Despite the promises of many a classic comedy, the U.S. government doesn't know shit about good weed. Duh. For the unconvinced, just look at the garbage-y weed they've apparently been giving to researchers:
The side-by-side photos show the clear discrepancy between good weed and (really, really, really) bad weed. The federal marijuana sample in the photo was distributed to researcher Sue Sisley, who the Washington Postreported this week has launched a "first-of-its-kind" clinical trial on marijuana's benefits for military veterans with PTSD.
The weed Sisley was given for her study arrived almost two years after she and her colleagues received a research grant. Though Sisley was initially excited to open the long-awaited shipment, that feeling was quickly extinguished. "It didn't resemble cannabis," Sisley toldPBS NewsHour earlier this month. "It didn't smell like cannabis." Furthermore, lab testing discovered mold contamination and an inadequate potency. Sadly, THC potency in federal weed is capped at a decidedly so-so 13 percent.
All federal (re: trash) weed is grown at a National Institute on Drug Abuse(NIDA)-overseen facility at the University of Mississippi. Though the Drug Enforcement Administration made moves toward ending the supply monopoly surrounding research weed last year, the Postnoted in their report that no additional entities have been approved in the months since.
The Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies, the group assisting Sisley in her work, openly explain on their website how both the NIDA and the DEA have previously "hindered" their efforts. "NIDA's previous monopoly on the supply of marijuana for research and the DEA's prior refusal to allow researchers to grow their own has restricted medical marijuana research for decades," the group states. "Since 1999, MAPS was involved in legal struggles against the DEA to end this situation. On August 11, 2016, the DEA announced their intention to grant licenses to additional marijuana growers for research, thereby ending the DEA-imposed 48-year monopoly on federally legal marijuana."
Meanwhile, in legal states like Washington and Oregon, you can easily procure non-trash weed for a reasonable price while screaming "FUCK THE GOVERNMENT!" if that's the sort of thing you're into.
