By Ray Downs

Kholood Eid

Jeff Mizanskey has served more than twenty years in prison for a nonviolent marijuana conviction.

 
Efforts to release Jeff Mizanskey, the only man in Missouri serving a life-without-parole sentence for a nonviolent marijuana charge, are continuing this month with help from Show-Me Cannabis and Change.org.
Show-Me Cannabis has bought billboard space on I-70 near Kansas City (and near Sedalia, where Mizanskey was arrested). The billboard features a photo of Mizanskey and says: “Life without parole for a non-violent pot crime? It’s time we fix our unjust cannabis laws.”
 
Full Article:
http://blogs.riverfronttimes.com/dailyrft/2014/04/free_jeff_mizanskey_efforts_co.php

by MANUEL RUEDA @ThisIsFusion

 
 
 
Vice has come up with a new gonzo stunt to attract some eyeballs.
This time a Vice correspondent managed to casually smoke a joint as he interviewed the president of Uruguay.
The scene, which would probably be impossible to replicate with the president of any other country, is part of a trailer for Vice´s upcoming documentary on the legalization of weed in Uruguay.
 
Full Article & Video:
http://fusion.net/leadership/story/vice-reporter-smokes-joint-president-uruguay-591723

Paula Goodyer

Protein source: humble hemp seeds won’t make you stoned. Photo: Alasdair Thomson
 
Food regulation in Australia can be baffling sometimes. It’s so easy to walk into a supermarket and fill your trolley with foods that can potentially undermine your health like litres of soft drink and cheap doughnuts. Yet if you want to buy hemp seed, a source of vitamins and minerals and a rich source of protein and healthy omega-3 fat, it’s still officially banned for use as a food.
However, as the man behind the counter in a health food store selling $12 packets of hemp seed explained to me recently, he was legally able to sell  me the product providing I only used it for non food purposes – as a body scrub perhaps- and didn’t accidentally sprinkle some on my muesli.
 
Full Article:
http://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/diet-and-fitness/blogs/chew-on-this/let-them-eat-hemp-20140411-36gz5.html

By Steve Trevelise

John Moore, Getty Images
 

Go vote in the poll!

 
Full Article and Poll:
http://nj1015.com/should-convicted-marijuana-users-be-pardoned-if-the-drug-becomes-legal-poll/
 
 
 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9eIiG-QHjMw#action=share
 
Outspoken marijuana supporter Wiz Khalifavisited the Arsenio Hall Show last night to make s’mores infused with weed.
Hall seems a bit spaced out with glazed-over eyes before introducing Wiz, and suggests that his glaucoma medicine “makes him awful hungry.”
 
Full Article:
http://blog.sfgate.com/smellthetruth/2014/04/01/watch-wiz-khalifa-and-arsenio-hall-make-weed-munchies/

BY Debra Borchardt
 
NEW YORK (TheStreet) — The marijuana industry may have already added over 175,000 jobs and that’s just the beginning. First, there are very few statistics on marijuana industry jobs. Hardly any states are tracking it and even the web sites that advertise for marijuana jobs don’t have any information and didn’t return calls.
So here’s how I came up with this number. I went to each state to see if they published numbers on the amount of people licensed to be in the business. Then I counted up the states that allow dispensaries. I reviewed studies that tried to predict the number of jobs for their states budgets and reached out to several people in the industry. I round up for the numbers I have calculated to make the math easier.
 
Full Article:
http://www.thestreet.com/story/12659355/1/marijuana-jobs-higher-than-estimated.html

TULSA, OKLA. — On April 11, 2014, Oklahomans for Health will submit an application for petition with Oklahoma Secretary of State Glenn Coffee, which would let voters decide whether medical marijuana should be legalized in the Sooner State.

By Yesenia Robles The Denver Post

Bo Shaffer of Delta Tech talks about hemp plants with an attendee at the NoCo Hemp Expo in Windsor on Saturday. (Hyoung Chang, The Denver Post)
 
Farmers in Colorado and at least 10 other states are preparing to plant, cultivate and harvest hemp legally for the first time since the crop was outlawed more than 50 years ago.
As they learn about the crop’s preferences and the best methods to harvest the seeds for oil or the long stalks for fiber, they are sidestepping the first part of the process that remains unclear: getting the seed.
“It’s kind of a catch there right now,” said Ron Carleton, the state’s deputy commissioner of agriculture.
 
Full Article:
http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_25534762/small-seed-remains-large-hurdle-legal-hemp-farming
 

Katie Kelly Bell Contributor

One of the cellar’s hemp bricks.
 
Chateau Maris’ 9,000 square foot wine cellar in southern France maintains a stable temperature year-round without the use of air conditioning or heating; it’s sustainable, organic, all-natural, odorless, and acts as a carbon sink–able to absorb carbon dioxide for up to 25 years (according to a French study). The cellar isn’t made of brick, or stone, or some magical new ingredient, but rather it’s a simple combination of hemp, lime and wood. Three things, that’s it.
 
Full Article:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/katiebell/2014/04/09/another-reason-to-legalize-hemp-make-a-wine-cellar-with-it/

Written by: Ken Sharp

 
“George called me up and said he had to do this. Ravi Shankar had asked him to get involved because they were having trouble in Bangladesh. Years later Willie Nelson told me it was because the U.S. government made them cut down all their hemp plant. Hemp was their major crop; they used it for ropes and baskets and tents and everything else. When they cut that down their top soil blew away and they had this huge famine.”
 
Full Article:
http://www.rockcellarmagazine.com/2014/04/04/leon-russell-interview-a-life-journey/
 
Note:  In the 1970s, Independent Bangladesh signed an “anti-drug” agreement with the U.S., promising not to grow hemp. Since that time, they have suffered disease, starvation and decimation due to unrestrained flooding.