Have you ever noticed that any time a young person commits a horrifying act of violence, someone is always trying to blame their behavior on marijuana? It happened with Jared Loughner, the man accused of a January shooting spree in Tuscon. Within days of the tragedy, stories were flooding the media asserting that his documented mental illness was the result of marijuana use, despite the fact that he had stopped using marijuana months before. And now The New York Times is focusing on the marijuana…

Yesterday, Gov. Christie announced that the wait is over for patients, and the medical marijuana program that has been on hold for months will finally move forward. He will instruct the New Jersey Department of Health and Social Services to begin implementation "as expeditiously as possible." This includes establishing the six alternative care centers that were approved last year. Christie had left the program in limbo while he determined how to allow dispensaries and not attract attention from the…

The last two weeks have been full of announcements from the federal government about marijuana policy. None of them has been positive, and none of them should be surprising. First, the Department of Justice stated that it retained the ability to prosecute anyone who cultivates, processes, or distributes medical marijuana, regardless of state law. As noted earlier on this blog, this is not really a change in policy, but it is certainly disappointing to see the Department of Justice is unwilling to…

On Wednesday, without any public announcement, Deputy Attorney General James M. Cole issued a statement reiterating the Obama administration’s promise not to waste federal resources going after medical marijuana patients and their individual caregivers. This is a good start. Unfortunately, the letter goes on to say that it maintains the right to prosecute anyone in the business of cultivating, selling, or distributing marijuana to those patients. According to the letter, compliance with state law…

Today, the Marijuana Policy Project released an updated version of the Teen Use Report, which analyzes all available data from medical marijuana states both before and after passing their medical marijuana laws. The purpose behind this was to find out if permitting patients to use their medicine “sends the wrong message” to teens, as prohibitionists are so quick to claim. Well, it turns out that it doesn’t. In fact, of the 13 states with available data, teen use rates have stayed the same or decreased…

Topic: Is marijuana policy the only issue heading in a libertarian direction? July 14-16, 2011 Bally's/Paris, Las Vegas FreedomFest: Register Now

Today, a handful of visionary and courageous Members of Congress, led by Rep. Barney Frank, introduced the "Ending Federal Marijuana Prohibition Act of 2011," a bill that would treat marijuana the way alcohol is treated under federal law. It would give each state complete freedom to regulate marijuana in the manner it believes is in the best interests of its citizens. If a state wants to make marijuana available to patients, it can. And if it prefers to make marijuana legal for all adults, it can…

Congressman Steve Cohen spoke on the House floor about legislation he is cosponsoring that would end the federal war on marijuana and let states legalize, regulate, tax and control marijuana without federal interference. The legislation would limit the federal government's role in marijuana enforcement to cross-border or interstate smuggling. Source: Youtube

In 2009, Attorney General Eric Holder announced that the Department of Justice would no longer spend scarce resources going after medical marijuana patients or providers. The “Ogden memo” clearly established that federal enforcement actions would not be taken against individuals or groups that act in clear and unambiguous compliance with state laws regarding medical marijuana. For the most part, the DOJ has followed this policy. Now, after a series of letters to various state officials from U.S.…

At a press conference at the National Press Club on Friday, representatives of Institute of the Black World, as well as Rev. Jesse Jackson, Ethan Nadelmann of the Drug Policy Alliance, and others met to look at the impact that our nation’s failed war on drugs has had on minorities. One of the ideas mentioned most frequently to eliminate some of the negative effects of the drug war was to remove criminal penalties for possession of small amounts of marijuana. While this is not a very radical statement,…