Free Republic

This week marks the fifth anniversary of Colorado's legalization of the commercial marijuana trade, and the reviews aren't good. An editorial in the Colorado Springs Gazette reports, "Five years of retail pot coincide with five years of a homelessness growth rate that ranks among the highest rates in the country. Directors of homeless shelters, and people who live on the streets, tell us homeless substance abusers migrate here for easy access to pot." The paper says, "Five years of Big Marijuana ushered in a doubling in the number of drivers involved in fatal crashes who tested positive for marijuana, based...

Murphy's win boosts prospects for legal marijuana in New Jersey

Nightmare neighbours smoking cannabis inside their own homes is a common problem for communities across Britain. The notoriously pungent stench may be a sign of a recreational user smoking the odd joint next door or the drug being grown in large quantities close by. And while you may not be bothered by what other people get up to in their own homes, there’s no denying the smell can be off-putting. So what action can you take if you suspect the drug is being used near your home? The Derby Telegraph and DevonLive took a closer look at the law surrounding...

Researchers at the University of Connecticut in the US tracked the effect of teenage alcohol and marijuana use on the achievement of life goals, defined as educational achievement, full time employment, marriage and social economic potential. The study included 1,165 young adults from across the US whose habits were first assessed at age 12 and then at two- year intervals until they were between 25 and 34 years old. ... Overall, individuals who were dependent on either marijuana or alcohol during their teen years achieved lower levels of education, were less likely to be employed full time or get married...

On a retail level, it costs about $35 to buy a small bag of good quality medical marijuana in Los Angeles, enough to roll five or six joints. But in 2018, when recreational sales take hold and additional taxes kick in, the cost of that same purchase in the new market is expected to increase at the retail counter to $50 or $60. Medical pot purchases are expected to rise in cost too, but not as steeply, industry experts say. Or consider cannabis leaves, a sort of bottom-shelf product that comes from trimming prized plant buds. The loose, snipped leaves...

It seems that many states, my home state of New Jersey included, are hell-bent on legalizing recreational use of cannabis. The arguments in favor of this, though loud and dominant in the media, are not particularly convincing. Most of the advocates tout the desire to legalize the drug so that the state can raise additional tax revenue off of the sales. Enhancing the ability of an over-bearing confiscatory high-tax state like New Jersey to extract even more revenue from its citizens is never going to be a compelling argument for me. Slightly better is the argument that legalizing the drug...

For the very first time in history the United States Government will have to answer to the judiciary about the scheduling of cannabis and its unconstitutionality. Jeff Sessions, the DEA, and the DOJ will all have to stand trial according to the judge overseeing their case. This is the first time that a trial to legalize cannabis has proceeded past the normal attempts at dismissal. All of the defendants will have to get recorded depositions. This is great news for the plaintiffs in the case which include Army combat veteran, Jose Belen, former NFL player Marvin Washington, 11 year old...

A new Gallup poll shows growing support for marijuana legalization, with 64 percent of Americans now in favor of the measure. The number is the highest level of support in nearly half a century of surveying adults on the issue, according to Gallup. Support has steadily increased in recent years, with the latest figure up 4 percentage points over last year and up 14 points from 2011. The poll also showed a majority of Republicans favoring legalization for the first time, with 51 percent expressing support. That number is up 9 percentage points from last year, according to Gallup.

The war on drugs has been going on since 1971, and we have a winner: marijuana. Back then, possession of pot carried heavy penalties in many states -- even life imprisonment. Today, 29 states sanction medical use of cannabis, and eight allow recreational use. Legal weed has become about as controversial as Powerball. One sign of the shift came in Wednesday's debate among the Democrats running for governor of Illinois. The state didn't get its first medical marijuana dispensary until 2015, and it decriminalized possession of small amounts of pot only last year. But most of the candidates endorsed legalization...

Colorado’s legal marijuana dispensaries generated over $1 billion in sales during the first eight months of 2017 — a 21 percent year-over increase putting the Centennial State on path to having its best year yet in terms of retail pot sales. Licensed pot shops in Colorado sold a total of about $1.02 billion worth of marijuana products between January and August 2017, including $733,057,112 in recreational sales and $291,978,141 in medical sales, according to data released Wednesday by the state’s Department of Revenue and analyzed by The Cannabist, the Denver Post’s marijuana news portal.

Rev. Al Sharpton argued that the fight to legalize marijuana is the next civil rights cause in a Thursday op-ed for the Guardian. Sharpton, an activist and preacher, said it’s crucial to decriminalize marijuana because laws against it have oppressed minorities over the years, making it difficult for them to get good educations and other opportunities.“It is a civil rights cause that we should not postpone, but accelerate during these dark and difficult times,” Sharpton said. “For Democrats and progressives, the arguments have always been clear: generations of Americans, overwhelmingly people of color, have been imprisoned and starved of access...

Just when you think you’ve heard it all, a pastor calls your radio show asking how to respond to a congregant who claims that cannabis was sanctioned by God in the Torah. That’s right, sanctioned by the Lord Himself, not to be smoked but to be burned in large quantities by the priests of Israel. Far out! To be sure, there was a time in my life when I would have readily believed something like this, since I spent 1969-1971 as a heavy drug-using, hippie rock drummer, consuming everything from pot to LSD and from speed to heroin. Not surprisingly,...

Men who smoke too much marijuana could face fertility problems because the drug makes sperm 'mellow' causing it to 'swim in circles'. Cannabis - which is the most widely-used illegal drug in Britain - tends to leave users feeling chilled out and relaxed. But now researchers have revealed that it has the same effect on sperm and regular weed smoking can cut counts of the cells by as much as a third.

California would become the first state in the nation to legalize psychedelic mushrooms if a long-shot ballot initiative passes muster with voters next year. The measure is backed by a legalization activist who says he kicked his heroin habit with the help of a mushroom trip in Death Valley. It would exempt Californians over the age of 21 from a state law that criminalizes mushrooms containing psilocybin, the compound that gives some mushrooms psychedelic properties. […] … California is one of eight states where voters have legalized marijuana for recreational use, and Saunders said legalizing psilocybin-bearing mushrooms is the logical...

Federal and state data show that the number of drivers involved in fatal crashes in Colorado who tested positive for marijuana has more than doubled since 2013. A Denver Post analysis of the data and coroner reports provides the most comprehensive look yet into whether roads in the state have become more dangerous since the drug's legalization. It shows that Increasingly potent levels of marijuana were found in positive-testing drivers who died in crashes in Front Range counties. The trends coincide with the legalization of recreational marijuana in Colorado. However, Colorado transportation and public safety officials say the rising number...

Authorities on Thursday announced the removal of thousands of marijuana plants from illegal grow sites on public and private lands in San Mateo County.

Tiger Woods, who had been known to have the painkillers Vicodin and Xanax in his system when he was arrested on a charge of driving under the influence in Jupiter on Memorial Day, also had Dilaudid, Ambien and THC (tetrahydrocannabinol) -- the active principle of cannabis -- in his system that night, according to an ESPN.com report.

A group that believes cannabis has a secret historical role in Christianity is forging ahead with plans to visit the largest Roman Catholic church in the nation during next week's solar eclipse, where members intend to light incense doused with cannabis-infused olive oil. Yet church leaders say the event won't happen. Anne Armstrong, founder and deaconess of Rhode Island's Healing Church, said the Monday afternoon service could "end degeneration, disaster and war" by consecrating the Americas to the Virgin Mary. ... "I don't anticipate any trouble, but if there is, we'll go outside," she said. "If they tell us to...

Quitting finance to focus on marijuana sounds like it’s something that involves finding yourself by surfing and living in a beach hut in California. But with momentum building for the legalization of cannabis in the U.S. – 29 states and the District of Columbia have laws legalized marijuana in some form – finance professionals are increasingly viewing it as a big business opportunity. The number of jobs that the cannabis industry is creating continues to increase. New Frontier Data, a research and analytics firm, projects that the legal cannabis market will create more than 250m jobs by 2020 – more...

Pollution from illegal marijuana farms deep in California's national forests is far worse than previously thought, and has turned thousands of acres into waste dumps so toxic that simply touching plants has landed law enforcement officers in the hospital. The volume of banned or restricted pesticides and illegally applied fertilizers in the woods dwarfs estimates by the U.S. Forest Service in 2014, when a top enforcement official testified that the pollution was threatening forest land in California and other states. California accounts for more than 90 percent of illegal U.S. marijuana farming, with much of it exported to other states...