The Obama administration calls prescription drug abuse the nation’s most pressing drug problem. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, prescription drug deaths are at an all time high and account for more deaths and hospitalizations in the U.S. than any other drug. Advocates of affordable health care are decrying the exorbitant price of prescriptions and the toll such costs take on them and their families.

Well, guess what non-toxic and inexpensive medicine patients use as a substitute for those expensive, dangerous pharmaceutical drugs? If you said marijuana, you are correct!

A recent survey conducted by the Berkeley Patients Group and reported in the American Psychiatric Association’s Institute on Psychiatric Services found that 66% of their medical marijuana patient clients reported using marijuana as a prescription drug substitute. Most patients said they used marijuana because it was more effective than their prescribed drugs and was accompanied with fewer, and less severe, side effects.

Unfortunately, the federal government insists that marijuana is a dangerous drug with no accepted medical use. Perhaps if it came in a pill, cost a fortune, and had debilitating side effects, it would sail right through the FDA approval process.

The Marijuana Policy Project and a coalition of advocacy and labor groups staged a demonstration today to protest the federal government's escalated attack on California's medical marijuana laws. A rally of medical marijuana patients and supporters took place in front of the Sacramento Federal Building and features state legislators, advocates, labor unions, and dispensary operators impacted by the recent Department of Justice (DOJ) crackdown in California.

Since the beginning of October, U.S. attorneys in California have released statements giving some medical marijuana businesses 45 days to close or risk prosecution. They have also issued threats to landlords, indicating that they will be prosecuted and their property seized if they rent to medical marijuana businesses. In addition, media outlets have been warned that advertising for medical marijuana businesses, a major source of media revenue in California, could lead to federal charges as well.

“The recent announcements by the U.S. attorneys of the intent to target the California medical marijuana industry are a waste of law enforcement resources and a betrayal of campaign promises made by President Obama,” said Rob Kampia, executive director of the Marijuana Policy Project. “Shutting down businesses that provide medical marijuana to patients, and threatening their landlords and media advertisers, will not have any effect on the illicit marijuana market. This crackdown will hurt the California economy, deprive state and local governments of vital revenue, and, most importantly, put patients in danger. Any attack on the ability to safely access medical marijuana is an attack on patients.”

“The Department of Justice and President Obama could easily stop this interference at any time and allow California to deal with medical marijuana in the way that is best for its residents,” said Kampia. “Since the federal government cannot be trusted to respect states’ rights when it comes to medical marijuana, concerned citizens should urge their congressional representatives to support H.R. 1983 – The States’ Medical Marijuana Patient Protection Act – which would remove the threat of federal intrusion in states that permit the medical use of marijuana.”

Sponsored by Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) and co-sponsored by several prominent lawmakers, this bill would remove the ability of the federal government to enforce provisions of federal law that are contrary to states’ medical marijuana laws. The bill would also pave the way for changing the classification of marijuana in the Controlled Substance Act to Schedule III or lower. For more information on this bill, please visit our Federal Policy page.

Yesterday, voters in Kalamazoo, Michigan and Tacoma, Washington directed local law enforcement to make marijuana possession the lowest enforcement priority. The measures passed by 2:1 margins, garnering nearly 65% of the vote in Tacoma and 66% in Kalamazoo.

With only 61-66% of homicide cases in this country cleared every year, and only 12% of burglaries cleared, it’s not surprising that voters think police should have more important things to do than arresting individuals who possess a substance safer than alcohol. While crimes with actual victims went unsolved, police found time for the arrests, bookings, and court time associated with more than 750,000 marijuana possession arrests in the U.S. in 2009.

Kalamazoo and Tacoma are far from alone in directing police to find better things to do than arrest marijuana users. More than a dozen cities and counties —with a total population of over 3.3 million — have directed law enforcement to de-prioritize marijuana possession enforcement.

Congratulations to all who were involved in these sensible measures that will prevent the convictions and resulting stigmatization and heartache that can haunt people for life.

This is one more step in the turning tide. In less than a year, voters in Colorado, Washington, and possibly other states will be deciding whether to replace marijuana prohibition with regulation in their states. With 50% of Americans now supporting making marijuana use legal, we are hopeful that the first states will have opted out of prohibition by this time next year.

Since the beginning of the White House’s “We the People” petition program, questions and requests about marijuana policy have dominated the site. Last week, the Obama administration lumped all of those detailed, nuanced questions together and answered them all by parroting the same old rhetoric. Very little in the way of an actual response was given to the questions, other than this: marijuana is dangerous and should remain illegal, but more research should be done on its medical properties.

This response is disingenuous, given the federal government’s repeated interference in medical marijuana research, including a recent denial of a study on the effects of marijuana on post-traumatic stress disorder in veterans. It is also not an appropriate answer to the myriad policy issues addressed in the petitions.

Luckily, one Jon G from Michigan has started a petition that is sure to get an appropriate reply from the Obama White House:

Since these petitions are ignored apart from an occasional patronizing and inane political statement amounting to nothing more than a condescending pat on the head, we the signers would enjoy having the illusion of success. Since no other outcome to this process seems possible, we demand that the White House immediately assign a junior staffer to compose a tame and vapid response to this petition, and never attempt to take any meaningful action on this or any other issue. We would also like a cookie.

The Coalition to End Marijuana Prohibition, the MPP-backed issue committee paying for the signature drive in Colorado for the initiative to regulate marijuana like alcohol, has hit a major milestone.

As of today, the campaign has 100,000 signatures in hand! This puts us more than two-thirds of the way toward our goal of collecting 145,000 raw signatures by January 6, with 86,105 valid signatures needed to qualify the initiative for the November 2012 ballot.

There are some amazing volunteers helping out on the ground, but we simply cannot finish the drive without also paying people to circulate petitions. The cold weather that's descending on Colorado has forced us to increase the amount we're paying per signature by $0.50. Would you please help us cover the additional $22,500 that we need to finish the signature drive by donating $10, $50, or even $1,000 today?

According to the latest poll, 51% of Coloradans support regulating and taxing marijuana like alcohol, with only 38% of voters opposed. While these are encouraging numbers, the campaign is far from over. This is one of the primary reasons we need to finish the signature drive as soon as possible — so the campaign can begin to focus on educating the residents of Colorado about the benefits of passing this initiative.

If you live in Colorado and would like to help the campaign, there are a variety of ways to do so. Visit this page to find out what you can do, including becoming a paid signature gatherer.

Together, we will end marijuana prohibition.

After the recent federal crackdown on medical marijuana in California, advocates are understandably upset and want to show it. This week, they took their complaints right to the top, with hundreds of people turning out to protest President Obama in Los Angeles and San Francisco. Shortly after this, however, the U.S. Attorneys in charge of the California crackdown said that the Obama administration had nothing to do with it.

According to a statement made by California Eastern District spokesperson Lauren Horwood prior to these protests, “California U.S. Attorneys decided to take action on their own because the situation has grown out of control among recreational users. But she acknowledges they received Obama's blessing.” (quote from original author paraphrasing Horwood) After a massive outcry, and after protests specifically targeted at Obama, the story changed.

"What I said, or at least meant to say, was that the U.S. Attorneys in California saw the need for coordinated enforcement actions and spoke with folks in Main Justice in D.C. (not the Obama Administration)," she told the Huffington Post in an email.

Okay, so who at Main Justice is responsible?

According to Horwood, approval came from Deputy Attorney General James Cole, author of the Cole Memo that said only individual medical marijuana patients should expect to be left alone by federal law enforcement, not growers or distributors. Cole, however, seemed to be awfully uncomfortable talking about this for being the person directly responsible and lobbed the blame back to the U.S. Attorneys in California when asked if other medical marijuana states should expect this type of enforcement.

Okay, so is it really the California U.S. Attorneys who are responsible? Wait, no.

Kevin Sabet, former senior policy advisor for the Office of National Drug Control Policy, was not as uncomfortable answering that question, however. "Remember, all actions have to be approved by Attorney General Holder, so it's hard to imagine that California would be the only place the Department of Justice is focusing on," Sabet said.

So now the blame is on Holder?

Why can’t we get a straight answer from these people?

Whatever the reasoning for the crackdown, it appears that everyone is trying to draw responsibility away from the men at the top, but not allow it to be put solely on themselves either. After seeing the outrage of medical marijuana supporters in California this week, perhaps the president realized that this sort of interference is alienating his base. And while Attorney General Holder is surely thankful that this issue is distracting people from the fact that the DOJ and ATF provided Mexican drug cartels with assault rifles for two years, he certainly doesn’t need any more blame for unpopular decisions heaped upon him when he is under the gun. And the U.S. Attorneys certainly don’t want to look like they are going rogue, but direct popular anger at their bosses.

We are basically left with two options: either Obama is knowingly breaking his campaign promise to leave medical marijuana alone, or he has completely lost control of the Department of Justice.

And unless the former is true, everyone in the chain of command has the power to stop this wasteful insanity and allow states to run their medical marijuana programs free from unwanted federal interference.

The buck stops with all of them.

Research continues to show cannabinoids are remarkably helpful for symptomatic as well as therapeutic treatment in cancers. Inhaled cannabis has a long history of use by some patients to mitigate pain without the sedating side effects of opiates. THC, the main psychoactive component of cannabis, has been shown to restrict metastases and growth in a variety of tumor cell lines. THC as Marinol, FDA approved, has been used in humans to mitigate nausea and vomiting side effects of chemotherapeutic agents for 25 years. In recent years, CBD (cannabidiol), a non-psychoactive constituent of the resin from some cultivars of cannabis, has also been found to work in concert with THC, through different mechanisms to inhibit or kill tumor cells. Now CBD is shown to prevent the dose limiting side effect of chemotherapy for advanced breast cancer in mice, according to data published in the journal Anesthesia and Analgesia.

Paclitaxel, used in advanced breast and ovarian cancer chemotherapy, causes nerve and muscle disturbances in “up to 93%” of patients. That is, Paclitaxel can cause severe pain to minor stimuli, limiting its usefulness in those patients. If use in humans was possible, CBD, which is non-toxic and non-psychoactive, would be an important contribution both for symptomatic and possible therapeutic benefit to patients afflicted with ovarian or breast cancer. Given the harmless profile of CBD in pre-clinical studies in a wide variety of cancers, it should be available as an alternative for any cancer patient. Being found in marijuana, a Schedule I drug, it is not available for any therapeutic use. In Europe and Canada, the combination of CBD and THC is available by prescription.

Dr. Joseph McSherry, a neurologist from Burlington, VT, was one of two physicians to serve on the Medical Marijuana Study Commission, which was established by the Vermont Legislature in 2002. His support and testimony helped Vermont become the ninth medical marijuana state in 2004. Even after his success in his home state, Dr. McSherry continues advocating for patients' rights to use medical marijuana, including in New Hampshire, Iowa, Delaware, and Washington, D.C., by testifying at hearings, reaching out to doctors in other states, and meeting with lawmakers.

Dr. McSherry is a guest blogger for the MPP blog.

If you’ve been following news in the drug policy world, you know that Senator Jim Webb (D-VA) is sponsoring the National Criminal Justice Commission Act. The bill would create a blue-ribbon panel that, according to Webb, would “take the long-overdue step of undertaking a comprehensive review of the criminal justice system, producing recommendations for changes in oversight, policies, practices, and laws designed to prevent, deter, and reduce crime and violence, improve cost-effectiveness, and ensure the interests of justice at every step of the criminal justice system.” Among the many reasons Webb feels the commission is needed, “the number of incarcerated drug offenders has soared 1200% since 1980.” Sounds sensible enough, right?

Last night, the U.S. Senate narrowly shot down an amendment that would have established such a commission. Why? States’ rights of course.

“We are absolutely ignoring the Constitution if we do this,” said noted drug warrior Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK). “We have no role … to involve ourselves in the criminal court system or the penal system in my state or any other state.”

Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) was even more incredulous: “This is the most massive encroachment on states' rights I have ever seen in this body,” she said.

Never mind that the bill wouldn’t actually change any state laws; it would only establish a commission to review policies and make non-binding recommendations. At this point, you might be curious how these senators feel about the Department of Justice threatening to shut down medical marijuana dispensaries in California. So was I, so I called their offices.

“Given the senator’s strong support for states’ rights, where does s/he stand on the Department of Justice threatening to close medical marijuana dispensaries in California, even though medical marijuana is legal under state law,” I asked, after repeating each senator’s quotes above.  Not surprisingly, each time I was transferred around a couple times, given a “no comment,” and told to leave a voicemail that’ll almost certainly never be returned. Before Sen. Coburn’s office sent me to voicemail purgatory, I did get one staffer to mutter “um … well … he um … he’s opposed to medical … er, I’m not sure.”

Anyone else reminded of the Robot on Lost in Space: “does not compute?”

We will of course update this if we get any sort of official response. In the mean time, maybe you’ll have better luck than me. If you live in Texas, you can ask Sen. Hutchison again by calling 202-224-5922. If you’re reading this from Oklahoma, Sen. Coburn’s office number is 202-224-5754.

In late September, I wrote about the letter sent by the ATF to all federally licensed firearms dealers, explaining that it was illegal to sell guns or ammunition to state-licensed medical marijuana users.

The reasoning behind this was a clause in the Federal Firearms Act that states that a person cannot purchase or possess a gun if they are “an unlawful user of, or addicted to, marijuana, or any depressant, stimulant, or narcotic drug, or any other controlled substance.” The ATF reminded gun dealers that marijuana is still illegal according to the federal government, and that having a medical marijuana license was proof that a person fit the definition of an unlawful user or addict. Of course, a state-licensed patient is a lawful user as far as the state is concerned, but as we have seen, the feds do not care all that much about state law.

In a debate between MPP’s Steve Fox and former head of the ATF Mike Sullivan, Sullivan repeatedly claimed that the ATF’s hands were tied in this matter. Contrary to the claims that the ATF is simply reminding gun dealers about the law, the ATF actually has the discretion to define what they consider to be an “unlawful user.” In the absence of a court decision clarifying the definition, the ATF had every right to issue a memo that instead declared state-legal medical marijuana users to be lawful users and exempt from this particular status. Instead, they decided to use the vague law as a cover to deny sick people their constitutional right to bear arms.

Well, it looks like this might get cleared up in the (reasonably) near future.

On Oct. 4, outspoken Nevada medical marijuana advocate Rowan Wilson was denied purchase of a handgun due to her status as a patient. On Oct. 17, she and her attorney announced that she is suing the ATF and the federal government.

If this case goes to trial, federal judges will have the ability to determine whether patients in jurisdictions that allow the medical use of marijuana are, in fact, unlawful users pursuant to federal firearms laws.

Let’s hope they side with Ms. Wilson.

So far, gun rights activist groups like the National Rifle Association have been largely silent on this issue, but smaller organizations such as the Montana Shooting Sports Association and the Independent Firearms Owners of America have offered their support.

When asked why gun rights activists should support medical marijuana patients in this instance, IFOA president Richard Feldman said, "Republicans, Conservatives and independents need to face the dire economic realities facing our nation and stop funding programs like the war on drugs that don't work, corrupt law enforcement and grow criminal enterprises. Our experience with alcohol prohibition teaches us how to lessen both the harm and the costs to society from banning substances which otherwise law abiding individuals will pursue.  As gun owners many of us subscribe to the maxim, 'Better to be caught by the police with one, than by a gang banger without one'!  It's time American face reality, deal with it intelligently, and stop protesting it, regardless of the 'it' being guns or marijuana."

One of the most often-heard arguments against marijuana reform can basically be summed up as follows:

“But what about the children?”

Prohibitionists are quick to trot this one out whenever their other arguments have failed because it’s an easy way to elicit a strong emotional response. They claim that marijuana reform will lead to increased rates of use, developmental damage, and easier access to marijuana. Even talking about the issue will lead to higher rates of use, according to their arguments. Never mind that teen use rates tend to decrease in states that pass medical marijuana laws, or that licensed distributors would have ample reason to ID customers.

No, facts don’t really apply to this argument. It is very useful, however, when it comes to terrifying parents. According to the standard drug warrior mentality, the only way to keep kids away from marijuana is to arrest adults for using it. To do otherwise would “send the wrong message to our youth.”

Apparently, all this concern does not extend to children living on the U.S.-Mexico border:

SAN ANTONIO (Reuters) - Texas law enforcement officials say several Mexican drug cartels are luring youngsters as young as 11 to work in their smuggling operations.

Steven McCraw, director of the Texas Department of Public Safety, told Reuters the drug gangs have a chilling name for the young Texans lured into their operations.

"They call them 'the expendables,'" he said.

McCraw said his investigators have evidence six Mexican drug gangs -- including the violent Zetas -- have "command and control centers" in Texas actively recruiting children for their operations, attracting them with what appears to be "easy money" for doing simple tasks.

The policy of marijuana prohibition is the primary reason cartels are able to bring in so much profit from distribution within the U.S., the reason they are in such brutal competition with each other, and the catalyst for using cheap and available child conscripts within our borders. Instituting more rational marijuana policies and bringing marijuana into a regulated, legal market would greatly diminish the power of the cartels, as well as their need to corrupt our youth. Licensed businesses, unlike cartels, must obey child labor laws and other regulations in order to stay in business.

Drug Czar Gil Kerlikowske and other prohibitionists don’t want to hear that, though. It seems as if they have no problem using imaginary children to scare people away from reform. Real children, however, are “expendable.”