Mastercard is on the wrong side of history as it moves to ban cannabis purchases on its debit cards.  Mastercard told financial institutions to stop allowing marijuana transactions on its debit cards.  Dispensaries are scrambling for already-limited alternative financial options. This is a major blow to an industry on the fringes of financial systems in the U.S. The payment-processing company asked financial institutions to stop allowing marijuana transactions on its debit cards.  There were over 1.46 billion Mastercard debit cards in circulation worldwide including the U.S. by ..read more

Artificial intelligence is a smarter, faster, and more effective pathway to drug development.  It has the potential to take the medical world by storm.  The need for speed – and accuracy – is real.  AI is well underway in revolutionizing the discovery of life-saving drugs.  With the promise of lower costs and shorter development timelines, AI-enabled drug discovery holds major potential to increase the accessibility of drugs and to treat diseases and conditions.  AI is a wide-ranging branch of computer science that builds smart machines to perform tasks typically requi ..read more

In 2018, I was a Presenter at a Hillsborough County Bar Association event for a group of judges after Florida passed its limited medical marijuana bill.  During a Q&A following my lecture, several jurists used a collective label for cocaine, heroin, and cannabis … that word being “drugs.”  As a result of bundling cannabis with coke, off to jail you go if you are caught using or possessing marijuana, according to these judges.  Just wait until their granddaughters get arrested by a Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Deputy for possession of marijuana and see if they still feel the ..read more

The presidential election of 2024 is closer than you think.  With a field of Republicans already vying for the nomination, it is a good opportunity to take stock of where we are with the federal cannabis question.  Case in point: There’s a groundswell of support for legalization, which has been embraced by nearly every demographic, whether age, race, sexual orientation, gender or party affiliation. I’m not sure future administrations want to die on the hill of prohibition.   Federal cannabis prohibition is in direct contradiction to the overwhelming will of the American ele ..read more

Improve access and reverse the disastrous War on Drugs.  I think that’s the goal when it comes to state-led ballot initiatives that seek to legalize adult-use cannabis in Missouri and Florida.  Voters must disrupt the criminalization of cannabis in individual states because federal legalization is still a pipe dream. Two initiatives that directly affect states that have shaped my life – Missouri, my home state and Florida, where I currently reside – are at the center of Election 2022 and Election 2024, respectively.  While the fate of these petitions is unclear, adult-use cannab ..read more

A duet of magic mushroom measures could make it on the November ballot in Colorado.  You can bet I will be one of many American citizens living in Colorado who will vote “yes” on whether their state should legalize psychedelics for both personal use and for psilocybin-assisted therapy centers.  If you live in Colorado and wish to legalize psychedelics, make sure you vote on November 8th, 2022. The goal is to reform the state’s psychedelic laws by popular vote through the passage of Initiative 58 or Initiative 61.  If passed, these two pillars to legalize psychedelics for persona ..read more

Looking at the statistics, it’s clear that African Americans are disproportionately targeted for cannabis-related criminal charges.  What’s also obvious is that Black Americans do not have equal access to economic opportunities in the cannabis space.  But what if we could reverse the tide and change course to make cannabis a tool for good?  Let me explain.   African Americans are arrested for non-violent marijuana crimes at four times the rate as white Americans, despite equal usage rates, according to the ACLU and Human Rights Watch.  A cannabis conviction doesn ..read more

The Ruling A conservative panel of the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that Delta-8 THC products fall under the 2018 Farm Bill’s definition of hemp, in a case styled AK Futures LLC v. Boyd Street Distro, LLC, 9th Cir. No. 2-56113.  The lawsuit concerns a trademark claim by AK Futures, which manufactures and sells cigarettes and vaping products containing Delta-8 THC.  (Delta-8 THC is less potent than Delta-9 THC, and Delta-8 can be smoked, vaped or ingested.  It comes in many forms such as tinctures, joints, gummies, flowers, creams, and vape cartridges/pens.) AK Futur ..read more

Psilocybin, the hallucinogen found in mushrooms, is known to relieve symptoms for those who suffer from hard to treat depression as well as other mental illnesses. As the active chemical in magic mushrooms, psilocybin is one of the most studied of the psychedelic chemicals found in plants and fungi, and it’s the most likely to become an accepted mental health therapy.  The implementation of psychedelics as medicine when used as part of an overall mental health treatment plan under the supervision of a licensed practitioner can provide transformative experiences for a better life. &nb ..read more

Every May, Mental Health Awareness Month focuses on bringing attention to how mental health plays an outsized role in our lives.  Thanks to groundbreaking scientific studies, we know magic mushrooms could be the future of mental health care.  Why is this important?  Our mental health powerfully influences our quality of life while affecting how we feel, how we relate to others, how we handle stress, and our decision-making abilities.  Whether it’s grief after the death of a loved one, PTSD, a generalized anxiety disorder, or schizophrenia, mental health comes in all shapes ..read more