Medical marijuana dispensaries and 215 patients would not be targeted by the investigation, Schadler said. The Humboldt Cooperative, a medical marijuana dispensary in Arcata, said Tuesday evening that federal agents had not interfered with business.

”We're not here to set policy or interfere with California's compassionate use laws,” Schadler said. The FBI is investigating “for-profit and corporate grow operations beyond the scope of 215.”

Attention: You are now free to float about the cabin.

Well, not yet, but maybe someday - that is, if Mason Tvert has anything to say about.

Tvert, a crusader for legalizing marijuana, has called for pot-smoking lounges in the nation's airports. His reason for doing goes beyond his cannabis liberation mission: He wants to help make flying safer.

"There's been this growing trend of alcohol-related air rage," he said Tuesday, alluding to episodes of drunken passengers creating in-flight disturbances.

"This report makes it more important than ever that we get past outdated, anachronistic views of marijuana," said John Walters, director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy.

The US Government believes the increase in potency is down to sophisticated growing techniques used by drug traffickers.

He said baby boomer parents might have misguided notions that the drug contains the weaker potency levels of the 1970s but said it can cause psychological, cognitive and respiratory problems, and lead users to "harder" drugs such as cocaine and heroin.

“It’s a clear shield for commercial operations,” said Mike Sweeney, 60, a supporter of both medical marijuana and a local ballot measure on June 3 that called for new limits on the drug in Mendocino. “And we don’t want those here.”

The outcome of the ballot measure is not known, as votes are still being counted, but such community push-back is increasingly common across the state, even in the most liberal communities. In recent years, dozens of local governments have banned or restricted cannabis clubs, more formally known as dispensaries, that provide medical marijuana, in the face of public safety issues involved in its sale and cultivation, including crime and environmental damage.

JPG Magazine posted a photo essay of some wild herb growing in Nepal.

Both Reuters and Eurograduate posted a story about heavy Marijuana use shrinking parts of your brain.

Long-term heavy use of marijuana may cause two important brain structures to shrink, Australian researchers said on Monday.

Brain scans showed the hippocampus and amygdala were smaller in men who were heavy marijuana users compared to nonusers, the researchers said. The men had smoked at least five marijuana cigarettes daily for on average 20 years.

The hippocampus regulates memory and emotion, while the amygdala plays a critical role in fear and aggression.

The study, published in the American Medical Association's journal Archives of General Psychiatry, also found the heavy cannabis users earned lower scores than the nonusers in a verbal learning task -- trying to recall a list of 15 words.

I hope I didn't brain my damage.

A little research shows that the NIDA is behind this high biased research. The NIDA is so obvious in it's scare tactics that it's smell is all over this junk science. It's the same old warmed-over crap they've been pulling for decades. To make matters worse, the press has picked this up a fact, and not allowed a place for dissenting comments. So, the uninformed public just sucks it's up & repeats it as true valuable research. Nothing could be further from the truth. Who smokes this much marijuana & functions? I'd love to see them produce these people. This will never happen. If they do exist, they probably just said whatever the researchers wanted to hear. So, they would get paid for their lies. Boo, to the NIDA, NHMRC, and Dr. Murat Yucel. You're all guilty of defaming a far safer substance than alcohl or tobacco.

An unwitting passenger arriving at Japan's Narita airport has received 142g of cannabis after a customs test went awry, officials say.

A customs officer hid a package of the banned substance in a side pocket of a randomly chosen suitcase in order to test airport security.

Sniffer dogs failed to detect the cannabis and the officer could not remember which bag he had put it in.

They injected THC into mice that had been implanted with human lung cancer cells. After three weeks, tumors shrank by about 50%, compared with tumors in untreated mice, says Anju Preet, PhD, a HarvardUniversity researcher in Boston who tested the chemical. Preet notes that animals injected with THC seem to get “high,” showing signs of clumsiness and getting the munchies. “You would expect to see the same thing in humans, so if this work does pan out, getting the dose right is going to be all important,” she says.

The findings were presented at the annual meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research.

The largest study of its kind has unexpectedly concluded that smoking marijuana, even regularly and heavily, does not lead to lung cancer.

Call it cinema's stoned age. Films featuring characters using marijuana have mushroomed.

"Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay," the second movie to feature the titular pot-smoking characters, grossed nearly $15 million on its opening weekend, which might portend a big opening for August's "Pineapple Express," a Judd Apatow-produced comedy about a pot smoker and his supplier on the run. Also rolling out: "The Wackness," with Ben Kingsley as a bong-using psychiatrist; "Humboldt County," in which a medical student spends a summer in a marijuana-farming town; and "Super High Me," with comedian Doug Benson using the drug for 30 days.