A British Columbia civil rights group is asking the City of Vancouver to reconsider its plan to ban dispensaries from selling edible forms of medical marijuana.

The request comes as city council prepares to vote Wednesday on new zoning regulations for medical marijuana shops, even though the sale of pot in any form by dispensaries remains illegal under federal drug laws.

The B.C. Civil Liberties Association said it recognized the logistical challenges to regulation, but it argues an outright ban on items such as cookies and brownies would just transfer the problem to patients.

“This is not comparable to other kinds of medication,” said Micheal Vonn, the organization’s policy director.

On June 14, more than 200 people gathered at the Sebastopol Grange for a fundraiser and organizing meeting of  local pot growers, the Sonoma County Growers Association. They were being mentored by their northern neighbors from Humboldt, Mendocino, and Trinity counties, the Emerald Growers Association, which already has lobbyists in Sacramento and is in the middle of the effort to legalize weed in California next year. The Emerald Triangle is the largest marijuana growing area in the country's largest marijuana producing state.

Pot policy is splintering the GOP.

GOP support for medical marijuana is on the rise as backers look to couch legalization as a states’ rights issue, while other Republicans are fighting tooth and nail to beat back recreational pot laws like the one approved in Washington, D.C.

The division reflects a political conundrum for the party, which is torn between social conservatives who still see marijuana as a gateway drug, and libertarian-leaning voters who want to legalize pot.

The GOP’s internal conflict has been on full display of late, as Congress has voted on a series of conflicting marijuana measures — frustrating advocates on both sides of the fight over legal pot.

It was a classic political fundraiser — semi-formal, with chicken, potatoes and salad on the menu.

The jovial donors sipped gin cocktails and Oregon pinots at the Left Bank Annex on Portland’s East Side earlier this month.

But the 300 attendees who came to support Rep. Earl Blumenauer, D-Oregon, represent a newly energized group: They’re members of the cannabis industry, now in an era where their product is legal for recreational use.

“People that I’ve been working with — in some cases for years dealing with trying to modernize our marijuana laws — came together and they threw me a little party,” Blumenauer said. “It was great fun.”

The Obama administration has removed a major regulatory barrier standing in the way of desperately needed research into medical marijuana.

On Monday, the Office of National Drug Control Policy, which oversees the United States' overall drug-fighting efforts, announced it will no longer require scientists seeking to study medical marijuana to pass a stifling Public Health Service review process, the Associated Press reports.

While this may seem like a small step for marijuana research, the recent announcement could pull the lynch pin that opens the floodgates for a wave of future scientific marijuana research that could add to the already growing list of potential medical applications of the substance. 

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) has proposed a  massive increase in the amount of marijuana it will allow to be produced this year. The DEA’s objective is to meet the demands of researchers studying medicinal uses of marijuana.

The Controlled Substances Act, a law which categorizes drugs in accordance with their risk of abuse and medical benefit, provides for the DEA to control the growing and production of Schedule I and II drugs for research purposes. Cocaine and marijuana are both Schedule I drugs.

Lock up your animals, and board up your windows Oregon, we have some incredibly disturbing news from War On Drugs expert Linda Blair. Recently, Blair spoke with ThatOregonLife.com and gave some startling insight on the legalization of the pot in Oregon.

According to Blair, when the devil’s lettuce is introduced to Oregon July 1st for the first time to innocent Oregonians all across the state, we could see numbers as high as 1 in 3 Oregonians losing their lives to random violent deaths as a result of Satan himself visiting Oregon.

AUSTIN — Texas lawmakers may be reluctant to ease up on punishing small-time pot smokers, but local prosecutors across the state are increasingly looking for ways to keep two-bit toking cases from clogging court dockets and wasting resources.

This past session, seven bills that would have reduced criminal penalties for minor marijuana possession went up in smoke. But some county prosecutors are already choosing to pass on even filing charges when it comes to small pot possession cases, or looking for ways to divert recreational users to probation or community service programs.

Some have been doing so for years.

As a lifelong conservative, I’m no fan of government regulation. Even so, I’m convinced it’s time for California to aggressively regulate the medical marijuana industry.

I’ve spoken with concerned citizens, local government officials, rural law enforcement officers, federal officials, anti-drug crusaders and medical marijuana industry insiders.

I visited the Emerald Triangle with fellow Board of Equalization member Fiona Ma. Our April tour showed how we can work with the industry to generate greater voluntary compliance with California law.

Who would have thought that the most notable legislation in the recently completed session of the Louisiana legislature was increasing taxes by over one billion dollars, and legalizing marijuana use for certain purposes.  Some observers around the state capitol wondered sarcastically just where did all the conservative republicans go?