| TokeoftheTown.com |
The teenage years are an awkward time for everybody. High school can be especially tough, just trying to fit in, particularly if you have any sort of disability. 15-year-old Noah Kirkman, a 10th-grade student at Western Canada High School knows about these pressures all too well, growing up with attention-deficit disorder and Tourette syndrome.
While he is far from the first high school student to have to deal with such issues, he appears to be one of the first students to have been granted permission by his school to use medical marijuana, while on campus, to treat his ailments. That’s right, three times a day the young man walks right past the Principal’s office, and into the Vice Principal’s office for a quick rip, or two or three, off of his handheld herbal vaporizer.
Americans are in favor of making marijuana legal, and that most people don’t believe it is harmful or a gateway drug.
Could we be seeing the effects of anti-pot propaganda finally wearing off? Fifty-five percent of people think that the use of marijuana should be made legal and 54 percent think that sales should be made legal as well. These numbers are dramatically higher than they were from other surveys over the past 40 years, and have dramatically spiked since 2010. The percentage of Americans in favor of making marijuana use legal rose 25 percent from 1973 to 2012, then jumped another 12 percent from last summer until now.
| Michael Schmidt. |
There hasn’t been a satisfying explanation as to why Michael Schmidt, a successful Dallas trial lawyer described by friends as a “good, good person,” barricaded himself in an Uptown apartment complex and opened fire on police while his 11-year-old daughter sat in his apartment. Probably, there never will be. But a list of the items found in Schmidt’s home obtained by WFAA offers … clues? Red herrings? A voyeuristic glimpse of an unsettled life?
Dallas Observer has more on this extremely strange, wild saga.
| Video and more below. |
The inability of marijuana businesses to straight-forwardly stash their cash in standard financial institutions due to federal banking regulations aimed at stopping drug trafficking has been an issue in Colorado for years. But despite Obama administration statements about possible fixes and a request from Governor John Hickenlooper more than three months ago, nothing has been done. Now, however, with the recreational pot biz reportedly taking in more than $5 million in the first five days of sales, the Denver City Council is raising its voice.
Denver Westword has more.
Is Walter White overtaking Tony Montana as Florida’s iconic drug-dealing antihero of choice?
Earlier this month, police in Florida found a stuffed Walter White doll in a car parked outside a meth house, and now a Florida man who won a fan contest to watch the series finale of Breaking Bad with the cast was arrested for running his very own ring of lab-made drugs often called “synthetic marijuana”. Miami New Times has the details.
| New Hampshire state house. |
Kicking off the New Year with a bhang, New Hampshire’s House is set to vote Wednesday on a plan that would legalize up to an ounce of pot for adults 21 and up for recreational purposes (or, for whatever purpose you may have for using cannabis). The bill, dubbed House Bill 492, is among the first few to be debate in the 2014 session.
Under the proposal, the state would legalize and regulate cannabis dispensaries to sell herb taxed at a rate of $30 per ounce. Adults 21 and up would be able to grow up to six plants at a time at home. Generally speaking, the plan is identical to the one passed in Colorado in 2012.
| Science! |
Leave it to the French to figure out a way to make marijuana healthy for you.These are the people who drink plenty of wine and eat fatty duck liver without the kind of waistline expansion seen here in the United States. Maybe they’re on to something.
A study from the French institute INSERM says the ill effects of marijuana, namely the high, can now be blocked. Science! Now — of course you’re asking — why in the heck would we want to nullify the high? Good question, and the LA Weekly has the answer.
Medical marijuana could be coming to New York sooner than later, with a plan from Gov. Andrew Cuomo coming in a few days that could allow hospitals to dispense the herb.
Members of Cuomo’s staff leaked the plan Saturday to State Assemblyman Richard Gottfried, a medical marijuana advocate who has pushed for legislation in the past. Gottfried called the program “limited and cumbersome,” but conceded that it’s a step in the right direction.
| TokeoftheTown.com |
The push is on to make Florida the next state to legalize medical marijuana. Organizers have one month to get 700,000 signatures on a petition to get the issue on the November ballot. But since state laws require that the petitions be paper petitions that are mailed in via snail mail — not online ones — and then validated, the petition organizing group, United for Care, is asking that all petitions come in by Tuesday, January 7.
United for Care is backed by megamillionaire John Morgan, who has donated $2 million to the effort. The group is working around the clock to collect enough signatures before the fast-approaching deadline passes. Broward-Palm Beach New Times has the full story and links to find out where you can sign if you’re living in Florida.
While the type of Colorado weed that gets you stoned has been getting all the attention this week, it’s fibrous cousin hemp also saw some major changes in the Centennial State.
The Colorado Department of Agriculture yesterday announced farmers can register for industrial hemp production starting March 1. Registration as a grower will cost a farmer $200 plus $1 an acre. Research licenses will be granted for $100 plus $5 an acre.