Nope, it’s not Dick Cheney or Alberto Gonzales or John Yoo. It’s a trusted authority figure who’s lied for 11 years now, no matter which party held sway. (Nope, it’s not Alan Greenspan.) This liar didn’t end-run Congress, or bully it, or have its surreptitious blessing at the time only to face its indignation later. No, this liar was ordered by Congress to lie—as a prerequisite for holding the job.

Give up? It’s the head of the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP), a.k.a. the drug czar, who in 1998 was mandated by Congress to oppose legislation that would legalize, decriminalize, or medicalize marijuana, or redirect anti-trafficking funding into treatment. And the drug czar has also—here’s where the lying comes in—been prohibited from funding research that might give credence to any of the above. These provisions were crafted by Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) and Bob Barr (R-Ga.) and pushed for by then-czar Barry McCaffrey, best remembered for being somewhat comically obsessed with the evils of medical marijuana. A few Dems complained that the bill, which set “hard targets” of an 80 percent drop in the availability of drugs, a 60 percent decrease in street purity, and a 50 percent reduction in drug-related crime and ER visits, all by 2004—whoops!—was “simplistic” and “designed to achieve political advantage.” Though the vote count was not recorded for history, it got enough bipartisan support to be signed into law by Bill “Didn’t Inhale” Clinton.

But then, the drug war has never been about facts—about, dare we say, soberly weighing which policies might alleviate suffering, save taxpayers money, rob the cartels of revenue. Instead, we’ve been stuck in a cycle of prohibition, failure, and counterfactual claims of success. (To wit: Since 1998, the ONDCP has spent $1.4 billion on youth anti-pot ads. It also spent $43 million to study their effectiveness. When the study found that kids who’ve seen the ads are more likely to smoke pot, the ONDCP buried the evidence, choosing to spend hundreds of millions more on the counterproductive ads.)

Like Stasher Jillian wrote: “the ONDCP is required by law to forever oppose legalization, and when they do our legislators say ‘look, the ONDCP opposes legalization so it must be a bad thing’, so they continue to vote against it.”  Yup, when it comes to legalizing marijuana, our three branches of government are quick to point fingers.  The Judicial branch, when we take medical marijuana to the Supreme Court, points to the Legislative and says, “Congress has the power to change it”.  When we look to the Congress, they point to the Executive and say, “The ONDCP, NIDA, and FDA all say medical marijuana is bad, so we can’t change it.”  When we appeal to the President and the Drug Czar, they point to the Judicial and say “The Supreme Court ruled we can control marijuana,” and they point to the Legislative and say, “and Congress has mandated that we do so.”

Regarding medical marijuana, there is no other policy (save perhaps foreign policy toward Israel) where the American people have have such overwhelming support for one side, regardless of party affiliation, and the leaders in Washington have the complete opposite stance, again, regardless of party affiliation.  And you know – you just know – that if any Congressman’s spouse was stricken with cancer, that regardless of whether they serve in a medical marijuana state or have ever voted against medical marijuana, one of their aides would magically find a joint or two to get the spouse through chemo.

Because it doesn’t matter if 70% of the American people support medical marijuana.  100% of Merck, Pfizer, Bristol-Myers-Squibb, Eli Lilly, GlaxoSmithKline, Johnson & Johnson, and others don’t.

From the ever-knowledgable Wikipedia (emphasis mine):

By law, the drug czar must oppose any attempt to legalize the use (in any form) of illicit drugs. According to the “Office of National Drug Control Policy Reauthorization Act of 1998″ the director of the ONDCP

(12) shall ensure that no Federal funds appropriated to the Office of National Drug Control Policy shall be expended for any study or contract relating to the legalization (for a medical use or any other use) of a substance listed in schedule I of section 202 of the Controlled Substances Act (21 U.S.C. 812) and take such actions as necessary to oppose any attempt to legalize the use of a substance (in any form) that– 1. is listed in schedule I of section 202 of the Controlled Substances Act (21 U.S.C. 812); and 2. has not been approved for use for medical purposes by the Food and Drug Administration;

This also explains why the attempts to get the Drug Czar to comply with the Data Quality Act, the law that requires government not to lie about scientific data, may be pointless:

Application of Anti-Lobbying Laws to the Office of National Drug Control Policy’s Open Letter to State Level Prosecutors, B-301022, March 10, 2004

Finally, apart from considerations of whether any particular law has been violated, you have asked whether the Deputy Director’s letter disseminated misleading information in connection with statements relating to the debate over legalization of marijuana. Clearly, the Deputy Director’s statements reflect one perspective regarding marijuana – a perspective that is disputed by others with different viewpoints. However, ONDCP is specifically charged with the responsibility for “taking such actions as necessary to oppose any attempt to legalize the use” of certain controlled substances such as marijuana – a responsibility which logically could include the making of advocacy statements in opposition to legalization efforts. The Deputy Director’s statements about marijuana are thus within the statutory role assigned to ONDCP. Given this role, we do not see a need to examine the accuracy of the Deputy Director’s individual statements in detail.

He’s required by law to lie, so why bother checking whether his statements are lies?

Do you support legalization?

No. I’ve never advocated legalization and certainly the president has made it clear that’s his position.

Where did the perception come from that you are permissive in drug enforcement?

The perception is that Seattle is this very tolerant city, but when I talk to my colleagues around the country and they look at what are your resources for law enforcement, targeting adults for small, personal amounts of marijuana, it isn’t high on the radar screen when you have X amount of bodies. You can look at most prosecutors across the country and they have filing standards. Police departments aren’t going to say no, don’t arrest, but are you going to take an officer off the street for four hours or are they going to choose to take themselves off the street for four hours to book somebody for a small amount of marijuana? It’s less about tolerance.

via – The wall Street Journal “Q&A With the New Drug Czar“

I believe we need to give Director Kerlikowske a chance to get moved into his office and a few months to get on his feet before we can start screaming, “What are you doing?!?!” at him. I like his tone and the 50/50 split between enforcement and treatment is refreshing. I’m not happy that any drug use is still seen as abuse. It is my hope that Director Kerlikowske is the bridge between a law enforcement official and a medical professional holding the office. Time will tell.

One thing to remember: it is just as irrelevant that the Director does not favor legalization as President Obama holding the same opinion. The People will change the law on a state by state basis. What we require from the federal government is to not interfere with process.

Today the former Seattle Police Chief, Gil Kerlikowski was confirmed by the Senate as the nation’s new drug czar. He has the potential to sway the war against marijuana one way or another. However, I hope and believe we will finally get a pragmatic solutions-oriented approach to drug control rather than more drug war rhetoric that puts people in cages and stifles solutions.

Kerlikowski was confirmed as the State of Illinois debates the issue of medical marijuana. With religious leaders surprisingly siding on the side of those with the need for medicine, changes are imminent in the political home town and stomping grounds of President Obama.

During Chief Kerlikowske’s tenure as police chief Seattle voted in favor of Initiative 75 in 2003 which made marijuana the lowest law enforcement priority. The public sent a message with their vote that they did not want limited law enforcement resources spent on marijuana offenses.

This kind of behavior from an official is in absolute contrast to what American citizens are used to,

The [previous] drug czar, John Walters, wrote U.S. attorneys,

“No drug matches the threat posed by marijuana”

The kind of attitude that Kerlikowske brings to the office isn’t nearly as important as the amount of courage he will have to have in his back pocket. If Kerlikowski truly wants to do what’s right for his country, he will stand up to the prohibitionist politicians and help them embrace a new era of progressive strategy that’s based on SCIENCE over POLITICS.

Every April 20, marijuana smokers around the country light up for an unofficial holiday celebrating pot that stems from the smoker slang “420.” This year, as the drug war rages in Mexico, the festivities fall against an increasingly violent backdrop.

Some antidrug advocates are using the occasion to jump-start a movement against marijuana not just for health and legal reasons, but on moral grounds. American pot smokers, they say, are unwittingly supporting drug cartels in Mexico.

Aaron Byzak, president of the North Coastal Prevention Coalition, an antidrug group in north San Diego County, says he’ll focus on the Mexican drug war when he addresses 1,000 seventh- to 10th-graders at the group’s annual antidrug festival, also held on April 20, at an amusement park in Vista, Calif. Mr. Byzak will urge the kids to think of Mexico’s drug lords if they’re offered a puff.

“This is a prime opportunity for us to educate them about how every bit of marijuana someone smokes here is giving more power and more money to the drug cartels in Mexico,” he says.

via The Wall Street Journal “The Antidrug Campaign Tries a New Message“

I’m unsure how this works out as a new message. It’s the same message used right after 9-11 that said every bit of marijuana bought directly funded terrorism. Surprisingly, that message and other propaganda from the ONDCP between 1998 and 2004 was ineffective:

In February 2005, Westat, a research company hired by NIDA and funded by The White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, reported on its five-year study of the government ad campaigns aimed at dissuading teens from using marijuana, campaigns that cost more than $1 billion between 1998 and 2004. The study found that the ads did not work: “greater exposure to the campaign was associated with weaker anti-drug norms and increases in the perceptions that others use marijuana.” NIDA leaders and the White House drug office did not release the Westat report for a year and a half. NIDA dated Westat’s report as “delivered” in June 2006. In fact, it was delivered in February 2005, according to the Government Accountability Office, the federal watchdog agency charged with reviewing the study.

via Wikipedia “National Institute on Drug Abuse: Effectiveness of anti-marijuana ad campaigns“

Let’s repeat that for clarity: not only were the results proven ineffective but were so distressing to the ONDCP and NIDA that they delayed releasing the report for a year and a half. And you’re trying to push this on kids again? How stupid do you think they are?

[If there's any message to be taken from the "pot funds Mexican drug gangs" and the "pot funds 9/11 terrorists" propaganda, it's "Buy American!"  Or maybe, "Friends don't let friends smoke Mexican schwag." -- "R"R]

Yet Kerlikowske is no get-tough-on-drugs zealot. When asked to help design a new police station as police chief in Port St. Lucie, Fla., Kerlikowske recommended making room for a library instead of a jail. He has long been a proponent of community policing, which he defines as “problem solving, decision making … and the utilizing and leveraging of the community.” And as police chief in Seattle, he instructed his officers to stand by during the annual HempFest, while thousands of civil disobedients smoked pot in the streets.

With this résumé, Kerlikowske might look like Bill O’Reilly’s worst nightmare (or Keith Olbermann’s secret crush). But Kerlikowske’s decisions were based on prudence and case-by-case analysis, not political ideology. In the case of the Port St. Lucie police station, Kerlikowske did not refuse to build a jail because of any anti-incarceration views but because “we [already] have a nice jail.” Though some dogmatists continued to decry community policing as “soft on crime,” Kerlikowske supported it—because community policing works.

via – Slate “The New Czar in Town“

Very promising indeed! One of big takeaways from this article is in the second paragraph above: politicians or appointed officials being fearful of appearing ’soft on crime’. So, what has being ‘hard on crime’ accomplished for us? Isn’t it time that we apply what actually works rather than our government being full of sound and fury, signifying nothing? (If you have to steal, steal from the best. Thanks Will!)

President to Downgrade Drug Czar Position from Cabinet Rank — A Move Biden Criticized in 1989

It’s often said that if you live long enough you’ll see everything. I suppose Joe Biden has officially seen it all.

When Vice President Biden… formally announce[d] the nomination of Seattle Police Chief Gil Kerlikowske as the new Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, he [was] also …  formally downgrading the office from Cabinet-level status to non-Cabinet level status. Interestingly, Biden himself criticized a similar move by then-President George HW Bush in 1989…

Biden, then the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, criticized the elder Bush’s position, telling the Washington Post in 1989 that it would lower the profile of the drug war.

I guess the old un-winnable war is just not that important anymore. Nope, the new hotness is that Biden is a “veteran” of the war and knows it all.

The Obama administration “is fortunate to have a vice president with an unrivaled breadth of knowledge about federal drug policy,” says an administration official. “Never before has there been someone with this level of knowledge who is as close to the president as Vice President Biden.”

It’s unmistakable that the longest war is beginning to show it’s age, even amongst it’s strongest supporters.

EXTRA CREDIT: Joe Biden was the man who “invented” the phrase “Drug Czar”. I guess we can credit him for the name of every position in charge of a hopeless effort like the newly proposed “Car Czar”.

The New Czar in Town

So you think Gill is all about the decrim? Think that because of his son he’s gonna get his steel backbone back after having to sell out to those liberals in Seattle? Well read this article and get some insight on this most important position that will have the most impact on the Marijuana Community.

If Kerlikowske’s record is any indication, he is just the man to clean up this mess. From a personal standpoint, he has experience with the issue: A son from a previous marriage has a history of arrests, some of them drug-related. (This could lead to some awkward questions at his confirmation hearing.) Professionally, his record of lowering crime rates gives him instant credibility. Speaking approvingly of Kerlikowske, Barry McCaffrey, drug czar under Bill Clinton and a retired general, told Fox News: “If you really want to understand the drug issue, go talk to any police officer with more than five years on the force.”

Yet Kerlikowske is no get-tough-on-drugs zealot. When asked to help design a new police station as police chief in Port St. Lucie, Fla., Kerlikowske recommended making room for a library instead of a jail. He has long been a proponent of community policing, which he defines as “problem solving, decision making … and the utilizing and leveraging of the community.” And as police chief in Seattle, he instructed his officers to stand by during the annual HempFest, while thousands of civil disobedients smoked pot in the streets.

Gill is a committed prohibitionist, but he’s pragmatic not dogmatic. He’s shown respect for the legalization movement by enforcing the laws that are handed to him and not ignoring them to fit his own ideology. In order to succeed legalization needs an opportunity to work and Gill may just be the man to respect the law enough to give it that chance. We just have to do the hard work needed to seize the moment given to us.

Click here to view the embedded video.