Free Republic

BOSTON - The first recreational marijuana shop opened Monday in Boston, where owners are bracing for large crowds. Pure Oasis owners Kobie Evans and Kevin Hart say they’re preparing for up to 1,000 customers a day to visit the store, which is also the first pot shop owned and operated by black entrepreneurs, in its initial days. Evans and Hart say their shop marks a significant step forward for the East Coast’s pot industry. “It’s bittersweet. It’s a great feeling to be first, but we know that also comes with a level of responsibility,” Hart told The Associated Press last...

CHICAGO (CBS) — Statewide legal marijuana sales in Illinois totaled nearly $35 million in the month of February, according to the state. The Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation announced preliminary numbers showed statewide sales totaled $34,805,072.01 for February. Dispensaries sold 831,600 items in total, with $25,615,371 worth being purchased by Illinois residents, and $9,189,701.01 being purchased by out-of-state residents. The figures do not include taxes collected. The state charges a 7% tax on the sales of cannabis by cultivators and craft growers to dispensaries. The governor’s office has estimated cannabis tax revenues will grow to $127 million in...

Like a number of states, concealed pistol license holders in Michigan are exempted from the requirement to undergo a NICS background check every time they purchase a new firearm. That’s because permit holders have already undergone an extensive background check and fingerprinting in order to be issued a permit in the first place. Michigan has had that exemption from the ATF since 2006, but yesterday the ATF rescinded it. Why? Because recreational marijuana is now legal in the state. Voters approved legalization in 2018 and retail sales started December 1, 2019. While buying and using weed may not be a...

MONTPELIER, Vt. (WCAX) Vermont lawmakers have given the initial green light for a legal market for marijuana. In a preliminary vote Wednesday night, the House approved the cannabis bill 90-54 following hours of debate. They will be back Thursday afternoon to consider additional amendments before taking final action. The bill calls for marijuana sales to be charged a 20% tax and some of that revenue would be used for after school and summer learning programs. The bill establishes a license for current medical dispensaries to start selling marijuana in 2022. The bill also bans flavored cannabis vapes and sets a...

We can all agree that the recent trend of teen vaping is cause for concern. As a trained Pediatric nurse practitioner, I understand the harm nicotine can have on a developing adolescent brain, but attempts to ban vaping products runs an even greater risk of exposing individuals to higher risk alternatives in an unregulated black market. The recent congressional vaping hearing appears to be a part of a larger campaign to chip away at the rights of legal adult citizens to use nicotine products. Even if those nicotine vaping products are a critical part of harm reduction by transitioning traditional...

(Reuters) - In just four years, marijuana use grew by 75% among Americans aged 65 and older, according to a new study, and researchers expressed concern over a lack of information on the potential health implications. The increase was most pronounced in women, those with higher incomes and more education, according to a report published on Monday in JAMA Internal Medicine. The findings continue a trend seen over the last decade, said the study's lead author, Benjamin Han, an assistant professor of geriatric medicine and palliative care at the New York University School of Medicine. "Consider that not even 10...

State legislatures across the U.S. have convened for new sessions over the past month, and a growing number of governors are taking steps to push lawmakers to include legalizing marijuana as part of their 2020 agendas. At least 10 governors have gone so far as to put language ending marijuana prohibition in their annual budget requests, or used their State of the State speeches to pressure legislators to act on cannabis reform. Some are proactively addressing the issue, while others appear to be mostly reacting to support that has already built up among lawmakers. But altogether, it’s clear that top...

4:45 PM PT -- TMZ Sports has learned that Greg Robinson was busted with 156.9 pounds of marijuana, according to law enforcement docs. Robinson -- who was also with 26-year-old ex-NFL player Quan Bray -- was stopped around 7:15 PM on Monday evening after a Border Patrol drug-sniffing dog alerted to the rear cargo door of their 2020 Chevy Tahoe. According to the docs, Robinson and Bray were NOT reentering the country from Mexico -- rather they were trying to get from Los Angeles to Louisiana and hit the checkpoint on the way. The agents performed a follow-up search and...

Today, White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) Director Jim Carroll announced the Fiscal Year (FY) 2020 Drug-Free Communities (DFC) Support Program’s Notice of Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA), which begins this year’s process of awarding funds to community coalitions focused on preventing youth substance use.For FY 2020, this will allow 200 new communities to receive direct financial help totaling $25 million from the White House to prevent illicit drug use and save lives.“Educating our youth about the dangers of substance use is critical to preventing and ending the crisis of addiction in America.  ONDCP’s Drug-Free Communities are proven,...

The dismissals include 62,000 felony convictions for marijuana cases dating back to 1961 and around 4,000 misdemeanor cases, District Attorney Jackie Lacey’s office said in a news release. “As a result of our actions, these convictions should no longer burden those who have struggled to find a job or a place to live because of their criminal record,” Lacey said in a press conference in announcing the move. She added that it’s the largest mass dismissal of marijuana cases in state history.

SANTA FE – The push to add New Mexico to the ranks of states that have legalized recreational cannabis for adult use will have to wait another year. The Senate Judiciary Committee voted 6-4 late Wednesday to table a high-profile marijuana legalization bill, as two Democrats joined with Republicans to block it from advancing. Backers acknowledged the measure is all but dead for this year’s 30-day session, which ends next week, but said they plan to try again in 2021. “We’d have no chance of getting it through now,” the bill’s sponsor, Sen. Gerald Ortiz y Pino, D-Albuquerque, said in...

CLEVELAND, Ohio (WKBN) – Living through the pain of being a Cleveland Browns or Cincinnati Bengals fan isn’t enough to obtain a medical marijuana license. The Cincinnati Enquirer reports that the Ohio State Medical Board committee rejected a petition for the condition “being a Bengals or Browns fan.”

Former New York City Mayor—and potential 2020 Democratic presidential candidate—Michael Bloomberg called efforts to legalize marijuana "perhaps the stupidest thing anybody has ever done." Speaking at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, on Tuesday, Bloomberg said on the subject, according to WBNG-TV: "We have a different kind of problem in America, for example. Last year, in 2017, 72,000 Americans [overdosed] on drugs. In 2018, more people than that are OD-ing on drugs, have OD'd on drugs. And today, incidentally, we are trying to legalize another addictive narcotic, which is perhaps the stupidest thing anybody has ever done. We've got...

Disclaimer I live in Canada My 85 year old mother has a poor appetite and she only weights 79 Lbs. My question is have any here tried CBD oil for Appetite Stimulation and does it really work? I'm desperate and am seriously considering getting her CBD gelcaps (0% THC)

Whoopi Goldberg and her business partner Maya Elisabeth are shuttering their cannabis brand, Whoopi & Maya, after four years. And we’re told it all went up in smoke because of a rift between the pair. Board member and High Times veteran Rick Cusick told us, “In the last few months, Whoopi and Maya wanted a divorce, and the board had worked very hard to try and come up with some proposals … but we couldn’t get both principals to agree.” He said the board thought they had found a “win-win” solution to “preserve the company,” but that Goldberg then sent...

Does legalized marijuana prevent people from turning towards more dangerous drugs, like opioids, to manage pain and withdrawal? Or does marijuana continue to act as a "gateway" drug, even after obtaining it no longer requires someone to enter into a shady underworld? The CDC just released its summation of 2018 deaths due to drug overdoses. (THIS IS FOR ALL OVERDOSES, NOT MARIJUANA OVERDOSES; I'm looking at how marijuana relates to overdoses from other drugs!) When I saw that death rates from drug overdoses (largely due to opioids, but with cocaine and other drugs playing an increasing role) had declined for...

SNIP “We both have a dream in life and that is to get Gayle to smoke weed,” Winfrey said of her best friend, while talking with Schumer on a recent episode of her podcast “Oprah’s Super Soul Conversations.” Winfrey explained that as long as she’s known the “CBS This Morning” co-host, King has stayed away from the hard stuff. “In all the years that I’ve been besties with Gayle and that’s since 1976, and I’ve been with Stedman [Graham] since 1685, in all those years neither he nor Gayle has ever had a sip of anything,” she said, adding that...

Despite the drubbing that marijuana stocks took in 2019, it was still a year filled with cannabis firsts. We witnessed Canada become the first industrialized country to launch derivative pot products and watched Illinois do what New Jersey and New York failed to do -- legalize recreational weed while also passing an expungement clause for those people with previous cannabis possession or use convictions. The current year also looks as if it'll be filled with marijuana milestones. For instance, Mexico should become the third country in the world to give adult-use cannabis the green light by no later than the...

Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo vowed on Wednesday to legalize marijuana in New York, prioritizing a push that fell apart last year amid tensions over who should be allowed to sell the drug and where the revenue should go. The governor described the effort as a long overdue criminal justice reform that could help salve wounds in communities affected by the decades-long war on drugs. “For decades, communities of color were disproportionately affected by the unequal enforcement of marijuana laws,” Mr. Cuomo said in his annual State of the State address. “Let’s legalize adult use of marijuana.” The effort comes as...

A handful of local police officers and the Honorable Mark C. Simmons, a General District Court Judge in Fairfax County, Virginia, pushed back on the progressive prosecutor backed by George Soros, who took office last week. The neoliberal Steve Descano has spent his first few days in office attempting to effectuate leftist political agenda with powers that he does not legally have. He declared that his lawyers will not prosecute simple marijuana possession crimes, essentially transforming Fairfax County into a marijuana sanctuary while possession continues to remain unlawful under Virginia state law. Virginia State Senator Mark Obenshain (R), who is also...