Sage Advice: Check State Law Before You Order [Archive]

Paregoric Kid

05-03-2008, 06:59 AM

Sage Advice: Check State Law Before You Order

http://www.reason.com/blog/show/126312.html

Jacob Sullum (http://www.reason.com/staff/hitandrun/128.html) | May 2, 2008, 1:06pm
Spurred on by horrific YouTube images (http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=salvia&search_type=) of teenagers falling over and giggling, the Salvia divinorum crackdown (http://www.reason.com/blog/show/125542.html) proceeds apace. The Florida legislature recently approved (http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/533/florida_senate_passes_salvia_ban_bill) a ban by a nearly unanimous vote, and the Drug War Chronicle reports (http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/533/north_dakota_first_salvia_arrest_kenneth_rau) that police in North Dakota have made what appears to be the first salvia arrest. Kenneth Rau, a Bismarck bottling plant worker with an interest in altered states of consciousness, is charged with possession of salvia with intent to distribute, a Class B felony, based on eight ounces of leaf he bought on eBay for $32. Rau, who faces up to 10 years in prison, complains that police are falsely portraying him as a dealer. He says he bought the psychedelic herb, which has been used by shamans in Mexico for centuries and is also known as Diviner's Sage, for his own chemically assisted self-exploration. North Dakota's salvia ban, approved last year, took effect on August 1, and Rau says he was unaware of it. "I've never been a drug user, never been arrested," he told the Chronicle. "I started experimenting with this stuff because I thought it was legal. I didn't want to get into trouble, but now they're treating me just like some meth dealer."
My previous posts on the anti-salvia crusade are here (http://www.reason.com/blog/show/114166.html) and here (http://www.reason.com/blog/show/125542.html). The Salvia Divinorum Research and Information Center has a recently updated overview (http://www.sagewisdom.org/legalstatus.html#North%20Dakota) of the plant's legal status in various jurisdictions.

jacky

05-03-2008, 11:57 AM

in my home state, a recent news bit on salvia fueled not much attention.

first off, the news agency announced that many, many people probably have salvia growing in their yards and homes!
they didnt even do the research to realize that there are some 1200 different species.

the news called the local police, the police refused to comment on salvia divinorum except that it isnt a problem in this state.

the news agency basically took the stance that this stuff is pervasively grown in the USA, and that parents should be aware of what their kids are getting into, that parents are the best control point for plants like this that can be psychoactive.

it was a relief.

now that its illegal in some states, these people have driven the price up in those states. they have made it a black market option.
now states that havnt illegalized stand to profit from the states that have.
and many people just buy the herb for freinds in other states.

to my knowledge there still isnt a feild test for salvia divinorum, labeling it as something else, or putting into gel caps and putting into various empty dietary supplement bottles is going to hide its identity from most law enforcement.

some companies reportedly are still selling to their customers in states that its illegal, as they dont fear extradition for a law that does not exist in their residential state.

unless federal scheduling happens, salvia can be easily shipped into the states that it remains legal and distribute to all the states that have illegalized it. there only need be one state that doesnt illegalize.

in some states the dry plant material is illegal for consumption/smoking, but the live plants are allowed. in those states people can consume the material as it grows, and leave no trace basically, they can also arguably grow more than they can consume...so who is responsible for coming and disposing of all the dead material? is the DEA going to enact some salvia leaf cleaning service for all the people that enjoy growing this plant?
its laughable....almost, that these people are creating laws that cannot be enforced on a large scale.

for people in states that have not outlawed the plant a certian acetone/naptha and finally water and ethanol cleaning process can help a person to isolate the active diterpenoid compounds present in the plant. a few kilos can be extracted to produce at least 2-3 grams of salvinorin a and lesser amounts of similiar, though most likely low active compounds.
that would be a lifetime of salvinorin a for some people...most people.
the toxicity of the compound is very low it seems. large amounts of the pure compound can be orally or nasally introduced, and all that it really does is make me tired and a bit dreamy.
smoke 1-10 milligrams and 80% of the population will effected to some degree, some people will be incoherent, and others really wont be feelling much but some pulling at the face and a slow feeling.

what is up with a compound that doesnt effect everybody? a compound that can for the most part be put in the mouth, swallowed, touched, and not cause too much harm, well, in most of the people.
I can attest that salvinorin is active to some people through the skin, I felt a tiny bit of strangeness once when attending a small get together in which a chemist showed the steps in how to isolate certian diterpene compounds, including salvinorin a.

when I first tried the plant leaf, it was in raw, leaf form. me and my buddy smoked almost all of that ounce of leaf without feeling much of anything.
it was only when compounding huge lungfulls of the stuff that I started to get it.
my first thoughts was that there was some mechanism to it that was shared by ketamine.
and then it was gone.
later I tried the 5x extracts. here was strong effect, but only if I was completely still, if anything disturbed the experience, reality came brightening up the scene and the feelings would quickly diminish.
hardly a drug of concern in my opinion, because of its relative low toxicity.

the people should stop selling dxm to kids without a prescription if they are so worried about peoples health. and no herb should be outlawed for smoking purposes, till the ax falls for the divine tobacco plant.
in most of these states that salvia is illegal, angel trumpet plants still lead to medical emergencys probably every year or so.....
the laws are just reactionary for the most part attributed to head shop sales.

and in a few states, common sense prevails.
like in maine, controls on sales under the age of 18 are in place.

in a few others only the raw leaf is allowed, and live plants. a less sane, but still acceptable agreement, people should be allowed to standardize anything that they grow in their own gardens....

I dont think the DEA will want it federally scheduled till the first accepted medications are finally hitting the market that have been created from taking analogs of salvinorin a and using them in drug design.
this is already well underway, there are some really cool scientists making some real headway with these kappa active research chemicals.
and along the way they have even discovered some compounds that are similiar psychoactively to salvinorin a, but up to 6x stronger.
I think my math might not be any good, but my mental image of a compound that strong would probably rate it as stronger by wieght than lsd if consumed in the right fashion.

perhaps the "monster" analog of this kind will escape the labratory...
ha ha

and somewhere out there, steaming in a jungle that is pumping out phyto chemistry 24/7, there is a spicy yellow orange slime mold, or toxic pod, that is going to be the next psychoactive study.

if the authorities keep up this reactionary seclusion of plants, they will limit nanotech and biotech futures, they will get in the way of people making money, and making medicine, they will step on the toes of the naturalists, and the religious, and the scientists, and at some point, their foolery will run out,
it may take decades,
but I think it will be seen as the great centuries long war that led to so much corruption in the world that it will be unacceptable to continue the policies.
they will have to many things on the rise to worry about, like farming humans efficiently.

I hope this guy in North Dakota gets probation and a slap on the wrist.
maybe we should raise a few bucks to send to his defense.
his use was obviously religious/spiritual/medicinal,
and the attempts the prosecution is making to template drug dose considerations is sloppy, a half pound of salvia leaf might not be enough for a few months if the person packs big old quids in their mouth.
and some people smoke the stuff like its weed, I went through and ounce initially in under a few weeks, of just occasional use.