Over the past 8 years, marijuana dispensaries throughout the US have come under increased scrutiny by the Drug Enforcement Agency, which has performed large numbers of raids on and seizures at these institutions. In California, the situation has been the worst, as this was the first state to legalize selling pot to patients with doctor's prescriptions, as far back as 1996. Now, the US Attorney General Eric Holder has announced that federal agencies will no longer raid medical marijuana dispensaries, in a move that has been saluted by both dealers and authorities in California who want to legalize and tax sales for this drug.

During his presidential campaign, now-President Obama argued that each of the American states should have total autonomy, as far as deciding their drug policy was concerned. Eric Holder has made this view abundantly clear, when he has stressed that the promises Obama made at the time are now “American policy.” There are currently 13 states that allow the use of marijuana for medical purposes, but in California the law doesn't specify what kind of ailments people need to suffer from in order to be able to get the drug.

Furthermore, law makers in the state now seek to pass a more ambitious plan, namely to legalize pot for recreational use in the state. The idea is to regulate the stuff just like they did with alcohol and tobacco, and to only sell it to people who are over the age of 21. “This is a significant step. There's a lot of support for the bill, and the context of the conversation is going to change,” Democrat Tom Ammian, the San Francisco assemblyman who introduced the new bill, says.

“Legalizing marijuana would be a horrible thing to do to our communities. It would be the springboard for other problems, and that's just not the right thing to do for our children,” Republican assemblyman Jeff Miller, from Corona, disagrees. Police groups also oppose the initiative, and there is a good chance that the federal government will step in and challenge the legislation itself, if it passes.

“No one should assume that just because the Obama administration is tolerant of medical marijuana, that they'll be as tolerant of recreational marijuana,” University of California in Berkeley (UCB) drug policy law professor Rob MacCoun opines.