Backers of the California Cannabis Hemp Initiative have been given the go-ahead from the state to begin collecting the required 504,760 signatures needed to get their legalization bill before voters this fall.
If approved, the measure – dubbed the Jack Herer Initiative — would legalize cannabis use for adults 21 and up, allow for licensed and taxed cannabis retail sales, loosen restrictions on doctors recommending medical cannabis for minors, restrict drug testing for pot by employers and forbid any state funds from going toward enforcement of federal marijuana laws. But that’s a big “if”. The signatures must be collected by Aug. 18, and that’s not going to be cheap or easy to achieve.
| Bernard Gagnon. |
Utah parents of children suffering from severe seizure disorders can now obtain CBD-based medicines for their children thanks to a bill signed into law yesterday by Gov. Gary Herbert.
The only catch: the parents can’t purchase the oil anywhere in Utah, nor can they grow plants to make the oil themselves. Instead, Utah lawmakers are forcing the families to travel out of state, purchase the oil, then break federal and local laws bringing it back home with them.
| Coleen Danger. |
Gov. Mark Dayton took to the radio yesterday morning to say that his proposal to research medical marijuana hasn’t gotten any love from the advocates of broader legalization. He put the prospects of passing it between “slim and none.”
However, those same advocates plan to add part of the Dayton proposal as an amendment and are open to compromising on some points. They contend that the governor’s version of a medical marijuana program — despite his assertions — would help no one in the immediate future.
The Colorado Supreme Court has ruled that Colorado attorneys can advise medical and recreational marijuana shops to follow state laws, even though such laws are in complete contradiction to federal laws that Colorado attorneys all vow to uphold. Back in December, the Colorado Bar Association had released a formal opinion that attorneys were not allowed to counsel dispensary owners “in structuring or implementing transactions which by themselves violate federal law.” Basically, that meant attorneys couldn’t help draft contracts or advise their clients how to run a legal medical or recreational dispensary.
All that changed Monday.
More photos below.Could marijuana have played a role in fixing one of the most important American boxing matches in history? Probably not, but we’ve uncovered at least one harebrained scheme reported in a Colorado newspaper in1889 that says it could be plausible.
| Jacqueline Patterson from YouTube. |
When Jacqueline Patterson took her first toke of marijuana at the age of fourteen, she experienced what it was like to be without pain for the first time in her life. It’s also why she eventually had to leave Missouri. Patterson was born with cerebral palsy. The muscles on the right side of her body are significantly weaker and less developed than her left, and she speaks with a severe stutter, or as she prefers to call it, a “speech spasm.” Medical marijuana, Patterson says, has helped her deal with the pain her medical condition causes every day of her life, and it also helps with her speech. When she smokes, her brain doesn’t feel as rushed, and she’s able to get the words out easier, she says.
Although using marijuana to treat cerebral palsy is not unheard of these days, it wasn’t an accepted notion roughly twenty years ago when Patterson first tried it and noticed a remarkable difference it made on her body.
South Carolina is the latest state to move forward with legislation that would allow children to access high-CBD oils to help control major seizure disorders. Or, at least that’s what lawmakers would like their constituents to believe. The reality is that they are wasting their time on a bill that won’t help anyone and gives false hope to suffering South Carolina families.
A new report published in the medical journal Neurology proves what thousands of multiple sclerosis patients already know: cannabis can help considerably alleviate some of the symptoms of MS. And actually, that’s exactly what Dr. Pushpa Narayanaswami, lead researcher on the report, says got him interested in the plant in the first place. The report is meant to be a guideline for physicians with patients seeking alternative treatments.
Mason Tvert, founder of SAFER and father of Amendment 64, showed up outside the Colorado Governor’s mansion last Friday to call Governor John Hickenlooper a hypocrite for installing craft-beer taps there and turning it into Colorado’s version of Animal House.
But while Tvert’s protest outfit — a bed-sheet toga — was intentional — he swears the timing was a coincidence. After all, the members of the Colorado Brewers Guild who paid for the tap system and the governor himself weren’t showing up until 6 p.m., so Tvert was all alone except for a few cameras. Denver Westword has more.
| Flickr/Anupam Kamal |
A St. Louis Metropolitan Police officer with three years on the force shot a robbery suspect during a foot chase Thursday night near Fairground Park, striking him in the thigh.
Turns out, suspect Keon Davis wasn’t involved in the robbery police were investigating. But a department-issued bullet in the leg didn’t stop the Circuit Attorney’s Office from charging the seventeen-year-old with unlawful use of a weapon, possession of up to 35 grams of marijuana and resisting arrest.