The San Francisco Chronicle has a welcome editorial today criticizing the feds for putting noted marijuana expert, activist and author Ed Rosenthal on trial for growing pot. Some quotes:

... Ed Rosenthal agreed to grow Oakland's medical marijuana -- in compliance with city law and with the blessing of local officials -- But in a trial now under way in U.S. District Court in San Francisco, the 58-year-old Rosenthal has become a focal point for the federal government's "war on drugs." He is charged with felony marijuana cultivation and conspiracy, which could bring him 10 years-to-life imprisonment if convicted.

Rosenthal had been deputized by the city of Oakland as "an officer" in the city's program to distribute medical marijuana. Proposition 215, passed by California voters in Nov. 1996, was designed to allow patients -- with a doctor's approval -- to grow and use marijuana to, among other things, relieve the effects of cancer, AIDS and glaucoma.

The trouble is, despite substantial anecdotal evidence, the federal government never has recognized the medicinal potential of marijuana. Drug Enforcement Administration official Asa Hutchinson points out that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration does not approve "medicine by popular referendum. " He made that comment in response to a letter by California Attorney General Bill Lockyer calling for "a proper sense of balance, proportion and respect for states' rights."

WHEN Ed Rosenthal agreed to grow Oakland's medical marijuana -- in compliance with city law and with the blessing of local officials -- he had no idea he was about to become the target of federal authorities who would try to send him to prison.

The war on drugs should not be about Rosenthal. He represents one city's noble effort to distribute medical marijuana in a controlled, responsible way. Without Rosenthal, many patients would be forced to turn to dealers in the streets, enriching the enterprises that should be the real focus of a war on drugs.

There's more so go read the whole thing.

Last week the federal court refused to gag Rosenthal during the trial. For updates, go to NORML.