Medical marijuana purity under a microscope

PHOENIX - Hunched over a microscope, Steve Cottrell peered at a bud from a plant that is increasingly used as medicine in Arizona and across the nation.

He pointed at a computer screen that glowed with a magnified image of the marijuana bud. The sample, the size of a quarter, was covered with powdery white bumps - a mold that was invisible to the naked eye.

Increasingly, medical-marijuana dispensaries and patients are turning to laboratories to evaluate medical-marijuana plants, identify potentially harmful substances and pinpoint the potency of plants and cannabis-infused products, from caramels and "cherry roll" candies to butter.

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Arizona pot advocates set sights on ’16 ballot initiative

Supporters of an effort to legalize marijuana in Arizona this year see their chances fading, an organizer told The Arizona Republic last week, even as thousands of Colorado residents lined up to buy pot from the nation’s first recreational-marijuana shops.

Many Arizona marijuana advocates hope to replicate Colorado’s model of regulated pot for recreational use, but it likely won’t happen in 2014 as organizers had hoped. The real effort, some say, will come in 2016, when an influential group is expected to substantially fund an initiative.

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Pot, guns and paparazzi: New laws run gamut in US - Yahoo News

 

The new year is bringing a host of new laws taking effect in January or thereabouts. A look at some state and local laws that are making news:

ALCOHOL AND MARIJUANA

COLORADO, MAINE AND WASHINGTON: Colorado pot stores open Jan. 1 as retailers usher in the nation's first legal recreational pot industry. Sales in Washington, which also legalized recreational marijuana, are expected to start later in the year. The laws still fly in the face of federal drug rules, but the federal government has said it's not going to fight to shut down pot shops for now. A law legalizing recreational marijuana went into effect in early December in Portland, Maine, but it's largely symbolic because the state has said it will continue to enforce its own ban.

Read more...Pot, guns and paparazzi: New laws run gamut in US - Yahoo News

The Minimum Wage Debate Should Be About Poverty Not Jobs - Forbes

 

This week the debate over raising the minimum wage became a battle of two competing studies. First the White House’s Council of Economic Advisors came out with a briefing that was trumpeted for its claim that we could raise the minimum wage by almost 40 percent (from $7.25 to $10.10 per hour) with no loss in jobs. Then this week the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released its own, nonpartisan, report which said the proposed minimum raise increase would result in 500,000 fewer jobs.

Read more...The Minimum Wage Debate Should Be About Poverty Not Jobs - Forbes

Colorado and Washington brace for ‘marijuana tourism’ surge | The Raw Story

 

Marijuana users in Colorado and Washington are counting down the hours before the western US states become the first to legalize recreational pot shops on January 1.

Blazing a trail they hope will be followed in other parts of the United States, cannabis growers and others are also rubbing their hands, while tax collectors are eyeing the revenue the newly-legalized trade will generate.

Enterprising companies are even offering marijuana tours to cash in on tourists expected to be attracted to a Netherlands-style pot culture — including in Colorado’s famous ski resorts.

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Teens shun synthetic marijuana for the real thing

 

Teens are shunning synthetic marijuana, such as K2 and Spice, but smoking more of the real thing, a national survey of more than 40,000 children in three grades found.

The number of high school seniors who said they used the synthetic drugs dropped sharply from 11% in 2012 to 8% in 2013, the Monitoring the Future survey, released Wednesday, found. A growing number of teens see the drugs as dangerous.

Perceptions of marijuana have slid in the other direction as fewer teens see the drug as harmful and more smoke it. In 2013, one in 15 seniors reported using marijuana daily, up from one in 50 in 1993, the survey found.

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Benson cartoons January to March 2014 - azcentral.com photos

Benson cartoons January to March 2014 - azcentral.com photos

Republicans eyeing a presidential run in 2016 start to open up to legalization of marijuana - Washington Times

 

Republicans eyeing the White House in 2016 are pushing their party to change its stance and accept a softening of federal marijuana laws — a dramatic shift from the GOP’s most recent contenders who railed against the drug and questioned its medicinal value.

Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky has arguably been the most vocal on the subject, saying the federal government should leave the issue entirely to the states. Texas Gov. Rick Perry also argues that marijuana’s legal status should be a state issue, and he points to drug courts in his state that he said have helped move Texas toward decriminalization.

Read more...Republicans eyeing a presidential run in 2016 start to open up to legalization of marijuana - Washington Times