According to NORML, the following states have medical marijuana laws in place already: Alaska, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington. You may notice that with the exception of New Englandish states that don't even count because of all the hippies there, the list is dominated by West Coast states. What would Biggie think?

New Jersey would be a powerful step towards getting the East Coast back in the game. The WSJ says that even incoming NJ governor and rotund Republican Chris Christie says he'll support the bill if it has "enough restrictions," which we assume means that Redman can't bogart all of Chris Christie's shit. Fair enough.

Okay, before we delve into Med Grow Cannabis College and its myriad innovations in marijuana education, let's get all the dumb dope jokes out of the way: Yes, Med Grow Cannabis College does give new meaning to the phrase "higher education."

They didn't even use the extra two days to change this lead. Dude.

[Sorry, losers. Pic via]

Stupid lawmen types noticed that LA was becoming overrun with legal weed spots, thanks to a legal loophole, so they tried to put a moratorium on them, and were sued. Meanwhile, cops are kicking in doors and shutting shit down at weed dispensaries. It's not the Feds, dude, it's the locals; specifically, LA district attorney Steve Cooley, a bitch ass scrub who wants to shut down all the weed shops because they are not technically "legal," in California, allegedly. That's right, Cooley: We called you a bitch ass. It's in the first amendment, look it up.

But meanwhile, you know who is on the side of the weed people? A motherfucking judge!

A Superior Court judge concluded today that Los Angeles' moratorium on new medical marijuana dispensaries is invalid and granted a preliminary injunction against enforcement of the ban sought by a dispensary that had sued the city.

Follow the law and stop being illegal against weed!
[Pic via]

See, the government outlawed flavored cigarettes, so Kretek, which makes all the cloves you smoke, is now selling clove cigars. Problem solved!

Lake Isabella, Calif., resident Terry Day, 42 years old, used to drive 240 miles round-trip to buy clove cigarettes when he lived in rural Valentine, Neb. He said he might try the cigars but was dubious about whether he would like them.

That is even farther than most heroin addicts are willing to drive. Fun fact(?) about the origin of the healing powers of cloves:

Studebacher Hoch, a resident of Kudus, Java, created kreteks in the early 1880s as a means to deliver the medicinal eugenol of cloves to the lungs, as it was thought to help asthma. It cured his chest pains and he started to market his invention to the village, but he died of lung cancer before he could mass market it.

[Pic: AP]

GOOD: The updated stash box, by Base. People already like their own stash boxes so they'll probably like these. Keeps weed dry!


BAD: Corny ass stickers, by The Heads of State. Weed is cool. Slapping corny stickers with slogans like "Uptown Schwag" on your weed package is not cool. Why would you do such a thing? Narcs.

See all the designs at Print Mag [via Fast Company]

They're joining ashrams! Take this funemployed dude's unbelievably sweet deal, for example:

Now he spends his days on the Himalayan Institute's 400-acre wooded campus, practicing hatha yoga and meditation, studying spiritual texts, biking, walking and preparing meals in the institute's kitchen. In exchange for his cooking duties and an annual fee of $3,000, he gets a private room, three vegetarian meals a day and unlimited access to the institute's classes, seminars and other events.

And you know you can totally smuggle weed in there, and smoke it. Just by saying you want to "find yourself," or whatever, you can get a hookup that will productively waste an entire year.

Yehnemsah Oneha, work-study coordinator at Ananda Ashram, says that while cost-cutting and ice-breaking are nice benefits, the true purpose of these work exchanges, sometimes known as karma yoga, is to foster selflessness and good will. "It helps circulate the energy," she said. "You're doing it for someone else's comfort and welfare."

Ha, whatever you say, dude. You think they're fuckin' in there? I bet the people are totally fuckin'. This is the future of funemployment.
[NYT. Pic via]

Not only is he starring in a new Subway TV ad—the first since his little controversy (smoking of drugs illegally and saddening children)—but he's once again plastered all over Subway's website (they never technically dropped him as an endorser, they just hid him in a secret "stash box," in the closet).

There he is, right on the website, telling children how to get "Fresh Toasted." If we make any more weed jokes we will probably puke, right on the floor here, but feel free to browse around the site and make your own. "Phelps Phlavor"? Ha right he likes the different flavors of marijuana to smoke on, I bet! Those colors behind him in that photo probably drove him loony when he was high on the marijuana, I bet!

Going to throw up now. Eat Subway, ladies and gentlemen.

The new attorney general did say that, in contrast to the Bush administration, the feds would now stop raiding medical marijuana distributors in states where it was legal. But for those who got caught up when Bush was still president, they're ass-out; one owner of a California dispensary just got sentenced to a year in jail on a conviction from last summer, even though the judge tried to find a way to let him go. Mandatory minimums!

"He is caught between California's voter-approved medical marijuana system and the Bush administration's single-minded effort to smother it," said Stephen Gutwillig of the Drug Policy Alliance, an organization that favors a change in drug policy. "That Attorney General Holder changed federal policy three months ago only makes this miscarriage of justice all the more disturbing. Charlie is like a forgotten prisoner of war, abandoned after a truce was declared."

Sucks, yes. Also the LA City Council has now closed the legal loophole that turned the entire city into one big weed spot. It's like living in Russia or something.
[Pic of still-oppressed individual via]

Arnold's just talking about a legalize-and-tax plan in California, okay, but read the seeds and stems, people:

Pressure to mend the state's fractured budget along with growing public support of marijuana legalization moved him to support such a study, Mr. Schwarzenegger said.

Seriously, "Public support" has been high enough for quite a while, if the political will had been there, but it wasn't. The money issue is going to make it happen. Shit, you think the lottery brings in good revenue? Just wait until California starts charging, I don't know, a 20% tax on weed sales, in exchange for not putting you in jail? Everyone would be only too happy to pay! The state estimates it could make well over $1 billion per year in taxes, and that would only grow as the best and the brightest weed wholesalers flocked to Cali and really got their marketing going.

Hey, poor governments will resort to making money from drug sales, just like poor people. Republicans learned something today!
[Pic via]

In a study that confirms what you totally already knew, it turns out that the active ingredient in ganja kills off brain cancer cells:

In the study, THC was found to induce the death of various human brain cancer cell lines and primary cultured human brain cancer cells by a process known as autophagy...

As analysis of tumors from two patients with recurrent glioblastoma multiforme (a highly aggressive brain tumor) receiving intracranial THC administration showed signs of autophagy, the authors suggest that cannabinoid administration may provide a new approach to targeting human cancers.

It's like you can just feel it working, like the smoke is little soldiers going in and like grabbing the brain cancer and throwing it down a deep black hole and you exhale it out with the smoke and inhale purification and like, cleanse. Dude.
[Journal of Clinical Investigation via Science Daily]

Last month our new attorney general, Eric "Will You Please Pass Me That Marijuana, So I May Enjoy It" Holder indicated that the feds would no longer go around raiding medical marijuana spots, in states where it was legal. In contrast to the Bush administrations, which loved to do that shit. And now, Holder has made his point in clear detail:

The Bush administration targeted medical marijuana distributors even in states that had passed laws allowing use of the drug for medical purposes by cancer patients, those dealing with chronic pain or other serious ailments. Holder said the priority of the new administration is to go after egregious offenders operating in violation of both federal and state law, such as those being used as fronts for drug dealers.

One might point out that most of the medical marijuana distributors are "fronts for drug dealers," in the strictest sense, but no matter. See your hippie doctors at once! Freedom!
[LAT; Pic via]

Our new US attorney general, Eric "Loves Marijuana" Holder, said this past week that the federal government is no longer going to raid medical marijuana distributors, if medical marijuana is legal in the state. Under the Bush administration, it was nice and everything to live somewhere like, oh, California, where medical marijuana could be easily had, but it wasn't completely nice, because the US govt. officially considered marijuana illegal still, so federal types would come in and raid medical marijuana places, being all like, fuck your state laws! But Holder said the federal government is scrapping all that, and going by what Barack "Marijuana is Good" Obama said during the campaign:

"My attitude is if the science and the doctors suggest that the best palliative care and the way to relieve pain and suffering is medical marijuana, then that's something I'm open to," Obama said in November 2007 at a campaign stop in Audubon, Iowa. "There's no difference between that and morphine when it comes to just giving people relief from pain."

And since getting a medical marijuana prescription in Cali is as easy as telling some weedhead doctor "I have stress," weed is basically legal there now, as well as in many other states.

Dude. [MSNBC, Alternet; pic via]

If you haven't been following Tucker's own extensive updates, we'll bring you right up to speed! The film is all done shooting now and is in post-production. His box office prediction: "I could make a very good argument for it making anything from 20 million all the way up to 200 million." But more importantly: "I think we made something special."

Furthermore: "I think this movie is fucking awesome, and I think it has the potential to be regarded as one of the best comedies released over the past generation."

They still have to get a rating, finish the editing, and get a distributor, so Tucker doesn't want to get ahead of himself. The release would probably come in the second half of this year, at the earliest. But he can see the film "becoming the type of movie that is on everyone's DVD shelf, that is referenced thousands of times in hundreds of contexts," based on the anecdotal evidence:

There was the 60 year old woman at the second LA screening, the crippled one with the cane who got in because she was the ride of someone else we invited. She could not be farther from our projected demographic...and she LOVED the movie. Raved about it.

It was probably the dookie pants scene that grabbed her. We think this could be big! Anyone with fresh info, as always, feel free to email us. [Learn all about this wondrous auteur here]

"You guys need to go stand on those stairs," one girl shouted to her friends, who were seated in a circle on the quadrangle grass. "You don't even understand."

...

Smoke-out participants — thousands of whom wore green or T-shirts promoting pot — climbed trees, played the bongos, snapped pictures and had miniature picnics.

That, of course, after they sparked the weed they had come to smoke.

...

Although CU junior Max Lichtenstein, 21, isn't into marijuana or smoking, he also felt Sunday's event was a chance to do something "bigger" than himself. He passed out 126 Rice Krispies treats with messages attached asking that they act out against the injustices in Darfur.

"Tomorrow, when you're sober ... call the White House at 202-456-1414," the note read.

...

One woman was hopeful Betz's treats [he was selling peanut butter and jelly sandwiches] were charged with some special ingredients.

"Are these magical?" she asked, only to be disappointed. "Why aren't you selling magical ones? I mean, it's cool — but c'mon."

[pic via Daily Camera]