Hey DEA dudes, drop the ‘Reefer Madness’ mentality

The appellate court decision on marijuana is understandable: We don’t have solid, gold-standard scientific evidence, just as the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration says, that it’s helpful medically. And that is precisely because the DEA controls the marijuana available for such scientific studies and makes it all but impossible for serious researchers to get their hands on it for studies.

The courts would be hard put to order the DEA to make marijuana available for the kinds of studies required by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. But the president does.

It is long past time for the government to store its “Reefer Madness” mentality back in the Dark Ages where it belongs and admit that it also lacks scientific evidence for its own position that this is a dangerous drug with high potential for abuse and no acceptable medical uses. Science would give us an answer one way or the other; why does the DEA seem so afraid of it?

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