ANTI-KRATOM ASSOCIATION

Nothing says "America First" quite like fighting to keep an Indonesian psychoactive product on American shelves.

Idaho Rep. Rob Beiswenger has apparently identified the real problem in Idaho's kratom debate.

It isn't the product.

It's the people complaining about it.

In an Idaho Freedom Caucus article titled "Kratom Crazies: Hero complex and media panic fuel poor legislation," Beiswenger accuses the media of manufacturing a crisis and politicians of wanting to "play the hero."

Yes, that's a sitting member of the Idaho House Health and Welfare Committee. And yes, he voluntarily put his name and smiling photograph on an article called "Kratom Crazies."

Who Are the "Kratom Crazies"?

Here's where the sneering headline becomes considerably less amusing.

The Idahoans who have spoken out against kratom at the legislative hearing included doctors, police chiefs and a mother who lost her daughter to kratom.

Those are the people whose concerns Beiswenger dismisses as "hysteria."

Meanwhile, he describes kratom as what it is geographically: an "Indonesian leaf."

Indonesia's Newest Fan Club

Beiswenger argues that Idaho should target 7-OH rather than ban natural-leaf kratom. He objects that the proposed legislation sought an "all-out ban on natural leaf kratom."

Fine. That's a policy position.

But enough with the romantic tale of a harmless little leaf.

This is what the "leaf" looks like once it reaches American commerce:

KRATOM. VAPE. CBD. That's not a leaf peacefully fluttering through an Indonesian forest. That's a retail industry.

Speaking of Getting Paid…

There's another fact readers deserve to know.

Screenshots from Idaho's official Sunshine campaign-finance system show $5,000 in reported contributions to Rob Beiswenger from identifiable pro-kratom donors, including Happy Hippo, Happy Hippo founder Christopher Deoudes, ShaeLee Deoudes and Tyson Baker of K-Tropix.

They show another $8,000 reported to Tammy Nichols from Happy Hippo, Deoudes family members and Deoudes-associated Animal Farm entities.

That's $13,000 in reported pro-kratom contributions shown in those records.

Readers can check Idaho's records themselves:

Idaho Sunshine campaign-finance database →

And Idaho Taxpayers Get the Chore

Beiswenger praises Sen. Tammy Nichols' alternative regulatory proposal, saying it would have created a structure under which kratom would be tested before distribution.

Which raises a much better question than anything involving apple seeds:

Testing doesn't happen by magic. Neither do inspections, compliance, investigations or enforcement.

Idaho gets the expense and responsibility of policing the marketplace. Retailers get to keep selling. The overseas supply chain gets to keep supplying.

And we're supposed to call that freedom?

If the goal is less government, there is a considerably simpler regulatory framework:

Then Came the Apple

Beiswenger actually compares kratom to apples.

He notes that apple seeds contain cyanide and reasons that nobody proposes banning apples because of it.

True.

We also haven't noticed many neighborhood storefronts glowing with:

Perhaps we've been shopping in the wrong part of town.

Even better, the NIH material Beiswenger reproduced on the first page of his own article states that mitragynine and 7-hydroxymitragynine interact with opioid receptors in the brain.

When anecdotes are peer-reviewed by yourself.

Thanks for the Headshot

The article identifies its author as "Rep. Rob Beiswenger, Republican, District 8, Member of the House Health and Welfare Committee."

That's worth remembering.

This wasn't an anonymous internet troll calling concerned Idahoans "Kratom Crazies."

It was a sitting legislator.

On a health committee.

Writing about a public-health controversy.

No one had to embarrass him. He supplied the byline and headshot himself.

OpenTruth's Question

Strip away the "natural leaf" language and this gets remarkably simple.

• An Indonesian psychoactive product enters the United States.
• American businesses sell it.
• Idaho doctors, police chiefs and a mother who lost her daughter speak out against it.
• Lawmakers consider banning it.
• Kratom interests make reported campaign contributions to lawmakers involved in the debate.
• And the Idaho Freedom Caucus publishes an article called "Kratom Crazies" attacking the people sounding the alarm.

Perhaps somebody in Indonesia should send a thank-you card.

Because when it comes to keeping Indonesian kratom on Idaho shelves, the Freedom Caucus seems to have found a foreign industry worth fighting for.