News Brief

Given rising gang problems surrounding the hash trade in Copenhagen, Danes can be forgiven for yearning for the good old days of Pusher Street, where hash was slung relatively peacefully. Now, the Copenhagen city council wants to experiment with cannabis stores, but that seems unlikely to fly with the Conservative national government.

It was a relatively quiet week in Mexico's drug wars this week. Only about 15 people a day were killed.

It's been a wild week for weed in Washington. Hearings and initiatives and polls, oh, my!

With the Obama administration having removed the threat of federal prosecutions, the door is swinging open for an expansion of medical marijuana dispensaries. Activists in Oregon are walking through that door, and they are carrying a whole bunch of gathered signatures with them. Look for a dispensary initiative on the ballot there this fall.

Last weekend saw the single deadliest 24-hour-period ever in Mexico's drug war, with 69 people killed. And that's just for starters.

San Francisco Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi wants the city's residents to vote on a measure that would make it city policy to license, tax, and regulate marijuana cultivation and sales, and not just medical. Now, he has to convince the rest of the Supes to agree with him -- or at least a majority.

Another legislative season begins across the land, and with it comes another crop of bills demanding drug testing of people receiving public benefits, from unemployment to food stamps to state medical assistance. They're expensive, they're impractical, and they're most likely unconstitutional, but that doesn't stop drug war demagogues from promoting them.

A bill that would make New York the next medical marijuana state has won an Assembly committee vote.

Acting from firmly prohibitionist principles, the Russian government saw potential new drug threats on the horizon and promptly criminalized them.

The New Jersey legislature has become the first in the nation to pass a bill reforming mandatory minimum school zone laws. Gov. Jon Corzine has said he will sign it.