The failure of Drug War is glaringly obvious to judges, cops, wardens, prosecutors and millions more. Now calling for decriminalization, legalization, the end of prohibition. Let us investigate the Century of Lies.
________________
Alright, my friends. Welcome to this edition of Century of Lies. We have with us online, Dr. Tom O’Connell. He’s currently working as a “Pot Doctor” out in California, making recommendations for use and he has his own Blog. I want to read a couple of extracts from it, during this show. I’m going to start with this one.
A lot of non-criminals have been breaking America’s stupid drug laws for decades. To treat not only Multiple Sclerosis, but a lot of other conditions as well. As a matter of fact, the people who’ve been applying for medical legitimacy under the provisions of California’s Proposition 215 for over thirteen years, are a valuable resource that’s been shamefully neglected by self appointed experts in both academia and reform, for far too long.
What might have opened their eyes a bit sooner, could have been a few more pot-docs willing to take decent medical histories and published their results. Doctor O’Connell, are you with us?
Dr. Tom O’Connell: I’m still here.
Dean Becker: Alright, sir. Good to know that. Dr. O’Connell, you have written significantly on your blog. We’re going to delve into a couple of the items that you have posted there during the show. But I wanted to ask you, ‘Are you recognizing progress within the medical community? Are they, the Pot Doctors, beginning to better legitimize what they’re doing, to take down that data, to make use of it?’
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Yes and no. When I first started, I was certainly not the first pot-doc in Northern California. There was a cluster of about twenty people who were pretty much known to me by name or reputation, who were outspoken advocates of marijuana use. Most of them wore hats, themselves, let’s be frank and the dean was the late Tod Mikuriya, who died a few years ago.
Tod was a psychiatrist who had encountered marijuana in the late 60’s and became a user at that time. (He) actually worked for the National Institute to Health, for a few months when that would have been possible. Then Richard Nixon was elected. So Tod got out of government service fairly quickly.
Practiced in the Bay area and was always an outspoken advocate of marijuana use and had written about it… lonely voice. But when 215 made the ballot, he was one of the authors probably and the significant contribution was, ‘Any other condition for which marijuana provides relief‘. Because in point of fact, marijuana had never been studied scientifically, with modern techniques. It was made illegal on the basis of lies told by Harry Anslinger in 1937. Thirty-seven was not a very enlightening time medically, anyway.
So the law was ratcheted up again in 1970, when Nixon was elected. But we had this law, which by then was embracing people. But there was no knowledge, there’s no information. Most of it was mistakes. They thought the munchies the A-motivation... They characterized pot smokers as people who were flakey. Nothing could have been further from the truth, but the only way to find that out would be… That didn’t really happen until (Proposition) 215.
(Proposition) 215 was an opportunity for doctor/patient relationship between an unbiased physician and a pot smoker and the material that comes out of that formula, is amazing. It continues to amaze me. But this has been a shameful trashing of a very valuable medicine. Even most users are not aware of the benefits until it’s pointed out to them.
Dean Becker: Now Dr. Tom O’Connell, I wanted to ask you here, another of your blog pieces dealt with the fact, “There are considerable differences between smoked and orally ingested Cannabis. It’s emphasized by use of the term ’body high’, to describe the effects of edibles. The Federal Policy Makers still don’t understand either those differences or those physiological basis is made clear from their failure to discuss them and from their subsidization of Marinol.
I guess what I’m curious about here is, I have tried Marinol. I have done edibles and there are some similarities, but the edibles are by far the better product. Your thoughts in that regard?
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Marinol is a bank-to-order ‘Government Drug’ that was suppose to address the deficiencies that they claimed to see in an herbal preparation. Marijuana as it grows, is extremely complex. There are many different strains and apparently some of the pharmaceutical effects are strain dependant. This is not investigated by the government or by industry, of any to much extent.
Clinically and from the standpoint of lore, there’s quite a bit appreciated. But one of the things that happens with almost everybody who becomes a repetitive smoker. Which doesn’t always happen after initiation, sometimes a few years later. My belief is that when we start to buy pot, it’s use ceases to be recreational. If it’s your own, it’s medical.
People use it as they’re able to, depending on their work schedule, their day. Elementary consideration’s a safety, because they don’t want to be arrested. But within that context, it’s used remarkably, intelligently and carefully by most users. The edible phenomenon is completely different, because it takes so much longer for the edible to get to the brain. By the time it gets there, it’s also been altered by the liver.
We know some clinical differences, the ’high’ from eating pot is about three hours. The ’high’ after smoking is more like an hour. A big difference there. A body high consists of this feeling of weakness and a sort of a luxurious relaxation in your arms and legs, which makes physical work very difficult to do. So that somebody’s high on a brownie, becomes a couch potato for about three hours.
The benefit, is that pain relief for certain types of neuropathic pain is markedly enhanced by edibles. This has not been investigated. We do not know why, it’s just been consistently noted. I’ve recently heard from people who are managing their seizure disorder with pot, that edibles work better against seizures, too. It makes sense to me. But because the product is illegal and the DEA doesn’t allow it to be used for research very readily, these important differences has never been studied.
Does the Government know about them? I don’t even know that. Because if the did, they certainly wouldn’t be pushing Marinol the way they do. Marinol’s an inferior product that was made to order for propaganda purposes, as far as I’m concerned.
Dean Becker: I agree with you sir. OK, we’re speaking with Dr. Tom O’Connell. Once again, we have phone lines open. We’d love to hear from you. Our number’s (713) 526-5738 or you can dial toll free, 1-877-9-420 420.
Dr. O’Connell you have, over the years, witness the changing of the guard. The changing of the attitude is a better phrase for it and I’m always amazed when I go to California, that people are less… Well, they’re not paranoid. They carry around their weed and they smoke it on the sidewalks or anywhere it’s allowed. I guess what I’m leading up to here is that, that has not led to any overdoses or train wrecks basically, of any kind. Other than violence that stems from prohibition, right?
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Yeah. Marijuana’s a drug of moderation, both of use and behavior. The differences between, even in the same person. If he’s a drunk, he’s a pain in the ass. If he’s high on weed, he may be a lot more reasonable. Certainly not combative. Alcohol is a drug that encourages violence and erases judgment. Cannabis does just the opposite. So it’s reputation is undeserved.
Dean Becker: I agree and I was just going to bring up this. It’s just a thought that’s derived from one of your blog pieces. Talking about, ’Erroneously considered by those who never experienced it, marijuana’s considered as the equivolent of alcohol intoxication.’ It couldn’t hardly be further the truth, right?
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Right.
Dean Becker: OK. Well, we do have Bill…
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Unless you’ve been high, you don’t know that.
Dean Becker: Right. They just inagine that it’s like drinking. Then you’re going to stumble out to your car and smash into a tree. But, it’s just not very likely to do that, whatsoever. I was talking to a friend the other day about that. If you’re trying a new strain, you might want to wait awhile before you get out on the road. Till your brain adjusts to it, right?
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Yeah. People vary considerably in the way they respond to pot. The best way to think about dose is, fractions of an ounce consumed per week. Which is a pretty reasonable way. It ranges from a sixteenth of an ounce, which is half an eighth, in a fairly significant fraction or percent of my patients, on up to over an ounce. So that’s a huge difference.
The people who smoke over an ounce are lighting up eight or ten times a day. They function well. Most of them are either working in the industry or working alone at home, because they have to be out of observation to light up that many times a day.
Dean Becker: You bet. OK, we’re going to go to the phone lines. Let’s go ahead and… Bill is first. Let’s hook him up over here with Dr. Tom O’Connell. Bill, what do you got for us?
Bill: OK, I’m on the air?
Dean Becker: Yes, you are.
Bill: Yes, I am a respiratory therapist and I wanted to touch on the COPD aspect of marijuana, if I could. I have heard it Dean, that marijuana does not cause COPD. But there’re stories that you hear often, ’Oh, marijuana has more tar and more nicotine.‘ Obviously it doesn’t have more nicotine.
But I know as a respiratory therapist that it is also a bronchodilator. But being a smoke, that the smoke part of the marijuana is not the best way of adjusting to take care of people’s asthma. But there are ways around that. There’s the vaporizers. Could you all talk about that a little bit?
Dean Becker: Thank you, Bill. I appreciate that. Were you able to hear him, Tom?
Dr. Tom O’Connell: I did. Vaporization is based on the fact that, first of all the cannabinoids have to be released by heat. Whether we set it on fire by smoking it or bake it into a brownie or cookie, or vaporize it. Which involves raising the temperature to about a hundred ninty degrees (ferinheight) in a vaporizer that’s properly designed. Most of the Cannabinoids come off as a water vapor which can be collected in some kind of container and then inhaled. So what you’re inhaling does not have any plant product.
Dean Becker: Alright.
Dr. Tom O’Connell: That’s suppose to be the advantage of vaporization. Now on the other hand, as Dr. Tashkins work suggests, the plant product that you inhale with Cannabis, is not nearly as dangerous as that which you inhale with nicotine. In other words, cigarette or pipe tobacco. We don’t really know why this is so. But it appears to be so. Certainly more work needs to be done. But the pure pot smoker does not face nearly the risk of neoplasm or chronic infection that the cigarette smoker.
Dean Becker: Alright. Well, Tom we…
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Just one thing about asthma. It is a bronchodilator. I’ve got a few patients who were managing their asthma with pot, period. That’s all they used.
Dean Becker: Hmm. Well, ok. I guess we have Anonymous calling us, let’s go to line two if we can? We’re speaking with Dr. Tom O’Connell. A self described Pot Doctor, out of California. We’re taking your questions. Our number’s (713) 536-5738 or toll free, 1-877-9-420 420. Anonymous, you have a question or comment?
Anonymous Caller: Is that me?
Dean Becker: It is.
Anonymous Caller: Oh, my. It settled that, didn’t it? Hey, I just wanted to say something about… I’ve been on pot since sixty-nine and I was a mechanic for thirty-five years. I won’t say where. But it did me real good, ’cause I did good jobs and I hardly had any comebacks from my job. Was great for the company I worked for and it helped me out in thinking and everything. Never got me mad about anything and I do have COPD and that was from smoking. Twice I’ve been in the hospital for that.
Dean Becker: In that smoking, you’re talking about cigarettes?
Anonymous Caller: Yeah, that was cigarettes, then. But I got that COPD, because of what he was saying. You know, about the pot giving you that. It was cigarettes that did it. The pot that I smoked was no problem. But it helps me now, because I did have brain injury on a motorcycle without a helmet. But now I got seizures. I got bad mental problems and stuff.
But it helps me out so very much, to calm my fears down and to make my life more normal and it helped me on working with cars all these years. Never got mad at anybody, never shot anybody, you know that. It was pretty good.
But it’s all helped me so good and if the Government would legalize it for us, we wouldn’t have so many Southerners come in and try to kill everybody, get their stuff and the government can take it over and handle the hospitals that they want to provide for, for everybody. That would be more money the Government could make to do that. But I don’t think that is a problem, whatsoever.
Dean Becker: Alright. Dr. Tom, your thoughs on… I think he’s talking about curtailing violence and saving money and all the good things. But your response?
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Well, the one legislative body, I heard that it could legalize pot, is Congress. Congress of the United States. For them to do that, they would have to admit a huge mistake… depending on how you count. Either back to 1968 or to 1937. It’s a very difficult thing for any government to do, to admit that they’ve been wrong. But the injustice and the wasted inofficial treatment that should have been realized, is really a disgrace.
Dean Becker: Thank you, Mr. Anonymous. I wanted to throw my two cents in on this. This comes from the Journal of Schizophrenia. Schizophrenic patients with a history of Cannabis use demonstrate higher levels of cognative preformance, compared to patients who have never used the drug. We’ve been fooling ourselves for a long time. Haven’t we, Dr. Tom?
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Yeah, we have. If Cannabis were a person, it would be very unlucky. What happened, it was slandered by Anslinger in thirty-seven who said, ’Oh, it made the high school kids go crazy.’ At that time, very few high school kids or anybody else, were smoking it comparatively.
When it was discovered by high school kids in the mid-sixties, the general public got the wrong impression, because this was the baby boom and there was a lot going on, a lot of other drugs. There was a certain amount of youthful irresponsibility and that’s what led to Nixon’s election.
He was a nasty guy. He punished pot smokers. When his own committee suggested that it be studied for it’s medical benefits, he buried that report. I will never forgive the press for letting him get away with that. They knew it. It was in March of 1972.
Dean Becker: I think I have a quote from Richared Cowen that, “The reason for the Drug War? Bad journalism.” That sums it up, doesn’t it? We’re talking with Dr Tom O’Connell. We’re taking your calls. We probably have room for one more than what’s already online. Our numbers (713) 526-5738 or toll free, 1-877-9-420 420. Let’s go to Patricia. You have a question for Dr. O’Connell?
Patricia: Yes sir, I do. How does Cannabis work to help people with nerve pain? I have a daughter who has got Trigeminal Neuralgia on the whole right side of her face, in all three branches. I was wondering how Cannabis would be beneficial? Because right now she is taking opioids for the pain. She has been taking morphine and that was very, very frightening for her and for us, on that. Now she’s taking Oxycontin for the pain.
Dr. Tom O’Connell: How old is your daughter?
Patricia: She is now twenty-five. She has been living with this pain that’s in…
Dr. Tom O’Connell: What she’s got is called Tic Douloureux. It’s a very…
Patricia: I’m sorry?
Dr. Tom O’Connell: What she has is called Tic Douloureaux. It’s a…
Patricia: That is exactly. Yes, sir. It is one of the worst nerve pains known to man.
Dr. Tom O’Connell: It’s well known. The pain can be excruciating.
Patricia: Yes, sir.
Dr. Tom O’Connell: An attack can occur at almost anytime. The way it’s been treated in the past has been an operation on the brain. A craniotomy, to lift up the frontle lobe and then divide the branch. Which works pretty well, but it’s major surgery. I’m not aware of any cases that have been managed with marijuana. But it would make great sense, because of the known benefits in other neuropathic pain.
Dean Becker: If I could throw my two cents in here. I am aware of one. There’s a lady named Alison Murden, based up in Canada who was a former law enforcement or parole officer, I think it was. Developed this Tic Douloureaux and uses marijuana on a regular basis and it helps with that excruciating pain and for her to have a more productive day.
Patricia: Well there’s anxiety and there’s depression associated, when you’re in constant pain.
Dean Becker: Sure.
Patricia: There’s also difficulty in sleeping. Concentration is just wacked out. It’s very, very difficult for the individual. Not only the pain part of this, but also the medications that you have to take to just keep some kind of control on this. So I was wondering about Cannabis to be used in a much safer form.
I’m a Babyboomer. I’ve smoked pot in the past and all I noticed with people that I’ve been around, is that they got very mellow. They slowed down. Communication was wide open. People were just happy. Drinking is something so different.
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Do you know if your daughter has ever tried pot?
Patricia: I think she may have tried pot in the past. But I’m not really sure.
Dr. Tom O’Connell: This is very interesting to me.
Patricia: I’m sorry?
Dr. Tom O’Connell: I said, this is very interesting to me. You’ve tried pot and presumably…
Patricia? Well, I’m a Babyboomer.
Dr. Tom O’Connell: …been able to get high.
Patricia: Yeah. I’m a Babyboomer.
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Right.
Patricia: I live in Texas and so a long time ago…
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Parents routinely tell their children not to do the things they do.
Patricia: Yeah, well.
Dr. Tom O’Connell: That’s number one and that number two, they can’t stop them. But one of the things that I’ve learned of, is that unless you’ve been high; unless you got high during that window between twelve and twenty-five, you’re not likely to do so later on. Even though you may get something that pot could help. Very frustrating.
People who have gotten high, they’ve given themselves permission to use the drug, if they should need it. That’s the way it works. If they haven’t done that and they reach the age forty-five or fifty and they develop new conditions that should respond to pot, that sometimes you have to plead with them. Because they’re resistant to using an illegal drug.
Dean Becker: I tell you what. Tom, I got a couple of callers here. I want to respect them and get to them and thank you, Patricia. I want to go to Michala. Michala, please make it brief. We’re going to try to get you and another caller on.
Michala: Ok, I’ll make it as brief as I can. First of all, thank you Doctor, for doing this work that you’re doing. All of us that use Cannabis medically, really appreciate and pray for the day that it is legalized. I’ve been diagnosed with Bi-polar and am on a number of different psych meds. A lot of which I’ve been able to cut down, because of my use of Cannabis.
My psychiatrist is fully aware that I use it for break through depression and for anxiety and for everything else that this disease causes. I’m also an asthmatic and I cannot be around cigarette smoke, but I can be around marijuana. I mean it does help me breath better and it doesn’t give me an asthma attack, like tobacco smoke would.
So if there’s anything I could do to help your cause, I would be willing to do whatever I could to assist you in finding out more ways to have this legalized. Or how we can ask the people to speak up to have this legalized for those of us that needed it, and for people that just suffer daily frustration. It’s not like, alcohol that alters your brain and your physical sense of being, in such a way that you become… I hate to use this term but, testosteronic. {chuckling}
Dean Becker: I tell you what, Michala. I think you just gave us an endorcement and I want to thank you for that. My email is dean@drugtruth.net. If you’re serious about wanting to help contribute or help make some changes, please get in touch with me. Thank you, Michala. Let’s go to Matt. He’s up in Victoria, British Columbia. Hello, Matt.
Matt: Good evening, Dean.
Dean Becker: You have a question or concern? We’re running out of time.
Matt: I hear that. You maybe heard that five Compassion Clubs recently got busted in Quebec. The Province of Quebec, up here in Canada. I was looking at the Press and apparently some onlookers were allegedly concerned that people were coming and going from the clubs who appear to be, “Young” and “Healthy looking” and I thought, ’Marvelous! One doesn’t need a medical degree to do a diagnosis. You can just tell whether somebody’s sick or not by how healthy and young they look.’
But I wonder if Dr. O’Connell wanted to comment on this perception that Medical Cannabis is only for the infirm and wheelchair bound and if maybe that’s our fault, as advocates of Medicinal Cannabis. That we’re not emphasizing the use for psychological problems and stress and anxiety, which it seems a lot of people are using it for.
Dean Becker: Thank you, Matt. We’ve got thirty seconds, Dr. Tom.
Dr. Tom O’Connell: The biggest change I’ve seen in the last eight years is the young men who come in. Back in 2001-2002, they all wanted to tell me about their Carple Tunnel Syndrome, their trick knee, their bad shoulder and they were resistant to the idea that they were using pot for it’s emotional benefits. That slowly changed.
Now not only just the women, but the men too. I ask everbody, ’What’s the single most important thing that pot does for them?’ Eighty percent of them will use the word, ’relax’ and will site ‘insomnia’ or ‘stress‘, ‘anxiety‘, ‘anger management‘.
Dean Becker: Tom, I got to cut you off, buddy. Thank you so much. We’re going to invite you back soon, Dr. Tom O’Connell. As always I remind you, there is no truth, justice, logic, scientific fact. No reason for this drug war to exist. We have been duped. Please visit our website, endprohibition.org.
You guys are the answer. You’ve got to do your part, or this drug war will go on forever.
Prohibido istac evilesco.
For the Drug Truth Network, this is Dean Becker. Asking you to examine our policy of Drug Prohibition.
The Century of Lies.
Drug Truth Network programs, archived at the James A. Baker III Institute for Policy Studies.
‘This bud's so good. That when I smoke it, the Government freaks out.’
Transcript
Transcript
Century of Lies June 6, 2010
The failure of Drug War is glaringly obvious to judges, cops, wardens, prosecutors and millions more. Now calling for decriminalization, legalization, the end of prohibition. Let us investigate the Century of Lies.
________________
Alright, my friends. Welcome to this edition of Century of Lies. We have with us online, Dr. Tom O’Connell. He’s currently working as a “Pot Doctor” out in California, making recommendations for use and he has his own Blog. I want to read a couple of extracts from it, during this show. I’m going to start with this one.
A lot of non-criminals have been breaking America’s stupid drug laws for decades. To treat not only Multiple Sclerosis, but a lot of other conditions as well. As a matter of fact, the people who’ve been applying for medical legitimacy under the provisions of California’s Proposition 215 for over thirteen years, are a valuable resource that’s been shamefully neglected by self appointed experts in both academia and reform, for far too long.
What might have opened their eyes a bit sooner, could have been a few more pot-docs willing to take decent medical histories and published their results. Doctor O’Connell, are you with us?
Dr. Tom O’Connell: I’m still here.
Dean Becker: Alright, sir. Good to know that. Dr. O’Connell, you have written significantly on your blog. We’re going to delve into a couple of the items that you have posted there during the show. But I wanted to ask you, ‘Are you recognizing progress within the medical community? Are they, the Pot Doctors, beginning to better legitimize what they’re doing, to take down that data, to make use of it?’
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Yes and no. When I first started, I was certainly not the first pot-doc in Northern California. There was a cluster of about twenty people who were pretty much known to me by name or reputation, who were outspoken advocates of marijuana use. Most of them wore hats, themselves, let’s be frank and the dean was the late Tod Mikuriya, who died a few years ago.
Tod was a psychiatrist who had encountered marijuana in the late 60’s and became a user at that time. (He) actually worked for the National Institute to Health, for a few months when that would have been possible. Then Richard Nixon was elected. So Tod got out of government service fairly quickly.
Practiced in the Bay area and was always an outspoken advocate of marijuana use and had written about it… lonely voice. But when 215 made the ballot, he was one of the authors probably and the significant contribution was, ‘Any other condition for which marijuana provides relief‘. Because in point of fact, marijuana had never been studied scientifically, with modern techniques. It was made illegal on the basis of lies told by Harry Anslinger in 1937. Thirty-seven was not a very enlightening time medically, anyway.
So the law was ratcheted up again in 1970, when Nixon was elected. But we had this law, which by then was embracing people. But there was no knowledge, there’s no information. Most of it was mistakes. They thought the munchies the A-motivation... They characterized pot smokers as people who were flakey. Nothing could have been further from the truth, but the only way to find that out would be… That didn’t really happen until (Proposition) 215.
(Proposition) 215 was an opportunity for doctor/patient relationship between an unbiased physician and a pot smoker and the material that comes out of that formula, is amazing. It continues to amaze me. But this has been a shameful trashing of a very valuable medicine. Even most users are not aware of the benefits until it’s pointed out to them.
Dean Becker: Now Dr. Tom O’Connell, I wanted to ask you here, another of your blog pieces dealt with the fact, “There are considerable differences between smoked and orally ingested Cannabis. It’s emphasized by use of the term ’body high’, to describe the effects of edibles. The Federal Policy Makers still don’t understand either those differences or those physiological basis is made clear from their failure to discuss them and from their subsidization of Marinol.
I guess what I’m curious about here is, I have tried Marinol. I have done edibles and there are some similarities, but the edibles are by far the better product. Your thoughts in that regard?
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Marinol is a bank-to-order ‘Government Drug’ that was suppose to address the deficiencies that they claimed to see in an herbal preparation. Marijuana as it grows, is extremely complex. There are many different strains and apparently some of the pharmaceutical effects are strain dependant. This is not investigated by the government or by industry, of any to much extent.
Clinically and from the standpoint of lore, there’s quite a bit appreciated. But one of the things that happens with almost everybody who becomes a repetitive smoker. Which doesn’t always happen after initiation, sometimes a few years later. My belief is that when we start to buy pot, it’s use ceases to be recreational. If it’s your own, it’s medical.
People use it as they’re able to, depending on their work schedule, their day. Elementary consideration’s a safety, because they don’t want to be arrested. But within that context, it’s used remarkably, intelligently and carefully by most users. The edible phenomenon is completely different, because it takes so much longer for the edible to get to the brain. By the time it gets there, it’s also been altered by the liver.
We know some clinical differences, the ’high’ from eating pot is about three hours. The ’high’ after smoking is more like an hour. A big difference there. A body high consists of this feeling of weakness and a sort of a luxurious relaxation in your arms and legs, which makes physical work very difficult to do. So that somebody’s high on a brownie, becomes a couch potato for about three hours.
The benefit, is that pain relief for certain types of neuropathic pain is markedly enhanced by edibles. This has not been investigated. We do not know why, it’s just been consistently noted. I’ve recently heard from people who are managing their seizure disorder with pot, that edibles work better against seizures, too. It makes sense to me. But because the product is illegal and the DEA doesn’t allow it to be used for research very readily, these important differences has never been studied.
Does the Government know about them? I don’t even know that. Because if the did, they certainly wouldn’t be pushing Marinol the way they do. Marinol’s an inferior product that was made to order for propaganda purposes, as far as I’m concerned.
Dean Becker: I agree with you sir. OK, we’re speaking with Dr. Tom O’Connell. Once again, we have phone lines open. We’d love to hear from you. Our number’s (713) 526-5738 or you can dial toll free, 1-877-9-420 420.
Dr. O’Connell you have, over the years, witness the changing of the guard. The changing of the attitude is a better phrase for it and I’m always amazed when I go to California, that people are less… Well, they’re not paranoid. They carry around their weed and they smoke it on the sidewalks or anywhere it’s allowed. I guess what I’m leading up to here is that, that has not led to any overdoses or train wrecks basically, of any kind. Other than violence that stems from prohibition, right?
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Yeah. Marijuana’s a drug of moderation, both of use and behavior. The differences between, even in the same person. If he’s a drunk, he’s a pain in the ass. If he’s high on weed, he may be a lot more reasonable. Certainly not combative. Alcohol is a drug that encourages violence and erases judgment. Cannabis does just the opposite. So it’s reputation is undeserved.
Dean Becker: I agree and I was just going to bring up this. It’s just a thought that’s derived from one of your blog pieces. Talking about, ’Erroneously considered by those who never experienced it, marijuana’s considered as the equivolent of alcohol intoxication.’ It couldn’t hardly be further the truth, right?
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Right.
Dean Becker: OK. Well, we do have Bill…
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Unless you’ve been high, you don’t know that.
Dean Becker: Right. They just inagine that it’s like drinking. Then you’re going to stumble out to your car and smash into a tree. But, it’s just not very likely to do that, whatsoever. I was talking to a friend the other day about that. If you’re trying a new strain, you might want to wait awhile before you get out on the road. Till your brain adjusts to it, right?
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Yeah. People vary considerably in the way they respond to pot. The best way to think about dose is, fractions of an ounce consumed per week. Which is a pretty reasonable way. It ranges from a sixteenth of an ounce, which is half an eighth, in a fairly significant fraction or percent of my patients, on up to over an ounce. So that’s a huge difference.
The people who smoke over an ounce are lighting up eight or ten times a day. They function well. Most of them are either working in the industry or working alone at home, because they have to be out of observation to light up that many times a day.
Dean Becker: You bet. OK, we’re going to go to the phone lines. Let’s go ahead and… Bill is first. Let’s hook him up over here with Dr. Tom O’Connell. Bill, what do you got for us?
Bill: OK, I’m on the air?
Dean Becker: Yes, you are.
Bill: Yes, I am a respiratory therapist and I wanted to touch on the COPD aspect of marijuana, if I could. I have heard it Dean, that marijuana does not cause COPD. But there’re stories that you hear often, ’Oh, marijuana has more tar and more nicotine.‘ Obviously it doesn’t have more nicotine.
But I know as a respiratory therapist that it is also a bronchodilator. But being a smoke, that the smoke part of the marijuana is not the best way of adjusting to take care of people’s asthma. But there are ways around that. There’s the vaporizers. Could you all talk about that a little bit?
Dean Becker: Thank you, Bill. I appreciate that. Were you able to hear him, Tom?
Dr. Tom O’Connell: I did. Vaporization is based on the fact that, first of all the cannabinoids have to be released by heat. Whether we set it on fire by smoking it or bake it into a brownie or cookie, or vaporize it. Which involves raising the temperature to about a hundred ninty degrees (ferinheight) in a vaporizer that’s properly designed. Most of the Cannabinoids come off as a water vapor which can be collected in some kind of container and then inhaled. So what you’re inhaling does not have any plant product.
Dean Becker: Alright.
Dr. Tom O’Connell: That’s suppose to be the advantage of vaporization. Now on the other hand, as Dr. Tashkins work suggests, the plant product that you inhale with Cannabis, is not nearly as dangerous as that which you inhale with nicotine. In other words, cigarette or pipe tobacco. We don’t really know why this is so. But it appears to be so. Certainly more work needs to be done. But the pure pot smoker does not face nearly the risk of neoplasm or chronic infection that the cigarette smoker.
Dean Becker: Alright. Well, Tom we…
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Just one thing about asthma. It is a bronchodilator. I’ve got a few patients who were managing their asthma with pot, period. That’s all they used.
Dean Becker: Hmm. Well, ok. I guess we have Anonymous calling us, let’s go to line two if we can? We’re speaking with Dr. Tom O’Connell. A self described Pot Doctor, out of California. We’re taking your questions. Our number’s (713) 536-5738 or toll free, 1-877-9-420 420. Anonymous, you have a question or comment?
Anonymous Caller: Is that me?
Dean Becker: It is.
Anonymous Caller: Oh, my. It settled that, didn’t it? Hey, I just wanted to say something about… I’ve been on pot since sixty-nine and I was a mechanic for thirty-five years. I won’t say where. But it did me real good, ’cause I did good jobs and I hardly had any comebacks from my job. Was great for the company I worked for and it helped me out in thinking and everything. Never got me mad about anything and I do have COPD and that was from smoking. Twice I’ve been in the hospital for that.
Dean Becker: In that smoking, you’re talking about cigarettes?
Anonymous Caller: Yeah, that was cigarettes, then. But I got that COPD, because of what he was saying. You know, about the pot giving you that. It was cigarettes that did it. The pot that I smoked was no problem. But it helps me now, because I did have brain injury on a motorcycle without a helmet. But now I got seizures. I got bad mental problems and stuff.
But it helps me out so very much, to calm my fears down and to make my life more normal and it helped me on working with cars all these years. Never got mad at anybody, never shot anybody, you know that. It was pretty good.
But it’s all helped me so good and if the Government would legalize it for us, we wouldn’t have so many Southerners come in and try to kill everybody, get their stuff and the government can take it over and handle the hospitals that they want to provide for, for everybody. That would be more money the Government could make to do that. But I don’t think that is a problem, whatsoever.
Dean Becker: Alright. Dr. Tom, your thoughs on… I think he’s talking about curtailing violence and saving money and all the good things. But your response?
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Well, the one legislative body, I heard that it could legalize pot, is Congress. Congress of the United States. For them to do that, they would have to admit a huge mistake… depending on how you count. Either back to 1968 or to 1937. It’s a very difficult thing for any government to do, to admit that they’ve been wrong. But the injustice and the wasted inofficial treatment that should have been realized, is really a disgrace.
Dean Becker: Thank you, Mr. Anonymous. I wanted to throw my two cents in on this. This comes from the Journal of Schizophrenia. Schizophrenic patients with a history of Cannabis use demonstrate higher levels of cognative preformance, compared to patients who have never used the drug. We’ve been fooling ourselves for a long time. Haven’t we, Dr. Tom?
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Yeah, we have. If Cannabis were a person, it would be very unlucky. What happened, it was slandered by Anslinger in thirty-seven who said, ’Oh, it made the high school kids go crazy.’ At that time, very few high school kids or anybody else, were smoking it comparatively.
When it was discovered by high school kids in the mid-sixties, the general public got the wrong impression, because this was the baby boom and there was a lot going on, a lot of other drugs. There was a certain amount of youthful irresponsibility and that’s what led to Nixon’s election.
He was a nasty guy. He punished pot smokers. When his own committee suggested that it be studied for it’s medical benefits, he buried that report. I will never forgive the press for letting him get away with that. They knew it. It was in March of 1972.
Dean Becker: I think I have a quote from Richared Cowen that, “The reason for the Drug War? Bad journalism.” That sums it up, doesn’t it? We’re talking with Dr Tom O’Connell. We’re taking your calls. We probably have room for one more than what’s already online. Our numbers (713) 526-5738 or toll free, 1-877-9-420 420. Let’s go to Patricia. You have a question for Dr. O’Connell?
Patricia: Yes sir, I do. How does Cannabis work to help people with nerve pain? I have a daughter who has got Trigeminal Neuralgia on the whole right side of her face, in all three branches. I was wondering how Cannabis would be beneficial? Because right now she is taking opioids for the pain. She has been taking morphine and that was very, very frightening for her and for us, on that. Now she’s taking Oxycontin for the pain.
Dr. Tom O’Connell: How old is your daughter?
Patricia: She is now twenty-five. She has been living with this pain that’s in…
Dr. Tom O’Connell: What she’s got is called Tic Douloureux. It’s a very…
Patricia: I’m sorry?
Dr. Tom O’Connell: What she has is called Tic Douloureaux. It’s a…
Patricia: That is exactly. Yes, sir. It is one of the worst nerve pains known to man.
Dr. Tom O’Connell: It’s well known. The pain can be excruciating.
Patricia: Yes, sir.
Dr. Tom O’Connell: An attack can occur at almost anytime. The way it’s been treated in the past has been an operation on the brain. A craniotomy, to lift up the frontle lobe and then divide the branch. Which works pretty well, but it’s major surgery. I’m not aware of any cases that have been managed with marijuana. But it would make great sense, because of the known benefits in other neuropathic pain.
Dean Becker: If I could throw my two cents in here. I am aware of one. There’s a lady named Alison Murden, based up in Canada who was a former law enforcement or parole officer, I think it was. Developed this Tic Douloureaux and uses marijuana on a regular basis and it helps with that excruciating pain and for her to have a more productive day.
Patricia: Well there’s anxiety and there’s depression associated, when you’re in constant pain.
Dean Becker: Sure.
Patricia: There’s also difficulty in sleeping. Concentration is just wacked out. It’s very, very difficult for the individual. Not only the pain part of this, but also the medications that you have to take to just keep some kind of control on this. So I was wondering about Cannabis to be used in a much safer form.
I’m a Babyboomer. I’ve smoked pot in the past and all I noticed with people that I’ve been around, is that they got very mellow. They slowed down. Communication was wide open. People were just happy. Drinking is something so different.
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Do you know if your daughter has ever tried pot?
Patricia: I think she may have tried pot in the past. But I’m not really sure.
Dr. Tom O’Connell: This is very interesting to me.
Patricia: I’m sorry?
Dr. Tom O’Connell: I said, this is very interesting to me. You’ve tried pot and presumably…
Patricia? Well, I’m a Babyboomer.
Dr. Tom O’Connell: …been able to get high.
Patricia: Yeah. I’m a Babyboomer.
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Right.
Patricia: I live in Texas and so a long time ago…
Dr. Tom O’Connell: Parents routinely tell their children not to do the things they do.
Patricia: Yeah, well.
Dr. Tom O’Connell: That’s number one and that number two, they can’t stop them. But one of the things that I’ve learned of, is that unless you’ve been high; unless you got high during that window between twelve and twenty-five, you’re not likely to do so later on. Even though you may get something that pot could help. Very frustrating.
People who have gotten high, they’ve given themselves permission to use the drug, if they should need it. That’s the way it works. If they haven’t done that and they reach the age forty-five or fifty and they develop new conditions that should respond to pot, that sometimes you have to plead with them. Because they’re resistant to using an illegal drug.
Dean Becker: I tell you what. Tom, I got a couple of callers here. I want to respect them and get to them and thank you, Patricia. I want to go to Michala. Michala, please make it brief. We’re going to try to get you and another caller on.
Michala: Ok, I’ll make it as brief as I can. First of all, thank you Doctor, for doing this work that you’re doing. All of us that use Cannabis medically, really appreciate and pray for the day that it is legalized. I’ve been diagnosed with Bi-polar and am on a number of different psych meds. A lot of which I’ve been able to cut down, because of my use of Cannabis.
My psychiatrist is fully aware that I use it for break through depression and for anxiety and for everything else that this disease causes. I’m also an asthmatic and I cannot be around cigarette smoke, but I can be around marijuana. I mean it does help me breath better and it doesn’t give me an asthma attack, like tobacco smoke would.
So if there’s anything I could do to help your cause, I would be willing to do whatever I could to assist you in finding out more ways to have this legalized. Or how we can ask the people to speak up to have this legalized for those of us that needed it, and for people that just suffer daily frustration. It’s not like, alcohol that alters your brain and your physical sense of being, in such a way that you become… I hate to use this term but, testosteronic. {chuckling}
Dean Becker: I tell you what, Michala. I think you just gave us an endorcement and I want to thank you for that. My email is dean@drugtruth.net. If you’re serious about wanting to help contribute or help make some changes, please get in touch with me. Thank you, Michala. Let’s go to Matt. He’s up in Victoria, British Columbia. Hello, Matt.
Matt: Good evening, Dean.
Dean Becker: You have a question or concern? We’re running out of time.
Matt: I hear that. You maybe heard that five Compassion Clubs recently got busted in Quebec. The Province of Quebec, up here in Canada. I was looking at the Press and apparently some onlookers were allegedly concerned that people were coming and going from the clubs who appear to be, “Young” and “Healthy looking” and I thought, ’Marvelous! One doesn’t need a medical degree to do a diagnosis. You can just tell whether somebody’s sick or not by how healthy and young they look.’
But I wonder if Dr. O’Connell wanted to comment on this perception that Medical Cannabis is only for the infirm and wheelchair bound and if maybe that’s our fault, as advocates of Medicinal Cannabis. That we’re not emphasizing the use for psychological problems and stress and anxiety, which it seems a lot of people are using it for.
Dean Becker: Thank you, Matt. We’ve got thirty seconds, Dr. Tom.
Dr. Tom O’Connell: The biggest change I’ve seen in the last eight years is the young men who come in. Back in 2001-2002, they all wanted to tell me about their Carple Tunnel Syndrome, their trick knee, their bad shoulder and they were resistant to the idea that they were using pot for it’s emotional benefits. That slowly changed.
Now not only just the women, but the men too. I ask everbody, ’What’s the single most important thing that pot does for them?’ Eighty percent of them will use the word, ’relax’ and will site ‘insomnia’ or ‘stress‘, ‘anxiety‘, ‘anger management‘.
Dean Becker: Tom, I got to cut you off, buddy. Thank you so much. We’re going to invite you back soon, Dr. Tom O’Connell. As always I remind you, there is no truth, justice, logic, scientific fact. No reason for this drug war to exist. We have been duped. Please visit our website, endprohibition.org.
You guys are the answer. You’ve got to do your part, or this drug war will go on forever.
Prohibido istac evilesco.
For the Drug Truth Network, this is Dean Becker. Asking you to examine our policy of Drug Prohibition.
The Century of Lies.
Drug Truth Network programs, archived at the James A. Baker III Institute for Policy Studies.
‘This bud's so good. That when I smoke it, the Government freaks out.’
Transcript provided by: C. Assenberg of www.marijuanafactorfiction.org