
A Hidden Origin Story of the CBD Craze - Hooke
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/23/sunday-review/coronavirus-cbd-oil.html
======
nickysielicki
The article doesn't talk about this, but the most mind blowing thing about the
"CBD craze" to me is that hemp flower is now legal in all 50 states, and
despite what people will tell you ("you can't get high off hemp; it doesn't
have THC; it doesn't have enough THC to get you high") it definitely can get
you high. It won't get you high in the same way that Modern Engineered
Marijuana (TM) will (read: it won't make you go crazy), but marijuana of the
1970's is basically legal everywhere, and you will get stoned if you smoke it.

Flower is typically tested for compliance against the psychoactive delta9-THC
in most states (not in all states though), which ignores the THCA content. But
THCA is converted to delta9-THC when heated/"decarboxylated", which is a
pretty big loophole.

These communities [1][2] are buying ounces of weed through the mail.

A better example is probably this 17 gram edible [3]. At 0.3% d9-THC, that's a
~5mg dose of psychoactive THC per package. You can buy these all over the US
in states like Texas, Oklahoma, Alabama, Mississippi, and Kentucky... Places
not exactly known to be "weed friendly". See this map [4].

Pot has basically been legalized everywhere and people just don't know about
it yet.

[1]:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/hempflowers/](https://www.reddit.com/r/hempflowers/)

[2]:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/CBDhempBuds/](https://www.reddit.com/r/CBDhempBuds/)

[3]: [https://lunchboxalchemycbd.com/products/full-spectrum-
hemp-s...](https://lunchboxalchemycbd.com/products/full-spectrum-hemp-
squibs-100mg-each-10-servings?variant=31701050556496)

[4]: [https://lunchboxalchemy.com/cbd-retailers-cbd-
squib/](https://lunchboxalchemy.com/cbd-retailers-cbd-squib/)

~~~
craftinator
> It won't get you high in the same way that Modern Engineered Marijuana (TM)
> will (read: it won't make you go crazy)

Make you go crazy? I've had friends who were all-day stoners for 20+ years.
I've never seen anyone "go crazy". Become lazy yes, get couch-locked yes, get
really creative yes, have short attention spans yes; crazy, no. Worst I've
seen is someone who's never smoked do a dab (inhale highly concentrated THC as
a vapor) and have a paranoid panic attack, after which I learned that they
were prone to panic attacks. I do agree, however, that the genetically
engineered marijuana of today is at least 5% more potent than the stuffs of
the 60s-70s.

~~~
throwaway420524
Anecdotal: I know 4 people well enough to know that they had psychotic
episodes. _All_ of them were using cannabis at the time of onset.

I don't think it _caused_ those diseases in those people, but I think if you
have schizophrenia or bipolar I, or critically if you might have it but are
not yet diagnosed, it can mix poorly and you could be in for a bad time with
long term consequences, so be careful.

I am in favor of legalization, but people need to get less defensive about
this. It's harmless for most people and shouldn't be a crime for law abiding
adults. But there's real risks for that small subset of people.

Also anecdotal: There were a few times where I saw mental health professionals
ask in my town "how often do you use cannabis?" as one of the first screening
questions, one of them said offhand that they see it a lot in their line of
work.

------
aardvark291
» Unrelated to the brouhaha on the West Coast, tobacco farmers in Kentucky
were seeking a new cash crop. In 2011, James Comer won the race for Kentucky
state agriculture commissioner by promising to legalize industrial hemp.

“That raised a lot of eyebrows, including in McConnell’s office,” Eric
Steenstra, a hemp lobbyist, told me. “They saw the winds were shifting.”

Along with Representative Jared Polis, now the governor of Colorado, Mr.
McConnell included a hemp pilot program in the 2014 farm bill — for
“research.” In the legislation, hemp was defined as cannabis containing less
than 0.3 percent THC — an arbitrary threshold, not a scientific distinction:
Nothing in the Farm Bill, in case law, or in the Controlled Substances Act
seemed to say anything about CBD. So entrepreneurs interpreted this research-
oriented pilot program as the de facto legalization of cannabidiol.

The Drug Enforcement Administration disagreed, but couldn’t stop the tidal
wave of CBD production. In 2018, over 60 percent of the hemp crop in Kentucky
was grown for CBD. Then, long after the country was already flooded with CBD
products both dubious and legitimate, Mr. McConnell inserted language into the
2018 Farm Bill explicitly making hemp federally legal.«

~~~
refurb
It's actually pretty amazing how quickly this happened. Prior to the new
legislation, "cannabis" was illegal, that is, the plant, regardless of THC
content. Schedule 1 narcotic according to the DEA.

Then this farm bill passes, without a lot of fanfare (about cannabis) and
poof, it's legal across all 50 states (as long as it's less than 0.3% THC).

What's interesting to me is how the DEA is losing influence. They not only
tried to stop this legislation, but also kratom (they were making it schedule
1 as well). Due to public outcry, the DEA backed down and we're in this weird
limbo where kratom remains legal federally, even though the DEA doesn't want
it to be.

I'm guessing over the next 20-30 years, we'll see a lot of changes with
regards to the war on drugs. It started with marijuana, but it won't stop
there.

~~~
redisman
This is definitely one of the spaces where the internet has made the status
quo unacceptable to the majority of at least the US public. It’s very hard to
fight one of humanity’s basic urges with disinformation in a open society with
the internet.

~~~
anewdirection
And yet adult contact is down overall, sex workers cannot communicate online
anymore, and covid is seen as a 'nothingburger' by half the people I meet
reguardless of political leanings. Never underestimate a good disinfo wave.
Hell, even Biden is singing the old 'we don't know if it is safe, better keep
it illegal' refrain.

------
cannaceo
It's rare that I read an article that has the names of so many people I've
worked with over the years. Samantha Miller is one of the pioneering cannabis
scientists in Northern California and for a long time was the only resource in
the area. I still test with her lab to this day.

Lawrence Ringo introduced me to a lot of my supply chain before his passing.
The network of farmers he worked with were largely not able to make the
transition to the recreational cannabis industry.

Mel Frank cultivated cannabis in the next room over from my first
manufacturing lab. Super nice guy with a real love of the plant.

Reading articles like this make me miss the old days of cannabis when there
was more passion for the plant.

~~~
Animats
_The network of farmers he worked with were largely not able to make the
transition to the recreational cannabis industry._

Yes, the industry has been taken over by people who don't actually use the
stuff. That says something.

~~~
huonpine
Its definitely hard to be motivated by money when your using cannabis.

~~~
bagacrap
or by anything else for that matter

------
coderintherye
There's actually a big "hidden" story in CBD Hemp flower right now that has
gotten surprisingly little attention.

The 2018 Farm bill legalized < 0.3% delta-9 THC which basically legalized all
hemp flower strains that are currently popular to grow.

However, 2020 USDA regulations and various state regulations are changing that
to TOTAL THC which includes THCA, which is typically at 0.4-0.6% for all
popular strains.

The market is about to get seriously hurt for 2020 if this comes to fully pass
and a lot of farmers are confused about the new regulations.

------
mmaunder
In South Africa we’ve been treating cancer patients with hemp oil for 2
decades.

~~~
zabana
Interesting ! How well does it work ?

~~~
ycombinete
As a South African, I recently watched a family friend die after 10 years of
breast cancer growth, which could have been quite easily been curbed with
modern medicine.

They opted for naturopathic treatment instead, relying on CBD oil, amongst
other things.

I’m sure, like all medicines, CBD oil is highly effective, when used for the
right ailment. In this case it might even have prolonged a life, and might
have been an amazing co-medicine alongside more brutal modern treatments like
chemo. But it definitely did not cure or even stop the progress of the cancer.

------
casefields
Mirror: [http://archive.md/ur9wT](http://archive.md/ur9wT)

------
aardvark291
TIL that CBD was kind of "invented" around 2011.

------
Wraith420
Excuse me, I buy Pounds of Federally Legal flower through TheHempSheet's
discount coupons.

