Author Alex Halperin

The Washington Post learned that Maryland state lawmaker Del. Dr. Dan K. Morhaim, a vocal supporter of legalizing MED, is affiliated with a company applying for a state MED license. Morhaim, who’s also a physician, said he has no equity in the company, and had cleared his involvement with the legislature’s ethics advisor.

Maryland has promised to begin awarding the coveted licenses next month. The evaluation process cost about $2 million , almost five times the original estimate.

More rigorous product testing is coming to Oregon this fall, but so far  no testing lab licenses  have been issued. MED dispensaries  can open in Hawaii  but none are ready.

Tech billionaire Sean Parker doubled his contribution to California’s REC initiative to $2.25 million.

Long Beach, Calif. won a lawsuit that will allow it to maintain its dispensary ban. Voters will have a chance to overturn the city’s ban in November. It’s complicated.

High Times says Brexit could set back legalization in the U.K.

Italian lawmakers will consider full legalization. Greece may legalize MED. A new bill in Ireland would legalize MED.

Legal pot probably isn’t as big a draw for Colorado tourists as had once been thought. Seattle alt-weekly The Stranger makes a technical argument that Washington State should have licensed more dispensaries.

Edibles company Bhang Chocolate lost a $1.875 million breach of contract suit to investor Mentor Capital.

HelloMD, a site that allows patients to obtain doctors’ recommendations online, has a questions and answers site that TechCrunch compares to “ Quora for cannabis.”

Canadian company Canopy Growth, plans to start selling MED in German pharmacies.

Weed is among the highest grossing products on the “ dark web,” online marketplaces that are difficult for law enforcement to track.

Investment in cannabis start-ups is on the rise. Instagram “ purged” a few big brands’ accounts.

The Atlantic talks to a few female cannabis entrepreneurs.

Canna Law Blog has a post on the eight pitfalls awaiting the industry in California.

Dispensary chain Terrapin Care Station acquired Denver Relief’s central Denver store.

The situation appears under control.

The following is excerpted from the newsletter WeedWeek. Get your free and confidential subscription at WeedWeek.net.

An investigation in Hugo, Colo. found THC in the drinking water. Authorities found signs of tampering on a well and initiated a criminal investigation. Additional tests are underway to confirm the finding. Initially, the cannabis community said contamination is unlikely since THC is not soluble in water.

Screening stations have been set up for residents and water is being trucked in. Hugo, a town of about 750 on the state’s eastern plains, does not have any marijuana businesses.

LA Weekly looks at how legalization  could change employer drug testing  policies. The California Supreme Court has ruled that a MED card does not allow employees to be high on the job, or overrule company drug testing policies. In the future, the piece notes, this stance may lead to disability suits.

In California, concentrates remain a “ legal gray area.”

A random controlled study out of Holland proved that alcohol makes users more aggressive and cannabis makes them less aggressive. (Read the study here.)

Vancouver activist Dana Larsen said customers don’t need prescriptions at his MED pharmacies.

Colorado has released a PSA on cannabis and pregnancy. Chronic and/or severe pain is by far the most common qualifying condition for MED.

Washington state hopes new labelling will keep kids away from edibles.

Between 2002 and 2013, it’s estimated that Massachusetts crime lab chemist Annie Dookhan, who was later convicted of perjury and evidence tampering, corrupted more than 24,000 cases. Those convicted based on her work can now seek new trials. Dookhan served three years in prison.

An audit in Houston found 298 wrongful drug convictions. A researcher at the libertarian Cato Institute argues that the drug war has made policing more violent.

Operation Sabot, Canada’s annual sweep for illegal outdoor grows, takes place at the end of summer. Each year it targets a different region right before the harvest.

Maryland withdrew a proposal to ban letters to prisoners (except legal correspondence). The state’s prisons have been overwhelmed by Suboxone, an opioid available in sublingual strips that prisoners receive in envelopes.

If California legalizes, what will happen to people in prison for marijuana offenses? Missouri governor Jay Nixon (D), signed a law that will make it easier for marijuana offenders to get their records expunged.

A bill in the U.S. Senate would protect the families of children with epilepsy from prosecution if they obtain CBD treatments.

Is smoking pot a guaranteed religious freedom?

Excerpted from the newsletter WeedWeek. Get your free and confidential subscription at WeedWeek.net.

The activist known as New Jersey Weedman will be able to argue in court that raids on his Trenton, N.J. “cannabis temple” violate his religious freedom.

Kayvan Khalatbari, a prominent activist and businessman in Denver, discussed the industry’s lack of diversity with Vice.

Sports Illustrated travels to Humboldt to ask about the industry’s impact on high school and college sports there. “There are probably no other public schools in the world that have ever offered clipping trays — trays for clipping marijuana on — as part of their auction for the PTA fair,” local journalist Kym Kemp says.

NFL running back turned cannabis investor Ricky Williams is the subject of a new Sports Illustrated documentary. He estimates that 70 percent of NFL players smoke marijuana.

Harper’s Bazaar visits the annual Spirit Weavers Gathering, a getaway for New Age-inclined women, that the article calls “the world’s chicest cult.” There, author Marisa Meltzer hears of a California pot farm that has fertilized the plant with menstrual blood for two generations.

A Canadian known as Marijuana Man makes $78,000 a year getting high on Youtube. He told an interviewer that he’s had internet “since 1984.”

There’s a crowdfunding campaign to bring “industrial hemp building and farming ambassador” Klara Marosszeky to California for a visit. She’s based in Australia.

Wired visits high-end edibles maker Défoncé Chocolatier. (Défoncé means ‘wasted’.)

“The Summer Fair,” a festival in Portland this month, will have free pot giveaways.

Netflix will make “Disjointed,” a weed sitcom starring Kathy Bates.

The Reductress recommends “ Healthy Snacks To Balance Out All The Junk You’ll Devour When You’re High Tonight.”

The question of use by women who are expecting heats up.

Excerpted from the newsletter WeedWeek. Get your free and confidential subscription at WeedWeek.net.

A study suggests that cannabis use during pregnancy affects brain development. More Colorado newborns are testing positive for THC.

Thirty-three were hospitalized in Brooklyn, for suspected synthetic cannabis (“K2”) overdoses in the area around a subway stop.

The National Institutes of Health sent out a request for information about varieties of marijuana and their possible research value.

Check out this chart which illustrates last week’s remarkable finding that drug prescriptions are falling in MED states.

Project CBD published a CBD Users Manual. It’s one of the better ones I’ve seen.

Cannabis allergies are climbing.

The big move by Scotts Miracle-Grow into cannabis is dividing the industry.

Buzzfeed makes the case that Facebook and Google’s cannabis policy enforcement is a mess.

The U.K.’s GW Pharmaceuticals which has seen its stock soar on data from its cannabis-based drug Epidiolex, plans to raise $252 million on the Nasdaq exchange with Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and Bank of America Merrill Lynch shepherding the deal.

Business attorney Hilary Bricken lays out  six weed scams  for investors and others to watch out for.

Compliance at Millennium Bank, a community bank in Des Plaines, Ill. is reportedly under scrutiny from state and federal authorities for working with marijuana companies.

Whitney Hobbs, a founder of Oregon distributor Highly Distributed, has sued CEO Christopher Mallott for sexual harassment that led to her departure from the company. She says he groped and smelled her. The company declined to comment but an employee refuted Hobbs’ claims.

Cannabis sales continue to climb in Colorado and support the state’s economy. See here for more.

A glimpse of the future? A group of Colorado’s largest craft breweries, led a break-up of the Colorado Brewers Guild to form a new group called Craft Beer Colorado. The split follows an overhaul of state alcohol laws.

Analyst Alan Brochstein writes that Canada’s pot policies make more sense than America’s.

Former NORML head Allen St. Pierre joined a publicly-traded consultancy called Freedom Leaf.

Voters will have a clear choice in November.

The following is excerpted from the newsletter WeedWeek. Get your free and confidential subscription at WeedWeek.net.

The Democratic Party Platform states “We encourage the federal government to remove marijuana from its list as a Class 1 Federal Controlled Substance, providing a reasoned pathway for future legalization.” The Washington Post describes the language as a nod to Bernie Sanders.

For its platform, the Republican Party rejected language supporting MED. It was proposed by Dale Jackson, a GOP delegate from Georgia with an autistic son. Another delegate said mass-shooters are, “young boys from divorced families, and they’re all smoking pot.”

Donald Trump’s vice presidential pick, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence (R) opposed reducing marijuana penalties in 2013.

The Cannabist released its 2016 election guide.

The industry-loathed “ potency amendment” will not be on the Colorado ballot. Frank McNulty (R), a former speaker of the Colorado House and supporter of the measure said the industry paid signature gathering firms to not gather signatures. “Without [signature gathering companies]we didn’t have the ability to get it to the ballot,”McNulty said.

An industry spokesman denied the accusation andThe Denver Post editorial page finds it “dubious.” “ Big marijuana trashes democratic process,” the Colorado Springs Gazette editorializes.

Campaign filings released on August 1 will clarify what happened. (An email query from WeedWeek was not returned.)

The Amendment would have banned products with higher than 16% THC, which account for 80% of cannabis products in Colorado. “Make no mistake,” the Post writes, “139 was an anti-pot measure designed to gut the industry. And it’ll be back.”

With industry support, California plans to regulate water use by growers.

Hezekiah Allen, executive director of the California Growers Association, explains his ambivalence about California’s upcoming Adult Use of Marijuana Act vote: “The initiative is decidedly more friendly to big business and will lead to rapid consolidation of the industry. This is an avoidable and undesirable outcome.” (See the initiative’s exact language here.)

Montanans will vote on a measure to expand the state’s MED program. L.A. County voters will decide on a marijuana business tax to benefit the homeless. The L.A. Times tells government officials, “Legal marijuana should not be seen as the solution to your revenue problems.”

A federal judge rejected the claim that current federal laws are “so arbitrary and irrational as to be unconstitutional.” The complaint was brought by Charles and Alexander Green, two Californian brothers accused of trafficking.

A proposed MED measure in North Dakota would be too expensive, the state health department said. The Pennsylvania legislature approved growing hemp for research.

Home gardening in Washington D.C. just got a lot more fun.

The following is excerpted from the newsletter WeedWeek. Get your free and confidential subscription at WeedWeek.net.

Washington D.C. consultant Natalie Carver has started a business assisting home growers. “She rolls her joints with rosemary, lavender, and mullein, a bronchial dilator used by Native Americans in spiritual ceremonies.”

A rabbi and an African-American pastor are among the parties competing for grow licenses in Maryland.

The German bestseller “ High Hitler: Drugs in the Third Reich,” is being translated into English.

Product Earth Expo, the U.K.’s largest cannabis convention, took place for the second time. An Australian man called the cops on his father for burning his crop.

There has been a resurgence of the red cannabis associated with Calabria, the rugged “toe” of Italy. In another piece, Leafly’s Enrico Fletzer asks if legalization is coming to Naples, where organized crime controls the market. Fletzer also calls Bologna the “ Hemp capital of Europe.”

Rival pro-legalization groups had an altercation outside the Vancouver Art Gallery. An organizer with Cannabis Culture said he was attacked by someone wielding a yoga mat. I’m just juvenile enough to mention that western Canada’s premiere art museum is known as “ the VAG.”

Washington D.C. consultant Natalie Carver has started a business assisting home growers. “She rolls her joints with rosemary, lavender, and mullein, a bronchial dilator used by Native Americans in spiritual ceremonies.”

Contrary to internet rumors, doughnut chain Tim Hortons will not start selling pot next year.

The video game Hemp Inc. resembles Farmville, with one predictable difference. Vice also interviews some female dealers.

The new 419.99 mile markers on Interstate 70 in Colorado, do not get stolen as often as their 420 mile predecessors.

Olympics-branded weed is available in Rio.

Just your average, .32-gram joint here.

The following is excerpted from the newsletter WeedWeek. Get your free and confidential subscription at WeedWeek.net.

A ProPublica investigation finds that field drug tests widely-used by police are unreliable and can turn up false positives.

A study in JAMA Psychiatry found that cannabis use disrupts the reward processing mechanism in the brain. The journal editorializes that more research into the plant’s effects on the brain is urgently needed.

Smoking cannabis and tobacco together, a practice more common in Europe than the U.S., may contribute to dependency on both, a study found. See the study here.

In Canada, border authorities have cracked down on shipments of CBD oil. In Australia, some children with epilepsy will have access to the CBD-based drug Epidiolex before trials are complete.