The cannabis industry has no shortage of entrepreneurs fighting to gain a toehold in the field, but one of the industry’s most well-known names got there almost by accident. Ricardo Baca had been covering music for the Denver Post for over a decade when Colorado legalized the plant recreationally, and he was a bit befuddled when his bosses asked him to lead what would become the Cannabist , the first cannabis vertical for a major daily newspaper.
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Andrew Freedman lost his job in January, but it wasn’t because of poor performance. In fact, the Colorado director of marijuana coordination was let go for just the opposite reason: He’d been hired to implement the state’s framework of rules and industry regulations for recreational marijuana, and he’d done such a good job that the state was eliminating the job entirely.
Kevin Sabet, the president and CEO of Virginia-based Smart Approaches to Marijuana, has become arguably the most influential critic of marijuana legalization in the United States. But in an extended interview on view below, he fights against the perception that he’s a one-dimensional prohibitionist along the lines of U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions. Sabet stresses that he and his organization, shorthanded as SAM, take what he sees as a sensible approach to cannabis by arguing in favor of treatment rather than jail time for users in trouble and advocating for greater study of the substance to determine the best ways to utilize it medically.
Today is my 15th anniversary with Miss Mary Jane, a long and torrid love affair that will not end with a baby named “North”. I’ve tried a lot of other drugs (most of them, in fact), including trying to smoke the insides of a banana peel because The Anarchist Cookbook apparently wanted to ruin a day of my life. These, in no particular order, are the things I’ve learned about herb.
| It always feels like somebody’s watching me. |
Well, crazy tokers of the internet: you were right. I’ve argued for years that no one gives a shit what you do online as long as it doesn’t involve kids or weapons, even though a tiny hit of Durban Poison will have me drawing the shades and painting mental pictures of what prison is like.
But apparently the NSA cares what EVERYONE is doing. All the time. Our prized privacy is under attack, but here are some positives:
For states about to medical, let me learn ya something: there is no way to prepare for your first visit to a dispensary. It’s like you Neil Armstrong moon-walked into the Wonka factory. Unless the shop is staffed with little people suffering from extreme Carotenemia though, you’ll probably have to deal with a real life human being with their own set of issues. Don’t become one of them. Here are the five things to avoid if you want to ingratiate yourself to your new budtender:
| Wikipedia commons. |
Last Friday, Seattle Seahawks defensive end Bruce Irvin was suspended by the NFL for a violation of their substance abuse policy, the sixth member of the squad to receive such punishment since 2010.
Since the NFL can’t disclose why, Irvin did as teammate Richard Sherman did before him: hint that the violation was for taking Adderall without disclosing it. While heavily prescribed, Adderall isn’t without risks, but it certainly can have it’s performance-enhancing advantages — same as any number of drugs that areallowed in sports. If the league is going are going to be hypocrites, then why not allow one of the best natural performance enhancers out there: marijuana?
Big pharma/tobacco/ag is coming for our pot: this much we know. With a market potential of “billions” being floated around, they certainly won’t leave it in the hands of Joe Grower.
When Colorado passed the most permissive cannabis laws in the history of the world this week, stakeholders did everything they could to prevent the corporate takeover of “Phizanto Morris” in the state. That’s what they’ll tell you, at least. In reality, they just fucked over toking entrepreneurs in 49 states, D.C., and whatever Puerto Rico is these days.
If you combined Saturday Night Live‘s “Really?” segment with ESPN’s celebration of boneheaded NFL plays titled “C’Mon Man!” you would have my reaction to Derek Rosenfeld’s recent HuffPo article trashing our commander in chief. In his piece “President Obama Is the Last Person Who Should Joke About Marijuana”, Rosenfeld, who is the Internet communications associate at the venerable Drug Policy Alliance, took issue with one joke from the Prez’s annual White House Correspondents Dinner.
What was so egregious about Obama’s marijuana diss? It wasn’t one to begin with.