"Stoner Jesus Bible Study is the creation of Deb Button, a 40-something mother of two who had never considered smoking pot until last year..."

"... when Colorado became the first state to legalize recreational marijuana for adults over 21. 'I was majorly conservative,' said Button, who was wearing a navy cardigan and jeans cuffed at the calf. Earlier this year, while going through a divorce, she’d tried an edible on a friend’s advice. This had proved a revelation. 'I expected to see unicorns,' Button said. 'But when I started smoking I just got so connected to God.' Joye was the only person to show up when Button posted a listing on Craigslist for Stoner Jesus Bible Study; she arrived to find Button 'so baked out of her head she forgot that she’d invited me over.' They talked for four hours."

From a New York Magazine article titled "Ambling Through America’s Most Stoned Suburbs."

Ohio votes against legalizing marijuana.

The ballot measure fails, CNN reports.

Yesterday, we talked about the unusual approach that was proposed: "Is there something quite different about the Ohio experiment in marijuana legalization — something wrong?"

AND: Also on this obscure election day, Kentucky elects a Republican governor for only the second time in four decades.

Is there something quite different about the Ohio experiment in marijuana legalization — something wrong?

If the ballot initiative wins:

Issue 3 expressly states that commercial cultivation of marijuana in Ohio will be limited to 10 separate properties, whose addresses have already been determined. And just who owns the land that will be granted exclusive rights to what is projected to be a billion dollar industry? The same investment groups, organized by James, that are financing the ResponsibleOhio campaign to legalize marijuana in the state....

ResponsibleOhio projects that there will be an estimated 300 employees per facility, which is astronomical when compared with Colorado commercial growers like Medicine Man, which operates one of the state’s largest cultivation centers—40,000 square feet—and needs only 32 employees to run it. James says that Ohio’s cultivation centers will be up to 300,000 square feet. The imagery of Smithsonian-size grow-houses and multibillion-dollar sales plays into the Big Cannabis narrative that marijuana prohibitionists (and now some legalizers) have rallied around....

No matter what happens, with recreational marijuana having already proved itself as an endeavor worthy of Big Business attention, it’s certain that we’re going to see large influxes of cash into future campaigns by investors looking for a stake in the coming green rush.

Promoting a business but only if it's small makes little sense. But is there something wrong with designating the 10 properties? If producing marijuana is to be legal, the state will have to control it, and limiting the production to 10 big places instead of allowing lots of little places to operate is perhaps a creditable idea about how to keep tabs on this business. Doesn't it make sense to want fewer bigger grow houses? I'm just asking questions. I don't have a policy position here.

Did you hear Ted Cruz enthuse about marijuana?

In last night's debate, Cruz said he might not be the guy you'd pick "to grab a beer with," though he'd be good at driving you home safely. Later, giving Cruz a few more seconds for something, the moderator Carl Quinanilla wove in the beer reference — "Before we go to break, we're clearly not having that beer you mentioned..." — and Cruz said, "Then I'll buy you a tequila... Or, even some famous Colorado brownies."

What is Ted Cruz's position on marijuana anyway?

At the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Maryland [Feb. 26, 2015], Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) endorsed marijuana federalism during an exchange with Fox News talk show host Sean Hannity. "Look," Cruz said. "I actually think this is a great embodiment of what Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis called 'the laboratories of democracy.' If the citizens of Colorado decide they want to go down that road, that's their prerogative. I personally don't agree with it, but that's their right."

But, about a year before that, at a Texas Public Policy Foundation conference, Cruz had criticized Obama for announcing that his administration wouldn't prosecute certain crimes. His criticism seemed to be mostly about not enforcing the laws that remain on the books:

You can go to Congress. You can get a conversation. You could get Democrats and Republicans who would say, "We ought to change our drug policy in some way," and you could have a real conversation. You could have hearings. You could look at the problem. You could discuss commonsense changes that maybe should happen or shouldn't happen. This president didn't do that. He just said, "The laws say one thing"—and mind you, these are criminal laws; these are laws that say if you do X, Y, and Z, you will go to prison. The president announced, "No, you won't."

That's not inconsistent with saying the states can serve as laboratories, experimenting with different approaches to decriminalizing and regulating marijuana. I do see a problem with saying that citizens of a state, like Colorado, if they want to do this kind of policy experiment, have the "prerogative." A "prerogative" is "A prior, exclusive, or peculiar right or privilege." (OED definition.)

The federal law is the supreme law. Even though the President may decide to refrain from enforcing it, he's the one with the prerogative. It's a word used to refer to the power of kings. It speaks of priority. The states do not have that as long as the Controlled Substances Act outlaws marijuana. They're proceeding at the forbearance of the federal government.

Now, Cruz might be saying that, as President, he too would forbear, but would he work to change the federal law so that we can overcome the disorder of having the people in some of the states deeply involved in the commission of federal crimes?

ADDED: "Sanders proposes nixing marijuana from federal list of dangerous drugs."

I shouldn't have...

... left those "Weedsburg" photographs at the top of the blog for so long.

Creates the wrong impression.

Those were the recent photographs I had... after a drive and a long walk to look at fall foliage. You might think fall foliage is photogenic, but what looks pretty in person may come out of your camera looking rather dull. The shop — where they didn't mind my taking pictures — was, by contrast, really interesting.

Leaves versus leaves, and marijuana won, being more photographable.

But I'm sorry to create the wrong impression. I'm not a big marijuana legalization advocate, though I did change my position on the subject fairly recently, because I think substance-boosted disinhibition is important, though overdone.

ADDED: I changed my mind about legalization in March 2015 as a result of reading something written by Paul Johnson about Henrik Ibsen:

There was one aspect of Ibsen’s vanity which verged on the ludicrous... He had a lifelong passion for medals and orders. In fact, he went to embarrassing lengths to get them...

[T]here is ample evidence for Ibsen’s passion since he insisted on displaying his growing galaxy of stars on every possible occasion. As early as 1878 he is reported to have worn all of them, including one like a dog-collar round his neck, at a club dinner. The Swedish painter Georg Pauli came across Ibsen sporting his medals (not the ribbons alone but the actual stars) in a Rome street. At times he seems to have put them on virtually every evening. He defended his practice by saying that, in the presence of ‘younger friends’, it ‘reminds me that I need to keep within certain limits.’ All the same, people who had invited him to dinner were always relieved when he arrived without them, as they attracted smiles and even open laughter as the wine circulated....

In the comments, back in March, John Stodder said: "I like Paul Johnson. I like Ibsen. I like legalizing marijuana. I like Ann Althouse. However, I do not understand the connection. I feel like I've been outrebounded!"

I said — after laughing at "outrebounded" (an inside joke back then) — "Here's a clue: freedom and democracy depend on our disinhibition; we need to be able to laugh at authority."

Another Weedsburg Café...

... in case you can't get enough.



Oh, and here's some marijuana news: "Congressional action prohibits federal drug enforcers from shutting medical marijuana dispensaries that comply with state law, a federal judge in San Francisco ruled Monday in a potentially precedent-setting case.":

The decision by U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer is the first known ruling by a federal judge to protect pot dispensaries under a budget amendment approved by Congress in December 2014 and in effect through this December, when backers plan to renew it for another year. It bars the Justice Department from spending any money to prevent California and other states from “implementing their own state laws” that authorize the medical use of marijuana.

At the Weedsburg Café...

... you write about whatever you want (not that you can buy everything you might want).