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Marijuana

Jeff Sessions Eyes Crackdown On Medical Marijuana

June 16, 2017 Mike Ludwig, www.truth-out.org , , ,
By Mike Ludwig for Truthout - The Trump administration's policy toward legal marijuana began to emerge from the fog this week, and it appears that Attorney General Jeff Sessions and his underlings remain more interested in orchestrating law enforcement crackdowns than in the current scientific understanding of cannabis. Sessions wants greater freedom to prosecute medical marijuana businesses and patients in states where the drug is a legal medicine. Federal authorities allege that "dangerous drug traffickers" and international "criminal organizations" cultivate marijuana under state medical marijuana laws and sell it in states where the drug is still illegal, according to a May 1 letter from Sessions to members of Congress obtained this week by the Massroots.com and The Washington Post. Sessions' assistant attorney general, Rod Rosenstein, told members of Congress on Tuesday that the Department of Justice would continue a policy on state-legal marijuana adopted in 2013 by the Obama administration, at least for the near future. That policy, as laid out in 2013 by the famous Cole memo, has allowed recreational and medical marijuana businesses to operate in states where legalization has taken hold, despite ongoing federal prohibition.

Study: Legal Pot Will Boost California Economy By $5 Billion

June 13, 2017 Andrew Buncombe, www.independent.co.uk , ,
By Andrew Buncombe for Independent - The economy of California - poised to create a market for legal marijuana - could see its economy boosted by as much as $5bn, according to a new study. The report by the University of California Agricultural Issues Centre, says that the legalisation of the drug will provide the state a further reason for tourists - or at least some tourists - to visit. Yet it also warns that around 30 per cent of people who use cannabis may remain in the illegal market, in order to avoid the financial impact of regulations that require marijuana to be tested, tracked and taxed at 15 per cent of its retail value. The Los Angeles Times said that state officials developing the regulations, hope they will be able to persuade the majority of cannabis users to go through the legal market. Lori Ajax, director of the state Bureau of Marijuana Control, which commissioned the report, told the newspaper: “It’s going to take some time. While it’s unlikely that everyone will come into the regulated market on Day One, we plan to continue working with stakeholders as we move forward to increase participation over time.”

New Study: Artificial Intelligence Will Alter Humankind In 10 Years

June 12, 2017 Lee Camp, www.rt.com/redacted-tonight , , , ,
By Lee Camp for Redacted Tonight. Redacted Tonight host Lee Camp has the latest on an impending crisis robots are causing. As jobs are rapidly becoming automated, what will it mean the society of workers made of flesh and blood and not controlled by a processor? Robots are climbing the ladder and will soon take over more mortal jobs. Though it may not be hard to imagine that cashiers will disappear, with self check out already around the corner, there are also white collar jobs at risk. With this imminent job loss, what on Earth can we do as a society to take on skyrocketing unemployment? Lee gets into why the growth of artificial intelligence doesn't necessarily mean the end of the world if we harness these changes the right way. Then to Europe.

DOJ’s Mysterious Marijuana Subcommittee

June 7, 2017 Steven Nelson, www.usnews.com ,
By Steven Nelson for US News - Led by an outspoken legalization opponent, Jeff Sessions' Justice Department is reviewing federal marijuana policy, with significant changes possible soon. Almost nothing about the review process is publicly known and key players in the policy debate have not been contacted. The outcome of the review could devastate a multibillion-dollar industry and countermand the will of voters in eight states if the Obama administration's permissive stance on non-medical sales is reversed. What is known: The review is being conducted by a subcommittee of a larger crime-reduction task force that will issue recommendations by July 27. The subcommittee was announced in April alongside other subcommittees reviewing charging and sentencing. The task force is co-chaired by Steve Cook, an assistant U.S. attorney in Tennessee who like Sessions advocates harsh criminal penalties and a traditional view of drug prohibition. The other co-chair is Robyn Thiemann, a longtime department official who works as a deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Policy. The marijuana subcommittee is led by Michael Murray, counsel to Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, U.S. News has learned.

The Astounding Size Of The Marijuana Economy

June 4, 2017 Phillip Smith, www.alternet.org ,
By Phillip Smith for AlterNet. Marijuana is legal in eight states and the District of Columbia, and medical marijuana is legal in nearly 30 (although often under quite restrictive regulatory schemes). Between the two, legal weed is generating total annual sales of between $4 billion and $4.5 billion. But legal marijuana sales are dwarfed by sales in the black market, which according to a recent report in Marijuana Business Daily, accounts for about 10 times the size of the legal market, or about $45 billion to $50 billion. While that's still only about half the size of the legal beer and tobacco market, it is nothing to sneeze at, and it puts marijuana well ahead of some major American economic sectors. Here are 10 products or services already being surpassed by pot, with the first five being smaller than the legal market and the second five being smaller than the estimated overall market, including both licit and illicit markets.

Officials In Obama’s Drug Czar Office Wanted To Decriminalize Marijuana

June 2, 2017 Jason Cherkis, www.huffingtonpost.com , ,
By Jason Cherkis for The Huffington Post - WASHINGTON ― Officials at the Office of National Drug Control Policy under President Barack Obama wanted to take a more lenient stance on marijuana, with one former official telling HuffPost that staff pushed to ease federal prohibitions against the drug. But they never made that case directly to the public. “ONDCP was in favor of decriminalizing but not legalizing,” explained former deputy director A. Thomas McLellan, who worked in the White House office during Obama’s first term. Such a policy shift could have given a shot of momentum to efforts to relax marijuana laws across the country. But it never happened, in large part because officials were worried it would consume the office at a time when they needed to focus on the more pressing issue of the opioid epidemic. The Office of National Drug Control Policy, which is more commonly known as the drug czar’s office, also determined that it couldn’t publicly support decriminalizing marijuana because of a provision in the legislation that authorized its existence. The bipartisan 1988 law that created the drug czar’s office declared that “the legalization of illegal drugs is an unconscionable surrender in the war on drugs.”

Public Banking Goes To Pot

April 27, 2017 Jeremy Lybarger, www.hcn.org ,
By Jeremy Lybarger for High Country News - Last October, a couple from Philadelphia traveled to Sebastopol, California, a quiet outpost some 50 miles north of San Francisco, to buy pot. They’d arranged the deal beforehand, but at some point during the hourlong transaction, the mood soured. Gunfire shattered the mild night. When it was over, two men were dead, a woman was critically injured, and 100 pounds of marijuana and $100,000 to $200,000 in cash were reportedly missing. The killers remain at large. Crime haunts the edges of the cannabis industry, as it does any underground economy. Sebastopol’s local newspaper reports that seven of the 26 people murdered in Sonoma County since 2013 died during marijuana deals. “People get robbed all the time,” says Andrew DeAngelo of Harborside, a dispensary in Oakland, California. Although 29 states and the District of Columbia have legalized marijuana in some form, it’s still federally classified as a Schedule I drug alongside heroin and LSD. And that means, as Last Week Tonight host John Oliver noted in an early April show, that “legal marijuana businesses have struggled to get bank accounts because at the federal level, they are still seen as criminal enterprises.”

It’s Time To Legalize Marijuana And Abolish The Drug Czar

April 24, 2017 Mike Ludwig, www.truth-out.org ,
By Mike Ludwig for Truthout - With its lengthy name and familiar acronym, the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws is one of the oldest pro-legalization lobbies on Capitol Hill, and the group is tired of waiting for a good drug czar to come around. So, NORML is asking the White House to abolish the position altogether, just as President Trump is reportedly preparing to appoint Rep. Tom Marino of Pennsylvania to the office. Marijuana legalization proponents have plenty of problems with Marino becoming the director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP), the position informally known as "drug czar," but that's not the only reason NORML wants the entire "anti-science" agency closed. The ONDCP has long been a center of command for the war on drugs, a bloody and chaotic conflict that is widely seen as a costly failure. Unfortunately for NORML and anyone who cares about personal freedom or public health, top Trump administration officials -- most notably Jeff Sessions, Trump's cannabis-loathing attorney general -- do not appear to agree. Just this week, Department of Homeland Security Chief John Kelly said that minor marijuana charges would be used as a reason to deport immigrants...

Marijuana Giveaway Near US Capitol Somehow Goes Awry

April 22, 2017 Julie Strupp, www.washingtonian.com ,
By Julie Strupp for Washingtonian - Nine cannabis activists were arrested while giving out joints on Capitol Hill Thursday. Nikolas Schiller, co-founder of marijuana advocacy group DCMJ, says he believes his group was in compliance with District laws. Approximately 1,000 of the joints the group hoped to hand out to members of Congress, their staffs, and journalists were taken by US Capitol Police. DCMJ is the group behind Initiative 71, a 2015 law which legalized the possession of small amounts of marijuana for personal use in DC. Federal law still prohibits the possession or use of any amount. Seven of those arrested were members of DCMJ, including the other co-founder Adam Eidinger, and two were part of a local cannabis co-op who were helping out with the giveaway. DCMJ organized this first annual #JointSession event in honor of “4/20,” a holiday celebrated by cannabis enthusiasts, to push for reform in marijuana policy. Schiller says the activists did not anticipate the hassle. Each person had less than two ounces of marijuana on them and they were giving it away on a sliver of what they thought was non-federal land at the corner of 1st Street and Constitution Avenue, NE.

Sessions Says Obama Marijuana Memo Is ‘Valid’

March 16, 2017 Tom Angell, www.massroots.com ,
By Tom Angell for Mass Roots - S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions is indicating that he might keep Obama-era marijuana enforcement guidelines in place, perhaps with some modifications. "The Cole Memorandum set up some policies under President Obama's Department of Justice about how cases should be selected in those states and what would be appropriate for federal prosecution, much of which I think is valid," he said in a question-and-answer session with reporters on Wednesday following a speech in Richmond, Virginia. That memo, adopted in 2013, lays out guidelines for how states can avoid federal interference with their marijuana laws.

Jeff Sessions’ Alternative Facts About Marijuana

March 3, 2017 Tony Newman, www.alternet.org , ,
By Tony Newman for AlterNet - Attorney General Jeff Sessions became the second member of the Trump administration in less than a week to provide “alternative facts” and backward analysis when it comes to marijuana. Yesterday, in a meeting with reporters, Sessions spoke out against marijuana legalization and implied that it’s leading to more violence. “I’m dubious about marijuana. I’m not sure we’re going to be a better, healthier nation if we have marijuana sold at every corner grocery store.” "Experts are telling me there's more violence around marijuana than one would think,” said Sessions. "You can't sue somebody for a drug debt. The only way to get your money is through strong-arm tactics, and violence tends to follow that."

Jeff Sessions Issues Ominous Warning On State Marijuana Legalization

March 1, 2017 Ryan J. Reilly and Matt Ferner, www.huffingtonpost.com , ,
By Ryan J. Reilly and Matt Ferner for The Huffington Post - WASHINGTON ― Attorney General Jeff Sessions on Monday restated his opposition to marijuana use and offered an ominous warning about state-level marijuana legalization efforts, suggesting that such policies would open states to “violence,” as well as potential repercussions from the federal government. “I don’t think America is going to be a better place when people of all ages, and particularly young people, are smoking pot,” Sessions said to reporters Monday at the Department of Justice. “I believe it’s an unhealthy practice, and current levels of THC in marijuana are very high compared to what they were a few years ago, and we’re seeing real violence around that.” Sessions said he had a meeting on Monday with the attorney general of Nebraska, who is very concerned about marijuana flowing in from Colorado, which legalized weed in 2012. “Experts are telling me there’s more violence around marijuana than one would think and there’s big money involved,” he said.

Mobilization Against Sessions Anti-Marijuana Views Begins

February 17, 2017 Stephanie Akin, www.rollcall.com ,
By Stephanie Akin for Roll Call - Lawmakers looking to draw attention to pet issues have formed groups in favor of everything from auto care to zoos. Now, there’s a caucus for cannabis. Rep. Earl Bluemenauer said the move — to be announced at a press conference Thursday — is a sign of how mainstream the drive for marijuana legalization has become. “This is happening all across the country, and its going to continue,” said the Oregon Democrat, an advocate for legalized marijuana since the 1970s. “The industry is growing, as is public acceptance and demand for medical marijuana.” Blumenauer is one of the caucus’s founding members, along with California Republican Dana Rohrabacher, Colorado Democrat Jared Polis and Alaska Republican Don Young.

Legal Pot Sales Top $1 Billion In 2 States

February 12, 2017 Reid Wilson, www.thehill.com ,
By Reid Wilson for the Hill. Residents and visitors to the two states at the vanguard of the marijuana legalization movement spent about $1 billion on pot and pot products last year, according to state data. Marijuana producers and retailers in Colorado generated more than $1.3 billion in revenue in 2016, the state Department of Revenue said Thursday. In Washington, the state Liquor and Cannabis Board said retailers have sold $984 million in pot products during fiscal year 2017 — which does not end until June. Voters in four states — California, Nevada, Massachusetts and Maine — opted to legalize marijuana for recreational use in November’s elections. They join Oregon, Alaska and the District of Columbia, where ballot measures passed in 2014. Several state legislatures, including New Jersey, Vermont and Rhode Island, are expected to debate legalization measures in their current sessions. The legal marijuana industry generated almost $7 billion in sales in 2016, according to Arcview Market Research, which keeps tabs on the industry. Arcview expects more than $21 billion in revenue by 2021.

Why Are They Still Prosecuting Pot Cases In Massachusetts?

February 6, 2017 Mike Crawford, www.alternet.org ,
By Mike Crawford for Alternet. With marijuana having been legalized through the ballot in Massachusetts, and with it now being legal to grow 12 cannabis plants in a household, one might expect to see any existing small time marijuana grow cases to be dismissed.At the same time, state Sen Jason Lewis, considered the leading expert on weed among Beacon Hill lawmakers who themselves know little to nothing, is aiming to severely cut the cannabis possession limit from 10 ounces at home to 2 ounces, as well as limit for home grown plants from 12 to 6. Ironically, Lewis and others have shown superficial support for criminal justice reform—all while lining up to kill and compromise marijuana legalization, one of the clearest wins for criminal justice reformers in recent Mass memory. There is, of course, a choice. Instead of gutting the reform, Lewis should consider joining his colleague Jamie Eldridge in developing an amnesty bill that would dismiss charges, free prisoners, and seal criminal records related to marijuana. Unfortunately, that hasn’t been the case.
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