ONDCP specifically exempted from Scientific Integrity policy

Yesterday, John P. Holdren, Assistant to the President for Science and Technology and Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, distributed a long-awaited memo to all agency and department heads on Scientific Integrity. This 21-month effort was the result of a pledge by President Obama on March 9, 2009 to, within 120 days, develop recommendations for Presidential action designed to guarantee scientific integrity throughout the executive branch” as well as “emphasizing the importance of science in guiding Administration decisions and the importance of ensuring that the public trusts the science behind those decisions.”

The memo lays out some excellent principles that agencies and departments should follow…

Ensure a culture of scientific integrity. Scientific progress depends upon honest investigation, open discussion, refined understanding, and a firm commitment to evidence. Science, and public trust in science, thrives in an environment that shields scientific data and analyses from inappropriate political influence; political officials should not suppress or alter scientific or technological findings. […]

Open communication among scientists and engineers, and between these experts and the public, accelerates scientific and technological advancement, strengthens the economy, educates the Nation, and enhances democracy/ […]

Establish principles for conveying scientific and technological information to the public. The accurate presentation of scientific and technological information is critical to informed decision making by the public and policymakers. Agencies should communicate scientific and technological findings by including a clear explication of underlying assumptions; accurate contextualization of uncertainties; and a description of the probabilities associated with both optimistic and pessimistic projections, including best-case and worst-case scenarios where appropriate.

This is, while merely a memo, refreshing, and the kind of thing that has been sorely lacking from the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy and its director.

There’s much more in the memo which, if followed, would open the door to a realistic and open national conversation about drug policy.

But there’s one catch.

At the end of the memo…

Nothing in this memorandum shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect:

(i) authority granted by law to an executive department, agency, or the head thereof…

And, of course, the current law authorizing the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy specifically states:

Responsibilities. –The Director– […]

(12) shall ensure that no Federal funds appropriated to the Office of National Drug Control Policy shall be expended for any study or contract relating to the legalization (for a medical use or any other use) of a substance listed in schedule I of section 202 of the Controlled Substances Act (21 U.S.C. 812) and take such actions as necessary to oppose any attempt to legalize the use of a substance (in any form) that–

  1. is listed in schedule I of section 202 of the Controlled Substances Act (21 U.S.C. 812); and
  2. has not been approved for use for medical purposes by the Food and Drug Administration;

If the science says that legalization is even a viable option, the Drug Czar is required by law to ignore, obfuscate, lie, or whatever else is necessary to oppose any attempts to legalize.

By definition in the memo, scientific integrity requires an open analysis of the issue, including looking at best and worst-case scenarios. Yet the law specifically prohibits that kind of openness.

The law trumps the memo’s guidelines, leaving the Drug Czar and the ONDCP specifically exempt from the government’s Scientific Integrity policy.

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43 Responses to ONDCP specifically exempted from Scientific Integrity policy

  1. pt says:

    Despite the end of the memo quote. I am still sure Gil read the memo and thought ” I’m glad we are already doing all this”…..

  2. darkcycle says:

    You’re right, Pete, There isn’t any other plausable reason for that exemption.
    Of course, It was an Obama Pledge. Meaning the second it became even a minor inconvenience it was discarded. Honestly, I think he’s worse than Shrubya. At least there was none of this bullshit pretending to want change. You knew exactly where Bush stood, even if it was knee deep in shit.

  3. claygooding says:

    I have read and re-read good old #12 until I am blue in the face and have come to the conclusion that our legislators were not bright enough to write that particular Machiavellian paragraph.
    You know some group of lobbyist,wanting to keep hemp illegal for the same reasons they wanted it made illegal to grow in 1937,handed that too the committee that wrote that re-authorization.
    I know a lot of people believe that the government just wants to keep them from getting high,but it is still all about the industries that would lose billions if hemp re-enters the open market.
    Some of the biggest industries in the world.

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  5. claygooding says:

    Pete,I pasted your article @ msnbc and gave your email,up to you if you want to verify the link to have it printed :<)

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  7. Jake says:

    This is pretty much the same thing as we have in the UK with the ACMD (Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs) where they are trying to sneak in a clause that removes the need for scientists in the council.. as well.. their advice is only based on SCIENTIFIC EVIDENCE.. and since that sure as hell doesn’t come under the remit of ‘scientific integrity’ we can ignore it to make easy keep-the-masses-happy-as-we’ve-lied-to-them-for-so-long, policy. All it illustrates is that the unquestioned foothold their policies once held now has to rely on subverted tactics just to survive.. something it will NOT do indefinitely!!

  8. kaptinemo says:

    I have long held that if Western civilization collapses as others have, it will be not be (solely) because of invasion, but because of a prejudice incorporated into the culture as a regular practice, and thus becomes at odds with reason and rationality…and thus, cultural survival.

    There’s even been a book published along that line that examines how those earlier cultures were unwilling to face their deepest prejudices and beliefs, and refused at every step to correct them, leading to greater and greater internal stresses and imbalances – and tragedies – that led to the dissolution of those cultures.

    Given the wholly destructive and non-beneficial nature (to society at large) of drug prohibition, and the enormous resources that have been and continue to be squandered on such a rank failure when society now desperately needs the funding behind those squandered resources to maintain its’ social safety net for its’ people, and that so many repressive laws destructive of the basic fabric of civil society have been spawned by the madness, I daresay that a major component of a collapse of Western civilization in general and the American Experiment in particular will be drug prohibition.

    That memo is but a perfect example of a stupid cultural prejudice blindly and unthinkingly held by far too many and enshrined into law – and is now acting as just such a catalyst for that societal dissolution. And I can’t help but think that something, somewhere, is smiling a very evil grin indeed at the prospect…

  9. claygooding says:

    Jury adjudication before the trial?

    Missoula District Court: Jury pool in marijuana case stages ‘mutiny’

    http://missoulian.com/news/local/article_464bdc0a-0b36-11e0-a594-001cc4c03286.html

    “”The tiny amount of marijuana police found while searching Touray Cornell’s home on April 23 became a huge issue for some members of the jury panel. No, they said, one after the other. No way would they convict somebody for having a 16th of an ounce. In fact, one juror wondered why the county was wasting time and money prosecuting the case at all, said a flummoxed Deputy Missoula County Attorney Andrew Paul.””

    “A mutiny,” said Paul.

    “Bizarre,” the defense attorney called it.

    In his nearly 30 years as a prosecutor and judge, Deschamps said he’s never seen anything like it.

    CHIP,CHIP,CHIP,,,,,,,thud

  10. claygooding says:

    Kapt,you and me bud,,,,got a lake already scoped out for my move,,no residences around it because it is a state “recreational area” so no neighbors to argue with and since there will be no government,no cops or game wardens,all you can eat fish and game.
    Come on Mr Postman!!!!!

  11. kaptinemo says:

    ‘Mutiny’? Mutiny is a military term. It has no place in civilian law or practice. If anything, this outburst of a ‘drug warrior’ should give pause for any who doubt just how dangerously regimented our society is becoming, and that in no small part thanks to the DrugWar.

    No, this was no ‘mutiny’. This was an application of the principle behind jury nullification as it was meant to be applied against unjust laws.

    Regardless of the defendant’s ‘alleged’ lifestyle, which brought him to the attention of the police, those Missoula citizens are true patriots. The DA Mr. Paul marks himself with his words and actions as not understanding that people are way ahead of him and his entire bureaucracy in the matter.

    And that he should take heed, lest they find themselves so far behind their neighbors that their neighbors will not try to reason with he and they but seek to remove him and his ilk from their lofty positions next election cycle. For when times get tight, people demand the same frugality from their government that they, themselves, are forced to endure.

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  13. kaptinemo says:

    Clay, I believe that, after a period of instability after a possible societal collapse, we may see a resurgence of civil society based once again on true libertarian principles, and it may be faster than most people think.

    With 100 million firearms-owning Americans, ‘neighborhood watch’ will morph into ‘neighborhood patrol very quickly should the need arise. People will once again get to know their neighbors; they’ll have to, for truly “No man is an island..” as John Donne said so long ago.

    Of course, I expect this to happen after the supposed paladins of society, our ‘roid-addled po-leece bug out like they did in NOLA after Katrina. But if they try to come back after things go to Hell, ‘to establish (their) order’, they may face the business ends of the weapons of those they abandoned, who have no intention of allowing that corrupt order to rule them again.

    We can hope, anyway…

  14. darkcycle says:

    YEAH Clay! Read the Missoula post if you want to know what a “win” feels like. The judge in the case couldn’t even seat a jury. The guy involved wasn’t an angel either.
    When prosecutors can’t even find enough white haired Baptists to convict a pothead in Missoula, Montana, we are winning. This may be a fluke, but I’m thinking probably not.

  15. darkcycle says:

    Ah, Kap’n? At the other end of that scale is ‘Somalia’….

  16. claygooding says:

    I won’t be standing alone,there is already a few families
    scoping out the area for the same reason,,,,why,,,,because they are convinced our government will continue their legislation supporting big industry and the rich(not just on drug law reform) until our society sinks
    like the Titanic,with the three stooges holding the mainmast and grinning like the idiots they are.

  17. claygooding says:

    PS: I suggest the “The Postman” with Kevin Costner for indoctrination into one post US(as we know it) lifestyle possibility.

  18. darkcycle says:

    Man, Clay, I’m with ya and so are alot of my educated cohort. I have plans to purchase a piece of mountainside near Granite Falls, next to an old friend who already owns about half. The reason I came out here to the PNW in the first place was to get away from the crumbling urban landscape of the Midwest. And that was almost thirty years ago now….Went back through St. Louis last year, parts were abandoned completely and some looked as though they had endured shelling….It was surreal. Infrastructure, which is the god-parent of economic activity, was GONE in these ares. Power lines had even been stripped of wire for scrap, and streets were impassable. Gutted buildings pock-marked by bullets (they must have been shooting out windows for fun) completed the effect. And this was not in hidden abandoned, industrial ares, these were NEIGHBORHOODS at one point, and they were right alongside the major freeways, clearly visible from any passing car.
    And our Government’s plan? Let ’em crumble. Just make sure Exxon and BP, and Citigroup and Godman-Sachs are happy.

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  20. kaptinemo says:

    DarkCycle, I’m too painfully aware of the possibilities for that. There was a frightening book published by an avowed racist in the early 1990’s called Civil War II: The Coming Breakup Of America.

    I said it was frightening. And I don’t scare easy. But well over 2/3rds of the predictions the author had made at the end of the book have already happened since the time of the publication in 1993.

    The Meltdown caused by international ‘elites’ with the hearty help of their domestic cat’s-paws. The ever-increasing oppression in the form of ‘security’ The devaluation of the currency (i.e. the ‘Quantitative Easing’ which printed up over 600 Billion extra Fed Reserve Notes, causing any savings to lose their value by 20% on top of that already lost from the 700 Billion bankster bailout), with more on the way.

    On and on, item after item with scary prescience has taken place, and the last 1/3rd of his predictions could begin any day now. And this was the trend that that author mapped out years before 9/11!

    If anyone wants to know where this can lead, read about Weimar Republic Germany, and all the fiscal, social and political circumstances that led to the rise of Hitler. We aren’t any safer than they thought they were.

    But the DrugWar was the foundation for the (fascist) militarization of our police, just in time for the 9/11 follies and the crypto-security state. My, how convenient. But if things get dicey, like what happened in post-Katrina NOLA, and the cops pull out to look after their own families, then we just might have a chance to turn things around towards true freedom again. “Patriots wanted; no fascists need apply.”

    Yes, there is yet hope, for the same people who’ve benefited so handsomely from the DrugWar, the people at the very tippy-top of the food chain, the banksters, have made some very grave errors. One such was the Internet. They really, truly did not understand it until too late, and it’s gotten to be the tiger they cannot afford to stop riding. Now more people than ever know of them, thanks to that very same creature spawned in a DoD lab. What’s happening with the Assange/WikiLeaks affair is proof of just how scared they are that ‘their Monster’ has turned on them.

    So…if those arrogant idiots do pull the plug on civilization, there won’t be a place to hide on this planet that they can’t eventually be found, identified…and dealt with. Summarily.

  21. DdC says:

    Exclusive: US empire could collapse at any time, Pulitzer winner tells Raw Story

    America’s military and economic empire could collapse at any time, but predicting the precise day, week or month of its potential demise is unattainable, according to a former New York Times war correspondent who spoke with Raw Story

    “We’ve undergone a corporate coup d’état in slow motion,” he said. “Our public education system has been gutted. Our infrastructure is corroding and collapsing. Unless we begin to physically resist, they are going to solidify neo-feudalism in this country.

  22. darkcycle says:

    Yeah, DdC, I saw that one yesterday at http://www.informationclearinghouse.info
    It’s got around. The elites know this and they smell trouble. The next step is crackdowns on public protests. Complete with tactics like ‘bottling’; where police cordon off protesters and don’t let anybody in or out (even for medical emergencies and bathrooms) for up to ten hours at a time. Police squads in civvies infiltrating protests and starting property destruction to provide the excuse for violent suppression. Deployment of ‘heat’ rays and infrasonic noise generators, and other nasty crowd control devices we haven’t even seen yet. But mark my words. Crackdowns on public protests are already in the works and are next, with Obama’s complete support. You see, when we were voters, we were his constituency, now that he’s elected, we’re problematic. And the thugs come next.

  23. DdC says:

    would open the door to a realistic…

    Wo Nelly… that fucking door was blown wide open a century ago and hasn’t been shut since.

    Politics of Pot
    Virtues’ of Ganja

    Keep pacifying these devil babies and they will keep shoving this horshit down the throats of the masses forever. Forget Obombo, forget the DEAth mongers. This is nothing that is going to be dealt with, period. Obesity is epidemic because of politicians eating their own words, especially drug worrier rats we keep fumigating with reality ttill they choke. Think they learned? When will they ever and how can they when its all just blowin wind. Another $700 billion to the Military while they cut off services for the indigent? For oil we could have replaced before it got hold of the market in the 30’s. ProMises and ConPromise, catch 22 and keep them doggies movin’ in a circle raw hide. The drug czar is a sub-human creature that has no vocabulary. Its a fricking tape recorder hypnotically verbilizing Anslinger’s Gore Files. It works for the Banksters and Wallmart St corporatists. Who ain’t all of a sudden gonna find Jesus, move to the country and grow peaches or care for the struggling masses.

    With their multi billion dollar profits selling the competition who can honestly believe they don’t have more positive attributes of Ganja than even we do? They know full damn well what properties are in Ganja and non-psychoactive Hemp, that’s why its illegal. Pretending in some far off dream that there really must be a negative consequence to smoking Ganja. Therefore we must compromise and take whatever crumbs they drop by mistake as a sign of moving forward. After pointing out each ridiculous lie as if anything has credibility. He’s a paid fucking advertisement, a billboard.

    Its just silly as hell to keep whining about the lies, and showing overwhelming reality to the contrary to groups without the capacity to form an intelligent opinion. They exist on a schedule with a dozen or so talking point perjuries. Then have any opposing views flushed or censored. A necessity of a fascist agenda. The Ganjawar funds covert ops like Iran Contra and Iraq war preparations and think tanks and money laundering Philanthropy Roundtables, Piss Quizzers and Please barter rehabilitation’s, private prisons and bloated cop budgets. Same as the cold war before the 50,000 Russian hippies marched on the Red Square. Reagan got blamed for loosing Dyncorp profits but howdy doobie was just in the wrong place and spouting to tear down that wall didn’t help. So they drag out hogwash and hobgoblins like it was real and reformers not only jump on it they even compromise with it if it gets them something in the deal. The deal that always has fine print and loop holes for (s)elected lobbyists to tweak in favor of the prohibitionists. Bartering with the known realities leaves so little for the wingnuts. Hard to tell who’s who anymore.

    Spreading their gossip is like working for them, free, period. MAP Inc and Cannabis news do the same. Over and over putting their obvious lies out there for the public to see and debate. Giving it a nad of credence is too much. Like debating that salt is really harmful because its made of sodium and chloride, two poisons. Or water should be avoided because it has hydrogen and mixed with oxygen is 2/3rds of the fire triangle and just a spark could burn people up. The czars headlines contain the gist of their sputum’s. Nothing much to debate in the article. Then after devouring it we pick every piece of false out and show it to the simple folk hoping the light will shine through and they’ll finally get it. These are the people of the land. The common clay of the new West. You know… morons. Same ones who go a-ridin’ into town, a-whompin’ and a-whumpin’ every livin’ thing on the planet. Beyond their comprehension. If any do respond they send in the trolls with their one liner trashing.

    Work-drink-forget work-eat-shit-screw-sleep-work. No time to think or rationalize. Just say No because “All propaganda must be so popular and on such an intellectual level, that even the most stupid of those towards whom it is directed will understand it. Therefore, the intellectual level of the propaganda must be lower the larger the number of people who are to be influenced by it.” “Through clever and constant application of propaganda, people can be made to see paradise as hell, and also the other way around, to consider the most wretched sort of life as paradise.”
    ~ Benito Mussolini
    London Sunday Express December 8, 1935

    This Ganjawar has so very little to do with Ganja. It has absolutely nothing to do with dangers that aren’t real in the first place. Though those spewing falsehoods do make the prettiest brightest red flags to avoid the potential of believing them at a later time. Liars lie and they lie consistently and for long periods only because they can. They can because we would like to believe them and even compromise on their lies… again and again. We remove checks and balances so as to not hurt their feelings, trust me we don’t need them thar oversights and regulations. Why? So they like us? So maybe if we’re really good and behave and stop advocating for old sick people so the kids don’t think they’re old sick people and try it. Then maybe by another 75 years we’ll forget about it altogether like 60 million boomer yuppie philistine sissies out of 80 trying it. They really don’t deserve Ganja and therefore have no say in the matter. Only those who choose to use it have a stake in it and should demand quality assurance be enforced if need be. Other than that, leave it alone and get your grubby ONDCPaws off it. None of your business. Shew, scat, psfttt!

  24. claygooding says:

    I want some of that smoke DdC,and you need to cut back to
    one energy drink at a time.
    But spot on about them knowing and fearing the power of the hemp plant,but she is a resilent bitch,and will always be with us.

  25. DdC says:

    but she is a resilent bitch,and will always be with us.

    We can hope the WoD wingnuts don’t get their way. Souder was pushing Fusarium oxysporum, Fla tried and the drug thugs got shut down and Montana sued to stop them I believe. But that doesn’t end the long line of drug worrier idiots in the wings praying for a chance to get headlines. Now with the frankenfoods come frankenganja? Same poison pushers who dropped agent orange and now agent less orange on Colombians. Tied with Cliarence Thomas in St Louis dumping dioxins into the river. Genetically hemp is linked to hops so maybe they’re trying for two birds with one stone. Don’t see that many beer chuggers worried about it. Numb. If Soros has an inkling to somehow bring Monsanto to Ganja, what are the chances the Soros bashers would oppose it? It seems the more devastation drug worriers think up the higher they get. Getting off on others misery is a drug that should be banned. btw, I don’t do artificial if possible, especially fake “energy” drinks.

    Wall street’s Spontaneous Abortionists
    Soros Monsanto Connection

    Monsanto, Poison & Genes (documentary, 2008) U2b

    Welcome to BAN TERMINATOR
    Your action is needed.

    PROPOSITION 19, MONSANTO, AND GMO TERMINATOR CANNABIS ~ By Conrad Justice Kiczenski
    An article by D.M. Murdock written in August 2010 and entitled “Why hemp could save the world”

  26. darkcycle says:

    Okay, then, DdC, the hyperventilation/kundalini technique you use to center yourself is causing some frothing at the keyboard….
    And the Monsanto/terminator gene story is a hoax. Start with the lead in and look up the stuff he refers to, it’s not what he says. And he smears Sam the Skunk man, whose fine Skunk strains have provided the basis for many many fine crosses, some of which I’ve nurtured myself. Sam is and always was solid people who used nothing more that selective breeding to make and to protect his strains. As for Cannabis, Hortapharm in Holland was commissioned to create seeds for the GW Pharma/Sativex. When they were asked about the use of genetic engineering on Cannabis, they responded that it would be stupid and useless. Cannabis responds so quickly to selective breeding that it is unnecessary. As a weedy dioecious that has limited hybridization, and many, many wild landrace cultivars, it’s so close to wild type that genetic variability is still built in. There’s alot more biological complexity in there. It’s like trying to eradicate a weed….wait, it is a weed.

  27. darkcycle says:

    Plus, Terminator genes are only useful for keeping people from re-creating strains by re-seeding. They’re never ever going to cause any damage whatsoever to anybody elses strains. If the plants can’t reproduce, then the trait can’t be heritable.

  28. DdC says:

    Monsanto/terminator gene story is a hoax.
    Start with the lead in and look up the stuff he refers to,
    it’s not what he says.

    Buzz words dude? Hoax means fabricated, fraud like a joke. What link you referring too? Clays post? Look up what stuff? Links man, links.

    You mean this lead?

    Cannabis prohibition has served to redirect human evolution from that of a decentralized agrarian lifestyle and natural economy, to a centralized petro-chemical military dictatorship controlled through the artificial economic will of private banks and other trans-national corporate interests.

    sounds about right…

    The agenda of the government in its policies against Cannabis have always been to deprive the people access to the plant, while maintaining control over it for the government’s own self-interest.

    The Elkhorn Manifesto

    This also sounds true to me mon…

    The next stage in continuing this control, is in the regulation, licensing and taxation of Cannabis cultivation and use through the only practical means available to the corporate system, which is through genetic engineering and patenting of the Cannabis genome.

    Merdénol, and the gov already has patients.

    The leading advocate for Proposition 19 is the organization known as the Drug Policy Alliance (DPA). The DPA is the leading organization spearheading the reform of Cannabis policies in the United States, and has been made up of some of the most powerful and influential characters in today’s global petro-bio-chemical-military-banking-industrial complex. Some of the Directors of DPA include the following:…

    Drug Policy Alliance getting rapped this week
    First by Bish Bozo now The Terminator man…

    And he smears Sam the Skunk man

    Some of the gods of this underground Cannabis culture are people such as the Skunkman aka David Watson, who is ironically also one of the only people to have acquired a DEA Cannabis import license.

    Monsanto terminator technology is being applied to Cannabis by (David Watson) at Hortapharm in Holland.”

    SEE: Treating Yourself – Meet Dr. Frankenbeanstein | Cannabis Farmer
    The following article published in the UK Independent on September 27, 1998, Interviewed Mr. Watson on the intent of his research in Cannabis with his company HortaPharm:

    I was skeptical about terminators sterilized seeds shouldn’t be able to pollinate. What you mentioned about the numbers add up too. If profit was their only agenda. As far as cloning from cuttings, that’s already being done and nothing at genetic manipulation I’ve heard of until this article. I don’t know if he’s “sam” He’s from SC so I’ll ask around town if anyones heard of him.

    As for the natural ability of cannabis as an herb deterrent, I agree it is. But we’re talking about Neocon Nazi drug worriers. As for the fungus eradications thats something ongoing and as far as I know nothing federally banning another state from testing. Buying up seed banks and sterilizing seeds to resell next year is why many Indian farmers in India committed suicide. They still required chemicals plus the extra cost of terminator seeds plus loosing the ability to use harvested seeds next year. Dumping dioxins or legislating competition off the market isn’t beyond their means. neither is cannabis extinction. But thanks for the tip. I only skimmed the web page.

    hyperventilation/kundalini, is that what they were doing at the beginning of the Woodstock movie? No, if I am going to mass murder brain cells it will be the old fashioned way by getting drunk. Not since 1980. I split a beer every superbowl but really lost the taste for it. I’m still waiting for Carlos Castinada to pan out since Nixon totally lied about flashbacks. Ram Dass and down in Big Sur is the Echelon retreat and we’re pretty much eat up with New Age critters here. Liberals make the worst hypocrites.

  29. Tim says:

    Darkcycle: is bottling like kettling? We know about that here from the G20. The police chief tried to discredit video of a beatdown recently and there was a huge backlash.

    I tell people that even as the police ‘police themselves’ and get their friends off, all one has to do it type ‘police brutality’ into Youtube. Rodney King writ large. I have sensed the attitudes of the people changing, even here in Canada.

  30. darkcycle says:

    There’s so much bad info in there that I only touched the tip of the iceberg. Monsanto is never going to buy the seeds of all the marijuana seed banks, or the stashes of breeders worldwide. Wheat evolved in small slice of Mesopotamia, it’s wild range was never more than a few thousand miles. Cultivated wheat bears little or no resemblance to it’s wild progenitor, in all the critical areas, seed size, plant growth characteristics and nutritional value. Even if it grew wild all over the world, you couldn’t use it for “Wheat” as we know it. Cannabis, on the other hand, grows in a variety of landraces wild, all over the planet. Moreover, most, if not all of these landraces are capable of providing multiple useful cultivars. you give me a field of feral midwestern hemp, and in just a couple of generations I can breed a useful medicinal plant, given a large enough pool of from which to pick.
    The author in the story confuses producing a “no high” pot plant with the part of Watson’s project where he was looking for a high CBN cultivar. G.W. decided that to get a predictable ration of CBN to THC they would use two different plants, one bred to produce THC in high amounts, another to provide the THC. These would then be combined to give an exact ratio.
    We’ve had “no-high” marijuana for ever. It’s called Hemp. This guy wrote this unscientific garbage and now he sits back laughing every time someone cites it. It’s scientific Poo-Poo.

  31. darkcycle says:

    I don’t have links that will connect you to a basic genetics class. But that stuff is the stuff of wild fantasies.
    Monsnato became the monster it is by destroying the ability of people to grow anything but their seeds. Little old wheat didn’t stand a chance, and soybeans aren’t far behind. But Marijuana? Hemp? Bring it on Monsanto. Cannabis already has ’em beat.
    It’s a weed. (And thank fucking god it is.)

  32. darkcycle says:

    For more history on the origin of Wheat and and it’s ties to civilization and a nice list of cereal grains in modern cultivation and their relative seed weights, protein contents and wild ranges, as well as their differences from their wild cousins, Read “Guns, Germs, and Steel” By Jerrod Diamond. And don’t miss the Sequel, “Collapse”.
    For an overview of Genetics, any good modern textbook will work, but since we’re talking Pot here,I would recommend Greg Green’s “Cannabis Breeder’s Handbook” Green Candy Press.
    Sorry I don’t have the time to go searching out links for you right now, but I’ll be back with those when I have a chance. I’ve debunked this one enough times that I should just ‘boiler-plate’ a refutation and paste it up, but I’m not the prepared type of stoner.

  33. darkcycle says:

    P.S. “How to protect your work” Chapter 12, Cannabis Breeder’s Handbook. Greg Green. Gives the exact methods used by Sam and other breeders to protect their valuable seeds from knockoffs and re-breeding. It’s nothing more than selectve breeding (I do it myself).

  34. darkcycle says:

    Sorry, “Cannabis Breeder’s Bible” Greg Green. Green Candy Press. (Man, I should at least look at the bookshelf! Yes, I can be THAT lazy)

  35. darkcycle says:

    Yeah, Tim, I think it’s the same tactic.

  36. sandy says:

    well well well .It is almost as if our country has been sold out to those industrial monopolies who oppose legalizing any non toxic competition including cannabis,to their poison gou. .Thank God,for the nullification clause,I certainly plan to spread the word about this. I am beginning to think all law enforcement,all lawyers ,all Judges, governors and any one who wants to serve any seat in the senate,congress,house,and especially any dea officials,Maybe even the president,should all be required to do five years in prison,before they are given a job in any of these fields.I believe they are not qualified to put people in jail unless they have experienced it themselves.Maybe this would make all of them think twice about what it is that they are doing when they sentence innocent,non violent people to jail time over a harmless non toxic medicinal herb they classified as a lethal,dangerous,schedule one,narcotic like heroin.(which cannabis is not).Only truths should be told in scientific exploration, regarding all studies including schedule and classifications of substances.To push a lie on the people is not going to get our vote.

  37. Gart says:

    Pete, I need your help here. Unless the ONDCP have the power to ignore both the FDA recommendations and the Controlled Substance Act, you are barking at the wrong tree. I totally oppose the so-called War on Drugs (WoD) and believe it should be stopped, but think your post is rather misleading. Would you say that the Police are specifically exempted from Scientific Integrity? Of course not. The tragedy is that the WoD has never been informed by scientific principles. If that were the case, the consumption of drugs would have been considered long, long time ago a health issue, not a criminal one. And the WoD won’t have been engineered in the first place. We should continue denouncing the WoD for what it is: an irrational, inefficient and impractical policy. We cannot expect those who want to feed, nurture, propagate and enforce the WoD to adhere to scientific principles. The tail does not usually wag the dog!

  38. Sandy says:

    This certainly makes it clear that any science that proves cannabis will cure diseases that currently no cure is provided for, will not be published nor released by the government?I guess nor will this research be enough reason to re class or re schedule cannabis based on any new scientific finding.Well what the hell?This thinking,and lack of logic,makes it very clear that the federal government dose not care that cannabis could help a lot with health care costs,save the environment,and give some of the power to survive back to the people.Now I understand ,Why the states have chosen to take it upon them selves to legalize it for medical purposes.I wonder if now would be a good time to rethink the idea of succession ?I have heard,No one would do this because of Federal funding ..but on the other hand We also hear that the federal government is broke and has no money.Trillions have gone missing etc.I am thinking a lot of Americans
    are even wondering if our federal government has been high jacked?It is not cooperating with the wishes of the people as it should.If it is still a democracy and I think every one would want whats best for the majority.Certainly A cure for cancer being kept from the people is not in the best interest of the people.So yea something real fishy is going on..and needs to be carefully approached and looked into,by some oversight comity.This is just dishonest and unethical.

  39. Bruce Cain says:

    2011 is the year we are going to cut through the Achilles
    Heal of Marijuana Prohibition. We are going to do this by fully
    exposing the counterproductive legacy of NORML, DPA and MPP: all of
    whom have no real interest in the real solution which is self
    cultivation for all adults without any taxation or regulation. The
    approach is known both as MERP and the Tomato Model. Please join
    our group and become active locally to effect change nationally in
    2011: Why Re-Legalization Activists Should Vote NO on PROP19
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R_6rdG4w3Vo MERP Headquarters The
    Marijuana Re-Legalization Policy Project (MRPP)= “MERP”
    http://www.newagecitizen.com/MERP.htm “NO” On Prop19 “YES” on CCHH
    & MERP http://www.newagecitizen.com/NoOnProp19.htm
    PROPOSITION 19, MONSANTO, AND GMO TERMINATOR CANNABIS
    http://community.kpfz.org/node/17 Fax to Your Representatives to
    Immediately Re-Legalize Marijuana:
    http://www.change.org/actions/view/petition_for_the_immediate_re-legalization_of_marijuana#
    19 reasons to vote NO on 19: http://www.votetaxcannabis2010.blogspot.com
    Jack Herer’s CCHH 2012 Initiative:
    http://www.youthfederation.com/cchhi2012.html Working Group Against Prop19
    and For CCHH and MERP
    http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/GlobalMarijuanaReLegalization/
    Re-Legalize Marijuana Self-Cultivation Without Taxation (Like Beer)
    http://www.causes.com/causes/339097 Monsanto’s Fall: The End of GMO
    Seed Industry? (Oct 12, 2010)
    http://conspiracyplanet.com/channel.cfm?channelid=123&contentid=7416

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  41. chris says:

    The MERP model is idiocy. We have it hard enough as it is going for modest goals of legalization of medical marijuana and decrim.

  42. Alice Lillie says:

    The Founders did not have government regulation or prohibition in mind when they founded this country. Neither did countless ordinary people who rose up and took up arms, many to die, against England to free this country.

    The war on drugs is insane and totally unamerican.

    Murray Rothbard, great historian and economist wrote a 4-volume series on the Founding called _Conceived in Liberty_. It sheds a great deal of light on the Founding, the struggle for liberty in the decades before the Founding, and how the ordinary people fought and laid down their lives so that you and I could enjoy liberty and prosperity.

    But, it has all been taken away thanks to many government evils, the war on drugs being one.

    Please see my website for a review of these 4 volumes, or better still read them online or order them at mises.org.

  43. Pingback: ONDCP specifically exempted from Scientific Integrity policy – Drug WarRant | Daily news portal

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