Do You Believe This Statement by the DEA’s Own Administrative Law Judge?
Question by St. Jimmy: Do you believe this statement by the DEA’s own administrative law judge?
In 1989, the DEA’s own administrative law judge concluded that “Marijuana is one of the safest, therapeutically active substances known to man.”
Best answer:
Answer by Sexual Harassment Panda
I agree.
So why not make it legal?
Vote yes on prop 19!
Answer by The Nerd Next Door
He’s on those stuff
Yes, I agree.
But the problem is with the misuse of it.
lively, the prohibition is *not* about the misuse of marijuana, it’s about preventing marijuana from being used altogether. That’s why it’s 100% illegal to sell and 100% illegal to possess.
To reiterate your quote OP, here’s what people far more learned than me have said about marijuana:
DEA Chief Administrative Law Judge Francis L. Young – “In strict medical terms marijuana is far safer than many foods we commonly consume. It is physically impossible to eat enough marijuana to induce death. Marijuana in its natural form is one of the safest therapeutically active substances known to man. Marijuana does not meet the legal criteria of a Schedule I prohibited drug and should be reclassified”.
Governor Raymond P. Shafer, Commission chairman of the National Commission on Marijuana and Drug Abuse (“the Shafer Commission”) – “the actual and potential harm of use of marijuana is not great enough to justify intrusion by the criminal law into private behavior” and recommended that “the possession of marijuana for personal use no longer be an offense, and that the casual distribution of small amounts of marijuana for no remuneration, or insignificant remuneration no longer be an offense”.
Dr. Donald Tashkin, author of the largest study ever conducted into marijuana and cancer – “We hypothesized that there would be a positive association between marijuana use and lung cancer, and that the association would be more positive with heavier use. What we found instead was no association at all, and even a suggestion of some protective effect”.
The World Health Organization – “the gateway theory is the least likely of all hypotheses”.
The Lancet (British medical journal) – “the smoking of cannabis, even long term, is not harmful to health”.
So that’s the health aspects of marijuana, lets also look at its prohibition:
John P. Walters, Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy – “Marijuana, not heroin or cocaine, is the “bread and butter,” “the center of gravity” for Mexican drug cartels that every year smuggle tons of it through the porous U.S.-Mexico border. Of the $ 13.8 billion that Americans contributed to Mexican drug traffickers in 2004-05, about 62 percent, or $ 8.6 billion, comes from marijuana consumption”.
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton – “The killings, beheadings and bombings in Mexico are due to “our insatiable demand for illegal drugs”.
So, taxpayers pay $ 40 BILLION a year for the prohibition which *doesn’t* stop people smoking (so whatever “harms” it causes are with us already and always will be) and which empowers the sadistic drug cartels, resulting in the death of thousands of good people every year. We need to STOP people buying from the cartels, and the ONLY way to do that is by allowing legitimate businesses to produce and sell marijuana to adults with after-tax prices set too low for the cartels to match. We have to legalize marijuana.