The eyes and ears of the national and international media will be focused on Colorado on New Year’s Day as the nation’s first modern state-licensed retail cannabis dispensaries will be open for business.
Late last week, state and local regulators signed off on the first wave of licensed cannabis businesses, with hundreds more applicants awaiting final approval. (See the actual state-approved marijuana business license via today’s CNN video here.)
The Colorado NORML website has posted a clock counting down the hours and minutes until the nation’s first recreational cannabis sales become reality here. They also provide a statewide list of licensed cannabis retailers, as well as a ‘consumers’ guide’ to complying with Colorado state law here.
Like I told USA Today in its coverage today, “The genie’s out of the bottle and it’s simply not going back in.”
I suffered a severe back injury, which resulted into three surgeries. The third being a bi-level fusion. It made my nerve damage in my left calf contract at any given moment. Sometimes they last for minutes at a time. Governor Christie has made it impossible for me and people who are dying from Aids and Cancer, to receive Medical Marijuana.
Means nothing to me. Marijuana should be legal for sale to anyone 18 or older. Celebrating the further mutations of meaning of “Freedom” that do not include “freedom” is, well sorry.
Anyone should be able to grow and own marijuana or cannabis plants. You should be 18 to smoke marijuana. Simple. But impossible as we beg for the govenment to take over marijuana.
Well I live in Minnesota and don’t think this very fair to the rest of us. There is no doubt the entire country will be getting access to marijuana from Colorado, which makes it more sensible to legalize it nationally.
Im traveling from Baltimore to Denver on New Years just to witness this incredible day. Needless to say, I am very excited
Awesome New Year.
I’m still waiting to hear that the federal dawgz (DEA, IRS, ATF, FBI) have been called off, you know, that law enforcement doesn’t come in and steal all your product and money via one of the aforementioned or similar.
That’s the green light for the rest of the world.
@Dave: The government taking over marijuana? Are the retail stores owned by the government? BTW, I agree that the legal age should be 18, but I didn’t write A-64. However, to put it in perspective, I waited decades of my life for marijuana to be legal, an 18 year old waiting three years isn’t asking too much. Also, 18 years old can acquire marijuana medically if I’m not mistaken. Don’t be such a Debby Downer!
It’s beautiful. For myself, an amputee cancer survivor, it represents hope for New York, and many other states.
Happy New Year Everyone. And Blessings to all of you at Norml and the people of Colorado for making this amazing day possiable. Our voices have been heard.
Everyone has the right to smoke cannabis, just as much as they have the rigght to drink alcohol and smoke tobacco.
I wanna see this in New York!
I’m jealous. Boom Baby.
It’s finally here. I wish I lived in Colorado. Just can’t help but think about those poor pot smokers setting in prison right now. It would be real hard to convince them that they did something wrong.
The kings new clothes just ain’t there and he’s walking around butt ass naked.
Meanwhile…the DEA is working on another plan with Eric Holder.
I just pray the discrimination will end for the rest of the country soon.
Hip hip hooray! Let the legal selling begin! I can smell the sweet aroma of freedom already! Can’t wait to take my vacation in Denver! Can’t wait to that that first legal hit!!! 2014–year of the legal bud!!!
Hemp hemp hooray!
My brother is in Colorado for the holidays and he doesn’t even smoke weed anymore. I told him, “You will now. The smoke has nowhere to go in Denver.” I don’t care if everyone obeys the new law and goes home and uses a vaporizer, this is going to be the largest cloud of marijuana the sky has ever seen. Astronauts on the I.S.S. will panic looking down, going “Oh no… They bombed DENVER!… Those BASTARDS! Oh… waitaminute, it’s cool; they just legalized marijuana.”
Seriously, the Denver Post oughtta take some panoramic views of the city with this huge cloud of smoke hovering against the backdrop of the mountains, and a trail of traffic trying to get in and celebrate.
..From Every Mountain Side…
Let Freedom Ring…
What about cannabis banking?
Linda Chavez’s syndicated column has made it from the big city papers a few days ago to the rural hills of central Pennsylvania.
“And banks, which are regulated by the feds, won’t set up accounts for businesses that are still considered criminal enterprises by federal statute.”
I thought there was a meeting with Obama’s minions at DOJ, IRS, etc. about banking, like wasn’t it between the governors of Washington and Colorado?
whole article
http://nypost.com/2013/12/29/legal-pot-colorados-bad-medicine/
[Editor’s note: While not yet public, much sooner than later, the federal government will be issuing even more instructing memos for federal technocrats regarding how to deal with states moving towards adopting legal cannabis commerce, notably with banking regulations. Ms. Chavez, who has a history of supporting cannabis decriminalization, comes off sounding like a former inside the beltway arch conservative stuck in one of America’s most progressive cities and college towns. Maybe she should…move away, rather than complain about matters that she will never be able to effect one iota and that a majority of Coloradans voted for.]
@ Paul,
The genie can go back in the bottle if it wants to, but someone’s eventually going to turn his house into a water bong, so it’s up to him.
@Dave, @Sean, I think the debate over under-age use would not exist if everyone was One-Hit literate. Alleged IQ deficits in “heavy users” who started before 18 might turn out, if honest research were conducted, to be caused by H-ot B-urning O-verdose M-onoxide joint smoking rather than by cannabis per se.
By shutting down mental functions to a degree, carbon monoxide and 4221 combustion toxins may play a temporary role in “relieving anxiety” in some individuals and thus become “addictive” (which the tabloid press then blames on the cannabis).
Should be a good next new South Park.
This democracy at work the feds wont touch this , but, please please please we must all be on our best behavior the eyes of the nation and world are watching……don’t screw it up
Hey, @HR, don’t leave me alone saying this, the one best way to NOT screw it up is to eliminate the 500-mg H-ot B-urning O-verdose M-onoxide joint (which causes health and behavior failures) by making and marketing 25-mg-serving-size utensils and making sure every kid has access to Dosage Titration. Are you good at handwork, manufacturing etc.?
McShane is a liar
The bankers won’t do business with the cannabis industry? Common since tells everybody that this is a new market with plenty of money to be made. The banks are the most public end of the corporate big boys.
Wonder if they know something, that we don’t.
OOOOO SHIT I AM IN TEAXS AND SO EXCITED. Being 57 yers of age been wateing since 14 years of age. It will come to Texas.
It’s about “frickin” time!!!
Now make alcohol illegal….
Countdown! Remember, we came in peace for all mankind.
@Editor
These memos are going to be interesting to watch.
Well, it happened. No big billowing clouds of smoke, no water bongs made out of genie bottles. Just a bunch of marijuana customers standing patiently in orderly lines waiting for their first legal purchase of marijuana.
In fact, the Denver Post reports that in average stores, journalists outnumbered customers 3 to 1 on this crisp Colorado morning. Not that customers were lacking, with at least 1 guy driving 20 hours straight to MOVE there. But marijuana refugees aside, I suppose all the press puts more pressure on THAT guy… to behave appropriately. Glad to read they have Iraq war veterans publically lining up for PTSD. What a great way to meet the press.
I notice every article im reading is quoting NORML these days. Congratulations to Paul snd Allen, official spokesmen for the marijuana legalization movement. I count more quotes than Tvert (mpp) and Ethan (dpa) combined. But were all in this together; so whose keeping score:-)
What a very happy new year indeed.Thanks NORML.
Just read the coverage from the Times. Thank you Oracle for asking the right questions and Paul for giving the right answers. The whitehouse is really between a large blunt and a drug testing program now! Wait… I’m getting a visual of the white house spokesman being rolled up like the cover of Cheech and Chong’s Up in Smoke.
The Times reports that the White House staff says “Get ready for Big Marijuana. Selling something addictive is the only way to make money.” …wow.
Lets pause for a moment to appreciate the bittersweet irony of this statement. Is the only angle that saprophagic drug testing prohibitionists have left is to compare the addictive properties of marijuana to tobacco and alcohol? This proves that the prohibitionist agenda has depended entirely on public ignorance on a grander scale than can be weighed with words. Just keep writing those memos to the DOJ President Obama… while you’re out sneaking a cigarette in the Rose Garden.
This just in: “bud”tenders in Denver now feel it’s “NORML” enough to tell their parents what they do for a living.
@julian: AMEN!
Seriously, you should see the new guy they’ve hired at my place. Constantly talks about “getting drunk”, how he frequently “drops 200 dollars at the bar and can’t remember it the next morning”, asks me if we’re allowed to go to the bar next door and, upon my telling him they probably won’t like it if we went there, say, before our shift or on our break, tells me “heck with that, I’m off the clock!” And tells me proudly that if they hadn’t given him New Years Eve and Day off, he’d “come in drunk anyway”. Always talks through this irritating @#$%-eating grin so half the time I can’t even understand him–unless he wants to talk about his drinking habits, then for some reason he finds the ability to enunciate.
You know what? I am SO GLAD he pissed in a cup before they hired him. I feel SO MUCH SAFER knowing that he doesn’t smoke marijuana on his days off. It’s SO MUCH BETTER to have someone who not only is a drunk but is so completely and proudly a drunk that he is likely to stumble into the job plowed off his ass, rather than all those much more competent potential hires they rejected for not being able to pass a drug test. I feel SO MUCH SAFER working here now that they drug test everyone and I’m working with incompetent drunks and little old 300 year old ladies who often don’t seem to know where they are let alone what to do and can take weeks to train.
I look forward to the inevitable day when the drug testing industry dies, but I’m getting to a point where that’s not enough. I want them investigated and brought up on charges of fraud. 100% accuracy, indeed.
well, glad to hear the good news
HR says:
“This democracy at work the feds wont touch this , but, please please please we must all be on our best behavior the eyes of the nation and world are watching……don’t screw it up”
Why do pot smokers have to compensate for being anything more or less than who they are?
The average joe -can be fast or slow,creative or boring,good looking or ugly.
but as soon as you put the pot label on the person,the scrutiny goes under the microscope. Instead of a person being quite and polite,under the *marijuana scrutiny microscope*,they are perceived as”withdrawn and sullen” If the average Joe is angry for any number of reasons he is simply being angry, but under the *marijuana scrutiny microscope* he appears as being-“agitated with extreme mood swings”,that kind of bullshit.Or instead of relaxing on the couch while being engaged in a video game,it becomes misconstrued as ‘he has couch-lock and is displaying anti-motivational syndrome.”
Those are the kind of attitudes and scapegoating, that you have to watch out for.
.
Unfortunately I was unable to go the first day. But no work tomorrow and I’ve never been so excited to go stand in line for something. Honestly after studying political science for three and a half years now, you can’t find one American political system professor who will tell you that gay marriage and marijuana legalization will not become federally legal, only.a matter of time I’m positive.
@Julian, thanks for your excellent research but I have two disagreements here:
(A) any time you even mention “blunt” remember to insert a warning that the “wRAPper” may contain addictive nicotine;
(B) talk nice to Obama and other leading suits, Assume Good Faith about his quitting the coffinnails, pretend to be a well-groomed, nicely dressed young lobbyist from Phill-Up More-Rich, but sell them on the idea of saving CDC-estimate $193-bil./year national economic cost of $igarette smoking by
(A) substituting cannabis for tobacco, and/or
(B) substituting long-drawtube one-hitter (25-mg servings) for anything wrapped in “rolling papers” (700 mg tobacco per $igarette).
Im so happy I don’t have words to . O’h hell 2014 jubilation
When is it coming to Ohio?
NOOOOOOOOOOO!MaryJane should only be sold to,used by persons or people 21 or older.
Thats my 2 cents.