More Pot Talk

Folks still continue to discuss the ramifications of Raich, the Supreme Court's medical pot decision from Monday. Salon has this fairly comprehensive (for a two-page piece) article on Raich and it's aftermath. Ironically, the first three lawyers/law profs quoted in the article are all members of The Volokh Conspiracy and will surely have more to say in the days to come.

The article restates the common perception that not much has changed in the world of medicinal pot:

The high court's ruling doesn't change state law whatsoever; as long as you only
run into state and local cops, you're fine.

To me, that demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of how drug crimes are prosecuted in this country. We see lots of cases where the initial (if not only) investigation is done by state law enforcement officials. Often, the cases "go federal" because the perps will get longer sentences in federal court than state court. That fact is not lost on at least one eager US Attorney.

Meanwhile, over at National Review online, a commentator argues that Raich is actually a victory for principles of federalism because it was the state of California, not the federal government, that was in the wrong. That's pretty strong stuff for NR. He then goes on to predict a similar fate for Gonzalez v. Oregon, the not-yet-argued Supreme Court case which will resolve whether the feds can tell doctors in Oregon that prescribing controlled substances in accordance with that state's Death With Dignity Act is not the proper practice of medicine. Of course, he appears to be an anti-euthanasia activist, so I'm not sure that he's not engaged in some wishful thinking (hopefully).