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HARTFORD —— The drive to decriminalize small amounts of marijuana appears to be coming up short in the legislature this year. Senate Majority Leader Martin Looney, D-New Haven, conceded Friday that a bill to soften the penalty for possession of a half-ounce of pot or less does not currently have enough support in the chamber. "We did have a caucus last week and we were somewhat short of the number to pass it with purely Democratic votes,'' Looney said. "We may circle back around to that issue again.''

On his MSNBC show this evening, Cenk Uygur argued in favor of decriminalizing marijuana since, 74 years after the feds made it illegal, people continue to smoke it, or as Cenk put it, the War on Drugs is unwinnable. Yo, Cenk: Cain killed Abel more than 5,000 years ago. Murder has been illegal ever since, and yet people continue to commit it. By that logic, since the War on Homicide is also unwinnable, should we decriminalize murder? Be sure to view the video here. Not only will you hear Cenk make his nonsensical argument, you'll see Dem Rep. Jared Polis....

Starting in January, getting caught with an ounce or less of marijuana in California will be an infraction on par with jaywalking and littering — and not a misdemeanor that can tie up juries and show up on criminal background checks for job applicants. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed the law Thursday, but said it doesn’t change his opposition to Proposition 19, the Nov. 2 ballot measure that would legalize possession and personal use of up to an ounce of marijuana. Reaction was predictably divided Friday. Both sides of Proposition 19, which voters will settle on Nov. 2, tried to use...

Come November, Californians will have the chance to legalize marijuana for the specific purpose of raising revenues via taxes. We all knew that it would be just a matter of time before the same individuals would get enough signatures to put the legalization of marijuana up for a vote by the California citizens. It is a bit ironic when you consider how militant the same individuals wanting marijuana legalized have gone on a witch hunt against tobacco products. The attack on the tobacco industry began over 50 years ago when the Surgeon General forced the tobacco company's to label...

Come November, Californians will have the chance to legalize marijuana for the specific purpose of raising revenues via taxes. We all knew that it would be just a matter of time before the same individuals would get enough signatures to put the legalization of marijuana up for a vote by the California citizens. It is a bit ironic when you consider how militant the same individuals wanting marijuana legalized have gone on a witch hunt against tobacco products. The attack on the tobacco industry began over 50 years ago when the Surgeon General forced the tobacco company's to label...

Come November, Californians will have the chance to legalize marijuana for the specific purpose of raising revenues via taxes. We all knew that it would be just a matter of time before the same individuals would get enough signatures to put the legalization of marijuana up for a vote by the California citizens. It is a bit ironic when you consider how militant the same individuals wanting marijuana legalized have gone on a witch hunt against tobacco products. The attack on the tobacco industry began over 50 years ago when the Surgeon General forced the tobacco company's to label...

Glenn Greenwald is a civil rights attorney, a blogger for Salon, and the author of a new Cato Institute policy study called “Drug Decriminalization in Portugal: Lessons for Creating Fair and Successful Policies.” The paper examines Portugal’s experiment with decriminalizing possession of drugs for personal use, which began in 2001. Nick Gillespie, editor of reason.com and reason.tv, sat down with Greenwald in April. Q: What is the difference between decriminalization and legalization?A: In a decriminalized framework, the law continues to prohibit drug usage, but it’s completely removed from the criminal sphere, so that if you violate that prohibition or do...

In the face of a growing number of deaths and cases of HIV linked to drug abuse, the Portuguese government in 2001 tried a new tack to get a handle on the problem—it decriminalized the use and possession of heroin, cocaine, marijuana, LSD and other illicit street drugs. The theory: focusing on treatment and prevention instead of jailing users would decrease the number of deaths and infections.

For me, drug use is immoral. The harder the drug, the more immoral. Why? I believe there is an inherent value in having control of our faculties at all times. So why, might you ask, do I believe that drugs should be legalized? The answer is simple – making drugs illegal only masks the problem and may, in fact, make the problem even worse. If a friend came to me and said, “Hey, I’m thinking about shooting up. What are your thoughts?” I would tell him that I value self-control and that drug use and the value of self-control are...

Jeffery A. Miron finds that by decriminalizing cannabis, the federal government would generate $2.4 billion in federal tax revenue annually, and that an additional $7.7 billion would be saved as the cost of incarceration, policing, and processing offenders. Now, that's too much money to for the human brain to fully conceptualize, given the air quality around April 20th, so your friends at the Prometheus Institute have provided this handy quantitive index in order show exactly how much the U.S. can earn each year from cannabis decriminalization. The math: $2.4 billion per year + $7.7 billion per year = $10.1 billion...

With offenders failing to enroll in or complete treatment, the initiative is a 'get out of jail free' card, critics say. The most comprehensive assessment of California's landmark effort to treat drug users rather than jail them has found that nearly half of offenders sentenced under the program fail to complete rehab and more than a quarter never show up for treatment. The high failure rates have prompted a growing number of critics to call for jail sanctions for defendants they say take advantage of the program's lack of penalties. Voters overwhelmingly approved Proposition 36 in November 2000. Under the...

It turns out that alcohol is legal for the simplest, most nostalgic, and most American reason of all. Despite its risks and harmful side-effects, adults are reserved right to drink because they are independent adults in a free country. For all of the empty rhetoric about economics and black markets, the end of Prohibition was due to a single principle: even if drinking may be bad for society, government has no right to keep the people from doing it. The ability to get drunk is an inalienable right that we have forever confirmed with the 18th Amendment.

BREAKING NEWS: Mexican president refuses to sign drug decriminalization bill, returns it to Congress developing .. or not.

Mexico votes to decriminalize drug possession 04:02 PM CDT on Saturday, April 29, 2006 Associated Press MEXICO CITY – Mexicans would be allowed to possess small amounts of cocaine, heroin, even ecstasy for their personal use under a bill approved by lawmakers that some worry could prove to be a lure to young Americans. ... However the bill stiffens penalties for trafficking and possession of drugs – even small quantities – by government employees or near schools, and maintains criminal penalties for drug sales. ... Sen. Miguel Angel Navarro of the leftist Democratic Revolution Party argued against the bill. "This...

"Demonstrators pretend to smoke fake marijuana cigarettes during a protest for the decriminalization of marijuana in La Alameda park, in this May 4, 2002 file photo in Mexico City. Police and business owners from Mexico's beaches to border cities worried Sunday, April 30, 2006 that a measure passed to decriminalize possession of cocaine, heroin and other drugs could attract droves of tourists solely looking to get high. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana, file)"

At the polling booth this year, Berkeley residents will have a unique voting choice: Yes or no to the decriminalization of prostitution. Decriminalization means the repeal of measures that outlaw prostitution, soliciting, pimping, pandering, and brothels. Although the vote will take place only in the city of Berkeley, the decriminalization campaign's ultimate goal is the repeal of California state laws on prostitution and related offenses.** Decriminalization is a more extreme measure than legalization. Legalization would mean the regulation of prostitution with laws regarding where, when, and how prostitution could take place. Decriminalization eliminates all laws and prohibits the state and...

<p>Nevada voters are evenly split on a ballot initiative that would legalize adult possession of 3 ounces or less of marijuana, a new poll shows.</p> <p>But in Reno and Washoe County, a clear majority of residents oppose the legalization of small amounts of marijuana, according to a Reno Gazette-Journal/News 4 poll. The poll of 600 likely voters was conducted in July by Rockville, Md.-based Research 2000.</p>

Northern Neighbor's Pot Policy Irks Drug Warriors Posted by CN Staff on July 30, 2002 at 07:56:22 PT By H. G. Levine, Pacific News Service Source: PacificNews.org Earlier this month, Great Britain effectively decriminalized marijuana. Now Canada may follow -- much to the chagrin of America's fervent drug warriors. But Canada, which helped lead the United States out of the prohibition era 70 years ago, may again show Washington the light. A specter is haunting U.S. drug warriors -- the specter of marijuana decriminalization ... in Canada. U.S. lawmakers discovered with alcohol in the 1920s that it's difficult to run...

Prostitutes and pot smokers could get the equivalent of a traffic ticket slap on the wrist under a little-noticed budget rider that lawmakers hail as a money-saver and prosecutors slam as the backdoor to decriminalization. Tucked deep in the massive state budget, the provision would yank district attorneys' discretion over whether to prosecute certain low-level misdemeanors as civil or criminal infractions. Instead, judges could choose to try crimes ranging from indecent exposure to possession of marijuana or heroin as civil matters. Defendants wouldn't need lawyers, wouldn't face jail and wouldn't even get a criminal record. ``That undercuts the quality of...

Full text of the home secretary's announcement of the reclassification of cannabis: All controlled drugs are harmful and will remain illegal. We must concentrate our efforts on the drugs that cause the most harm, while sending a credible message to young people. I will therefore ask parliament to reclassify cannabis from class B to class C. I have considered the recommendations of the home affairs committee, and the advice given to me by the ACMD medical experts that the current classification of cannabis is disproportionate in relation to the harm that it causes. It is important to remember that cannabis...