Tag Archives: Marijuana

Reefer Madness and More, by David Stockman

Posted on February 12, 2021 | Leave a comment

Some marijuana has hallucinogenic properties, and that’s what they’re smoking on Wall Street and the Federal Reserve these days. From David Stockman at davidstockmanscontracorner.com via lewrockwell.com:

We sometimes wonder what they are smoking down on Wall Street, but today the question might better apply to the homegamers who are apparently hitting their bongs down in mom’s basement.

We are referring to Wednesday’s rip-snorting 47% rise in the stock of Tilray – the lead rabbit in the Reddit run on pot stocks.

As it happened, the day that GameStop peaked on January 27th, the once left for dead Tilray was valued at $2.9 billion. Thereafter it went vertical, weighing-in at $10.6 billion upon Wednesday’s close.

That’s not bad, of course, for a company with a mere $201 million of LTM sales, a net loss of $487 million and negative free cash flow of $261 million. And it’s not getting any better, either.

Since going public in 2018, the company’s net loss (blue line) has grown by 60X and its free cash flow (orange line) hemorrhage has worsened by 15X.

Indeed, when you look at Tilray’s three-year history as a publicly traded company, the massive swings in the market cap of this money loosing marvel are about as close to pure reefer madness as you can get without inhaling.

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Posted in Banking, Business, Currencies, Debt, Economy, Financial markets, Government

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High Times in the Plague Year: Booze & Cannabis Retailers Shine, by John McNellis

Posted on October 31, 2020 | 1 comment

There are a few businesses doing well amid the coronavirus lockdowns. From John McNellis at wolfstreet.com:

Landlords already know this: People are getting more toasted than Wonder Bread

Happy Hour starts at 3 o’clock. Tenants selling reality-relief are killing it. I called a number of retailers to double-check my desultory anecdotal evidence. One, the owner of a first-rate supermarket chain, said his alcohol sales are up 25 percent since March. That came as no surprise, but the identity of his best-selling beer — Corona — did.

Along with half of America, I assumed that Corona was destined to become the Adolph of beer labels. Wrong. Drinkers love it — some think calling a hangover a “corona virus” is funny. This merchant said the only limitation on his Corona sales was lack of inventory. Neither he nor any other seller of liquor is asking for any rent breaks.

I called a major beer distributor in the Central Valley. Same story. Up 25 percent across the board. Any brand outselling the pack? “Honey, anything selling in a can or a bottle, our customers are buying it.”

Alcohol is easy to vet, sales are reported — no one’s cooking moonshine in their backyards. Marijuana? Let’s just say the numbers are a little cloudy. Without getting lost in the weeds, the big picture looks like this: Recreational marijuana (“rec”) consumption is up considerably this year, but precise numbers are hard to come by. Point of sale numbers for California’s legal rec were up 29 percent for the month of August.

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These People Are Nuts: Pot Stocks Soar as Pot Prices Plummet, by Nick Kelly

Posted on October 1, 2018 | 2 comments

Growing plants is not usually a high-margin activity. From Nick Kelly at wolfstreet.com:

Beyond prohibition, it’s an ag business with no barriers to entry.

The stocks of cannabis companies have been on a wild ride, with some observers comparing them to the crypto-craze. Canadian based Tilray (TLRY), which went public in July at $17 a share and is trading on the NASDAQ, was in the $20 range until late August, when it started flaring like a supernova. By September 19, it briefly reached $300 a share, up 1,660% from its IPO price two months earlier. The market cap approached 29 billion, making it more valuable than Clorox, though it had only $17 million in revenues in the first half of 2018 and generated a loss of $18 million.

Then it plunged for the rest of the week. Smaller gyrations continued into this week. Today it closed at $131.30, down 56% from its peak, but still up 672% from its IPO price, with a market cap of $7.6 billion.

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Warring on Some Drugs, by Eric Peters

Posted on April 5, 2018 | 1 comment

There are legal drugs that are far more addictive and destructive than some of the illegal drugs. From Eric Peters at theburningplatform.com:

An irony of the War on Some Drugs is that legal drugs – most notoriously, the pain medication oxycodone – are more of an objective threat to people’s health than illegal ones like marijuana, which can be used to treat the same conditions, but without the life-threatening (and ending) downsides.

Opioids – which are derived from opium – are often prescribed as painkillers. They’re effective, but the downside is they are enormously addictive. And – unlike marijuana – they can literally kill you.

Marijuana is also a very effective pain killer – but without the lethal downsides.

It is impossible to “OD” on pot.

Or even to become addicted.

The worst thing that might happen is a bad case of the munchies – which is why marijuana is frequently used (and prescribed, in states where it’s legal) as an appetite stimulant for people undergoing chemotherapy to treat cancer. It’s also very effective as a treatment for glaucoma; it reduces intra-ocular eye pressure – but without the problems of physical addiction or the potential to end up dead from an overdose.

These are among the reasons for the decriminalization of medical marijuana by several states, most notably Colorado and California.

It’s hard to understand why any reasonable person could object.

If the argument is that marijuana can be abused, that argument applies even more to legal opioids, such as Oxycontin (the brand name for the opioid oxycodone). As an article in U.S. News by Adrianne Wilson Poe noted, “Opioid addiction . . .  kills 115 people a day, more than gun violence or traffic accidents.”

As opposed to no people killed – ever – by medical marijuana.

Poe also cites the estimated $500 billion annually that opioid abuse costs the U.S. economy.

Whereas medical marijuana costs the U.S. economy . . .  nothing.

To continue reading: Warring on Some Drugs

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It’s Been Exactly 80 Years Since the US Declared War on Weed — and Weed Is Still Winning, by Carey Wedler

Posted on August 3, 2017 | 1 comment

Prohibition didn’t work out too well with alcohol, and it hasn’t worked out too well for marijuana…or a host of other banned substances. From Carey Wedler at theantimedia.org:

The government fought cannabis — and cannabis won.

This Wednesday is the eightieth anniversary of the first major action the federal government took against cannabis in the United States, and eight decades later, that same federal government has still failed to reduce Americans’ consumption of the plant. In fact, it’s on the rise.

Long before the era of prohibition, druggists used cannabis as a medicine. According to Origins, a joint publication by the Ohio State University and Miami University history departments:

“Cannabis, like opiates and cocaine, was freely available at drug stores in liquid form and as a refined product, hashish. Cannabis was also a common ingredient in turn-of-the-century patent medicines, over-the-counter concoctions brewed to proprietary formulas.”

Then, like today, it helped people relax:

“The hashish candy advertised in an 1862 issue of Vanity Fair as a treatment for nervousness and melancholy, for example, was also ‘a pleasurable and harmless stimulant.’ ‘Under its influence all classes seem to gather new inspiration and energy,’ the advertisement explained.”

Though in 1906 the passage of the Pure Food and Drug Act required patent medicine companies to list cannabis as an ingredient in products where it was present – and between 1914 and 1925 26 states passed laws prohibiting it — it wasn’t until 1937 federal authorities took substantial action.

To continue reading: It’s Been Exactly 80 Years Since the US Declared War on Weed — and Weed Is Still Winning

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Ex-DEA Spokeswoman: ‘Marijuana Is Safe,’ Kept Illegal Because It’s a ‘Cash Cow’, by Alex Thomas

Posted on April 21, 2017 | 1 comment

The biggest beneficiary of the drug rackets is the US government. From Alex Thomas at theantimedia.org:

Before the heroin epidemic became a nationwide problem, claiming thousands of lives, Plano, Texas, was already entrenched. And like many of the places caught in the crosshairs of the continuing heroin crisis, Plano is the last place that one would expect to be swept into the opioid tidal wave.

Anti-Media recently interviewed Texas-native Belita Nelson, who has had an interesting few decades. For six years she termed herself the “chief propagandist” — or spokeswoman — for the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA). Before that, as a Plano mother and teacher, Belita noticed what was happening in her community. She described Plano as an area rivaling Newtown, Connecticut, or Cape Cod — tight-knit regions where tragedy strikes hard and deep.

She explained that “[Plano] has the best school districts in the state of Texas…it’s a gated community. And in 1998, for heroin to be that prevalent in the community was stunning. Stunning. We got all the media attention because we were this upscale Texas neighborhood that nobody thought would be inundated with heroin.”

Nelson decided to take action, saying, “I decided I’d had it. I was going to organize my community and fight this thing at the grassroots level. But we were never grassroots because the first thing I did was go on the Oprah show for the DEA.”

Belita stresses that she was never officially employed by the DEA but traveled for six years as a sort of unofficial spokeswoman for the agency.  The group recruited her because their goals aligned, and in many ways, she was perfect for the role. She was a mother who had witnessed the toll of heroin first-hand. She was passionate and knew what she was talking about. Belita spoke to schools and parent groups and appeared on television networks.

With the help of a former Dallas Cowboy, she founded the Starfish Foundation to tackle heroin addiction. That organization ran until 2004 when one of the employees pocketed the donation money and left the foundation scrambling in the dark.

To continue reading: Ex-DEA Spokeswoman: ‘Marijuana Is Safe,’ Kept Illegal Because It’s a ‘Cash Cow’

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He Said That? 2/28/17

Posted on February 28, 2017 | 1 comment

From Carl Sagan (1934–1996), American astronomer, cosmologist, astrophysicist, astrobiologist, author, science popularizer, and science communicator in astronomy and other natural sciences:

The illegality of cannabis is outrageous, an impediment to full utilization of a drug which helps produce the serenity and insight, sensitivity and fellowship so desperately needed in this increasingly mad and dangerous world.

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The Stupidity of Jeff Sessions Could Single-Handedly Bring Down Trump, by Michael Krieger

Posted on February 28, 2017 | 2 comments

No argument from SLL with Michael Krieger that the noises his Attorney General, Jeff Sessions, is making about going after states that have legalized marijuana would be an idiotic move. Federalism anyone? This is not why people voted for Trump. From Krieger at libertyblitzkrieg.com:

The corporate media would have you believe that the key to resisting Trump lies in the embrace of heinous individuals and institutions such as themselves, George W. Bush, and the CIA, as well as clownish figures manufactured by neocons such as Evan McMullin (formerly of both Goldman Sachs and the CIA). Ironically enough, though Trump supporters see these nefarious outside forces as the biggest threat to his administration, I believe that if Trump’s Presidency goes up in total flames it most likely will be the fault of the ridiculous fossil he chose as Attorney General, Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III.

Personally, I don’t think Trump cares one bit about recreational marijuana, but if he’s foolish enough to let Jeff Sessions run wild with his petty and moronic little Drug War, he runs a serious risk of having his administration destroyed from within. While the deep state and its various rent-seeking institutions are indeed very powerful, they are not popular amongst the American public for very good reasons. While they will continue to shamelessly and relentlessly target Trump for the most absurd of reasons (such as Russia conspiracy theories), I don’t think these tactics can bring Trump down. In fact, these blatant attacks tend to solidify Trump’s support amongst his base.

Trump can get away with acting like an authoritarian goon when it comes to attacks against the deep state and its institutions, but Trump cannot get away with acting like an authoritarian goon against the American people. If he allows Jeff Sessions to make life miserable for the tens of millions of Americans who voted to legalize cannabis, Trump will have no one to blame for his spectacular collapse than himself.

To continue reading: The Stupidity of Jeff Sessions Could Single-Handedly Bring Down Trump

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What Can We Say About a System that Criminalizes a Safe Painkiller (0 Deaths) and Promotes Big Pharma Opiates that Have Killed 165,000 Americans? by Charles Hugh Smith

Posted on August 25, 2016 | 1 comment

The never ending war on drugs must continue to be fought and marijuana must continue to be criminalized, because its safer and more effective than a lot of legal painkillers and legalization would threaten drug company profits. From Chareles Hugh Smith at oftwominds.com:

So when will the citizens wake up to the criminality of their government in favoring killer corporate opiates over safe natural painkillers?

Set your mindset to objective and come with me to the little-known but plucky nation of Lower Slobovia. The residents of Lower Slobovia have two choices when they are suffering from chronic pain:

1. A natural, non-addictive medication that they can grow themselves that has never caused a single fatality due to overdose, adverse reactions or mixing with other drugs (polypharmacy), or

2. synthetic opiates manufactured by pharmaceutical corporations that are highly addictive, trigger multiple adverse reactions, manifest dangerous polypharmaceutical attributes and have killed over 165,000 people in the past 15 years– 28 times the nation’s 5,790 combat deaths in recent military conflicts.

The corporations manufacturing and distributing the synthetic opiates as “safe” hid the truth about their medications from doctors, patients and the media: ‘You Want a Description of Hell?’ Oxycontin’s 12-Hour Problem (via John F.) OxyContin’s stunning success masked a fundamental problem: The drug wears off hours early in many people, a Los Angeles Times investigation found. OxyContin is a chemical cousin of heroin, and when it doesn’t last, patients can experience excruciating symptoms of withdrawal, including an intense craving for the drug.

So take a guess which class of drugs is perfectly legal and widely promoted by Lower Slobovia’s healthcare system, and which one is classified as a restricted Schedule 1 drug by the nation’s Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA), i.e. as dangerous as heroin?

I suspect you saw this coming, right? The natural painkiller that never killed a single soul and can be grown at home is criminalized, while the drugs that have already killed 165,000 people (a number that grossly understates the total number of deaths at least partly attributable to synthetic opiates) and addicted and/or harmed millions of other users is perfectly legal, declared “safe” by the pushers (oops, I mean pharmaceutical manufacturers) and the government, and distributed in the tens of millions of doses by the “healthcare” system.

Lower Slobovia’s DEA, the corporate manufacturers of the killer-opiates and its healthcare system that slavishly distributes millions of the killer pills should be immediately escorted to Devil’s Island and left to rot, right? And the insane laws reversed so the killer corporate synthetic opiates are declared Schedule 1 and heavily criminalized, and the natural nobody-dies painkiller legalized and distributed, right?Isn’t this obvious? Yes, I realize cannabis and opiates are not apples to apples, but you get the point–the drugs that have killed more than 165,000 people and ruined the lives of hundreds of thousands of others should be on Lower Slobovia DEA’s Schedule 1 of criminalized drugs instead of being passed out like candy by its “healthcare” system– a distribtion that has reaped tens of billions of dollars in sales and profits for the pharmaceutical sector.

To continue reading: What Can We Say About a System that Criminalizes a Safe Painkiller (0 Deaths) and Promotes Big Pharma Opiates that Have Killed 165,000 Americans?

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The Real Reason Pharma Companies Hate Medical Marijuana (It Works), by Michael Krieger

Posted on July 20, 2016 | 1 comment

Medical marijuana reduces pain among its users better than a lot of prescription pain killers, and its cheaper. The big pharmaceutical companies don’t like that. From Michael Krieger at libertyblitzkrieg.com:

Former Federal Judge Nancy Gertner was appointed to the federal bench by Bill Clinton in 1994. She presided over trials for 17 years. And Sunday, she stood before a crowd at The Aspen Ideas Festival to denounce most punishments that she imposed.

Among 500 sanctions that she handed down, “80 percent I believe were unfair and disproportionate,” she said. “I left the bench in 2011 to join the Harvard faculty to write about those stories––to write about how it came to pass that I was obliged to sentence people to terms that, frankly, made no sense under any philosophy.”

She went on to savage the War on Drugs at greater length. “This is a war that I saw destroy lives,” she said. “It eliminated a generation of African American men, covered our racism in ostensibly neutral guidelines and mandatory minimums… and created an intergenerational problem––although I wasn’t on the bench long enough to see this, we know that the sons and daughters of the people we sentenced are in trouble, and are in trouble with the criminal justice system.”

– From the post: Federal Judge of 17 Years Repents – Compares Damage Done by “War on Drugs” to Destruction of World War II

Whenever an irrational and inhumane law remains on the books far longer than any thinking person would consider appropriate, there’s usually one reason behind it: money.

Unsurprisingly, the continued federal prohibition on marijuana and its absurd classification as a Schedule 1 drug is no exception. Thankfully, a recent study published in the journal Health Affairs shows us exactly why pharmaceutical companies are one of the leading voices against medical marijuana. It has nothing to do with healthcare and everything to do with corporate greed.

So is it a war on drugs, or a war on cheap medicine. Decide for yourself.

The Washington Post reports:

There’s a body of research showing that painkiller abuse and overdose are lower in states with medical marijuana laws. These studies have generally assumed that when medical marijuana is available, pain patients are increasingly choosing pot over powerful and deadly prescription narcotics. But that’s always been just an assumption.
Now a new study, released in the journal Health Affairs, validates these findings by providing clear evidence of a missing link in the causal chain running from medical marijuana to falling overdoses. Ashley and W. David Bradford, a daughter-father pair of researchers at the University of Georgia, scoured the database of all prescription drugs paid for under Medicare Part D from 2010 to 2013.

They found that, in the 17 states with a medical-marijuana law in place by 2013, prescriptions for painkillers and other classes of drugs fell sharply compared with states that did not have a medical-marijuana law. The drops were quite significant: In medical-marijuana states, the average doctor prescribed 265 fewer doses of antidepressants each year, 486 fewer doses of seizure medication, 541 fewer anti-nausea doses and 562 fewer doses of anti-anxiety medication.

To continue reading: The Real Reason Pharma Companies Hate Medical Marijuana (It Works)

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