Sean Spicer compared marijuana to opioids – but there’s…

White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer relayed the Trump administration’s first official comments on legal cannabis this past Thursday. Unfortunately, his remarks involved zero scientific consideration when he compared adult-use cannabis to the ongoing opioid epidemic: “When you see something like the opioid addiction crisis blossoming in so many states around this country, the last thing we should be doing is encouraging people,” Spicer said.

Trump Sanctions Venezuela Vice President on Drug Trafficking

The Trump administration imposed sanctions against Venezuelan Vice President Tareck El Aissami on Monday, accusing him of playing a major role in international drug trafficking. The executive decree, the result of a years-long investigation, is bound to ratchet up tensions between the new Republican administration and the United States’ harshest critic in Latin America.

‘That idiot’: Rodrigo Duterte responds to former Colombian…

During a speech at an event celebrating the 115th anniversary of the founding of the Philippine Bureau of Customs, President Rodrigo Duterte gave a customarily blunt response to an op-ed written by former Colombian President Cesar Gaviria. Gaviria, who presided over the hunt for and killing of Pablo Escobar , cautioned against deploying armed police and troops to fight the drug trade and called for more efforts to address the social factors related to drug use in a New York Times op-ed titled ” President Duterte is repeating my mistakes .”

This Cutting-Edge Marijuana Bill Could Keep Pot Users From Losing Their Jobs

Marijuana had an incredible 2016, and the hope for pro-legalization enthusiasts is that momentum will continue to carry into 2017 and beyond. As it currently stands, just 21 years after California became the first state to legalize cannabis for medical purposes, 28 states have now legalized medicinal pot, while residents in eight states have voted in favor of legalizing recreational, adult-use weed.

Weed 101: Colorado agriculture office shares pot know-how

In this Jan. 31, 2017 photo, agriculture regulators from seven different states and Guam tour a Denver marijuana growing warehouse on a tour organized by the Colorado Department of Agriculture in Denver. The department is opening up its marijuana … knowledge to other states and encouraging them to plan now for the possibility of regulating farmers growing a plant that violates federal law.

Just 2 Groups of People Now Oppose Legalizing Marijuana

With the exception of Arizona, which narrowly voted against an initiative that would have legalized recreational pot, residents in eight other states voted in favor of legalizing medical or recreational cannabis in the November election. The year ended with 28 states having approved medical cannabis, and twice as many recreation-legal states as at the end of 2015 .

Trump has two paths he can take on marijuana legalization – …

After his inauguration on January 20, Trump signed an executive order that directs federal agencies to start rolling back the Affordable Care Act, revived two controversial oil pipelines, staged a war on the media, and played a game of chicken with the president of Mexico. But we still don’t know much about Trump’s plans for marijuana legalization.

Tests: Maintenance workers killed by train were on drugs

Both maintenance workers killed by an Amtrak train near Philadelphia last year were on drugs when the crash happened, test results show, but that doesn’t appear to have factored into safety lapses and miscommunications being blamed for their deaths. Toxicology reports released Thursday by federal safety investigators show backhoe operator Joseph Carter Jr. tested positive for cocaine and supervisor Peter Adamovich had morphine, codeine and oxycodone in his system.

Tests: Maintenance workers killed by train were on drugs

Both maintenance workers killed by an Amtrak train near Philadelphia last year were on drugs when the crash happened, test results show, but that doesn’t appear to have factored into safety lapses and miscommunications being blamed for their deaths. Toxicology reports released Thursday by federal safety investigators show backhoe operator Joseph Carter Jr. tested positive for cocaine and supervisor Peter Adamovich had morphine, codeine and oxycodone in his system.

The definitive guide to what experts know about the effects of marijuana use

Cannabis plants grow in the greenhouse at Vireo Health’s medical marijuana cultivation facility, August 19, 2016 in Johnstown, New York. As eight states plus the District of Columbia have moved to fully legalize recreational marijuana, debates on the merits of legalization have focused on the effects of marijuana use on individuals and society: is marijuana bad for your lungs, or for your brain? Does it have therapeutic applications? Is it safer than alcohol or tobacco? Marijuana is one of the most studied substances in scientific literature, but the answers are scattered across tens of thousands of scientific papers.

Police took down a Sydney crime syndicate and made ‘the…

Australian police dismantled a major cocaine smuggling ring after a two-and-a-half-year multi-agency operation undertaken with Tahiti, Australian authorities announced on Thursday. Operation Okesi, which began in July 2014, culminated in a Christmas-night seizure of 500 kilograms of cocaine in New South Wales in eastern Australia.

3 Myths About Marijuana Stocks

What do Hercules, Thor, centaurs, and marijuana stocks have in common? They’re all the subjects of myths. Most myths have at least a little bit of truth interspersed with a lot that is false.

California aims to take lead in giving marijuana industry access to financial services

In this Wednesday, Oct. 12, 2016 photo, Rolie Gonzalez III displays a branch of marijuana buds taken for a plant on the farm of grower Laura Costa, near Garberville. California hopes to take the lead in giving the cannabis industry access to banking services in 2017, with a new working group focused on finding a solution to ongoing conflicts between state and federal laws that force marijuana businesses to operate largely in cash.

Year in Review: Marijuana’s Green 2016

As we look back on the year, 2016 may very well go down as the greatest year ever for marijuana and the cannabis industry. Over the past 12 months we’ve watched the industry evolve before our eyes, and in some cases seen legal marijuana spread to new states.

Aging baby boomers increasingly embrace marijuana, heavy alcohol use

I wrote earlier this week on how fewer teens are using drugs or alcohol than at any point in the past few decades. Indeed, while anti-drug PSAs still encourage parents to talk to their teens about drugs before someone else does, two recent studies suggest there’s another high-risk population we should be worried about: our kids’ grandparents.