By James B. Kelleher and Cynthia Johnston (Reuters) An 87-year-old Indiana man was arraigned on drug charges in federal court in Detroit on Monday after police found 228 pounds of cocaine worth an estimated $2.9 million in his pickup following a routine traffic stop. via Indiana man, 87, nabbed with 228 pounds of cocaine, police say [...]

(WSJ) More than 10,000 petitions have poured in since the new initiative was announced last month in a bid to bring government closer to the people. And issues like massive federal deficits, two wars and high unemployment don’t appear to be on the people’s minds. The Top Ten Petitions Legalize and regulate marijuana in a [...]

By Associated Press (Washington Post) A new study released Tuesday showed that when hundreds of medical marijuana dispensaries were closed last year in Los Angeles crime rates rose in surrounding neighborhoods, challenging claims made by law enforcement agencies that the storefronts are magnets for crime. The report by the nonprofit RAND Corp. reviewed crime reports [...]

(Wikipedia) Rat Park was a study into drug addiction conducted in the late 1970s and published in 1980, by Canadian psychologist Bruce K. Alexander and his colleagues at Simon Fraser University in British Columbia, Canada. Alexander’s hypothesis was that drugs do not cause addiction, and that the apparent addiction to opiate drugs commonly observed in [...]

A high-ranking Rhode Island lawmaker who criticized the Legislature by invoking the image of pot-smoking immigrants is facing drug charges in Connecticut. Police in East Haven, Conn., say East Greenwich Republican Robert Watson, the House Minority Leader, was stopped at a police checkpoint Friday and charged with possession of marijuana and drug paraphernalia and driving [...]

By Russ Belville (Examiner) Apparently the National Cancer Institute got a talking to from someone, because now that page has been scrubbed of any reference to the direct antitumoral effects of cannabis. via National Cancer Institute scrubs “anti-tumoral effect” of cannabinoids from webs – Portland medical marijuana dispensaries | Examiner.com.

By Michelle Alexan­der (Colorlines) The U.S. Bureau of Justice estimated that as of 2008, there were over 846,000 black men in prison, making up 40.2 percent of all inmates in the system. But in a recent talk, noted author Michelle Alexander put those numbers in grave historical perspective. “More African American men are in prison [...]

By Dan Rather (Huffington Post) Jorge Castañeda, who served as foreign minister under Mexican president Felipe Calderon’s predecessor and now teaches at New York University, thinks the answer is to legalize drugs in Mexico and the United States — starting with marijuana. “Legalization of drugs doesn’t seem to me to be a terribly radical proposal,” [...]

The Washington Post reported Thursday that the supervisor — who has been suspended — has also been drug tested, though the FAA wouldn’t confirm or deny the testing. The supervisor was on duty alone that night and the National Transportation Safety Board has said that the supervisor told investigators that he was working his fourth [...]

(Combined Wire Services) David Charles Schubert, 47, the Las Vegas district attorney who helped prosecute Paris Hilton and Bruno Mars on separate drug charges in 2010, was arrested and booked into jail Saturday on a charge of possession of cocaine, according to jail records.  According to the Las Vegas Review-Journal, Schubert allegedly bought crack cocaine from a [...]