Reconciling cannabis’ past, present and future in our culture and politics can be a tough job. As someone who has navigated through the perilous task of working to unite activists, patients, growers, processors, retailers, consultants, politicians and funders, I can certainly relate. There is the need to remember those that […]

The Oregon cannabis community converged upon the State Capitol Building to fight for patients’ access to medical marijuana Monday night as the Oregon Legislature held a public hearing on both House Bill 3400 and Senate Bill 936. While many headlines focus upon the plant limits being debated in Salem, patients […]

The firing of Oregon’s Marijuana Czar, Tom Burns, understandably rocked the Oregon cannabis community and everyone involved with developing prospective legislation and regulation that would implement marijuana legalization in the Beaver State. At first, the Oregon Liquor Control Commission (OLCC) was silent about why their Director of Marijuana Programs was […]

Can it possibly be that hemp agriculture presents a catastrophic threat to sinsemilla marijuana cultivation? Will the hemp field of dreams be a cannabis nightmare? The climate of southern Oregon is among the world’s best for cultivating cannabis. Local growers have been producing some of the world’s finest marijuana for […]

I got the chance to visit the Bushido Gardens, a Medical Marijuana grow somewhere in Oregon. I got a chance to talk to the grower about cannabis and growing techniques.   I also got to watch him roll a really nice joint. This is the first of what will be a […]

MARIJUANA POLITICS BROKE THE NEWS FIRST I have learned from an anonymous source with intimate details of the ouster of Tom Burns, the Oregon Liquor Control Commission’s Director of Marijuana Programs for the past three months, was partly due to an improper leak of a work-in-progress internal document that was […]

The “Green Rush” is booming.  As marijuana prohibition falls by the wayside, many “legitimate” entrepreneurs are looking to get into the cannabis industry. The funny thing is, most of them are white.  That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but let’s remember that 61 percent of the people in jail or […]

The small town of Talent, Oregon is blessed with two medical cannabis dispensaries, and a third will open soon. At the same time, neighboring Phoenix, Oregon has shuttered the doors of its single (thriving) dispensary and nearby Medford tries to discourage all things marijuana. The old saying is “all politics […]

To anyone paying attention, marijuana has gone mainstream in virtually all aspects of our culture: in opinion polls to the ballot box to our music to TV shows to the silver screen. Dr. Sanjay Gupta made national news with his “evolution” on cannabis, President Obama is forced to ask questions about […]

March Madness is here! Studies show it to be one of the least productive work months of the year. Rather than work, people are distracted by picking brackets, placing bets and, most importantly, watching basketball. This year, however, I find myself more interested in the on goings of cannabis, especially […]

So, you just hit a jay straight to the face. Now you need some sort of entertainment. Sure, you could play a video game or watch the same old boring things on TV. But why not try watching some shows made just for people that really, really like weed?  Please […]

Marijuana has played an important role in the last few general elections and 2016 is shaping up to be possibly the most important election yet for cannabis law reform. We already know that a Nevada legalization proposal will be on the ballot and there is a great likelihood that California, […]

Oregonians, two important bills before the House Judiciary Committee would greatly benefit those convicted of marijuana law offenses. Senate Bill 364 has already passed the Oregon Senate and is awaiting a hearing on the House side. The Oregon Legislature, in 2013, passed a measure that decreased marijuana penalties, effective on […]

New York City, the media capital of the world, is obviously one of the most influential cities in the world. New York State, in turn, is a very influential state and news out of the area resonate across the country, if not the globe. I remember when the New York […]

This Tuesday, I was honored to be selected as the pro-legalization side in the first-ever public debate on marijuana legalization at Texas Christian University.  Opposing me was Ben Cort, a board member of Project SAM, the nation’s anti-legalization lobby. At one point in the debate (and I’m paraphrasing, since I […]