It’s a big step towards national legalization.
Here’s your daily round-up of pot-news, excerpted from the newsletter WeedWeek. Download WeedWeek’s free 2016 election guide here.
Irvine, Calif.-based Weedmaps is full of bogus dispensary reviews, according to an investigation by the L.A. Times.
Reporter Paresh Dave looked at nearly 600 businesses reviewed on the site and found that 70% included reviews submitted from a single IP address (i.e. a single computer). A textual analysis found that 62% of reviews on the site are “fake.”
Weedmaps, a Yelp-like service with operations in several states, had stored the IP addresses of anonymous reviewers, in its publicly available code. A Weedmaps executive said the 62% figure is far too high, and emphasized that reviews are only part of the product.
Patrick Kennedy, the former Democratic Congressman from Rhode Island, is not a fan of marijuana legalization, and he wants everyone to know about it. The son of the late Teddy Kennedy, the wildly popular long time Senator from Massachusetts, Patrick is riding the coattails of his family name on a whirlwind media tour to promote his new prohibitionist group, SAM (Smart Approaches to Marijuana).
After visits to nationally syndicated cable television shows like Bill Maher and Piers Morgan, Kennedy’s latest soapbox comes in the form of an op-ed piece that was graciously printed by the notoriously conservative and anti-cannabis San Diego Union-Tribune.
In the piece, Kennedy says, “When I woke up after the 2012 election, two states had voted to legalize marijuana. That day I also ‘woke up’ to how naive I had been. ”
| Patrick Whittemore/Boston Herald |
| U.S. Attorney Carmen Ortiz: “While this office does not intend to focus its limited resources on seriously ill individuals who use marijuana as part of a medically recommended treatment program in compliance with state law, individuals and organizations who are in the business of cultivating, selling or distributing marijuana, and those who knowingly facilitate such activities, will be in violation of federal law and be subject to federal enforcement.” |
Medical marijuana advocates in Massachusetts say they’ll take their cause to the ballot if the Legislature won’t pass it, but the usual objections are being raised by law enforcement officials, who say that legalizing medicine cannabis could put the state at odds with the federal government.
| Graphic: International Cannabis & Hemp Expo |
The International Cannabis & Hemp Expo is coming to Daly City, California’s Cow Palace next month. Organizers say no marijuana will be sold during the expo, planned for April 17 and 18.