{"id":181066,"date":"2016-10-12T19:39:00","date_gmt":"2016-10-13T00:39:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/2016\/10\/12\/signs-of-sanity-from-the-dea\/"},"modified":"2016-10-12T19:39:00","modified_gmt":"2016-10-13T00:39:00","slug":"signs-of-sanity-from-the-dea","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/2016\/10\/12\/signs-of-sanity-from-the-dea\/","title":{"rendered":"Signs of Sanity from the DEA"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>Following a torrent of protest that included members of Congress, the DEA has <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/news\/wonk\/wp\/2016\/10\/12\/the-dea-is-reversing-its-insane-decision-to-ban-the-opiate-like-plant-kratom-for-now\/?tid=sm_fb\">has withdrawn a proposal to put kratom on the Schedule 1 List<\/a>:<\/div>\n<blockquote><p><span style=\"color: blue;\">The Drug Enforcement Administration is reversing <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/news\/wonk\/wp\/2016\/09\/15\/the-dea-wants-to-ban-another-plant-researchers-say-the-plan-is-insane\/\">a widely criticized decision<\/a> that would have banned the use of kratom, a plant that <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/news\/wonk\/wp\/2016\/09\/27\/lawmakers-slam-obama-administrations-hasty-decision-to-ban-another-plant\/\">researchers say<\/a> could help mitigate the effects of the opioid epidemic. <\/p>\n<p>Citing the public outcry and a need to obtain more research, the DEA is withdrawing its notice of intent to ban the drug, according to <a href=\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/public-inspection.federalregister.gov\/2016-24659.pdf\">a preliminary document<\/a> that will be <a href=\"https:\/\/www.federalregister.gov\/documents\/2016\/10\/13\/2016-24659\/schedules-of-controlled-substances-temporary-placement-of-mitragynine-and-7-hydroxymitragynine-into\">posted to the Federal Register Thursday<\/a>. <\/p>\n<p>The move is &#8220;shocking,&#8221; according to John Hudak, who studies drug policy at the Brookings Institution. &#8220;<b><span style=\"font-size: 100%; font-variant: small-caps;\">The DEA is not one to second-guess itself, no matter what the facts are.<\/span><\/b>&#8221; <\/p>\n<p>The DEA had announced in August that it planned to place kratom in schedule 1 of the Controlled Substances Act, the most restrictive regulatory category, as soon as Sept. 30. But since announcing their intent to ban kratom, the &#8220;DEA has received numerous comments from members of the public challenging the scheduling action,&#8221; acting administrator Chuck Rosenberg wrote in the notice, &#8220;and requesting that the agency consider those comments and accompanying information before taking further action.&#8221;<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>(<i>emphasis mine<\/i>)<\/p>\n<p>5 years ago, no one beyond the <a href=\"http:\/\/norml.org\/\">NORML<\/a> crowd would have batted an eyelash, but with the rise of the Marijuana legalization movement, people no longer take the whole &#8220;War on Drugs&#8221; bullsh%$ as gospel.<\/p>\n<p>This is a very good thing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Following a torrent of protest that included members of Congress, the DEA has has withdrawn a proposal to put kratom on the Schedule 1 List: The Drug Enforcement Administration is reversing a widely criticized decision that would have banned the use of kratom, a plant that researchers say could help mitigate the effects of the &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[817],"class_list":["post-181066","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181066"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=181066"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181066\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=181066"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=181066"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=181066"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}