marijuana

CBC News

 

Long-held fears that the use of marijuana will lead to harder drugs are overblown, according to new research from the University of New Hampshire.

 

The research, in the September issue of the Journal of Health and Social Behavior, found that other factors, such as whether or not a person has a job, or is facing severe stress, are far more predictive of future hard drug use than whether they smoked pot as a teenager.

 

"Employment in young adulthood can protect people by closing the marijuana gateway, so over-criminalizing youth marijuana use might create more serious problems if it interferes with later employment opportunities," said co-author Karen Van Gundy.

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By KAREN SELICK, Freelance

 

Widespread ridicule from abroad has apparently caused the Iranian government to back down on outlawing certain hairstyles for men -ponytails, for instance.

 

Nevertheless, Iranians have been subject to grooming and dress codes for decades. This summer, Iranian police have been arresting women for such heinous offences as wearing too much lipstick or sporting sun tans. Barber shops have been ordered by police not to pluck men's eyebrows.

 

Do the people of Iran enjoy liberty? Most Canadians, upon hearing of these bizarre rules, would respond with a resounding "No!" Such regimentation, enforced by law, spells full-fledged authoritarianism to us -the very antithesis of liberty.

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By MINDELLE JACOBS, Toronto Sun

 

The federal government has it half right. We have a drug problem. But it’s not marijuana, which has never killed anyone. It’s the abuse of prescription drugs which kills hundreds of Canadians annually.

 

Whether it’s because of ongoing pain, depression or the urge to get high, more and more people are heading to their doctors — not the neighbourhood pusher — for a fix.

 

As the International Narcotics Control Board noted in its 2009 annual report, the abuse of prescription drugs in North America is second only to the abuse of cannabis.

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By: Anne-Marie Tobin, The Star

 

Smoking pot can make some of the pain go away, without the patient getting high.

 

The finding comes from what researchers in Montreal believe to be the first outpatient clinical trial of smoked cannabis, involving 21 people with chronic neuropathic pain.

 

The results, which included improvements in mood and sleep, were published Monday in the Canadian Medical Association Journal.

 

Dr. Mark Ware and colleagues at McGill University and McGill University Health Centre got the ball rolling for the study almost a decade ago, but found it was a long road to get all the necessary approvals and import a convincing marijuana placebo from the United States.

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Editorial: Globe and Mail

 

Toronto this week became the first city in the world to formally endorse the Vienna Declaration that states that war-on-drugs-style prohibitions are a costly failure, denounces the “severe negative consequences” of such policies both in terms of public health and crime rates, and urges a shift in emphasis to regulation and harm reduction.

 

It would be easy to dismiss the city council’s decision as a meaningless gesture by local politicians working well out of their depth, except that the push to decriminalize, not only marijuana, but hard drugs like cocaine and heroin as well, is a rising international phenomenon, being driven by serious and credible sources, not by local politicians or stoner websites.

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By BILL KAUFMANN, Calgary Sun

 

It doesn’t happen by design, it’s just how things shake out in the war on drugs, says the senior cop.

 

Drug bust statistics compiled by a new Alberta police force created largely to battle organized crime — the drug trade, in other words — reveal a strikingly lopsided picture.

 

In 2009-10, the entity comprising city and RCMP officers known as ALERT states it seized illicit drugs of various kinds worth $104 million.

 

Of that total, nearly $101 million was marijuana — the drug that, unlike legal pharmaceuticals and alcohol, has never led to a fatal overdose and which most Canadians believe should be decriminalized. Read more »

By Rosa Harris-Adler, Special to Times Colonist

 

Forget Reefer Madness. What we're experiencing across North America these days is Reefer Sanity. In an Angus-Reid poll conducted last year, more than half of those Canadians asked said possession of marijuana should be legalized. And in the U.S., California voters will soon determine that very issue.

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By Phillip Smith, Stop the Drug War

 

Canada's Conservative minority government hopes the third time is the charm for its controversial measure to increase sentences for marijuana cultivation and introduce mandatory minimum sentences for some drug offenses. Now known as S-10, the measure will be taken up by the Senate when it returns from recess at end of next month.

 

The bill is designed to "send a message" that "if you sell or produce drugs, you'll pay with jail time," Justice Minister Rob Nicholson said when re-filing the bill in May.

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News 1130

 

VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) - All this week, the News1130 Midday Show takes an in-depth look into Proposition 19, the partial legalization and taxation of small amounts of marijuana in California.

 

Erin Loxam and Rob Freeman will chat with reporters, professors and police about what the passing of Prop 19 could mean for B.C.'s pot industry and just how far reaching the affects could be.

 

The Midday Show goes 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., Monday to Friday on Vancouver's Traffic and Information Station News1130.

 

 

By Kent Spencer, The Province

 

An Abbotsford mom says gun-toting police terrified “innocent” children on the weekend during a raid that failed to produce the underground grow-op bunker police were after.

 

“Maybe somebody’s going to get shot the next time,” mom Jennifer Hewison, 35, told The Province after an emergency response team surrounded the family’s home on Saturday, looking for what they called a “large-scale grow operation” in an underground bunker.

 

Abbotsford police admit they failed to find a bunker, but said no apology will be made.

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