Marijuana finding supporters even in halls of Congress

IT wasn’t all that long ago that any efforts to get pro-marijuana legislation through Congress were dead on arrival. Not anymore. This change seems to reflect a troubling shift in the American public’s views about pot.

Four states in recent years have legalized recreational marijuana use, and the District of Columbia is working to do the same. Two weeks ago, the Senate Appropriations Committee approved an amendment that would give recreational marijuana retailers access to the federal banking system.

The vote, a first in the Senate, was needed to counter the “absurd regulatory morass” now in place, one Republican told Politico’s James Higdon, who in a story about the diminishing clout of the Drug Enforcement Administration described the vote as “a landmark shift that will help states like Colorado, where pot is legal, fully integrate marijuana into their economies.”
Many in Colorado may not be thrilled by that news. As The Gazette newspaper in Colorado Springs reported this spring, the first year of legalized recreational marijuana found that tax revenues hadn’t met expectations, which forced curtailment of education programs and substance abuse programs.

The Gazette found that the black market for marijuana was going strong, youth consumption of the drug had increased, and drug-related arrests at Denver-area schools had increased.
Marijuana has moved well down the list of concerns at the DEA, Higdon reported. The agency’s acting administrator, Chuck Rosenberg, said last week that marijuana cases generally aren’t a focus for agents. “Typically it’s heroin, opioids, meth and cocaine in roughly that order, and marijuana tends to come in at the back of the pack,” Rosenberg said.

Perhaps that’s to be expected, given the dangers that those drugs present. Oklahoma certainly knows all too well the toll that opioids (painkillers) and methamphetamine can exact on a state. Yet ignoring marijuana is a mistake. U.S. Rep. Ted Lieu, D-Calif., wants the DEA’s marijuana eradication budget eliminated by next year, saying that for the feds to spend “one penny on marijuana criminalization or enforcement is a ridiculous waste of taxpayer dollars.”

In May, the Senate approved a bill that would allow the Veterans Administration to recommend medical marijuana to veterans. Medical marijuana’s popularity continues to grow — 23 states allow it. Just 15 years ago, an anti-medical marijuana bill passed 311-94 in the House. Now, “Medical marijuana holds promise,” says Sen. Lindsay Graham, R-S.C., who’s seeking the GOP’s presidential nomination.
Higdon noted it took eight tries before Congress, in 2014, passed a bill that keeps the federal government from interfering with states’ medical marijuana programs.

The same year, 18 House members asked the administration to make marijuana a Schedule II drug instead of Schedule I. A Senate effort this year to do the same has Rand Paul, R-Ky., as a co-sponsor.
The Senate bill also would protect marijuana programs that are legal in states, open banking to marijuana businesses and redefine cannabidiol oil, or CBD, as a separate substance. Oklahoma is among 14 states that have legalized CBD, which is extracted from marijuana stalks.

CBD doesn’t contain the chemical that creates pot’s narcotic effects, but it does have the potential to help children who suffer seizures and strokes due to epilepsy and other medical conditions.
There’s a potential upside to CBD. The same can’t be said for its parent plant — ask Colorado — although this view, sad to say, seems to be shared by fewer and fewer all the time.