Prime Minister Stephen Harper may be dismissive about the fact that the states of Washington and Colorado voted in favour of legalizing marijuana last week, but they have set the stage for a game changer, however complicated. Ironically, last Tuesday's vote on the day of the U.S. election fell on the same day that the Harper government's Safe Streets and Communities Act with tougher drug possession laws came into effect. Whether Harper likes it or not, individual states in the U.S. are inching forward while Canada's drug laws are going backwards. [continues 537 words]
Impact on $6-Billion-To-$8-Billion Pot Industry Is Difficult to Quantify (CP) - The future appears hazy for British Columbia's thriving underground pot industry, even as two U.S. states have voted to allow citizens to legally use the drug recreationally. Business consequences could range from mild to sending marijuana producers' livelihoods up in smoke, depending on how much of the estimated $6-billion-to-$8-billion annual economy is currently being exported south of the border, analysts say. [continues 297 words]
Voters in Washington and Colorado Say No to the Long, Costly War on Pot Last month, the Federal Bureau of Investigation released its accounting of all arrests made by law enforcement agencies across the fruited plain. Cops and federal agents made 12,408,899 arrests in the USA in 2011. No wonder we're known around the world as Incarceration Nation. Let's walk through the breakdown of that big number: *Of the total, 534,704 arrests were for violent crimes, and that number was down about 5 percent from 2010. [continues 790 words]
Colo., Wash. Legalize Marijuana, Setting Up a Confrontation With the Feds Lawmakers in Maryland this year shied away from legalizing the medical use of marijuana by certain very ill patients under carefully controlled clinical conditions. Voters elsewhere, it seems, are not so cautious. On Tuesday, Colorado and Washington passed ballot initiatives legalizing the possession and sale or marijuana for purely recreational use - no prescription required - making them the first states in the country to do so. (A similar initiative in Oregon was narrowly rejected, but voters in Massachusetts approved a law allowing doctors to prescribe marijuana for medicinal purposes.) The law would allow individuals to have up to an ounce of marijuana, and get high on it, with no criminal risk. [continues 588 words]
A nearly three-month operation that targeted gang-related crimes in Northeast El Paso resulted in more than 100 arrests -- most of which were on outstanding narcotics warrants. Operation Triple Beam, which started in mid-August and ended Friday, led to the arrests of 119 gang members and 17 convicted felons who failed to register as sex offenders, according to the El Paso Police Department. Officers seized about $15,000 in cash, five firearms and drugs with a street value of more than $85,000. More than 330 outstanding warrants were cleared with the arrests. [continues 480 words]
Washington, Colorado Unsure How to Proceed Senior administration officials acknowledged Friday that they are wrestling with how to respond to the legalization of marijuana in Colorado and Washington, which directly violates federal drug law and is sparking a broad debate about the direction of U.S. drug policy. The most likely outcome will be that the Justice Department will prevent the laws from going into effect by announcing that federal law preempts the state initiatives, which would make marijuana legal for recreational use, law enforcement sources said. But the White House and the Justice Department have not made a decision yet, senior officials said. [continues 765 words]
Canadian drug law reform advocates were rejoicing after two U. S. states voted to legalize marijuana this week, even as the Harper government brought into effect tough new penalties for pot. The states of Washington and Colorado voted in favour of ballot-box propositions to remove criminal penalties for the possession and sale of recreational marijuana on Tuesday, the same day drug measures in Canada's Safe Streets and Communities Act came into effect. The new measures legislate a minimum six-month jail sentence for growing as few as six marijuana plants. [continues 772 words]
Economic impact unclear as two U.S. states vote for legal use VANCOUVER - The future appears hazy for British Columbia's thriving underground pot industry, even as two U.S. states have voted to allow citizens to legally use the drug recreationally. Business consequences could range from mild to sending marijuana producers' livelihoods up in smoke, depending on how much of the estimated $6 billion to $8 billion annual economy is currently being exported south of the border, analysts say. Opinion on the impact varies considerably, but those advocating for Canada to adopt a more evidence-based policy on marijuana say this week's votes mean Canada is falling behind the U.S. in developing evidence-based policy. [continues 854 words]
Mr. Zimmer's reasons for his opposition to marijuana legalization beg for rebuttal: 1) Marijuana (MJ) as a gateway drug - does Mr. Zimmer have evidence for this or is it just a feeling that he has? One assumes that Mr. Zimmer prefers MJ users to get their supply from drug dealers as opposed to a government-controlled outlet. Dealers sometimes also sell cocaine, heroin etc. What a great way to introduce other drugs. 2) Legalizing MJ "is just going to put it into the hands of more young people". Where is the evidence? Other jurisdictions have not found this to be the case and MJ is very easy to get even now when it is illegal. Mr. Zimmer as much as confirmed this when he referred to his students. [continues 114 words]
The future appears hazy for B.C.'s thriving underground pot industry, even as two U.S. states - Washington and Colorado - have voted to allow citizens to legally use the drug recreationally. Business consequences could range from mild to sending marijuana producers' livelihoods up in smoke, depending on how much of the estimated $6 billion to $8 billion annual economy is currently being exported south of the border, analysts said. Opinion on the impact varies widely, but those advocating for Canada to adopt a more evidence-based policy on marijuana say Tuesday's votes mean Canada is falling behind the U.S. [continues 421 words]
India Never Saw Eye-To-Eye With the US-Led Drive to Outlaw Recreational Use of Cannabis Across the World The referendum passed by two US states approving the recreational use of marijuana for adults is fraught with irony for India. Whether it can prevail over the stringent federal law or not, the referendum adopted by Colorado and Washington vindicates the reservations expressed by India 50 years ago to a global prohibition on hard as well as soft drugs. The 1961 "single convention on narcotic drugs" was the first ever international treaty to have clubbed cannabis (or marijuana) with hard drugs and imposed a blanket ban on their production and supply except for medicinal and research purposes. During the negotiations for the UN treaty signed in New York, a group of cannabis and opium producing countries, led by India, opposed its intolerance to the sociocultural use of organic drugs. They were however overwhelmed by the US and other western countries which espoused tight controls on the production of organic raw material and on illicit trafficking. [continues 830 words]
MEXICO CITY - The main adviser to Mexico's president-elect said Wednesday that votes legalizing recreational marijuana in the U.S. states of Washington and Colorado will force Mexico and the United States to rethink their efforts to halt marijuana smuggling across the border. Luis Videgaray, head of incoming President Enrique Pena Nieto's transition team, told Radio Formula that the Mexican administration taking power in three weeks remains opposed to drug legalization. But he said the votes in the two states complicate his country's commitment to quashing the growing and smuggling of a plant now seen by many as legal in part of the United States. [continues 302 words]
MUKILTEO -- People started coming into the medical marijuana co-op in Mukilteo on Election Day asking the same question: "Can I buy pot now?" "There's obviously a bit of confusion," said Jeremy Kelsey, owner of the Medical Marijuana Patients Network. His shop only sells to patients who have legal authorization from a doctor or naturopath to use marijuana for specific medical conditions. The questions continued for Kelsey on Wednesday, the day after Washington voters approved Initiative 502, which taxes and legalizes the sale of an ounce or less of marijuana to anyone 21 years or older. [continues 1126 words]
LITTLE ROCK - The state Court of Appeals on Wednesday sided with a Vilonia man who argued that drugs and firearms federal agent seized from him were the fruit of an illegal search and should not have been admitted as evidence against him. The appeals court ruled that a federal Drug Enforcement Administration agent violated Elfido Gutierrez's constitutional rights when he entered the man's home without a warrant. Gutierrez argued that evidence seized from his home on Oct. 14, 2010, should have been suppressed. [continues 327 words]
Regarding George Reed's Nov. 7 column, the drug war is largely a war on marijuana smokers. In 2010, there were 853,839 marijuana arrests in the U.S., almost 90 percent for simple possession. At a time when state and local governments are laying off police, firefighters and teachers, this country continues to spend enormous public resources criminalizing Americans who prefer marijuana to martinis. The end result of this ongoing culture war is not lower rates of use. The U.S. has higher rates of marijuana use than the Netherlands, where marijuana is legally available. Decriminalization is a long overdue step in the right direction. Taxing and regulating marijuana would render the drug war obsolete. As long as organized crime controls distribution, marijuana consumers will come into contact with sellers of hard drugs like methamphetamine, cocaine and heroin. This "gateway" is a direct result of marijuana prohibition. Robert Sharpe, Common Sense for Drug Policy, Washington, D.C. [end]
Regarding the Nov. 4 news article "Mexican drug cartels establish networks in U.S. cities": Since March 2009, the Obama administration has placed an unprecedented amount of personnel, infrastructure and technology along the southwest border. The U.S. Border Patrol has doubled in size, we've bolstered operations at our ports of entry and we've expanded successful partnerships with the Mexican government that are cracking down on cross-border crime. These actions have improved our ability to disrupt drug-trafficking across the United States. [continues 137 words]
Some years ago I wrote a column in this paper suggesting it might be time to consider legalizing marijuana since it probably isn't any more harmful than beer, a legal drug. But I have come to see I was wrong. Proponents of legalized marijuana make the point that it is not as harmful in its health and social consequences as alcohol, and they might be right. But that doesn't mean its effects are benign or that legalization will eliminate all criminal activity associated with its manufacture, sale and usage. If alcohol and tobacco were new on the scene today and we were aware of their potential harmful, sometimes lethal, consequences, would we still legalize them? [continues 1162 words]
Backed by a growing roster of politicians, health officers, and legal experts, a single beat cop blows the whistle on prohibition For all the hype, says Const. David Bratzer, the life of a downtown cop is about wordplay more often than gunplay. As the scores of drug offenders who've served jail time at his insistence will attest, his main weapon isn't his service revolver, it's polite, persistent persuasion. As he unrolls his six-foot frame from a floatplane in Vancouver harbour on a humid summer morning, that's a weapon he plans to level once again at the very drug laws he's charged with enforcing. "It's tough for a cop to admit," he says, heading down the wharf while buttoning his charcoal jacket, "but our laws just don't make sense." [continues 3114 words]
'Substantive' Instances at Ontario Training Facility Officers at Canadian Forces Base Borden, a key training facility for the military, have sounded the alarm about increasing drug use at the southern Ontario location, according to newly released records. "There has been a substantial spike in the increasing number of drug-related instances in the CFB Borden area," according to the March briefing note produced for the commander of the Canadian Forces National Investigation Service (CFNIS). Between Jan. 1, 2011, and March 26, 2012, there were a minimum of 22 "substantive drug-related occurrences," the document said. [continues 609 words]
Even as she was strung out on cocaine, waking up in places and with people that repulsed and shamed her, Paulette Walker prided herself on the fact she had never been busted. As it turned out, selling drugs to an undercover cop 10 years ago, and being hauled off to jail, was a lifesaver - scaring her straight to a place where she now guides addicts out of what she calls "a horrible pit." We're at old city hall, at the Toronto Drug Treatment Court, an enlightened alternate justice initiative that seeks to rehabilitate rather than incarcerate people who abuse drugs. [continues 453 words]
