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conduct and criticize the government for not properly notifying victims before filing the motion. | |
| In July, a federal judge in Florida turned down similar government requests to release material in that state. | ||
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| Television for serious readers. | ||
| Joining us now is the co-director of RAND's Drug Policy Research Center, Bo Kilmer. | ||
| Welcome to the program, Bo. | ||
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unidentified
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Good to see you, Mimi. | |
| Can you tell us a little bit about the type of work that you do at the Drug Policy Research Center? | ||
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unidentified
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Yeah, so RAND is a nonprofit, nonpartisan research organization that really tries to improve policy and decision-making through research and analysis. | |
| We work on a lot of different topics, but at the intersection of the work that we do on health and social and economic well-being and on criminal justice, we have our drug policy research center where we work on all substances ranging from alcohol to cannabis to fentanyl and looking at all different levers, whether it be on the supply side, reducing demand, and analyzing the economics of these markets. | ||
| Really trying to help federal, state, and policymakers in other countries have the information they need so they can have productive conversations about this controversial issue. | ||
| Now, in speaking about federal policy regarding marijuana, first, what is that federal policy? | ||
| What is it right now? | ||
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unidentified
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Yeah. | |
| Well, as many people know, there are 24 states which have passed laws to allow the production and distribution and retail sale of cannabis to adults for any reason, covering more than 50% of the U.S. population. | ||
| There are another, we have, I think, 40 states now that also allow cannabis to be used for medical purposes. | ||
| But the important thing to keep in mind is that this is all illegal under federal law. | ||
| And when we look at federal laws with respect to illegal drugs, we really want to focus on the Controlled Substances Act. | ||
| Now, there are many different aspects to that act, but what seems to be getting a lot of attention is this discussion about rescheduling. | ||
| And within the Controlled Substances Act, it places all controlled substances into five different categories. | ||
| We could call them schedule, with Schedule 1 being the most restrictive and Schedule 5 being the least restrictive. | ||
| And the way that drugs get classified into these different schedules largely depends on two factors. | ||
| One, whether or not the federal government recognizes that there's medical value to using the substance, and then also it's a potential for abuse and dependence. | ||
| And so, so, Bo, not to cut you off, but I wanted to put that on the screen actually so people can follow along with what you are talking about with these DEA drug classifications, starting with Schedule 1, with, as an example, heroin, ecstasy, and marijuana are in Schedule 1. | ||
| Schedule 2 is cocaine and fentanyl, and then it goes all the way down to Schedule 5, which is something like robotuscin. | ||
| This isn't an exhaustive list, but it gives you an idea. | ||
| I mean, how did marijuana be in the same category as heroin and considered less dangerous than cocaine? | ||
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unidentified
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Well, Mimi, while there are five schedules, it's best to think about this as there being two buckets. | |
| If something doesn't have a federally recognized medical value, it automatically goes into Schedule 1. |