NO POT FOR PROF

He Can't Grow Weed for Medical Research, DEA Says

Despite strong support from Capitol Hill big shots, professor Lyle
Craker got a big thumbs down from the Drug Enforcement
Administration last week in his bid to grow marijuana for medical research.

A horticulturalist and head of the medicinal plant program at the
University of Massachusetts-Amherst, Craker challenged the
government's monopoly on the production and distribution of the plant
at its growing facility at the University of Mississippi, reported The
Associated Press.

He claimed that the government's marijuana isn't strong enough for
researchers to adequately make scientific breakthroughs, nor is there
enough for a wide breadth of study.

U.S. Sens. Edward Kennedy and John Kerry supported those claims, and
in 2007 a federal judge sided with Craker, recommending that the DEA
grant him an application to grow the plants for Food and Drug
Administration-approved research.