With my busy work schedule as it is, I managed to miss the very encouraging news that Cory Maye will get a new trial! I think it will be very interesting how his second trial unfolds now that he will have a better legal team with better expert witnesses to debunk the dubious testimony of [...]

Referring back to my post I wrote last week about the “perfect storm” the Obama Administration has created regarding medical marijuana, Colorado in many ways seems to be in the eye of this storm. It seems that more and more people are starting to understand the insanity of declaring war on a substance which has [...]

Uh-oh: Last week the Minnesota Supreme Court ruled that bong water is an illegal drug. Under state law, a controlled substance includes any “mixture” containing that substance, “regardless of purity.” The consequences of reading that definition literally can be severe. In the case before the court, a woman whose bong contained 37 grams of water [...]

Last week’s announcement from the Obama Administration that the Justice Department would call off the dogs with regard to medical marijuana in states where legal has created a perfect storm regarding state and local regulations. Colorado Attorney General lamented that with this announcement, a “legal vacuum” has been created and was quoted in The New [...]

I tells ya, sometimes ya just gotta to make an example of ‘em: When Sally Harpold bought cold medicine for her family back in March, she never dreamed that four months later she would end up in handcuffs. … Harpold is a grandmother of triplets who bought one box of Zyrtec-D cold medicine for her [...]

The new FBI Crime Report is out and reveals some interesting information: Prostitution and “commercialized vice” — 75,004 arrests Gambling — 9,811 arrests Drug Possession — 1,401,188 arrests Heroin or Cocaine Possession — 342,210 arrests Marijuana — 754,224 arrests Synthetic drugs (i.e., crystal meth) — 56,184 arrests Other “dangerous” drugs — 248,570 Which leaves us [...]

A Georgia Pastor was mistakenly killed in the a police drug string operation: STEPHENS COUNTY, Ga. — A pastor was shot and killed following a drug sting in Stephens County, Ga., on Tuesday, and the officers involved and friends of the pastor are giving different versions of what led up to the shooting. The Stephens [...]

The War On (Some) Drugs has reached the ridiculous stage: KISSIMMEE, Fla. — A man is suing the Kissimmee Police Department for an arrest over mints. When officers pulled Donald May over for an expired tag, they thought the mints he was chewing were crack and arrested him. May told Eyewitness News they wouldn’t let [...]

One of Obama’s campaign promises was to stop federal raids on medical marijuana dispensaries which were allowed by state law. Many pundits (myself included) have been lambasting him for not living up to that promise based upon stories like these: Police raids on medical marijuana dispensaries continue–and continue with federal help, despite an Obama promise [...]

Over at the Agitator, Radley Balko asks why people are amused by Bob Dylan’s latest run-in with the law. I find it pretty depressing. There was a time when we condescendingly used the term “your papers, please” to distinguish ourselves from Eastern Block countries and other authoritarian states. Post-Hiibel, America has become a place where [...]

“Legalization [of marijuana] is not in the president’s vocabulary, and it’s not in mine,” – Gil Kerlikowske, director of the White House’s Office of National Drug Control Policy.

THIS BOOK IS BASED on a single idea: You should be allowed to do whatever you want with your own person and property, as long as you don’t physically harm the person or property of a nonconsenting other. Thus begins a book that everyone interested in politics should read; Ain’t Nobody’s Business If You Do: The [...]

The July/August 2009 issue of the Left-leaning Mother Jones dedicates several articles to the asinine War on (some) Drugs. The title of the magazine’s cover story states it best – “Totally Wasted: We’ve blown $300 billion. Death squads roam Mexico. Cartels operate in 259 cities. This is your War on Drugs. Any Questions?” Reason’s Nick [...]

…and route around them By the by, for those who don’t get the reference, it’s a paraphrase of a quote from John Gilmore – “The internet interprets censorship as damage, and routes around it”

The Sheriff whose deputies raided Berwyn Heights, MD mayor Cheye Calvo’s house predictably doesn’t think they did anything wrong. He said a lot of pretty despicable things in that article, but this one really bothers me: “I’m sorry for the loss of their family pets,” Jackson said. “But this is the unfortunate result of the [...]

Read the news story here and reason‘s coverage here. The video below is Lynch’s response: While I’m not happy that Mr. Lynch is doing time for legally dispensing marijuana under California’s compassionate use law, he certainly could have received a much harsher sentence (up to 100 years). U.S. District Judge George Wu should be commended [...]

It’s too early to tell if it’s a semantic change or a major step in the right direction, but these comments from President Obama’s “Drug Czar” are encouraging: WASHINGTON — The Obama administration’s new drug czar says he wants to banish the idea that the U.S. is fighting “a war on drugs,” a move that [...]

From the “Not The Onion” files comes a tale that I can’t even believe, much less figure out how to respond to. Is this really what the Boy Scouts are becoming? The Explorers program, a coeducational affiliate of the Boy Scouts of America that began 60 years ago, is training thousands of young people in [...]

From David Rittgers, Cato@Liberty: As I have said before, the quickest way to create an insurgent is to burn a man’s livelihood. This may be a competent counternarcotics tactic, but it is an epic failure as a counterinsurgency strategy. We can fight a war against the Taliban or we can fight the war on drugs, [...]

For years, activists have been trying to pass federal legislation which prevents the feds from arresting patients (or doctors, growing clubs, etc.) when they’ve been prescribed medicinal marijuana by a physician in the states where such prescriptions are allowed by law.  Libertarians have often made valid points about Republican hypocrisy regarding federalism when it comes [...]