Weed, Inc.: The Truth about the Pot Lobby, Thc, and the Commercial Marijuana Industry

262 Pages·2017·3.82 MB·English

by  Ben Cort

WEED, INC.
The Truth About THC, the Pot Lobby,
and the Commercial Marijuana Industry
Ben Cort

Health Communications, Inc.
Deerfield Beach, Florida
www.hcibooks.com
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
is available through the Library of Congress © 2017 Ben Cort
ISBN-13: 978-07573-1988-4 (Paperback) ISBN-10: 07573-1988-2 (Paperback) ISBN-13: 978-
07573-1989-1 (ePub) ISBN-10: 07573-1989-0 (ePub) All rights reserved. Printed in the United
States of America. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or
transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or
otherwise, without the written permission of the publisher.
HCI, its logos, and marks are trademarks of Health Communications, Inc.
Publisher: Health Communications, Inc.
3201 S.W. 15th Street
Deerfield Beach, FL 33442–8190
Cover design by Jim Pollard
Interior design and formatting by Lawna Patterson Oldfield
ePub created by Dawn Von Strolley Grove
Christy, you inspire all that I do. I would have accomplished nothing
without you by my side, all that I am proud of in life we have done
together. The journey that we are on has been miraculous, even in the
mundane, and I owe you everything. Thank you for always being there
and for giving me the push I needed to write this. I know it wasn’t easy on
you for me to invest all of this time writing, but you gave it with grace and
understanding that is typical of you.
We did this together, thank you. I love you.
Contents
Acknowledgments
Foreword
Introduction:
Who I Am and What I Do and Do Not Care About
CHAPTER 1
Decriminalization Versus Commercialization
Have We Been Played?
CHAPTER 2
The Evolution of a Plant
God Didn’t Make This Stuff
CHAPTER 3
The Lobby
Where the Gold’s At!
CHAPTER 4
Social Justice
That’s What This Is All About, Man!
CHAPTER 5
Concentrates
710 Is the New
CHAPTER 6
Vaping
Get High Like a Ninja!
CHAPTER 7
Edibles
Brownies? That’s so 1970s!
CHAPTER 8
Weed and the Environment
There Is Nothing “Green” About This Stuff
CHAPTER 9
Law Enforcement
What’s Johnny Law Saying?
CHAPTER 10
Medical Marijuana
Way More Complex Than Either Side Is Telling You
CHAPTER 11
In a Perfect World
Proposed Laws and Their Insanity Versus Rational Changes
CHAPTER 12
The Arguments and the Rebuttals
How to Respond to What the Seventeen-Year-Olds Throw at You
CHAPTER 13
Addiction and Recovery
Yeah, They Are Real Things
Afterword:
It’s Time We Started Really Paying Attention to This Weed “Experiment”
in Colorado
Resources
Glossary
About the Author
Acknowledgments
Kevin Sabet, Monte Stiles, Patrick Kennedy, Chris Thurstone, MD, Laura
Martin, MD, David Smith, MD, Jag Khalsa, MS, PhD, Deni Carise, PhD,
Evelin Lim Esq, Steve Millette, Mike Cox, Jay Voigt, Adam Pisoni, Sara
Urfer, Stacey Harris, Josh Mahan, Jeremy Holburn, John Elliott, Ben
Battaglia, Jeff Rasor, Courtney Strong, The Steel Group, Tom Gorman,
Kevin Wong, LaTisha Bader, PhD, Chief John Jackson, Chief Marco
Vasquez, Josh McClellan, Will Jones, Elyse M, Keith Bradley, Howard
Samuels, PhD, Bob DuPont, MD, Tyler Richardson, Rourke Weaver, Bob
Ferguson, Gary Forrest, Doug Edwards, Duke, Andy, and NMI.
My mom and dad. I was a pain and you were good to me. I love you
both and am doing my best today to help people in the situations I put
you in years ago. Thanks for all of your help with this, Dad. I couldn’t
have done it without you.
Crumb Cake, Rooster, Jelly Boo, you are why I do what I do.
Foreword
In 2016, Ben Cort delivered a powerful presentation at the fourth annual
David E. Smith Symposium, the theme of which was marijuana. Ben
raised important, frequently overlooked concerns about the risks of
making marijuana and cannabis products more available to the public.
In the election that fall, more states legalized marijuana for both
medicinal and recreational purposes. With momentum increasing for
decriminalization and legalization, commercialization and
industrialization of cannabis are not far behind. Weed, Inc. examines the
many implications of that phenomenon.
Ben informs us, “What the generations before us smoked isn’t what kids
today are using. The 2 percent THC weed of the Woodstock era is gone; it
has been replaced by something with a potency unimaginable a few years
ago and consumable in forms that we never thought possible.” Those
consumable forms include concentrated extracts packaged as candy.
Limited research data suggests that these stronger products may cause
more adverse reactions to cannabis use in the short term. As Ben notes,
“For the first time ever, cannabis withdrawal was included in the latest
edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders
(DSM-5).” No one knows what the long-term effects might be.
When I founded the Haight Ashbury Free Medical Clinic during the
Summer of Love in 1967, I witnessed the tragic consequences of the
popular idea that drugs were harmless. Voices like Ben’s can help us
avoid repeating that history.
—David E. Smith, MD
Introduction
Who I Am and What I Do and
Do Not Care About
Let’s get one thing straight right off the bat, before we even begin
this thing: I am not concerned with casual adult marijuana use. So long
as kids don’t see you (and if they do, realize that it reduces their
perception of risk, making them more likely to use before their brains are
developed and causing them much more harm), and you are not driving
(I don’t think I need to make much of a case against driving under the
influence), I seriously don’t care if an adult chooses to consume weed. As
a recovering drug addict, not only do I not get to throw stones, I have no
interest in the conversation. We will get into all of this later, but by the
age of twenty-five to twenty-six a person’s brain is pretty well developed.
The likelihood of doing harm to yourself or others because of your use is
significantly reduced, unless you’re doing something dumb or
irresponsible while intoxicated—so just don’t do dumb things!
With that said there is potential for harm with any mood-altering
substance that intoxicates. I’m not advocating for the adults reading this
book to put it down, settle into a comfy sofa, press play on The Wizard of
Oz and The Dark Side of the Moon at the same time while blazing one. If
you choose to, however, don’t drive and don’t let kids see you and I won’t
say a word against it.
We’re only a few sentences in, but I’ll bet I’ve managed to piss off some
of you already. The old school of drug abuse prevention is likely unable to
reconcile how someone who is so publicly opposed to marijuana
commercialization could say something as heretical as what I just did. I
can hear it now, “Can you believe this? Now the author is advocating that