April 26, 2012 • 33 mins
Some quarters of the medical establishment endorse it, others abhor it. The DEA is cracking down on it, but the Veterans' Administration supports it as a treatment for soldiers. Medical marijuana is indeed a contentious issue. Learn all about it here.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
It's ready. Are you welcome to you Stuff you Should
Know from House Stuff Works dot Com. Hey, and welcome
to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. This is Charles W.
Chuck Bryant, who is seated across from me. Hello, and uh,
(00:23):
you put the two of us together, you get a
podcast called Stuff you Should Know? Like it or not exactly? Um,
how are you doing? I'm well, I'm glad. Uh, Chuck,
We're going to talk today about why don't think is
a pretty important issue. Uh, medical marijuana. We've spoken for
(00:45):
about the potential health benefits a plenty of other drugs, ecstasy, LSD, psilocybin, mushrooms.
I feel like it's high time. Did you do that
on purpose? Sadly not interesting that we did medical marijuana.
This article had a couple of those little puns that
(01:08):
I thought were one strain of research man that silverman
thought he was so funny for getting that in there
and just like freaking the man out. So where do
we start? Do you have an intro? No? I don't
have an intro. I feel like this, uh, this subject
itself needs no intro. It's using pot marijuana for medicinal purposes,
(01:31):
and apparently there is a pretty extensive body of research
showing that it does in fact help, that seven hundred
and thirty thousand UH people who have grave diseases and
illnesses aren't really just faking so they can smoke pot,
that the stuff is helping. UM. There's a lot of
(01:53):
diseases that Jacob Silverman lists that this UM that medical
marijuana has been shown to howl with. Do you know
what they are? You recite them in alphabetical order. Well,
I have two lists UM. The list in the article
says nausea, especially chemotherapy, nausea, loss of appetite, chronic pain, anxiety, arthritis, cancer, AIDS, glaucoma,
(02:17):
MS or multiple sclerosis, insomnia, A d H D epilepsy, inflammation, migraines,
Crohn's disease, and if you're terminally ill, to improve your
quality of life. This is a list on the sign
outside of the Cush Doctor at Venice Beach, California. And
(02:39):
there's a lot more things on this list. Do you
suffer from? UM? They also include in here sickle cell anemia, UM,
psychiatric disorders basically anything autoimmune, sleep, disorders, and it says,
I think either sleeplessness or too sleepy? Does it say that? Yeah? Um?
(03:04):
Any any well? At list about twenty more things, and
then at the bottom it says, or any chronic or
persistent medical symptom. Write anything fingernail hurt right now. So
that's what the cush doctor will And that is an
actual I'm not just making that up at Venice speech.
I saw the picture. It says, cush doctor, and um,
(03:25):
you can go in there with your little card and
get you some pot. So what you've just gotten at
is the heart of this problem. Like there is plenty
of legitimate, bona fide medical research that shows that marijuana
does help ease symptoms. It does a special double weighamy
on people who are nauseated and don't have any appetite,
(03:46):
which is a terrible symptom of several diseases, cancer AIDS.
So you have this part of the medical establishment saying yes,
pot helps, and then you have the drug warriors, the
d e A, lots of US district attorneys, plenty of
the square Americans, um saying now it's a drug, and um,
(04:14):
there's gonna be plenty of guys like the cush doctor
who are just gonna sell it to anybody they can
and use any medical marijuana laws that you enact as
a shield to operate criminally from behind, like don't don't
take that drug. So um. For a long time, the
medical marijuana idea has been taken up by states. It's
(04:38):
been a state's rights issue also, um. But the federal
government apparently was the first ones to ever legalize um
or sell or supply legal medical marijuana from a program
that ran from nineteen seventy. UM. It kind of petered
out in the states, starting with California really took up
(04:58):
the cause. Yeah, for a while, they did not sit
very well, especially during the Bush years. That did not
sit well with the federal government, and the Feds used
to routinely raid uh legitimate uh medical pot dispensaries that
were operating within the letter of state law because federal
law supersede state law. So the d A can read
(05:21):
you anytime they want, because according to the federal government,
pots still a drug. It doesn't matter what your state says,
right right. UM. With Obama, he came into office saying,
you know what, I'm not going to waste the resources
of the d O j on cracking down on legal
pot operations. Yeah, that was in two thousand nine, um
(05:43):
and memo. Yeah, and things really launched after that, like
more states pass legislation and more dispensaries like in l A.
At the time, after that passed, they say there could
have been up to a thousand dispensaries in l A proper,
but then they and said no, it was more like six.
(06:04):
But what happened recently, well, UM, the the head of
the d A, UM, a woman named Michelle Leonhardt was
She was appointed by Bush and Obama reappointed her and
shortly after her reappointment, she rewrote the d a's position
(06:26):
on medical marijuana, saying like no, it's a drug and
we're gonna go after it. And her, let's see leon
Hart with the help of the district attorney no USA
U S attorney UM by less name of Hague. I
can't remember first name, Melissa Hague maybe she Um. She
(06:48):
started basically prosecuting we're sending sending the d e A
to medical dispensaries, and everything just totally changed, like it
just went backwards by years when it looked like it
was all about to change. Yeah, and um, the media
and especially the liberal media have held Obama's feet to
(07:08):
the fire, and they're like, dude, what is up with
this reversal? And um, isn't this probably just election year
campaign strategy And they're like, no, it's not a reversal. Really,
it's sort of the same as it always was. Really
but not really No, And apparently with so this is um.
Chuck and I both thread a really good article called
(07:30):
um Obama's Warm Pot in Rolling Stone. It's very thorough. Um.
But the the there there has basically been a step
up in the way that medical marijuana and the people
who use it and prescribe it are being treated by
the federal government. Um. With there there's been a hundred
raids so far, at least a hundred rates carried out
(07:52):
under Obama's watch. So if it keeps if it keeps
up with this pace, then um, he will be worse
than Bush as far as medical marijuana raids. Uh. And
this one guy, Rob Campia, who was executive director of
the Marijuana Policy Project, said that Obama is the worst
(08:12):
president on medical marijuana. Crazy. It is just totally crazy
because that's not what he said during the campaign. And Uh,
the I don't know, no what need astorney. I'm one
of the residents of Colorado that was campaigning hard to
you know, to keep this going against Obama even though
he voted for him, said he needs to watch it
because quote, medical marijuana is twice as popular as he is.
(08:36):
So he says he's already lost that vote no matter
what happens. So we'll see how this shakes down, all right. So, uh,
California has been studying this since about two thousand. In
earnest um, they were given about nine million bucks to
do genuine medical research on the effectiveness of marijuana for
(09:00):
different usually pain causing and nausea causing diseases. And um.
It's always been hard to do these studies though, because
the federal government, if they're gonna give you money, they're
gonna regulate like where the pot comes from. And this
at the time was that you see San Diego. They
would only let them get it from one place, one source,
(09:20):
and then they would visit them. Federal agents would in
uh the Medical Cannabis Research Center to verify that it
was kept in a vault that was bolted to the floor,
so they would, you know, they want to come by
and make sure they were all sitting around smoking joints
and like playing ping pong. You guess which I mean.
I guess if you are kind of hung up on
(09:42):
testing with medical marijuana, that's cool. That's your right to
drop by and make sure that everything is here and
it's not being Yeah, I'm not liking that. Um. The
federal government started, like like the the head of the
Bureau of Alcohol to back on firearms. Then a lighter
to firearms dealers saying it's um, it's illegal to sell
afire are armed to a person addicted to marijuana. So
(10:02):
if you are, if you are receiving medical cannabis, you
just had your Second Amendment right strip from your banks
are worried about getting prosecuted for money laundering by dealing
with dispensaries medical marijuana dispensaries. So now it's starting to
go to a cash only I eat, more dangerous business
for prone to robberies and tax evasion. It's just like
(10:25):
definitely going backwards, huge huge steps backwards. It's crazy, and
by backwards, I should say, if you're pro medical marijuana, sure,
let's talk about why um pot might help. Okay, th
HC is in um it's a cannaba cannabinoid in marijuana,
and that's what makes you feel high, and it's also
(10:47):
where you find your medicinal properties. They're all locked in
there together because we produce our own cannabinoids in the
form of indo cannabinoids naturally. Yes, so we have endocannabinoid receptors, right,
an abinoid, Yeah, cannabinoid. I like the way you said,
it's kind of pleasing phenomena UM in our body. And
when they are when they receive something, when something is
(11:10):
recepted to them, uh, they release things like pain relievers,
reduced anxiety. It has a whole just a whole lot
of effects on us mood, memory, appetite. Well, it has
a negative impact on memory. I think, well, it's it's
just to regulates these responses whether or not there makes
(11:31):
you sleepy or hungry or not. So with some with
some diseases, UM, this combination of UM introducing THHC to
the ENDO can now I can't say it correctly. Endocannabinoid
receptor UM results in increased appetite, results in UM lesson
(11:51):
muscle spasms. If you have multiple sclerosis, UM or if
you're quadriplegic, UM results in just a greater outlook a
sense of well being if you're dying. All these things
that have been studied and document it is actually working.
I got one for you. Uh. They did a study
in mice that showed that the cannabinoids may protect against
(12:15):
development of certain types of tumors, both benign and cancerous.
And not only that, listen to this. It appears to
kill only the tumor cells and may even protect the
healthy cells from cell death. That is some pot That's
pretty rad. That's all I'm saying. So on the other hand,
you've got people saying, Okay, all right, I'm going to
take the medical establishment at face value, and um say, yes,
(12:41):
THHD hit your endocannabinoid receptors and produces it alleviates a
lot of symptoms of certain diseases. Can we just not
come up with something that doesn't get you high? And uh,
some drug companies have been like, yes we can, and
they introduced um shiny black pills called marian All, which
is synthetic THHC. Josh, I have had a Marino pill?
(13:04):
Really did it? Did it alleviate your symptoms? Uh? It
was a very mild thing, to be honest. And this
was this was many years ago when I was living
in Los Angeles. But um, yes, I've had a marinal pill,
and it's did you get it from Dr Couch? Now
I didn't. But it is funny how you just pointed
out because that kind of debated off air. I was like,
should I say that I've had a marinal pill. We're like, well, yeah,
(13:27):
it's an FDA proved drug, Like you can say that,
but you can't say, yeah, I smoked pot and not
get you know, the cross side stairs. Sure, it's just interesting,
Yeah it is. That's I guess that's at the heart
of all this. It's kind of like this this drug,
the synthetic drug, yeah, uh, that you can get through
(13:49):
a prescription right and go to your pharmacy and they'll
give it to you. Um, you can have that, but
this this drug gros in the ground, right, Yeah, that
actually works better than this other drug, the synthetic version
of it, supposedly. That's the big um complaint against marian
all is that it's like it's a synthetic teaching, but
(14:11):
it's lacking some really important parts. Yeah, well, and it
absolutely is lacking. I mean chemically it's it's lacking. But um,
but you can't have that and I'm really reminded of this,
Like this is where like witches and doctors came from
from the struggle of like the I guess some Middle Ages,
so where science was really starting to kind of come
(14:33):
about and um, to basically maintain a foothold or create
a foothold for itself over Western society, it had to
get rid of its rivals, which were um traditional healers
who very quickly became witches and outcasts and were ostracized
(14:53):
as backward and possibly even evil. So don't go to them,
come to me, because I'm the guy with the beat on.
We can protect you from the plague. Look at you,
Arthur Miller. But isn't that Isn't that kind of analogous? Yeah?
I think so. Um. There's also, uh, that's very astute, Josh,
thank you. Um. There's also a tv X which is
(15:16):
um a pain reliever, and it is actually an extract
of real marijuana administered by spray and I think they
have that's in England, Spain, and Canada, and it's in
trials here in the US. Yeah, so that's not synthetic,
that's actually an extract. Yeah. I'll bet everybody who uses
it goes oh, I can't. I don't feel any pain,
(15:38):
but you might as well just use this. Uh what's
the stuff you spray when you have tonsillitis? Oh? Yeah,
might as well just use superl That's not the one
I was thinking of, though, is the uh so, Like
you said, most experts agree that mare and all um
and it's at vax actually in clinical riles show to
(16:00):
have less of an effect than actual the marijuana plant itself.
But the d e A points out t S this
is what this is legal that and they make a
pretty good point here that um may and all is
the THHC what morphine is to opium. Like, yeah, you
might need morphine. We're not gonna tell you it's okay
(16:22):
to go smoke opium for your pain. There's morphine. Go
use the morphine. It's legal, it's regulated, it's taxed, and
it's not gonna get you landed in jail unless you
get your hands on it illegally. So the Feds are
the ones who are definitely blocking this right now. UM
this I should say in in a lot of states,
(16:42):
there's eighteen states, including d C that have UM laws
on the books that say, yeah, man, you you we've
got legalized medical marijuana to some degree. Yeah, and Oregon
is the king Daddy of medical marijuana. California was Yeah,
I mean there's probably more dispensaries and things like that.
(17:04):
But in Oregon you are allowed to possess up to
twenty four ounces of you what they call usable marijuana,
or twenty four plants um, six of which can be mature,
eighteen of which can be immature, which means they're like flowering,
budding plants. They were Jeane jackets. So Washington's right behind them.
(17:26):
You can possess twenty four ounces or fifteen plants, and
uh not surprisingly, there are no states in the Southeast,
and Michigan is the only state in the Midwest. Uh
So yeah, in these in these Bible Belt areas, you're
not finding any pro marijuana medical marijuana states going on
(17:48):
and insert your own Detroit joke here. Uh we should. Yeah,
we don't have to read through just all those other
hippie states plus Iowa in New Jersey. Yeah, that's so
surprised thing have them Maryland. The thing is, though, is
a lot of these, like you said, a lot of
them rushed to um get laws on the books. Delaware.
(18:10):
I think Delaware just wanted to be like he remember us,
we're really a state. UM, but a lot of them
have backed off, like Rhode Islands UM Governor Lincoln Chaffee
is a vocal supporter of medical marijuana and a big
critic of the federal government for using like goon squad
(18:32):
tactics to like fight it and basically over rule state law. UM.
But even he's back down because federal prosecutors have been like, hey,
don't make us come after your your state employees who
are running these these dispensaries, because we'll put him in
jail and they can do it. Thirty four states, Josh,
(18:53):
have UM laws passed that recognized marijuana as having medical value,
and I think New Mexico was the first one actually
in the oh yeah, yeah, even before California and UM. However,
you know, you know how these laws go. It's like
the gay marriage laws. It's like it's legal and then
it's repealed, and then it's legal, and then it's repealed
(19:16):
and you can do it here, and now you can't.
So there's been a lot of back and forth over
the years with the states. UH, sort of on a
roller coaster that duke in it out with the federal government. Interesting. So, um,
let's talk about California. Let's take California as a state. Yeah,
I love that place. I love California. So California is
(19:37):
I think they were the first state with legal medical marijuana, right,
I think so. I think it's properly to fifteen. Uh.
And they said, hey, if you have a doctor's recommendation,
because we should point out there's no doctor that can
legally prescribe marijuana, because exactly if you walk into your
local drug store, they'll be like, get out of here.
(19:59):
We got marrin all. You want some of that, but
we don't have any pot. Um. So a doctor can
recommend it in a state where you have legal medical marijuana,
that it can say, I doctor feel good, UH, say
that Chuck Bryant uh suffers from glaucoma and to relieve
the interocular eye pressure associated with his condition, I recommend
(20:24):
that he um use medicinal marijuana. And then that's that
signed Dr Kush right, and you, being a medical pot recipient,
would keep that letter on you at all times, depending
on if you were in California, which also passed the
supplemental um law, saying you know what this is, you
(20:45):
can lose your doctor's note or whatever. So let's just
issue I D cards to people who have a doctor's recommendation. Uh,
if you have an ID card or doctor's recommendation, you
can grow and you can um buy pot and possess yeah,
and ostensibly use it. You know what Senate bill that was, yes,
(21:06):
I do. Can you believe it? I could not believe it.
Two thousand three. Um, they passed Senate Bill four twenty
in California which um stipulated the cards and um that
you could have eight ounces of usable marijuana, six mature plants,
or twelve imager plants. Senate bill. That's crazy is that
(21:28):
the two thous three bill? Okay? Um, apparently even more
than that. The state said, by the way, uh, let's
take this down to the county level. You counties, if
you feel like you want to expand upon this, go ahead.
So some counties have been like sure, Like the Humboldt
is one that definitely expanded the amounts that you can
(21:51):
have in the situations in which it's not. Okay, boy,
I had some Humboldt fog two days ago. What cheeze,
it's cheese. But it sounds like marijuana doesn't it does.
And now that you mentioned that, I think I've had
that before too. Is really like yummy blue cheese. Um.
And we got some of the store down the street.
(22:12):
But I laughed, Emily, I was like, it always cracks
me up because some both Fox sounds like one of
those marijuana streams. It definitely does. Yeah, you got me
with that one. You're like, you can't say that, chuck.
Uh so if you so. California also has um what's
called a caregiver law. Yeah. A caregiver is somebody who
(22:34):
basically takes care of you if you're sick, right. Uh.
In California, a caregiver can also refer to a person
who supplies medical marijuana to people who have docutors recommendations. Right. Um,
It's like your grandmother has glaucoma, she didn't know where
to score, right, So you could be her caregiver and
(22:55):
get this for her, or you can be the guy
who's growing it for her. Right. Did you ever see
the Curb your Enthusiasm where Larry got pot for his dad.
He got medical marijuanta for his dad because he had
I think it was glaucoma, And he smoked with him
and showed him how to do it and everything, and
(23:16):
like went in the bathroom and freaked out. It was
pretty funny. Yeah, and the whole buying process. So it
was the guy from Lost. Hurley from Lost was the
pot dealer. It was really really funny. It was good.
Oh yeah, did you ever see the Mr. Show sketch
about medical marijuana. The pharmacist who has the brownies? Yeah, yeah,
(23:37):
and he always wants to play like the music he
recorded on his four track Yeah for everybody. Well, it's
it's funny. You mentioned that though, because at some of
these dispensaries, um, you can buy things like brownies and
butter and cookies and smoothies and yeah, because not everybody
wants to smoke pot. Who has a medical cannabis exactly? Okay,
(23:58):
so you have a recommended and you have a caregiver
that you go to, and the caregiver, um, so this
is where it gets really cloudy. They the Feds don't
go after patients, even during the Bush years um and
now which is worse than the Bush years. Um. They
they have never gone after patients. It's basically, don't go
(24:20):
after patients. Caregivers used to be protected, but because caregiver
is also basically synonymous for pot dealer in medical marijuana
states that that's no longer you're if you are one
of those caregivers who's really like spending your You live
with your elderly grandmother and you're taking care of her,
(24:40):
and she has medical marijuana that she takes and you
go get it for you're in jeopardy now too, because
a lot of these operations have gotten very, very big,
and though they may be bona fide and legitimate, they
may not be making any profit, which is part of
the law. Um, they are considered caregivers rather than like
dispensaries or anything like that. So that's what's clouded the issue.
You that's where a lot of the protections for regular
(25:03):
people who are caregivers are being stripped away. It got
out of hand and it was people like Dr Cush
sprung up and all of a sudden there were dispensaries
that weren't co ops where you have actually members growing
the weed for the co op. That's just say weed
stead of marijuana, medical weed, medical weed. Um. They supposedly
(25:27):
a lot of them were buying it illegally, making profit
off of it and kind of screwed it up. For
the legitimate ones. It is a cloudy issue. That's where
we're at right now. Basically, it sounds like some there
were either um, some groups who just want pro or
decriminalization of marijuana altogether, who were using this issue to
(25:49):
just force it through, hammer it through, or probably more realistically,
there were just a bunch of hoot dealers who found
like a lot a very easy cuss immers by supplying
these co ops. Americans, by and large, if you believe poles,
are in favor of medical marijuana for people who really
(26:10):
need it. Um CBS News did a poll last year
UM seventy seven percent of Americans thought doctors should be
allowed to prescribe it for serious illness. And there was
a gallop pole in two thousand and ten UM that said,
do you favor or oppose to reduce to allow medical
marijuana just to reduce pain and suffering for people with disease,
(26:31):
and seventy were proc said oh, and three percent said no,
absolutely not. So it's pretty pretty low percentage. And again
we're pointing out this is for people who need it
for their disease. It's not to be confused with pot
legalization for recreation. Two different things did you know that
the v A in two thousand and ten, I believe
(26:53):
UM said that recommended cannabis, medical cannabis for soldiers returning
home them. What for PTSD, I believe PTSD. I'm sure
all sorts of other things. It's a legitimate course of
treatment for soldiers returning from the front lines. Wow, isn't
that crazy? It's interesting? Uh. And speaking of l A,
(27:14):
you know they hit their peak in uh two thousand
nine ish with you know what, they said, anywhere from
six hundred to a thousand dispensaries, and they said, you
know what, the city said, this is getting way out
of hand, Like you've got a strip mall over there
with like three medical marijuana dispensaries in it. That's kind
of ridiculous. So they ordered, um, four hundred and thirty
(27:38):
nine of them to be closed. Uh. And I think
what was the It was only dispensaries that registered with
the city after the council adopted the moratorium in two
thousand seven were allowed to operate. So about a hundred
and thirty of the six hundred roughly were allowed to
stay open that were registered after the moratorium or for
(28:00):
it says, after which that doesn't make any sense. Yeah,
it doesn't make any The most unfair law This is
from the LA Times too. But now people are, you know,
filing lawsuits and and such on on patients rights lawsuits
and uh, stuff like that. It's a it's a wild ride, man.
It's interesting to watch. You need to see anybody who
(28:22):
can use the help of something like medical marijuana being
denied it and suffer well. And that's the point of
one of the attorney says, He's like, why should we
treat them any different than the vicat and patient or
the OxyContin patient. Um. They did do a study to
when they closed down all those hundreds of dispensaries about crime,
and it was a Rand Corp study and they found
(28:44):
that crime went down, um with the dispensaries, and crime
went up when they closed him. But it was a
pretty hinky study. Admittedly, Yeah, they only looked at ten
days before and ten days after, and um, it was
within three tenths of a mile of the closed facility
there was a increase in crime. H within six tenths
(29:09):
It was just it was a pretty hinky study. Basically,
Even the people that are for it were like, come on,
you need to do a better job than this. If
you're going to study crime, well, I will tell you this. UM.
In that Rolling Stone article, the United Food and Commercial
Workers Union estimates that umred jobs have been lost since
the federal crackdown starting in the beginning of two thousand
(29:31):
and eleven. Jobs in this economy. That's unconscionable us. All right,
do you have anything else? No? I don't. Let's do
a follow up on this in five years. Good idea. Yeah,
you got anything else? I got nothing else. I don't either.
If you want to learn more about medical marijuana, you
(29:52):
can type those words into the search bar how stuff
works dot com. UM. That's m A R I JU
A n A. I believe uh. And since I said
handy search parts the time for listener mail. Actually I
did have one more thing. Brownie Mary. You ever heard
of her? She was a famous uh medical marijuana activists
(30:15):
in San Francisco, This elderly woman who would make brownies
for people, UM and you know, really went to the
mat for for people in need. Her name was Mary Jane.
That was her real name, Mary Jane. I can't think
of her last name. Let's call her that. I don't
know Brownie Mary because she delivered the brownies. I guess
Brownie Mary or Brownie Mary Jane. That's much better. She
(30:37):
always laughed about her name. Supposedly she was like, Hey,
I guess I was destined to do this, but those
of you don't know, Mary Jane is a street term
for marijuana. If it's okay, Josh, I'm gonna call this. Uh.
It was just sort of a weird email from a
dude in Minneapolis. Hey, guys, I was just listening to
(30:58):
the Mexican Wrestling podcast and you called for something to
knock your socks off. I thought i'd shared this with you.
Please take a moment to aim your feet away from
anyone's face unless they want a knocked off sock up
in their grill. Are you ready for this? I was
an anthropological expedition. I was on one into the heart
(31:19):
of the darkest Iowa, researching archaeological and cultural leads regarding
a Mayan prince who fell out of favor and may
or may not have traveled up the Mississippi in twelve
seventy BC, setting up a kingdom in exile somewhere around
the current town of Farmersburg. Ancient text also hint that
he appointed a monkey as his head of agriculture, which
(31:41):
was particularly interesting to me because I think monkeys are hilarious. Anyway,
I was excavating near Farmersburg, uh their single stop sign,
when I was suddenly surrounded by a street gang. They
all had switchblades, so you knew they meant business. Their
leader threatened me by saying, I only need to touch
(32:01):
you once, like touching the wings of a butterfly, then
you're dead, to which I replied, actually that's a myth.
You can touch their wings without killing them as long
as you know break the veins. Clearly a reference to
our show on your dethence right, uh? Or no? Was
that part of your Desthence in this manner, I opened
up a dialogue and we discussed briefly butterfly anatomy, the
(32:25):
difference between cumulus and Sirrhus clouds, and the way the
sun works. They were so impressed by my knowledge they
not only let me live, but they gave me a
gift certificate to Applebee's made an honorary member of their gang,
the Lords of Lepidoperative lepidoptery. This is the study of flies. Anyway,
(32:46):
I just wanted to thank you and share a first
day knowledge. Uh is truly power yours innertitude Matt from
Innneapolis that I don't think it's true at all, but
I think it's hysterical. And Matt took great time and
crafting a very clever email. So yeah, of course not
a monkey head of agriculture. I don't know, man, maybe
(33:06):
that parts true. The minds were awfully rich, true, and
they were I guess in Iowa. Yes, Um, well, let's see.
If you want to take the time to craft a
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(33:29):
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(33:49):
of tomorrow, brought to you by the reinvented two thousand
twelve camera. It's ready, are you
Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
It's ready. Are you welcome to you Stuff you Should
Know from House Stuff Works dot Com. Hey, and welcome
to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. This is Charles W.
Chuck Bryant, who is seated across from me. Hello, and uh,
(00:23):
you put the two of us together, you get a
podcast called Stuff you Should Know? Like it or not exactly? Um,
how are you doing? I'm well, I'm glad. Uh, Chuck,
We're going to talk today about why don't think is
a pretty important issue. Uh, medical marijuana. We've spoken for
(00:45):
about the potential health benefits a plenty of other drugs, ecstasy, LSD, psilocybin, mushrooms.
I feel like it's high time. Did you do that
on purpose? Sadly not interesting that we did medical marijuana.
This article had a couple of those little puns that
(01:08):
I thought were one strain of research man that silverman
thought he was so funny for getting that in there
and just like freaking the man out. So where do
we start? Do you have an intro? No? I don't
have an intro. I feel like this, uh, this subject
itself needs no intro. It's using pot marijuana for medicinal purposes,
(01:31):
and apparently there is a pretty extensive body of research
showing that it does in fact help, that seven hundred
and thirty thousand UH people who have grave diseases and
illnesses aren't really just faking so they can smoke pot,
that the stuff is helping. UM. There's a lot of
(01:53):
diseases that Jacob Silverman lists that this UM that medical
marijuana has been shown to howl with. Do you know
what they are? You recite them in alphabetical order. Well,
I have two lists UM. The list in the article
says nausea, especially chemotherapy, nausea, loss of appetite, chronic pain, anxiety, arthritis, cancer, AIDS, glaucoma,
(02:17):
MS or multiple sclerosis, insomnia, A d H D epilepsy, inflammation, migraines,
Crohn's disease, and if you're terminally ill, to improve your
quality of life. This is a list on the sign
outside of the Cush Doctor at Venice Beach, California. And
(02:39):
there's a lot more things on this list. Do you
suffer from? UM? They also include in here sickle cell anemia, UM,
psychiatric disorders basically anything autoimmune, sleep, disorders, and it says,
I think either sleeplessness or too sleepy? Does it say that? Yeah? Um?
(03:04):
Any any well? At list about twenty more things, and
then at the bottom it says, or any chronic or
persistent medical symptom. Write anything fingernail hurt right now. So
that's what the cush doctor will And that is an
actual I'm not just making that up at Venice speech.
I saw the picture. It says, cush doctor, and um,
(03:25):
you can go in there with your little card and
get you some pot. So what you've just gotten at
is the heart of this problem. Like there is plenty
of legitimate, bona fide medical research that shows that marijuana
does help ease symptoms. It does a special double weighamy
on people who are nauseated and don't have any appetite,
(03:46):
which is a terrible symptom of several diseases, cancer AIDS.
So you have this part of the medical establishment saying yes,
pot helps, and then you have the drug warriors, the
d e A, lots of US district attorneys, plenty of
the square Americans, um saying now it's a drug, and um,
(04:14):
there's gonna be plenty of guys like the cush doctor
who are just gonna sell it to anybody they can
and use any medical marijuana laws that you enact as
a shield to operate criminally from behind, like don't don't
take that drug. So um. For a long time, the
medical marijuana idea has been taken up by states. It's
(04:38):
been a state's rights issue also, um. But the federal
government apparently was the first ones to ever legalize um
or sell or supply legal medical marijuana from a program
that ran from nineteen seventy. UM. It kind of petered
out in the states, starting with California really took up
(04:58):
the cause. Yeah, for a while, they did not sit
very well, especially during the Bush years. That did not
sit well with the federal government, and the Feds used
to routinely raid uh legitimate uh medical pot dispensaries that
were operating within the letter of state law because federal
law supersede state law. So the d A can read
(05:21):
you anytime they want, because according to the federal government,
pots still a drug. It doesn't matter what your state says,
right right. UM. With Obama, he came into office saying,
you know what, I'm not going to waste the resources
of the d O j on cracking down on legal
pot operations. Yeah, that was in two thousand nine, um
(05:43):
and memo. Yeah, and things really launched after that, like
more states pass legislation and more dispensaries like in l A.
At the time, after that passed, they say there could
have been up to a thousand dispensaries in l A proper,
but then they and said no, it was more like six.
(06:04):
But what happened recently, well, UM, the the head of
the d A, UM, a woman named Michelle Leonhardt was
She was appointed by Bush and Obama reappointed her and
shortly after her reappointment, she rewrote the d a's position
(06:26):
on medical marijuana, saying like no, it's a drug and
we're gonna go after it. And her, let's see leon
Hart with the help of the district attorney no USA
U S attorney UM by less name of Hague. I
can't remember first name, Melissa Hague maybe she Um. She
(06:48):
started basically prosecuting we're sending sending the d e A
to medical dispensaries, and everything just totally changed, like it
just went backwards by years when it looked like it
was all about to change. Yeah, and um, the media
and especially the liberal media have held Obama's feet to
(07:08):
the fire, and they're like, dude, what is up with
this reversal? And um, isn't this probably just election year
campaign strategy And they're like, no, it's not a reversal. Really,
it's sort of the same as it always was. Really
but not really No, And apparently with so this is um.
Chuck and I both thread a really good article called
(07:30):
um Obama's Warm Pot in Rolling Stone. It's very thorough. Um.
But the the there there has basically been a step
up in the way that medical marijuana and the people
who use it and prescribe it are being treated by
the federal government. Um. With there there's been a hundred
raids so far, at least a hundred rates carried out
(07:52):
under Obama's watch. So if it keeps if it keeps
up with this pace, then um, he will be worse
than Bush as far as medical marijuana raids. Uh. And
this one guy, Rob Campia, who was executive director of
the Marijuana Policy Project, said that Obama is the worst
(08:12):
president on medical marijuana. Crazy. It is just totally crazy
because that's not what he said during the campaign. And Uh,
the I don't know, no what need astorney. I'm one
of the residents of Colorado that was campaigning hard to
you know, to keep this going against Obama even though
he voted for him, said he needs to watch it
because quote, medical marijuana is twice as popular as he is.
(08:36):
So he says he's already lost that vote no matter
what happens. So we'll see how this shakes down, all right. So, uh,
California has been studying this since about two thousand. In
earnest um, they were given about nine million bucks to
do genuine medical research on the effectiveness of marijuana for
(09:00):
different usually pain causing and nausea causing diseases. And um.
It's always been hard to do these studies though, because
the federal government, if they're gonna give you money, they're
gonna regulate like where the pot comes from. And this
at the time was that you see San Diego. They
would only let them get it from one place, one source,
(09:20):
and then they would visit them. Federal agents would in
uh the Medical Cannabis Research Center to verify that it
was kept in a vault that was bolted to the floor,
so they would, you know, they want to come by
and make sure they were all sitting around smoking joints
and like playing ping pong. You guess which I mean.
I guess if you are kind of hung up on
(09:42):
testing with medical marijuana, that's cool. That's your right to
drop by and make sure that everything is here and
it's not being Yeah, I'm not liking that. Um. The
federal government started, like like the the head of the
Bureau of Alcohol to back on firearms. Then a lighter
to firearms dealers saying it's um, it's illegal to sell
afire are armed to a person addicted to marijuana. So
(10:02):
if you are, if you are receiving medical cannabis, you
just had your Second Amendment right strip from your banks
are worried about getting prosecuted for money laundering by dealing
with dispensaries medical marijuana dispensaries. So now it's starting to
go to a cash only I eat, more dangerous business
for prone to robberies and tax evasion. It's just like
(10:25):
definitely going backwards, huge huge steps backwards. It's crazy, and
by backwards, I should say, if you're pro medical marijuana, sure,
let's talk about why um pot might help. Okay, th
HC is in um it's a cannaba cannabinoid in marijuana,
and that's what makes you feel high, and it's also
(10:47):
where you find your medicinal properties. They're all locked in
there together because we produce our own cannabinoids in the
form of indo cannabinoids naturally. Yes, so we have endocannabinoid receptors, right,
an abinoid, Yeah, cannabinoid. I like the way you said,
it's kind of pleasing phenomena UM in our body. And
when they are when they receive something, when something is
(11:10):
recepted to them, uh, they release things like pain relievers,
reduced anxiety. It has a whole just a whole lot
of effects on us mood, memory, appetite. Well, it has
a negative impact on memory. I think, well, it's it's
just to regulates these responses whether or not there makes
(11:31):
you sleepy or hungry or not. So with some with
some diseases, UM, this combination of UM introducing THHC to
the ENDO can now I can't say it correctly. Endocannabinoid
receptor UM results in increased appetite, results in UM lesson
(11:51):
muscle spasms. If you have multiple sclerosis, UM or if
you're quadriplegic, UM results in just a greater outlook a
sense of well being if you're dying. All these things
that have been studied and document it is actually working.
I got one for you. Uh. They did a study
in mice that showed that the cannabinoids may protect against
(12:15):
development of certain types of tumors, both benign and cancerous.
And not only that, listen to this. It appears to
kill only the tumor cells and may even protect the
healthy cells from cell death. That is some pot That's
pretty rad. That's all I'm saying. So on the other hand,
you've got people saying, Okay, all right, I'm going to
take the medical establishment at face value, and um say, yes,
(12:41):
THHD hit your endocannabinoid receptors and produces it alleviates a
lot of symptoms of certain diseases. Can we just not
come up with something that doesn't get you high? And uh,
some drug companies have been like, yes we can, and
they introduced um shiny black pills called marian All, which
is synthetic THHC. Josh, I have had a Marino pill?
(13:04):
Really did it? Did it alleviate your symptoms? Uh? It
was a very mild thing, to be honest. And this
was this was many years ago when I was living
in Los Angeles. But um, yes, I've had a marinal pill,
and it's did you get it from Dr Couch? Now
I didn't. But it is funny how you just pointed
out because that kind of debated off air. I was like,
should I say that I've had a marinal pill. We're like, well, yeah,
(13:27):
it's an FDA proved drug, Like you can say that,
but you can't say, yeah, I smoked pot and not
get you know, the cross side stairs. Sure, it's just interesting,
Yeah it is. That's I guess that's at the heart
of all this. It's kind of like this this drug,
the synthetic drug, yeah, uh, that you can get through
(13:49):
a prescription right and go to your pharmacy and they'll
give it to you. Um, you can have that, but
this this drug gros in the ground, right, Yeah, that
actually works better than this other drug, the synthetic version
of it, supposedly. That's the big um complaint against marian
all is that it's like it's a synthetic teaching, but
(14:11):
it's lacking some really important parts. Yeah, well, and it
absolutely is lacking. I mean chemically it's it's lacking. But um,
but you can't have that and I'm really reminded of this,
Like this is where like witches and doctors came from
from the struggle of like the I guess some Middle Ages,
so where science was really starting to kind of come
(14:33):
about and um, to basically maintain a foothold or create
a foothold for itself over Western society, it had to
get rid of its rivals, which were um traditional healers
who very quickly became witches and outcasts and were ostracized
(14:53):
as backward and possibly even evil. So don't go to them,
come to me, because I'm the guy with the beat on.
We can protect you from the plague. Look at you,
Arthur Miller. But isn't that Isn't that kind of analogous? Yeah?
I think so. Um. There's also, uh, that's very astute, Josh,
thank you. Um. There's also a tv X which is
(15:16):
um a pain reliever, and it is actually an extract
of real marijuana administered by spray and I think they
have that's in England, Spain, and Canada, and it's in
trials here in the US. Yeah, so that's not synthetic,
that's actually an extract. Yeah. I'll bet everybody who uses
it goes oh, I can't. I don't feel any pain,
(15:38):
but you might as well just use this. Uh what's
the stuff you spray when you have tonsillitis? Oh? Yeah,
might as well just use superl That's not the one
I was thinking of, though, is the uh so, Like
you said, most experts agree that mare and all um
and it's at vax actually in clinical riles show to
(16:00):
have less of an effect than actual the marijuana plant itself.
But the d e A points out t S this
is what this is legal that and they make a
pretty good point here that um may and all is
the THHC what morphine is to opium. Like, yeah, you
might need morphine. We're not gonna tell you it's okay
(16:22):
to go smoke opium for your pain. There's morphine. Go
use the morphine. It's legal, it's regulated, it's taxed, and
it's not gonna get you landed in jail unless you
get your hands on it illegally. So the Feds are
the ones who are definitely blocking this right now. UM
this I should say in in a lot of states,
(16:42):
there's eighteen states, including d C that have UM laws
on the books that say, yeah, man, you you we've
got legalized medical marijuana to some degree. Yeah, and Oregon
is the king Daddy of medical marijuana. California was Yeah,
I mean there's probably more dispensaries and things like that.
(17:04):
But in Oregon you are allowed to possess up to
twenty four ounces of you what they call usable marijuana,
or twenty four plants um, six of which can be mature,
eighteen of which can be immature, which means they're like flowering,
budding plants. They were Jeane jackets. So Washington's right behind them.
(17:26):
You can possess twenty four ounces or fifteen plants, and
uh not surprisingly, there are no states in the Southeast,
and Michigan is the only state in the Midwest. Uh
So yeah, in these in these Bible Belt areas, you're
not finding any pro marijuana medical marijuana states going on
(17:48):
and insert your own Detroit joke here. Uh we should. Yeah,
we don't have to read through just all those other
hippie states plus Iowa in New Jersey. Yeah, that's so
surprised thing have them Maryland. The thing is, though, is
a lot of these, like you said, a lot of
them rushed to um get laws on the books. Delaware.
(18:10):
I think Delaware just wanted to be like he remember us,
we're really a state. UM, but a lot of them
have backed off, like Rhode Islands UM Governor Lincoln Chaffee
is a vocal supporter of medical marijuana and a big
critic of the federal government for using like goon squad
(18:32):
tactics to like fight it and basically over rule state law. UM.
But even he's back down because federal prosecutors have been like, hey,
don't make us come after your your state employees who
are running these these dispensaries, because we'll put him in
jail and they can do it. Thirty four states, Josh,
(18:53):
have UM laws passed that recognized marijuana as having medical value,
and I think New Mexico was the first one actually
in the oh yeah, yeah, even before California and UM. However,
you know, you know how these laws go. It's like
the gay marriage laws. It's like it's legal and then
it's repealed, and then it's legal, and then it's repealed
(19:16):
and you can do it here, and now you can't.
So there's been a lot of back and forth over
the years with the states. UH, sort of on a
roller coaster that duke in it out with the federal government. Interesting. So, um,
let's talk about California. Let's take California as a state. Yeah,
I love that place. I love California. So California is
(19:37):
I think they were the first state with legal medical marijuana, right,
I think so. I think it's properly to fifteen. Uh.
And they said, hey, if you have a doctor's recommendation,
because we should point out there's no doctor that can
legally prescribe marijuana, because exactly if you walk into your
local drug store, they'll be like, get out of here.
(19:59):
We got marrin all. You want some of that, but
we don't have any pot. Um. So a doctor can
recommend it in a state where you have legal medical marijuana,
that it can say, I doctor feel good, UH, say
that Chuck Bryant uh suffers from glaucoma and to relieve
the interocular eye pressure associated with his condition, I recommend
(20:24):
that he um use medicinal marijuana. And then that's that
signed Dr Kush right, and you, being a medical pot recipient,
would keep that letter on you at all times, depending
on if you were in California, which also passed the
supplemental um law, saying you know what this is, you
(20:45):
can lose your doctor's note or whatever. So let's just
issue I D cards to people who have a doctor's recommendation. Uh,
if you have an ID card or doctor's recommendation, you
can grow and you can um buy pot and possess yeah,
and ostensibly use it. You know what Senate bill that was, yes,
(21:06):
I do. Can you believe it? I could not believe it.
Two thousand three. Um, they passed Senate Bill four twenty
in California which um stipulated the cards and um that
you could have eight ounces of usable marijuana, six mature plants,
or twelve imager plants. Senate bill. That's crazy is that
(21:28):
the two thous three bill? Okay? Um, apparently even more
than that. The state said, by the way, uh, let's
take this down to the county level. You counties, if
you feel like you want to expand upon this, go ahead.
So some counties have been like sure, Like the Humboldt
is one that definitely expanded the amounts that you can
(21:51):
have in the situations in which it's not. Okay, boy,
I had some Humboldt fog two days ago. What cheeze,
it's cheese. But it sounds like marijuana doesn't it does.
And now that you mentioned that, I think I've had
that before too. Is really like yummy blue cheese. Um.
And we got some of the store down the street.
(22:12):
But I laughed, Emily, I was like, it always cracks
me up because some both Fox sounds like one of
those marijuana streams. It definitely does. Yeah, you got me
with that one. You're like, you can't say that, chuck.
Uh so if you so. California also has um what's
called a caregiver law. Yeah. A caregiver is somebody who
(22:34):
basically takes care of you if you're sick, right. Uh.
In California, a caregiver can also refer to a person
who supplies medical marijuana to people who have docutors recommendations. Right. Um,
It's like your grandmother has glaucoma, she didn't know where
to score, right, So you could be her caregiver and
(22:55):
get this for her, or you can be the guy
who's growing it for her. Right. Did you ever see
the Curb your Enthusiasm where Larry got pot for his dad.
He got medical marijuanta for his dad because he had
I think it was glaucoma, And he smoked with him
and showed him how to do it and everything, and
(23:16):
like went in the bathroom and freaked out. It was
pretty funny. Yeah, and the whole buying process. So it
was the guy from Lost. Hurley from Lost was the
pot dealer. It was really really funny. It was good.
Oh yeah, did you ever see the Mr. Show sketch
about medical marijuana. The pharmacist who has the brownies? Yeah, yeah,
(23:37):
and he always wants to play like the music he
recorded on his four track Yeah for everybody. Well, it's
it's funny. You mentioned that though, because at some of
these dispensaries, um, you can buy things like brownies and
butter and cookies and smoothies and yeah, because not everybody
wants to smoke pot. Who has a medical cannabis exactly? Okay,
(23:58):
so you have a recommended and you have a caregiver
that you go to, and the caregiver, um, so this
is where it gets really cloudy. They the Feds don't
go after patients, even during the Bush years um and
now which is worse than the Bush years. Um. They
they have never gone after patients. It's basically, don't go
(24:20):
after patients. Caregivers used to be protected, but because caregiver
is also basically synonymous for pot dealer in medical marijuana
states that that's no longer you're if you are one
of those caregivers who's really like spending your You live
with your elderly grandmother and you're taking care of her,
(24:40):
and she has medical marijuana that she takes and you
go get it for you're in jeopardy now too, because
a lot of these operations have gotten very, very big,
and though they may be bona fide and legitimate, they
may not be making any profit, which is part of
the law. Um, they are considered caregivers rather than like
dispensaries or anything like that. So that's what's clouded the issue.
You that's where a lot of the protections for regular
(25:03):
people who are caregivers are being stripped away. It got
out of hand and it was people like Dr Cush
sprung up and all of a sudden there were dispensaries
that weren't co ops where you have actually members growing
the weed for the co op. That's just say weed
stead of marijuana, medical weed, medical weed. Um. They supposedly
(25:27):
a lot of them were buying it illegally, making profit
off of it and kind of screwed it up. For
the legitimate ones. It is a cloudy issue. That's where
we're at right now. Basically, it sounds like some there
were either um, some groups who just want pro or
decriminalization of marijuana altogether, who were using this issue to
(25:49):
just force it through, hammer it through, or probably more realistically,
there were just a bunch of hoot dealers who found
like a lot a very easy cuss immers by supplying
these co ops. Americans, by and large, if you believe poles,
are in favor of medical marijuana for people who really
(26:10):
need it. Um CBS News did a poll last year
UM seventy seven percent of Americans thought doctors should be
allowed to prescribe it for serious illness. And there was
a gallop pole in two thousand and ten UM that said,
do you favor or oppose to reduce to allow medical
marijuana just to reduce pain and suffering for people with disease,
(26:31):
and seventy were proc said oh, and three percent said no,
absolutely not. So it's pretty pretty low percentage. And again
we're pointing out this is for people who need it
for their disease. It's not to be confused with pot
legalization for recreation. Two different things did you know that
the v A in two thousand and ten, I believe
(26:53):
UM said that recommended cannabis, medical cannabis for soldiers returning
home them. What for PTSD, I believe PTSD. I'm sure
all sorts of other things. It's a legitimate course of
treatment for soldiers returning from the front lines. Wow, isn't
that crazy? It's interesting? Uh. And speaking of l A,
(27:14):
you know they hit their peak in uh two thousand
nine ish with you know what, they said, anywhere from
six hundred to a thousand dispensaries, and they said, you
know what, the city said, this is getting way out
of hand, Like you've got a strip mall over there
with like three medical marijuana dispensaries in it. That's kind
of ridiculous. So they ordered, um, four hundred and thirty
(27:38):
nine of them to be closed. Uh. And I think
what was the It was only dispensaries that registered with
the city after the council adopted the moratorium in two
thousand seven were allowed to operate. So about a hundred
and thirty of the six hundred roughly were allowed to
stay open that were registered after the moratorium or for
(28:00):
it says, after which that doesn't make any sense. Yeah,
it doesn't make any The most unfair law This is
from the LA Times too. But now people are, you know,
filing lawsuits and and such on on patients rights lawsuits
and uh, stuff like that. It's a it's a wild ride, man.
It's interesting to watch. You need to see anybody who
(28:22):
can use the help of something like medical marijuana being
denied it and suffer well. And that's the point of
one of the attorney says, He's like, why should we
treat them any different than the vicat and patient or
the OxyContin patient. Um. They did do a study to
when they closed down all those hundreds of dispensaries about crime,
and it was a Rand Corp study and they found
(28:44):
that crime went down, um with the dispensaries, and crime
went up when they closed him. But it was a
pretty hinky study. Admittedly, Yeah, they only looked at ten
days before and ten days after, and um, it was
within three tenths of a mile of the closed facility
there was a increase in crime. H within six tenths
(29:09):
It was just it was a pretty hinky study. Basically,
Even the people that are for it were like, come on,
you need to do a better job than this. If
you're going to study crime, well, I will tell you this. UM.
In that Rolling Stone article, the United Food and Commercial
Workers Union estimates that umred jobs have been lost since
the federal crackdown starting in the beginning of two thousand
(29:31):
and eleven. Jobs in this economy. That's unconscionable us. All right,
do you have anything else? No? I don't. Let's do
a follow up on this in five years. Good idea. Yeah,
you got anything else? I got nothing else. I don't either.
If you want to learn more about medical marijuana, you
(29:52):
can type those words into the search bar how stuff
works dot com. UM. That's m A R I JU
A n A. I believe uh. And since I said
handy search parts the time for listener mail. Actually I
did have one more thing. Brownie Mary. You ever heard
of her? She was a famous uh medical marijuana activists
(30:15):
in San Francisco, This elderly woman who would make brownies
for people, UM and you know, really went to the
mat for for people in need. Her name was Mary Jane.
That was her real name, Mary Jane. I can't think
of her last name. Let's call her that. I don't
know Brownie Mary because she delivered the brownies. I guess
Brownie Mary or Brownie Mary Jane. That's much better. She
(30:37):
always laughed about her name. Supposedly she was like, Hey,
I guess I was destined to do this, but those
of you don't know, Mary Jane is a street term
for marijuana. If it's okay, Josh, I'm gonna call this. Uh.
It was just sort of a weird email from a
dude in Minneapolis. Hey, guys, I was just listening to
(30:58):
the Mexican Wrestling podcast and you called for something to
knock your socks off. I thought i'd shared this with you.
Please take a moment to aim your feet away from
anyone's face unless they want a knocked off sock up
in their grill. Are you ready for this? I was
an anthropological expedition. I was on one into the heart
(31:19):
of the darkest Iowa, researching archaeological and cultural leads regarding
a Mayan prince who fell out of favor and may
or may not have traveled up the Mississippi in twelve
seventy BC, setting up a kingdom in exile somewhere around
the current town of Farmersburg. Ancient text also hint that
he appointed a monkey as his head of agriculture, which
(31:41):
was particularly interesting to me because I think monkeys are hilarious. Anyway,
I was excavating near Farmersburg, uh their single stop sign,
when I was suddenly surrounded by a street gang. They
all had switchblades, so you knew they meant business. Their
leader threatened me by saying, I only need to touch
(32:01):
you once, like touching the wings of a butterfly, then
you're dead, to which I replied, actually that's a myth.
You can touch their wings without killing them as long
as you know break the veins. Clearly a reference to
our show on your dethence right, uh? Or no? Was
that part of your Desthence in this manner, I opened
up a dialogue and we discussed briefly butterfly anatomy, the
(32:25):
difference between cumulus and Sirrhus clouds, and the way the
sun works. They were so impressed by my knowledge they
not only let me live, but they gave me a
gift certificate to Applebee's made an honorary member of their gang,
the Lords of Lepidoperative lepidoptery. This is the study of flies. Anyway,
(32:46):
I just wanted to thank you and share a first
day knowledge. Uh is truly power yours innertitude Matt from
Innneapolis that I don't think it's true at all, but
I think it's hysterical. And Matt took great time and
crafting a very clever email. So yeah, of course not
a monkey head of agriculture. I don't know, man, maybe
(33:06):
that parts true. The minds were awfully rich, true, and
they were I guess in Iowa. Yes, Um, well, let's see.
If you want to take the time to craft a
very clever email that captures our attention, we are always
happy to read it. Um you can, well, you can
tweet it to us if it's really short, tweet to
s y s K podcast, hit us up on Facebook
(33:29):
at Facebook dot com, slash Stuff you Should Know, and
you can send us an email to Stuff Podcast at
Discovery dot com. Be sure to check out our new
video podcast, Stuff from the Future. Join How Stuff Work
staff as we explore the most promising and perplexing possibilities
(33:49):
of tomorrow, brought to you by the reinvented two thousand
twelve camera. It's ready, are you
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Josh Clark
Chuck Bryant
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