The legislation enables the District to bypass the annually-renewed congressional spending bill rider that has prevented D.C. from using its local taxes to implement a system of legal cannabis commerce.
Washington, D.C. lawmakers green-lighted emergency legislation to set up a faux recreational cannabis market. The DC bill will allow medical marijuana patients to self-certify without a doctor’s recommendation and buy cannabis from licensed retailers.
Sponsored by Councilmembers Kenyan McDuffie (D) and Mary Cheh (D), the measure was advanced by the full Washington, D.C. Council on Tuesday in a 13-0 vote, reported Marijuana Moment.
The legislation enables the District to bypass the annually-renewed congressional spending bill rider that has prevented D.C. from using its local taxes to implement a system of legal cannabis commerce, even though voters approved cannabis possession, cultivation and gifting in 2014.
Why This Matters
Cannabis is fully legal in the nation’s capital, but due to a convoluted bicameral omnibus spending bill, marijuana sales are banned in the District, where some 700,000 people reside.
A similar measure to provide the cannabis self-certification process, sponsored by District Council Chairman Phil Mendelson (D) was defeated earlier this year due to separate provisions that would have come down on unlicensed businesses that are leveraging existing policy to “gift” marijuana to people who buy unrelated products and services.
While these enforcement provisions were not part of the bill approved on Tuesday, lawmakers touched on the issue in a resolution attached to the legislation.
“Because these shops are operating outside of the law, there is no requirement or enforcement of customer registration, including verification that purchasers are of legal age,” the resolution says. “In addition, for gray market products, there is no assurance that the marijuana has been tested or adequately labeled, raising concerns that products could be contaminated or otherwise unsafe for consumers, and that the potency of the marijuana purchased could differ from what was advertised.”
Seniors Don’t Need Doctors To Get Medical Marijuana
In February, Mayor Muriel Bowser signed a bill into law that expanded access to the District’s medical marijuana program for people 65 and older.
Under that bill, senior residents can “self-certify that they will use cannabis for medical purposes in lieu of including a recommendation from their health care practitioner with their registration application as is required for all other applicants.”
The measure also extended the registration renewal deadline for other patients and set up a week-long medical marijuana tax “holiday” that happens to coincide with 4/20.
Two new Omicron variants are leading the charge in COVID cases in the US. One of them is of particular concern to scientists.
Two new Omicron variants are currently leading infections in the US, and one of them is being called “the worst version of the virus” scientists have seen.
The new variants are Omicron BA.4 and BA.5, with the latter being the one that has scientists on high alert due to its ability to evade immunity.
Fortune wrote about BA.5, picking up on a newsletter written by Dr. Eric Topol. “It takes immune escape, already extensive, to the next level, and, as a function of that, enhanced transmissibility,” he wrote. Topol is a professor of molecular medicine at Scripps Research.
“You could say it’s not so bad because there hasn’t been a marked rise in hospitalizations and deaths as we saw with Omicron, but that’s only because we had such a striking adverse impact from Omicron, for which there is at least some cross-immunity,” he wrote, referencing the current Covid numbers that are being reported across the country.
According to the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC), Omicron variants B.4 and B.5 are expected to have caused 52% of Covid infections last week. While it’s difficult to predict the variant’s response to vaccines, experts believe vaccinated people are likely experiencing a drop in protection, higher than the one experienced by previous Omicron variants.
When discussing variant B.5, it’s unknown how vaccines perform against it.
B.4 and B.5 are spiking in places all over the world, but you wouldn’t know it, because they’re occurring at the same time as previous variants are declining. This gives the impression that the wave is stabilizing instead of one variant replacing the other.
New Omicron variants present similar symptoms as the original Omicron strain. They include fever, loss of smell, and fatigue, with less of a focus on respiratory complications. While the disease is still something to contend with, it’s not as dangerous as it was at the start.
Over the past two years, between law enforcement and some anti-cannabis media outlets, frightening stories about “fentanyl-laced marijuana” have cropped up in the news although lab testing has never confirmed it.
Does fentanyl-laced weed even exist? Leafly undertook a 6-month investigation and analyzed claims of fentanyl-laced cannabis. “Many of our readers are medical marijuana patients or adult cannabis consumers. If they face a serious risk using any cannabis-related products, we intend to let them know about it,” Leafly stated.
“The lie spreads from three sources: Faulty field drug testing kits, police departments incentivized to hype local fear, and reporters who fail to question, investigate, or follow up on police claims,” Leafly added.
In reality, Fentanyl traces have only been found in one cannabis sample on US soil — one of 40 claimed in Connecticut, where a state public health leader admitted it might be “the first confirmed case in the United States.”
According to harm reduction specialists, “even if marijuana was dusted with fentanyl, it likely wouldn’t kill a consumer because fentanyl burns up at a lower temperature than marijuana.”
Even WebMD said that is a myth. “There is no scientific data that would validate the assumption [that fentanyl-laced weed is causing widespread fatalities] thus far,” Lawrence Weinstein, MD and chief medical officer at American Addiction Centers said.
According to the Ontario Harm Reduction Network (OHRN), there have been no laboratory-confirmed cases of fentanyl-laced cannabis. OHRN, said also that fentanyl has a high-profit margin, whereas marijuana has a low-profit margin.
Moreover, fentanyl’s high potential for fatal overdose makes it a bad option for producing dependence. “The idea they would enhance dependency does not hold water because of the lethality of [fentanyl]. That’s truly a myth,” Weinstein added.
In addition, testing positive for both fentanyl and marijuana does not automatically mean that you’ve consumed fentanyl-laced weed.
“It is more likely that that person also may test positive for other substances for fentanyl. [Fentanyl] is much more prevalent to be used in cutting opioids. It doesn’t mean that other substances cannot be laced with fentanyl, but based on frequency and likelihood, it is most likely other substances that one would need to be tested for,” Weinstein concluded.
If you live in a state where weed is legal and you’re ready to take quitting smoking seriously, it might be a good idea to have some fast-acting edibles handy for when the urge to smoke strikes.
Nicotine is widely known to be one of the most addictive substances on the planet, and it is certainly the most addictive legal drug in America. According to the CDC, tobacco causes about one in every five deaths in America. While there have been some positive results from anti-smoking campaigns that have helped reduce the number of new smokers in recent years, nothing close to a cure for nicotine addiction exists today.
There are all sorts of products on the market that try to help those addicted to nicotine move away from tobacco, including patches, gums, lozenges, pills and everything in between. In recent years, some have even started to turn to cannabis in the form of CBD gummies and even THC. But can these cannabis derived edibles really help you quit smoking?
Recent studies have shown CBD has been effective in helping with cigarette withdrawals, and decreasing one’s desire to smoke. One study, by University College London, found that using CBD helped reduce nicotine desire almost instantly. “The study found that after a single dose of CBD treatment, heavy daily smokers find smoking-related cues less visually attention-grabbing,” UCL said.
CBD and its connection to smoking cessation has spawned many brands to market their gummies to those trying to quit. When it comes to THC, however, there has been far less research done in general. Further, with marijuana still illegal and untrusted on a federal level, it is much easier to promote CBD, which has been widely accepted as having very few negative side effects. But when you take a look at some of the benefits of medical marijuana and reference the main side effects of nicotine withdrawal, you can start to see the reason some are turning to marijuana to help quit smoking.
According to the National Cancer Institute, some of the most common nicotine withdrawal symptoms include irritability, insomnia, anxiety, depression and others. Any one of these symptoms can be difficult to overcome on your own, but combine them all at once and one can be left feeling debilitated. Coincidently, some of the benefits of marijuana include alleviating depression and anxiety.
In regards to sleeplessness, Americans have used a little bit of weed to fall asleep on restless nights for generations. Many of marijuana’s perceived benefits seem like they would directly benefit those experiencing severe nicotine withdrawal. But with limited research and a federal prohibition, it is still difficult to say if THC can definitely help you quit smoking.
If you do decide to give THC a try on your nicotine-quitting journey, edibles would be the logical choice, as smoking a joint instead of a cigarette does not exactly constitute the whole “quitting smoking” idea. But marijuana edibles may have not been highly effective at treating nicotine withdrawal, as it turns out, because they often take upwards of one to two hours to kick in and produce the symptom-relieving effects. This may no longer be the case, however, now that several manufacturers have released fast acting edibles.
The newly-popular fast acting edibles use different scientific techniques, like emulsification, to get the THC into your system much quicker, mirroring the high of smoking rather than the delayed and elongated high of traditional edibles. This new formula allows edibles to bypass the stomach and get into the small intestine faster, so the effect is more similar to smoking.
Just like with nearly all aspects of marijuana research, there needs to be more analysis on whether or not marijuana can help those addicted to nicotine and other dangerous and addictive substances. If, however, you live in a state where marijuana is legal and you are ready to take quitting smoking seriously, it might be a good idea to have some fast-acting edibles handy for when you really want to head to the store and buy a pack of smokes.
Since 2014, members of Congress have passed annual spending bills that have included a provision protecting those in compliance with state medical cannabis programs from the DOJ. However, such guidance has not been officially renewed under the current Administration.
A House Appropriations subcommittee approved an amendment on Tuesday afternoon that would prevent the Department of Justice (DOJ) from interfering with legal adult-use marijuana programs as part of the Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies appropriations legislation for the Fiscal Year 2023, NORML reported in a press release.
The bipartisan amendment, introduced by Reps. Barbara Lee (D-CA) David Joyce (R-OH) along with Reps. Earl Blumenauer (D-OR), Tom McClintock (R-CA) and Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) would bar the DOJ from using resources to interfere with the ability of states, territories, tribal governments or the District of Columbia to implement cannabis laws or to target people acting in compliance with those laws.
Morgan Fox, political director of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) said the amendment brings peace of mind to individuals, businesses and institutions.
“As federal lawmakers steadily work to determine the best way to finally end marijuana prohibition and undo the damage it has caused, the people involved in regulated cannabis programs in the growing number of states that are leading the way on this issue deserve to know whether the federal government will actively get in the way of their continued successes,” Fox said.
“Including these protections in the federal budget will go a long way toward giving individuals, businesses, and state governments some peace of mind while signaling to the vast majority of Americans who support legalizing and regulating cannabis that their elected representatives are actually listening to them.”
Congressman Earl Blumenauer added: “Congress must honor the will of the voters and prevent wasteful Department of Justice prosecution of those complying with their respective state’s or tribe’s cannabis regulations. I appreciate the partnership and leadership of my colleagues, Representatives McClintock, Lee, Joyce, and Norton to move this important language forward today.”
Since 2014, members of Congress have passed annual spending bills that have included a provision protecting those in compliance with state medical cannabis programs from undue prosecution by the DOJ. However, such guidance has not been officially renewed under the current Administration and “does not carry the force of law,” NORML stressed. Meanwhile, U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland recently said the DOJ was examining cannabis policy and would address the issue “in the days ahead.”
Depending on how you perceive the past few months, Texas may be heading towards a minor liberal reform, or the conservatives could be doubling down on its dominance.
The past few months, ranging from gun tragedies to legal decisions to special elections, highlight a busy and somewhat unclear Texas political landscape heading into November.
The recent back-and-forth momentum leaves most sources uncertain where Texas will stand post-Election Day. However, many appear firm on two points: Texans are frustrated, and most support legalizing cannabis.
Much Messing With Texas
No matter the outcome this Fall, Texas will remain an overwhelmingly conservative-held Congress. The state has deep GOP ties, with Republican Presidential nominees taking the state in every election since 1980.
Still, with frustrations running high across the board, changes of some kind could be on the horizon.
February data from the Texas Politics Project listed border security (19%), immigration (12%), COVID-19 (11%), political corruption (9%) and the economy (6%) as its top five voter issues.
March results from the 2022 Texas Lyceum Poll cited border security (14%) as the top trouble spot. Inflation, political corruption/leadership and energy prices are all tied at 9%. Cannabis legalization was not mentioned in the list of 25 concerns.
“From the shaky electric grid to health care access, the economy, endemic corruption, and gun violence, issues are swamping the Texas election cycle,” said Susan Hays, a Democratic candidate for Agriculture Department Commissioner.
Hays said the typical voter likely places cannabis somewhere in the middle of their priorities this voting cycle.
“But voters consistently raise cannabis reform as an important issue for them,” she said.
Jax James, NORML state policy manager said cannabis legalization “definitely” falls behind gun and abortion rights, adding that property taxes could also be considered a higher priority to most Texans.
James said the state’s current surplus may make legalization less of a concern to those outside of advocates. In July 2021, state Comptroller Glenn Hegar projected Texas would have a $7.85 billion surplus for the 2022-2023 biennium.
“The desire to have legal market revenue is not as big as it could, perhaps,” said James.
How Cannabis Policy Fits Into The Discussion
Texans have come around on legalization and now seem to be waiting on key lawmakers to do the same. Across the aisle, voters have supported a legal market expansion for some time.
“Overarchingly, cannabis is truly a fairly bipartisan issue here in Texas,” said James.
June 2021 results from the Texas Politics Projects saw 60% of those polled supporting a small or large quantity possession. Just 13% opposed legalization in any form.
A May 2022 poll from The Dallas Morning News and The University of Texas at Tyler found similar results. 60% of those polled supported adult use legalization, with 83% favoring medical. 42% of identified Republicans supported adult use.
Public support hasn’t done much to sway Gov. Abbott from previous stances. He prefers to see cannabis remain a Class C misdemeanor.
James blamed Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick, who has been linked to squashing reform momentum for several years.
“The Governor has actually negotiated with activists to get quite a bit more done than has passed,” James said.
Others offered similar opinions. “Texans do seem to want a more robust medicinal program, similar to Oklahoma, but the current Lieutenant Governor will not allow cannabis legislation to be brought to the Senate floor,” said Matt Hawkins, founder and managing principal at Entourage Effect Capital.
Tristan Seikel is executive director of the nonpartisan group Decriminalize Denton, one of the cities taking up decriminalization in November. He feels that the rise of local-level policy and ballot questions is a response to stalled state-level efforts.
“People are organizing more and providing support for each other, I think, as a necessary reaction,” Seikel said.
Medical advocates have also continued to push for changes to its restrictive market. In 2021, the Texas Compassionate Use Program expanded its coverage to people with cancer and PTSD. Efforts to include chronic pain were removed in the Senate.
Conservatives Gaining Recent Ground
While Beto O’Rourke and cannabis reforms could win out in November, the state’s conservative grip still appears strong.
“I can’t even begin to speculate on how our election is going to go this year, especially with the recent news of a Republican flipping a historically Democratic district in the Rio Grande Valley,” said Shayda Torabi, CEO of Restart CBD and host of the To Be Blunt podcast.
In mid-June, GOP candidate Mayra Flores flipped the typically Democratic seat during a special election.
The state GOP also made waves in June when its new party platform included claims against the 2020 election results, condemned gay marriage and called to repeal the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The platform also opposes cannabis legalization but does support rescheduling.
With results not coming for several months, we’re left to wait and see what will unfold. While waiting, NORML’s James reports knowing of several companies waiting to capitalize on what could be a lucrative Texas market.
Rather than just waiting, she urges those companies to get involved. “The activists are here on the ground doing the work, and we need to make sure that the businesses and the people in positions of power are supporting that work.”
White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said on Tuesday that the ongoing detention of WNBA superstar Brittney Griner has the full attention of President Biden.
“It has the fullest attention of the president and every senior member of his national security and diplomatic team. And, we are actively working to find a resolution to this case and will continue to do so without rest until we get Brittney safely home,” Sullivan told reporters on Air Force One as Biden is traveling to Spain for a NATO meeting.
Sullivan said that he and Secretary of State Antony Blinken have both spoken with Griner’s wife, Cherelle, to “convey our very deep sympathy, convey that we just can’t even begin to imagine what the family must be going through, what Brittney must be going through.”
Sullivan reiterated to reporters that Griner was “wrongfully” and “unjustly” detained and that the White House is working for her release but would not go into details, according to The Hill.
Griner’s appearance in a Russian court Monday was the first time the two-time Olympic gold medal winner has been seen publicly, with the exception of her booking photo. Arrested on Feb. 17 at a Moscow airport for allegedly having cannabis oil in her suitcase, Griner faces up to 10 years in prison if convicted. Last week a Putin spokesperson said Griner was not a hostage but had broken Russian law.
Is A Deal In The Works?
Numerous organizations and individuals have called on Biden to broker a deal with Russia for Griner’s release like the one that brought home US Marine Trevor Reed in exchange for a Russian pilot convicted of drug trafficking conspiracy.
Some believe that Moscow is using Griner to gain leverage for that very reason.
“This may sound counterintuitive, but the trial is a crucial part of the process. The Russians have to keep pretending that this is a legitimate arrest. There is no reason to believe that the charges are legitimate or that her trial will be fair. But if and when she’s convicted, the Russians will have made clear their credible alternative to a deal to bring her home,” Dr. Danielle Gilbert, assistant professor of military and strategic studies at the US Air Force Academy, told ESPN.
New study says marijuana users are more likely to visit the ER and be hospitalized when compared to nonusers.
A new study says marijuana users more likely to need emergency care, painting a different picture than most people think. The study claims marijuana users are more likely to be visit emergency rooms when compared to non-users.
The study, published in the journal BMJ Open Respiratory Research, relied on self-reporting from Canadian residents between the ages of 12-65 over a six-year period. After adjusting for counfounding factors, cannabis users were 22% more likely to visit the ER or to be hospitalized.
Per the study’s abstract, its objective was “to evaluate the association between cannabis use and respiratory-related emergency room (ER) visits and hospitalisations.” Researchers didn’t find a link between cannabis use and respiratory emergency occurrences, instead, they found that people who consumed cannabis often visited the ER due to physical bodily injury.
“Physical bodily injury was the leading cause of emergency department visits and hospitalizations among the cannabis users, with respiratory reasons coming in a close second,” said study author Nicholas Vozoris, in an email exchange with CNN.
“Although no significant association was observed between cannabis use and respiratory-related ER visits or hospitalisations, the risk of an equally important morbidity outcome, all-cause ER visit or hospitalisation, was significantly greater among cannabis users than among control individuals,” concludes the research.
Marijuana use has long been associated with slower response times from users, which is why most experts recommend avoiding the use of heavy machinery or doing any physical task that demands coordination after consuming cannabis. This is a valid concern, yet one that shouldn’t be mythologized and brought out of proportion.
There are a lot of things we don’t know about cannabis, making it a priority for researchers and experts to analyze every possible aspect of the drug and how it could impact the population as a whole. Still, it’s important not to fall back on fear mongering; as we continue to embark on this new stage of cannabis use on a national level, responsible authorities should advocate for safe and responsible use of the drug.
There is no single answer or solution for how to improve the current state of cannabis in indigenous Sovereign nations because the issue is complicated, and opinions and challenges vary from tribe to tribe throughout the land.
Many lawmakers continue to say marijuana policy should be left up to individual states. Often, they then proceed to either oppose federal marijuana legalization, or deflect back to their opinion that it is a state issue. With more states legalizing marijuana, it may seem that slowly but surely the United States might fully legalize marijuana with or without federal legislation. This logic, however, overlooks a major group of people: Native Americans.
Cannabis and its tricky legality among indigenous people and their sovereign nations continues to be a topic so unresolved that the U.S. Senate Committee on Indian Affairs launched a hearing called “Cannabis In Indian Country,” which had alistening session recently.
While this committee may spark some necessary dialogue and highlight major issues on the subject, there is not one universal opinion or solution. This is because nearly every Tribal Nation has its own unique views and challenges when it comes to marijuana legalization.
A sovereign nation, by definition, should have supreme authority over how it runs, but history has shown this is not always the case with Native American Nations, and this includes marijuana laws. While many rules and governance can not be infringed upon by the federal government “Under US law, however, Congress has the authority to legislate on tribal issues. Thus, in the context of marijuana legalization efforts in Indian Country, federal laws may affect legalization implementation,” according to theCDC.
Federally recognized Native American tribes, of which there are well over 500, are often caught in limbo when it comes to marijuana legalization. “State and territorial medical marijuana markets have been protected by Congress for years. But Native American tribes were never included in those protections,” wrotePolitico. The article goes even further to say that some tribes gave up part of their own sovereignty to states just to make sure their cannabis markets were protected from the federal government. These kinds of deals between states and tribal nations are only one way that borders become blurred.
Lands within the Cherokee Nation, for example, became the first area in North Carolina where medical cannabis was legalized, making marijuana policy a bit foggy in that Western region of the state. In New York, where marijuana was recently legalized, a strange twist of fate in the form of a legal ordinance is currently allowing the Mohawk Tribal Council in Upstate New York to sell marijuana legally in dispensaries months before it was legal off the reservation.
William Roger Jock, a partner in Good Leaf Dispensary on Mohawk lands, explained this change in fate to ABC News: “We have been stepped on for so long and to have something like this happen, it’s almost liberating.” While this change of fortune is a short lived one, it is a welcome opportunity for those who often seem to get the short end of the legal loophole.
Photo by FatCamera/Getty Images
Cannabis in Native American Nations is a complicated matter. There is no single answer or solution for how to improve the current state of cannabis in indigenous Sovereign nations because the issue is complicated, and opinions and challenges vary from tribe to tribe throughout the land.
There is one simple thing that can be done, however, in order to improve these conflicting and confusing legalities. And that thing is for lawmakers to remember and carefully consider Native Americans when making future marijuana laws, and how these laws will impact their lands and the lands bordering their nations.
Learning disabilities are usually thought of as limitations. New research shows that these conditions have benefits of their own.
A new study reframes the way scientists have been thinking about dyslexia. Researchers found that people with this particular learning disorder might have an edge when compared to people without it, having better decision-making skills, spatial awareness, and more.
The study, published in the Journal Frontiers in Psychology, reexamines the way that developmental dyslexia has been viewed, finding some of the advantages it provides for people with the condition.
The study shows that the brains of people with dyslexia might find it easier to explore their environments for clues, impacting their decision-making skills, abilities that were highly important back when humans made life or death decisions on a frequent basis.
“This research proposes a new framework to help us better understand the cognitive strengths of people with dyslexia,” said Helen Taylor, psychologist of the University of Cambridge and one of the study’s lead authors.
Dyslexia is a condition known for its impact on reading and learning. While this limitation can impact people’s self-esteem, particularly due to how modern learning is designed, scientists have found that people with dyslexia are better equipped at spatial reasoning and are also more inventive, creative, and better at predicting a variety of outcomes.
“We believe that the areas of difficulty experienced by people with dyslexia result from a cognitive trade-off between exploration of new information and exploitation of existing knowledge, with the upside being an explorative bias that could explain enhanced abilities observed in certain realms like discovery, invention, and creativity,” said Taylor.
Researchers explain that people with dyslexia have been around for ages, with our reliance on reading and learning — relatively new developments in terms of evolution — bringing this issue to the forefront, prompting experts to view them as a cognitive limitation.
Dyslexia is a common condition, with around 3 million cases reported in the US annually. It usually runs in families and is often linked with trouble learning, social problems, and problems as adults.
