The two launched the project because, as Slate writes, there are few real-time chronicles of daily gun deaths in the United States, despite the daily mention of firearms and gun politics in the media since the shooting. In fact, the onslaught of reporting on guns has been so intense, The Huffington Post published an article this morning with the headline “So You’re Bored of the Newtown Massacre?”

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Yet, many of the health benefits are lost, Courtney says, when a patient ingests marijuana in the most typical way: by smoking it. Burning the plant kills off enzymes, which can diminish some of the curative properties. Juicing the entire plant, on the other hand, retains the enzymes and may be more medically beneficial. Plus, smoking the plant kicks the THC--and its psychoactive properties--into high gear, producing marijuana's high, which many find to be a curative effect in its own right, but is not always what the patient desires or wants.

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The parents, grandparents, cousins and widow of nine of the 12 people killed released a letter sent to the theater's owner, Cinemark, in which they criticized the Plano, Texas-based company for not reaching out to the families of victims to offer their condolences. They also said the company refused to meet with them one-on-one without lawyers present.

The families said they were asked to attend an "evening of remembrance" followed by a movie when the Aurora theater reopens on Jan. 17 in invitations sent two days after Christmas.

"Thanks for making what is a very difficult holiday season that much more difficult. Timing is everything and yours is awful," they wrote.

The company had no immediate comment.

Cinemark has been renovating the Aurora theater and plans to re-open it Jan. 17, a move the city's mayor said had widespread support in the community. Gov. John Hickenlooper is among those planning to attend.

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These victories came in campaigns that had no candidates — no Democrats, Republicans or other party designations. Rather, they were ballot initiatives — policy ideas put to a vote of people themselves. This is an exercise in direct democracy that was first proposed by the historic Populist movement of the 1870s. It's presently available to citizens in 26 states and hundreds of cities — and in this past year, it produced some serious progressive wins.

Unfortunately, corporations and super-wealthy individuals have now glommed onto this democratic innovation with deep-pocket vengeance, using their silos of money and expertise in PR deceit to pass some awful proposals and kill some great ones. Still, though, progressives are making good use of the initiative alternative to build winning coalitions around many big issues that the power structure refuses to address. They achieved several important public policy victories in November, even in red and purple states, showing again that populist issues can open minds, shove aside right-wing orthodoxy and overcome corporate money.

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“In the now nearly fifty-year-old effort to end cannabis prohibition laws led by non-profit citizen advocacy groups, 2012 must be viewed as a watershed year for cannabis law reformers,” said Allen St. Pierre, the executive director of NORML, a leading marijuana reform group.

Tom Angell, the chairman of Marijuana Majority, agreed. "This was the year that we broke through and succeeded in getting prominent political observers and the media to pay attention to the fact that this is quickly becoming a mainstream issue.”

The biggest victories for advocates, of course, came in Washington and Colorado, where voters approved ballot measures to legalize cannabis for private recreational use. Washington’s law has already gone into effect, while Colorado’s will soon. Advocates hope that if all goes according to plan, other states will see there’s nothing to be afraid of and follow the example.

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This certainly seems like good news for reform advocates as it apparently rules out the harshest possible response -- a lawsuit in federal court to trump the states' laws -- and suggests the feds will mostly leave the states be. And when asked if he personally supports legalizing the drug, Obama said he does not "at this point,” opening the door for a marriage equality-like “evolution” down the road. "This is a tough problem, because Congress has not yet changed the law. I head up the executive branch; we're supposed to be carrying out laws,” he added.

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In a letter to Gil Kerlikowske, the administration's director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, Leahy wrote:

The Senate Judiciary Committee has a significant interest in the effect of these developments on Federal drug control policy. How does the Office of National Drug Control Policy intend to prioritize Federal resources, and what recommendations are you making to the Department of Justice and other agencies in light of the choice by citizens of Colorado and Washington to legalize personal use of small amounts of marijuana? What assurance can and will the administration give to state officials involved in the licensing of marijuana retailers that they will not face Federal criminal penalties for carrying out duties assigned to them under state law?

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1. A whole battalion of generals? The titles “general” or “admiral” sound like they belong to pretty exclusive posts, fit only for the best of the best. This flashy title makes it pretty easy to say, "so what if a few of our military geniuses get the royal treatment -- particularly if they are the sole commanders of the most powerful military in human history." The reality, however, is that there are  nearly 1,000 generals and admirals in the U.S. armed forces, and each has an entourage that would make a Hollywood star jealous.

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That vote wasn't some fluke. Following Pittsburgh's lead, both Republican and Democratic residents in the city voted overwhelmingly to ban the controversial natural gas extraction process after reports from (among others) the Environmental Protection Agency, Duke University, the University of Colorado and the fossil fuel industry itself documented fracking's potential hazards. Yet, despite all of this, Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper (D) just announced that his administration will officially back any lawsuit brought by those same firms against Longmont's new law.

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In many cases, the Environmental Protection Agency has granted these so-called aquifer exemptions in Western states now stricken by drought and increasingly desperate for water.

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Colorado became the second state after Washington to allow pot use without a doctor's recommendation. Both states prohibit public use of the drug, and commercial sales in Colorado and Washington won't be permitted until after regulations are written next year.

Hickenlooper, a Democrat, opposed the measure but had no veto power over the voter-approved amendment to the state constitution. He tweeted his declaration Monday and sent an executive order to reporters by email after the fact. That prevented a countdown to legalization as seen in Washington, where the law's supporters gathered to smoke in public.

"Voters were loud and clear on Election Day," Hickenlooper said in his statement. The law allowed him until Jan. 5 to declare marijuana legal.

Adults over 21 in Colorado may now possess up to an ounce of marijuana, or six plants. Public use and sale of the drug remain illegal.

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Under federal law, recreational marijuana use is still illegal. But now that the American people (in two states, at least) have made it clear they support legal recreational marijuana use, the Feds have to make a choice about whether to lay down the law – the federal law, that is -- or respect voters' choices.

The New York Times had a story yesterday about this issue. It noted that “the Obama administration has been holding high-level meetings since the election to debate the response of federal law enforcement agencies to the decriminalization efforts.”

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Last month, voters in Washington and Colorado chose to legalize the possession of small amounts of marijuana to adults aged over 21. In both states licenses will be granted to pot growers and sellers to legally distribute the product, which, like alcohol and tobacco, will be taxed. Colorado's legalization measure is set to go into effect early next month. Smoking pot in public remains illegal in both states but, as the AP noted, there was "nary a police officer in sight" during the celebration early Thursday morning -- the Seattle Police Department told its 1,300 officers that until further notice they were not to issue citations for public marijuana use.

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Marijuana legalization is a beginning, not an end.

When residents of Colorado and Washington voted to legalize the adult use of cannabis, it felt like a momentary rush of sobriety in a country dazed by decades of anti-marijuana hysteria. But what comes next?

The drug war edifice is cracking and the end of prohibition may be nigh. Or may not be. The way things play out is not preordained. Major strategic differences among legalization proponents are surfacing about how to proceed. Some drug policy reform leaders, fearing an official backlash, are urging a cautious, go-slow, approach: make it as easy as possible for the feds to back off and let the states do their thing. Other voices, claiming a pro-pot electoral mandate, are calling for bold, assertive moves to implement the will of the voters.

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Since the drug remains illegal under federal law, the administration could squash the states’ nascent legalization movement by asking for courts to stop the implementation of the new laws, or by sending more federal agents to the states. But even though they knew the measures would be on the ballot for more than a year, “the Obama administration has stayed mum On The Other Big Thing That Happened on Nov. 6,” as Reason’s Mike Riggs wrote yesterday.

Meanwhile, stakes have been raised: Prosecutors in both states have dropped pot charges against hundreds of offenders, and legislators in Maine and Rhode Island are considering their own legalization bills.

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It would be a mistake to call these ballot initiative victories "pro-pot." Most of those who voted in favor don't use marijuana; indeed many don't like it at all and have never used it. What moved them was the realization that it made more sense to regulate, tax and control marijuana than to keep wasting money and resources trying to enforce an unenforceable prohibition.

Whether or not the two state governments move forward with regulating marijuana like alcohol will depend on two things: how the Obama administration, federal prosecutors and police agencies respond; and the extent to which the states' senior elected officials commit to implementing the will of the people. The fact that federal laws explicitly criminalize marijuana transactions, and that the federal government can continue to enforce those laws, means that federal authorities could effectively block the initiatives from being fully implemented. But there are also good reasons why the Obama administration should, and may, allow state governments to proceed as voters have demanded.

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The answer to the former is maybe. Barack Obama campaigned for president pledging to respect state marijuana laws, and his Justice Department in 2009 issued a memo reiterating that promise. But by 2011, the same Justice Department countermanded that directive and authorized a federal crackdown. Now, with the results of the 2012 election, Colorado's Democratic Gov. John Hickenlooper has been forced into the awkward position of fighting off the feds in defense of a state constitutional amendment he tried to defeat.

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The problem, of course, is that the Obama administration may cite the 1970 Controlled Substances Act as statutory rationale to try to force states to continue an expensive and inhumane war on weed that unnecessarily arrests and incarcerates thousands of Americans each year.

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