Free Republic

Unusual witness presses medical-marijuana cause in Pa. During the last 32 years, stockbroker Irvin Rosenfeld has smoked 130,000 marijuana cigarettes - with the federal government's blessing. As jaws dropped in a Harrisburg legislative chamber filled with state senators, Rosenfeld made the remark Tuesday and then held up a silver canister containing 300 pre-rolled joints, a month's supply. He continues to receive the canisters from a government-authorized farm in Mississippi to help treat a rare bone-tumor disorder. This despite the drug's classification by the Drug Enforcement Administration as a top-tier hazardous substance with no medicinal value. "I'm living proof of the...

July 05--Anyone who wants a job next year at Anne Arundel Medical Center -- whether as a surgeon or security guard -- will have to prove they don't smoke or use tobacco. The Annapolis hospital's new hiring policy might be controversial, but it is legal in Maryland and more than half of the United States. And it's a type of job screening that is gaining favor with employers -- from hospitals to companies such as Alaska Airlines -- trying to control rising health costs and cultivate a healthier, more productive workforce. Anne Arundel Medical Center, like a growing number of...

Veteran marijuana activist Douglas Hiatt, right, says Washington's Initiative 502 establishes a "Soviet style" market for marijuana and won't work. “You’re going to have people selling grams of pot for $25? What, are you kidding me?” Hiatt says. “You can get the best pot you have ever smoked for 10 bucks a gram at a [medical marijuana] dispensary or from someone else who's going to give you a better deal than the state.” There’s no way they are going to eliminate the black market with something that’s totally unresponsive to a market at all,” Hiatt says. "You're going to see...

(CNN) — Some Colorado marijuana sellers are challenging Uncle Sam. They’re filing a lawsuit — saying the IRS shouldn’t be allowed to collect taxes on marijuana sales because marijuana is illegal under federal law. Attorney Rob Corry says forcing Colorado’s recreational marijuana businesses to pay violates the United States Constitution. He has filed a lawsuit in District Court on behalf of clients, some of whom say taxes could be used as evidence in any future prosecution. “They’re open records and they are admitting to a federal crime. It’s still a federal crime to sell marijuana,” Corry said.

Mike Boyer, 30, was canned Tuesday after waiting 20 hours to buy pot and immediately going home to smoke. He was called up for urine analysis after he was spotted on TV buying the pot. Boyer told The News he 'regrets nothing.'His high was quickly brought low. A Spokane, Wash. man was fired from his job as a security guard the same day he became the first person to legally buy weed in the city Tuesday. “I don’t regret it,” Mike Boyer told the Daily News Wednesday. “I’m sad it happened but I got the title: I’m No. 1. I...

Mike Lee calls for "a new conservative reform agenda" based on "three basic principles," one of which is federalism. "The biggest reason the federal government makes too many mistakes is that it makes too many decisions," the Republican senator from Utah explained in a speech at the Heritage Foundation last year. "Most of these are decisions the federal government doesn't have to make -- and therefore shouldn't." So why on earth is Lee co-sponsoring a bill introduced last month that would ban online gambling throughout the country, instead of letting each state decide whether to allow Internet-assisted poker? The...

As a hard-partying teenager, Patrick Kennedy met President Reagan at a fundraiser for the JFK Library, a meeting captured in a photograph that the former Rhode Island congressman now hangs in his home office. He used to think of it as a funny episode, a collision of Camelot’s cocaine kid and America’s foremost opponent of illegal drug use. But Kennedy took his last hit of anything in 2009, and he’s since honed an anti-drug message that sounds a bit like Reagan with a Boston brogue. Kennedy believes there is "an epidemic in this country of epic dimensions when it comes...

The actress, who is teetotal and follows a strict vegan macrobiotic diet, hates seeing girls intoxciated and thinks women should limit their alcohol intake. Gwyneth said: "I think it's gross! I really don't like drunk women, it's such a bad look. I think it's completely inappropriate." The Oscar winner's Colplay star husband Chris Martin is also known for being teetotal, and as well as her strict diet Gwyneth keeps in shape with regular yoga sessions. Earlier this month, Gwyneth revealed she loves getting together with fellow celebrity-mothers so their children can play together. The actress is good friends with Madonna...

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. What about the fifth time? On four separate occasions during Martin Chávez's two terms as Albuquerque mayor, the ACLU has raised serious, well-substantiated concerns about the constitutionality of the mayor's pet legislative projects. First, there was the 1999 teen curfew ordinance. Then there were two radical sex offender laws and an anti-panhandling ordinance, all of which were touted as "the toughest laws of their kind in the country." Four times we asked the mayor to reject these bills as unconstitutional, and four times he ignored us. Four times...

Bill would card anyone buying booze GENESEE COUNTY THE FLINT JOURNAL FIRST EDITION Saturday, April 09, 2005 By Marjory Raymer Thinking of a glass of merlot? Get out your ID, no matter how many gray hairs and crows feet you've got. A proposed state law would require all drinkers to show identification every time they buy alcohol. What's more, anyone convicted of driving while intoxicated or impaired would get licenses in the same vertical format that are designed to prevent teen drivers from buying alcohol. It is part of an attempt by state Rep. John Stahl, R-Arcadia Twp., to ban...

A new craze for inhaling alcohol was today attacked by medical experts as a potential danger that could cause brain damage. Drinks including vodka and absinthe can be “snorted” into the nose or inhaled into the mouth through a tube using a new device known as an Alcohol Without Liquid (AWOL) vaporiser. Scientists estimate that the effects of the alcohol can be felt much quicker as it is directly absorbed through blood vessels in the nose or lungs – bypassing the stomach and liver. Bristol bar Il Bordello became the first venue to offer its customers the device last week...

WASHINGTON (AdAge.com) -- In a legal strategy similar to how state attorneys general successfully pursued tobacco companies, a class action lawsuit has been filed to recover "billions of dollars in ill-gotten profits" from alcohol makers that falsely denied their ads targeted underage drinkers. The suit accuses brewers Coors Brewing Co. and Heineken; distilled spirits makers Mark Anthony Brands (maker of Mike's Hard Lemonade), Bacardi USA, Bacardi Group, Brown-Forman, Diageo and Kobrand (maker of Alize cognac); and the Beer Institute of a "long-running, sophisticated and deceptive scheme ... to market alcoholic beverages to children and other underage consumers." Absent from suit...