The Patriot Post® · Trump Repositions Pot
“I had a brother, Fred,” said a reflective Donald Trump back in 2017. “Great guy, best-looking guy, best personality — much better than mine. But he had a problem. He had a problem with alcohol. And he would tell me: ‘Don’t drink. Don’t drink.’”
In another interview, Trump added of his brother, “He had a profound impact on my life because you never know where you’re going to end up.”
Indeed. Death, it seemed, was the only thing that could stop Freddy Trump from drinking. And, sure enough, it did — in 1981, at the too-young age of 43.
I mention this because yesterday, President Trump issued an executive order that directs his administration to reclassify marijuana as a less dangerous drug by moving it from Schedule I status to Schedule III. So, if all goes according to plan, pot will no longer be lumped in with heroin and LSD, which sounds about right. Still, you could practically hear the president’s people wrestling with the words of the order, wrestling with the language in order to set a proper tone. Clearly, it wasn’t a cause for celebration, but it was the right thing to do.
As the AP reports, “The proposed change still requires federal regulatory approval. But the change could make the marijuana industry more profitable, facilitate new research on medicinal uses and nudge federal policy closer to a more tolerant approach already in place in many states.”
The order focused on the research piece and the medicinal piece, as opposed to the recreational component of pot. And rightly so. “I’ve always told my children, ‘Don’t take drugs, no drinking, no smoking,’” said Trump yesterday at a White House event.
While noting that he’s been inundated with calls to make marijuana more accessible for folks dealing with severe pain, he added, “At the same time, the facts compel the federal government to recognize that marijuana can be legitimate in terms of medical applications when carefully administered.”
As the executive order puts it:
It is the policy of my Administration to increase medical marijuana and CBD research to better inform patients and doctors. It is critical to close the gap between current medical marijuana and CBD use and medical knowledge of risks and benefits, including for specific populations and conditions. Research methods and models should include real-world evidence and should facilitate affordable access in order to rapidly assess the health outcomes of medical marijuana and legal CBD products while focusing on long-term health effects in vulnerable populations like adolescents and young adults.
Here in our shop, we think the president is right on the merits because, as bad as marijuana is, it’s not on the same level at all with those other Schedule I drugs. But here, it’s also worth noting that Trump was supposed to issue this order on Monday but instead waited until yesterday. Why? Maybe his administration was struggling with it. Or maybe because on Monday, he issued an executive order reclassifying another drug, fentanyl, as a weapon of mass destruction. Given the grim body count of fentanyl in recent years, it’s hard to argue with that assessment. Maybe it would be a bad look to ease restrictions on pot on the same day.
As for the pot EO, there’s plenty of snark to go around. The Wall Street Journal asks, “Does MAHA Stand for ‘Make America High Again’?” and then wrings its hands about the reclassification, saying that it “flies in the face of Trump and RFK Jr.‘s professed concern about health.”
Whatever, dudes.
The point, though, is that the optics of Trump’s decision aren’t particularly good among some traditional Republicans, even if the spirit of the order is spot-on. The drug issue is a deeply complicated one that cuts a jagged path across our left-versus-right political affiliations. As for the evolving nature of the marijuana taboo, more than half of Americans live in places where recreational marijuana is legal.
The bottom line: We’re not going to pot, at least not yet, and at least not for this particular reason. As is his nature, President Trump is trying to find the right balance and solve difficult problems — because that’s precisely what we elected him to do.