Congress accidentally legalized THC six years ago

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/07/hemp-marijuana-legal-thc/678988/

by fortran77 • 2 years ago

192 177 2 years ago

chomp• 2 years ago

Yep you’ve been able to buy bud, edibles, all sorts of stuff here in Texas from big name smoke shops, for now.

I've been very much enjoying these loopholes, as someone who lacks any personal connections in my state. I've been keeping an eye on these proposed reforms. It might be time to buy some up to keep for a rainy day.

dtagames2• 2 years ago

Indeed. The state health department tried to stop it a few years ago. The $8 billion hemp product industry in Texas ended that in about 3 days. The state was found to have no jurisdiction.

Recently, there was an "alternative hemp products" expo here in Houston (that's the new word for this stuff). Just like the marijuana expos in Colorado when that first became legal, Texas is a dry state for pot with no legal states within an easy drive. This, combined with our huge population, makes it a natural market "alt hemp." I don't think it will be going away here anytime soon.

0cf8612b2e1e4• 2 years ago

  The state was found to have no jurisdiction.

I know politicians can justify laws coinciding with their belief system, but this strikes me as hilarious rationale. I thought the state was supposed to be the final authority. Does anyone have the ability to regulate the sale of plants?

brudgers• 2 years ago

no legal states within an easy drive

Texas borders New Mexico. Weed is legal there.

The problem is that to a first approximation Texas isn’t an easy drive from Texas.

whoitwas4• 2 years ago

Yes, you can buy chemical extractions of not delta-9 cannabinoids that might make you a little almost high.

wavefunction• 2 years ago

It will make you very high. Not necessarily in the same manner or experience that "normal cannabis" does but most of those products do contain synthetic terpenes and isomers of delta-9 or what they market as "delta-10" or other product names. Paired with CBD in the admixture they can approximate the natural cannabis experience

jajko3• 2 years ago

Can somebody else confirm this? This stuff was and sometimes still is freely available in Europe, and so is CBD in various forms.

At the end I don't care what chemicals do get mixed but trips from THC substitutes are not the same and not only for me subpar to the point of ignoring it (closer to being dizzy from alcohol than fun creative weed, also tolerance seems to be built much faster).

whoitwas4• 2 years ago

I don't agree. Delta 9 is restricted for a reason.

astura2• 2 years ago

As TFA points out, you can also buy edibles and drinks with chemical extractions of delta-9 THC too. They are widely available, accept major credit cards, and ship to all states.

whoitwas4• 2 years ago

Yes. In concentrations up to .3%. Which is useless.

cthalupa• 2 years ago

Respectfully, you do not seem well informed on this matter.

THCA, when decarbed, will convert into regular THC. A good chunk of what you are smoking with "regular" marijuana was likely THCA when on the flower, particularly if it is relatively fresh.

I've been smoking for decades. The THCA products will get you just as high as a similarly potent strain of recreational stuff in a legal state.

aoieu• 2 years ago

Are we sure this loophole in the legislation was accidental? Seems like a surprisingly convenient mistake to make.

ceejayoz9• 2 years ago

Wouldn't be the first time. Dems in MN managed to slip a similar loophole through the Republican-controlled state senate a while back. https://www.npr.org/2022/07/02/1109576113/minnesota-thc-edib...

Or Tennesee, where early versions of a law accidentally forgot to keep marrying a toddler illegal. (They fixed that one.) https://www.npr.org/2022/07/02/1109576113/minnesota-thc-edib...

mywittyname3• 2 years ago

Minnesota state Sen. Jim Abeler, a Republican from Anoka, told the Minneapolis Star-Tribune he did not realize this law would allow THC-infused edibles of any kind and thought it would only apply to delta-8 THC products.

It's almost as though people who are experts in a field should be in charge of making the specific regulations, with Congress tasking them with high-level objectives.

Expect more of this with the Chevron deference ruling. Now we will have judges making these decisions using only technical input from the party in favor of looser restrictions.

petesergeant2• 2 years ago

Thailand managed something similar, an attempt to reform the law to be slightly more cannabis friendly, and ended up in some kind of legal limbo where it’s become unregulated in practice:

https://time.com/6208192/thailand-war-on-drugs-weed-legal/

Which is a big deal for a country that used to have exceptionally draconian laws about it.

alephnerd• 2 years ago

They revoked it within 2 years and are back to the old laws.

Outside of the tourist/expat/backpacker bubble Thailand is very conservative.

Neighboring Myanmar having Balkanized into multiple mini-narco states doesn't help either.

0cf8612b2e1e4• 2 years ago

Considering the groups looking to close the loophole, I can believe it was unintentional. Especially since this started as a project from Mitch McConnell to support his home industry. The end of the article notes how Florida is continuing to fight marijuana.

  …legislative battles at the state level. In early June, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis launched a political-action committee to fight a state ballot initiative that would legalize recreational marijuana. The very same week, he vetoed a bill that would have restricted hemp cannabinoids in the state.

gnu8• 2 years ago

I was wondering if the Supreme Court had legalized all drugs recently when they discovered that the executive branch agencies lack the power to create detailed regulations. Surely that would include the DEA’s power to schedule drugs, wouldn’t it?

ceejayoz9• 2 years ago

No; the ruling mostly moves adjudication of disputes over regulations from the administrative agency into the courts. From one set of unelected bureaucrats to another.

It's likely to result in a DDoS of the court system, but all existing regulations remain in effect until someone brings it to that one-judge jurisdiction in Texas with the judge that loves issuing nationwide injunctions.

It's darkly funny to me that the Court, in this power grab, managed to illustrate how insane this is probably going to get directly in the opinion; it repeatedly mixed up nitrogen oxides with nitrous oxide. https://newrepublic.com/article/183285/supreme-court-chevron...

mywittyname3• 2 years ago

It's likely to result in a DDoS of the court system, but all existing regulations remain in effect until someone brings it to that one-judge jurisdiction in Texas with the judge that loves issuing nationwide injunctions.

But also SCOTUS shot down stare decisis, so another court at the same level can make the opposite ruling and that ruling also holds.

Someone is going to eventually take this ruling to it's logical conclusion: using "scientific mumbo-jumbo" to get a compound legalized/illegal. Hopefully it's something like, "SCOTUS bans all sales of all forms of dihydrogen monoxide", but there's the very real possibility of something far more sinister.

jcranmer• 2 years ago

No; the ruling mostly moves adjudication of disputes over regulations from the administrative agency into the courts.

Not quite. Chevron deference (what was struck down) says that if the statute is ambiguous, courts are required to accept the agency's interpretation of the statute. In practice, striking down Chevron deference is unlikely to make much of a difference--it now means courts don't have to find a statute to be unambiguous to ignore the agency's interpretation, and many courts have already been willing to do that.

The bigger issue is that another case this term effectively guts the concept of statute of limitations for regulations, saying that the clock starts from when someone is injured by the regulation, even if the regulation predates their legal existence by decades. All you have to do to challenge a decades-old ruling is form a new corporation, congratulations, you are now newly injured by regulations that predate the founders' births. That's more likely to DDoS the court system.

prophesi3• 2 years ago

Wish they delved further into legal Delta 9 THC. The Farm Bill limits how much of the activated Delta 9 products may contain.

Essentially, they grow hemp like regular marijuana, except it's grown in the shade and plucked early. This prevents the sunlight from activating the THC-A in the plant and keeps the federally regulated Delta 9 under the legal limit.

Now breed the plants so that they have a higher level of THC-A, and you get to where we are today where THC-A bud you can buy in a smoke shop will be about as potent as recreational/medical marijuana.

This is also increasing the potency of recreational/medical marijuana across the board as places will use the same plants harvested for THC-A; just grown in the sun instead.

bitxbitxbitcoin8• 2 years ago

There is a lot of misinformation here.

THC-A is the acid form of Delta 9 THC. Marijuana has mostly THC-A that doesn’t turn into d9 thc until it is decarboxylated. Look at any test result COAs of marijuana to see what I am talking about.

THC-A hemp is just marijuana that isn’t considered marijuana until it is burnt. Hemp is just cannabis. It is all cannabis. The same cultivars are being used for THC-A hemp as medicinal and recreational. In fact, there is genetic bottlenecking going on.

As you said though, cutting early generally ensures that any cultivar doesn’t “test hot” for d9 THC. Besides sufficient heat, THC-A turns into d9THC through oxidation as well as UV exposure so the sun isn’t necessary. There is plenty of THC-A hemp flower being grown indoors too.

Happy to answer any further questions.

prophesi3• 2 years ago

Thanks, that's why I wish they delved into the topic further as I'm certainly no expert in chemistry or growing cannabis. When I meant "activated" delta 9, I meant decarb'd as you said. Not sure where I'm giving misinformation apart from that.

Would you say that vapes and edibles in this loophole inherently have to be sprayed with chemicals, due to how these inherently must be decarb'd, and due to the very low yield of other cannabinoids like Delta 8 in cannabis?

notamy• 2 years ago

In fact, there is genetic bottlenecking going on.

Do you have more info about this? I've never seen this claim before (not saying you're wrong) and would love to learn more.

mkatx2• 2 years ago

You are mostly correct. But there are definitely common instances where hemp that is strain specific to be low in THC is sprayed with outside sourced thca. I have found this to be the case for most brands I see in texas, unfortunately. That and added synthetic terpenes imo bastardize the legal hemp industry as it is.

It's this exactly that turned me off, especially after a sales person misinformed me that their products where definitely not sprayed with anything, when the flower brand website itself told me otherwise.

wyclif• 2 years ago

Can someone explain to me what the attraction is to THC-A, since it's not psychoactive? Is it because it is anti-inflammatory and neuroprotective?

ProllyInfamous• 2 years ago

THC-A bud you can buy in a smoke shop will be about as potent as recreational/medical marijuana.

Except it tastes like dog farts, on account of its growing irregularities (e.g. lack of sunshine, as you pointed out).

As a personal annecdote, test-sample size of only a few ounces (of "legal weed" [THC-A]), my Volcano vaporizer filter/screen looks entirely different when running illegal/legal products through it:

For THC-A, the screens cake-up quickly with a dense, black, tar-like substance; no green is left within the plant even after fewer runs/hits; the vapoo (depleted marijuana, thrown out) is left lifeless, stunk.

For full-grown marijuana, the vaporizer screen is still dirtied brown, but it's fluffier (cottonlike) and accumulates much. more. slowly. The vapoo still has flecks of green, and nothing appears charred. It smells like popcorn instead of shit-stained bedsheets. "Trim" & "ditch weed" sublimate similarly, albeit for not as long/strong (but tastes better than legal weed, still).

Perhaps the temperature needs to be lowered for THC-A? I don't know, but I ask the few friends I know that buy local (legal THC-A) weed to "bring me a gram of the next `good ounce` you buy from that store, and we'll see what Volcano can do." I have yet to see much deviation from my above-observations.

----

Combusting THC-A ("legal weed") has never been an enjoyable experience [no sunshine == no terpines/flavanoids], but vaping it does still deliver some "high" so I know there must be some weed in there.

haswell• 2 years ago

Anecdotally, some of the THC-A flower I’ve tried wasn’t anything like what you’re describing in terms of taste/aftermath, but does seem to stress the particle filter on my Storz & Bickel Mighty.

I suspect this has a lot to do with the particular strain and grower. I was experimenting with products from Wildflower Hemp based out of Bend, OR.

I’m in a legal state and prefer the predictability and quality of the “real” stuff, but was surprised by how decent the pure hemp experience was since I’ve heard people describe a range of experiences/results.

deergomoo• 2 years ago

depleted marijuana, thrown out

Cook it! It remains pretty potent if you save up enough of it.

bibliotekka• 2 years ago

Dog farts taste terrible.

viccis3• 2 years ago

I think it depends on the grower. Fairly certain some take some liberties like growing one of the plants under insane conditions to make this happen and then get their lab sample from it. My experience has been that the THC-A stuff I've gotten from high quality sellers (WNC for example) is substantially richer in terps than the stuff I can currently buy legally in my state, largely because that THC-A bud is grown in organic living soil, while the legal stuff is grown under insane regulations (common to medical-first states) that renders most of it dry, straw smelling, and leaving next to nothing in the kief collector. I would avoid buying from gas stations and similar outlets and look at user feedback online (r/CultOfTheFranklin on reddit is a good source)

And since I'm replying here, I'll point out that the parent comment calls it "Delta 9", which is misleading because "Delta 9" is the common phrase used when people extract Δ9 THC from "hemp" plants and then distribute it in edibles, which makes it legal because the bill specified "less than 0.3% Delta 9 THC on a dry-weight basis", and 10mg of THC is well below that for any gummy (or similar product like can of seltzer) that is > ~3g. The "THC-A" stuff makes use of a similar loophole in a very different way.

TechDebtDevin• 2 years ago

They just grow regular marijuana and noone is checking. There's no regulatory framework to get licenses ect.

hirvi74• 2 years ago

What are you basing this off of? My state is one of the largest producers of hemp and has extremely strict regulations.

You need to a have a license to grow, license to transport, license to sell, etc.. Seeds must be registered with the state and there will be periodic compliance inspections with steep punishment if violated.

https://www.tn.gov/agriculture/farms/hemp-industry/hemp/lice...

Not to mention the difference between marijuana and THCA hemp is a legal distinction and not inherently scientific.

robg2• 2 years ago

Clickbait, not weed but THC and CBD derivatives that when combined can approximate the subjective feeling of being “high”.

BugsJustFindMe2• 2 years ago

The molecules are the molecules. There's no "approximate" here.

robg2• 2 years ago

Molecules don’t equal the subjectivity of different strains, terpenes, THC levels, etc.

karaterobot• 2 years ago

I've never met a weed gatekeeper, this is kind of exciting. I wish I had some simple heuristics for determining whether I was authentically high or just fake high.

grubbs• 2 years ago

Is this the reason I could legally buy weed in Nashville, TN a few weeks ago? It sounded like there were some crazy loophole there.

gs17• 2 years ago

The same loophole is used to sell THC products in stores here, but any plant material used is usually hemp.

There also used to (there still might be) be guys selling fake weed (as in no high) products to tourists on Broadway downtown where the "loophole" was that the product wasn't illegal and they only gave you an implication of what it was. As in it was the equivalent of a guy walking up to you to sell a bag of ground up leaves he says will blow your mind and it's just basil.

is_this_valid_3• 2 years ago

There are solvent extracts and there are CO2 extracts. State testing regulations in other states tests for solvents: the -anes; propane, butane, hexane,.

Some fire extinguishers are tanks of CO2.

Compared to a double-boiler reduction with flammable alcohol and oil on a stove, quality-controlled extracts are in the interest of public safety.

There are much safer desktop infusion units with electronic temperature control, and then an ISO factory might have more consistent doses than sketch gummies.

I don't think the sky is falling due to the lesser-regulated hemp consumable products. Quality control and banking would probably further reduce the cost to society.

If the 'sin tax' on recreational isn't enough, then raise it to pay for substance abuse treatment and prevention.

Practically, retail strain availability differs in states with only Farm Bill hemp products, in that the strains being selected for by the regulation don't have same or sufficient levels of the unscheduled cannabinoids which may also be as or more therapeutic than the terpene essential oils in fresh flower without preservative.

BugsJustFindMe2• 2 years ago

My problem with this whole phenomenon is that the explosion of smoke/vape/candy shops has become something of a commercial nuisance in places. It has a tendency to degrade the character of a business district when seemingly every other shop is selling basically the same set of products. It can feel a lot like that Lewis Black standup bit about finding a Starbucks across the street from another Starbucks.

ceejayoz9• 2 years ago

Same thing happened with cupcake shops and microbreweries in my area. Now it’s happening with car washes.

75% of them will be out of business in a few years as the people who think “sweet, easy money!” discover it’s less fun than they imagined.

Suppafly3• 2 years ago

Now it’s happening with car washes.

Yeah, I don't know what the correct number of car washes is to have, but I swear my city has enough for every car to wash every day with capacity left over.

mindslight• 2 years ago

I have the same gut feeling. But I also realize it's because these types of shops are one of the few types of small retail businesses you can open these days and possibly be successful, with everything else having had its margins thoroughly squeezed by the highly centralized megacorps.

0cf8612b2e1e4• 2 years ago

That is a solid take. Until you can buy it at Amazon/Walmart/CVS the tiny corner shop is the only entity willing to handle the legal gray zone. You will get crushed once it is fully commercialized, but not impossible to imagine you can make a good business for a decade.

MrSkelter• 2 years ago

It’s a deliberate tactic. Saturate the market, lose money while your smaller competitors can’t, then return to normal when your competitors are gone. Whomever is left standing gets an unchallenged monopoly. It’s why Starbucks will open stores beside competitors.

vizzier• 2 years ago

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sg-J2TS13GA

asdff2• 2 years ago

That's part of it, especially when it is a national chain coming in that can afford to subsidize a loss to compete. The other side of the coin is that there are areas with non-chain liquor stores on every corner and they've been like that for decades. Maybe the customer base for these sort of stores is simply larger than you might have figured.

asdff2• 2 years ago

Its just indicative of customer desires. These shops wouldn't exist for very long if they couldn't bring in enough money from the local community to pay for their overhead and rent.

ajkjk5• 2 years ago

Well it's not just indicative of that. It's also indicative of the lack of regulation for something that didn't exist previously. The shops could exist in a less-unpleasant way... just, nobody has forced them to yet. It's coming, though. Everyone is pissed.

(Also I remember reading an article somewhere about how smoke shops are an ideal "short-term tenant" for landlords. Basically they cost very little to set up and close, so they can get short-term leases while a landlord e.g. waits for a higher-rent client or for some macroeconomic winds to shift. No idea how true that is but it's floating around in my head from somewhere.)

kstrauser• 2 years ago

Eh. There are a few liquor stores near me that are cookie cutter identical. The local weederies are no more of an eyesore than the alcohol stores.

Which isn’t to say I disagree with you, just that I don’t think we should judge them more harshly than their more traditional competitors.

dmix• 2 years ago

You could just sell it like cigarettes/booze at convenience stores and eliminate the whole need for weed shops on every corner, and just have specialty weed shops for higher stuff, like liquor stores.

If the gov required a full store to exclusively sell candy there'd be one on every block too.

Mountain_Skies• 2 years ago

As sleazy looking as the shops often look, they're usually locally owned. I don't vape or use any THC products but I'd rather suffer a bit of an eye sore and have money stay somewhat local instead of it going to CVS and 7-Eleven.

rm_-rf_slash• 2 years ago

There is a logic in grouping the same businesses together.

If a dispensary opens at, say, E 14th St in Manhattan, New Yorkers will know E 14th is the place to buy weed.

So if you’re looking to open a dispensary (regulatory hurdles aside), you probably want to locate at the place New Yorkers go to get weed: E 14th.

kagakuninja• 2 years ago

Are you aware that there are many specialty shops that will sell you alcohol, many of them operating 24 hours a day? Many people find bars and liquor shops to be a nuisance; they also sell basically the same set of products!

mastax• 2 years ago

I’m dumbfounded that this seems to have gone completely under the radar. Does being passed by Trump make it immune to the culture war? Does it just feel right to people that weed is loophole-legal, such that it seems totally unremarkable?

lbotos• 2 years ago

Well, lawmakers are trying to close the loophole

https://norml.org/news/2024/05/30/federal-house-committee-ap...

May still allow for THC-A but time will tell where it lands.

dtagames2• 2 years ago

People vote with their wallets. It's clear that Americans either want weed or don't care if other people do. This law -- a complete Federal law, tested numerous times and not a loophole -- survives because the public wants the product and this is the way to get it.

galdosdi2• 2 years ago

Sigh, it's probably because, for cannabis-naive people, it's far harder to tell if someone is super high than if someone is super drunk. There's not a lot of difference between a high person who's trying not to let on, and someone who's just rather tired or a bit dumb. It's not like with alcohol where past a few drinks it's pretty easy to tell. But that doesn't mean the effects are harmless.

Legalization was one thing, but valorization is another.

THC potency levels are going through the roof and availability of analogues is too. I feel like there will eventually be problematic societal consequences and a pushback a generation from now, much as happened a few decades after cheap hard liquor distillation was invented, or a few decades after we hit peak tobacco.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beer_Street_and_Gin_Lane

Also, here's an ad from a century ago selling whiskey, claiming it is a medicinal cure all for any and every condition, much as is common today with cannabis

https://tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com/filer...

RandallBrown• 2 years ago

Does being passed by Trump make it immune to the culture war?

Marijuana is popular on both sides of the political spectrum.

HanShotFirst• 2 years ago

My cynical and informed-only-by-observation take is that it is a win win for lawmakers of both parties. It allows people who want to buy weed to get it, without those local politicians seeming overly radical or permissive by decriminalizing fully.

smileysteve2• 2 years ago

It's odd that neither recent administration has embraced this, especially during a pandemic when we funded farmers and needed people to stay at home;

but also in the midst of opioid deaths, alcoholism (of older Americans) - with a seemingly well regulated, American grown, not physically addictive, impossible to overdose to death - for a muscle relaxer and/or mild hallucinogenic effects.

nerdix• 2 years ago

And now all the soccer moms in illegal states are buying delta 9 gummies at CBD stores (and there isn't mass hysteria in the streets) so those states are reluctant to outright ban it. We'll see how long that lasts.

mkatx2• 2 years ago

Just legalize it.. There's so much to say..

Yeah, you can buy thc-a hemp legally in most places, as it's federally legal, and few states restrict it specifically.

But.. just a couple notes to keep in mind:

This is indeed a grey area, even if it seems explicitly legal. Thc-a, through time, heat, oxygen, etc, WILL degrade into federal illegal THC. So if you buy a jar of thca hemp, the thca will turn into THC over time, and potentially rise above the legal limit of THC percentage.

This could mean, in the worse case scenario, that if they confiscate your legally purchased hemp, and test it, then they could charge you for illegal cannabis possession because it has more than the allowed thc, and therefore is not legal hemp.

Also, I've asked at hemp stores, and was told no.. But indeed, some growers spray thca liquid crystal and even non-cannabis derived terpenes on their bud. Pretty shady imo..

This market, although a legal victory, is actually a detriment to the industry and legalization as a whole, IMHO.

grecy2• 2 years ago

Just legalize it..

It feels like the US needs to just make some really basic decisions that would vastly improve the quality of life for hundreds of millions of it's citizens so it can get on with actual important stuff.

Legalize weed. Legalize abortion. Fix the severely broken healthcare system. Make education affordable.

Bring the quality of life up to par with other OECD countries, then start actually making stuff better - renewable power, cheap and good public transit, fix crumbling infrastructure.

So many arguments about petty stuff that should have just been decided and moved on from two decades ago.

mistermann• 2 years ago

Marijuana could even catalyze such initiatives, especially if used strategically. Strategic cultural initiatives aren't exactly our thing here in the west (at the public level anyways), but marijuana could also catalyze changing that!

RiverCrochet• 2 years ago

It feels like the US needs to just make some really basic decisions that would vastly improve the quality of life for hundreds of millions of it's citizens

It already did. If you are of the citizens that have hundreds of millions, you have a quality life.

psd1• 2 years ago

Yes. Or: keep the two-party system, which degrades debate to a zero-sum game.

viccis3• 2 years ago

This could mean, in the worse case scenario, that if they confiscate your legally purchased hemp, and test it, then they could charge you for illegal cannabis possession because it has more than the allowed thc, and therefore is not legal hemp.

My attitude towards it when I lived in a non-legal state was to treat the THC-A the same as illegal stuff when it came to storage and use because cops aren't going to listen to some nerdy rant about the difference. They wouldn't even likely test it. Just charge you like they otherwise would.

I lived in a decriminalized area, so it wasn't a big risk. But I'm not sure I would take that risk in some place where they still do nasty felony charges for THC possession.

sharpshadow• 2 years ago

These edibles are even spreading over here to Europe. I was very conventional in the thinking about their potency potential but now I understand better how it works.

kortex• 2 years ago

Yes, but actually no. If the DEA or local LEOs actually wanted to crack down, there is plenty enough wiggle room in the scheduled substances act and all the related add-on laws (esp. Federal Analogue Act), there is enough molecular similarity between the various cannabinoids, and insufficient sensitivity in most chemical tests, plus the tendency of THC-A to decarb (eject a carbon dioxide molecule to give THC) under heating, that these agencies could absolutely give you a hard time and make your life hell for a while. Even if charges didn't stick, you'd still have a bad time and be out thousands in legal feels.

What's actually happened is de facto, not de jure, legalization (in effect, but not in law), because of the unpopularity of cannabis prohibition. It's just not worth it in most situations to go after these products at this point.

There's still a strong need for actual legalization at this point.

mind-blight2• 2 years ago

Totally depends on the product. The federal farm bill states that hemp products need to be under 0.3% THC to be considered hemp. How high you get depends on the milligrams. So, edibles (gummies, etc) can remain under a 0.3% THC by volume in the product while still having more than 5-10 mg per edible.

You're not wrong about people being able to make your life hell, but the edibles absolutely fall under the letter of the law. (The one exception being the concentrate used to name the edible with have a large percent THC until it becomes diluted again)

krsrhe• 2 years ago

A gummy isn’t a hemp product. A gummy is a candy infused with a hemp product.

The article’s claim about gummies is supported only by shops, not by courts.

https://www.fda.gov/news-events/public-health-focus/fda-regu...

0xcde4c3db• 2 years ago

To paraphrase Schneier: law is a process, not a product. The raw text of statutes and regulations is just one component in the overall system, and there is no amount of contemplating the One True Meaning of the text that will lead to a functional understanding of how that system operates in reality.

(see also [1])

[1] https://xkcd.com/1494/

floxy• 2 years ago

Also: "The Myth of the Rule of Law"

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1I-JhqpU3_0r_HL06hP-5DABhEtG...

sangnoir6• 2 years ago

The supreme court recently curtailed the latitude of federal agencies have in making rules - they were aiming for the EPA, but the blast radius is huge. The effects of that ruling wil reverberate for years to come.

Muromec• 2 years ago

That assumes US of A still operates under rule of law and there will be “no actually “ at some point resulting in Federal agencies that bother corporations to be gutted, but drug enforcement will keep going on as it was.

vkou• 2 years ago

You're assuming that the courts will be consistent or sane with their rulings.

archontes2• 2 years ago

I'm a fan of decriminalization rather than legalization, mainly because I believe that people should be able to engage with it, but I don't want companies marketing it. Marketing in the US is too effective, and I don't want to load that gun with anything that makes people less well, because it'll find a way to maximize consumption.

unclenoriega• 2 years ago

Wouldn't it make more sense to legalize it and ban advertising it?

say_it_as_it_is• 2 years ago

no mention in the article of "Type I", "Type II", or "Type III" cannabis indicates that the research wasn't exhaustive

the story here is that there was a hemp strain called Franklin that was getting cbd consumers high. it was considered a hot batch of hemp. growers cultivated additional Franklin derivatives and brought out higher THC-A strains. eventually, growers said to hell with Franklin, let's just sell high THC-A, low THC strains. this categories includes a wide variety of retail strains sold for recreational use today

so, yeah. you can get real cannabis, no weird stuff, that will get you absolutely lifted and delivered to your house in most of the states where recreational remains illegal.

if you're asking why you haven't heard about this, it's because loose lips sink ships. why am i talking about it now? it doesn't matter anymore!

check out flowgardens and wnc-cbd

DesiLurker• 2 years ago

Recently USSC killed the Chevron Doctrine, I wonder how that impacts the powers of DEA to keep scheduling substances w/o court legal battle. I think its time for some big marijuana corporate to pool resources and challenge DEA for their deference in enforcement.

zoklet-enjoyer• 2 years ago

I keep telling people marijuana is legal and they don't believe me. I'm so tired of explaining it to people.

mannyv• 2 years ago

Thanks, Trump!

Seriously. It's amusing that Trump essentially legalized hemp/CBD.

Congress accidentally legalized THC six years ago

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