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Legalizing Pot

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Ex-Microsoft manager plans to create first U.S. marijuana brand. Ex-Microsoft manager plans to create first U.S. marijuana brand. Bloomberg: Medical marijuana a 'hoax' Medical Marijuana ProCon.org. Bloomberg: Medical marijuana a 'hoax' Bloomberg: Medical marijuana a 'hoax' Jimmy Carter: ‘I do not favor’ legalizing marijuana - Kevin Robillard. The haze surrounding Jimmy Carter’s position on marijuana legalization has lifted. Six months after the former president told a Georgia crowd he supported state efforts to legalize marijuana use, Carter told gathering in Atlanta on Friday he supported keeping weed illegal.

Continue Reading Obama on the legalization of pot ( PHOTOS: 9 pols who talked pot ) “I do not favor legalization,” Carter said, according to a statement from Smart Approaches to Marijuana. “We must do everything we can to discourage marijuana use, as we do now with tobacco and excessive drinking.” SAM , as the group is known, was founded by conservative writer David Frum and former Rep. . ( Also on POLITICO: Illinois Senate OKs medical marijuana bill ) Carter’s tune was different in December, when it was widely reported he had backed Washington state and Colorado’s decision to allow residents to legally buy and grow the drug. “I’m in favor of it. . ( PHOTOS: Presidents and their spouses ) Marijuana Repeal Considered In Colorado. Get CBS4 News Updates In Your Inbox Sign up for News, Sports, Broncos and Health Emails. Sign Up DENVER (AP/CBS4) — Marijuana legalization could be going back to the ballot in Colorado — a prospect that infuriated pot legalization activists Friday.

The proposal for a marijuana ballot measure came as the House started debate Friday evening on bills to regulate and tax pot. One bill would state how pot should be grown and sold, and the other would tax recreational marijuana more than 30 percent. A draft bill floating around the Capitol late this week suggests that a new ballot question on pot taxes should repeal recreational pot in the state constitution if voters don’t approve 15 percent excise taxes on retail pot and a new 15 percent marijuana sales tax. Lawmakers have only a few days left to finish work deciding how to regulate the newly legal drug. Sen. The marijuana measure approved last year won more votes than President Barack Obama, who carried the state. Two shot at Denver's Civic Center 4/20 pot rally. The Denver Post Posted: 04/20/2013 05:08:35 PM MDT|Updated: about a year ago Denver Paramedics, Denver Police officers and good samaritans at the scene attend to a shooting victim at Civic Center Park in Denver Colorado, Saturday April 20th, 2013 after the 4/20 pot rally.

(Joe Amon, The Denver Post) Two people were shot in the leg at Denver's Civic Center during Saturday's 4/20 pot rally and a third person was grazed by a bullet. A man and a woman were both shot, said Denver Police spokesman Sonny Jackson. Their injuries are not life-threatening. A juvenile who was grazed by a bullet walked to a nearby hospital. Both victims are in their 20s. Police are looking for at least two suspects involved in the shooting. Crowds scattered around 5 p.m. when shots were heard Saturday. Both of the victims were shot near the outdoor Greek theater. Denver police are asking witnesses that fled to come forward with information, Jackson said. "Everybody fled. Officers are looking for two men.

Reduction in marijuana penalties approved by St. Louis Board of Aldermen. ST. LOUIS • Marijuana smokers in the city may soon get a break. Anyone caught with small amounts of marijuana could end up with a charge as insignificant as a traffic ticket. The Board of Aldermen voted 22-3 on Monday to reduce penalties for possessing small amounts of the drug.

The bill, which was championed by Alderman Shane Cohn, gives police officers the option to redistribute some marijuana cases to the municipal court system, essentially making a criminal infraction a municipal offense. Violators would typically be given a summons to appear in municipal court instead of handcuffed and put in the back of a police car. “I think this is a good step for the city of St. Cohn hopes the measure can help focus prosecutors and law enforcement resources on more serious crimes. Cohn introduced the bill in January, which included a provision to recognize out of state patients with “valid legal prescriptions for medicinal marijuana.” The concept of the bill was supported by the St. In St. Holland's Half-Baked Drug Experiment.

"LOOK AT the Dutch example! " That phrase has become a kind of mantra, chanted whenever the advocates of liberalizing drug laws in Europe or the United States gather. The Dutch, liberalization proponents argue, got it right by legalizing the public sale, under certain restraints, of cannabis products in their now-famous coffee shops and by adopting a much more lenient policy toward all forms of drug use and abuse based on a philosophy of "harm reduction. " But did they? It has been almost a quarter-century since the Dutch Parliament set Holland's drug policy on a course of its own, one markedly different from that of the rest of Europe.

Surely 23 years is enough time to examine the consequences of that policy. How has it affected drug use and addiction in the Netherlands? The revised Dutch drug policy was based on Parliament's 1976 acceptance of the recommendation of a commission headed by Pieter A. How has that situation changed today? The answer they came up with was simple: grow it. The Experience of Foreign Countries and Drug Legalization.

Chapter Three: The Experience of Foreign Countries and Drug Legalization Discussion I. Their Argument Proponents of legalization suggest that the experiences of countries such as Great Britain, the Netherlands, and Switzerland prove the efficacy of legalizing or decriminalizing various types of illegal drugs such as cocaine, heroin, and marijuana. They maintain that because such drugs are legal, these countries have fewer addicts and less drug-related crime. II. Our Argument The statements of the legalizers here are empirically untrue. A. With the report of a government commission known as the Brain Committee of 1964, England instituted a policy whereby doctors could prescribe heroin so long as they followed certain treatment criteria.47 Previously in England, doctors could prescribe heroin much like any other opiate (such as morphine).

As of 1983, however, England began to phase out these programs of clinically supplied heroin in favor of methadone treatment.49 Why? Drugs; B. C. D. E. F. Spiders On Drugs. Spiders On Drugs Scientists at the United States National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) have turned their attention from the mysteries of the cosmos to a more esoteric area of research: what happens when you get a spider stoned.

Their experiments have shown that common house spiders spin their webs in different ways according to the psychotropic drug they have been given. Nasa scientists believe the research demonstrates that web-spinning spiders can be used to test drugs because the more toxic the chemical, the more deformed was the web. * Spiders on marijuana made a reasonable stab at spinning webs but appeared to lose concentration about half-way through. * Those on Benzedrine - "speed" - spin their webs "with great gusto, but apparently without much planning leaving large holes", according to New Scientist magazine. * On chloral hydrat, an ingredient of sleeping pills, spiders "drop off before they even get started". * See what happens to their mental state.

Dogs should be given medical marijuana too says one veterinarian who 'dosed' his own pooch. By Daily Mail Reporter Published: 01:47 GMT, 7 April 2013 | Updated: 01:47 GMT, 7 April 2013 Some pet owners legally give their dogs antidepressants and anti-anxiety medication. Now that several states, including Colorado and Washington, have legalized marijuana use, one veterinarian says that dogs dealing with chronic pain and other debilitating conditions should be allowed to benefit from the medicinal effects of cannabis.

That doesn’t mean dog owners should blow pot smoke in their beloved pets’ faces, Dr. Doug Kramer said in an interview with Vice Magazine. Doggy medicine: Veterinarian Doug Kramer says dogs dealing with chronic pain and other debilitating conditions should be allowed to benefit from the medicinal effects of marijuana Proof: Dr. But he acknowledged that after he ‘dosed’ his own dog Nikita, who had been suffering from terminal cancer, she was up and about and enjoying a better quality of life until she reached her end. But the non-human marijuana users wouldn't smoke it. Is Legalizing Marijuana the Best Thing for America? Marijuana driving limits up for vote in Colorado. DENVER (AP) - Colorado lawmakers are trying for a fourth time to set driving limits for marijuana users.

A bill scheduled for House debate Tuesday would say drivers should be considered impaired if their blood contains more than 5 nanograms of THC per milliliter. THC is the psychoactive ingredient in marijuana. The legislature has tried and failed three times to pass a driving-high blood standard. This year's version is slightly different. It would allow accused drivers to argue they were sober despite a blood test above the legal threshold. Frequent pot users argue their blood limits exceed 5 nanograms even while sober. Driving-high bills have passed the House in previous years, but failed in the Senate. Supporters say that marijuana legalization makes the driving-high bill more important.

(Copyright 2013 by The Associated Press. Kentucky Legislature Passes Hemp Bill, Rand Paul Vows Support From D.C. Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul Join Forces to Legalize Hemp. Supporters of industrial hemp gained a powerful ally in Washington several weeks ago when Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) joined fellow Kentucky Republican Senator Rand Paul and Sens. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) as a co-sponsor of S.359, the Industrial Hemp Farming Act of 2013. The House companion, sponsored by Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), has 28 co-sponsors. The bills would amend the Controlled Substances Act to exclude industrial hemp, the domestic production of which has been illegal since 1970. Though manufacturing hemp is currently just as illegal as growing smokable pot, 10 states already have frameworks in place for industrial hemp production.

The problem is that the Drug Enforcement Administration classifies all forms of hemp as a controlled substance, despite the fact that industrial hemp generally contains less than 0.3 percent THC, or anywhere between 1/6 to 1/66 the amount you'll find in marijuana. Buzzkill? Cash-strapped states eye pot tax - Rachael Bade. Now that voters in Colorado and Washington have legalized recreational marijuana use, dope smokers there can light up without the usual paranoid fear that the cops are at the door. The taxman is another matter.

Continue Reading Obama says 'no' to legalizing pot Rand on marijuana legalization Cash-starved legislators are seeing dollar signs in dime bags — with talk that a tax on marijuana could pump hundreds of millions or even billions into budgets still reeling from the recession. “I’ve seen some estimates in the high tens of millions, as much as $100 million for [Colorado],” said Rep. (PHOTOS: 9 pols who talked pot) It’s long been a central argument of the pro-marijuana crowd: Get marijuana out of the hands of dope dealers, tax it like you do cigarettes, then sit back and watch the money pour in. “We all know where the money from nonmedical marijuana sales is currently going,” said a narrator in a Colorado campaign ad from last year, nodding to Mexico. The estimates are necessarily hazy. Get A Federal Grant To Research Marijuana Legalization In The US.

On first glance, a federal grant to research marijuana legalization in the United States seems like a good thing, and for all I know it might be. It depends on who gets the grant. If it’s a true marijuana expert, that lets science speak for itself and not let pre-conceived, politically motivated biases get in the way, then this is a very good thing. However, if a prohibitionist gets this grant, than the final results and recommendations won’t be worth the paper it’s printed on. Below is information about the grant, and where/how to apply: Submission Deadline: May 31, 2013 by 5:00 PM local time of applicant organization Purpose & Objectives In November 2012, voters passed ballot initiatives in the states of Washington and Colorado to legalize marijuana for adult recreational use.

Scope of Support IC Specific Considerations Award Budget: Eligible Organizations All organizations administering an eligible parent award may apply for a supplement under this announcement. For-Profit Organizations. UN: Colo., Wash. legal pot violates drug treaties | Nation & World. Originally published March 5, 2013 at 6:36 AM | Page modified March 5, 2013 at 9:46 AM A United Nations-based drug agency urged the United States government on Tuesday to challenge the legalization of marijuana for recreational use in Colorado and Washington, saying the state laws violate international drug treaties. The International Narcotics Control Board made its appeal in an annual drug report. It called on Washington, D.C., to act to "ensure full compliance with the international drug control treaties on its entire territory.

" U.S. The federal government could sue the states over legalization or decide not to mount a court challenge. "The entire international system is based on countries respecting the rules, and there's a broad fabric of international treaties that are part and parcel to that," said David Johnson, the U.S. delegate to the Vienna-based board. The control board is the independent monitoring body for the implementation of United Nations drug control conventions. Washington State posts best job ever: marijuana consultant - Feb. 1, 2013. NEW YORK (CNNMoney) But are you qualified? The job requirements are uniquely challenging: At least five years "working experience" doing everything that would land you in federal prison. Washington legalized marijuana for recreational use during the November elections, and the state's Liquor Control Board detailed the new government contract job in a recent 17-page solicitation. In its request for proposal, Washington said it wants expertise on how marijuana is "grown, cultivated harvested, cured and processed," along with "experience with cannabis testing" and "establishing quality standards.

" The best candidate also needs to figure out how to properly regulate the business -- and forecast how much marijuana each region of the state is going to demand. "Ideally, we would like one person who has all those characteristics," said board spokesman Mikhail Carpenter. Carpenter said a criminal record won't be "an immediate disqualifier.

" Related: Don't expect a marijuana boom " You'd need a lawyer. Marijuana dealers get slammed by taxes - Feb. 25, 2013. Denver Relief, one of the largest marijuana dispensaries in Colorado, has an effective tax rate of around 50%, according to co-owner Kayvan Khalatbari. NEW YORK (CNNMoney) The hefty levy is the result of a 1982 provision to the tax code, known as 280E, that stemmed from a successful attempt by a convicted drug trafficker to claim his yacht, weapons and bribes as businesses expenses, according to 280E Reform, a group working to overturn the statute. Enacted in the wake of that PR debacle, the rule bars those selling illegal substances from deducting related expenses on their federal income taxes. It may have been effective against cocaine dealers and smugglers of other hard drugs, but the law now means purveyors of medical marijuana in the 18 states that have legalized the drug can't can't take typical things like rent or payroll as a business expense.

That's taking a heavy toll on this new field. Related: Newest government job - expert pothead.