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Alex Berenson has written an important book that reveals the truth about marijuana. The book is titled, Tell Your Children The Truth About Marijuana.
Berenson destroys six myths about marijuana. But, before we examine each myth, the story about how marijuana came to be used as medicine needs to be known. Ethan Nedelmann is perhaps the most influential person behind the movement to legalize medical marijuana. Nadelmann was born in 1957 and grew up in Westchester County, north of New York City. He went to college at McGill in Montreal before transferring to Harvard. He graduated in 1979 and entered a joint law-PhD program also at Harvard. The drug war grabbed his attention. He decided to write his PhD thesis about the effort to block supply of drugs from the source on an international level. Nadelmann opposed America’s war on drugs. In 1992, Nadelmann met George Soros for lunch. Soros was a billionaire at the time and was interested in liberalizing drug policy. In 1994, Nadelmann, with Soros’ backing, started the Lindesmith Center (Alfred Lindesmith was a sociologist who questioned whether drugs were as addictive as they seemed). In 1992, Bill Clinton was elected president of the United States. In that same year, Proposition 215 took off from San Francisco and Nadelmann became involved. Prop 215 was the first medical marijuana initiative. It offered to give California’s voters the chance to change the state’s laws so that anyone 18 or older could use marijuana with a physician’s authorization. Initiatives allow voters to vote yes or no on issues directly. They don’t exist on the national level. California is one of the states where they are most frequently used. Lester Grinspoon in Marijuana Reconsidered, devoted a thirteen page chapter to the idea of medical marijuana, but otherwise the concept did not receive much attention. Not much thought was given to marijuana as medicine. However, AIDS activists in San Francisco began using marijuana to treat AIDS-related wasting. Clinical trials would show that marijuana was only marginally helpful in treating the syndrome. Activists insisted that dying patients should be able to use marijuana. Nadelmann paid for a private statewide poll to see if Prop 215 had a chance to win. To his surprise, it did. He brought the results to George Soros who liked the idea of medical marijuana and spent $550,000.00 to back the initiative. Two other rich men were supporters: Peter Lewis, the billionaire chairman of Progressive Insurance and George Zimmer, the founder of Men’s Warehouse who, together, added another $750,000.00. Lewis and Zimmer actively used marijuana. On Nov. 5, 1996, Prop. 215 won approval in California–clearing the way for medical marijuana use in the state and eventually across America. The long-term importance of Prop. 215 is hard to overstate. Also, in 1996, Bill Clinton won re-election as president of the U.S. The concept of medical marijuana is really a misnomer. The Food and Drug Administration has never approved of marijuana as a medicine! (Part 2 to follow).