GhostOfCaptSpaulding
06-03-2008, 09:38 AM
All Indicators Point to a Softening of America's Harsh Marijuana Laws (http://www.alternet.org/drugreporter/86982/?page=entire)
In February, the 125,000-member American College of Physicians, the second-largest physicians group in the country, published a position paper endorsing the merits of medical marijuana and recommending the end of marijuana's classification as a Schedule 1 drug. "The ACP endorsement is massive," says Bruce Mirken of the Marijuana Policy Project, a Washington, D.C.-based lobbying group. "It blows to splinters the assertion that the medical community doesn't support medicinal cannabis."
As goes the ACP, so may go the American Medical Association, an endorsement from which would leave the anti-medical marijuana position of the Food and Drug Administration very lonely indeed.
To its credit, the country has not waited for the medical establishment before moving forward on marijuana policy reform. Over the last decade, support for compassionate use laws and broader decriminalization efforts has been growing, if not at weed's pace, then fast enough for one veteran marijuana reform lobbyist to now speak of being "within striking distance of a national tipping point."
Reason for hope, and hope for reason.
In February, the 125,000-member American College of Physicians, the second-largest physicians group in the country, published a position paper endorsing the merits of medical marijuana and recommending the end of marijuana's classification as a Schedule 1 drug. "The ACP endorsement is massive," says Bruce Mirken of the Marijuana Policy Project, a Washington, D.C.-based lobbying group. "It blows to splinters the assertion that the medical community doesn't support medicinal cannabis."
As goes the ACP, so may go the American Medical Association, an endorsement from which would leave the anti-medical marijuana position of the Food and Drug Administration very lonely indeed.
To its credit, the country has not waited for the medical establishment before moving forward on marijuana policy reform. Over the last decade, support for compassionate use laws and broader decriminalization efforts has been growing, if not at weed's pace, then fast enough for one veteran marijuana reform lobbyist to now speak of being "within striking distance of a national tipping point."
Reason for hope, and hope for reason.