by
Dan Mitchell on April 14, 2021
It’s hard to know anymore what to make of “4/20.” What was once an underground reference (sometimes employed ironically) has now been largely subsumed into the commercial culture of legal weed. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. After all, that’s what legal weed means: it means capitalism, marketing and commodification. It means taking…
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by
Dan Mitchell on April 7, 2021
After the vaping-illness outbreak that started in 2019, when people were sent to emergency rooms in droves and several dozen of them died, sales of cannabis vaping products ground to a near-halt. Sales have picked up again since, and reports of vaping-related illnesses have slowed way down—but they haven’t stopped. Meanwhile, many…
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by
Dan Mitchell on March 31, 2021
As the federal government tip-toes around making cannabis legal, it’s making what could be a simple and well-regulated cash cow of a business into a complex industry ripe for abuse. One example of that is the gaping loophole the federal government, presumably unwittingly, offered in its 2018 Farm Bill that not only makes…
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by
Dan Mitchell on March 24, 2021
Last week, we learned that the Biden administration has reportedly fired or sidelined dozens of White House staffers because of cannabis use. In the past, this might not have been a big deal; after all, cannabis is still illegal federally and the use of illicit drugs has been disqualifying for decades. But…
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by
Dan Mitchell on March 17, 2021
Cannabis may be legal statewide, but people across vast swaths of California still have no opportunity to buy weed, in part because many local governments refuse to license pot shops. Those people do have options, of course. One is to have it delivered, if that’s available. Another is to grow their own. That…
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by
Dan Mitchell on March 10, 2021
Back in 2010, a spate of scare stories about “digital drugs” flashed across local TV news channels. It was exactly what it sounded like: a new drug was being delivered over the Internet and into the brains—and souls—of our precious children. These “drugs” were audio files that supposedly had a euphoric effect,…
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by
Dan Mitchell on March 3, 2021
As pot legalization advocates whipsaw between pessimism and optimism over the new administration and Democrats’ unexpected control of both houses of Congress, some legislators have been pushing for smaller reforms that, in the end, might help make federally legal weed a reality. The latest such effort comes in the form of a letter…
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by
Dan Mitchell on February 24, 2021
Every time new numbers come out about the growth of the cannabis industry, the context has to be: just imagine what these numbers would look like if weed were actually legal at the federal level. Leafly last week released its annual jobs report, which shows that even with the Covid-19 pandemic and…
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by
Dan Mitchell on February 17, 2021
When the California Department of Public Health announced this month that retail cannabis workers would be eligible for the first round of Covid vaccines in the state, reactions were predictable. KABC, the L.A. talk-radio station, went with this headline on its web site: “You know who else is getting vaxed before you?…
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by
Dan Mitchell on February 10, 2021
As the Biden administration prepares to regulate hemp and CBD products, it faces a unique challenge: creating a set of rules meant to rein in an essentially rule-free, chaotic industry. State laws and regulations exist, of course, but those are often spottily enforced, and even in the best of circumstances add to…
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