A Brief History of Medical Marijuana

By Patrick Stack, with Claire Suddath Wednesday, Oct. 21, 2009

On Oct. 19, the U.S. Justice Department announced that federal prosecutors would not pursue medical-marijuana users and distributors who comply with state laws, formalizing a policy at which the Obama Administration hinted earlier this year. Currently, 13 states allow doctors to prescribe medical marijuana to patients suffering from ailments ranging from AIDS to glaucoma, and in Maryland a prescription can soften punishment if a user faces prosecution. But until now those laws didn't provide any protection from federal authorities. (Read "Can Marijuana Help Rescue California's Economy?")

Should Professors Cheech and Chong ever receive university tenure teaching the medical history of their favorite subject, the course pack would be surprisingly thick. As early as 2737 B.C., the mystical Emperor Shen Neng of China was prescribing marijuana tea for the treatment of gout, rheumatism, malaria and, oddly enough, poor memory. The drug's popularity as a medicine spread throughout Asia, the Middle East and down the eastern coast of Africa, and certain Hindu sects in India used marijuana for religious purposes and stress relief. Ancient physicians prescribed marijuana for everything from pain relief to earache to childbirth. Doctors also warned against overuse of marijuana, believing that too much consumption caused impotence, blindness and "seeing devils."

By the late 18th century, early editions of American medical journals recommend hemp seeds and roots for the treatment of inflamed skin, incontinence and venereal disease. Irish doctor William O'Shaughnessy first popularized marijuana's medical use in England and America. As a physician with the British East India Company, he found marijuana eased the pain of rheumatism and was helpful against discomfort and nausea in cases of rabies, cholera and tetanus.

The sea change in American attitudes toward pot came at the end of the 19th century, when between 2% and 5% of the U.S. population was unknowingly addicted to morphine, a popular secret ingredient in patent medicines with colorful names like "The People's Healing Liniment for Man or Beast" and "Dr. Fenner's Golden Relief." To prevent more of the country from being washed over with a morphine-induced golden relief, the government introduced the Pure Food and Drug Act in 1906, creating the Food and Drug Administration. While it didn't apply to marijuana and merely brought the distribution of opium and morphine under doctors' control, the regulation of chemical substances was a major shift in American drug policy. (See pictures of cannabis culture.)

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Nation’s major newspapers ignore Iraq war’s 6th anniversary

Today marks six years since former President Bush launched the invasion of Iraq, yet the NY Times, Washington Post, LA Times, Wall Street Journal, & many other major American newspapers are ignoring the anniversary today. Only USA Today printed a story noting the anniversary of the invasion. Over 4,000 U.S. soldiers & 100,000 Iraqis have died.

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TIME’s Person of the Year From 1927 to 2008 - TIME

See who made the grade over TIME's first eight decades — from aviators and ayatollahs to youths and, of course, You.

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Time: Person of the Year 2008: Barack Obama

Why History Can't Wait

You probably sat in a fancier conference room the last time you refinanced or heard a pitch about life insurance. There's a table, some off-brand mesh office chairs, a bookcase that looks as if it had been put together with an Allen wrench and instructions in Swedish.

To reach this room, you pass through a cubicle farm lightly populated by quiet young people. Either they have just arrived or they are just leaving, because their desks are almost bare. The place has a vaguely familiar feel to it, this air of transient shabbiness and nondescriptitude. You can't quite put your finger on it ...

"It's like the set of The Office," someone offers.

Bingo

It is here that we find Barack Obama one soul-freezingly cold December day, mentally unpacking the crate of crushing problems — some old, some new, all ugly — that he is about to inherit as the 44th President of the United States. Most of his hours inside the presidential-transition office are spent in this bland and bare-bones room. You would think the President-elect — a guy who draws 100,000 people to a speech in St. Louis, Mo., who raises three-quarters of a billion dollars, who is facing the toughest first year since Franklin Roosevelt's — might merit a leather chair. Maybe a credenza? A hutch?
But he doesn't seem to notice. Obama is cheerfully showing his visitors around, gripping the souvenir basketball he received from Hall of Famer Lenny Wilkens, explaining a snapshot taken the day he played pickup with the University of North Carolina hoops team. ("They are so big and so fast and so strong, you know.") Then, since those two items basically exhaust the room's décor, Obama sits down on one of the mesh chairs and launches into a spoken tour of his world of woes. It's a mind-boggling journey, although he shows no signs of being boggled — unless you count the increasingly prevalent salt in his salt-and-pepper hair. By now we are all accustomed to that Obi-Wan Kenobi calm, though we may never entirely understand it. In a soothing monotone, he highlights the scariest hairpin turns on his itinerary, the ones that combine difficulty with danger plus a jolt of existential risk. (See pictures of the Civil Rights movement from Emmett Till to Barack Obama.)

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Source: Why History Can't Wait - Person of the Year 2008 – TIME

Technorati Tags: TIME,TIME magazine,Person of the Year 2008,Barack Obama,people,culture,society,media

Time magazine names Russia's Putin as 'Person of the Year'

***Personal note...I don't understand how TIME could even suggest Putin as anything but "a**hole of the year"...

TIME Magazine unveiled its Person of the Year live Wednesday on the TODAY Show, Russian President Vladimir Putin.

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Gen. Pace: Homosexuality "Immoral"

I believe war is much more immoral than who I chose to love. War is Murder. War is Uncivilized. Love is not immoral. How can love be immoral?

WASHINGTON—The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said Monday he considers homosexuality to be immoral and the military should not condone it by allowing gay personnel to serve openly, the Chicago Tribune reported.

Marine Gen. Peter Pace likened homosexuality to adultery, which he said was also immoral, the newspaper reported on its Web site.

"I do not believe the United States is well served by a policy that says it is OK to be immoral in any way," Pace told the newspaper in a wide-ranging interview.

Source: Gen. Pace: Homosexuality "Immoral" -- TIME

Technorati tags: news, opinion, homosexuality, immoral