For all the potheads “possible” good news and a THC surprise

As the societal push for legal marijuana continues, it begins to take on new avenues  to become the NORM again. The article states that NATURAL marijuana is still bad for and illegal, synthetic or Big Pharma lab altered marijuana is safe because a doctor solicits it to you for an exhorbant bit. In the end everyone is happy. Capitalist rape the common folk, those who waste their life away with always wanting to be high can now always be high, and the government gets their almighty tax dollar.

DEA to legalize marijuana only for ‘Big Pharma,’ NORML claims

By Eric W. Dolan
Wednesday, February 23rd, 2011 — 8:33 pm

A Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) proposal to reclassify the main psychoactive chemical in marijuana as a Schedule III substance would allow pharmaceutical companies to market the drug while still penalizing common recreational use, according to marijuana law reform advocates.

The main psychoactive chemical in marijuana, delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), is currently a Schedule I substance within the US Controlled Substances Act, the most restrictive schedule with the greatest criminal penalties.

In November 2010, the DEA proposed reclassifying dronabinol, a synthetic THC, as a Schedule III substance, which would place it among substances such as hydrocodone and allow it to be dispensed with a written or oral prescription.

“The DEA’s intent is to expand the federal government’s schedule III listing to include pharmaceutical products containing naturally derived formations of THC while simultaneously maintain existing criminal prohibitions on the plant itself,” Paul Armentano, the deputy director of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML), wrote at AlterNet.

With its proposal, the DEA is responding to the demands of large pharmaceutical companies, he claimed.

Marijuana plants and THC extracts would remain illegal under the proposal, but companies would be able to purchase THC from a government-licensed provider to develop pharmaceutical products.

“While the DEA’s forthcoming regulatory change promises to stimulate the advent of legally available, natural THC therapeutic products… the change will offer no legal relief for those hundreds of thousands of Americans who believe that therapeutic relief is best obtained by use of the whole plant itself,” Armentano added.

“Rather the DEA appears content to try to walk a political and semantic tightrope that alleges: ‘pot is bad,’ but ‘pot-derived pharmaceuticals are good.'”

THC can help cancer patients regain their appetites and sense of taste, according to a study published on Wednesday.

“This is the first randomized controlled trial to show that THC makes food taste better and improves appetites for patients with advanced cancer, as well as helping them to sleep and to relax better,” Dr. Wendy Wismer, associate professor at the University of Alberta, said. “Our findings are important, as there is no accepted treatment for chemosensory alterations experienced by cancer patients.”

Fifteen states and the District of Columbia have passed legislation to legalize the medical use of marijuana.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/02/23/dea-to-legalize-marijuana-only-for-big-pharma-group-claims/

This should make birthers go crazy Gaddafi says Obama is African

 This should the Obama birthers going crazy. “Oh no even Libya is saying Obama is from Keny….wait wait a minute he said Sudanese?” Release by Ynet news this should stir up some good controversy to show away from the Libya collapse.

Gaddafi: Barakeh Obama is friend

 Libyan leader praises US president: ‘He is of Muslim descent, his policy should be supported, as he now leans towards peace’ 

Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi considers the US president a blessing to the Muslim world. In a speech published in London-based al-Hayat newspaper on Saturday, Gaddafi praised Barack Obama, called him a “friend” and said there is no longer any dispute between his country and the US.

Speaking in the Libyan city of Sirt at an event marking the 24th anniversary of an American attack on Libya, he said, “At the time, we were the target of the American cannon, the American navy challenged us in the gulf of Sirt and attacked us all along Libya’s shores. America tested Libya, and the Libyan people resisted the large country, but today, thank God, the difference is great.”

He said, “Now, ruling America is a black man from our continent, an African from Arab descent, from Muslim descent, and this is something we never imagined – that from Reagan we would get to Barakeh Obama.”

Gaddafi stressed that Obama’s presidency is “a major historical gain” and said, “He is someone I consider a friend. He knows he is a son of Africa. Regardless of his African belonging, he is of Arab Sudanese descent, or of Muslim descent. He is a man whose policy should be supported, and he should be assisted in implementing it in any way possible, since he is now leaning towards peace.”

He continued, “I urge all peoples to give him this chance and to support this policy, because America is a country that, when its policy is bad –harms the world, and when it is good – it helps the world.”

The Libyan leader also expressed hopes that, “the dream that Obama has for a world free of nuclear weapons will come true. This is something that no previous American president has proposed. Obama is a man who opposes wars that previous American presidents were entangled in; he has declared that he will withdraw from Afghanistan and Iraq – something which has never been proposed before.”

Despite the warm sentiments towards the American leader, he stressed, “The Arabs hate America, there is no doubt. There is not an Arab that loves America, and even the leaders who the United States considers allies or friends – hate it. The external love is merely hypocrisy or pragmatism. The reason for this is clear – Palestine.”

In this context he said, “The Palestinians today are like the Jews of the past – dispersed in exile and persecuted. Now the Palestinians are at a point where they deserve to have the United States on their side and not on the side of the Israelis.”

He reiterated his demand to allow the millions of Palestinian refugees around the world to return to the land where, according to his vision, a nuke-free democratic state by the name of Isratine should be established.

 http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3877174,00.html

Marc Faber on the Financial Collapse and total Meltdown of America

Marc Faber an independant economist has been known for his not so sunny views of the American and Worldwide marketplace. Here are a couple videos to keep the rain clouds near.

Here comes the shut down of the Federal Gov’t

March 4th is round the corner folks. This has been spoken of for a bit now. Geithner along with Ron Paul, which I believe, said this will cause the US of A to go into default. Default means bankruptcy.

 

Federal agencies preparing for shutdown, White House says
By Ed O’Keefe
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, February 22, 2011; 6:51 PM

Federal agencies are preparing to operate at reduced levels if a government shutdown occurs, but the Obama administration hopes to strike a deal with congressional Republicans to avoid one, the White House said Tuesday.

By March 4, lawmakers must pass a short-term resolution to continue funding the government, or President Obama and congressional leaders can strike a deal on how to fund government operations for the final seven months of fiscal 2011. Failing to do so would prompt at least a partial shutdown affecting various agencies and functions.

“There have been contingency plans for government shutdowns since 1980, and those plans are obviously updated accordingly, but they’ve been around for a long time,” White House press secretary Jay Carney said Tuesday. The White House is hoping to reach an agreement with lawmakers soon, he said.

Federal agencies must maintain plans “for an orderly shutdown in the event of the absence of appropriations,” according to Office of Management and Budget guidance issued each year to agency officials. The plans must include estimates of how long it would take agencies to complete a shutdown and the number of employees that would need to work during one, OMB said.

According to federal law, employees working through a shutdown must be engaged in military or law enforcement duties, provide medical care or protect lives and property. Some agencies may keep employees on the job if their compensation is paid for through a different appropriations process.

OMB would not provide details Tuesday of individual agency plans, but most workers might stay on the job if a shutdown occurs, according to partial data obtained by the Government Accountability Office following a November 1995 shutdown.

At that time, the departments of Commerce, Justice and State kept about 63 percent of their workers on the payroll. Just over 50 percent of Interior Department workers stayed on the job, as did 42 percent of employees at the departments of Education, Labor and Health and Human Services, GAO said.

Ahead of potential cutbacks, the Social Security Administration plans to discuss the impact of a shutdown with union leaders next week.

Though Social Security Commissioner Michael J. Astrue has not made any decisions on furloughing workers, the agency wants to meet with union leaders “in the event that a furlough may become necessary,” Jay Clary, the agency’s acting associate commissioner for labor issues, told union leaders in a letter late last week.

The agency made about 4,800 employees work through the 1995 shutdown to ensure beneficiaries obtained their checks, according to a Congressional Research Service report. An additional 61,000 workers had to stay home, but officials later called some in to help process new claims.

“I don’t know who might have to stay home this time,” said Witold Skwierczynski, president of the American Federation of Government Employees Council 220, which represents SSA workers. The union is negotiating a new contract and also plans to devote next week’s talks to potential budget cuts, he said.

Skwierczynski said Monday that the union is upset about the possibility of a furlough, but that “we don’t have a problem with the agency giving us a heads up.”

“Hopefully, it won’t happen,” he added. “But if it does, we’ll have an opportunity to negotiate a reasonable methodology.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/02/22/AR2011022206063.html

While we were watching Russians, THE CHINESE ARE COMING THE CHINESE ARE COMING!!!

Bye Bye Gaddafi Bye Bye

As the uprising of the middle east spreads, Libya a natural choice, is in civil war. Libya is also a big player in the price of oil. As any normal dictator would do, Gaddafi doesn’t stand for any opinion besides his own and orders the military to fire on and drop bombs on the people of Libya. Instead of being loyal to this chump, military commanders are loyal to the people who are also family members and say “NO”! They instead in a beautiful act of Libyan patriotism tell this evil despot to shove it and have now are waging war against him. Word is Libya has completely succumbed to the people accept for Gaddafi’s one last hold out which shouldn’t last long. I am sure he is going the way of the dodo. Another cool piece of information is top Muslim Cleric has ordered a FATWA on Gaddafi. A fatwa is a religious decree to kill him.

…..

An air force officer, Major Rajib Faytouni, said he personally witnessed up to 4,000 mercenaries arrive on Libyan transport planes over a period of three days starting from 14 February. He said: “That’s why we turned against the government. That and the fact there was an order to use planes to attack the people.”

Numerous witnesses in Benghazi have said that while artillery was used against citizens, air force planes did not fire on them here. They did, however, according to Faytouni, drop two bombs inside the Rajma military base to stop weapons falling into the hands of anti-government forces.

“The two colonels who defected in MiGs had refused orders to bomb the people,” he said, referring to a pair of air force officers who fled to Malta in their jets on Monday. He added: “There were also two helicopters that flew to Tunis.”

All around Benghazi there were indications that Gaddafi has lost control of the city. The military is no longer operating checkpoints, which are now manned only by a handful of traffic police. Every physical sign of the dictator has been taken down or burned. While there has been no violence in the past two days, angry demonstrators are driving through city firing Kalashnikov rifles into the air and demanding Gaddafi cede control and leave the country.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/feb/23/libya-free-benghazi-anti-gaddafi-troops

Another State joins Arizona in Anti-Immigration Law

Indiana passes Arizona-like immigration measures

INDIANAPOLIS (Reuters) – The Indiana senate passed a sweeping immigration bill that echoes Arizona’s tougher measures on illegal immigrants and despite opposition from some of the largest employers and business groups in the state.

The measure, passed on Tuesday night by a vote of 31-18, would allow state and local police to ask a person stopped for infractions like traffic violations for proof of legal residency if the officer has a “reasonable suspicion” they may be in the country illegally.

Another provision would call for, with some exceptions, the use of English only in public meetings, on Web sites and in documents.

The bill still needs to be adopted by state’s House of Representatives, where opponents say they will now turn.

The vote “was a key step in the legislative process,” the bill’s author Sen. Mike Delph said in a statement, adding that the bill will “send a clear message that Indiana will no longer be a sanctuary for people who are in our state and country illegally because of our federal government’s failure to act on illegal immigration.”

Greater Indianapolis Chamber of Commerce officials say the measure would have a chilling effect on business, particularly convention business.

“It will have a negative economic impact on the state of Indiana,” Chamber Public Policy Director Angela Smith-Jones said, adding that immigration issues should be handled on the federal level.

(Reporting by Susan Guyett. Editing by Peter Bohan)

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/02/23/indiana-passes-arizona-like-immigration-measures/

My market crash view shared

I predicted in ’06 the market come to a screaming halt soon, it happened in ’07.  Since then I have said we have not left this depression, we are simply experiencing a cycle within a cycle. This is still a depression folks and now this, what we call in the dating world “rebound” is coming to an end. I told my friend who trades a ton of stocks, “Mike, get into cash. The market is way oversold and it is going to crash (this was at 10,900 DJIA area). It is taunting people right now to throw money in, but it is going through a bubble”. It has since moved upward of 12,300, everyone screaming at the top of their lungs “We are fine, we are back in business” as markets in easterns countries have crashed the country into bankruptcy like Bangladesh.

Marketwatch.com has now published a post that strengthens what I’ve been repeatedly saying.

Market Crash 2011: It will hit by Christmas

Commentary: The S&P 500 is worth only 910. Get out or lose big

By Paul B. Farrell, MarketWatch

SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif. (MarketWatch) — Politicians lie. Bankers lie. Yes, they’re liars. But they’re not bad, it’s in their genes, inherited. Their brains are wired that way, warn scientists. Like addicts, they can’t help themselves. They want to sell stuff, get rich.

We want to believe they’re telling us the truth. Silly, huh? Both trapped in this eternal “dance of death” controlled by programs hidden deep in our brains, telling us what to do, telling us to ignore facts to the contrary — till it’s too late, till a new crisis crushes all of us.

Dow ends at 2 1/2-year highJoe Bel Bruno explains why stocks climbed to 2 1/2-year highs and extended their winning streak to a third consecutive week.

Psychology offers us a powerful lesson: Our collective brain is destined to trigger a crash before Christmas 2011. Why? We’re gullible, keep searching for a truth-teller in a world of liars. And they’re so clever, we let them manipulate us into acting against our best interests.

In fact, behavioral science tells us that bankers and politicians are lying to us 93% of the time. It’s 13 times more likely Wall Street is telling you a lie than the truth. That’s why they win. Why we lose. Because our brains are preprogrammed to cooperate in their con game. Yes, we believe most of their lies.

One of America’s leading behavioral finance gurus, University of Chicago Prof. Richard Thaler, explains: “Think of the human brain as a personal computer with a very slow processor and a memory system that is small and unreliable.” Thaler even admits: “The PC I carry between my ears has more disk failures than I care to think about.” Easy to manipulate.

Eternal love story: Your brain’s in love with Wall Street’s brain

Thaler’s a quant, speaks mostly in cryptic algorithmics. So if you really want to know how Wall Street’s con game works on you, Barry Ritholtz, the financial genius behind “Bailout Nation,” recently summarized it in the Washington Post: “Humans make all the same mistakes, over and over again. It’s how we are wired, the net result of evolution. That flight-or-fight response might have helped your ancestors deal with hungry saber-toothed tigers and territorial Cro Magnons, but it drives investors to make costly emotional decisions.”

Humans have something “akin to brain damage,” says Ritholtz. “To neurophysiologists, who research cognitive functions, the emotionally driven appear to suffer from cognitive deficits that mimic certain types of brain injuries. … Anyone with an intense emotional interest in a subject loses the ability to observe it objectively: You selectively perceive events. You ignore data and facts that disagree with your main philosophy. Even your memory works to fool you, as you selectively retain what you believe in, and subtly mask any memories that might conflict.”

Worse, there’s no cure.

Your brain needs to believe lies; Wall Street loves telling lies

Examples: USA Today headline: “Average Bull is 3.8 years: We’re not at 2 yet.” More upside. Wall Street loves it. The Wall Street Journal: “Stock recovery in high gear … S&P500 now speeding toward its next landmark,” double its March 2009 bottom.

Other lies: Inflation and rate rises won’t push China and America over the edge into a new bear recession. That one’s real popular in Wall Street’s echo chamber. Wall Street also cheers every time cable pundits and journalists repeat their favorite statistic: That stocks rally in the third year of a presidency, often more than 20%. Yes, Wall Street loves those 93% lies.

Biggest lie? Wharton’s perennial bull, Jeremy Siegel, of “Stocks for the Long Run” fame, recently told a TD Ameritrade Institutional Conference, “There’s nothing but upside to come …the next several years are going to be good for stocks.”

Yes, one of Wall Street’s favorite co-conspirators is hypnotizing thousands of our best money managers and advisers into believing the lie that this bull market will roar indefinitely. Worse, they’ll use that message to sell naive investors on buying whatever junk Wall Street is selling.

Get the picture? A little conspiracy begins in your head, a conspiracy between your gullible brain and Wall Street’s con men selling hype, hoopla and happy-talk. Listen and you’ll lose.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/market-crash-2011-it-will-hit-by-christmas-2011-02-22

I predicted oil would hit at least $130/bbl

Which would lead it to $4.75/gal on average across the states. Now that outbreaks of uprisings of people who are just damn tired of dictators are in play, oil is rocketing. Currently at $100/bbl, Marketwatch.com backs my belief with this post:

Middle East unrest could push oil to $220: Nomura

By Claudia Assis

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) — Crude futures prices could peak above $220 a barrel if Libya and neighboring Algeria “were to halt oil production together,” said Michael Lo, an analyst with Nomura. The closest comparison to current unrest in the Middle East and North Africa is the 1990-91 Gulf War, he added. The unrest could also reduce spare capacity of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries to levels last seen during that war and in the summer of 2008, when prices hit $147 a barrel, Lo said. Crude-oil futures closed 2.8% higher at $98.10 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/middle-east-unrest-could-push-oil-to-220-nomura-2011-02-23?dist=afterbell

Alot higher than I expected for this summer. I wasn’t expecting these prices until next summer. This will cause an economic crash here in the U.S.