Sadly, we’ve seen this one before. 

Iowans suffering from chronic, painful medical conditions, their families and friends troop to the Statehouse to urge state lawmakers to give them legal access to medical cannabis. Lawmakers listen, express deep sympathy and then move ahead at a glacial pace with woefully inadequate legislation. 

It’s really the best they can do, they insist.

n Arizona lawmaker's proposal to stop dispensaries from moving out of their state-designated areas highlights the need for updated medical-marijuana program rules.

"We're in limbo — and we've spent a lot money." — Lori Nicks, would-be dispensary operator.

The Arizona Medical Marijuana Act that voters approved in 2010 requires the state to adopt rules that govern what was then a fledgling program.

In 2013, the small South American country became the first nation in the world to legalize marijuana.

By Amanda Reiman

In early November, I attended the Marijuana Business Conference in Las Vegas. The event provided great insight into where the cannabis industry is going in the U.S., and gave more attention to advocacy than most business conferences. Spoiler alert: Cannabusiness is moving further away from the consumer and closer to the CEO. I found myself constantly wanting to ask the nicely dressed business-people with their gigantic, expensive displays, “Do you even use cannabis?”

The United Kingdom is starting to talk about cannabis as a medicine.

End Our Pain, a campaign to give patients legal access to medicinal cannabis, launched earlier this month.

This new movement, that coincides with the start of a medicinal cannabis storyline on Coronation Street, has already generated considerable media attention.

Wednesday is an important date in the state’s long process of licensing commercial cannabis in Alaska: The deadline for the state to have a permit application up and running.

“From the stand-point of somebody that wants to go into the industry, February 24th is actually the starting point, it’s not a deadline at all, it’s really just the first date,” said Bruce Schulte, Chair of the state’s Marijuana Control Board.

For anyone expecting to start buying cannabis products in stores, there are still many months to go before the start of legal sales.

As a judge in Washington, D.C. in the ’80s and ’90s, Eric Holder says it didn’t take much to tell that the nation’s criminal justice system – especially when it came to low-level drug offenses – was “fundamentally unfair.”

“I had these mandatory minimum sentences that I had to impose on people who had drug problems who were selling, you know, relatively small amount of drugs in a nonviolent way to support a drug habit that they had, and who had to to go to jail for a five-year mandatory minimum, or a 10-year mandatory,” Holder remembers. “I didn’t feel comfortable doing it.”

CANNABIS CULTURE – Liberal members of Canada’s Senate will host an open forum to discuss the legalization of marijuana tomorrow in Ottawa.

Unfortunately, most of the official “experts” slated to answer questions are former police officers and substance abuse workers.

The Liberal Senate Forum website’s introduction to the event:

Saudi Arabia executed one of its own citizens and two Yemenis last week. The two Yemeni nationals had been accused of smuggling hashish into the kingdom. The Saudi national had been convicted of smuggling amphetamines, as reported by Agence France Presse.

Hash, or hashish, is made from compressed marijuana trichomes.

CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) — Wyoming lawmakers are struggling with how to craft legislation regulating marijuana brownies and other foods and beverages containing the drug.

The Wyoming Senate on Monday voted to advance a bill making possession of more than 3 ounces of marijuana edibles a felony. However, senators continue to argue about how to measure the concentration of marijuana in the substances, and its potency.

The debate was prompted after a state district court judge ruled last year that the law outlawing marijuana refers specifically to pot in plant form and does not cover the extract found in edibles.

Former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan is pushing for the legalization of cannabis and other personal drugs.

However, he said regulations must be put in place by governments to curtail abuse.

“And therefore, the fourth and final step is to recognize that drugs must be regulated precisely because they are risky. It is time to acknowledge that drugs are infinitely more dangerous if they are left solely in the hands of criminals who have no concerns about health and safety.