I will be going up as it is coming down.
"Marijuana: Experimenting in Uruguay, December 20, 2013
Uruguay recently became the first country to make recreational marijuana use legal for adults, putting in place a system to regulate sales, production, and consumption. Whatever one thinks of legalization of marijuana, this could be a useful experiment for US leaders and law enforcement officials to watch.
A number of states have adopted measures to relax their blanket bans on marijuana. Massachusetts voters, among others, have decriminalized the drug and allowed consumption for medical purposes; Colorado and Washington state have voted to legalize it outright. Yet because these measures exist alongside a strong federal prohibition, their effects on abuse patterns and public safety are difficult to assess.
Adults living in Uruguay will be able to purchase up to 40 grams per month at their local pharmacy or grow up to six plants for personal consumption. President Jose Mujica, who championed the controversial bill, insists that making marijuana legal will take profits away from drug cartels. Critics counter that the new law will inevitably lead to higher use of marijuana, and perhaps of more addictive drugs.
Banks will still benefit, and now corporations can get in on the goodies. That leaves drug-running government agencies out of the circle though.
For American policy makers, the details of how Uruguay sets up its marijuana trade should be informative. How will sales be taxed? Where will additional revenues be employed? Will law enforcement save money? Until now, the relative lack of variation in marijuana laws from jurisdiction to jurisdiction has hampered informed debate on the subject. Uruguay will help fill in that gap.
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Related: Uruguay OK’s marijuana bill
Next stop Massachusetts?
"Mass. activists push to fully legalize marijuana" by Steve LeBlanc | Associated Press, November 29, 2013
Pro-marijuana activists in Massachusetts have already succeeded in paving the way for dozens of medical marijuana dispensaries and decriminalizing possession of small amounts of the drug.
Now, many of those same activists have set their sights on the full legalization of marijuana for adults, effectively putting the drug on a par with alcohol and cigarettes.
And those activists — as they have in the past — are again hoping to make their case directly to voters on the state’s 2016 ballot.
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The activists have some reason to be hopeful. Not only have Massachusetts voters twice supported past efforts to ease restrictions on marijuana, but other states and cities have also recently moved toward lifting prohibitions on the drug.
Last year, voters made Washington and Colorado the first states to legalize the sale of taxed marijuana to adults over 21 at state-licensed stores.
Related:
"Colorado marijuana stores open Jan. 1 as retailers usher in the nation’s first legal recreational pot industry. Sales in Washington, which also legalized recreational marijuana, are expected to start later in the year. The laws still fly in the face of federal drug rules, but the federal government has said it’s not going to fight to shut down pot shops for now."
For now?
This month, voters in Portland, Maine, overwhelmingly passed a question making it legal for adults 21 and older to possess up to 2½ ounces of pot but not purchase, sell, or use it in public.
Related:
"A law legalizing recreational marijuana went into effect in early December in Portland, Maine, but it’s largely symbolic because the state has said it will continue to enforce its own ban."
In 2008, Massachusetts voters approved a ballot question decriminalizing possession of up to an ounce of pot, making it instead a civil offense punishable by a $100 fine. Some Massachusetts towns have given up trying to enforce the law, however, saying it has too many loopholes.
Not everyone thinks legalizing marijuana is a good idea.
Essex District Attorney Jonathan Blodgett said marijuana use can lead young people to harder drugs and other harmful behaviors.
Once again the shameless authorities wave kids at us.
‘‘I’m not saying everyone who tries marijuana becomes a heroin addict, but the medical information is irrefutable that kids who start smoking marijuana are more likely to have substance abuse problems as adults,’’ said Blodgett, who also serves as president of the Massachusetts District Attorneys Association.
Related: Heroin is Here
But it is pot that is the gateway? Maybe they should stop shoving prescription pharmaceuticals down kids' throats!
Blodgett said one consequence of the decriminalization law in Massachusetts is that it’s harder to get young people into treatment and diversion programs because they can’t be arrested for possession of the drug. He said many private health insurance plans don’t cover drug treatment.
Obummercare took care of that!
‘‘Unless and until we have treatment on demand, we shouldn’t be talking about legalizing marijuana or any other drugs,’’ Blodgett said.
Downing rejected the notion that marijuana is a gateway to harder drugs and said the ballot question would restrict the sale of marijuana to adults.
‘‘This isn’t about getting pot for kids,’’ he said. ‘‘No one on my side says we are getting marijuana for kids.’’
No, but the other side and its a$$holes always try to imply that!
When asked recently about the push to legalize marijuana in Massachusetts, Governor Deval Patrick declined to offer an opinion.
There are potential legal troubles that come when states legalize marijuana, including the fact that state legalization doesn’t remove risk from an industry that still violates federal drug law.
Last year, Massachusetts voters overwhelmingly approved a ballot question allowing for up to 35 medical marijuana dispensaries around the state. State health officials last week released a list of the 100 applicants that are seeking dispensary licenses. They said they hope to award the licenses early next year.
Yeah, what's taking them so long?
Backers of that question benefited from the deep pockets of Ohio billionaire Peter Lewis, who has underwritten marijuana initiatives in states around the country and served as chairman of the board of the auto insurer Progressive Corp. Lewis, who almost entirely bankrolled the Massachusetts medical marijuana question, died Saturday at 80.
Because it will make rates rise?
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Related:
"Illinois becomes the 20th state to legalize medical marijuana in a pilot project with some of the strictest standards in the nation. However, it may take more than a year to actually buy marijuana as separate state agencies draft rules that must be approved by a legislative committee. In Wisconsin, towns and cities may legalize pedal pubs, multiple-person bicycles that ferry riders to and from taverns. A driver steers while multiple riders sit at a bar mounted behind him, each with his or her own pedal-and-chain assembly."
And look who will be making some good $moke:
"Marijuana bidders getting help from politically savvy" by Frank Phillips and Joshua Miller | Globe Staff, November 26, 2013
Several former elected officials and politically connected figures have joined the sweepstakes to be part of the state’s potentially lucrative medical marijuana industry, partnering with applicants who need help navigating the regulatory process.
Why am I not $urpri$ed? It's only being legalized so they can make a buck!
Former US representative William D. Delahunt, now a lobbyist, is the president of a nonprofit corporation that has applied for three marijuana dispensary licenses in Southeastern Massachusetts.
Former House speaker Thomas M. Finneran, as well as at least three former state senators, a former sheriff, and two former top aides to powerful officeholders are also associated with dispensary applicants, as investors or advisers, as they lobby for state and local support of their proposals.
I'm already thinking this thing $tinks!
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Since the ballot initiative passed, applicants have been hurrying to set up not-for-profit corporations that will be the backbone of the marijuana distribution system. Despite the name, nonprofits can be highly lucrative for those involved.
Related: "nonprofits provide new ways for corporations and individuals to influence"
And here they are pa$$ing around a joint!
“It’s an absolute gold rush,’’ said John Scheft, the attorney who represented the opponents to the 2012 voter-approved law that created the system. “You are an idiot if you are running a dispensary and you can’t make a couple of million dollars in profit.”
The nonprofit model also means they can AVOID TAXES!
Interviews with several of the participants and a Globe review of preliminary applications indicate some of the political figures who have joined the Massachusetts marijuana market are investors in the firms while others say they are simply consultants.
Delahunt, who represented Cape Cod and much of the South Shore for 14 years, is part of Medical Marijuana of Massachusetts, a group that has applied for facilities in Plymouth, Taunton, and Mashpee.
Two weeks ago, Delahunt, a former Norfolk district attorney, appeared before the Plymouth board of selectmen along with several competitors to plead the case for his group.
The board initially hedged on taking action. But a week later, it endorsed Delahunt’s project.
Working with Delahunt is a political figure with connections in both the State House and the town — Kevin O’Reilly, who once served as a top aide to Senate president Therese Murray, a longtime Plymouth lawmaker, and has been her closest political adviser. He serves on the board of the Plymouth chamber of commerce. Former Barnstable county commissioner Mary J. LeClair, a veteran political figure on Cape Cod, is also working with Delahunt.
The initial financial backing for the group is coming from Jeffrey L. Feinberg, a California-based hedge fund manager, who, along with his wife, Stacey, has pledged $1.3 million as part of the firm’s demonstration of financial viability to state public health regulators.
Do I even need to say it? And the fees, overhead, and other costs will deter an individual entrepreneur from getting a small business going.
Delahunt, who said he has never met Feinberg, repeatedly sidestepped questions about whether he was looking to financially gain from his involvement with the project.
“That’s yet to be determined,’’ he said last week.
Analysts say medical marijuana dispensaries tend to be lucrative endeavors.
Luigi Zamarra, a certified public accountant who has overseen the books for medical marijuana businesses in a half-dozen states, said the mark-up in dispensaries is usually about 100 percent.
“If you buy a pound for $2,500, you can retail that, when you break it all down, for $5,000,” he said, explaining that the average-size dispensary brings in $4 million to $5 million in gross revenues per year.
In Massachusetts, Zamarra said, the relatively limited number of dispensaries in the state indicates the potential for “strong profitability, depending on the size of the population of patients.”
But some proponents say the regulations and contours of the law will ensure that clinics will focus on patients not profits.
Oh, yeah, the PATIENTS got LOST in the HAZE of SMOKE!
Valerio Romano, a lawyer who represents seven organizations applying for marijuana dispensary licenses in Massachusetts, scoffed at the idea that the facilities would be cash-cows, saying his clients are involved to help patients.
“I think that that’s a contradiction on its face,” he said of the charges. “In the highly scrutinized medical marijuana industry, it would be unwise to try to extract profits from a nonprofit.”
And weed is notorious for its low margin. That's why government agencies like to traffic in powder.
Delahunt said his hope is that the dispensaries will ease the rising scourge of Oxycontin abuse and offer patients a chance to use high quality medical marijuana instead of buying from unregulated sources....
Yes, it turns out the pre$cription pharmaceuticals are the worst drugs of all.
In Western Massachusetts, former state senator Brian P. Lees, the former Senate GOP minority leader, is an officer in a nonprofit hoping to operate a dispensary in Holyoke. He said he has no interest profiting from the enterprise, adding that the revenues will be put back into the community.
Former state senator Andrea F. Nuciforo, also a Western Massachusetts politico, is an investor in Kind Medical, which wants to open a clinic in Easthampton. A Democrat, he served as a senator from Pittsfield through 2006, when he was elected to one term as register of deeds for Berkshire County’s middle division. He has committed more than $400,000 in financial backing, according to the group’s preliminary application.
Guy Glodis, who is also a former Worcester County sheriff, is offering his law enforcement background as part of an outfit — Boston Wellness Association — that has its eye on opening a dispensary in Revere. He declined to comment.
David A. Passafaro, former chief of staff to Mayor Thomas M. Menino of Boston, who serves on the board of Boston Medical Center, is part of a group — Prime Wellness of MA — that applied to open dispensaries in Framingham, Roxbury, and Worcester. He is currently a vice president of Suffolk Construction.
He said he will not receive any of the revenues, but will advise the group on how to use the profits for community programs. Henri S. Rauschenbach, a former Republican state senator from Cape Cod and now a State House lobbyist, is helping an outfit called the Kingsbury Group — founded by two Cape area businessmen — that is looking to convert a go-kart site in Bourne for a medical marijuana dispensary.
The group also hopes to open marijuana facilities in Provincetown and on Martha’s Vineyard. He said he is merely serving as an adviser, but did not discount that in the future, he could reap some of the profits.
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Hey, if you can't get it in state then go on line:
"Medical marijuana Web services raising concerns; State medical leaders concerned about untrained entrepreneurs" by Kay Lazar | Globe Staff, September 30, 2013
Massachusetts’ nascent medical marijuana law has sparked a recent flurry of new Internet companies promising to match patients with doctors who will certify they need the weed for health reasons, a phenomenon that has dismayed the state’s medical society and raised concerns with the board that regulates physicians.
A number of the companies are run by entrepreneurs with no medical background, which the Massachusetts Medical Society said raises questions about the quality and safety of the care.
Some of the sites, the society said, appear to be tiptoeing just inside state rules, which require a “bona fide physician-patient relationship” be in place before marijuana can be prescribed.
“The fact that you have people with no medical pedigree [launching these companies] is testament that this is purely a money-making operation,” said Dr. Ronald Dunlap, a cardiologist and president of the medical society. “These people are working around the edges.”
Now, all of a sudden, making money is bad! It's okay for the pharmaceuticals, the banks, and the war profiteers, the more the better, but now that someone might make a buck of weed.... horror!
Voters last November approved a ballot referendum that legalized marijuana for medical use, but left it to the health department to issue regulations that would implement the law.
With those rules released in May, the department is whittling a list of 158 applications for registered marijuana dispensaries to 35, the maximum number of facilities allowed in the first year under the ballot initiative.
In the interim, patients are allowed to legally grow a small amount of marijuana for their own use, as long as a Massachusetts physician certifies they have a medical need.
That's good! Then they won't NEEDLESSLY SUFFER as the state drags its heels.
Once the dispensaries open, which is expected in the spring, the state will begin tracking patients and doctors in a computerized system. A doctor’s certification will still be required then.
Almost makes you wish it were still illegal.
Among the newly launched Massachusetts doctor-finder websites is Commonwealth M.D., founded by Jai Chawla, a 28-year-old Cornell University graduate with a degree in history who founded an Internet security company, which he still runs.
Chawla, who is temporarily running his new business from a friend’s basement in Cambridge, said he charges $250 to cover the patient referral and the physician consultation.
“I understand that’s a large fee for a patient to be paying out of pocket,” said Chawla in a phone interview, noting that patients’ health insurance probably will not cover the service because marijuana is not federally sanctioned.
Most of the fee goes directly to the physicians so his company can remain “competitive” in attracting physicians, Chawla said. He said he has “fewer than five” physicians in his referral service, which opened a few weeks ago.
Matt Allen, executive director of the Massachusetts Patient Advocacy Alliance, which lobbied for the medical marijuana law, said the fees charged by the companies will probably be too high for many patients with chronic medical conditions who are on fixed incomes.
“We do hope some of these places will offer discounts for these patients,” Allen said.
But he also said the companies offer a needed service to some patients, such as veterans, who may be unable to get a certification where they typically receive medical care, through the Department of Veterans Affairs, because of federal rules prohibiting marijuana use.
Massachusetts would not be the first state to encounter growing pains with its medical marijuana law. A June report by Colorado’s state auditor found that 13 years after voters there approved the use of medical marijuana, a number of physicians appeared to be flouting the state’s bona fide patient-physician relationship requirement. It concluded that half of the 108,000 patients who had obtained state cards to possess medical marijuana received their certification from one of just 12 physicians.
Yeah, we shouldn't have voted for this.
One of those physicians had certified more than 8,400 patients, it said.
Massachusetts Public Health Department spokesman Dave Kibbe said in a brief statement that state rules require physicians to have a “bona fide relationship” with patients they certify for medical marijuana. He declined to comment further on the services....
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Also see:
Worcester has most medical marijuana dispensaries applicants
100 applicants seek marijuana-dispensary licenses in final round
It's all good, folks, but you can't smoke it in the park tonight and you are advised to get a CAT scan as soon as possible.
Related: Slow Saturday Special: Meth House Cleanup Makes Me Mad
Because the state is all bunged up about medical marijuana as the coke, meth, and heroin flow.
