News Brief

A ballot initiative needs 50% plus one vote to win, and California's "Tax Cannabis" measure isn't there yet. But the latest poll shows it eight points ahead, meaning only one out of five undecided voters needs to go for it to push it over the top.

In Mexico, the killing continues with no end in sight. Here's the latest rundown.

Canadian marijuana activist and entrepreneur Marc Emery has now begun a journey toward freedom that will most likely take him five years to complete. He pleaded guilty in Seattle Monday.

It looks like marijuana legalization is about as popular in Colorado as it is in California. A new Rasmussen poll has pot doing better than any of the state's gubernatorial or US Senate candidates.

In a bid to save money and be smarter on crime, Colorado has enacted a package of bills that, among other things, will reduce some drug use and possession sentences, allow greater judicial flexibility in sentencing, and keep some technical parole violators from being sent back to prison. But the package also increases some drug sales and manufacturing sentences.

Harm reductionists and drug reformers in Scotland have their work cut out for them, according to an annual national survey released this week. Support for marijuana legalization has declined dramatically, and attitudes toward heroin users are harsh, leading to declining public support for harm reduction.

Canadian "Prince of Pot" Marc Emery is now a resident of the American drug war gulag. He was extradited from Vancouver yesterday. Don't we all feel a bit safer now?

You can already legally possess up to 10 grams of pot in Berlin, but the city-state's health administrator thinks that isn't enough. She says, "I'll see your 10 and raise you 5."

It's starting to look more and more certain that the Oregon medical marijuana dispensary initiative will be on the November ballot. Organizers handed in 30,000 more signatures than they need Thursday, and they still have five weeks to get more if necessary.

Mexican President Felipe Calderon visited Washington this week, but on the ground back home, it was business as usual as prohibition-related violence continues to wrack the country.