This editorial will appear in Friday’s print edition.

If only the question of “medical marijuana” were as simple as Gov. Chris Gregoire makes it sound.

She and Gov. Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island petitioned the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration on Wednesday to knock marijuana down from a Schedule 1 drug to a Schedule 2 drug. Her press release said the move “will allow its use for treatment – prescribed by doctors and filled by pharmacists.”

Not quite. Before drugs can be legally prescribed, they must be approved by the Food and Drug Administration, which must first determine that they are both effective and safe. Moving marijuana to Schedule 2 would make research easier, but it won’t put the plant into pharmacies without the FDA’s approval.

And bank on this: The FDA will never put its imprimatur on raw cannabis – the leafy street version sold as medicine in Washington and a dozen other states. But it will approve medical use of therapeutic compounds derived from the plant.

In fact, it already has approved the use of synthetic THC, the chief psychoactive chemical in cannabis. More promising, it appears close to approving Sativex, an extract composed of two other “cannabinoid” molecules that looks like an effective treatment of several serious medical conditions.

There’s continual confusion – much of it deliberate – between useful compounds found within marijuana and the raw plant they come from. The plant may be a grand party drug, but no responsible medical authority is going to be enthusiastic about inhaling the smoke of burning leaves.

Modern medicine is big on things like controlled doses, purity and minimal side effects. To get the pain-killing benefits of opiates, patients are not given opium pipes. To get the benefits of cocaine, patients don’t sniff lines of white powder.

The gold standard for medical marijuana is going to be precisely isolated and administered molecules – which may produce little of the high that recreational users are after. Sativex reportedly addresses pain and spasticity with minimal euphoric effects.

Contrary to Gregoire’s insinuation, the federal government is already moving cannabis-based medicines out of Schedule 1 and into the pharmacies. Too slowly, maybe, but it’s happening.

But “marijuana” – to use her overbroad term – isn’t going to be a prescription drug, if that means dispensing cannabis-laced brownies or the makings of joints.

Some marijuana advocates are happy to blur the distinction between medical and recreational use, the better to wrap an aura of legitimacy around the raw street drug. But as Sativex and other prescription versions appear, it’s going to get harder to perpetuate that blur.

Jeff Rochon, CEO of the Washington State Pharmacy Association, cut to the heart of the issue when he said the drug should be “managed and monitored under the expert guidance of pharmacists who are required to obtain a professional doctorate degree and undergo continuing education to maintain licensure.”

That won’t be as hip as Hempfest, but it will be medicine.