Legalizing Marijuana, Legalizing Pot | featured news

Entrepreneurs ramp up after the state's voters approved a constitutional amendment legalizing recreational use of marijuana... Two hedge-fund partners — monogrammed shirts, taut Windsor knots, cuff links — step into a hipster cafe called Sputnik on an unorthodox mission.

If a California company has its way, recreational marijuana users in Colorado and Washington state will one day be able to get their pot out of vending machines.

On Monday afternoon, in a conference room off Colfax Avenue in suburban Denver, two dozen members of a government task force will gather to begin hashing out the details of how to create a market for legal, recreational marijuana in the state.

President Barack Obama says he won't go after Washington state and Colorado for legalizing marijuana.<p/>In a Barbara Walters interview airing Friday on ABC, Obama is asked whether he supports making pot legal. He says - quote - "I wouldn't go that far."

As more states legalize marijuana for medical use, one of the lesser-known repercussions is that sick children now often have access to it too, and the responsibility for deciding when it’s appropriate, the dosage and the monitoring is usually left solely with a parent.

Efforts to legalize marijuana for recreational use are gaining momentum in Washington state and Colorado, despite fierce opposition from the federal government and a decades-long cultural battle over America's most commonly used illicit drug.

California voters rejected Prop. 19, but a post-election poll found that they still lean toward legalizing marijuana for recreational use and, if young voters had turned out as heavily on Tuesday as they do for presidential elections, the result would have been a close call.

Voters now oppose Prop. 19, which would legalize marijuana, 49% to 44%, and Prop. 23, which would suspend the state's global warming law, 48% to 37%.

Attorney General Eric Holder says the Justice Department will prosecute distribution and possession of marijuana in California even if the state's voters approve a ballot measure to legalize the drug.

The city of Oakland, California on Tuesday legalized large-scale marijuana cultivation for medical use and will issue up to four permits for "industrial" cultivation starting next year.