Many people are at least vaguely aware that government-sanctioned medical marijuana programs exist in Canada and the Netherlands. But few Americans are aware that another of America's strongest allies, Israel, also has a national medical marijuana program. And, according to a translation posted by MAPS of a recent article in the Israeli newspaper Maariv, that program is growing.

Three hundred patients are now enrolled, representing a 1,400% increase in new permissions to use medical marijuana in the last two years, according to the paper. Strikingly, the program includes not only the obvious indications like neuropathic pain or nausea and vomiting related to treatments for cancer or HIV/AIDS, but conditions like post-traumatic stress disorder that are often not included in U.S. medical marijuana laws, though there is reason to believe that marijuana may be helpful for at least some PTSD patients.

Meanwhile, seven German patients recently became the first in their country to receive whole marijuana for medical use with government approval. As the rest of the world starts to enter the 21^st century on this issue, will the U.S. continue to be stuck in 1937?

Two weeks and eight arrests after a photo of Michael Phelps smoking from a bong made headlines, Richland County, S.C., Sheriff Leon Lott has called off the criminal investigation of the Olympic champion.

Unlike Phelps, who has expressed regret for the entire incident, Lott was unrepentant about wasting the county's time and resources on a case that at most would have led to charges of possession of a pinch of marijuana. He also didn't apologize for the armed raids and arrests of eight college kids whom he hoped he might pressure into verifying whether the contents of Phelps' bong might have been marijuana.

He did say he hoped Phelps had learned something from all this. I suppose it's too much to hope that Lott might actually learn something here too.

One point upon which MPP agrees with federal officials is that kids shouldn’t use marijuana recreationally. But we’ve criticized exaggerated ad campaigns from the drug czar’s office on the grounds that lying to kids is likely to backfire. A study published recently by the journal Psychology of Addictive Behaviors suggests we’re right.

Based on a two-year survey of adolescents, researchers looked at how changes in teens’ expectations regarding the effects of using marijuana (i.e., that it would “mess up my life” or lead to being “more creative and imaginative,” etc.) affected whether or not they began to use it. Changes in expectations did correlate with the teens’ decisions to use marijuana, with the correlation noticeably stronger among those who started using marijuana in the second year of the survey than among those who didn’t. This suggests, the researchers write, that changes in expectations “brought about by actual experiences have greater effects” on intentions to use than do changes in expectations based on second-hand sources, like what teens hear from parents, teachers, friends, etc.

Translation: If you tell kids that smoking marijuana will turn them into heroin addicts, and then they try marijuana and no such thing happens, real-world experience will pulverize the propaganda every time. Or, as the researchers explain it:

“When threatened outcomes are experienced as less severe than anticipated, intentions to engage in threatened behavior may be amplified.”

Put more simply, lying to kids does more harm than good. There are lots of good reasons for teens not to use marijuana as a toy, but in explaining this to them, there is simply no substitute for telling the truth.

My colleague John Berry made this 30-second video about Michael Phelps and the hypocrisy surrounding the reaction to the photo of him smoking something out of a bong. I think he pretty much nails it.

A commission led by three former Latin American heads of state blasted the U.S.-led drug war as an utter failure in a report released Wednesday.

The report, by the Latin American Commission on Drugs and Democracy, called for the U.S. to re-examine its punitive, enforcement-based drug policies and consider decriminalizing the use of marijuana.

What’s really startling about this report is not its findings – we’ve long known the war on drugs was a failure – but rather our government’s response.  As reported by the Wall Street Journal, a senior U.S. official said Wednesday: “If the drug effort were failing there would be no violence … We're taking these guys out. The worst thing you could do is stop now."

Not only does this statement ignore the plethora of evidence showing that U.S. drug policy has failed to curb marijuana use, it clearly admits that drug-trade violence is a symptom of marijuana prohibition and not marijuana use – something MPP has been saying, and drug warriors have been denying, for years.

Please take this opportunity to visit www.house.gov and tell your member of Congress about the Latin American Commission on Drugs and Democracy’s report entitled Drugs and Democracy: Toward A Paradigm Shift.

No one cares that Barack Obama used marijuana, why should Michael Phelps be treated differently?

Newsclip from KSTP-TV on the Minnestoa Medical Marijuana Hearing before the Senate Committee of Health, Housing and Family Security.

One of the purposes of this blog is to highlight the insanity of our war on marijuana users. So I have to admit I'm a little resentful that in such a short time Sheriff Leon Lott has done such an effective job illustrating that point in his hot pursuit of Michael Phelps.

The Richland County, S.C., sheriff had announced earlier he would investigate and – god willing – arrest the Olympic champion after he was photographed smoking from a bong at a college party.

As if he hadn't already done enough to advance the arguments of marijuana policy reformers, Lott has now arrested eight people in connection with his investigation. I guess he believes Phelps couldn't have pulled off the crime of possessing less than a thimbleful of what may or may not have been marijuana without help.

But then, this is probably just business as usual for a sheriff who thinks he needs an M113A1 armored personnel carrier to maintain order in a town of about 350,000 people, as Reason's Radley Balko has reported. That's him in the necktie below with his ridiculous toy, oblivious to his new role as exhibit A in the argument that the war on marijuana users has gone WAY too far.

Last week the Washington Times reported that the Obama administration had reaffirmed the president's position that federal resources should not be used to circumvent state medical marijuana laws and expected departments to reevaluate their policies in light of that position -- signaling a death knell for Drug Enforcement Administration medical marijuana raids.

A particularly antediluvian group of prohibitionists called "Save Our Society From Drugs" is now sounding the alarm, urging their supporters to write President Obama in support of continued arrests. As usual with such groups, they never let mere facts get in the way of their argument, lacing their appeal which such whoppers as the claim that "no credible and replicable scientific evidence exists as to the medical efficacy" of marijuana.

Interestingly, SOS doesn't trust its people enough to let them modify the prewritten e-mail text they provide. If you want to support President Obama's stand, the White House Web site  provides both a link to send e-mail messages as well as phone numbers.

Breakfast cereal giant Kellogg's has announced it won't renew Michael Phelps' endorsement contract  because he's been photographed apparently smoking marijuana. Some are already arguing for a boycott of Kellogg's in response. Others are urging people to contact the company and politely complain. Given that Kellogg's apparently thought a prior drunk driving arrest was not a problem, endorsement-wise, there certainly seems to be a hypocrisy issue here.

Boycotts are notoriously difficult to pull off, and many more such efforts flop than produce meaningful results. But personally, I think I can live without Rice Krispies for a while. What do you think?