With the Panama Papers' revelations of transnational financial skulduggery now burning up the Internet, Bernie Sanders' many fans have started passing around a video of a fairly prescient speech the presidential candidate delivered back in 2011. At the time, the U.S. was considering a free trade agreement with the charming Latin America tax haven, supported by President Obama and his then–secretary of state, Hillary Clinton. But progressive activists argued that the deal would only make it harder for the U.S. government to deal with bank secrecy and tax avoidance. Sanders brought those concerns to the Senate floor:

One day before WeeMedical Chilliwack opened on March 18, manager Shayli Vere was optimistic about the future. Eighteen days later the medical marijuana dispensary was raided by RCMP, Vere was arrested, the shop was shuttered by city hall and Vere and the society that manages WeeMedical are on the outs.

Just 18 days after opening its doors, Chilliwack's first medical marijuana dispensary is shuttered, raided by police Tuesday evening.

Even before it opened on March 19, WeeMedical Dispensary was warned by City of Chilliwack lawyers it was violating business licence and zoning bylaws.

International progress abounds from beyond the borders! Costa Rica already decriminalized cannabis, but now it's considering a major medical marijuana program, New Zealand’s Labour Party is trying to solve a problem like medical cannabis access, and the United Kingdom found that the number of cannabis arrests have been cut nearly in half in the last five years.

Stateside, Alaska’s retail licenses are being held up by the Legislature, Arizona’s recreational campaign calls out the hypocrisy of a critic, New Hampshire could decriminalize cannabis possession (again), and Vermont is a hop, skip and one House vote away from legalizing recreational cannabis. This year will be historical for cannabis – are you paying attention?

Strange bedfellows: Yavapai County Attorney Sheila Polk, pro-cannabis activist David "Safer Dave" Wisniewski, and Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery.

In a case of politics making strange bedfellows, Arizona's top pot prohibitionists and supporters of a grassroots, pro-cannabis effort agree on a legalization bill headed for November's ballot.

In fact, hardcore stoners who support the spoiler group Arizonans for Mindful Regulation would spit up their dab hits in disgust at the very notion that the planned ballot initiative backed by the national Marijuana Policy Project should even be called "legalization."

Current support for California’s marijuana legalization has taken flight and polls have shown that it is up 60 percent with California’s likely voters in the November presidential contest to support legal pot. The Adult Use of Marijauna Act (AUMA) initiative, has grown in support and off to a huge push for the Nov. 8 ballot by the likes of Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom and former Facebook President, Sean Parker.

One of B.C.'s best-known medical cannabis promoters is in police custody.

Dana Larsen, a spokesperson for Sensible B.C., is on a cross-Canada tour to give away one million cannabis seeds.

After a speech to a standing-room-only crowd at a Days Inn in Calgary, he left the building because police were arresting a man outside.

According to a CBC News report, Larsen was holding seeds in his hand and was hauled away by offficers.

After a proposed constitutional amendment to legalize marijuana in Ohio was quashed in the November election, some voters may have assumed it would take a while to see a marijuana-related issue show up on the ballot again.

With Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine and the Ohio Ballot Board’s recent approval of language for an amendment that would allow patients to use medical marijuana with a physician’s approval, Ohio voters may have their say on marijuana use in this coming election.

Now, organizers with Ohioans for Medical Marijuana — which is an affiliate organization of the Marijuana Policy Project in D.C. — have to gather 305,591 signatures by early July for it to appear on the ballot.

It sounds like torture. A living nightmare. 

But it could just as easily happen to you or me. Accidents that result in severe nerve pain are quite common.

Victoria, British Columbia businessman Dave Brownell, 68, found this out when he herniated a disc and ended up with serious nerve pain radiating throughout his body.

"Over the years, I've had all sorts of injuries, including a broken neck and chopping off the end of my finger. But I never ever before experienced pain like this." 

"Imagine jumping off a table and landing with one foot on a three-inch nail sticking out of a piece of wood," he adds. "That's the kind of pain I had pulsing through my legs once every minute or so -- all day long, all night long." 

Sens. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) on Tuesday convened a hearing of the Senate Caucus on International Narcotics Control to investigate whether the Justice Department has been derelict in its enforcement duties on marijuana.

In the words of Grassley, "The Department of Justice decided to all but abandon the enforcement of federal law relating to the possession, cultivation, and distribution of marijuana."

Smoking marijuana in public or in clubs was banned permanently on Tuesday by the District of Columbia's city council, reversing course for a second time.

Council members in the U.S. capital voted 7-6 to approve the measure, a spokeswoman for Council Chairman Phil Mendelson said. A second vote will be needed to finalize it.

Two months ago, the council voted unanimously to create a task force to study the licensing of marijuana clubs and ending the ban on public consumption of pot.

A law that took effect in February 2015 allows adults to possess small amounts of marijuana and grow and consume it at home. The District bans the sale of marijuana, but public smoking has become common as arrests have dried up.