What Biden's Weed Plan Really Means

Biden's bombshell weed announcement is both bigger and smaller than it might seem. On Thursday afternoon, President Joe Biden announced that he would be pardoning some federal convictions for marijuana possession and urged states to do the same. He also asked Attorney General Merrick Garland and Secretary of Health and Human Services Xavier Becerra to initiate a review of how marijuana is classified under federal law. "Sending people to jail for possessing marijuana has upended too many lives – for conduct that is legal in many states," Biden tweeted. "Today, we begin to right these wrongs."

Rescheduling marijuana would be a huge victory against the cruel and pointless drug war; likewise if state possession convictions are pardoned. But both of these things are, at the moment, merely asks.