Medical MJ, FDA Waivers, and Christmas Ponies
Monday, I wrote that the Mormon Church is not serious about finding a workable solution for medical marijuana in Utah. When it told its members to vote against Proposition 2, the Mormon Church held out the alternative scenario of a legislative compromise, while simultaneously slipping two poison pills in any future negotiations. Those poison pills are the illegal requirements (1) that doctors “prescribe” medical marijuana (instead of “recommending” it) and (2) that it be distributed through a “pharmacy” (instead of a “dispensary"). In a Facebook exchange, head lobbyist for the Mormon Church, former Utah Speaker of the House Marty Stephens, admitted that the illegal criteria are used in no other state. However, he wrote that Utah could “blaze a new and safer path.” Utah voters should know that the path the Mormon Church proposes is a path to nowhere real. It is a cruel deception that will deny Utah patients needed relief.
Veteran political journalist Bob Bernick, Jr., predicts (correctly, I believe) that Marty will pitch the concept of “an FDA waiver” to Utah voters, arguing that the waiver would allow Utah doctors to “prescribe” medical marijuana and “pharmacies” to distribute it—both without losing their federal licenses, as currently would happen. Such talk is smoke and mirrors—electoral subterfuge, pure and simple—intended to mislead Utah voters.
The FDA waiver is electoral fantasy. “Vote against Prop 2, and the FDA will give Utah a Christmas pony!” Friends, hear me: it won’t happen. Such talk is deceptive. It is as fraudulent as any campaign claim you will ever hear.
To understand the absolute dishonesty of the FDA waiver plan (or any federal help), check out this article (fresh off the press just yesterday), documenting how the Trump Administration has a high-level “Marijuana Policy Coordination Committee” formed to … (wait for it!) …. “combat public support for marijuana and cast state legalization measures in a negative light, while attempting to portray the drug as a national threat.”
What the fetch!
Let me get this straight. The Mormon Church and Drug Safe Utah are telling Utahns to vote against Proposition 2, because those very same feds who are officially busy distorting marijuana facts and undercutting States’ legalization initiatives will reverse course and help Utah patients obtain medical marijuana?
Did I miss something? I mean that’s their plan, right? Vote against this Proposition, and Utah (population 3.1 million; 1% of the Nation’s population) will convince the people who are busy “casting state legalization measures in a negative light” to slap their foreheads in an “oh!-we-get-it-now!” moment and reverse course. Even by political standards, that “plan” is a, let’s generously say, streeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeetch.
Since Drug Safe Utah’s “plan” is DOA at DOE, let’s do this, Utah. Let’s pass Proposition 2. That is a solid first step that will get patients needed relief. Then, if Marty someday can convince our good friends in Congress, the FDA, and the Marijuana Policy Coordination Committee to give Utah that magical FDA waiver, we can amend the law to incorporate that glorious walk-on-water political triumph, when it is more than just a hollow election-time lie.
Steve Urquhart served in the Utah Legislature for 16 years.