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Republicans Found Their Talking Point – That Michael Brown Had Marijuana in His System

Republicans have looked for a narrative to defend the killing of Michael Brown since his lifeless body laid on a street in Ferguson, and now, with newly released information suggesting that Mike Brown had marijuana in his system, Republicans have found their talking-point.

Earlier today, I brought you a story of a rally that happened, not in Ferguson, but outside the area, where 125 people held a protest in support of the trigger happy police officer. Of the 125 people protesting, 124 of them were white. These people held their protest before the marijuana news broke, but now, Republicans like Rush Limbaugh and Bryan Fischer are ecstatic, hardly able to contain their enthusiasm in blaming Brown for his own death.

On his radio program today, Fischer happily proclaimed;

“We know now he did have marijuana in his system, and we’ve had stories, remember, we’ve had stories from Colorado, people going berserk on marijuana and killing people, hyped up on marijuana. So it’s more dangerous than people think”

Video

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marijuana Politics Weed

San Jose – Vote Today and Get Free Weed

Cannabis clubs in San Jose are offering free pot and discounts to patients who go to the polls Tuesday and vote in several contested races.

The Silicon Valley Cannabis Coalition is organizing the “Weed for Votes” program as an effort to increase voter turnout at Tuesday’s election.

“We have a huge opportunity to make a large impact in who runs San Jose,” coalition director John Lee said in a statement. “Although we may not have regulations on the June ballot, insuring the right politicians are elected is even more important.”

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cannabis Health marijuana

Report – Casual Marijuana Use Has Negative Effects on The Brain

Picture: Stuart Aylmer/ Alamy

Casual, as in a one to two times a week for a few months. The researchers at Harvard Medical School found that parts of the brain responsible for emotion, motivation and addiction were negatively affected when cannabis was introduced.

Researchers carried out detailed 3D scans on the brains of students who used cannabis casually and were not addicted and compared them with those who had never used it.

Two major sections of the brain were found to be affected.

The scientists found that the more cannabis the 40 subjects had used, the greater the abnormalities.

Around 10 million people in Britain, almost a third of the population, have used illegal drugs, with cannabis the most popular. The research author, Dr Hans Breiter, professor of psychiatry and behavioural sciences at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, said: “This study raises a strong challenge to the idea that casual marijuana use isn’t associated with bad consequences. Some people only used marijuana to get high once or twice a week.

“People think a little recreational use shouldn’t cause a problem, if someone is doing OK with work or school. Our data directly says this is not the case.

“I’ve developed a severe worry about whether we should be allowing anybody under age 30 to use pot unless they have a terminal illness and need it for pain.”

The team examined sections of the brain involved in emotion, motivation and addiction in 20 students who had used cannabis and 20 who had not. Anne Blood, assistant professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, said: “These are core, fundamental structures of the brain. They form the basis for how you assess positive and negative features about things in the environment and make decisions about them.”

The changes are thought to be the first steps towards addiction as the brain alters the way it perceives reward and pleasure, making ordinary experiences seem less fulfilling compared with drug use.

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marijuana Politics

President Obama – Pot is Less Damaging Than Alcohol

In an interview with the New Yorker’s David Remnick published Sunday, Obama said while he believes marijuana is “not very healthy,” the drug isn’t as harmful as some insist.

“As has been well documented, I smoked pot as a kid, and I view it as a bad habit and a vice, not very different from the cigarettes that I smoked as a young person up through a big chunk of my adult life. I don’t think it is more dangerous than alcohol,” Obama told Remnick.

When asked if he believes marijuana is less harmful than alcohol, Obama said it is less damaging “in terms of its impact on the individual consumer.”

“It’s not something I encourage, and I’ve told my daughters I think it’s a bad idea, a waste of time, not very healthy,” he added.

Marijuana is currently classified by the Drug Enforcement Administration as a Schedule 1 substance, which the DEA considers “the most dangerous class of drugs with a high potential for abuse and potentially severe psychological and/or physical dependence.” Other Schedule 1 drugs include heroin, ecstasy and LSD.

Obama said his focus on reforming laws that punish drug users, noting the racial disparity in drug arrests.

“We should not be locking up kids or individual users for long stretches of jail time when some of the folks who are writing those laws have probably done the same thing,” he said.

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marijuana Sports

Knicks J.R Smith Suspended for Marijuana Use

The winner of last season’s Sixth Man Award  J.R Smith, will miss the first five games of the season for alledegedly testing positive for Marijuana,  according to this tweet from Adrian Wojnarowski and Yahoo Sports.

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marijuana News

Legal Marijuana – Coming Soon To A Store Near You

It’s legal to light up in Colorado and Washington, and soon smoking pot could be legalized across the country following a decision Thursday by the federal government.

After Washington state and Colorado passed laws in November 2012 legalizing the consumption and sale of marijuana for adults over 18, lawmakers in both states waited to see whether the federal government would continue to prosecute pot crimes under federal statutes in their states.

Both Colorado and Washington have been working to set up regulatory systems in order to license and tax marijuana growers and retail sellers, but have been wary of whether federal prosecutors would come after them for doing so. They are the first states to legalize pot, and therefore to go through the process of trying to set up a regulatory system.

Consumption and sale of marijuana is still illegal in all other states, though some cities and towns have passed local laws decriminalizing it or making it a low priority for law enforcement officers. There are also movements in many states to legalize pot, including legalization bills introduced in Maine and Rhode Island, discussion of possible bills in states including Massachusetts and Vermont, and talk of ballot initiatives in California and Oregon.

But on Thursday, the Department of Justice announced that it would not prosecute marijuana crimes that were legal under state law, a move that could signal the end of the country’s longtime prohibition on pot is nearing. “It certainly appears to be potentially the beginning of the end,” said Paul Armantano, deputy director of the pot lobby group NORML.

The memo sent to states Thursday by the DOJ said that as long as states set up comprehensive regulations governing marijuana, there would be no need for the federal government to step in, a decision that will save the Justice Department from having to use its limited resources on prosecuting individuals for growing or smoking marijuana.

“This memo appears to be sending the message to states regarding marijuana prohibition that is a recognition that a majority of the public and in some states majority of lawmakers no longer want to continue down the road of illegal cannabis, and would rather experiment with different regulatory schemes of license and retail sale of cannabis,” Armantano said.

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marijuana Politics

Republican Voted Against Legalizing Pot, Gets Busted With Pot In Car

New York Assemblyman Steve Katz is the Putnam County politician who just last year voted down a bill to legalize medical marijuana in New York. Now fast forward to yesterday at 10 a.m., when Katz was pulled over for doing 80 in a 65 on I-87. The officer who pulled Katz over reportedly smelled pot in the car, at which point he discovered that Katz had a small bag of weed in his possession.

It’s too bad Katz, who is a Republican, is so anti-marijuana in his professional life, because he sounds like he’d be a blast to smoke a joint with.

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marijuana Tid Bits

Alligator Found Guarding $100,000 Worth of Marijuana

SAN FRANCISCO — Authorities in Northern California made a snappy discovery during a routine probation check: An alligator-like reptile named “Mr. Teeth,” who was apparently protecting a stash of marijuana.

When Alameda County Sheriff’s deputies entered the Castro Valley home on Tuesday, they not only found 34 pounds of marijuana valued at an estimated $100,000, but also the 5-foot-long caiman inside a Plexiglas tank guarding it in a bedroom.

Caimans are usually found in the wetland regions of Central and South America. They’re considered close relatives of alligators.

“We get guard dogs all the time when we search for grow houses and people stashing away all types of dope. But alligators? You just don’t see that every day,” Sgt. J.D. Nelson said Thursday.

Assif Mayar was arrested on suspicion of possessing marijuana for sale. He could also face citations from the California Fish and Game Commission, including possession of an exotic animal without a permit.

The 32-year-old told deputies he got the creature to commemorate rapper Tupac Shakur’s 1996 death.

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marijuana Politics

President Obama – If The People Voted For Marijuana, Let Them Have Marijuana

President Obama has given the clearest sign yet that the federal government has no intention of challenging those states which voted on Nov. 7 to legalize the recreational use and sale of marijuana.

Speaking to ABC News’ Barbara Walters, the president said that the prosecution of recreational marijuana users in states that have legalized the substance won’t be a ‘top priority’ for federal law enforcement officials in the war on drugs.

‘We’ve got bigger fish to fry,’ said the president, who was speaking about cannabis for the first time since Colorado and Washington voted to legalize it.

‘It would not make sense for us to see a top priority as going after recreational users in states that have determined that it’s legal,’ he told Walters in a 20/20 interview which airs Friday night.

Although the sale and use of marijuana is in defiance of federal law, the president’s comments are the strongest suggestion yet that he plans to adopt a ‘hands-off’ approach, similar to that taken toward users of medicinal marijuana in the 18 states where it is legal.

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