Is Cannabis the Best Weapon in the Opioid Epidemic?
Medical marijuana could be be an effective way to counter the opioid epidemic, and to help make the case, a Chicago lawmaker has come out publicly as a marijuana user.
A Cook County commissioner, John Fritchey, said in an interview Tuesday with Cheddar that he got his [medical marijuana card](https://cheddar.com/videos/cook-county-commissioner-john-fritchey-on-his-medical-marijuana-usage) six months ago. Though he didn't say what health issue he was being treated for, he said he wanted to be open about his use of the drug to help fight the stigma that might be associated with medical pot.
“Why would we continue, in light of the crisis that we have, to prescribe opioids for pain relief when we have something that’s so much more effective?” he said.
Fritchey has been on a years-long mission to gain legal acceptance for marijuana. In 2004, when Fritchey was a state lawmaker, he backed a bill legalizing medical marijuana. It eventually passed in 2013. He also supported decriminalizing pot in Chicago in 2011.
“Given that I got a card, I figured that I had a pulpit,” said Fritchey. “It would be hypocritical on my part to be the vocal advocate that I am but not be willing to admit that I’m a cardholder myself.”
In January, the state’s Department of Health rejected intractable pain as a qualifying condition for a marijuana card until a Cook County judge ordered the agency to accept the condition. The health department has said it will challenge the order in court.
Fritchey is also pushing for a referendum in Cook County, the second most populous county in the U.S., on whether the state should legalize recreational marijuana.
The vote is non-binding, but Fritchey told the [Chicago Tribune](http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/politics/ct-met-cook-county-recreational-marijuana-20171212-story.html) the referendum would let the state legislature know where people stand on the issue.
For full article, [click here](https://cheddar.com/videos/barriers-facing-cannabis-legalization-in-illinois).
The State Department had been in talks with Elon Musk’s Tesla company to buy armored electric vehicles, but the plans have been put on hold by the Trump administration after reports emerged about a potential $400 million purchase. A State Department spokesperson said the electric car company owned by Musk was the only one that expressed interest back in May 2024. The deal with Tesla was only in its planning phases but it was forecast to be the largest contract of the year. It shows how some of his wealth has come and was still expected to come from taxpayers.
At 100 years old, the Goodyear Blimp is an ageless star in the sky. The 246-foot-long airship will be in the background of the Daytona 500 — flying roughly 1,500 feet above Daytona International Speedway, actually — to celebrate its greatest anniversary tour. Even though remote camera technologies are improving regularly and changing the landscape of aerial footage, the blimp continues to carve out a niche. At Daytona, with the usual 40-car field racing around a 2½-mile superspeedway, views from the blimp aptly provide the scope of the event.
You'll just have to wait for interest rates (and prices) to go down. Plus, this deal's a steel, the big carmaker wedding is off, and bribery is back, baby!
It’s a chicken-and-egg problem: Restaurants are struggling with record-high U.S. egg prices, but their omelets, scrambles and huevos rancheros may be part of the problem. Breakfast is booming at U.S. eateries. First Watch, a restaurant chain that serves breakfast, brunch and lunch, nearly quadrupled its locations over the past decade to 570. Fast-food chains like Starbucks and Wendy's added more egg-filled breakfast items. In normal times, egg producers could meet the demand. But a bird flu outbreak that has forced them to slaughter their flocks is making supplies scarcer and pushing up prices. Some restaurants like Waffle House have added a surcharge to offset their costs.
William Falcon, CEO and Founder of Lightning AI, discusses the ongoing feud between Elon Musk and Sam Altman, and how everyday people can use AI in their lives.
U.S. tariffs on steel and aluminum “will not go unanswered,” European Union chief Ursula von der Leyen vowed on Tuesday, adding that they will trigger toug
The Trump administration has ordered the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to stop nearly all its work, effectively shutting down the agency that was created to protect consumers after the 2008 financial crisis and subprime mortgage-lending scandal. Russell Vought is the newly installed director of the Office of Management and Budget. Vought directed the CFPB in a Saturday night email to stop work on proposed rules, to suspend the effective dates on any rules that were finalized but not yet effective, and to stop investigative work and not begin any new investigations. The agency has been a target of conservatives since President Barack Obama created it following the 2007-2008 financial crisis.
