Pot is very much on the minds of voters, with millions poised to decide whether to legalize it. That raises a tantalizing question for presidential candidates: Is there political opportunity in the wind?

Some are beginning to believe there is.

The latest sign was the full-throated call last week by Sen. Bernie Sanders to end federal prohibition. With that one move, the candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination plunged into uncharted territory — and, arguably, so did the presidential race.

Never before has a contender with so much to lose so unequivocally suggested that smoking a joint should be viewed the same as drinking a beer, at least in the eyes of the law.

Mark Hauk, the owner of an unlicensed medical marijuana dispensary in Saskatoon, says he'll reopen his dispensary today, after spending Thursday night in jail and Friday morning in front of a judge to face drug trafficking charges related to his business.

"I don't have a condition that I can't be at the store," Hauk said at a protest staged in front of the Saskatoon police headquarters on Saturday afternoon.

He was released on $1,000 bail on Friday morning after appearing before a judge at Provincial Court.

"To be there and do advocacy work, it's not a breach of conditions, it's not against the law. And it's work that needs to be done," he said, noting he'll be providing "advice to patients in any way that they need it."

The television commercials, direct-mail ads, endorsements and debates are over: It’s time to decide whether marijuana will be legal in Ohio.

Eyes across the country will be on the Buckeye State on Tuesday to see what voters decide on State Issue 3, the for-profit constitutional amendment to legalize marijuana in smokable and edible form for recreational use for those 18 or older, and for patients of any age with qualifying medical conditions.

The warring campaigns — ResponsibleOhio and Ohioans Against Marijuana Monopolies — are as different as you can imagine.

ResponsibleOhio is backed almost exclusively by 10 groups of wealthy investors who were expected to spend upward of $25 million on the legalization campaign.

The Republican presidential candidates are facing off yet again in another primary debate to be held at the University of Colorado Boulder-so you can guarantee they’ll be asked about that state’s wildly successful experiment with marijuana legalization. Given this theme and the debate’s location in the first state to legalize marijuana, it’s likely that the state’s recreational marijuana industry will be discussed. “You’re not going to get the psychosis or schizophrenia trend lines in just a year or two”.

In a motion that could throw federal enforcement of marijuana laws in Colorado into commotion, a lawyer at the center of one of the biggest criminal pot cases in the state’s legal-marijuana era is asking a judge to toss out the case against him.

In the new motion, lawyer David Furtado argues that the federal crimes he is charged with — money laundering and trying to deposit proceeds from an illegal enterprise into a bank — all stem from activity that is legal under state law in Colorado. Because Congress last year passed a law prohibiting the U.S. Department of Justice from spending money to interfere with state medical marijuana laws, Furtado argues that the indictment against him should be dismissed.

Ohio may be on the brink of creating America’s first marijuana ‘monopoly.’

n the surface, Ian James sounds like any other idealistic marijuana advocate: He’s critical of the war on drugs, he touts the economic and tax benefits of legalization and uses the familiar rebuttal against the “think of the children!” argument by pointing out that dealers are currently selling pot to kids and dispensaries will be carding customers. But James, the man behind this Tuesday’s ballot measure to legalize marijuana in Ohio, is motivated by more than his political convictions.

On 12th October, after more than 220,000 people had signed a government e-petition, Mike Penning MP, the drugs minister, responded to the debate.  He said:

WARREN, Ohio (WKBN) – Former governor and U.S. Senate candidate, Ted Strickland, was in Warren on Sunday supporting current Warren Mayor, Doug Franklin, in his reelection.

Strickland also shared his thoughts on the issue of legalizing marijuana for medical and recreational use.

“If this was a straight marijuana legalization vote, I would vote yes. I am troubled by the monopoly aspect of it,” he said.

Stickland is for recreational and medicinal use of marijuana, but if Issue 2, the Ohio Initiated Monopolies Amendment, passes, it will give a limited number people power.

Yesterday a friend emailed to ask if I had any thoughts about Ohio's Issue 3, which would fully legalize marijuana cultivation and sale in the state. Ohio? I barely pay attention to California, let alone Ohio.

But Issue 3 turns out to be surprisingly fascinating—or venal and repellent, depending on your tolerance for sleaze. Apparently one of the authors of the initiative came across a Rand report on marijuana written by a bevy of drug-policy worthies, and it offered up a dozen possible options for legalization. One of them is called "structured oligopoly":

When Logan Edwards returned home to Davenport in 2008 after his deployment in Iraq as a Marine, he was anything but the same.

Having just turned 21, he started using alcohol to cope with his anxiety, insomnia and nightmares. Suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, better known by its initials PTSD, Edwards drank every day for six months before seeking help. By the time he got it, it was almost too late.

After a long journey with many trials and errors and no real relief, Edwards, now 28, said he found a way to live his life in a functional and productive manner through the advice of a Vietnam vet. That advice: Smoke weed.