Free Republic

MONTREAL — Marijuana is “infinitely worse” than tobacco and its use should be widely discouraged in Canada, Conservative Leader Stephen Harper says. The remarks come the morning after the federal leaders’ French-language debate, in which Harper’s clash with Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau over the issue of legalization was among the evening’s more memorable exchanges.

Six men were arrested this week after local and federal authorities targeted an elaborate illegal marijuana grow that covered a full mile of federal land, adjacent to Colorado Highway 141 at the Dolores River and near the Mesa and Montrose county lines. All totaled, 153 pounds of marijuana were hauled away in recent days by federal authorities, who boated it in trash bags from one side of the Dolores River to the other. Leonel Olaguez Cabrales, 22, Angel Guzman Gutierrez, 31, Sergio Enrique Arevalo Portillo, 26, Jose Eleno Rodarte Garcia, 38, Eduardo Arias Torres, 27, and Juan Mejia-Vasquez, 41, were...

A southwest Florida woman landed herself behind bars after calling 911 to complain about being shortchanged in a drug deal. According to a Fort Myers Police Department report, 36-year-old Erin Klich called police to complain that she'd attempted to buy $75 worth of marijuana, but never got the goods from the dealer. Officers arrived outside a home to find Klich outside the reported dealer's home, still on the phone with police. Klich told the responding officers that the dealer inside took her money. Klich was arrested for misuse of 911.= Upon searching Klich, police found a clear plastic baggy, later...

DENVER – Little Spider Creations had been making scary creations in Denver for 24 years, but the owner of the company says legalizing recreational marijuana changed everything. He recently moved his company to North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Eager night owls looking to score some of the first recreational pot in Oregon bought up baggies of bud at shops that opened early Thursday, some taking advantage of door-buster deals. Some of the more than 250 dispensaries that already offer medical marijuana welcomed lines of enthusiasts soon after midnight — just moments after it became legal to sell to anyone who is at least 21. There were no reports of problems from early sales, although most stores planned to open at a more reasonable hour. At Portland's Shango Premium Cannabis, co-founder Shane McKee said the...

FLANDREAU, S.D. — The Santee Sioux tribe has already proven its business acumen, running a successful casino, a 120-room hotel and a 240-head buffalo ranch on the plains of South Dakota. But those enterprises have not been immune to competition and the lingering effects of the Great Recession, so the small tribe of 400 is undertaking a new venture — opening the nation's first marijuana resort on its reservation. The experiment could offer a new money-making model for tribes nationwide seeking economic opportunities beyond casinos. Santee Sioux leaders plan to grow their own pot and sell it in a smoking...

Two Santa Rosa cannabis providers are coming to the rescue of Valley Fire victims. Care by Design and AbsoluteXtracts have teamed up to donate $20,000 worth of medical marijuana products to Lake County residents who have prescriptions but lost access to their medicine because of the fire, the Press Democrat reported. The companies issued a joint statement, saying: "This disaster happened in our own backyard. As a company that prides itself on putting patient needs first, we felt there was no better time to reach out and help our neighbors in their time of need." Through Oct. 7, each victim...

The results of a new study about the impact of Colorado’s marijuana legalization is raising troubling questions for parents. The study cites a significant increase in marijuana-related traffic deaths, hospital visits and school suspensions.

[...] Donald Trump Position: Cloudy In 1990, Donald Trump argued that in order to win the War On Drugs, you had to take away the profits from the drug czars. He favored legalizing drugs and using the tax revenue to fund drug education programs. Fast forward to 2015 at the Conservative Political Action Conference where Trump reversed course and said he was against the legalization of marijuana. “I think it’s bad and I feel strongly about that,” he said. “They’ve got a lot of problems going on right now in Colorado, some big problems.” However, Trump contradicts himself when asked...

Funny short video by Trump, skewering Jeb.

Editor's Note: This column was coauthored by Bob Morrison. Like too many politicians of his generation, President Obama seems to think that proper enforcement of our nation’s drug laws would be hypocritical. We know from David Maraniss’ highly acclaimed biography, Barack Obama: The Story, that the marijuana-smoking “Choom Gang” was all too much a part of the young Obama’s days at Hawaii’s exclusive Punahou prep school. Last year, the President asserted that smoking marijuana is little different than smoking cigarettes or drinking alcohol. He’s wrong: As FRC has documented, today’s pot is far more potent and thus far more likely...

In less than two weeks, Oregonians -- and any one else 21 and older -- will be able to walk into a marijuana shop and buy pot, the latest milestone in the state's long history with the drug. Though the Oregon Liquor Control Commission doesn't plan to launch a regulated recreational market until late next year, the Legislature authorized medical marijuana dispensaries to sell to the recreational market starting Oct. 1. Until now, dispensaries served only medical marijuana patients and their caregivers. Starting next month, they will be able to sell to anyone with a government-issued ID that shows they...

Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush admitted on the GOP debate stage Wednesday night that he smoked marijuana decades ago. "Forty years ago I smoked marijuana and I admit it," Bush said at the Ronald Reagan Presiential Library. "I'm sure that other people might have done it and might not want to say it in front of 25 million people." He tacked on a comment that his mother, former First Lady Barbara Bush, would not be pleased about the admission: "My mom's not happy that I just did." Moments later, Jeb Bush's official twitter account tweeted out an apology to his...

Colorado has temporarily suspended taxes on marijuana after the US state brought in more tax revenue than anticipated. The tax will return to 25% on Thursday but state law requires an automatic suspension of any new taxes in the event of an accounting error. Pot retailers saw large crowds on the pot tax-free day. Colorado became the first state in the US to legalise cannabis, after voters approved the change in 2012. Tax collected on marijuana sales came to $70 million (£45m), more than the $40 million (£26m) the state predicted. Colorado also saw an increase in tax revenue from...

Colorado Just Became The First State In History To Collect More Taxes From Marijuana Than Alcohol No state has ever generated more tax revenue from marijuana than alcohol—until now. The Colorado Department of Revenue, according to recently released figures, just brought in $70 million in taxes relating to marijuana, compared to less than $42 million for alcohol taxes, over the course of a year. This Wednesday, Colorado is declaring a marijuana tax holiday, meaning that for a single day, taxes on marijuana items will be suspended. “Marijuana taxes have been incredibly productive over the past year, so this tax holiday...

SANTA ANA – Turns out, selling pot in Santa Ana isn’t going to be easy. Seven months after the city became the first Orange County municipality to hold a lottery to let small businesses sell medical marijuana, only two, South Coast Safe Access and OC3, are open. Reasons for the slow start are varied. Some landlords and neighboring businesses aren’t thrilled about the prospect of working with or near pot merchants. And those would-be pot sellers who have won over their neighbors say the city and local police – in spite of overwhelming approval from Santa Ana voters – aren’t...

Nearly 20 years after California became the first state to legalize the medical use of marijuana, legislators have a plan to impose order on the erratic patchwork of inconsistent policies that currently govern the billion-dollar industry. “We’re making up for two decades of inaction”, said state senator Mike McGuire, whose district includes the “Emerald Triangle” in Northern California where 60% of the marijuana grown in the US is cultivated. “This legislation brings clarity and desperately needed rules and regulations.” In the final hours of the legislative session that ended late Friday night, lawmakers passed a trio of bills that create...

[...] Hickenlooper, founder of a beer brewery and a former mayor of Denver, opposed the historic 2012 measure that legalized pot for adults 21 and older. But in the interview published on Wednesday in Westword, he says legalization hasn't been so bad, after all. "Now I look at how far we've come, and I think there's a real possibility that we'll have a system that works... if you eliminate the black market, make it harder for kids to get marijuana. We can put more money into education for kids," he says. "The sky isn't falling. People thought it was the...

Teens are increasingly turning to electronic cigarettes not to get their tobacco fix, but instead to inhale pot. A new study published in the medical journal Pediatrics found that teens have devised ways to turn e-cigarettes into devices for hashish oil, marijuana, wax and other cannabis products. Researchers surveyed 3,847 Connecticut high school students about their drug and e-cigarette use and found that students using e-cigarettes to vaporize cannabis was 27 times higher than the adult rate. According to the study, 5.5 percent of the students surveyed had used an e-cigarette to vaporize cannabis. In total, nearly 30 percent of...

Susan Sarandon led a very belated funeral procession for her dear friend, the 'godfather of LSD' Timothy Leary, at Burning Man on Saturday. Clutching his ashes on the march into a makeshift church, the 67-year-old actress - who was wearing a bridal gown - said she had wanted to lay Leary to rest where he would be surrounded by revelers who had taken the psychedelic drug to honor his memory. 'I think he'd be so happy,' Sarandon said of Leary, who died and was cremated in 1996. 'I think he would have loved the chaos. He would have loved it....