One of the lighter moments of Wednesday’s epic slog of a Republican presidential primary debate came when former Florida governor Jeb Bush joked that his mother, the former first lady, would not be happy that he admitted having smoked marijuana “40 years ago.”

The line got a fair amount of laughs from the audience, but it also came amid a broader debate among the candidates over federal drug laws. Defending marijuana legalization, Sen. Rand Paul asserted that “kids who had privilege like [Bush]” are often given a pass when it comes to admitting past drug use, whereas people from poorer backgrounds — often minorities — are more likely to go to prison for using marijuana.

CannaVoices proudly announces the release of the book, The Cannabis Manifesto, written by Steve DeAngelo promotional bonuses and launch.

Tampa, Florida (PRWEB) September 18, 2015

CannaVoices, a premiere legal medical cannabis digital media company, proudly recognizes leader in the industry Steve DeAngelo’s new book The Cannabis Manifesto set to launch September 2015.

Florida hasn’t been particularly friendly to cannabis, and the procedure of legislating medical cannabis has actually been absolutely nothing if not a long, uphill struggle. This hasn’t prevented advocates though, and recreational cannabis is starting to wind its method up the very same road.

A campaign to legalize marijuana for adults 21 and older in Arizona has picked up 75,000 signatures already, an achievement that makes the proposal ever more likely to appear on the state's 2016 ballot.

J.P. Holyoak, chair of the Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol, says today that his group is about one-third of the way toward its goal to turn in 230,000 signatures before the July 2016 deadline. More than 150,000 signatures are needed to qualify for the ballot, but ballot-measure campaigns always shoot for a much higher number knowing that many will be thrown out for various reasons.

Marijuana was the main focus of an in-depth injury prevention conference in south London Thursday afternoon.

The 16th annual “Not By Accident” conference, hosted by the Ontario Injury Prevention Resource Centre, ran from 8:15 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the Best Western Lamplighter Inn, and looked specifically at the possible safety implications marijuana’s legalization or decriminalization could have on healthcare workers and society at large.

The temporary tax break could cost Colorado up to more than $NZ6m in revenue.

Colorado saw a sales increase last year in all three tax classes of alcohol.

Here’s how it all fits together. By comparison, state alcohol excise taxes raked in about $42m (£27m) – up 2.4% from 2013, the state said. The one-day pot tax holiday came after the state underestimated its overall state tax collections last year.

Curt Steiner, a political consultant and spokesman for Ohioans Against Marijuana Monopolies, said the report is handwriting on the wall if Ohio approves legalizing marijuana for recreational and medicinal use.

I thought Republicans supported reason and free enterprise, and yet here's Steve Schuh, the Republican executive of Anne Arundel County, getting his socks in a knot about the prospect of someone growing, processing and dispensing marijuana for medical purposes along the banks of the Severn. He wants to ban in his county what a new state law allows. Schuh worries that people who get therapeutic cannabis might end up becoming dealers.

In early 2015, Denver officials cited a handful of commercial marijuana growers for misusing pesticides in indoor grow houses. Some of those businesses were also advertising their products as “chemical-free” and “organic.”

Because the drug is still illegal at the federal level, and state regulators are still playing catch up, growers can make all kinds of unchecked claims about their plants, without drawing the ire of consumer fraud regulators. That could soon change.

DENVER — Some called it Christmas for stoners. Others warned of marijuana anarchy.

Marijuana products across Colorado were nearly tax free on Wednesday — a one-time tax break forced by a quirk in the state Constitution. The break knocked away the state’s 10 percent tax on cannabis purchases — which is imposed on top of the existing state sales tax and any municipal taxes — and marijuana shops around the state spent months coordinating their distribution plans, advertising deep discounts in addition to the tax vacation and encouraging customers to start lining up at dawn.

DENVER — Tim Cullen smiled when he reckoned a one-day marijuana-tax holiday in Colorado had probably saved him tens of thousands of dollars.

Cullen, the owner of Colorado Harvest Co., a chain of marijuana dispensaries, was among the many growers and shoppers who benefited Wednesday from a quirk that required the state to suspend a 10 percent sales tax and a 15 percent wholesale excise tax for a day.

While shoppers saved roughly $20 an ounce, or about 33 cents per joint, pot growers saved $300 a pound.

“I probably saved $45,000 before lunch,” Cullen said.

Looking over a small tangle of pot shoppers in his suburban Denver shop, Cullen said the crowds weren’t huge, but the tax break would be a big win anyway.