[BOT] Experimenting with delta-8, marijuana to understand Texas controversy

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Experimenting with delta-8, marijuana to understand Texas controversy

Found: Fri Sep 27 14:06:54 2024 PDT Source: Express (CN BC) Copyright: 2024 Kootenay Express Communication Contact: express@expressnews.bc.ca Website: http://www.expressnews.ca Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2374 Source: Express (Nelson, CN BC) Copyright: 2024 Kootenay Express Communication Corp. Contact: http://www.expressnews.ca/letters.html Website: http://www.expressnews.ca Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2339 Webpage: http://www.expressnews.com/business/column... [translate] Author: Chris Tomlinson, ColumnistSep, chris.tomlinson@houstonch Newshawk: http://drugpolicycentral.com/bot/

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Experimenting with delta-8, marijuana to understand Texas controversy Experimenting with delta-8, marijuana to understand Texas controversy

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I tried delta-8, delta-9 and marijuana to understand the cannabis controversy

Texas lawmakers are considering banning hemp products because they make people high like marijuana. So, I did a taste test.

By Chris Tomlinson, ColumnistSep 27, 2024

Products containing delta-8 THC are displayed next to the snacks and candies they resemble.Hannah Meisel/Capitol News Illinois

Army veteran Ty Cobb, shops for CBD gummies, which he says helps reduce his anxiety, in February 2023 in Houston.Raquel Natalicchio/Staff photographer

A woman walks by a display of hi Seltzer at a Spec's Wine, Spirits & Finer Foods store in Houston.Jon Shapley/Staff photographer

Products advertised as containing synthetically derived delta-8 THC are offered for sale at a smoke shop.Gene Johnson/AP

I don't always use cannabis, but when I do, I smoke marijuana.

Admittedly, I am an extremely infrequent user. I dabble when I visit places where recreational marijuana is legal or when my delinquent college friends show up. But I had never sampled products made with delta-8, a psychoactive form of hemp-derived THC, before I wrote about proposals to ban it.

After much reader feedback, I sampled hemp-derived delta-8 and delta-9 gummies sold in retail stores and compared them to marijuana gummies. I did this for you, dear reader, to understand why Republican leaders and marijuana growers are so upset over hemp products, which generate more than $6 billion in legal revenue for Texas farms and businesses.

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First, let's review how Texas retailers came to sell hemp-derived THC.

Hemp and marijuana are the same plant. The legal difference is the amount of THC found in different varietals. Less than 0.3% on a dry weight basis is legal hemp under federal and state law; anything more is illegal marijuana.

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Cannabis chemistry, though, is far more complicated than the law recognizes, and entrepreneurs are exploiting the ambiguity. As one retailer incorrectly claimed: "As long as the plant is under 0.3%, we can do anything we want with it."

For example, I previously wrote that two forms of THC are at issue: naturally occurring delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol from marijuana, which makes you high, and hemp-derived delta-8-tetrahydrocannabinol, which makes you not so high. Delta-9 can land you in jail, while delta-8 is legal. But that's not the whole story.

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Texas law allows doctors to prescribe stronger, marijuana-derived products under the Compassionate Use Program. Medical marijuana growers are frustrated, though, because they say people aren't getting prescriptions because they are getting high from hemp.

Hemp manufacturers have stepped up the competition by extracting delta-9 from hemp plants. The U.S. Department of Agriculture requires that all consumable hemp products contain less than a 0.3% concentration of THC, but you'll still feel something.

Cannabis plants have 113 cannabinoids that have potential applications. One of them is THCA, a substance abundant in raw cannabis that will not make you high but reportedly helps with inflammation. THCA, in small amounts, is considered legal.

If you heat THCA in a vape pen or bong, though, it turns into delta-9 THC through a process called decarboxylation. Some hemp manufacturers are isolating THCA crystals and adding them to hemp flowers so that when smoked, the weed gives a high like marijuana.

Here's the kicker. If law enforcement finds someone with a product that looks like marijuana, even if it is labeled a hemp product, the lab test could decarboxylate the THCA and show an illegal level of delta-9. North Texas police have started charging shop owners and consumers with possessing illegal marijuana, even if the products were sold as hemp.

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THC purveyors are angry, the police are frustrated, and conservatives want to ban it all. But what is the consumer experience?

I have chronic back pain and sometimes experience insomnia. So, I purchased delta-8 gummies manufactured by an approved hemp company from a smoke shop. I chose an Indica strain to promote relaxation before bed.

I definitely felt intoxicated by the 5-milligram dose and would not have tried to drive a car. The sensation was stronger than I expected, but it relieved my pain, and I slept well. The next morning, I woke up before the alarm and felt fine.

A few nights later, I took a similar dose of delta-9, also in gummy form, from another Texas hemp company. The experience felt the same as the marijuana gummy I had taken five days before. I was intoxicated, and my mind wandered in that cliche way portrayed in movies. The delta-9 eased my back pain but, like marijuana, triggered insomnia.

Lastly, I tried a hemp-derived THC beverage, and I felt a mild buzz that helped me sleep well.

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The hemp products I tested justified the marijuana industry's complaints that hemp is getting a pass on regulation. But the intoxication is only slightly different from when I drink alcohol. I did not hallucinate, lose control or blackout.

The problem is anyone can legally buy hemp products. California Gov. Gavin Newsom this month issued a controversial emergency ban on hemp THC because there is currently no restriction on selling it to people under 21. Some of the packaging is also misleading.

Nationally, Sen. Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat, has introduced the Cannabinoid Safety and Regulation Act to direct the Food & Drug Administration and the Alcohol Tax Tobacco & Trade Bureau to regulate intoxicating hemp products, including age, marketing and content rules.

Texas should regulate all intoxicants, whether alcohol or pot, but banning THC is next to impossible now. Thoughtful legalization of all cannabis products, preferably at the federal level, is the only feasible answer.

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Award-winning opinion writer Chris Tomlinson writes commentary about money, politics and life in Texas. Sign up for his "Tomlinson's Take" newsletter at houstonchronicle.com/tomlinsonnewsletter or expressnews.com/tomlinsonnewsletter.

Sep 27, 2024

Chris Tomlinson

Business Columnist

Chris Tomlinson writes commentary about money, politics and life in Texas for Hearst Newspapers. He can be reached at chris.tomlinson@houstonchronicle.com.

The Texas Association of Managing Editors awarded him columnist of the year in 2021, and the Headliners Foundation named him Texas's Star Opinion Writer. He's authored two New York Times Bestsellers, "Forget the Alamo: The Rise and Fall of an American Myth" and "Tomlinson Hill: The Remarkable Story of Two Families Who Share the Tomlinson Name - One White, One Black."

Before joining the Houston Chronicle, he spent 20 years with The Associated Press reporting on politics, economics, conflicts and natural disasters from more than 30 countries in Africa, the Middle East and Europe.

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analysis of article text

prohibitionist	prohibition_agency	drugwar_propaganda	legalization	drug_reformer
reform_referenda	cannabis	stimulant	narcotic	hallucinogen

incarceration/prison mentioned? yes .

propaganda analysis

EXP - explicit prohibition propaganda (explicit_propaganda)	GRP - hated group (propaganda_theme1)	MAD - madness, violence, illness (propaganda_theme2)
SOC - survival of society (propaganda_theme3)	USE - gateway, use is abuse (propaganda_theme4)	KID - children (propaganda_theme5)
WAR - demonize, war, epidemic (propaganda_theme6)	TOT - total prohibition (propaganda_theme7)	DIS - dissent opposed (propaganda_theme8)

text of article used for CRITICAL ANALYSIS, under FAIR USE provisions of the Copyright Act of 1976, 17 U.S.C. § 107, et al.

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analysis of article text

incarceration/prison mentioned? yes .

propaganda analysis

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