The rule of three -- you can't escape it. Not in religion, not in anatomy, not even in Barack Obama's War on Drugs.
First, there was the June memo from the Justice Department in which the White House decided the 16 states with medical cannabis laws be damned. Then late last week, the Drug Enforcement Administration finally got around to answering a nine-year-old petition seeking to remove marijuana from the same category as heroin and methamphetamine. Finally, on Monday, the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy released its annual report, in which the president's drug czars dedicated several thousand words to "debunking ... medical marijuana."
At least with the rescheduling petition, there's a silver lining for legalization and medical cannabis advocates alike: Now that the DEA finally responded to the petition with a negative, it can be appealed or at least acted upon, rather than stuffed into a drawer and forgotten.
And even the "The Truth on Marijuana" chapter in the National Drug Control Strategy isn't without its lighthearted moments. "Confusing messages being conveyed by the entertainment industry, media, proponents of 'medical' marijuana, and political campaigns to legalize all marijuana use perpetuate the false notion that marijuana use is harmless and aim to establish commercial access to the drug," the report reads. "Marijuana and other drugs are addictive and unsafe, especially for use by young people. ... Unfortunately, efforts to "medicalize" marijuana have widened the public acceptance and availability of the drug."
You like that? In a nice twist, a page from the Tea Party book is borrowed: Hollywood and the media are to blame! Wait, aren't they to blame for Obama, too?
