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(Newser) – A Maryland congressman who meant to take a stand against looser marijuana laws in Washington, DC, might end up making them even looser thanks to the legal fine print in his amendment. The Washington Post lays out the somewhat convoluted scenario surrounding Republican Andy Harris' legislation: To begin with, recall that DC's city council voted earlier this year to make possession of small amounts of pot punishable by only a $25 fine. Harris, who thinks that measure is a bad idea and wants to block it from taking effect, tacked an amendment onto a House spending bill that...

Cannabis use in the United States has increased, with more people visiting hospital emergency departments over its use, a UN report says. The potency of the drug in the US appeared to have increased, making it more harmful, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime's World Drugs Report added. It said it was too early to tell if the legalisation of cannabis in two US states had had an impact on drug use. Global illegal opium poppy farming rose 26% between 2012 and 2013, it added. "In the United States, the lower perceived risk of cannabis use has led to...

It may be legal to buy and smoke marijuana in Colorado, but it’s still against the law to drive while high — and that’s a message an increasing number of people aren’t receiving. Colorado’s largest detox network said Wednesday that the number of its patients busted for DUI while high on pot has nearly doubled, from 8 percent last year to 15 percent this year.

A 7-year-old Basalt girl accidentally ingested candy that was infused with edible marijuana Sunday and was taken to Valley View Hospital for treatment, according to police. The girl’s mother is a maid at an Aspen hotel where there is a policy that food and beverages left behind in rooms can be taken home by the cleaning staff, according to Basalt Police Chief Greg Knott. The woman found a bag of nuts that also contained a chocolate ball the size of a large marble, he said.

Did Trayvon Martin’s marijuana usage make him violent against George Zimmerman? Some reports are posing that controversial question now that marijuana legalization is quickly spreading across America. But while some police officers may support that contentious message others believe the controversy over Trayvon Martin, gun control, and drugs does not match up with the facts. In a related report by The Inquisitr, George Zimmerman’s lawsuit claims NBC employees purposefully edited the audio recordings of him talking to the 911 dispatcher in order to make it sound like the Hispanic man was racially profiling Trayvon. Whether or not Martin is a...

(Reuters) - Genes that increase the risk of a person developing schizophrenia may also increase the chance they will use cannabis, researchers said on Tuesday after studying more than 1,000 users of the drug. The results chime with previous studies linking schizophrenia and cannabis, but suggest the association may be due to common genes and might not be a causal relationship where cannabis use leads to increased schizophrenia risk. Cannabis is the most widely used illicit drug in the world, and its use is higher among people with schizophrenia than in the general population. "We know that cannabis increases the...

On Friday, Senators Rand Paul (R-KY) and Corey Booker (D-NJ) offered a medical marijuana amendment on the floor of the Senate. The bill is a massive win for states’ rights, as it outlaws the Department of Justice and the Drug Enforcement Agency from undermining state marijuana laws and prohibits the DEA from interfering with the production of hemp in states where it is legal. There is simply no reason the federal government should be trampling over state laws to perform armed SWAT-team raids on state-legal medical marijuana dispensaries. Destroying property and hauling entrepreneurs off to jail is not the proper...

Forget the lighthearted puns about a new kind of Street high, Jim Cramer believes there's serious opportunity in a marijuana stock. It's GW Pharmaeuticals. Cramer is a fan of this company, in particular, because it isn't simply a bet on more states approving medical marijuana as a treatment for patients fighting cancer. Instead, this U.K.-based company is at the forefront of developing new drugs from compounds found in cannabis, or marijuana plants. And if any company has a strong pipeline of cannabis derived drugs, it's GW Pharma. "First, they've already gotten approval for their lead drug, Sativex, a mouth spray...

As the entire nation sits back and watches the legalization situation in Colorado, millions of dollars of tax revenue generated by recreational marijuana sales continue to roll in to the state. From the single month of January 2014, the city of Denver is expected to receive 3.5 million in tax money generated from recreational and medicinal marijuana sales that will not be wasted.

Fort Collins will be home to two retail stores this Friday, Choice Organics located near I-25 and Organic Alternatives, along with a dozen existing medical dispensaries. More retail shops will be opening within the next few months, one of which is Flower Power Botanicals. Edibles are still banned in Larimer County, however. Individuals seeking baked goods, infused treats and other edible items containing cannabis will have to journey to Denver. To date in Colorado, there are a little over 200 retail marijuana stores, a number that is expected to grow.

Pope Francis condemns legalization of marijuana, says it won't produce good results

Americans are feeling the same fear for the future that preceded the Civil War when the incompetent James Buchanan left the mess that Abraham Lincoln had to address. I don’t think we have ever had a President with less knowledge of history than Barack Obama and less ability to solve domestic economic problems and address threatening foreign ones. “Rarely has a U.S. President been so wrong about so much at the expense of so many,” said former Vice President Dick Cheney, along with his daughter Liz, in a June 18 opinion published by the Wall Street Journal. Liz has been...

It's primary week and finally there’s some news. First, and most critically, we have our first-ever shakeup at the top of the Littwin Weekly GOP Governor’s Race Rankings. As LeBron James so ably put it, history is made to be broken. Second, John Hickenlooper apologized to a meeting of state sheriffs for hurting their feelings on guns, which came out sounding like he was apologizing for passing the gun laws. Worse (for Hick), he told the sheriffs he never talked to then-Mayor Bloomberg when, in fact, he had and, in fact, had said he had and, in fact, of course...

Near-continuous gunfire rang out Tuesday from a lawless village in southern Albania as hundreds more police arrived to battle well-armed marijuana growers who were trying to thwart a government crackdown. By mid-day, about 800 police had surrounded the village of Lazarat after shooting overnight wounded a special forces police officer. With local television broadcasting the events live, police and the Interior Ministry urged the village's 5,000 residents to stay indoors and warned others to stay away from the area, some 230 kilometers (140 miles) south of the capital, Tirana. On Monday, about 500 police raided Lazarat, running into 30 suspected...

(Reuters) - Florida Governor Rick Scott signed a law on Monday allowing for the limited use of a special strain of marijuana to treat epileptic seizures and other diseases. State lawmakers passed the measure this spring with bipartisan support after impassioned appeals from parents seeking access to the form of marijuana known as "Charlotte's Web," named for a Colorado girl whose epileptic seizures have shown some response to the drug. “As a father and grandfather, you never want to see kids suffer," Scott, a Republican, said in a statement. "I am proud to stand today with families who deserve the...

John Avlon’s dishonest column on the cop-killers in Las Vegas should be studied by journalism students as an example of how to exploit a tragedy for political purposes. It is a shame he gets on CNN as an “analyst,” which gives him undeserved authority and prestige, when he deliberately confuses and misleads people. jerad miller In this case, he tried to blame conservatives for the murders of two policemen. His Daily Beast column carried two titles, one of them being, “The Bonnie and Clyde of Ultra-Right Hate.” He said Jerad and Amanda Miller killed two metro cops while shouting, “This...

Volusia County deputies arrested a 450-pound man after they said they found marijuana hidden under his "stomach fat," according to The Smoking Gun. Christopher Mitchell, 42, was arrested Friday after a drug-sniffing dog alerted deputies during a traffic stop. A search turned up 23 grams of marijuana he had hidden on himself, authorities said, along with cocaine, a handgun and $7,000 in cash.

Yes, Washington marijuana growers will have product ready for sale in the first week of July in time for the first wave of 20-30 stores receiving state licenses. Exactly which day those first stores will open, how much you’ll be able to buy and how much it will cost the consumer is still mostly an open question, but there will be legal weed on store shelves. But expect it to sell out fast. “There’s just no way it’s not going to sell out,” said Attila Soos, the owner of Verdavanti, one of the largest growers licensed so far. He will...

A man was arrested by Prescott Valley police after he shot his handgun in a residence and claimed he was shooting at the moon. On Friday, a 49-year-old woman called police because her boyfriend had fired shots from a handgun and was still armed at the time, according to the Prescott Valley Police Department. Officers arrived at a residence near Robert Road and Loos Drive where they confronted 39-year-old Cameron Read. Read initially refused to leave the residence, but eventually exited and resisted arrest before being taken into custody by force, according to police. The victims told police Read had...

Arizona police arrest man for shooting at the moon PHOENIX (Reuters) - A marijuana smoker was arrested in Arizona after shooting at the moon with a handgun and wrestling with officers who were called by his girlfriend to subdue him, authorities said on Wednesday. Police went to a home in Prescott Valley, about 85 miles north of Phoenix, late last Friday where the woman told them her partner had fired several shots into the air after telling her and her teenage son he had seen Halley's Comet. Prescott Valley police spokesman Sergeant Brandon Bonney said Cameron Read, 39, was arrested...