| Industrial hemp. |
Did Henry Ford really make a car out of hemp? Was the Declaration of Independence written on hemp paper? Did Abraham Lincoln use hemp oil in his lamps?
The hemp plant, a variety of Cannabis sativa that’s the subject of this week’s cover story “Green Acres,” is steeped in lore. Some hemp legends are true. Others are half-true, and some are completely false. Denver Westword presents ten hemp myths culled from the Internet — and attempt to separate the fact from the fiction.
Update – Wednesday, March 20, 2013: The Maryland Senate voted to decriminalize marijuana possession of up to ten grams of marijuana yesterday. The bill’s sponsor, Sen. Robert Zirkin, a democrat from Baltimore, told the Washington Post that he was pleased with his colleagues and says the House would be smart to pass the legislation.
“Incarceration does not make sense [for small amounts],” he told the PostWashington Post newsroom.)
New York City police have spend more than 1 million man hours arresting making about 440,000 marijuana arrests since Mayor Michael Bloomberg took office, according to a study released by the Drug Policy Alliance earlier today.
That number could even be higher. The study, conducted by the Marijuana Arrest Research Project, used a two-and-a-half hour average for each arrest and multiplied that by the 439,056 arrests made in from 2002 through 2012.
| wikipedia.com |
| Bathsheba, Barbados. |
Barbados Attorney General Adriel Brathwiate last week said that he had doubts his country was winning the war on drugs and said the country should re-examine their existing marijuana laws.
According to the Stabroek News, Brathwaite made his remarks while speaking at the opening of a national drug council meeting that was reviewing the country’s drug policies. He pointed to what he sees as an increase in the country’s marijuana use – particularly by young people – as evidence that their policies are failing.
| SBCS |
| $4 million in wet schwag. |
Despite their taste in verdant herbal remedies, smugglers did not have the luck of the green on St. Patrick’s Day. Authorities in Santa Barbara said they found and seized their $4 million stash on Arroyo Camada Beach early Sunday morning.
The weed, found near an abandoned Panga boat, weighed 2,000 pounds. Interestingly, this isn’t the first time this month such a large haul has been found on a California beach near an empty boat. LA Weekly has the details.
| Tim Gabor for Westword.com |
Last week, Denver Westword writer Melanie Asmar took a closer look at what recent marijuana legalization laws have done for industrial hemp in Colorado and what that could mean for the rest of the country.
In it, she details “a merry band of hempsters, a small but dedicated group of supporters that includes a retired Yellow Pages saleswoman, a self-described mad scientist, the victorious defendant in one of Colorado’s landmark medical marijuana cases and a handful of stone-cold sober lawmakers who represent the type of places where people have dirt under their fingernails and make their living off the land. Together, this group is determined to create a hemp industry and position the state at the leading edge of an agricultural boom.”
Read Asmar’s story “Can hemp escape the role of marijuana’s sober stepsiter” in its entirety over at Westword.com
| Steve Katz. |
New York Republican Assemblyman Steve Katz is a fucking hypocrite. Last year, the lawmaker – who is on the Assembly Alcoholism and Drug Abuse Committee – voted against medical marijuana in the state, saying that it would only increase illegal drug use. Fast-forward to this past weekend when Katz was cited for marijuana possession after police pulled him over for speeding.
In an almost comical attempt to achieve pure political correctness, we have seen elementary schools across the nation go to the extremes by banning ridiculous items like Pogs, Flamin’ Hot Cheetos, and even kids playing tag – all in the name of student safety.
So while officials at Pomona Elementary School in Costa Mesa, CA were no-doubt busy busting kids for Pokemon cards and making sure that everybody wins at kickball, a sixth grade student at the school smuggled a potent batch of pot brownies right under their noses and onto the playground.
| Westword.com |
| From the 2011 4/20 celebration at CU Boulder. |
For many years, the University of Colorado was known as one of the largest 4/20 gatherings on any college campus in the United States. Thousands would descend upon Norlin Quad for a peaceful and hazy afternoon of basking in the Colorado spring sunshine (and occasional rain). But starting last year, the University decided to close down the campus to everyone but students and official visitors in an attempt to curb the gathering. Their efforts worked, and much to the dismay of ganja smokers in Boulder the campus is being shut down again this year.
Denver Westword has the rest.
Marijuana possession would not be included in Louisiana’s draconian mandatory minimum sentencing laws if a bill introduced earlier this week manages to find approval in the state legislature.
State Rep. Austin Badon, a democrat from New Orleans, introduced House Bill 103 on Tuesday which in addition to removing marijuana possession a qualifying offense for the state’s three strikes law.