Weekend News Recap
Happy Mother’s Day out there to all the fine ladies who have raised children and who are the glue that keeps every household moving forward. I hope each and every one of you glorious women had a great weekend and were shown how important you truly are to those who you love.
Hopefully everyone was busy this weekend, but rest assured that we have your weekend new recap for you to start of your day. So what’s being happening in the world of cannabis?
May 14th, 2018
U.S. Rep. Earl Blumenauer Says Cannabis May Be De-Regulated Nationwide Within Four Years, “If we do our job, it’s game over in 2 years.”
We need more leadership not only in Washington DC, but in Hartford as well. We need people who will put partisan issues aside and stand up for what so many of us believe is morally and ethically just. Have I always been so naive to believe we should elect individuals who are responsible and moral upstanding pillars of our communities…I guess so.
By Katie Shepherd
U.S. Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.) believes the end of the battle to legalize marijuana across the United States is fewer than four years away.
“I made a bet that within five years, every state will be able to treat cannabis like alcohol and there will be universal access to medical marijuana,” he told a crowd of cannabis business owners at Cultivation Classic in Revolution Hall Saturday afternoon. “If we do our job, it’s game over in 2 years.”
Blumenauer, a longtime champion of legal weed, said the 2018 elections could be pivotal to removing cannabis from the federal list of Schedule 1 narcotics, like heroin and methamphetamine.
“If Democrats control the House of Representatives in the first months of the next Congress in 2019,” said Blumenauer, “we will be having hearings on de-scheduling.”
The Oregon congressman says he’s happy to see some of his colleagues coming around in favor of legalization, like Republican and longtime cannabis-opponent John Boehner, who is now investing in the industry. Read More.
Colorado logs $106M in recreational cannabis sales in March
Can’t say we didn’t try to tell the legislators throughout Connecticut they were underestimating the potential revenue projections. Hey Colorado, you must really like cannabis! That’s only recreational sales for March, nothing more.
By Alicia Wallace
Colorado’s recreational marijuana sales set a new monthly high in March.
The state’s cannabis retailers sold $106 million in flower, edibles and concentrate for adult-use purposes during March, according to data released Wednesday by the Colorado Department of Revenue.
In total, the shops tallied up $135.2 million in sales during the month, up 3.7 percent from March 2017. The monthly haul — consisting of $29.2 million of medical marijuana sales and roughly $106 million in recreational sales — brings the first-quarter totals to $365.7 million, an increase of 6 percent from the first three months of 2017.
The latest data epitomize some ongoing sales trends in Colorado’s maturing marijuana industry: Recreational sales continue to take bigger pieces of the pie, and the industry is still growing — but no longer by leaps-and-bounds. Read More.
Can Massachusetts become a leader in marijuana research?
The way that Massachusetts already appears to be paving the way, I can definitely see Massachusetts becoming the leader in marijuana research on the East Coast without question. Are they ready to be the leader in the US? They have the technology, infrastructure, access to skilled workers, and they appear to be positioning themselves to take the lead.
By Shira Schoenberg
Massachusetts is a national leader in fields like biotech, life sciences and health care. Could marijuana research be next?
Marion McNabb, a doctor of public health and former global health worker, believes the state’s legalization of marijuana could encourage academics and scientists to conduct serious scientific research on marijuana — a field that has so far been lacking due to legal and financial barriers.
“My vision is Massachusetts could be the number one leading cannabis research state in the world,” McNabb said.
How to deal with marijuana is a major national policy question. Although marijuana remains illegal under federal law, 29 states allow medical marijuana and another eight allow recreational marijuana. Policymakers routinely debate questions such as the impact of marijuana on opioid addiction, the drug’s safety, and the effects of marijuana on driving.
But experts say factual information is hard to come by because of a lack of scientific research. Read More.
H/T: Willamette Week, Denver Post, Mass Live