Albanys pot pushers come for our kids in an ad campaign filled with deceit

The Empire State is now in the business of spending your money to sell weed to teens.For proof, look no further than the Office of Cannabis Management’s new campaign, “Cannabis Honestly.”The OCM runs New York’s legal marijuana program, and this latest initiative went live in July.One of its ads, which I spotted on the R train this week, shows a dreamy-eyed teenager (or a model who looks like one) staring at her phone, along with the helpful tagline MIXING WEED AND ALCOHOL IS RISKIER.It may as well be: STICK TO WEED, KID, AND YOU’LL BE FINE.Marijuana advertising aimed at anyone under 21 is illegal under state law; such ads are specifically banned from public transit.OCM sure seems like it’s breaking the law.An eagle-eyed X user spotted an even worse subway ad on Tuesday, featuring a photo of another teen and his apparent mom.This one proclaims CANNABIS IS LEGAL FOR ADULTS 21+ IN NEW YORK STATE.The inherent takeaway: You can’t buy it yourself yet, so get your parents to cop some sour for you at the dispensary.   Imagine the state Liquor Authority running a similar ad for vodka — or the Department of Taxation and Finance, which handles cigarette excises, doing one for Kools.Remember: These are taxpayer-funded ads from a state agency, normalizing weed use for literal kids.But the “Cannabis Honestly” website, the focal point of the campaign, makes the ads themselves look almost benign.The section of the site aimed at parents contains such howlers as: “Store cannabis like you would other medications.”Yikes.Raw marijuana is not and can never be a medicine, no matter how many states declare it one by political fiat.It has no accepted medical use; it cannot be prescribed.Study after study shows that it fails to treat the conditions doctors “recommend” it for. As leading marijuana policy expert Kevin Sabet recently noted in STAT News, an April systematic review in The Lancet Psychiatry found “no evidence any form of cannabis is effective in tr...