The marijuana industry, and marijuana stocks for that matter, have been expanding by leaps and bounds over the past two decades. What was once a completely taboo industry has become a thriving source of legal growth, at least in some states.

According to a Gallup poll from the mid-1990s, just 25% of respondents were in favor of seeing recreational weed legalized nationally. Mind you, this was during the height of the War on Drugs campaign in America. As of 2016, an all-time high of 60% of respondents wanted to see cannabis legalized for adult use across the country, per Gallup. An even larger figure, 93%, wants medical cannabis legalized nationally, according to a recent Quinnipiac University poll.

As the youth grow up, they are warned about the “dangers” of marijuana and other substances. The supposed danger, as echoed by many, is that marijuana makes people become unkempt, irresponsible, lazy and ultimately, running-on-the-streets-naked (that is, madness). Some religious preachers go as far as to say that marijuana users are hell-bound. Since the 1950s, thousands have been jailed; countless properties have been confiscated by the government, and taxpayers’ money has been wasted on the war on drugs in Nigeria, through the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA).

If marijuana insurance were available anywhere, you would think it would be in Colorado.

Colorado was one of the first states in the country to legalize marijuana for recreational use. Since 2012, it has been a boon to business there -- including businesses like insurance that support the marijuana industry.

But it is insurance after all, and exceptions may apply. That's the question in a wrongful death case involving a man who allegedly went crazy after eating marijuana candy and then killed his wife .

Too Much THC

On Friday morning, South Dakota prosecutors are expected to offer their opening arguments in a long-awaited trial against Eric Hagen, president and CEO of the Colorado cannabis consultancy Monarch America.

If convicted, Monarch America CEO Eric Hagen could face up to 15 years in prison for helping the Santee Sioux tribe set up their grow.

The case has drawn national attention and will be closely watched by leaders in both the cannabis industry and the Native American legal community. Issues of tribal sovereignty—and a potential precedent regarding the legal culpability of cannabis consultants—will play out in the old Moody County Courthouse, a small stone structure that sits lonely on a city block of grass in the county seat of Flandreau.

Advocates of legalizing recreational marijuana use and repealing Michigan's prevailing-wage law cleared a procedural step Thursday and will quickly begin collecting signatures needed to send the bills to lawmakers and potentially voters.

The Board of State Canvassers approved the form of the groups' petitions. The ballot committees must gather about 252,000 valid voter signatures within a six-month period to submit the bills to the Republican-led Legislature.

Lawmakers likely would not act on the marijuana measure and instead let it go to a statewide vote in November 2018.

A modest group of federal lawmakers assembled this week in the nation’s capital to generate some additional interest in a proposal that would drag the United States out of the pits of marijuana prohibition. 

Representative Thomas Garrett of Virginia introduced a bill earlier this year called the “Ending Federal Marijuana Prohibition Act,” which essentially would eliminate the cannabis plant from the confines of the Controlled Substances Act and allow weed to be taxed and regulated all across the nation in a manner similar to alcohol and tobacco. 

Elise Warren came to Washington because she is tired of counting tens and even hundreds of thousands of dollars every morning before opening her store.

That may sound like a fine problem to have, but for Warren, the manager of a legal marijuana dispensary in Corvallis, Oregon, operating a cash-only business is risky and a chore. While marijuana is legal in some states it remains illegal federally, which makes it difficult for cannabis companies to use banking services; and those banks that do welcome the business often charge punishingly high fees and interest rates.

Republican and Democratic senators on Wednesday renewed their drive to make banking easier for marijuana-based businesses in those U.S. states where the drug is legal, undeterred by signals from the Trump administration about maintaining tough marijuana restrictions nationally.

The eight senators, who spanned the political spectrum from libertarian-leaning Republican Rand Paul to liberal Democrat Cory Booker, introduced the bill to block federal banking regulators from somehow pushing a financial institution to stop serving a state-sanctioned marijuana business or the businesses’ landlords or lawyers.

The government would also not be allowed to give banks incentives to cut off the businesses.

The city of Portland has joined with cannabis businesses in lobbying for a bill that would allow consumption of cannabis at licensed lounges akin to tobacco smoking patios.

“The same way as Oregon and our city celebrate our craft beer and wine industry, Portland welcomes and wants to provide opportunities for our emerging craft cannabis industry,” Mayor Ted Wheeler and Commissioner Chloe Eudaly, who oversees the Office of Neighborhood Involvement, the city’s cannabis regulatory body, said in testimony submitted to the Joint Committee on Marijuana Regulation this week.