TRUMP DECLARED WAR AGAINST THE WAR ON DRUGS

 By Howie Katz

 

President Trump sits at the signing ceremony for his executive order to reclassify marijuana from a Schedule I drug to a Schedule III drug 

 

On Thursday, President Trump signed an executive order to reclassify marijuana from a Schedule I drug to a Schedule III drug. In doing so, Trump declared war against the war on drugs.

 

I first became involved in the war on drugs some 70 years ago. One thing I know for sure is that marijuana is one of the most dangerous of all drugs because it is a gateway drug. When marijuana users no longer get the high they were seeking, they often turn to harder drugs. 

 

During the six years I specialized in narcotics enforcement, I came into close contact with dozens of hardcore heroin addicts. Each and every one of those heroin users started out on pot. The same can be said for most of the cocaine users and the users of other potent drugs that I came into contact with. And those addicts were not restricted to the riffraff of society. I busted two doctors and several lawyers for heroin use. They all started out with a 'harmless' puff or two of pot.  

               

 

A 20 year study by a team led by Professor Wayne Hall, a drug adviser to the World Health Organization, found cannabis is highly addictive, causes mental health problems, doubles the risk of developing psychotic disorders, including schizophrenia and opens the door to hard drugs.

 

Most of the discomfort cancer patients sufferer comes from the chemotherapy. Trump calls his decision "common sense" because "so many people" suffering from the pain caused by cancer wanted him to reclassify marijuana. But a study by Dr. Penny Whiting and her team at England’s University of Bristol found that cannabis does not ease pain, nausea and vomiting in chemotherapy patients.

 

Marijuana is not the magic elixir that our President has been fooled into believing that it is. While marijuana may offer some relief to cancer sufferers, so will the consumption of alcoholic beverages. And even cigarettes offer some relief. The reclassification of marijuana will do much more harm than any good.

 

26 Republican lawmakers warned Trump that he is sending the wrong message on marijuana. "Rescheduling tells our youth that marijuana use is acceptable and safe, a dangerous falsehood that will sink us deeper into our country’s drug crisis,"

 

Pot advocates insist that marijuana is an innocuous drug. But a study released by Finnish researchers who worked alongside Cambridge and Queensland experts, showed that smoking cannabis just five times as a teenager raises the risk of psychosis. Researchers at the University of Ohio found a similar link between cannabis and psychosis.   

 

Ever since the epidemic of illegal drug use started with the youthful Vietnam War protesters, we have been dealing with the problem in the wrong - dead wrong - way.  The way to control the use of illegal drugs is by punishing the users.

 

The snuggling of drugs into our country, no matter whether from Mexico, China or South America, is governed by the Law of Supply and Demand. Our demand for drugs created the Mexican drug cartels. The insatiable hunger for drugs by Americans makes it hard to win the war on drugs.

 

Trump has now become an enabler of illegal drug use. By his stupid reclassification of marijuana, he has made it even harder to win the war on drugs ... as a matter of fact, Trump has now declared war against the war on drugs.