Drug War Chronicle #810 - November 21, 2013

Headlines about the "cocaine congressman voting to drug test food stamp recipients" are at best only technically accurate, and miss the support Rep. Radel has shown for compassionate sentencing reform.

New York's attorney general has examined the stop-and-frisk tactics of the NYPD in a new report. Only a miniscule fraction of stops result in an arrest for a serious crime, he found.

The International Narcotics Control Board is "concerned" that Uruguay might actually go ahead and legalize marijuana. But Uruguay doesn't seem to care.

Federal agencies are beginning to work on the banking problem for medical marijuana businesses, the District of Columbia is looking at why its program is so tiny, and New Mexico can't keep up with medical marijuana demand. And there's much more, too.

A quiet week on the corrupt cops front this week. We've got a pill-poppin' New England trooper stealing from the dead and a former New Orleans cop caught trying to peddle dope.

A Maryland gubernatorial candidate and a Maine legislator both call for marijuana legalization, politicians are in trouble for using drugs (at least one of them a bonafide hypocrite for it), and marijuana law reforms appear to be advancing internationally, except in one Australian state. That's just for starters.

Hmmm, on the same day the DEA warns that "marijuana availability seems to be on the increase," hundreds of people apply for licenses to sell pot in Washington state. Times are changing, and somebody needs to let the DEA know. And there's more news, too.

A bill to protect the guns rights of legal marijuana users has been filed, hempsters hit the halls of Congress, a new medical marijuana bill is filed in Pennsylvania, and more.

The future of medical marijuana under Washington state's legalization scheme remains a hot topic, the DEA is banning more new synthetics, there are contradictory signals from Holland, and more news, too.

Years in prison for growing weed in Missouri, life in prison for drug smuggling in Singapore -- we still have a long way to go. There's more drug policy-related news as well today.