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(1 of ) FILE- In this Nov. 9, 2016 file photo, Dave Jimenez, left, smokes marijuana with his friend Anthony A. in San Francisco. California law enforcement officials objected Wednesday, April 5, 2017, to Gov. Jerry Brown's proposed streamlining of the state's marijuana regulations, saying his plan could endanger public safety. Brown's administration released documents late Tuesday outlining proposed changes to square the state's new recreational pot law with its longstanding law on medical marijuana. (AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez, File) (2 of ) FILE - In this Oct. 12, 2016 file photo, Aaron Gonzalez removes a branch from a marijuana plant on grower Laura Costa's farm near Garberville, Calif. California law enforcement officials objected Wednesday, April 5, 2017, to Gov. Jerry Brown's proposed streamlining of the state's marijuana regulations, saying his plan could endanger public safety. Brown's administration released documents late Tuesday outlining proposed changes to square the state's new recreational pot law with its longstanding law on medical marijuana. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, File) (3 of ) FILE - In this Oct. 13, 2016 file photo, a tag identifies the type of marijuana plant on the medical marijuana farm near Laytonville, Calif. California law enforcement officials objected Wednesday, April 5, 2017, to Gov. Jerry Brown's proposed streamlining of the state's marijuana regulations, saying his plan could endanger public safety. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, File)

MICHAEL R. BLOOD AND PAUL ELIAS

ASSOCIATED PRESS | April 6, 2017, 10:27AM

| Updated 8 hours ago.

Find more in-depth cannabis news, culture and politics at EmeraldReport.com, authoritative marijuana coverage from the PD.

LOS ANGELES California law enforcement officials objected Wednesday to Gov. Jerry Brown's proposed streamlining of the state's marijuana regulations, saying his plan could endanger public safety.

Brown's administration released documents late Tuesday outlining proposed changes to square the state's new recreational pot law with its longstanding law on medical marijuana.

But the California Police Chiefs Association representing all of the state's municipal police forces said the governor's proposal could turn traditionally small marijuana businesses into much larger ones controlling the entire supply chain from growing operations to retail sales.

The proposed legislation to allow single businesses to hold multiple licenses to grow, distribute, manufacture and sell retail marijuana would be an opening for criminals to consolidate the booming industry, said association Ken Corney.

"The proposal favors big marijuana grows over the welfare of our communities," Corney said.

The state's two laws took different approaches in many areas including whether one entity could hold multiple licenses to grow, manufacture, distribute and sell in retail stores. The governor is seeking to "harmonize" those regulations. The proposal needs legislative approval.

Medical marijuana providers are currently prohibited from holding both licenses but Brown proposes to lift that restriction after it becomes legal to sell recreational pot in California on Jan. 1.

The head of California's newly established marijuana agency defended the governor's proposal.

"This proposed legislation helps build an effective statewide regulatory system for cannabis to achieve our goals of protecting public safety with clear and consistent rules that are not overly burdensome," said Lori Ajax, head of the Bureau of Cannabis Medical Regulation.

She added: "It harmonizes the many elements of the two main statutes governing medicinal and adult-use cannabis, while preserving the integrity and separation of those industries."

The police chiefs and other law enforcement agencies supported legislative passage of medical marijuana rules last year but opposed Proposition 64, which legalized the recreational use of marijuana after voters approved it in November.

The administration of Brown, a Democrat, has stressed that one regulatory framework is needed to avoid duplicating costs and confusing businesses in a marijuana economy expected to grow to $7 billion in annual sales annually after recreational sales become legal in California next year.

Hezekiah Allen, head of the California Growers Association, also said his organization has concerns with the elimination of the multiple licenses prohibition.

"It could lead to mega-manufactures and mega-chain stores," Allen said.

Allen said his organization is urging the governor to adopt a regulation that would temporarily ban a single business from owning more than three retail stores and having a farm larger than four acres (1.6 hectares), which Allen said may help to keep out big corporations.

Representatives of the Los Angeles Cannabis Task Force, comprised of Southern California marijuana businesses, said they're still reviewing the plan.

"This takes us another step closer to a uniform industry and puts this state in a position to set the national standard," Avis Bulbulyan, president of the group, said in an email.

California joined a growing number of states in legalizing recreational marijuana use for adults.

The regulations and rules governing the emerging legal market will cover issues ranging from where and how plants can be grown to guidelines on tracking marijuana buds from the fields to retail stores.

People 21 and over are allowed to possess up to one ounce of marijuana and grow six marijuana plants at home.

Find more in-depth cannabis news, culture and politics at EmeraldReport.com, authoritative marijuana coverage from the PD.

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Police object to California marijuana regulation revamp - Santa Rosa Press Democrat

President Donald Trump on Wednesday claimed that a top Democrat and vocal critic of his presidency told him that he would be one of the great presidents in the history of our country.

TRUMP: Elijah Cummings [a Democratic representative from Maryland] was in my office and he said, You will go down as one of the great presidents in the history of our country.

HABERMAN: Really.

TRUMP: And then he went out and I watched him on television yesterday and I said, Was that the same man?

[Laughter.]

TRUMP: But I said, and I liked him, but I said that was really nice. He said, in a group of people, You will go down as one of the great presidents in the history of our country. And then I watched him on television and I said, Is that the same man that said that to me?

But Cummings, the ranking member of the House Oversight Committee, had a very different account of that meeting.

As it turns out, Trump was, unsurprisingly, exaggerating this conversation and he omitted a major if, according to Cummings.

During my meeting with the president and on several occasions since then, I have said repeatedly that he could be a great president if if he takes steps to truly represent allAmericans rather than continuing on the divisive and harmful path he is currently on, Cummings said in a statement Thursday.

Not quite one of the great presidents in the history of our country.

At that same meeting, Cummings said that he confronted Trumpabout his unfounded claims of massive voter fraud and the offensive way in which he characterized the black community during his campaign.

When we hear those words about carnage and we are living in depressed situations, I told him it was very hurtful, Cummings said last month.

Excerpt from:
Donald Trump Claims Top Democrat Told Him He Would Be 'One Of The Great Presidents.' Not Quite. - Huffington Post

Eddie Lucio Jr. is a unique kind of Democrat in the Texas Senate, a devout Catholic from the states border lands who openly admits that his faith guides his decisions as a lawmaker. Over the years, that has meant Lucio's been quick to help his colleagues across the aisle champion policies his party generally eschews like supporing greater abortion restrictions for abused or neglected teenage girls, school vouchers or a gay-marriage ban.

So it was little surprise when Lucio came out as the only Democrat in the Texas Senate to support the other partys red-meat social conservative item for the session Senate Bill 6, a measure that would, in many cases, ban transgender people from using public restrooms that match their gender identity. This week, Lucio explained the decision by doubling down on his faith-driven approach to policymaking, telling a Rio Grande Valley NBC station, I dont believe in separation of church and state.

But is that really the reason Lucio voted to advance SB6? The issue got a little more clouded last month when the Quorum Report (a sometimes wonky, deeply-reported newsletter on Texas politics) discovered that the bills author had quietly slipped a $5 million rider into the senates spending plan to help fund a pet project in Lucios district, a historic adobe mansion and birding center in McAllen. And all in a tight budget year where lawmakers are having to cut elsewhere.

Lucio told the Valley TV station this week that the project's convenient boost in funding had nothing to do with his vote on the anti-trans bill. Everything that I do, I look at it as an act of faith, a moral obligation that I have for all people.

Lucio kept pressing the doctor, Colt Keo-Meier, on how a trans persons presence in a public restroom might violate someones privacy. Keo-Meier responded with a question: How does my existence violate your privacy?

So Lucio followed up by asking Keo-Meier if he believes in god. When the doctor answered yes, this was Lucios response: Do you also believe in altering his creation? When Keo-Meier brought up the discrimination trans people face every day, Lucio was dismissive, offended even. I am against segregation, OK? I lived through the civil rights era, which you did not. This is no where close to that.

Naturally, Lucio ended the exchange on a pious note: I embrace all human beings. Thank you very much.

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Border Democrat Says I Don't Believe In Separation of Church and State - San Antonio Current

LIVE OAK Two of the Suwannee Democrats reporters were honored among CNHIs best Monday.

Mike Jones was named CNHIs 2016 Sports Writer of the Year for Division III while Thomas Lynn was the companys 2016 Reporter of the Year for Division III. CNHI is the parent company of the Suwannee Democrat.

Jones, who came to the Democrat in January 2016, was honored for an entry that included features on former Suwannee High star Jimmie Taylor IIIs success at Rider University as well as SHS golfer Matthew Hilliard overcoming spina bifida. Game coverage was also part of Jones work that impressed the judges, including a Suwannee High football win last fall and Lafayette Highs baseball state championship last spring.

Mike regularly hits it out of the park on features, Democrat editor Jamie Wachter said. His story on Taylors rise from Jenkins Park to Division I basketball was especially a great read.

Mike has made quite an impact on our sports coverage in Suwannee, Hamilton and Lafayette counties.

Lynn also made an impression in a short time, joining the Democrat last April. Among Lynns winning works were a story on a local resident gaining her U.S. citizenship, East Coast residents finding shelter locally from Hurricane Matthew, a feature on Sam Jones sunflower fields in Hamilton and Suwannee counties and a look at domestic violence in Suwannee County.

Weve been blessed to have a talented, versatile journalist like Tom, Wachter said. He has a passion for journalism and is equally adept at covering hard news as well as writing touching features.

Publisher Myra Regan added about the two award winners: Were well aware of the talented, hard-working journalists Mike and Tom are, and its good to see them receive that recognition from others too.

CNHI, a private company based in Montgomery, Alabama, is one of the leading publishers of local news and information in the United States. Founded in 1997, its newspapers, Web sites and specialty publications serve more than 100 communities in 23 states throughout the United States.

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CNHI honors Democrat's Jones, Lynn - Suwannee Democrat

When President Trump is paying attention, he thinkswe're all Keynesians now.

"We're also going to prime the pump," he recentlytold the New York Times's Robert Draper, by which hemeans that the government is going to "spend money to make a lot more money in the future." That, he explained, is what will get the economy "going, and going big league, and having the jobs coming in and the taxes that will be cut very substantially and the regulations that'll be going."

Now, it's hard to say what exactly Trump has in mindhere, as it's not clear he himself does. What he seems to be saying, though, is that the government needs to spend more for the economy to grow more, which, given what we know about the kinds of things he supports, would probably mean investing a lot more in defense and infrastructure.But at the same time, he couldn't take too much out of everything else, because the whole idea is that the government would be spending more in total. Not that he seems to understand this, as we'll get to in a minute, whenhis budget would cut enough old spending to balance out all the new spending he's proposing.

Butthis is getting a little ahead of ourselves. As is the case whenever Trump talks about policy, the relevant questions are whether he actually means it, and whether Republicans in Congress would go along if he did.

Let's take those in reverse order. Members of Congress are the only ones who can follow through on Trump's kind-of, sort-of promise to "spend more money to make a lot more money," but that might be too hypocritical even for them. Now, on the one hand, Republicans havealways had a double standard when it comes to the deficit. They treat itlike an existential threat to the republic when they don't control the White House, but an afterthought when they do especially if it's the result of one of their big, beautiful tax cuts. Indeed, even Rep. Mark Meadows (N.C.), the leader of the far-right House Freedom Caucus, has said that, as a "fiscal conservative," he'd be okay with tax cuts that aren't "fully offset" by spending cuts or other revenue increases. Never mind that those words don't mean what he thinks they mean. The point is that the GOP won't have any problem with half of Trump's deficit-increasing agenda.

But, on the other hand, so many Republicans have convinced themselves that the road to hell is paved with too much spending that they wouldn't green-light any more of it even if Ronald Reagan's ghost came back to tell them to build that border wall. It's not just that the Grover Norquist wing of the party wants to shrink the government below bathtub size. It's that their activists have tried to come up with some story they can tell themselves about what went wrong during the George W. Bush years that doesn't involve the words "Iraq" or "Wall Street," and spending is the one they've settled on. Back then, Republicans in Congress rubber-stamped Bush's unfunded expansion of the welfare state (Medicare Part D) and the security state (the Department of Homeland Security). It was this betrayal of principles, they believe, that made Bush so unpopular, and it's something that at least the most ideological of them don't want to repeat. That's why the House Freedom Caucus prevented House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) from passing any of what they deemed insufficiently austere budgets last year, and why they would like to see further cuts than the ones Trump has proposed, particularly to entitlements.

And that brings us to what has been the defining feature of the Trump presidency. For all his populist talk, Trump doesn't know, care, or follow policy well enough to make any of it actually happen. He might say that he supports Keynesian stimulus, but his budget wouldn't increase spending, and, in fact, would impose deeply unrealistic cuts to everything but the Defense Department.He might say that he wants "insurance for everybody," but his health-care plan would have taken it away from 24 million people, including a lot of the older and poorer folks who propelled him to the presidency. And he might say that he'll rip up our trade agreements and replace them with great, great deals, but he has just made minor tweaksto them instead.

So although it may not be hard to imagine Trump getting into the budgetary equivalent of trench warfare with House Republicans, that would depend on him first realizing that his own plan doesn't increase spending, then insisting that his new one actually do so, and finallyfollowing through with a more detailed legislative strategy than just sending a few mean tweets to try to get Congress to pass it. In other words, an alternative fact. In the real world we live in, Trump just doesn't seem to have the intellectual stamina to do anything other than send 140-character book reports on whatever cable news show he's watching.

Trump isn't really a Keynesian. He just plays one on TV.

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Trump is talking like a big-spending Democrat - Washington Post