Teenagers short of sleep are more likely to become marijuana users, according to a recent study led by a researcher from UC San Diego. The study, funded by the National Institute of Mental Health, National Institute on Aging and National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, mapped the social interactions of 8,349 adolescents in grades 7 through 12. It concluded that drug use among teens increased by 19 percent among those who sleep less than seven hours a night, the Sacramento Bee’s “Weed Wars” blog reports. It also noted that sleep behaviors of teens [...]
I glommed the link to this Rolling Stone opus by Mark Binelli from NORML’s uber-informative Stash Blog. Print magazines offer a superior reading experience for long-form pieces like this one, but good writing is good writing wherever it appears. Enjoy. ================== If you spend enough time up in the Emerald Triangle — an area in Northern California comprising the adjoining counties of Mendocino, Humboldt and Trinity — you might notice a few things. There’s the crab fisherman selling you fresh crabs from his boat with a lit joint hanging from his mouth. There’s the jingle [...]
This tongue-in-cheek piece by L.A. Times columnist Sandy Banks ran under the headline: “Pot breaks the age barrier.” Apparently mom and dad are sparking up more these days than their own children … but the old farts are still much more likely to make their way to the ballot box. ============== Its name might be its strongest asset: The Regulate, Control and Tax Cannabis Act, a marijuana legalization effort that goes out of its way not to say the word “marijuana.” I suspect its organizers learned something from the failure of predecessors — like the [...]
Starting a business can be a bureaucratic nightmare. Not for Stephen Boski. His application sailed through Modesto’s City Hall. That is, until city officials realized Boski’s license was for a medical marijuana delivery service. Thirty minutes after Boski walked out of the Planning Department with a business license, he said, the city called to say it had made a mistake and would have to revoke the permit. He returned to City Hall and got a $112 refund, the Modesto Bee reports. Since then he’s been waiting for answers from the city attorney’s office about why [...]
As San Jose confronts a fiscal crisis forcing massive service cuts such as closure of popular community centers, the City Council moved Tuesday toward allowing medical marijuana collectives as a potential new source of revenue. Associated Press coverage in the Sac Bee “Weed Wars” blog coverage The council voted to approve a recommendation by Councilman Pierluigi Oliverio calling for an ordinance to be brought back in June that would allow a limited number of medical marijuana collectives and impose additional taxes on them to help support city services, reports the San Jose Mercury News. The [...]
Bud’s note: Quotation marks and “doobie-blazing” cliches are peppered throughout this otherwise fair and informative article from the prestigious San Jose Mercury News, but at least the headline writer played it straight. Memo to the mainstream media: Put down the stoner references and slowly back away. You’re better than that. ============ When the San Jose City Council takes up a thorny proposal Tuesday to regulate the city’s burgeoning crop of cannabis clubs, the mind-altering effect that drug has on politics will likely be evident even to the most sober local legislators. And with a statewide [...]
The campaign to legalize marijuana in California kicked off this week, just days after the initiative made the ballot, with a radio ad saying many law enforcement professionals know marijuana laws have failed and calling the measure “a common sense solution.” “Weed Wars” coverage from the Sacramento Bee The ad features Jeffrey Studdard, a former school district police officer and reserve L.A. County sheriff’s deputy, writes John Hoeffel of the Los Angeles Times. Studdard says that he has “seen firsthand that the current approach on cannabis is simply not working,” explaining that the fight against [...]
Two men found planting a marijuana garden in Knights Valley Saturday morning were arrested on suspicion of marijuana cultivation, drunken driving and carrying a concealed weapon, reported the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office. A deputy on patrol found a suspicious vehicle near the 16000 block of Ida Clayton Road around 11:30 a.m., the Santa Rosa Press-Democrat reports. The deputy found Valdovinos Maldonado, 45, of Sonoma and Alejandro Salinas-Bautista, 36, of Windsor nearby with a newly laid drip-irrigation system and more than 1,000 marijuana seeds, said Lt. Scott Dunn. Maldonado is being held without bail on an [...]
Far from being a war between hippies and police, the fight to legalize marijuana in California centers on whether decriminalizing and taxing cannabis can help fill the state’s fiscal hole. (Bud’s note: The last post sounded roughly the last theme, but I haven’t seen legalization opponents cracking the books on pot economics.) Using the drug for medical purposes has been legal for 14 years in the western state, AFP reports in an unbylined RawStory.com post. But a new initiative that will appear on the ballot in November elections is seeking to legalize recreational marijuana use. [...]
This week, a ballot initiative to legalize marijuana possession by adults qualified for the California ballot. The Regulate, Control and Tax Cannabis Act of 2010 is coming up for a vote. While all the standard, well-worn pot jokes and cliches were quickly pressed into service, writes “News Junkie” Steve Elliott, it’s becoming obvious that unlike failed legalization initiatives in the past (of which California has had at least two), the debate will this time center around money. California has once again become the focal point of a long-running battle over liberalizing the pot laws, Elliott [...]
Reading is cool; interacting is better