Opinion: Jeff Sessions’ vendetta on marijuana isn’t going anywhere
June 14, 2017
Pack up some “loud” as the kids call it and prepare your favorite munchies for this column.
U.S. Attorney General and Keebler Elf lookalike Jeff Sessions is ready to relight, uh, I mean, reignite his war on marijuana after recent reports indicated that he asked congressional leaders to undo federal medical marijuana protection laws that were implemented by the Obama administration.
Sessions’ justification and rationale for the desire to undo said laws are the result of our nation suffering from a “historic drug epidemic” as he referred (see what I did there?) to it.
Now granted, it’s undeniable that our country is in the midst of a terrible opioid and opiate epidemic with the increase in deaths from heroin, prescription opioids and fentanyl that have steadily risen since the early 2000s.
But then again, this is Sessions we’re talking about here, the very same man who testified in front of the Senate this past Tuesday on his potential dealings with Russia and got “nervous” because Sen. Kamala Harris was grilling his ass in front of the committee on national television.
Awww, did wittle Jeff get scared because a woman with enough influence, poise and determination to see through your half-assed answers made you feel uncomfortable?
Great to know that’s what makes you nervous, I’m sure being able to routinely slither away like the snake you are comes in handy at your day job.
This is also the same man who once said that marijuana is only “slightly less awful than heroin.” It’s a quote like this that literally makes me think Sessions doesn’t know what pot is, that he missed out on smoking some ganja and listening to the Stones growing up.
Either that or the dude got so paranoid smoking one time that he never wanted to touch the stuff again.
Need further proof that Sessions just doesn’t has a personal vengeance for marijuana? Some studies from the National Institute of Drug Abuse show that legally protected marijuana dispensaries, along with medical marijuana laws, were associated with a decrease in opioid prescribing, self-reports of opioid use and treatment admissions for opioid addiction.
While researchers haven’t fully been able to conclude the aforementioned studies as solidified facts, it’s hard to argue that those results don’t appear to be pretty positive.
That is, unless you’re Sessions.
Gee, what a radical idea it would be to keep these federally protected medical marijuana laws in place and treat patients who are in pain with medical marijuana while simultaneously keeping said patients off opioid-based medication to possibly help curb the real drug epidemic in this country.
It’s almost as if that would totally make sense to do.
But in today’s world and in today’s America governed by today’s administration, that would just, well, make too much sense to do.
Because, in case you need reminded once more, this incoming war on drugs that Sessions and his people are firing up isn’t about helping rid people of the life-threatening and life-destroying opioid epidemic that has plagued so much of this country.
And if you think for one second that it is, you’re getting scammed worse than a dude paying $25 for a gram of weed.
I don’t care if it’s the stickiest of the icky, as Dave Chappelle once said. That’s a rip off!
It just doesn’t make sense. And neither does screwing with these medical marijuana laws in some distant hope that it will prevent the use of illicit drugs.
How can Sessions and company keep up this illusion that cracking down on marijuana laws will somehow help the drug epidemic?
For starters, marijuana is still a hot topic in this country and God only knows why with all the BS issues that so desperately deserve our attention at the moment.
That, sadly, is not the world we’re living in right now.
I still can’t wrap my mind around how little Sessions understands about medical marijuana’s effects compared to other explicit drugs. It’s truly dumbfounding that a person like this in 2017 could be in charge of such a powerful division of our government.
(Remembers Donald Trump is president.)
Okay, maybe it’s not that hard to fathom.
But Sessions’ misguidance on weed is. And what’s even more alarming to consider is that maybe, deep down, Sessions knows there is no benefit from cracking down on these laws.
Maybe deep down he knows this could hurt more people than it would help, yet wants to do so anyway to achieve some personal victory or settle some score.
Why, that just about sounds plausible. And in today’s world and in today’s America governed by today’s administration, it wouldn’t surprise me if that were so.
Matt Poe is a columnist, contact him at [email protected].