Boing Boing » marijuana

The golden, explodey menace of hash oil

Xeni Jardin — Wed, 20 Feb 2013 23:55:01 +0000

Wired News has a feature on butane hash oil, a highly combustible form of marijuana that is increasingly produced inside the US. Just last week, FEMA posted an odd alert in its emergency services bulletin: “Hash Oil Explosions Increasing Across US,” along with the "more quotidian warnings of cyber terrorism and industrial vapor clouds." Why: more explosions at apartments and hotel rooms involving “a process using butane to extract and concentrate compounds from marijuana."

Drug OD fatalities up for 11th consecutive year; not one was due to marijuana

Xeni Jardin — Tue, 19 Feb 2013 23:26:48 +0000

Federal data to be released this week through the Journal of the American Medical Association shows that drug overdose deaths rose for the 11th year in a row. Most were accidents involving prescription painkillers: specifically, opioids like OxyContin and Vicodin which are commonly prescribed for pain management, and are widely abused. Those two drugs contributed to 3 out of 4 medication overdose deaths, according to the report.

Not one single death in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data set was due to overdosing on marijuana.

Why? Generally speaking, because of the way cannabis affects the human brain and nervous system, it is not medically possible to OD on marijuana—though you're welcome to try, and unconfined munchies could certainly cause some damage. Not that death by Doritos would be such an awful thing...

And yet in federal law, with the data once again proving that pot is non-lethal, cannabis remains classified as a schedule 1 drug. That classification means there are no federally-recognized medical applications for pot, while prescription drugs proven yet again to be potentially deadly when abused remain readily and legally available.

As an aside, it's lulzy to note that in the letter of the DEA's law, it's spelled "marihuana." Both the spelling of the law and the logic behind it are antiquated.

Photo: Shutterstock

Would you like to be a Marijuana Consultant?

Rob Beschizza — Thu, 31 Jan 2013 13:47:43 +0000

Attention! The state of Washington requires a pot consultant with many years of experience in how cannabis is grown, dried, packaged and "cooked into brownies." It really is time we opened a job board for this stuff.

David Frum's reefer madness

Xeni Jardin — Tue, 18 Dec 2012 21:02:33 +0000

Daily Beast contributor David Frum thinks legalizing weed is a bad thing: "marijuana smoking is a sign of trouble, a warning to heed, a behavior to regret and deplore," and that "young Americans deserve better than to be led to a future shrouded in a drug-induced haze." (thanks, @milesobrien)

Obama on pot smoking in newly-legal CO and WA: "Bigger fish to fry"

Xeni Jardin — Fri, 14 Dec 2012 16:07:00 +0000

Photo: Shutterstock. "Young man eating leaves of hemp. Shoot in the field of marijuana."

“We’ve got bigger fish to fry,” Obama told ABC News' Barbara Walters, speaking about marijuana smokers in Colorado and Washington.

In those two states, recreational use is now legal, but the DEA still has a hard-on for weed prohibition, as demonstrated by the agency's ongoing and aggressive dispensary raids in CA. According to the president, going after potsmokers in states where it's legal is no longer a high (heh) priority.

“It would not make sense for us to see a top priority as going after recreational users in states that have determined that it’s legal,” he said.

“This is a tough problem, because Congress has not yet changed the law,” Obama told Walters of the legalization in Colorado and Washington. “I head up the executive branch; we’re supposed to be carrying out laws. And so what we’re going to need to have is a conversation about, how do you reconcile a federal law that still says marijuana is a federal offense and state laws that say that it’s legal?”

Medical Marijuana comes to New Jersey

Xeni Jardin — Sat, 08 Dec 2012 20:10:40 +0000

"They skulked in and out like criminals, shoulders hunched, heads down, declining to comment." —a NYT profile on the Garden State's first pot dispensary. Hey, in the patrons' defense, it may be because they spooted Snookie or The Situation inside or something.

As states legalize pot, will Obama continue the federal War on Weed?

Xeni Jardin — Sat, 08 Dec 2012 19:55:43 +0000

Tom Dickinson in Rolling Stone about the growing conflict between what voters in more and more states want (legalizing pot) and what the federal government wants (shutting down dispensaries with guns and SWAT teams of DEA agents). "While the administration has yet to issue a definitive response to the two new laws, the Justice Department was quick to signal that it has no plans to heed the will of voters. 'Enforcement of the Controlled Substances Act,' the department announced in November, 'remains unchanged."

Marijuana now legal in Washington

Rob Beschizza — Thu, 06 Dec 2012 14:05:37 +0000

CBS: "An impromptu celebration was held, appropriately enough, at the Space Needle, a Seattle high point. The air was filled with the scent of victory."

Marijuana dispenser machine company's stock gets really, really high, man

Xeni Jardin — Fri, 16 Nov 2012 17:06:12 +0000

Medbox (MDBX), a firm that makes medical marijuana dispensing machines, says its stock "is getting way too high." Shares spiked 3,000% this week (from about $4 Monday to $215 Thursday), "prompting executives to try and dampen investor enthusiasm." The surge was caused by a MarketWatch story about how to invest in legalized marijuana.

Medical marijuana in Israel

Xeni Jardin — Wed, 07 Nov 2012 15:30:46 +0000

"I've been a Holocaust child all my life. I'm now 80 and I'm still a Holocaust child, but I'm finally able to better cope." A Buchenwald survivor who uses cannabis for PTSD in a nursing home in Israel, in USA Today.

Feds to debate medical use of marijuana

Xeni Jardin — Fri, 12 Oct 2012 18:38:45 +0000

Marijuana is currently classified in the US as a Schedule I controlled substance: no medically accepted use, despite ample evidence to the contrary.

Ira Flatow's syndicated public radio program Science Friday has a segment out about next week's planned arguments to a federal appeals court by pro-pot advocacy org Americans for Safe Access, in hopes of relaxing federal restrictions.

The radio segment includes UCSF oncologist Donald Abrams, who speaks about the evidence on the medical benefits of pot.

Disclosure: I'm a cancer patient, I use pot for medical purposes, and I'm strongly in favor of legalization and easier access for seriously ill people (and honestly, who cares, everyone else too).

HT: @milesobrien

City of Oakland sues to prevent closure of embattled medical marijuana dispensary

Xeni Jardin — Fri, 12 Oct 2012 18:34:00 +0000

The NYT reports on a lawsuit filed by the City of Oakland in federal court to prevent the Department of Justice from seizing property leased to Harborside Health Center. Previous posts on Boing Boing about the facility here and here.

US crackdown on medical marijuana threatens a dad's search to halt son's epilepsy

Xeni Jardin — Mon, 17 Sep 2012 20:52:17 +0000

In the Los Angeles Times, a really great feature about how the Obama administration's assault on medical marijuana dispensaries threatens one father's search for cannabidiol, which has helped reduce the severity and frequency of his 6-year-old son's seizures from Dravet syndrome.

Gentleman steals pot from police station because "that bud smelled so good"

Xeni Jardin — Wed, 15 Aug 2012 15:12:05 +0000

David Allan Thompson, 27, was arrested for ripping off a bag of marijuana seized as evidence from the Charleroi Regional police department, in Pennsylvania. Mr. Thompson had gone to the police station on his own volition, according to reports, to "help out" cops. "Police said that back at the station, Thompson apologized repeatedly, telling police, 'I just couldn’t help myself. That bud smelled so good.' He also reportedly told police he couldn’t believe he was in trouble for 'taking a little bit of weed,' especially since he had stopped by to give them information." (MSNBC)

Down in Smoke: through comics, Susie Cagle chronicles the DEA raids on medical marijuana facilities in California

Xeni Jardin — Fri, 10 Aug 2012 15:49:45 +0000

At Cartoon Movement, "graphic journalist" Susie Cagle (Twitter) surveys the impact of recent DEA raids of medical marijuana centers, and legal attacks against Harborside and the like, in 'Down In Smoke'. The work includes sound clips, which is brilliant.

Oakland, California. Ground zero for a medical marijuana fight between states and the federal government that has only been heating up. Incorporating real audio from activists, Cagle portrays what "feels like class war" as local growers, patients and city officials fight against losing their jobs, medicine, and tax revenue.

The whole thing is here, and it's fantastic. Susie has done some of the best reporting I've seen of the Occupy movement and related protests in America—she's been jailed and injured for it. The fact that her reporting is focused through the medium of comics is just so innovative and cool. She takes true risks for her reporting, and what comes out of it is insightful, informative, and funny. I just love her work.

Pot legalization is on the ballot in three US states. What happens when one state says yes to weed?

Xeni Jardin — Fri, 27 Jul 2012 01:31:35 +0000

This November, voters in three US states—Colorado, Washington, and Oregon—will be able to vote on ballot measures that would legalize marijuana, period.

Not just for medicinal purposes, but for recreational purposes, too.

At Rolling Stone, a smart blog post by Julian Brookes on what happens when the first state says "yes" to weed.

When that happens, expect one of two things – either: the federal government, in deference to democratic principles, will decline to enforce its ban on marijuana, creating space for the state to be a "laboratory of democracy," working out its new policy by trial and error, learning as it goes, creating a trove of hard-earned lessons to guide the states that (inevitably) will follow; or: the federal government will bide its time and then come down hard, busting growers and retailers, seizing land and property (or, just as effective, threatening to), going after banks that serve pot business, and doing whatever else it takes to shut down the state's legalization push.
True, the feds would be within their rights to crack down. A state can legalize all it wants, but – incredibly – happy-go-lucky marijuana will still be a Schedule I drug, right up there on the federal shit list with brain melters and organ fryers like Heroin, Cocaine, and PCP. And, no, this isn't some quaint, disregarded artifact from olden times: A personal stash can get you a year in federal prison, a single plant up to five.

Read the rest.

A rant on marijuana dispensaries, and the quest for a living wage in LA

Xeni Jardin — Thu, 26 Jul 2012 16:15:34 +0000

Over at Dangerous Minds, Richard Metzger has an epic rant in response to a recent Los Angeles City Council vote to close medical cannabis dispensaries in the city (there are many). I use pot to help with the side effects of cancer treatment. I didn't use pot before I was diagnosed with cancer. The City Council's suggestion that "seriously ill" people like me should just "grow their own" is very let-them-eat-cake-y. Cancer patients weak and nauseous from chemo can barely make a ham sandwich, let alone cultivate medicinal herb in the quantity and quality required to be useful. They might as well ask us to synthesize our own chemotherapy drugs. Metzger isn't a cancer patient, but he has great arguments here. Snip:

I live in an area of the city near the so dubbed “Green Mile,” a stretch known for its numerous, highly visible cannabis dispensaries. Within walking distance, there are approximately twelve dispensaries. Take a slightly longer walk and that number rises at least threefold.
By contrast, there are but two Starbucks, one McDonald’s, One Burger King, one KFC, one Jack in a Box, two Subways, two 7-Eleven stores and no Carl Jrs. It goes without saying that these are minimum wage jobs, whereas the average wage at a pot dispensary is $20 per hour.
In five years of living in this part of Los Angeles, I’ve seen every single one of these places pop up and what changes the neighborhood has gone through in that same period of time. Not only that, I have PERSONALLY visited almost all of them.
Here’s what I’ve noticed:
Since the recession, there have been very, very few new retail businesses that have opened along the “Green Mile” other than pot dispensaries. A few things, but not many. In every case, they are inhabiting real estate that was not being used, and that had not been used in some time. A lot of these previously empty buildings got much needed paint jobs, let’s just say, and many long empty buildings were rehabilitated by the dispensary owners.
I have seen no appreciable rise or fall in the neighborhood crime rate and I am sure the local police would probably agree. There is no discernible difference. No change. None.

More: Dangerous Minds | The Green Mile: A perspective from deep in LA’s busiest pot district on the weed ban vote

New York Governor asks to decriminalize possession of pot in public view

Mark Frauenfelder — Mon, 04 Jun 2012 16:20:23 +0000

New York Governor Andrew M. Cuomo is asking legislators to decriminalize possession of small amounts of marijuana in public view. New York City Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg is fighting back because he believes that destroying the job prospects of 50,000 people a year (mainly young black and Latino men) benefits society, and wants continue to use a sneaky police tactic to arrest them.

In New York, the Legislature in 1977 reduced the penalty for possession of 25 grams or less of marijuana to a violation, which carries a maximum fine of $100 for first-time offenders.

But it remains a misdemeanor if the marijuana is in public view or is being smoked in public, and lawmakers and drug-reform advocates have argued that the misdemeanor charge is often unfairly applied to suspects who did not have marijuana in public view until the police stopped them and told them to empty their pockets.

“Now it’s in public view,” Professor Levine said. “If you go by the police reports, all around New York City, there are people standing around with their palms outstretched with a bit of marijuana in them.”

From 2002 to 2011, New York City recorded 400,000 low-level marijuana arrests, according to his analysis. That represented more arrests than under Mr. Bloomberg’s three predecessors put together — a period of 24 years. Most of those arrested have been young black and Hispanic men, and most had no prior criminal convictions.

Cuomo Seeks Cut in Frisk Arrests

Lego marijuana art show

Mark Frauenfelder — Fri, 18 May 2012 17:45:00 +0000

The infamous art collective / brand, LA-GO has a show at Known Gallery in LA opening on May 26. It's called Legolize it, and features marijuana plants made from plastic hobby construction bricks.

In the NYT, a judge who has cancer argues for the legalization of medical marijuana

Xeni Jardin — Thu, 17 May 2012 17:28:56 +0000

Admittedly, I am biased, but New York state supreme court judge Gustin L. Reichbach speaks for me when he writes in a New York Times op-ed today that medical marijuana "is not a law-and-order issue; it is a medical and a human rights issue."

Like me, justice Reichbach has cancer. He has pancreatic cancer, and a prognosis that involves a short window of survival, and great pain and suffering during treatment.

"Medical science has not yet found a cure," he writes, "but it is barbaric to deny us access to one substance that has proved to ameliorate our suffering."

Read it and demand change: A Judge’s Plea for Medical Marijuana.

(NYT, via Clayton Cubitt)

Student abandoned in cell for 5 days by DEA gets apology but wants $20 million

Xeni Jardin — Thu, 03 May 2012 21:14:07 +0000

Mark blogged yesterday about Daniel Chong, a 23-year-old college student in San Diego who was detained by the Drug Enforcement Administration on "420 day" without charges, then abandoned in a holding cell for 5 days with no food or water. He drank his own urine in an effort to stave off fatal dehydration.

Today, he received an apology from the DEA. The Associated Press reports that "San Diego Acting Special Agent-In-Charge William R. Sherman said in a statement that he was troubled by the treatment of Daniel Chong and extended his 'deepest apologies' to him."

Chong's attorney says that's not enough. They intend to sue for $20 million. From the Los Angeles Times:

Chong, the agency said, was "accidentally left in one of the cells." He told NBC San Diego he kicked the door "many, many times" in a futile attempt to get agents' attention.
When they finally found Chong, he was taken to Sharp Memorial Hospital, where he spent five days. Iredale said Chong, who was close to kidney failure and had trouble breathing, spent three of those days in the intensive-care unit. Chong also suffered hallucinations and "thought he was going insane," Iredale said. Chong told NBC San Diego he tried to kill himself by breaking his glasses and cutting his wrists.
"I didn't care if I died," he told the station. "I was completely insane."

Regarding the hallucinations, Reuters reports that they were anime-themed at times. His lawyer says he "had Japanese cartoon characters telling him where to find water."

More coverage at the San Diego Union-Tribune, and the local San Diego NBC affiliate, and the local Fox News affiliate. There's a cellphone video of a press conference with Chong from yesterday, but the audio isn't great.

(Photo: Daniel Chong. Credit: K.C. Alfred / San Diego Union-Tribune)

TOM THE DANCING BUG: Medical Marijuana - Gateway Drug!

Ruben Bolling — Wed, 02 May 2012 16:30:23 +0000

IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT: Join Tom the Dancing Bug's new exclusive INNER HIVE and get exclusive access, stuff, and other stuff! Click HERE for information, on the Tom the Dancing Bug website. Do this!

To do in California May 19-22: fight for medical marijuana

Xeni Jardin — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 17:24:42 +0000

Now that you know my thoughts on medical cannabis for cancer patients, you'll understand why I think this is a noble cause. Patients gathering in Sacramento, May 19-22. On Monday May 21, public demonstration at the state capitol.

My Dinner with Marijuana: chemo, cannabis, and haute cuisine

Xeni Jardin — Mon, 23 Apr 2012 14:30:24 +0000

Photo: Xeni Jardin

I went to a "cannabis dinner" in a loft in downtown Los Angeles on a day of great significance for potheads: 4/20. I first heard about these speakeasy gatherings from an LA Times article by Jonathan Gold. They're hosted by a zany, playful computer science major turned Hollywood film sales rep turned restauranteur, Nguyen Tran. He runs a restaurant called Starry Kitchen with his wife and foodie partner, chef Thi Tran. Together with LA-based French chef Laurent Quenioux, they put on this now-not-so-secret cannabis dinner. There were about 100 people in attendance, plus a few news crews who shot video.

The food was beautiful. And yes: I got a little high.

Photo: Karen Marcelo

Photo: Chad Scira

The menu was adventurous. Chinese herbs, with the other herb, were put to imaginative use. Mostly, cannabis appeared in the form of a raw garnish, or infused into accompaniments like a sweet, melt-in-your-mouth coconut oil based "soil" snuggled up next to a creamy panna cotta for dessert. A cannabis-epazote pesto was memorable with monkfish. Pot has a strong flavor and aroma. But it didn't overpower here, either because of the modest quantities used, or because of how the chefs worked with it.

Photo: Chad Scira

Mr. Tran (above) was in character as alter-ego "Commodore Booty McHooters." He walked around the kitchen before dinner was served, singing songs as "Chef" from South Park. He has been known to dress up as a tauntaun from The Empire Strikes Back, or walk around wearing sandwich boards urging people to eat his balls (crispy fried green tofu balls, and well worth eating).

Photo: Xeni Jardin

"If you get high, it's just the tarragon talking," he said.

The organizers weren't too keen on answering questions about the legalities of serving cannabis dinners. Marijuana laws are a tangled, fuzzy mess in Los Angeles anyway; as confused and contradictory as a Cheech and Chong monologue. But the fact that your ticket for the evening bought you a "Lionel Richie Walking Tour (* followed by a totally optional dinner afterwards)" was telling. And funny.

Photo: Xeni Jardin

As I've been reading in Elise McDonough's The High Times Cookbook, you really can do a lot with cannabis in cooking. You can prepare dishes using cannabis flowers, leaves, or hash; some like to extract juice from the raw plant.

Stems and leaves slow-cooked in ghee for hours yield that magical and coveted golden oil with which one prepares the more psychoactive and medically potent edibles: brownies, cookies, caramels. You can even brew cocktails with pot. They served hemp beer with dinner. People seemed to enjoy it a lot. I don't drink, but it smelled lovely.

Photo: Xeni Jardin

It's such a pretty little plant. I love how certain strains smell like alpine forests, and others smell like exotic spices. Why is it illegal? So dumb. Tran told me they obtained the fresh leaves from a nearby grower.

Photo: Xeni Jardin

My feelings about marijuana have changed a lot since I was diagnosed with cancer. And specifically, since I started chemotherapy in January. For me, medical cannabis has been an important part of getting through chemo. My oncologist wrote a recommendation letter for me, and I have a card that makes it legal for me to purchase pot.

It helps me more than many of the pharmaceuticals my cancer docs prescribe for chemo side effects. It eases nausea and stops vomiting, it helps me sleep when the steroids accompanying chemo keep me up, it acts as a gentle analgesic against the excruciating bone pain that certain chemo drugs bring, and it stimulates appetite in those awful days after infusions when food is repulsive.

These things are important. If you can't eat or sleep, your body can't heal in time to be strong enough for the next infusion.

Photo: Karen Marcelo

Earlier on the same day of the cannabis dinner, I'd gone in for an MRI to see how the chemo had progressed in shrinking my tumor. Medical imaging is a stressful thing when you have cancer, because of the ever-present fear that a scan may reveal very bad news. MRIs in particular are loud and claustrophobia-triggering for many people, including me.

I prepared an by taking a nice big bite of a chocolate-chip pot cookie hour before the scan. So I wouldn't panic inside, and so the technician could capture a good image of my insides.

That's me, in the photo: I'm high in an MRI.

Photo: Xeni Jardin

Pot really is a cancer patient's best friend. Edibles are often best for us, because of how the liver metabolizes the active compounds, and how long they tend to last with this ingestion method. The idea of cannabis being connected to the enjoyment of food meant something to me that it probably did not for anyone else at the dinner table that night. I was happy to be there. But one week after my 8th chemo infusion, I was overjoyed just to be able to taste food again, and to be able to keep it down.

Photo: Karen Marcelo

Chemo wrecks your sense of taste. Some flavors become invisible, others taste weird or disgusting. Everything became metallic and dulled for me at various points in the treatment cycles. But this was a night of celebration. At last! My taste buds were working, and the buds were working on my taste, if you know what I mean.

Photo: Xeni Jardin

My San Francisco-based friend Karen Marcelo from SRL was my date that day for both the medical imaging and the dinner.

"They should have these in San Francisco," she said of the evening, and thought it "uniquely subversive."

This, from a woman who knows an awful lot about being subversive. Nguyen's exuberant high weirdness reminded her of Chicken John. Karen's snapshots of the evening are here.

Tran hinted that this may be the last cannabis dinner for a while. He and his co-conspirators do not want to be typecast as "the pot chefs." Whatever their next pop-up gathering ends up being, even if it's not weed-themed, I'm sure it will be yummy and fun. And I hope what they've done inspires others to explore.

Photo: Karen Marcelo

[Special thanks to Alex Williams, and to Karen, AJ, and Theresa.]

Photo: Xeni Jardin

Food critic Jonathan Gold attends a 9-course marijuana dinner

Xeni Jardin — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 19:49:54 +0000

Pulitzer-winning food critic Jonathan Gold, who recently departed the L.A. Weekly to join the Los Angeles Times, writes about his experience attending a nine-course "Marijuana and Chinese Herbs" dinner hosted by serial restauranteur Nguyen Tran and prepared by chef Laurent Quenioux. High Times columnist Elise McDonough, author of the newly-released "The Official High Times Cannabis Cookbook" (look for my Boing Boing review soon!) was among those in attendance. Snip from Gold's review:

When Nguyen Tran emailed to tell me about an extravaganza he was setting up at an acquaintance's house, a special herb dinner in which each of the many courses would involve fresh marijuana, I did not necessarily beg to be included in the feast. The first time I met Tran, on a social-media panel somewhere, he happened to be wearing a banana suit, and he has been known to show up to food events dressed as a tauntaun from "The Empire Strikes Back." I like his Starry Kitchen, a pan-Asian lunchroom in a downtown office-building food court, and I admire the running pop-up restaurant he mounts with chef Laurent Quenioux. But the notion of an “herb” dinner wasn't especially my thing. The last time I had sampled this particular herb was many years ago, in the course of reporting a story on Snoop Dogg and his 15 pit bulls, and its culinary uses were not apparent even back then.

Read the rest here.

(Photo: Rick Loomis/Los Angeles Times, April 2, 2012: Marijuana leaves are laid out in preparation for one of several courses.)

Newt Gingrich's pro-medical marijuana letter to Journal of the American Medical Ass'n., 1982

Xeni Jardin — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 18:27:24 +0000

"On Sept 16, 1981, Representative Stewart McKinney and I introduced legislation designed to end bureaucratic interference in the use of marijuana as a medicant. We believe licensed physicians are competent to employ marijuana, and patients have a right to obtain marijuana legally, under medical supervision, from a regulated source." Newt Gingrich, hypocritical piece of shit, was pro-medical-cannabis "way back before he wanted to behead people and cut off their hands for possessing it," notes Dangerous Minds.

Richard Branson: It’s time to end the failed war on drugs

Xeni Jardin — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 18:14:00 +0000

"Just as prohibition of alcohol failed in the United States in the 1920s, the war on drugs has failed globally. Over the past 50 years, more than $1 trillion has been spent fighting this battle, and all we have to show for it is increased drug use, overflowing jails, billions of pounds and dollars of taxpayers’ money wasted, and thriving crime syndicates."—Virgin CEO Richard Branson, calling for an end to the "war on drugs."

Why the raw cannabis juicing trend may not be all it's juiced up to be

Xeni Jardin — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 02:03:44 +0000

Earlier today, I posted a quick link to an LA Weekly item about a new round of media attention devoted to Dr. William Courtney, and his research on juicing cannabis for health benefits.

The tl;dr of his idea: with raw cannabis juice, you don't get high, but you do get various health benefits.

Hmmm. I was curious about the largely uncritical internet coverage I was seeing, and wondered about the science—so I asked Michael Backes and Amy Robertson of Abatin Wellness Center of Sacramento what they thought. Abatin is a medical marijuana collective you may have heard of because of its link to MS sufferer and med-can advocate Montel Williams; they're also very legit and science-oriented, and Backes has a long history in technology and the sciences. The tl;dr of their response is: it's not quite that simple, and cannabis juicing could even pose some risks for certain patients. "The raw plants have substances to discourage critters from eating them that can cause allergic reactions in some," explains Robertson, "And can you imagine how unpleasant this would taste?"

"The throat irritation is based on the fact that the stems of cannabis have sharp little hairs," explains Backes. "Typically, this wouldn't be a problem for those juicing the plant, but make chewing on a cannabis stems a no-no."

More below.

And, a disclosure: the topic is of personal interest to me because I was recently diagnosed with breast cancer and I'm undergoing chemotherapy. Chemo sucks, and I have learned that medical cannabis is a very effective aid for related side effects—but not all delivery methods are equally helpful.

From Michael Backes of Abatin Wellness Center:

Dr. William Courtney has been researching juicing cannabis for several years. The young woman in the video, Kristen, is his wife. Courtney makes some very plausible points, but his claims really do need to be subjected to randomized, controlled clinical trials.
Courtney's claim that raw cannabis is not psychoactive is true, but only for pristine, fresh cannabis. Disturb the gland heads on a living cannabis plant of a strain that contains THC and the process of converting its non-psychoactive THCA to psychoactive THC begins, albeit slowly.
There are a few cannabis strains that contain another cannabinoid called cannabidiol (CBD). CBD is not psychoactive, whether in its raw acidic state (CBDA) or its neutral state (CBD). But CBDA strains often contain THCA, too. Around twenty strains of cannabis produced in California have been found to contain CBD, while the number of THC strains is believed to exceed three hundred.
CBD is of great research interest, since it exhibits dozens of very promising medicinal effects ranging from anti-tumor activity to its potential to control some forms of diabetes. And CBD exhibits almost zero toxicity.
The primary advantage of raw fresh cannabis is found in its predominance of THCA and its lack of psychoactive THC.
But... the medical benefits of large doses of acidic cannabinoids have not been subjected to controlled clinical trials. The evidence at this point is anecdotal. And if someone is not harvesting the cannabis fresh and consuming it immediately, then there is a risk of significant THC intoxication.
And one more point. As with any cultivated plant, cannabis can harbor a wide range of microbes and some can be pathogenic. The risk of pathogen exposure from raw fresh cannabis is small, but anyone with a compromised immune system should be very careful.

Marijuana is the new Wheatgrass

Xeni Jardin — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 20:36:26 +0000

Drink your cannabis, say some raw-pot advocates. It won't get you high, but it's good for you. I'm skeptical, but I know one thing: unless you're growing your own, it is likely not good for your wallet.

Snoop Dogg portrait in marijuana by artist Jason Mecier

Xeni Jardin — Sun, 09 Oct 2011 22:32:04 +0000

Artist Jason Mecier has used candy, food, pills and the actual garbage of actual celebrities to construct celebrity portraits. This new Snoop Dogg portrait is made of marijuana joints, marijuana leaves and stems, and what looks to be hashish. The artist information says it's valued at $1,500. I wonder if it's legal to buy this thing without a medical marijuana permit? And what about the hash? I am not a lawyer, but I invite serious responses from persons who are, in the comments.

This work will be on display and featured in the new book La Luz de Jesus 25, as part of the 25th Anniversary of La Luz de Jesus Gallery.