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News Photographer Killed in Mexican Border City

Gunmen attacked two newspaper photographers Thursday in the drug prohibition-torn border city of Ciudad Juarez, killing one and seriously wounding the other. Mexican journalists are increasingly under siege from drug traffickers seeking to control the flow of information. The Committee to Protect Journalists, a New York-based watchdog group, said in a recent report that at least 22 Mexican journalists have been killed since December 2006, when President Felipe Calderon intensified a crackdown on drug traffickers by deploying tens of thousands of troops and federal police across the country.

Rhode Island Medical Marijuana School Indefinitely Postponed

The New England School of Alternative Horticultural Studies — previously billed as Rhode Island’s first medical marijuana school — has decided to cancel its inaugural class and indefinitely postpone operations over concerns that the Rhode Island Department of Health has not offered it explicit approval.

Adios! Mexican Town's Police Force Quits Because of Danger

No mas. That's what the police force in the Mexican town of Purepero said when all 45 of it members resigned en masse. Purepero isn't the first town to experience a mass resignation of officials afraid to continue their role in the nation's prohibitionist war on drug traffickers.

Mexico's Drug War Impacts Business

Mexico became a manufacturing mecca thanks, in part, to its inexpensive labor and proximity to the massive U.S. market. But there is a new reality on the ground in that country these days: a surge in violence tied to the prohibition-based war on drug traffickers that Mexico's President Felipe Calderon mounted after his election in 2006. The result has been a wave of kidnappings, extortion and murder that is threatening the country's economic health and causing multinationals to examine closely how they operate and invest in Mexico.

Marijuana Use Increases While Arrests Approach Record Levels, Reports Show (Press Release)

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                                                                                                                                 

SEPTEMBER 16, 2010

Marijuana Use Increases While Arrests Approach Record Levels, Reports Show

Marijuana Now Accounts for Half of All U.S. Drug Arrests, But Enforcement Efforts Have Done Nothing to Reduce Use

CONTACT: Mike Meno, MPP director of communications …………… 202-905-2030 or 443-927-6400

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Marijuana arrests accounted for more than half of all U.S. drug arrests in 2009, while its use among Americans increased by 8 percent, according to two reports released this week by government officials. 

         According to the FBI’s 2009 Uniform Crime Report released yesterday, U.S. law enforcement made 858,408 arrests on marijuana charges — 88 percent of which were for possession, not sale or manufacture.  Marijuana arrests peaked in 2007 at more than 872,000, and witnessed a slight dip in 2008 at 847,863.

         In 2009, an American was arrested on marijuana charges every 37 seconds.

         Meanwhile, an annual report released today by the National Survey on Drug Use and Health showed that 16.7 million Americans had used marijuana in the past month.

         “It’s now more obvious than ever that decades of law enforcement efforts have absolutely failed to reduce marijuana’s use or availability, and that it’s simply an exercise in futility to continue arresting hundreds of thousands of Americans for using something that’s safer than alcohol,” said Rob Kampia, executive director of the Marijuana Policy Project. “Rather than criminalize millions of otherwise law-abiding citizens and waste billions of dollars that could be better spent combating violent crime and other real threats to public safety, it’s time we embrace sensible marijuana policies that would regulate marijuana the same way we do alcohol or tobacco.”

         With more than 124,000 members and supporters nationwide, the Marijuana Policy Project is the largest marijuana policy reform organization in the United States. MPP believes that the best way to minimize the harm associated with marijuana is to regulate marijuana in a manner similar to alcohol. For more information, please visit www.mpp.org.

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Marijuana Law Reform is a Civil Rights Issue (Opinion)

Alice Huffman, president of the California State NAACP, opines on the civil rights aspects of legalizing, taxing, and regulating marijuana in California. She says the California NAACP does not believe maintaining the illusion that we're winning the "war on drugs" is worth sacrificing another generation of our young men and women.

Mexican Drug Trafficking Organizations Involved in Cocaine Surge in Australia

Drug prohibition isn't stopping Mexican drug trafficking organizations (DTOs). The Australian Crime Commission says highly sophisticated Mexican DTOs are having a significant impact on the Australian cocaine market. The surge is linked to one of the most powerful and brutal syndicates involved in the drug war in Mexico, the Sinaloa organization.

No Accepted Medical Use? Three Perspectives on Medical Cannabis (Video -- ReasonTV)

As medical marijuana proponents have pointed out since the Controlled Substances Act was passed by Congress in 1970, cannabis has been used medicinally for thousands of years, and there has never been a reported case of a marijuana overdose. Moreover, in recent years clinical researchers around the world have demonstrated the medicinal value of cannabis. ReasonTV talked to a doctor, a pharmacist, and a patient to get three firsthand perspectives on medical cannabis.
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