Rolling Cannabis Politics Thread

The Oregon legislature has a bill pending that is likely to pass, allowing about 40% of the counties (all of them rural) to ban legal marijuana without requiring a further popular vote, because the initiative that legalized pot was voted down in these counties by 55% or more. It is being analogized to the 'dry' counties when Prohibition ended. This is probably good politics atm and doesn't really bother me.

They are also tinkering with the method and amount of taxation, and setting the tax rate at what seems a bit too high to me (~20%). But again, this is quite naturally an era of experimentation and instability in regard to legalization, so this is not a huge concern to me either. The main thing is to move ahead.

ohio's ballot measure is very interesting (and not very great imo, despite a step forward in legalizing cannabis) and will effectively give only 10 companies the right to grow wholesale: http://time.com/3921751/ohio-marijuana-ballot-measure/

afaik that measure would also prohibit individuals from growing personal amounts, i don't think that was mentioned in the time article though?

I love seeing how all the mundane things are getting figured out here in WA post-legalization.

I stayed in a hotel in a different city here for the first time since and there were explicit rules on the check in form and near the outside smoking area explicitly banning marijuana smoking, the state Liquor Control Board is officially changing their name to the Liquor and Cannabis Board, stuff like that.

My small town - which had one state liquor store when I first moved here - will soon have to recreational stores, and due to the laws about how far they have to be from schools and such means they're going to be right across the street from each other. Some cities have banned stores, though I don't think there have been county-wide bans.

Plus all the branding and visual language and such is so up in the air, and still at sub-craft-beer levels of refinement. So much ridiculous Bob Marley imagery, so many uses of the word "green", so many places trying to go hard against that stereotype by looking like ridiculous hipster cocktail bars, etc.

It's not quite normal yet but doesn't seem that crazy anymore. I walked into a place the other day and there were three very college-bro looking guys from Texas talking to the guy behind the counter and they were just freaking out and sort of losing their shit that they could just buy weed and not get arrested.

http://www.theweedblog.com/shona-banda-the-latest-medical-marijuana-victim-of-mean-spirited-bureaucrats/

that's awful

jfc

happy legalization day, Oregon

http://www.oregonlive.com/marijuana/index.ssf/2015/07/recreational_pot_becomes_legal.html#incart_maj-story-1

Applications for large-scale growers and retailers aren’t being accepted until early 2016, and no Oregon stores are expected to have marijuana for sale until the fall of 2016. For the time being, then, while recreational marijuana use is legal, people aren’t allowed to buy or sell it.

The odd situation—weed is legal, but there’s nowhere to buy it—has caused marijuana proponents and entrepreneurs to take the very welcomed step of simply giving samples away. The Oregonian reports that the Portland chapter of NORML (National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws) will celebrate the momentous event by gathering on the west side of the Burnside Bridge at 11:30 p.m. on Tuesday, June 30. At midnight (therefore July 1), all 21+ adults with ID will be given free marijuana and cannabis seeds, courtesy of medical marijuana providers and activists.

“While it becomes legal to possess and cultivate cannabis, there is no legal place in Oregon to buy marijuana itself or cannabis seeds and starts,” a statement from the group explains. “Portland NORML will educate the public and our partners will give away thousands of seeds and hundreds of pounds of marijuana this year so Washington State and the black market do not benefit from our new marijuana legality.”

Later in the week, on Friday, July 3, an event called Weed the People is being held at the MCF Craft Brewing Systems facility in North Portland. Admission to the event isn’t free—advance tickets cost $40—but once visitors are inside, marijuana is indeed free to use on the premises or bring home for later enjoyment. Each attendee is welcomed to take as much as 7 grams, cultivated by a range of Oregon growers that have been producing the state’s supply of medicinal marijuana.

http://time.com/money/3938535/free-marijuana-oregon-portland/

SALEM — State Sen. Ginny Burdick's new bong would be the envy of even the most seasoned stoners.

On the first day of recreational marijuana being legal in Oregon, Senate Minority Leader Ted Ferrioli, R-John Day, presented Burdick with an elaborate navy-and-gold rig — the official colors of the state of Oregon — as a thank-you for her work as co-chair of the Legislature's committee on implementing Measure 91.

The $400 bong was handcrafted by Woody Nelson, a glass artist based in the Illinois Valley, and paid for by donations from every member of the Senate. It even includes the words "State of Oregon" monogrammed on the base.

Burdick, D-Portland, however, promised she'd use it only as a single-flower — or "bud" — vase.

http://www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2015/07/legislatures_pot_committee_cha.html#incart_story_package

The Oregonian grows weed. We've got seeds and clones. (Pot Grow Diary: Day 1)

I think it was like 18 months in WA between legalization and the first stores opening.

http://www.wired.com/2015/07/medical-marijuana-epilepsy/

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/obama-commutes-sentences-of-46-non-violent-drug-offenders/2015/07/13/b533f61e-2974-11e5-a250-42bd812efc09_story.html

i wonder how many non-violent drug offenders he could commute the sentences of before the justice industry started freaking the fuck out. theoretically he could commute them all, right?

I would assume that most of the non-violent drug offenders are held in state prisons and local jails so federal commutations probably wouldn't hurt them too badly at the outset.

recreational pot on the ballot in OH this fall

http://www.cleveland.com/open/index.ssf/2015/08/marijuana_legalization_amendme.html#incart_m-rpt-1

it is still a fucked up model w/ only 10 farms permitted to grow

individuals can still grow up to four plants in their homes (how much weed does four plants get you? i've never grown)

i have some family in OH who will be excited about this nonetheless

Anything that gets us away from the prohibition & criminalization model and into a management & mitigation model is worth getting excited about, imo.

ounce and a half to two per plant

something i've never properly understood: is the process of curing marijuana from plants grown at home fairly painless? Do you need a convection oven or a dry box or something? I get it if you're running a business but how simple is this for an individual to pull off? Seems like somebody's gonna get rich making a Bud Oven (tm).

EZ Bake duh
I'd like to know how OH bypassed the legislative apparatus and went straight for a y/n on the Nov ballot? Is the vote legally binding?

did some quick googling on curing weed, shit looks like a fair amount more work than say, growing tomatoes. i can see where outsourcing this is gonna be a good bet for the non-green thumbed for decades to come.

I get it if you're running a business but how simple is this for an individual to pull off?

uh people have been growing their own weed for ages, it isn't that complicated. Of course, you have to resign yourself to your house smelling like weed.

and yeah it takes time and effort and attention, but idk how that's different from successfully farming any other kind of crop, all of which come with their own unique challenges.

hang upside down in a closet iirc

(fyi I would never do it - don't have the time or energy + kids are around - so yes I look forward to buying my weed at the corner store)

Are any growers in WA/CO growing less potent weed? As it becomes easier to acquire, not everyone's going to want some holy shit strong strain that obsessive hippies have been cross-breeding for decades.

Not that I've seen, other than low THC / high CBD stuff geared towards legit medical use. Everything seems to be between 15-30% THC, with concentrates up to 80-90%.

I imagine someday someone might make some sort of "session" style ditchweed throwback though for old timers who want to smoke an entire joint without totally freaking out.

feel like the market will address that eventually but right now it's strictly for people who already know they wanna get high and stay real real high. I can't deal w/the blast-you-into-space indicas of today either, strictly sativa-dominant for me in the space-weed age

The space-weed age is very intense

i like getting blasted into space 9 times out of 10 but i know what you mean and the trick (IME) is just to smoke less weed. like even the weenciest little bit, an implausibly small amount that you would scoff at and say "bah! that wouldn't get me high for half a second!" of the most BYISI will do the trick

I do that and enjoy it when I can, I have some weird reactions - in colorado one of the, ahem, budtenders who was a pretty intense young cat ("I'm 3rd generation in this business, my family was ready to go six months before the law passed") listened to me describing which strains had worked for me in e.g. Amsterdam & from friends in SF and which ones hadn't and said "you're an invert, one person in 8 is an invert - sativa strains do for you what indica strains do for other people" which TOTALLY sounds like bullshit to me except that I always have this "no, that's not how I responded at all" reaction to indica strains. like, people'll say "a fun, mainly physical high" and I'll try it and go "by 'fun' do you mean 'contemplate your failures while lying on your back in the dark for three hours'"

whereas the sativa stuff I can really enjoy and get ridiculously high and still feel like I myself am present, and fall asleep super-easy whenever I'm ready to check out, which is one of the main uses of the stuff for me, getting me to sleep when I'm far from home and my internal clock's all fucked up

"a fun, mainly physical high" and I'll try it and go "by 'fun' do you mean 'contemplate your failures while lying on your back in the dark for three hours'"

lol I have definitely had similar experiences before (though with a different vibe on a different day I might feel fine with the same weed)

I don't really get on with indica-heavy weed either it just puts me to sleep if I'm lucky or makes me feel nauseous if I'm not.

Hopefully in 5-10 years Starbucks will sell weed coffee.

I don't think I ever had sativa til I got my med card. It's like a whole different drug! Def prefer it to indica.

I had no idea about any differences until recently. For most of my life I've only had sketchy connections and it was usually either nothing or seedy stemmy brick weed that traveled thousands of miles compressed into a spare tire or something. Better since I moved west but still, nothing like the stores now.

[i]which TOTALLY sounds like bullshit to me except that I always have this "no, that's not how I responded at all" reaction to indica strains. like, people'll say "a fun, mainly physical high" and I'll try it and go "by 'fun' do you mean 'contemplate your failures while lying on your back in the dark for three hours'"[/'i]

haha yeah I find this penchant for attempting to pseudo-scientifically quantify how weed affects various people to be really specious. It's such a variable drug and people respond so differently to it, I tend to dismiss any dispensed "wisdom" regarding effects to be mostly psychobabble.

damn bbc coding

Not to psychobabble, but indica is usually known as the fall-asleep variety, and not the laugh-your-ass-off variety.

no I know! my dude out here gave me indica strains for sleep - they did not have that effect at all. sativa strains? feel great and I can go directly to sleep or stay up and design desktop games for hours. it really is like they're totally different drugs which act differently in my body than they do in others'. I am otherwise a pretty baseline dude medically, ibuprofen for headaches, NKA, etc, but this is something I keep testing and it keeps coming up "indica is the one that keeps you awake"

i like getting blasted into space 9 times out of 10 but i know what you mean and the trick (IME) is just to smoke less weed. like even the weenciest little bit, an implausibly small amount that you would scoff at and say "bah! that wouldn't get me high for half a second!" of the most BYISI will do the trick

― flopson, Thursday, August 13, 2015 7:40 PM Bookmark

Yeah, usually a hit or two and I'm good. It's very rare that I smoke a whole bowl at once.

Texas?!?!

http://houston.cbslocal.com/2015/05/07/texas-house-panel-approves-full-legalization-of-marijuana-in-unprecedented-move/

“As a Christian, I recognize the innate goodness of everything God made and humanity’s charge to be stewards of the same,” wrote Simpson. “I don’t believe that when God made marijuana he made a mistake that government needs to fix.”

from may though? idgi, a panel approved it but it appears that is only one step to legalization? still seems like it needs some additional voting idk

yeah, it probably is not going to pass a full house vote, but I guess it is a step in the right direction

i'm very interested in seeing what happens w/ ohio tomorrow

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/02/us/on-ballot-ohio-grapples-with-specter-of-marijuana-monopoly.html?ribbon-ad-idx=5&rref=us

hope it fails. what a bizarre bill.

er proposition

truly an odd coalition

With help from Mr. Gould, he found 10 investment groups willing to put up a minimum of $2 million each to finance a campaign to pass an amendment that would legalize marijuana for medical use and personal use in small amounts; set up a commission to regulate it; and designate 10 parcels of land — each owned or optioned by funders of the initiative — where marijuana could be legally grown and cultivated for commercial use.

Adults 21 and older would also be allowed to grow small amounts of marijuana — up to four flowering plants — for themselves. The state commission would license retailers, who would be required to win elections in local precincts.

The backers call themselves ResponsibleOhio. Among the investors: the former professional basketball player Oscar Robertson, the fashion designer Nanette Lepore, Mr. Gould and two great-great-grand-nephews of President William Howard Taft. Each investment group has committed as much as $40 million to build facilities if Issue 3 passes.

http://www.cleveland.com/open/index.ssf/2015/08/buddie_the_marijuana_mascot_dr.html

all my family lives there, i go there all the time, may move back someday

very confusing ballot questions, if i understand correctly:

1)if issue 3 passes, 10 facilities will be granted the exclusive right to cultivate/sell cannabis commercially (individuals can grow up to 4 plants for personal use) essentially creating an oligopoly (though people are calling it a monopoly)
2) if issue 2 passes, such state-sanctioned monopolies will be outlawed, effectively nullifying issue 3?

very weird idk

personally i think it is more important to have legal weed even if the commercial system is fucked up. lots of angry potheads don't like the monopoly but imo we can sort that out later