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Buzzby

Medical Marijuana is No Dopey Matter
Jennifer MacDonald | PCC-Courier | 03/17/2005

Myasthenia gravis, a rare neurological disorder that affects the muscles causing loss of strength with each use of that muscle, is one of many illnesses for which marijuana is prescribed. The naturally growing plant can aid in reducing side effects like loss of appetite and stomach cramps caused by medication taken to alleviate symptoms of the disease.

In California someone suffering from myasthenia gravis or a number of other illnesses can receive a prescription from a doctor allowing legal marijuana use at least under state law. But the patient can't wander down to Rite Aid to fill this prescription. And most places set up to provide marijuana to medical users called "Cannabis Clubs," are raided by narcotics agents. This prevents medical users from having a reliable source for the medicine and they are left to buy the beneficial herb off the streets.

The legalization of marijuana for medical use on the state level is a step in the right direction toward a system where AIDS, cancer and glaucoma patients could obtain the medicine in an organized, legal and safe way. But the federal government not only continues to oppose legalization for medical use, they refuse to declassify marijuana as a Schedule I substance: illegal and having no medical benefits.

Marijuana was technically still legal for doctors to prescribe until the Uniform Controlled Substances Act of 1970 placed it in the same class as heroin.

No medical benefits? Then why do cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy praise the drug, saying it reduces nausea and increases their appetite? Why do multiple sclerosis patients say it relives muscle spasms?

Research has proven its ability to protect brain cells from toxic levels of chemicals that occur during a stroke. For those who suffer from glaucoma, marijuana reduces pressure on the ocular nerve resulting in less damage to the nerve so vision is not lost.

With federal approval, research could be further explored to tap into the potential medical benefits of the primary components of marijuana, tetrahydocannabinol (THC) and cannabinol.

But the federal government is too stubborn to legalize marijuana. In 1992 the federal compassionate use program, which still provides "joints" to a handful of seriously ill patients, was discontinued because it was said to undercut the War on Drugs.

The population is supposedly saved from marijuana at the expense of the sick and potentially sick.

Over the years, the government has called marijuana a "gateway drug" to heroin, the drug of choice for lazy potheadvertisers.com]advertise[/url]rs.com]ads[/url] (BuzzNote: Marijuana is the drug of choice for lazy potheads. I should know! It's also the drug of choice for ambitious, energetic potheads. ), and the cause of teenage psychosis. Since medical marijuana remains banned in the United States, it seems the plant's role as a potentially helpful medicine has been overshadowed by unfounded rumors of its dark side.

So where did the negative association with marijuana come from? To understand, one must understand the herb's history that dates back to 1 A.D. where it is identified in a Chinese pharmaceutical book as a cure for over 100 ailments. Over the centuries, marijuana was used all over the world as both a medicine and a recreational drug. In the United States during the early 1900s, cocaine and opium were available in over-the-counter elixirs. The population quickly became addicted to these narcotics, prompting a series of laws that eventually banned these drugs. But marijuana was left untouched until the 1930s when Harry J. Anslinger, head of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics, launched a campaign against the drug that was stereotypically used by jazz musicians and Mexican immigrants. This is where marijuana gained its reputation as an evil drug that drives its user to harder drugs or insanity.

Fearful, states quickly prohibited the non-medical use of the drug. But the federal government wasn't satisfied so it enacted the Marihuana Tax Act that imposed so high a tax on importation that doctors stopped prescribing the drug.

The government's control of marijuana has been sneaky and unfair. For thousands of years the sick used marijuana as medicine. Now we have many other drugs that have been developed, but current research has also shown new ways marijuana can help sick people.

Until the federal government is willing to listen to the patients, doctors, researchers and historians who support the legalization of medical marijuana, its use by the sick for healing will remain a criminal act and its values will be left untapped.

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Castklearr

"it seems the plant's role as a potentially helpful medicine has been overshadowed by unfounded rumors of its dark side."

The "dark side" is all the lies about cannabis.

The "American Indian" had another reason...Man cannot tell a lie when they smoke the "peace" pipe. In the "peace pipe" was marijuana growing wild in the mid-west ....at the time the American Indian was being over run and murdered by the arriving Europeans they would offer them marijuana to get the truth out of them, or share a moment in peace.

Marijuana shared is a moment of peace.

Buzzby

This is a myth. Native Americans smoked tobacco in their peace pipes.

The Marijuana Smokers - Chapter 1

"The American Indians never used it in their peace pipes," writes Richard Evans Schultes, one of the world's experts on ethnobotany; the "American Indian... did not anywhere have Cannabis sativa at his disposal in pre-Colombian times," agrees Michael Harner, an anthropologist who studies the use of psychoactive substances among Indians.

If marijuana was a "truth drug" it would be used widely in interrogations. I, personally, come up with really outrageous lies (or "flights of fantasy" or "tall tales") when I'm high.

kinghelwig

Yes it's true many did smoke tobacco from their pipes,but many more did and still do smoke not only pot,butpeyote as well however this is reserved for the most sacred of ceremonies,but pot no big thing they have used it for hundreds of years,my step daughter is half Indian,when we were in Washington,she dwent to school with alot of them,once they found out she was Indian they invited her to the reservation to sit in on some festivites.Well my step daughter's turn came to hit the pipe and she was nusureof so we told her these are your people they wont do anything to harm you,so instead of a small toke she tries to inhale the whole bowl,she tripped for two day's poor thing when she finally came around she was dinged for a couple of day's but is fine now,I was honored to meet the cheif and his son who asked us very politely not to bring April back to the reservation unless she was invited by one of the tribe,after all she being not used to their ways and being half white,she was not excepted by her own people,now some of the tribe who are full blood are being thrown out of the tribe because they are becomming rich and greedy now and only a few people feel they should get all the money the Gov.has earmarked for their tribe,not to mention their casino is doing very well and procedes from gambling,aremaking them very wealthy and you know what greed does,so people are being torn apart from their families in the name of Money,and being thrown off the reservation,by standards that weren't practiced till the white man stepped in again.

Buzzby

Marijuana is a modern affectation, not a traditional herb. Cannabis is not native to the Americas and didn't arrive on these shores until the 16th Century.

Peyote can't be smoked. Mescaline, the active ingredient, is very temperature-sensitive and breaks down when heated.

I wonder what was in the pipe? That doesn't sound like the effect of one hit of marijuana.

 

Capton CutClass

kinghelwig what are you talking about? you got ripped off they werent real indians

__________________
How dare you drag my name in the dirt and cheat.
You could of broke it off and ended it and dipped.
And if you spoke soft you could of still preserved the friendship.
Now you apologize, thats why they all say.
You wasn't sorry when you sucked him off in the hallway. Go Phillies!