November 28, 2000

Medical Marijuana Laws To Go Before Supreme Court
New York Times Demands Action on Global Warming
Santa To Get Extra Government Help for the Holidays

Medical Marijuana Laws To Go Before Supreme Court

The Supreme Court agreed yesterday to hear a case brought by the Clinton administration to stop a California group from distributing "medical marijuana," which some patients say alleviates their suffering but which the federal government considers an illegal substance with no therapeutic value, according to The Washington Post.

In the last four years, nine states have passed medical-marijuana laws: California, Alaska, Arizona, Hawaii, Maine, Oregon, Washington, Nevada and Colorado. California's law, passed by a wide margin of votes, legalizes the possession and use of marijuana for medical purposes with a doctor's recommendation. Physicians cannot legally prescribe marijuana and the law left murky how patients would procure the drug.

In "Punishing the Sick," Senior Fellow Doug Bandow lists the medical evidence that shows marijuana can help those suffering from AIDS, cancer, glaucoma, multiple sclerosis and other ailments. "Morphine is illegal, but is routinely prescribed as a painkiller," he writes. "Not marijuana, however, which remains illegal under federal law for all uses." In testimony before congress, Executive Vice President David Boaz urged Congress to respect state referenda on medical marijuana.

Tomorrow the Cato Institute will release the new book "Beyond Prohibition: An Adult Approach to Drug Policies in the 21st Century," edited by Timothy Lynch with an introduction by Milton Friedman and featuring chapters by New Mexico Governor Gary Johnson, Roger Pilon and others.

New York Times Demands Action on Global Warming

The New York Times editorializes today that the 170 countries that gathered in The Hague to address the threat of global warming this week have unfortunately fallen short of their main objective, which was to translate the 1997 Kyoto Accord into a detailed, enforceable treaty. "The United States, by far the biggest producer of the greenhouse gases that are believed to be a big part of the warming problem, has a special obligation to see that the diplomacy continues," the paper says. "Whoever is chosen as the next American president needs to put the matter on his agenda right away and assemble a team to continue the negotiations."

In "Kyoto's Chilling Effects," Patrick J. Michaels explains why its best no consensus was reached in The Hague as "both Democrats and Republicans can agree that Kyoto will wreck our economy, according to just about every credible study that uses realistic policy assumptions." Director of Natural Resource Studies Jerry Taylor agrees in "Hot Air in Kyoto," stating that "impoverishing society today to avoid a very uncertain problem tomorrow would harm, not help, future generations."

Santa To Get Extra Government Help for the Holidays

The Postal Service is bringing in thousands of temporary workers, 80 more airplanes, extra trucks and trains to speed the movement of holiday mail, according to The Associated Press.

"We have planned well and feel confident that we will be able to handle the increased heavy volume," Nicholas Barranca, head of operations planning and processing, said yesterday.

Between Thanksgiving and Christmas, the agency will handle an average of 150 million pieces of mail daily, he said. That's 50 million a day more than the rest of the year. As part of its effort to get people to mail early, the post office has licensed the characters from the Universal Pictures film "How the Grinch Stole Christmas." The Grinch character is appearing in a Postal Service commercial, urging customers to send Christmas mail early, and characters from Whoville decorate postal lobbies.

The new Cato Institute book "Mail @ the Millennium: Will the Postal Service Go Private?" edited by Edward Hudgins, director of regulatory studies, discusses privatization of the U.S. Postal Service and repeal of the Private Express Statutes that preserve the postal monopoly.

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