Backers of a proposed 2016 ballot initiative to regulate and tax marijuana like alcohol estimate the measure would raise more than $40 million annually for education in Arizona. The Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol highlighted the potential revenue Wednesday by presenting the state with a jumbo-sized check during a “back-to-school” news conference in front of the state capitol.

By Russ Belville

Last year, a member of the South African Parliament named Mario Oriani-Ambrosini proposed the Medical Innovation Bill. This law would legalize the commercial, industrial, and medical applications of dagga, the local term for cannabis. Mr. Oriani-Ambrosini died of cancer, but his bill lives on in the Parliament’s Health Committee, where members of the INKATHA Freedom Party are asking that the commercial and industrial regulations be deleted so the bill focuses only on medical marijuana.

The INKATHA Freedom Party is a minor party that collected just 2.4 percent of the vote in the 2014 elections, holding just ten of the 400 seats in a Parliament governed by the African National Congress with 249 seats.

Canadians sitting in prison or stuck with a criminal record for crimes related to marijuana have a reason to vote Liberal in this October’s federal election.

At an August 19 campaign stop in Vancouver, prime ministerial hopeful Justin Trudeau reiterated a campaign promise to legalize cannabis for recreational purposes. He then went one step further, adding that after a Liberal government is elected and has reversed laws that criminalize marijuana, it will begin discussing what should happen with people who have been charged for transgressions that the country no longer considers criminal.

FAIRBANKS — An effort failed on Thursday to bring a marijuana tax to the voters in the Fairbanks North Star Borough.

The assembly called a special meeting to vote on a tax measure, which would have gone on the October ballot, but two assembly members were absent and none of the various tax rates suggested could gain the five votes necessary for approval.

U.S. Rep. Earl Blumenauer, D-Ore., said he was still practically a “child legislator” when, in 1973, he joined other lawmakers voting to make Oregon the first state where marijuana possession earned the offender a civil citation rather than a criminal record and jail time.

Blumenauer was also among a smaller group of Oregon legislators who voted – unsuccessfully – to legalize possession of two marijuana plants for personal use.

“I am told that if the 19 of us that voted for it were joined by the people who voted ‘no’ but smoked dope, Oregon would have been the first state to legalize adult use” of marijuana, Blumenauer joked Thursday as he talked in what Mainers refer to as “the original Portland” about his decades of work on marijuana issues.

Conspiracy theorists have been saying it all along – but cannabis does apparently kill cancer cells.

That’s according to the US government, which has added a page on the use of cannabis and cannabinoids to their official cancer advice website.

The National Cancer Institute, part of the US Department of Health, now advises that ‘cannabinoids may be useful in treating the side effects of cancer and cancer treatment’ by smoking, eating it in baked products, drinking herbal teas or even spraying it under the tongue.

State has 21 days to file a response

Several people on Wednesday filed a complaint in Denver District Court against the Colorado Board of Health's decision in July not to add post-traumatic stress disorder to medical conditions that can be treated under the state's medical marijuana program.

The complaint lists Curtis Bean, Larisa Bolivar, Stephen Otero, Matthew Kahl and Zach Phillips as plaintiffs in the case. They are asking that a judge overturn the board's ruling. Several are military veterans, and one is a survivor of sexual and physical abuse.

By Romain Bonilla

Bernie Sanders isn’t done talking about criminal justice reform — in fact, he’s merely getting started. The presidential contender continues to rise in the polls and sensible Drug War reforms will only increase his standing with the Democratic base.