Made in the U.S.A.

Nice to find some common sense as well as an article rich in details and facts. Let's start putting our money not where our mouths are but back in our pockets; and not let corporate interests override our national interests.

I think they should also start growing hemp in farming communities like Montana, where the oil boom has started to take over putting many of the farmers and locals out of jobs. And because of this oil boom, instead of making more jobs for locals it in turn is only bringing more people into small towns like Glendive and due to most of them having more money because of this oil boom, it is putting lots of farmers and locals out of jobs. It is my belief that if there was a hemp growing industry, the farmers could hire locals and bring in more jobs, not just more people to take over. I think we need to find a way to help out the local farmers and small local people everywhere that hemp can be grown.

The good news is that hemp can be grown most anywhere! Hence the threat to the DuPonts and the Hearst lumber industries back in the day, and name your corporate conglomerate today.

Look up the hemp project in Canada. http://www1.agric.gov.ab.ca/$departme....
One thing that environmentalists will acknowledge is that hemp is a very toxic fiber to refine to use for all the commodities the HEMP groups would like you to believe that the Cannabis Sativa plant might be used for. He reason Cannabis Sativa was used for rope was because of its fibrous strength of the stalk only. The HEMP project is an inn road to legalizing marijuana that is not of the Cannabis Sativa farm variety. The TCH level and sexing of wild fields of these plants in low, the impact on the environment in resources and sewage from manufacturing hemp is high, no pun intended. More power, more water, repeated processing. It is harder on the environment than making paper from trees and recycled paper products. If you want a raw, natural, easy on the environment product, buy a burlap cloth sack.
You might be able to make a cannabis brick to build a house, but you will need a lot more land and resources to build that house. Trees are still really good for that. Kudos to our local inventors for the inflatable domiciles! Now that is excellent. Those guys are the kind of people that will change the course of things to come. Not the cannabis HEMP movement. Per hector, cotton is still better. Cotton seed oil is just fine. Nylon and rayon ropes, I would rather moor my boat with, tow with or climb with, than hemp twine. Nylon and rayon are lighter and stronger; and stretch when they need to.
As a medicine, well the federal people have the ball on that one. I believe that California police in general have used good discretion in regard to personal use. Users don’t know that marijuana has a post syndrome affect that can last three days. It is not dose certified either and it does not have the same effect on everyone. If you use pot daily you should not drive a car; period. Sorry, you are impaired, it’s the medicine.

Hemp is an herbaceous plant and a relative of Jute or the Corchorus plant. So why choose Hemp? Hemp is grown in 35 counties whereas cotton is grown in over 100 countries in the world today; that’s more than half of all the counties in the world. So if hemp was really so great, than why go to all the trouble to grow cotton? It’s because no one wants to wear burlap. Hemp and Corchorus supply jute for rope and clothing, HEMP wants marijuana. If you want to help the environment, do not buy clothing that is colored. When the coloring is washed, the heavy metals from the coloring go into the waterways. So wear white, and then dye it in coffee or tea. The owner of the Men’s Warehouse is a huge supporter of legalizing marijuana, “I guarantee it”.
Have you notice how the social attitudes on smoking tobacco have changed and at the same time the social trend to legalize more dangerous drugs have become socially acceptable?
The whole thing about War II is that hemp burlap bags and mooring lines for all the naval ships came from hemp because we had not yet discovered nylon and rayon or poly-fiber ropes. We lost close to 2000 vessels during WW II. So I would image that growing hemp was as important as recycling everything back then. But we didn’t have an EPA, thank God, or we wouldn’t have won the war. We had paper mills, steel mills, shipyards, enormous textile factories and more enormous factories of every sort. Sprechen sie Deutsch?
They practiced for the landing on Normandy here in Santa Barbara. Hemp is a third world rope product. The most common use is rope. Not the 300 other cool things. It is biodegradable so once the jute is striped the rest of the plant bark and leafs are tossed. Hemp has such a small portion of the world’s commodity market. That is why, if you read about the Canada project, farmers had to sit on their hemp, there was no world demand for it. If hemp was so huge, those Canadian farmers would have done really well. So there would not have been a surplus. If in fact, of the the 35 countries that are using it, really used a quantity of it. They don’t.

"Hemp fibers are traditionally coarse, and have been historically used for ropes rather than for clothing. However, modern technology and breeding practices have made hemp fiber more pliable, softer, and finer." (wiki)

Google "hemp clothing" to see all of the manufacturers using hemp.

For consumption, hemp also has the correct ratio of Omega 3 to Omega 6. More details here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hemp

It is a shame that it is not grown in the US.

(jw - use google to check the info in your posts)

“For those who care, you can’t get high from hemp because it contains very low levels of the euphoriant THC and high levels of the antieuphoriant CBD.”
Yes you can, the acceptable THC level of agricultural hemp industry is 3% same percent, same as what the hippy’s were rolling joints within the 1960’s. Tabatha, only cannabis sativa can be grown for agriculture, no highbred strains of cannabis sativa can be grown, sorry. Read the Canadian hemp project. It’s real, not wiki or google. There was a Hemp project in Michigan in the recent future and even with a 35% increase in the use of hemp products in the USA the project collapsed. People buy hemp products, which are really expensive if you have ever bought one, to be fashionable. If hemp was is wonderful then why is it so expensive? Is there a huge hemp tariff? That has to be the case. Because everything I buy that says made in China on it is cheap and hemp is grown there and 34 other countries. So you mean to tell me that we pay more for foreign hemp product than foreign wines? Even linen is cheaper.

Mr. jw, I believe your math is off:

The "acceptable" THC content for industrial hemp is below POINT THREE PERCENT (.3%) not 3%.

And yes, 3% THC content in weed is about what an acceptable joint in the '60s and '70s contained.
http://www.umsl.edu/~keelr/180/pot_po...

Binky,
1.0 is 100% so .3 is 3 percent. Sorry for that math lesson.

Kindly,
jw

3% was acceptable? Baby you've come a long way.

I'm further confused by your followup statement, Mr. jw.

I hope you realize that countries which product hemp aim to keep the THC content below POINT THREE PERCENT.

If you think it is 3% (THREE PERCENT), 10 times the actual amount, you are mistaken.

I also hope you understand, using your "math lesson," that if 1.0 is 100%, .3 would be 30%.

I have a whole different perspective: Get the government out of the pot issue--re-legalize it.

On the other hand, if in addition to my suggestion, people want regulated pot/hemp shops that meet government guidelines, that's fine too.

If one wants to grow and consume pot, or sell it on an "as is" basis, why should the government get involved?

I do however agree with JW that one should not smoke it then drive, although the three-day aftereffect is something I hadn't heard of until now.

It seems that if people are SO concerned about the THC level in hemp, 'they' need to hire the same hippies (argicultural students) that increased THC levels in marijuana throughout the 70's and 80's through artifical selection to work with hemp to artifcally select lower levels of THC.

And I am NOT a smoker. Never have been and never will be. HONEST!!

Legalize it and let me smoke it as much as I want is what I always say!

Anything you ingest stays in your body for a period of time. Beef stays in one's system for up to 30 days, just rotting away in the gullet. I conveniently forget this when I visit Hamburger Habit.

Ken_Volok,
I am just telling you what the agriculture standard max on THC is. You are not incorrect on what was. Yes the high bred and clone plants have become a hundred of times stronger per dose now . They outmatch the hashish of the 1960’s 5-9 percent. For every decimal point in chemistry the strength of a dose is 100 times stronger in marijuana THC. So, a 14% vs. a 3% is not an 11% increase in dose strength. It is a one 110 times stronger. That is a scientific medical fact.
Pasasgerider,
The AG students realized that if the female plants had higher THC levels with big stick buds that were trying to get pollinated. The only reason any plant grows a flower is for pollination. The harder we make them try, the harder the work. So is that plant abuse? Their next problem was in sexing the plants so there would be no pollination and then cloning and crossing the females. I think it’s all been done. In fact, wild hemp fields in abundance would pollinate those female plants wrecking them for smoking. You would have to have a really clean room to grow pot worth smoking. Like a feral dog pack where eventually they all look the same, I think a lot of the hard work on pot would be lost to labs.
For Bill,
Marijuana THC is transported by the evaporated or solidified oil from the plant and sticks to the fatty tissue of liver before it breaks the blood brain barrier. It sticks there. That’s the last filter. The post syndrome effect from smoking marijuana is lasting, although unnoticed mostly, and that is why pot smokers should not drive. Their problem solving skills or their drive to problem solve involves the frontal lobe, is still not recovered after smoking or eating today’s high TCH level weed. Daily multiple uses have effects on all four lobes of the brain, the pituitary gland and hypothalamus gland as well. This is why may chronic pot smokers are dull. Therefore they should not drive at all. Also, since THC is an antiemetic, alcohol should not be consumed with it. People don’t vomit when they have had too much to drink with the marijuana and emergency rooms are seeing more of these drug combination deaths every year.

Binky,
You are right .03 is 3 percent. I was going to re-post today to acknowledge that. Marijuana THC has a complex exponential value as it increases in strength chemically. The number base of ten does not apply to the decimal system as far as percentages go; related to strength of TCH per dose. I really wanted to talk about that modern misconception. Thanks.

"Anything you ingest stays in your body for a period of time. Beef stays in one's system for up to 30 days, just rotting away in the gullet. I conveniently forget this when I visit Hamburger Habit."

Hank says Hamburger Habit has abalone sandwiches. (Or is it albacore?) I would imagine fish clears through the digestive system much faster that beef.

For the elderly medical marijuana users, talk to your family physician about your heart health and blood pressure. Marijuana will increase the chance of stroke and heart attack 400 times in the first hour of onset of the drug. The heart organ is greatly influenced by THC. This is the factor: CO cardiac output = HR heart rate x SV stroke volume. It is a well know fact that the CO = HR x SV factor is exerted to the heart when THC is added to the blood vessels. This has a direct impact on other organs and glands that produce hormones. The autonomic input into the heart has a sympathetic nervous system response. Everyone’s heart is not the same, nor is their nervous systems. So as medicine marijuana’s affect on the heart has a direct effect on the hormonal system, including, insulin, glucagon and thyroid hormones and epinephrine is different for everyone and an EKG with a blood pressure check would be a smart diagnostic test. The epinephrine like norepinephrine binds to beta receptors on the heart muscle cells. Therefore it increases myocardial contractility. Thereby promoting increases, involuntarily, in stoke volume of the heart muscle and cardiac output. This is the physiology of marijuana on the human body. People that smoke it say they have better appetites. What they eat is influence by their nervous system response which puts further stress on their hormonal system, including, insulin and glucagon. The typical meal is not well balanced; there may be some people that pre-plan, however it is rare. This will lead to diabetes, heart diseases and lung cancer. Many of the carcinogens in marijuana are in tobacco too. If they legalize medical marijuana, then they should have those people trade in their driver’s licenses in for the medical marijuana card. These same people should have to see a doctor at least once a month to renew their prescription, just as all people that require a triplicate pharmaceutical drug.

Mr. jw, you are very careless with your 'facts,' particularly when using numbers.

The limited 2001 study which dealt with heart attacks and marijuana, suggested nothing in line with what you claim: "Marijuana will increase the chance of stroke and heart attack 400 times in the first hour of onset of the drug."

Again, you have confused your numbers -- it is actually 4.8 times the average, not your grossly-inflated "400 times."

The study did not cover strokes -- so I'd like a reference for your data -- and the heart attack risks are limited; indeed the conclusion notes, "Smoking marijuana is a rare trigger of acute myocardial infarction." :

From "Triggering Myocardial Infarction by Marijuana,"
Murray A. Mittleman, MD:

"Background—Marijuana use in the age group prone to coronary artery disease is higher than it was in the past. Smoking marijuana is known to have hemodynamic consequences, including a dose-dependent increase in heart rate, supine hypertension, and postural hypotension; however, whether it can trigger the onset of myocardial infarction is unknown.

"Methods and Results—In the Determinants of Myocardial Infarction Onset Study, we interviewed 3882 patients (1258 women) with acute myocardial infarction an average of 4 days after infarction onset. We used the case-crossover study design to compare the reported use of marijuana in the hour preceding symptoms of myocardial infarction onset to its expected frequency using self-matched control data. Of the 3882 patients, 124 (3.2%) reported smoking marijuana in the prior year, 37 within 24 hours and 9 within 1 hour of myocardial infarction symptoms. Compared with nonusers, marijuana users were more likely to be men (94% versus 67%, P<0.001), current cigarette smokers (68% versus 32%, P<0.001), and obese (43% versus 32%, P=0.008). They were less likely to have a history of angina (12% versus 25%, P<0.001) or hypertension (30% versus 44%, P=0.002). The risk of myocardial infarction onset was elevated 4.8 times over baseline (95% confidence interval, 2.4 to 9.5) in the 60 minutes after marijuana use. The elevated risk rapidly decreased thereafter.

"Conclusions—Smoking marijuana is a rare trigger of acute myocardial infarction. Understanding the mechanism through which marijuana causes infarction may provide insight into the triggering of myocardial infarction by this and other, more common stressors."

http://circ.ahajournals.org/content/1...

Binky,
4.8 times the normal is consistent with 400 percent; closer to 500 percent chance. When they say 4.8 times it is a multiplication number not a division problem. If you had 4.8 chance of winning the lottery you would have won a large prize. Read the text Principals of Human Physiology and the entire book collection of Dr. Forrest Tenant on the Physiology and Biology of drug use. My mentor has her masters BS biology and PhD in Chemistry and (2) post doctoral fellowships in biological chemistry and molecular pharmacology at the Dana-Farber Institute and one in Medical Pathology at the University of Davis. I have all the graduate text books on this and I think that the HEMP people were unable to buy their way into real biochemistry research. I described the effect to the heart and gland of the central nervous system starting at the heart based on the science of the physiology of THC’s effect starting at the heart. It is correct and if you have $100 and I multiply it by 4.8 you would have $480 dollars. That is the baseline.

"jw" is obviously a know nothing prohibitionist spouting numerous lies written in a rambling, incoherent style. jw says: "environmentalists will acknowledge is that hemp is a very toxic fiber to refine to use". No part of the hemp plant is toxic. All of the major environmental groups endorse the growing of hemp. Quoting jw: "It is harder on the environment than making paper from trees" Wrong...one acre of hemp equals four acres of trees because hemp grows so much faster. Quoting jw: "Per hector, cotton is still better". Cotton requires more water, fertilizer, and is considered the worst crop due to the amount of pesticides used per hectare, not "hector". Check with the "environmentalists" that you were quoting earlier for a rundown on why they think cotton is bad. Quoting jw: "Users don’t know that marijuana has a post syndrome affect that can last three days." What? "Marijuana Post Syndrome"? Sounds made up. I couldn't find any medical journal articles on "marijuana post syndrome". Quoting jw: "Hemp is an herbaceous plant and a relative of Jute or the Corchorus plant" Wrong again, Jute is in the order Malvales and hemp is in the order Rosales. Quoting jw: "Hemp is grown in 35 counties whereas cotton is grown in over 100 countries in the world today". That's because we have stupid laws that ban the growing of hemp in many countries. Quoting jw: "If hemp was so huge, those Canadian farmers would have done really well". The value of Canadian exports was $10 million on 2010, a 200% increase over 2007. We hear over and over again from you about how pot smokers shouldn't be allowed to drive. I agree that nobody should drive on pot, cold medicine, legal prescription drugs or legal alcohol. Perhaps we should take away the driver's licenses of those who choose to drink responsibly and not drink and drive? There might be the possibility that they could have "alcohol post syndrome" for the following three days after drinking. "jw", you have no credibility on this subject. Give it up before you make a more of a fool of yourself.

Kevin,
I did not say to prohibit it. I said see an MD. General Practitioner if you use medical marijuana every day. I don’t think that someone who has taken heavy dose of prescription pharmaceuticals should drive either. Normally they are well monitored. People that take triplicate prescription medications have to sign a contract with their physician and take random urine tests to make sure that they are not abusing their drugs. "Amotivational Syndrome" Try to sift through the pro marijuana sites to see what this is. I am sure you don’t have a book.
Why is linen cheaper than hemp? Did you read the current Canadian Hemp project link? Facts are facts. Kevin, 10 million dollars in exports is nothing in the global economy; it is in a local economy. A good local milling cabinet company in Santa Barbara could have a gross receipt of 10 million dollars in kitchen remodels alone. Or a local company like Decker’s could be making billions in exports.
My post was to use pot with caution and to explain that everyone is different regarding how marijuana may affect them and a regular doctor’s check up is not a bad idea. If you have high blood pressure and drink alcohol, are overweight and a doctor says you can take Lipitor forever or you can stop drinking and lose some weight and you won’t need Lipitor, you would say what? The principles of biochemistry and human physiology are sound. So thanks for the motivation to say, be careful.
Merry Christmas. jw

Binky,
My data was from 2005.

Kevin,
People sleep on linen because it is soft. To make hemp that soft it has to be processed multiple times and that is a huge carbon foot print. Do you sleep on burlap? Do you wear only white or coffee died brown clothes? If you do cool. No one has answered my question, why is hemp so expensive if it is grown in 35 countries and Jute in more?

Fair enough, jw. Your last post makes you out to be a more reasonable person than your previous posts would.

Mr. jw, you again can't recognize your errors when they are pointed out to you.

You said:
"Marijuana will increase the chance of stroke and heart attack 400 TIMES in the first hour of onset of the drug."

And after I pointed out your mis-reporting of the actual study, you then said:

"4.8 times the normal is consistent with 400 percent; closer to 500 percent chance"

Just to be clear, 4.8 times is NOT the same as 400 times, your original incorrect declaration.

And the misleading statement that marijuana triggers strokes remains your pure conjecture, hardly supported by saying "my data was from 2005."

You have difficulty conveying your thoughts clearly, are reckless and care-free with facts and figures, and appear to be intent on forwarding some agenda of your own device, bolstered by a troll-like nay-saying.

I will leave you to your confusion.

Binky--who took a vacation from these blogs for months--is back with a vengeance!

My biggest concern about pot-smoking is the effect it has on the lungs. Of course there IS the issue of long-term consistent use and how it can effect the brain.

Ideally, people should be drug free, but having known my share of alcoholics and loadies I'd say the alcoholics are far worse off.

"My suggestion is much less controversial and more environmentally friendly than increasing oil production — grow hemp."

I can't wait to see those hemp fueled airliners, trains and tractor trailers. Give me a break.

Back then it was the chemical death merchants - lately it has been the liquor death merchants - pouring millions of dollars into maintaining the criminalization of this practical weed of many uses. Just say now!

Actually JW, in about a week all the misinformation you've posted here is about to be completely rebuked to Indy readers far and wide. Read it and weep.
Your facts and figures are so false as to qualify your posts as Science Fiction.

Binky,
I get it, you like pot and think I stink.
So there is a clear indication that people want their pot and are reluctant to crack a book or use a scientific calculator. Binky, you want to pick on me because I made an error on a decimal point position and use that as the pivot for your next argument?
Understanding, "4.8 times the base line" is not multiplied by a numerical value of 1. You asked for my research and I kindly gave it to you and it was from texts and books from 2005 (buy the 3rd additions); did you reference any of it? I don’t think you went and read through medical journals or texts on cardiovascular output related to modern medical marijuana use. You used your computer. Go buy the books. Read the Canadian Hemp Project done by Canada (the link is up top) or get the books from the library, UCSB or maybe SBCC libraries.
The base line is an algorithmic compound of interest. It is a form of long division.
Your baseline was 1258 women and they were 4.8 times more likely to have a myocardial infarction. Since the baseline is built on tens that would mean that you had 125.8 stacks of ten. Since my math is wrong according to you, and you know the algorithm for baseline mathematics, you tell me how many times more likely you are to have a myocardial infarction in your study group. Even if I do a short cut, not using all proper the compounded values, 1258/4.8 = nearly a full 25% of your study group is at risk; 266; but the actual number is higher.
I truly read your study well, not just your post. That would be wrong to comment on it otherwise and just because I made a typo with a decimal point does not mean that the content of the science I wrote about is unsound. Read about human physiology from a medical book, not wiki. College libraries have books in them for a reason, which is still valid I believe. I won’t hide behind an error and I won’t write about the human heart from a pro pot web-site. Learn how to find out who owns the addresses of your online research sites to see if they are bias.
Also, no one has explained why hemp products cost so much money when there has been no evidence of a trade tariff that would make a jute based product so expensive. I stand by my earlier statement that HEMP is trying to get marijuana legalized in the USA; while others are trying to criminalize tobacco. The response to my posts shows the emotional attachment to marijuana in on this blog and not to hemp. There are over 20 posts many in responses to mine and many bloggers can’t keep track of the strands, nor will they follow through with looking data up, as they ask others to do. Nice chat. See you next year.
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, jw

Now that people are corporations according to our government, we have to take such rants with a grain of salt, especially when written with more than a few grammatical errors in many long entries. What I get from Dr. Bearman's article is the same thing I get from the 99% : this country is on the wrong path. Corporate socialism for the 1%, their poisonous products, bi products and tri products for us and the environment to deal with because "the HEMP people were unable to buy their way into real biochemistry research." Indeed.

Ken-Volok
I look forward to seeing the handpicked statistics or factoids. I used Binky’s key words to not only read the study she cut and pasted, but I read the other medical reports on that page, and other medical journals, that had to do with marijuana use and cardiovascular and lung disease as well as cancer.
Ken .03 is 3% of 100 = 1.0; I will show this again. My math was not wrong; the fact that some first time users of marijuana had lowered blood pressure may be helpful in stroke patients. This needs to be explored. Blood pressure in chronic users that have CPD may have higher blood pressure. High blood pressure is related to stroke in people with CPD. That is why I said consult an MD doctor. Read the books written on the Physiology and Biology of Drug addiction by MD Dr. PhD Forrest Tennant as I have. Also, The Principals of Human Physiology and Principles of Biochemistry and a book on the Introduction to Physical Science to really wrap up the complexity and the multiplicity of issues discussed in this blog. These books are in my personal library and I had to read them along with Organic Chemistry. I may type too fast as I think ahead and this is not a Capstone Project for my Masters degree, it’s a blog.
The conversation has been easily steered away from industrial hemp to marijuana and it has stayed there, proving it’s not about hemp. It’s about pot.
Tear me up as a science fiction character. Read all the different and current medical journals on THC and myocardial CPD problems and associative disorders. A hypothesis based on the physiological responses of the human body has not been fully concluded because the USDA does not recognize marijuana as a useful drug, so only self confessed patients who remain anonymous, are in most of these papers. As far as the baseline increase goes, please explain vertical and horizontal G force increase in physics. Then explain baseline increase in medical studies. What are the similarities in the math? The algorithms compound, that is the correct answer.
A baseline is a control group that is untainted or stationary. The increase of the baseline is as with the .03% is of 100% = 3%. Therefore, 4.8% is of 100% = 480%; but you don't get it the number base is 10, therefore the value of 100% = 1.0 it's that simple. But we don’t know the participant study group baseline numbers in Binky’s paper; just the increase; Science fiction.
Still no answers on why hemp products are so expensive.
I’m looking forward to your beatings after the holidays.
Until then, truly, peace, truce and enjoy your family and friends this holiday season, jw

It was with great interest to read this in JW's reply "only self confessed patients who remain anonymous, are in most of these papers" because I was going to ask him to consider dropping his/her anonymity (as Dr. Bearman has done) so we can research his credibility while we attempt to decipher your post..
But the historical fact remains that hemp has had traditional industrial, medicinal and nutritional uses in many cultures spanning epochs.

"Still no answers on why hemp products are so expensive."
-JW-

My guess would be the Black Market hyperinflated price. Re-legalize marijuana and I'm guessing the prices would drop.

Bill_C nailed that one, its the different between an abundant and a scarce commodity. Oil is scarce- it's expensive; sugar is plentiful- it's cheap.

Example given: (e.g.) back in the days when L.P.'s cost about $7 a Rolling Stones L.P. was costing about $120 on the Soviet Union's Black Market.

Imagine how much cheaper drug-related products would cost if they were re-legalized.

Often prohibiting something in itself makes it more attractive, more enticing. That's something those rednecks in the Kremlin never understood, nor do many of our Drug Warhawks.

http://reason.com/archives/2011/12/20...

That was a great series BC.

jw, I get the idea that you are still grasping at straws (stalks?) here, so I'll help out. Quoting jw: "No one has answered my question, why is hemp so expensive if it is grown in 35 countries and Jute in more?" For starters, jute only grows in tropical (monsoon) climates, which makes it uneconomic to grow in most of the U.S. Hemp grows all over the world, from the tropics to the subarctic regions. According to the government of Canada, hemp costs $500-600 per acre to grow, bale, truck, and process for storage as a raw grain or stalk product. Hemp fiber yield is 3800-4500 kg/acre in Ontario ($0.14 per kg avg). The Bangladesh Department of Agriculture Extension reports that the cost of cultivation of an acre of jute is $371, producing 1600 kg/acre ($0.23 per kg). As you can see, hemp is cheaper to produce. At the present time, hemp is still a niche market because it has been illegal to grow in much of the world until the last 10-15 years. The Bush Administration even tried to ban hemp products, but the Supreme Court shot that down. To answer your question, hemp is expensive because of government over-regulation. Jw, I don't know why you seem to be against farmers in the U.S growing this crop. The Canadian experience has shown that industrial hemp cannot be used as a drug, or even to hide the cultivation of drug varieties of cannabis. Why not get past all of the reefer madness and let U.S. farmers try to make money growing this useful crop? It has made money in all of the other countries where it has been grown.

The government is in total fear that someone might get some pot and god forbid relax and enjoy themselves briefly. Damn, I need a drink!

In 2004 Hemp seed products sold for .50-.60 a pound and certified organic hemp seed products sold for .85 cents a pound. Canada sold 40 million dollars worth. That is not even close to making it to a billion. If every one of the 35 countries that sold hemp did as well the then global hemp economy was 1.4 billion.
This article was about hemp not marijuana. I have not read any quantitative or qualitative analysis on hemp as a commodity. I only hear pro marijuana people who want to smoke pot. Big deal for them I guess? Therefore I can only conclude, based on the discussion that hemp is not the issue. Science fiction is? I was waiting for a real whipping when I got back because I was promised one. I have a lot more to come on botany; jute is within the plant, not the plant. Therefore, hemp is only one source of jute. Bark is on a tree, it is not the tree. Marijuana is not hemp. Deciduous and coniferous trees are trees but they are not the same. Is concrete cement?
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/RL32725.pdf

Written Dec, 19 "Actually JW, in about a week all the misinformation you've posted here is about to be completely rebuked to Indy readers far and wide. Read it and weep. Your facts and figures are so false as to qualify your posts as Science Fiction." Written by Ken_Volok. Where is it?
I have consulted with 3 brokers on hemp futures and the numbers are so small that I have to wait for a response if I want to invest in hemp commodities. That tells me that hemp and its 25,000 products is dismissal on the global market. A man that cannot afford an aluminum cane uses a wooden stick. If hemp was so great it would be the wooden stick; it is not.

The SB Independent comes out every Thursday JW, check this week's issue.

Ken,
Thanks. It's my first day. The article was written on December 17th. I am pleased that it took two weeks to put something together. It should be very thorough and have counter points as well as specific world commodity market trade values as well as the actual direction the conversation took. I am still waiting for a response from my brokers on global hemp commodities. This issue is a very emotional one and where the rubber meets the road history is all I hear about. Canada has a patent on a machine that does the shucking of hemp seeds. That’s cool, but no one is buying it. I look forward to Thursday. I looked last Thursday with zest for an editorial comment on this topic.
My science fiction and made up physiology, as well as the imaginary botany and textile industry and misunderstanding of the decimal point system in relation to percentages should be good reading.

Very biased and not about hemp and my guess is that most people don't understand that you need a lab to get the few good chemicals THC has to offer them; and you don't smoke them.

What a needy, glossy, handpicked bit of dribble.
We have a syntetic product but no one wants it; period.

Is part two going to be on the global hemp commodities being traded in the the billions of dollars traded on the world market and how we are missing out

Ken,
Hooray! The article had nothing to do with hemp as an industrial global commodity. As the paid advertisement in the Indy has illustrated; the four pages of glossy colorful tidbits on compounds from cannabis. It talks about marijuana not hemp. Guess what, not all the chemicals in marijuana are good as the article explains by omission.
Most of the studies citied were done before the completion of the human DNA strand being fully decoded. The article talks about using agents and compounds from THC. You need a laboratory to extract the gases and elements into their known agents to the mix these compounds. These are liquids and crèmes, not smoke. Who still chews on birch tree bark for a headache; that’s were aspirin came from. When scientist talk about “certain chemicals” that attach to “particular receptor cites” and do not explain what happens to the empty station when the receptor site is empty I am suspicious. How does the body compensate for the biochemical loss? MDMA users have serotonin deficiencies. The MDMA attaches to the serotonin receptor site and dumps the natural serotonin which is then depleted. Serotonin is not a biological chemical that is rapidity replaced like adrenalines. This leads to severe depression and addiction.
The handpicked totally pro cannabis propaganda would not be received into any medical journal because it lacks any adverse affects or studies contrary to within the four color pages, a testament such as this: Where marijuana tar placed on lab mice skin causes cancer, certain cannabinoid chemicals can shrink cancer cells of the prostrate and lab mice injected with a measured dose of THC inhibited growth and spread of human lung cancer cell lines . I found the article to be very biased, chop shop and very needy. I don’t even know that many of the readers understand the true physiology of what this article indicates in its biased is over the top. We have already made sensitized chemicals that do these very same things; 92% of our community is over 25 and about 30% have a bachelors degree or higher. Most will read, BLAH! BLAH! BLAH! Marijuana is healthy and good for me.
To break the blood brain barrier effectively science has yet to find a safe way to administer THC and its compounds. The danger of smoking a known cancerous substance is no longer prescribed by mainstream doctors.
People do not measure their dose, nor do they inject THC. They smoke pot and there are no dosages or warning labels or given side effects. With an opiate it may say take on tablet and say when. Then on the label you get a list of side effects and which ones you need to call your doctor for.
Each lab rat was under the supervision of a PhD or a MD doctor.

The pharmacological properties of the endocannabinoids were found to be very similar to those of the synthetic cannabimimetics. The subsequent description of a complex biochemical pathway for the synthesis, release (Di Marzo et al., 1994; Cadas et al., 1996), transport (Beltramo et al., 1997) and degradation (Cravatt et al., 1996) of endocannabinoids completed the scaffold of a new signalling system termed the ‘endocannabinoid system’. Since the discovery of anandamide, more than 3500 scientific reports have comprehensively explored the main aspects of the endocannabinoid system. The synthetic cannabimimetics work on the endocannabinoid system http://alcalc.oxfordjournals.org/cont... . and the esophagus was left out of the diagram too. Your lefties would not have you read this ENDOCANNABINOID SYSTEM: PHYSIOLOGY AND PHARMACOLOGY JUORNAL it says synthetic cannabimimetics work on the endocannabinoid system and the chemistry symbols the paid advertisement is wrong. No need for marijuana. “A paid advertisement provided by Santa Barbara Medical Cannabis Education Services” Really!
Four pages, how defensive and embarrassing too!
So where is the fascinating story on modern hemp as a global commodity?

I read Dr. Donald Tashkin’s full study, and as far as lung cancer goes, he said paraphrased, that smoking cigarettes and marijuana are the same. He said, “That there was not a significant increase of lung cancer in marijuana users”. Do people not know how to read? What he is saying is that marijuana users have nearly an equal or not a significant increase in lung cancer over tobacco users and the “Advertisement” says that it has a protective effect on the lungs. What a load of bovine fecal matter. You eat it.
I know how to read and do research. I suggest you read every report in full and see for your selves how skewed the advertisement and education is. Then go back to “Made in the USA” trying to grow hemp in the USA really is not about the textile of food industry and this is a fine example.
I can’t wait to read the Multi Billion Dollar Hemp headline.

To the editor,
I know that you are not responsible for the veracity of paid advertisements. I was really disappointed in the rebuttal of my comments by a paid advertisement that were embellished and biased. I took the time to read the published clinical papers and saw how the Santa Barbara Medical Cannabis Education Services not only sifted through the studies but omitted very important clinical information. These clinical studies are also skewed to make a reader think that smoking marijuana is a safe method of introducing the few experimental positives that cannabis may have. The complexity of the chemistry is profoundly intermediate and it was strewed in the advertisement and varies from the actual studies greatly. As I have said in my blogs, I believe that hemp is the passage for legalizing marijuana and the article on hemp turned 180 degrees to marijuana use as a positive. It is a clinical fact that .03% THC is enough to get high on. I am not taking a stand on legalizing industrial hemp, I just want to read real facts about how many times jute has to be environmentally stepped on to make comfortable textiles. I already know the carbon footprint is high. As far as a food seed or oil for fuel, I would like to read an article that significantly explains how may tons of seeds are needed to produce a billion barrels of fuel oil and how much it costs to make ready for our cars. The artcle was about industrial hemp production in the United States and it deviated quickly to marijuana use and bloggers not understanding the decimal point system in arithmetic. If the facts were presented fairly then I would not be writing on this subject. Dr. Bearman is a pro-marijuana doctor. The 25,000 uses should be on a Google or Bing list and they are not. Nor are 25,000 uses listed in medical journals, cook books or home improvement books .Breathing smoke is not healthy; there are carcinogens in smoke of all kinds; even in Bar-B-Que. Therefore, in the lab experiment with mice, the mice were swabbed or injected with a qualitative dose of a THC compound; no one seems to understand what a compound is. None of the compounds were administered with the burning smoke of marijuana. The fact that the synthetic compounds have kind effects on the same receptor sites. The pro-marijuana folks do not want to go to an internist physician for the prescription. The focus should have been on industrial hemp products in the modern world today as a global commodity as it stands now and what the top tier uses of the product is and what the future market may hold and what impact it will have on the economy, the environment and demand. I know that my research is good as well as my math and science. Someone on your staff must be able to back up Dr. Bearman on industrial hemp. I am disappointed in the biased and out of context education that the paid advertisement put into the Dec. 29, 2011 Indy. People want to smoke marijuana not farm hemp.

JW, wake up and live now!

The research of cannabis in the US is authorized by NIDA who has a congressional mandate only to study drugs of abuse as drugs of abuse. Researchers in the US have their hands tied. Why?

Well why don't you take a look at this list of over 1,000 patents on the medical use of cannabis and who holds those patents. http://literature.cannabisreeducation...

Or perhaps you can look at history and the fact that cannabis has been used effectively as medicine for over 4000 years and has only not been considered medicine in the United States for about the last 70 years. Or maybe you can look at why it became illegal in the first place (money, job security, and greed). For someone who claims to be coming at this from a scientific perspective, you sure are ignorant in your expressed viewpoint.

Your body contains an endocannabinoid system. All invertebrates have one. With out it you would die. YOU ARE HIGH WHETHER YOU LIKE IT OR NOT. Without your endocannabinoid system you would be in constant pain, you wouldn't have a desire to eat, your body wouldn't heal properly, and you would mostly likely starve and die in agony. Cannabis is chemically identical to the endocannabinoids that your body makes internally. By ingesting external sources of cannabinoids, you can help to regulate your body's endocannbinoid system. It's that simple. It doesn't take a PhD or a bunch of federally funded anti-cannabis studies to understand it.

BTW I know Dr. Tashkin personally and I produced the CME course that doctors and nurses in 16 states use to learn about the Endocannabinoid System. What Dr. Tashkin has found is that smoked marijuana, while it does contain carcinogens, also has very powerful and potent anti-oxidants and neuroprotectants that offset the damage done by en-hailing smoked cannabis. His studies found that if you smoke cannabis and tobacco you are less likely to get lung cancer than if you smoke tobacco alone.

I find it very interesting that you are campaigning against cannabis, when there are so many legal drugs that do much worse damage to society as a whole.

Alcohol kills. Tobacco kills. Oxycontin kills. All legal, do you follow? You may have also read the headline recently that prescription drug abuse is now the NO1 cause of accidental death in the US.

Ironically, it is impossible to take a lethal dose of cannabis. Not one death every has occurred from an overdoes of marijuana.

So tell me what is your problem with cannabis?
In the words of the late great Bob Marley, "Wake Up and Live Now!"

You can't stay on point. The article was on Hemp. I knew it wasn't. Rub a crystal on your jw headache. I ask too many questions or my science is bad and you are bereaved? Synthetic chemicals work on the Endocannabinoid System like natural ones if they have the same three dimensional geometrical structures. You do know that chemicals make compounds and that those molecular strands of compounds are what attach the receptor sites based on those geometric types. So it does not matter if it is “natural’ or synthetic as long as the molecule can attach itself. So why are you so against a pharmaceutical dose? Where is the hemp article? I have not stood against marijuana, just the biased and profane justification of legalizing it through false advertisement. Smoking is bad for you, so they say. Is it? The health and life insurance companies think it is and they are not doctors, they just pay out the cash. They measure their cash outflow as risk assessment values to categorize known values and assign categories of who to charge the most.
No one has ever died from a marijuana overdose is a strong statement. Impaired marijuana user deaths don’t count? How about all the marijuana users that combined alcohol to their dose and died because they did not vomit from drinking too much alcohol? So we shall ignore the secondary causes of fatalities due to marijuana. Good science.
Your argument about ancient marijuana use is invalid. The THC content of the ancient indicia marijuana and hashish were not equivalent to that of our modern marijuana THC strands and clones. Ancient hashish was weak because it was brewed or distilled from weeds. The Mexican field workers smoked hemp to get high at the end of the day.
“Wake Up and Live Now!” Marijuana has a relaxing effect or affect. Truth be told man!
You are on a mission for marijuana not hemp. Bye

JW, take a look at Marinol, 100% synthetic THC which is legal in the US and is a Schedule 3 drug. That same THC which might be found at 10-20% levels in modern day cannabis is classified as a Schedule 1 drug by the DEA...contrary to the law which says that a natural compound and a synthetic compound must share the same classification.

Why am I against Pharmaceutical doses? Firstly, you said that, I didn't. I am actually for Pharmaceutical doses of natural medicine. If you want to put a bunch of components that were assembled in some factory, which have long list of negative side effects (increased gambling urges, restless leg syndrome, and death) into your body....then by all means please continue to defend the Pharmaceutical Industry. In my opinion it is immoral to reap huge profits at the expense of human suffering. The Pharmaceutical industry has proven its ability to invent new illnesses, flood the television with ads, and reap profits from a mess of white powdery chemicals touted as treatment and cures. Not to mention that if you looked at that list of 1,000+ endocannabinoid patents, then you would know that the majority of them are held by Big Pharma, and you might also know that they are the largest lobbyist organization in the country, and use their money and patents to keep natural medicines off the market.

JW- "No one has ever died from a marijuana overdose is a strong statement." According to the US Government you would have to smoke 1500 lbs of pot at once to get a lethal dose. Since this is physically impossible, it is a fact that no one has ever overdosed on marijuana alone. So your "good science" "secondary causes of death" is complete nonsense. Anything you do can contribute to an accidental death, that doesn't make it the cause.

JW -"Your argument about ancient marijuana use is invalid." Invalid is a strong word and I suggest you might want to rethink that. Medical cannabis has historically been used in many forms including tinctures, hash, edibles, etc. The knowledge of how to reprocess cannabis to adjust the levels of THC and CBD's has been known for centuries. Also, THC breaks down and decomposes over time (law of thermodynamics), so there is no accurate way to determine the actually THC levels in ancient pot. So a few tests on the levels of THC in ancient hash has no real value or relevance.

JW - "The Mexican field workers smoked hemp to get high at the end of the day." Really? Which Anslinger Propaganda pamphlet are you reading? Do you think maybe they smoked it because they were doing hard labor and it helped to alleviate their pain? Or maybe they smoked it because they couldn't afford modern medicine, and marijuana worked better anyways? Interesting that you singled out a single race instead of talking about its use among the general population.

OH and BTW, sorry to burst your bubble, but the paid ad in the Independent had absolutely nothing to do with you.

Archer,
You cannot compare ancient alchemy to modern medicine or modern cannabis. Thank you for validating my earlier statement that you can get high from industrial hemp or cannabis sativa weeds.
Cocaine is natural should it still be in soda?
How many experiments do you think were done on human slaves to find out what worked in the ancient world to find medicines during the Roman, Persian and Chinese Empires? They had no need for lab rats when they could use humans and they did for dynasties.
Cocaine, opium, heroin, lithium are all from nature. Have you had your lithium?
As far as your ancient marijuana goes, it was a weed of about .03% THC. All you can get is 100 percent of 3 percent when it is distilled. Today’s marijuana is much stronger.
The paid advertisement has everything to do with the fact that the forum was exposed quickly from hemp to legalizing marijuana, who exposed the man behind the curtain?
You are desperate and grasping at straws. You know nothing about legalizing a drug or being able to differentiate the difference between organic substances that contains something of benefit, while other portions of the organic matter have no useful benefit.
I eat apricots but do not eat the seeds which can contain over 200 mg of cyanide. You probably still don’t understand because you want to smoke pot; it breaks the blood brain barrier faster.
Oral medications have a longer onset occurrence but the duration of the medical benefit is typically longer due to the passage of the medication through the body before it enters the blood stream. Why do you think crack cocaine was so tragically addictive? Lungs, heart, brain and bam! High!
The synthetic drug Marinol is the apricot; the THC compounds that attach to the receptor sites, none of the other junk. That’s the simplest way I can explain it to you, which I am certain is unacceptable. You contradict yourself when you say that you want it legalized but Marinol made illegal until marijuana is legal. If you knew organic chemistry you would now that marijuana is a plant and Marinol is a synthetic drug that mimics the THC cannabanoids that attach to your endocannabanoid receptor sites and that those molecules have to have the three dimensional structure to fit the receptor site or it would not have an effect on the patient’s affect to their health.

Just as I had suspected, there is no journalism on the global commodity of hemp seed products in this week’s Independent; Jan. 5, 2012.

This therefore concludes my theses, that hemp was the decoy for legalization of marijuana at the core issue of David Bearman’s article. I do know that a lot of people are really emotional about what I wrote.

I wish to you all the best, a healthy and a Happy New Year no matter your position. jw

OK just to debunk the propaganda that JW and others have been spreading about smoking anything is harmful to your health...and I quote:

"Therefore, people who are using marijuana for medicinal purposes or recreationally at least could be reassured that they're not harming their lungs in this way."

This was released today by American Medical Association.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/0...