An Iowa state senator has introduced a medical marijuana bill to the state legislature, but says advancing the bill any further would be a long shot.
Sen. Joe Bolkcom of Iowa City says he doesn’t have the bipartisan support in both the state House and Senate whatsoever for Senate File 79, which would allow for qualifying patients to cultivate and possess up to 2.5 ounces of herb at a time as well as create state-regulated medical cannabis dispensaries.
Two Michigan pot farmers found themselves in hot water when local authorities discovered 211 plants growing in well-guarded greenhouses on the men’s property.
Gerald Duval Jr. and his son, Jeremy Duval, were convicted of drug trafficking, with the elder getting slapped with a 10 year sentence, and his adult son being handed five years in the clink. They appealed their convictions on multiple grounds, but the 6th Circuit Court ruled this week that the two had no right to challenge the court’s decision any further.
“Joe is a freshman legislator in a Republican-controlled house, so he’s got zero juice to get anything done.” So says John Morgan, an Orlando-based attorney and cannabis reform advocate.
The “Joe” he is referring to is Florida state congressman Joe Saunders (D- Orlando), who recently filed House Bill 859, which if passed, would skip right past the voters in Florida, making legal medical marijuana the law of the land.
Morgan, who has personally raised $4,000,000 in an effort to get a similar piece of legislation before Florida voters this November, calls Saunders’ plan nothing more than a publicity stunt.
| Miami New Times |
Is Florida ready for medical marijuana? Well, yeah actually. The latest polls show that seven in ten statewide support legalized weed for various ailments, and supporters have gathered enough signatures to put the question on November’s ballot. One way or another, loosened mary jane restrictions seem coming to the Sunshine State.
But everyone knows Miami rocks to its own beat on just about every statewide issue. How’s the average Magic City resident feel about medical marijuana?
Miami New Times’ Kathryn Sotolongo took a trip to Bayfront Park to find out.
If you were arrested and/or prosecuted in Norfolk County, Massachusetts for marijuana possession, cultivation, or sales, between the years 1976 and 1996, it was local District Attorney Bill Delahunt who was ultimately responsible for your buzzkill. From 1997 until 2011, he served Massachusetts’ 10th District as a United States Congressman.
| Wikimedia Commons |
| Bill Delahunt from Medical Marijuana of Massachusetts |
Late last month, when just 20 medical marijuana dispensary licenses were granted across the entire state, it was Delahunt’s latest venture, a company called Medical Marijuana of Massachusetts, which was granted all 3 licenses that it applied for. No other group was awarded more than two.
In a new study published this week in Nature Neuroscience, European researchers claim to have proven that smoking weed does, in fact, give you the munchies. Beyond that, they appear to have isolated the specific region of the brain that is affected by THC consumption, and identified the process through which that desire to eat an entire box of Lucky Charms at 2am comes from.
| Flickr.com/enerva |
| So many choices… |
In their study, the team of neuroscientists used a mischief of mice to conduct their herbal experimentation on, due to the cognitive similarities that mice share with humans. Roughly half the time, the mice got to get super baked, the other half they had to sit around sober as churchmice, and then…well…what happened to some of the poor critters near the end is downright freaky.
The benefits of cannabis use are many, and are as varied as the types of people who benefit from the plant. Not a week goes by anymore without at least one headline about another person, young or old, who claims that marijuana saved their life.
In a groundbreaking report just published in the American Journal of Public Health, researchers from the University of Colorado, scouring state-level suicide data over a 17-year period, may have proven that legalizing marijuana may be saving more lives than we think.
| Brandon Marshall/Westword |
In the November elections of 2012, 63% of the voters in Massachusetts approved Question 3, the state’s newly proposed medical marijuana law, making the Bay State the 18th state in the nation to legalize ganja use for medicinal purposes. With Connecticut, Vermont, Maine, and Rhode Island already respecting patients’ rights, and New Hampshire looking to follow in Colorado and Washington’s footsteps, all of New England will soon enjoy safe access.
Back in Massachusetts, in accordance with the regulations set forth in the Question 3 medical marijuana law, the Massachusetts Department of Public Health sparked the process this past Friday by granting the first 20 official licenses for prospective storefront medical marijuana dispensaries.
As we’ve reported before, Arizona law allows for medical marijuana dispensaries around the state, but one county has been fighting a battle against legal pot shops (and private patients). Of course, it’s Maricopa County, so nobody is really that surprised.
Thankfully, the fight for a medical-marijuana dispensary on unincorporated Maricopa County land won a key victory on Wednesday with the Board of Supervisors lifting its ban on the shops. But the five Supervisors — one Democrat and four Republicans — and the county attorney continue to see the case as their ticket to overturning the state’s voter-approved medical-pot law. The good people at the Phoenix New Times have the details.
A pair of Pennsylvania senators has introduced legislation that would legalize the cultivation of state-regulated CBD-rich cannabis plants and the production of high-CBD oils and tinctures, but the rest of the cannabis plant would remain illegal.
Senate Bill 1182, sponsored by Sens. Daylin Leach and Mike Folmer, would legalize a specific strain of cannabis bred in Colorado by one specific medical cannabis shop that has been made famous through several high-profile media specials. Both lawmakers say the bill is aimed to help children suffering from severe seizure disorders.