Depp, an avid fan and long-time friend of writer Hunter S. Thompson, played a version of Thompson (named Raoul Duke) in 1998’s Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, based on the writer’s pseudobiographical novel of the same name. Depp also accompanied Thompson as his road manager on one of the author’s last book tours. In 2006, Depp contributed a personal foreword to Gonzo by Hunter S. Thompson, a posthumous visual biography of the writer’s legacy published by ammobooks.com. As a close friend of Thompson’s, Depp paid for most of Thompson’s memorial event, complete with fireworks and the shooting of Thompson’s ashes by a cannon, in Aspen, Colorado, where Thompson lived.
On August 20, 2005, in the private ceremony, Thompson’s ashes were fired from a cannon atop a 153-foot (47 m) tower of his own design (in the shape of a double-thumbed fist clutching a peyote button) to the tune of Norman Greenbaum’s “Spirit in the Sky” and Bob Dylan’s Mr. Tambourine Man.Red, white, blue, and green fireworks were launched along with his ashes. As the city of Aspen would not allow the cannon to remain for more than a month, the cannon has been dismantled and put into storage until a suitable permanent location can be found. According to his widow Anita, Thompson’s funeral was financed by actor Johnny Depp, a close friend of Thompson. Depp told the Associated Press, “All I’m doing is trying to make sure his last wish comes true. I just want to send my pal out the way he wants to go out.
Here are the letters wrote while working on Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
You know what I’ve been thinking about lately? KISS, reunion tours & the death of Rock and Roll.
The other day I was minding my own business and losing myself in the fast-paced world of IReports when an animated ad informed me that KISS would be blessing Seattle with its presence in mid-November. Just so there’s no confusion, I’m not talking about a KISS cover band or a group made up of KISS offspring. I’m talking about freakin’ KISS. That’s right, the costumed, hard rock band whose debut album dropped in the year of my birth (1974), is back on the road. And they aren’t playing the local Indian Casino either. They’re playing the 16,000 plus seat Key Arena.
Gene, Gene the blood-spitting machine.
I know what you’re thinking. “Wait. Aren’t those guys dead?” Well, not yet. Their careers were on life support for a little while, but then in ’96 the two founding members – Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons – decided there might be more money in kicking it old school. So KISS put the make-up back on, reconciled with the two original members they’d kicked out, and started a reunion tour, which apparently has never ended.
And they’re not the only rock stars with graying hair putting on a high-priced reunion tours. In 2008 the list of top grossing tours was overrun by acts whose best work is far, far behind them; Bon Jovi, Bruce Springsteen, Madonna, the Police, Neil Diamond, and the Eagles.
I thought the Eagles hated each other’s guts. Now they’re on tour ever three years. Apparently time (and money) heal all wounds.
What’s truly sad isn’t that these musical giants can still pack ‘em in, it’s that lesser acts – the ones you’re too embarrassed to admit you loved as a kid – are still touring. Just drive by your nearest casino and read the large, animated sign. You can’t miss it. It’s the one right next to the highway distracting the drivers who are flying by at 70 mph.
As I cruised past the Emerald Queen Casino sign on I-5 south of Seattle this week I was brought up-to-date on the parade of has-beens that are making their way to northwest in the next couple months.
Three Dog Night. Kansas. Air Supply. Blue Oyster Cult.
Blue Oyster Cult? Really? The only reason anyone under thirty knows who these guys are, is because of a Saturday Night Live sketch. And if this band didn’t fear the reaper, then why are they still hanging around?
Look, I guess I can’t blame the musicians. If someone’s willing to pay them to do the thing they love to do, they should cash those checks. The fact that there’s still an audience for this stuff is what has me scratching my head. Are there people out there who think it’s really worth paying fifty bucks to hear the silver-haired members of Kansas belt out a subpar rendition of “Carry on Wayward Son”? I mean, is there really no other way for baby boomers to spend a Saturday evening?
As a musical genre, Rock and Roll will live forever. It will carry on in some distorted form or another until the cockroaches retake the earth. But as a cultural concept, Rock and Roll is as dead as Kurt Cobain. Because at its core, Rock and Roll wasn’t just about music, it was a movement that represented cultural rebellion in the form or sex, drugs, and disenfranchised youth. It was supposed to titillate teenagers and scare parents. But when AARP members start leading the charge, the rebellion is clearly over.
Consider this…
Elvis Presley’s pelvis used to scare the shit out of parents and work kids into a frenzy. Now the song “Viva Las Vegas” is being used to sell boner medication.
The Who used to sing about their “generation” and hoped they’d die before they got old. Now they’re cashing the checks CBS sends them for licensing their music to the CSI franchise.
Myrtle Beach Rock City!
KISS used to sing songs about banging groupies while trying to find new merchandise to slap their likenesses on. Okay, they’re basically still doing the same thing. They just have reality shows and coffee shops to help them push the product.
The only true Rock and Roll icons left are the ones who died before they had a chance to sellout. But something tells me if Sid Vicious were alive today, he’d be more than happy to play the Lucky Eagle Casino. Provided, of course, they paid the acts in high-quality heroin.
Many of us have been misled into thinking pain is a problem.
Headache? Numb it. Gall bladder malfunctioning? Remove it. Sore throat? Soothe it.
All of these so-called “solutions” make the symptom the problem rather than attending to the underlying cause.
Imagine if you approached your car with the same attitude. Engine noise? Turn up the radio. Annoying vibrations at highway speeds? Drive slower. Squealing brakes? Turn the radio up even louder!
Ridiculous, right? Yet many of us employ this attitude when it comes to our body. We occupy this miraculous self-healing, self-regulating organism, and if we’ll listen, it warns us when things are amiss. First, with a little whisper. Then a serious warning. Or finally by SHOUTING!
Then we have a choice: address the underlying cause (fix) or merely quiet the warning sign (patch).
Chiropractic care produces great results by attending to the cause, rather than merely suppressing symptoms. Are you attending to your warning signs? Do you know a pill-popping symptom-treating friend who could benefit from our care? Encourage them to give Jaci a call. They can take advantage of our Octoberfest special. October 12th – 16th, consult, exam, x-rays, report of findings- $31.
Time Magazine’s article on “Why Doctors Are Giving Heroin to Heroin Addicts” begs the question, should we do what works or should we ignore what is right, on moral grounds? The article describes a study in the UK, where long-time heroin addicts were administered heroin under doctor supervision in clinics as part of a program to reduce their addiction to heroin. Most of the addicts had been using heroin for 15 years plus and many had attempted other treatment options, including methadone and going cold-turkey.
The results? The number of crimes committed by those in the study group who received heroin under supervision went from 1,700 in the 30 days before the program to 547 in the first six months of the program. This was much better than a control group receiving methadone. Similar programs were created in Switzerland and were recently supported by the people when they voted to continue public funding for the program. These types of programs work. The idea giving heroin addicts more of the drug they are addicted could seem like a moral hazard. Why can’t these addicts just quite, or should we not just lock them up? To the second question, our jails are already full of people who have committed much worse crimes and the jail system does not have the resources most of the time to properly handle drug addicts. To the first question, the reason person is an addict is because it is a medical addiction, so why not treat it like a moral issue?
The bigger point is that programs like this work to fix the problem. Needle programs reduce HIV infection and make the streets safer. Safe-sex programs in school reduce STD and pregnancy in school kids. These programs work and work much better than a moral stance not based on research ever will. It is effective public policy, which, by the way should not be based on a small section of society’s moral objections.
Wowwwww. This video literally turned my frown upside-down. I’m a little late with this, but trust me.. it’s even worth watching again if you’ve already seen it.
I present.. the 1980s Lakers, telling you what to do when it comes to drugs. Showtime!
We can dribble, shoot, slam dunk.. You can win too, without that junk!
The government Federal and State spent about $40 Billion on the war on drugs in 2009 already. Arrested were about 1.5 Million people and about half of them for marijuana. And about 8,000 were incarcerated, so what is the point? Is this a $40 Billion harassment bill?
It will cost about $145 Billion to wage war in Iraq and Afghanistan in 2009 and another $130 Billion in 2010, not to mention the human lives lost by both sides and the permanently injured and disabled as a result of these senseless wars. The war was based on a lie and everyone knows it so what is there to win?
Now let us add these numbers to the wastes in AIDS research and the incarceration of Americans placed in housing projects to survive by any means, as my nephew put it stockpiled like sardines. What are we talking about here?
You have $40 Billion spent on a war on drugs that cannot be won, because it is a war against the will of Americans choice of lifestyles. Put directly we live in a nation and a generation that is turned off from alcohol and choose to smoke marijuana, which we can grow domestically, tax it and turn a red into black.
You have $150 Billion spent on a Middle Eastern war that cannot be won, that we are in due to a lie by the Bush administration. And not only is the war senseless but once we exit we will have to restock the weaponry for the DOD so the expenses do not end with the war. We cannot win the war because there is nothing to win back because nothing was taken by them. We have to outgrow the mentality that we have to have enemies to be a leading nation and learn to mediate.
You have $600 Billion wasted on the incarceration of poor and mostly illiterate Americans. We do not even educate inmates anymore, so what is the product we are producing but people who will not have legitimate survival skills upon release, which was why they got incarcerated in the first place. The mission is to cause recidivism. It a mission meant to cause failure.
And how much does the government spent on AIDS research with a defeated mentally? The government spent about $25 Billion on AIDS/HIV related expenses? I do not know, but 66% on treatment and 13% to Research. Explain the war tactic? With out any controls that create collaboration, just grants given to dreamers without relevant continuance from prior developments in the campaign to cure AIDS. It is a mission to cause failure.
Is it the American way to spend money on punishing and killing instead of saving lives and educating the American people to compete in the global market?
A friend once said, “Teens may look and act like they don’t need parents any more but they need you now more than ever.”
If that’s the case, I’ll be on my toes for the next ten years, trying to (barely) stay one step ahead of my kids.
What are my options when I’m at the end of my rope?
Dr. Townsend imparts his words of wisdom:
1. Be the Grown Up
Keep teen’s future in mind – use current circumstances to equip and prepare your teen for adult life in the real world
Be loving but direct
Tolerate teen’s anger — As humanly possible, listen, contain your child’s feelings, understand what he is saying, and clarify whether you deserve his anger.
Don’t get hooked into fights. – “We’re finished talking about this for now. I’ll bring this up at another time when you’re not so upset.”
2. Make Connections
When in doubt, connect with your teen – don’t argue. Make a connection.
3. Model Respect and Responsibility
Deemphasize control — allow your teen to choose and experience consequences. Allow your child to experience responsibility.
Normalize “No.” – Say “no” when it’s in the best interest of your teen. Help your child get used to reality.
Be soft on preferences and style, and hard on disrespect and selfishness — give your teen room to dress differently but be strict about how he treats you and others.
4. Seek help and support
HALT — when you’re hungry, angry, lonely, or tired, don’t threaten your teen with consequences. Wait until you have the support, energy, or the resources you need.
Plug into safe people who understand — call for support and wisdom right before or after the problem occurs. Relax. We deserve it!
Saturday I watched episode 8 of Ken Burns’ movie Jazz, a documentary that Andrea and I started 2 years ago while still living in Kentucky and somehow never finished. If you’ve never seen any of Burns’ work, his documentaries are outstanding. His three major ones are on the Civil War, Baseball, and Jazz, which he considers to be the three quintessential elements of Americana, and his newest endeavor is titled The National Parks: America’s Best Idea; it premiers this Sunday at 8 eastern on PBS.
While watching this particular episode from Jazz, I was sobered by how often these amazing musicians found themselves enslaved to drugs and alcohol and saddened by the vast number of them who turned to addictions to find relief. I don’t say that with any thoughts of superiority; we all have sinful refuges we turn to besides our Creator, and, for many in that era of jazz music, drugs were the escape hatch from the pressures that surrounded them; pressures that ranged from racism to road life. It was just disheartening to hear about how their lives crumbled around them and their talent was often squandered.
In the midst of that discussion, a story about Miles Davis had clear echoes of redemption.
Inspired by [Sugar Ray] Robinson’s seriousness about his craft [of boxing] and finally weary of the life his addiction was forcing him to lead, Davis resolved to kick his habit. Characteristically, he determined to do it on his own. He had just finished an engagement with Max Roach in Hollywood. He rode the bus halfway across the continent to his father’s farm outside East St. Louis. His father told him he could do nothing for him except offer his love. “The rest of it you got to do for yourself.” Davis did. He moved into a two-room apartment on the second floor of the family guest house and locked the door. For seven days, as the craving for drugs raged, he neither ate nor drank, shivering with cold and struggling to keep from screaming with the pain that tortured his joints. Then, he remembered, “one day it was over, just like that…. I walked outside into the clean, sweet air over to my father’s house and when he saw me he had this big smile on his face and we just hugged each other and cried.”
Davis would not fully kick the habit after this instance, but it was an uplifting story amidst clouds of despair. In it, I saw parallels to the Christian life, though the correspondence does breakdown at some point, especially when considering the self-willed approach of Davis as opposed to the Spirit-empowered, community-focused sanctification of Scripture. But I can’t get over that picture of Davis emerging from the shadowlands of fighting his addiction to drink deeply of the fresh farm air and freedom he now felt. And then to see the smiling face of his father, for them to embrace, and for tears of joy and exhaustion to flow uncontrollably.
It’s what the fight of faith against sin and self often feels like; that God is near and offers his love, but we are shivering and struggling until the Spirit takes control and the struggle ends for a moment. It’s how I picture saints entering the rest of eternity: staggering in, war-torn and weary, to finally breathe in paradise and weep for joy in the arms of their Father, finally free from the struggles of life and the sins that have enslaved them for so long. It makes me want to keep fighting, remaining faithful to the end, because the fight is worth the present and future smile of the Father.
When Weed’s life started to go down the toilet, he was involved with Goth Girl.
Goth Girl was his first serious girlfriend and even though his decisions were his decisions, she was the one who introduced him to the people that offered up the opportunity to make those bad decisions.
There were a lot of “friends” who used to come in and out all the time and one of them was Lulu.
Lulu was a really sweet girl and I really liked her a lot. She was always laughing and being silly.. of course, she was probably always like that because she was wasted all the time but at least she knocked on the door before she came into the house.. would actually say “hi” and “see ya” and would stop and have a conversation with me and Chief when she was here.
Believe me, that was ALOT more then his other friends did.
Anyway.. after Weed got kicked out, I didn’t see Lulu anymore. Not that that was unusual.. I didn’t see anyone after he got kicked out and I liked that just fine.
A few weeks ago, I was getting dinner from Mickey D’s and they forgot to give me one of the burgers. I didn’t find out until I got home so I had to drive back. When I went through the drive thru again, guess who was at the window handing over my missing burger?
Yep.
Lulu.
I was like OMG! LULU! but she was just like, “… hey.”
So I kind of figured that maybe to others around her, it would seem like she was giving me something free so I just drove home but I was glad to see that she had a job and said as much when I relayed what happened to Chief.
A few days later, Lulu came into the store.
The reason why I haven’t seen her had nothing to do with Weed being thrown out. From what she said, she had been arrested last year because she got caught with a needle. I didn’t realize how deep she was into drugs and honestly, it made me wonder how deep Weed was involved in them.
Anyway.. so she told me that she did a month in the county jail and when she was released, she was on house arrested. It was then that she realized that she had to get her life together and got her GED.. got the job at McDondalds.. and has been working towards getting into college.
She told me that she’s been completely clean for 9 months, dumped her old friends and does nothing but study and go to work.
I was SO proud of her and told her so.. I told her that it was great seeing her and great that she turned herself around.
So yesterday I was at the shop killing time with my father-in-law when Weed walks in… with Lulu.
I was surprised.
Really surprised.
She was going to work and stopped in to get something to eat that wasn’t fast food. I made her the sandwich and then they left.
I explained to my father-in-law who Lulu was and told him that I didn’t know if them hanging out together meant that Weed was straightening out OR that Lulu was backsliding.
Coming out as gay in middle school – New York Times magazine has a lengthy profile of middle school students who have and have not come out to their families and friends. Their experiences range from acceptance and happiness to bullying and suicide. (NY Times)
School bans hooded sweatshirts – Students in Kansas were hiding cell phones in kangaroo front pocket and texting without looking as they have the keyboard memorized. “We had them in our pockets and they’d vibrated. So then we’d take it out and bring it to the side and type, and we could memorize our keyboards, because most of us have full keyboards.” (KWCH)
(∆) Teens’ donks grab attention – In addition to the rims and the custom interiors, decked-out cars are now featuring paint jobs with unpaid advertising for candy products. “Sugar Daddies. Mr. Goodbar. Nerds. It’s wanting to be different, standing out,” said Hopkins, 21, a student at St. Augustine’s College. “People have always been hooking up cars, buying hot paint jobs. This is taking it to the next level. It’s all about the attention you want.” (N&O) photo by Travis Long
Study promotes importance of family dinners - A new report by Columbia University concludes that teens who do not eat with their families three times a week are twice as likely to use tobacco or marijuana, one and a half times more likely to use alcohol, and twice as likely to try drugs as compared to children who eat with their families five times a week. “Having dinner as a family is one of the easiest ways to create routine opportunities for parental engagement and communication, two keys to raising drug-free children.” (Join Together)
Interview with teens from 16&Pregnant - People Magazine interviews young couple who gave up their baby for adoption, against their parents’ wishes, on the MTV reality show.’We were in Ohio a couple days ago and a girl came up to me and she was shaking. She came up to me and she just started crying and she’s like, “You’re a role model to me.” We get that a lot.’ (People)
Some of us tend to enjoy some video games. Ironically, the same day that the newest portion of the Halo saga was released, video games might be bringing down a criminal investigation.
She hit her first split in years!
Someone decided it would be a good idea to turn on the Wii and get a bowling game going. (Personally, I would have chosen the Wii tennis, because I think that’s a much better game, but maybe they did not have the luxury of choice.) Throughout the search, various police officers laid down the bags of drugs they found so they could get a few frames in. Pure genius! I mean, hey, who doesn’t want to take a break during work?
What the cops did not know is that micro-cameras were filming this joyous event (yes, m’am, we have team Ramrod’s turkey on tape!). Now, due to their childish desires, the evidence they find may get thrown out of court. While Detective Stabler would have been upset over this, Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd says it will have little effect on the results of the search.
Maybe next time, guys, but as Ernie Anastos says, don’t let this little snafu hold you back and “keep f***ing that chicken!”
Until next time, check out the people at Wal-Mart (compliments of Z-man).
Minutes after storming into the Florida home of a convicted drug dealer, some Polk county undercover drug investigators were caught on tape playing a Wii video bowling game for over an hour.
WOW! Really?! They’re playing Wii during a drug raid?! And some people wonder why a lot of other people don’t trust the federal authorities: MANY (not all) Do NOT do their jobs to the ‘T’ like they’re supposed to. Let’s not even get into the random killings and corruption. Yet, they expect the citizens trust them with our safety??? No further comment.
Research from the Linus Pauling Institute at Oregon State University suggests that natural compounds of chlorophyll, chlorophyllin, and selenium compounds, which previously have been studied for their ability to preventing a cancerous condition, may be able to play a more significant role in reversing a cancerous condition.
A new study just published in the International Journal of Cancer examined the activity of chlorophyllin and found that, on a dose-by-dose basis, it was 10 times more potent at causing death of colon cancer cells than hydroxyurea, a chemotherapeutic drug commonly used in cancer treatment.
Chlorophyllin is a water-soluble derivative of chlorophyll – the green pigment found in most plants and many food products that makes possible the process of photosynthesis and plant growth from the sun’s energy. Chlorophyllin is inexpensive, and animal studies plus human clinical data suggest that it can be ingested at relatively high levels without toxicity.
These studies were supported by the National Cancer Institute and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. Other collaborators included researchers from the New York Medical College and the Penn State College of Medicine.
Chlorophyll is identical to your hemoglobin except for the center atom. Dr. Robert O. Young, at the pH Miracle Living Center in San Diego, California suggests, “as one increases their consumption of chlorophyll from green foods and green drinks the quality and quantity of the red blood cells improve. This can be noted on a CBC medical test as the red blood cell count increases and the hemoglobin increases to a healthy range. Liquid chlorophyll and chlorophyllin can be added to any water or green drink to improve the concentration of this powerful blood building compound.”
You can buy this liquid chlorophyll from Dr. Young on my website. It costs $24 for 120 ml. You simply add a few drops to your water or smoothie.
I love my husband. I do…I really do. But I have had enough of his 16 year old Juvenile delinquent son! My step son, as some of you know, was arrested this summer around the end of June. 5 felony counts which were dropped down to only the weapons charge (as if that isn’t bad enough) in a plea agreement. All he has to do is be drug tested now twice a week (that was only once but the parole officer upped that one), pay a 300 dollar fine, write a paper on peer pressure, do 24 hours of community service, go to school, stay away from his druggy friends, and get counseling. Well guess what…he can’t do any of it, except the drug tests which have come up, according to the parole officer, diluted hence (yes I said hence) the upping of the testing from once a week to twice.
He has been leaving the house without telling anyone, hanging out with his drug addict friends (who are all over 18 by the way) skipping school, punching holes in our walls,and being a general pain in the rear. My husband said this past weekend he had finally had enough and that he wasn’t allowed to come back to our house, in fact he was going to call the parole officer and tell her what was going on and probably the kid would end up in the detention center. GOOD! That is what he needs! But guess what…one call from his ex and it is back to the same old crap. And honestly I am so totally done with it. My kids have moved out, and in with their dad because my step son is so violent and they are afraid of him. My health is not great because of the stress. Frankly, I have been gracious, forgiving and patient…but how much is enough?
Maybe I’m not being a good christian because I have given up…or have I actually given up if in fact I want him to get help that we as parents cannot provide him? His mom and dad are not strong enough to deal with him. I am definitely not strong enough to deal with him.
so, today I told my husband that I cannot be here any more when his son is here. I’m not sure where I will go or what I will do, but I am tired of being put in last place, of our whole family being put in last place because of this kid who doesn’t give a darn about anyone but himself. I just don’t know at this point what else to do!
It all moved. Whenever I fixed my gaze upon something, all of reality was spinning about it- it drove little holes of pain into my skull, my attempts at forcing sense into an environment where no sense can survive. Sounds were a blur. But it was attacking and I had no way of retaliation. So I waited, in pain. Waited for the long minutes of non-sense to fade. Waited until I’ve had enough of time, that I might turn myself the right direction, like a shirt.
It wasn’t sudden. But I sensed something shift in me. It was my meal and seven glasses of different wine wanting an outlet. So out I let them. And my sense returned. And come morning, I was only aching and hurting and nothing more.
Da…de ceva timp am tot zis si mi s-a spus sa pun si o categorie de “fun stuff” … si cred ca a venit timpul sa o fac…Astept sugestii si de la voi (pe mess sau aici ..unde vreti) cu poze/videoclipuri/texte etc…tot ce vi se pare haios si ce ar ajuta la buna dispozitie …. Am sa incep eu cu un video ce l`am gasit navigand pe ici`colo…
10 lucruri care nu trebuiesc facute cand esti intr-o toaleta de barbati !!
10 lucruri care nu trebuiesc facute cand esti la o inmormantare!!
10 droguri pe care nu ar trebuii sa le iei cand conduci !!
The Taliban leader says the West lacks the will to fight in Afghanistan and he may be right. Mullah Omar has issued a statement from his hiding place in Pakistan warning of huge casualties and said the West does not have the stomach for the war. Omar said that the more forces the US deploys in the country, the more they will face “unequivocal defeat”. He referred to history when he described the country as a “graveyard for colonial troops”. His statement came as Taliban-linked rebels have intensified use of roadside bombs, particularly in the south. This year more than 350 foreign troops have been killed, making it the deadliest year since fighting began. (picture credit: daviza)
Italy is the latest western country to question its commitment to Afghanistan after six of its troops were killed alongside ten Afghan civilians in a Kabul bomb blast on Thursday. The European nation has 2,800 soldiers in Afghanistan and had already started bringing some home before the latest attack which brought its death toll to 20. Now Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi is publicly questioning the mission. “We are all convinced it’s best for everybody to get out soon,” he said.
Berlusconi’s statement will not be welcomed by the White House which provides two-thirds of the 100,000 troops in the Nato-led occupation force. With a new administration in the White House, the US has re-examined their motives for fighting the eight-year war. In March President Obama made a pledge to expand the US military presence in Afghanistan. But as the World Politics Review puts it, the essential question now is not whether the war is winnable, but whether the mission is vital to American national security interests. And from this perspective, says the review, the open-ended strategy fails.
The US administration has acknowledged the new policy raises the stakes by transforming the Afghan War from a limited intervention into a more ambitious and potentially risky counter-insurgency. The statement was made in a Senate Report to the Committee on Foreign Relations which was released last month. The report stressed the importance of a counter-narcotics policy in winning the war. For years commanders on the ground said that going after drug lords was not part of their mandate. But now the US has targeted drug traffickers who help finance the Taliban as a major priority. The report said tens of millions of drug dollars are helping the Taliban and other insurgent groups to “buy arms, build deadlier roadside bombs and pay fighters.”
Afghanistan’s opium industry supplies 90 percent of the world’s heroin and generates $3 billion in profits. But the UN says production is on the decline for the second year in a row. The Americans have targeted 50 of the major drug traffickers on a military hit list to be “killed or captured”. It has also set up an intelligence centre to analyse the flow of drug money to the Taliban and corrupt Afghan officials, and an international task force to pursue drug networks in southern Afghanistan. But stopping the flow of drug money will not be easy. Most transactions are conducted in cash and are concealed by an ancient and secretive money transfer system. The strategy acknowledges that counter-narcotics will not be enough to win the war. The other major aspect of the change of direction relates to the activities of farmers. The Obama administration has admitted a program to eradicate poppies is a failure and emphasis will now be on promoting legal alternative crops.
The report raised two important questions that will impact the success of the new direction. Firstly, it asked whether the US Government has the capacity and the will to provide the hundreds more civilians to transform a poppy-dominated economy into one where legitimate agriculture can thrive. It also wondered whether Nato allies be counted on to step up their contributions on the military and civilian sides at a time when support is waning across the Western world. It also asks the questions that Obama’s team will need to honestly answer if the president is to avoid Afghanistan becoming his Vietnam: Does the American public understand and support the sacrifices that will be required to finish the job? And what is the job anyway? Obama and the other western leaders cannot use the hoary “terrorist safe havens” argument forever. And as Mullah Omar reminds us, forever is likely to be a very long time.
…Santa Cruz County Sheriff Tony Estrada who was “shocked” to discover that Richard Cramer, a high ranking Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) official who had worked as liaison between his agency and the Drug Enforcement Agency in Guadalajara before taking over as resident agent in charge at Nogales, Arizona was arrested for conspiracy charges.
Cramer has been under investigation since 2006, and remained with the Federal agency until 2007.
Cramer allegedly advised traffickers on law enforcement tactics and pulled secret files to help them identify turncoats. He charged $2,000 for a Drug Enforcement Administration document that was sent to a suspect in Miami by e-mail in August, authorities said.
“Cramer was responsible for advising the [drug traffickers] how U.S. law enforcement works with warrants and record checks as well as how DEA conducts investigations to include ‘flipping subjects,’ ” or recruiting informants, a criminal complaint says.
Other than they cost more to bribe, why would anyone assume that U.S. agents are any less likely to go to work for the cartels than any other cop? And given the D.E.A.s track-record around Latin America, I have the terrible inkling that what brought Cramer down was that he forgot the first lesson of Kindergarten: when you have goodies, bring enough to share.
As a person focused on weight loss and weight loss techniques and strategies, I have long been aware of the tendency of most drugs to interfere with weight loss and promote weight gain. It’s a pretty simple idea really. All processed and manufactured chemicals of any kind inhibit proper function of the body in one way or another. Those who would argue that point need only look back a short distance into the past to see the trend of human health since we got the idea that we could force the body to do what ever we wanted it to do by feeding it drugs.
Oh… lord I’m sorry about that. All of you people who are now lying on the floor laughing or spitting mad storming around your computer swearing at me will please accept my apology. I mean look at the life expectancy of humans now as opposed to 200 years ago. Ya … that sounds so reasonable doesn’t it? Dr. Joel Wallach says it this way. “American drug and cut medicine never added one single day to the average life of modern day man. The reason we are living longer is because of civil engineers. We have a stellar sanitation system in this country. We also have a food supply that has no end.” (not an exact quote but you get the gist)
Please forgive my sarcasm. I’m steaming mad right now at the drug dealers. Recently I read an article about Pfizer. These guys are at least as bad as any black hat drug dealer on any corner and probably worse because the do their dirty deeds while warring $5,000 suites and ties with an inappropriately huge knots to depict the noose that should be around their necks. As you can tell I’m in a mood so let me end this post with a warning that you NOT follow this link and that you do NOT read of the doings of the blackest of deeds you will ever see from any drug dealer. Particularly ones that you will see on the cover of bussiness week or seen in photo ops with heads of state. DO NOT READ what follows.
http://tinyurl.com/ltnr6h
Remember I warned you. Stay tuned for more of the real deal about weight loss. It’s only hard because of the lies and the misunderstandings your told. You can do it. Oh Yes You Can.
This poor girl was strangled to death and her body stuffed into a wall of a lab at Yale University in Sep, 2009. She’s fairly attractive and it happened at Yale so the police are hot on the heals of the killer. Given that they haven’t already caught the perp and American police are so incompetent a lazy anymore they can’t catch a cold I doubt they’ll actually make an arrest.
But again, since she was cute they’ll at least try. If she wasn’t cute they wouldn’t even bother putting on the pretense that they’re trying to catch who done it.
OH but not to worry, there’s plenty of cop cars on the side of the road pulling over hard working people just trying to get to and from work. They’ve got plenty of time for that.
So remember, if you’re a rapist, robber, murderer or drug dealer, don’t speed and you’ll be just fine.
One of these days, I won’t feel the need to add disclaimers. For now, I’m trying to stay out of trouble. This is not my mother or father. It is fiction. But “Cully Jean” is a very real woman. I love her dearly.
.
Red and White
Julie Buffaloe-Yoder
.
My sister is graduating today. I sit on a sweaty, metal folding chair at
the community center and wait to hear them call her name. Cully Jean sits
on a folding chair across the room beside ten other GED graduates. Nobody
wears a cap and gown. The air conditioner’s not working well, and the small
room smells strongly of felt tipped pens and hot bodies that are too close
together. Babies cry and little kids squirm on the floor. An administrator in
a cheap green suit stands up and looks at his watch. He wipes his forehead
with a handkerchief and reads a speech called It’s A Brand New Day.
.
Cully rolls her eyes and looks like she really wants a cigarette. She is
dark and beautiful like her Cherokee mama. Cully is thirty four, but she
already has stripes of white in her long black hair and dark half moons
under her eyes. Her breasts are large. She has one good arm and one
stubby arm. Her stubby arm ends where her elbow should be and has three
small, working fingers on it.
.
My legs are sticking to the metal chair, and I wish I had worn pants
instead of a skirt. Cully is wearing black jeans and the cute new top we
picked out at Wal-Mart today. It is dark red with short puffy sleeves and is
covered with tiny white dots. Cully points to her top and mouths the word
RED. Then she flips me off with her good hand and grins.
.
The women at social services nicknamed us Red and White. We were
born on the same day, but we’re not twins. We have the same white father.
He was almost fifty and already had a bunch of abused and abandoned kids
by the time he got our mothers pregnant.
.
My mother was white. She turned fourteen on the day I was born.
Cully’s mother was full-blooded Cherokee and a little older, maybe sixteen
or seventeen. Our father wanted to look noble for once in his life, so he
allowed both of his pregnant girlfriends to move in with him. He lived in a
dumpy little house on the outskirts of town. That’s where Cully and I were
born.
.
Social Services took us away when we were eight. I was small for my
age. Once my blond, curly hair was deloused and combed, I became a hot
commodity. I was placed with an older couple who live in a large Victorian
house on the good side of town. Eventually, they adopted me. Cully got
bounced around to different foster homes on the bad side of town.
.
When we were kids, our town was relatively small, and Cully could ride
her bike to my house. She showed up once or twice a week after midnight
and threw rocks at my window until I climbed down the trellis from my
second story room. The last time I snuck out with Cully Jean, we were
eleven. I didn’t really want to go anywhere. I was in a comfortable bed. I
liked my life and didn’t want to mess it up. But she kept throwing rocks, and
I was afraid she’d break the window. So, down I went.
.
Once my feet hit the ground, I turned around and saw Cully leaning
against a maple tree, smoking a cigarette. The rows of lights that framed the
lawn cast weird shadows on Cully’s face, and it made her look like she
had no eyes. What the frig took you so long? she asked. Little puffs of
smoke came out with her words.
.
We rode our bikes down Oak Street with its respectable rows of ivy
covered houses. We passed the Episcopal church and the new Elmwood
Elementary building where I went to school. After a while, we came to a
twin set of railroad tracks. We rode over the tracks and through the housing
projects and trailer courts. We passed the shabby little Ridgerock
Elementary school, where Cully may or may not be the next morning. We
passed the non-denominational church with Good News! spray painted in
neon yellow across its gray, windowless building.
.
We finally came to an abandoned gas station that was next to a row of
empty buildings. This was Cully’s favorite spot to hang, especially when her
foster father was in town. The street lights were still intact. We saw bullets
and needles on the ground. Sometimes, there were stray cats who would
let us pet them. When we got tired of sitting out front, we could slip inside
the gas station through a broken door in the back. There was an old, dust
covered cash register still on the counter. One time, we found a box full
of comic books.
.
Instead of going inside the gas station, we decided to sit down on a
rickety bench in front of the building. Cully pulled a joint out of her pocket
and lit it. We took little puffs and coughed until we gagged. The weed made
our heads feel big and put us in a silly mood. Broken glass sparkled on the
asphalt. We started doing hand clap games and laughing at how hard it was
to keep a rhythm, because we were stoned.
.
All of a sudden, a car pulled up. I didn’t hear it coming. I was laughing
too hard. Cully’s eyes got real big, and I laughed some more. Oh, shit, she
said. The car was a banged up piece of junk, and it squeaked and rattled to a
stop. A big man with a pot belly got out of the car. You little bitch! he
screamed. The state don’t pay us enough to put up with your crap!
.
Cully jumped up and started to run, but the man caught her by the hair
and flung her on the ground. He pulled off his belt and swung it high in the
air behind his head. Cully sat up and tried to get away. The belt came down
across her face with a snap. Cully screamed and fell back on the ground,
holding her face with her good hand. I jumped up and ran behind a pile of
wooden pallets while the man continued to beat Cully Jean.
.
I peeped around the pallets. I was so afraid the man would kill her. He
grabbed Cully by the hair and dragged her behind the gas station. I could
hear the sickening sound of his belt on Cully Jean’s skin. She screamed a
few more times. Then I heard nothing, except for the sound of my own
loud heart.
.
I waited for what seemed like forever. When I couldn’t stand waiting
any longer, I snuck to the side of the building and looked around back. The
man was sitting down on something. Cully Jean was on her knees in front of
the man. He was holding Cully’s head between his legs. Her shirt was off.
.
I was too terrified to run. I walked backward until I couldn’t see the
man or Cully anymore. I found a huge cardboard box on the side of the
building. I hid under the box. My pulse was beating loudly in my ears.
Something skittered by my arm, and I clapped my hand over my mouth so
I wouldn’t scream.
.
Eventually, I heard his heavy footsteps go past. The car door creaked
open. Then the car gurgled to a start and sped away. A few minutes later, I
crept out, and Cully’s bike was still there. I found her behind the gas station
on her hands and knees. She was crying and throwing up. Cully struggled to
her feet, still crying, and I helped her put on her shirt. Cully’s cheek was
bleeding. One of her eyes was closed shut. I didn’t know what to do, so I
reached out and tried to brush her hair away from her eyes. Cully Jean
spat in my face. Get away from me, bitch. I hate you, she hissed. Then she
got on her bike and slowly rode away.
.
I didn’t see Cully Jean for a long time after that. The next time we met,
we were thirteen. I was standing in front of the 7-11 store, and Cully came
whizzing up on a brand new skateboard and slammed into me. She told me
her mother had bought it for her. It still had the price tag on it. I doubted
what she said, but I tried to act impressed for her sake.
.
Then high school came along. People said I was a hottie. I got invited
to dances and had a lot of friends. Cully dropped out of her school midway
through freshman year. She was already addicted to crack. Once I saw her
when some friends and I went to a bar where underage kids could drink
without question. The place was a pit, and it reeked of underarms and
hot beer. Cully was working as a bar maid. She wore a short skirt and fish
net stockings. Old men slapped her on the ass and made mean remarks
about her stumpy arm. We pretended not to know each other.
.
I joined the debate team and the chess club. I graduated with honors.
Then I went to college and started drinking for real. Somehow, I managed
to get a degree in business. I put on a fairy tale wedding gown and married
a good looking bastard named Jim. He and I partied and fought our way
through our twenties. We cashed in my trust fund and bought a
condominium in Fort Lauderdale.
.
I moved back home when I was twenty nine and went into my adopted
father’s business. Now my ex is suing me for alimony. I make a lot of money
in real estate. My teeth are capped and bright white, and my face is on
billboards all over town, smiling like a fool. Cully won’t take a dime of my
money. If I mail her a check, she mails it back to me with cram it up your
ass written in big red letters across the front of the check.
.
Cully and I reconnected four years ago. She had just finished her last
session of rehab. Our reunion wasn’t a tearful one. We just saw each other
at the mall and started hanging out. Now we’re together most of the time.
If I don’t come around for a day, Cully calls and demands to know where the
hell I am.
.
But we don’t have long, meaningful conversations. We reveal ourselves
to each other cautiously and quickly, bit by bit. I told Cully about my
nervous breakdown while we were watching a sit com on television. When
we were waiting in line at the frozen yogurt stand, Cully told me she had
spent two years in jail.
.
Now Cully lives in public housing with her three youngest kids–two
girls and a boy. The apartment walls are thin, and we can hear people
arguing or having sex next door. Teenagers sell crack in front of the
apartments, and Cully yells at them until they leave.
.
Cully’s three kids are all under the age of five and have different fathers
they have never met. Cully has never gotten any child support. Two of the
fathers are dead, and she doesn’t know where the other one is. The kids are
sweet, but they’re a handful. They scream a lot and run around the
apartment, banging into walls. They leap on the kitchen counters like cats
and pour cereal all over the floor.
.
Five mornings a week, the kids take a little purple bus to daycare. Then
Cully takes the city bus to Wal-Mart, where she works all day. She goes to
school after work. At night, they all come home and run around the
apartment like crazy. Cully sings while she stirs spaghetti in a big, black
pot. She taught the kids how to write their names. She frames all of their
work and hangs it on the apartment wall.
.
In just a few minutes, Cully will have a high school diploma to hang on
her wall. The man in the green suit has finished reading his speech. The
folding chair hurts my ass. It feels like the air conditioner is completely
broken now. Cully is standing up with the other graduates, and I lean
forward to take her picture. The man in green has visible beads of sweat
running down the side of his face. He calls out the names quickly. Cully is
the last name on the list–Culletta Jean Whittaker.
.
Cully walks the few steps with her head held up. The man reaches out
and holds Cully’s good hand to shake it. There is an awkward moment when
he looks at her arm and is not sure where to put her diploma. Cully takes
the diploma with the three fingers on her stumpy arm and holds it up as
high as she can. Somebody behind me snickers.
.
I clap loudly for my dark sister. Tonight, we will go to Chuckie Cheese
to celebrate. She will show her kids how to spit wads of paper through their
straws. She will talk loudly and call me a dork. She won’t let me pay the bill.
.
We will go back to her apartment, and the kids will be high on
Mountain Dew. They will run and jump and break things until Cully
screams. Then they will put on their footie pajamas and settle down on her
bed, sucking their thumbs.
.
Cully will read a pile of books to them. The kids will fall asleep, but
Cully won’t stop reading until she finishes the last page of Good Night
Moon. When I wake up in the morning, I will be on the couch, covered with
Cully’s soft blanket. She will already be up, dressed in her Wal-Mart
Didn’t know there were so many connections between teens and ”D” words! I’ll briefly share Dr. John Townsend’s insights:
Deception and Lying — When deception begins, relationship ends. Your teen may fear that truth will interfere with love. Let him know, “I may not agree or like the things you say, but I’m on your side no matter what.” Encourage your teen to take a risk and have him decide whether or not you walk the talk. Follow through with logical consequences (e.g., When your teen is out with friends, he must call home often AND have an adult get on the line to verify the call).
Defiance — An argumentative teen tests parental boundaries while still respecting parents as their authority figure. Defiant teens completely reject parental authority. Solution? Stand firm. Provide structure, self-control, respect for authority, delayed gratification, and impulse control. Give as much freedom as your teen earns.
Detachment — Teen withdraws emotionally, anti-family, or he’s spending too much time in the outside world. Solution? Validate teen’s emotions, ask why, and solve the problem. Require respect. Schedule and structure family time. Teens aren’t adults. They need mature, wise parents to model socially acceptable behaviors.
There’s more:
Driving — What great leverage! Give your teen a sense of gravity of car ownership. Tell her she can drive as long as her attitude, conduct, and grades are acceptable. In addition, she can lose the privilege anytime she chooes not to fulfill her obligations. With privilege come responsibilities.
Deity (God and spirituality) — If you believe in higher power, you know God designed humans for relationships. Let your teen know God cares more about relationship than about keeping score. Get your teen involved in a healthy youth group. Insist that your teen join your family in going to worship services.
Whew! Three more days to go and the rest of my life to implement these strategies!
Some truly sad news to start. Actor Patrick Swayze died yesterday, age 57, after a 2-year battle with pancreatic cancer. He was only given 6 months initially by doctors but called himself a”miracle dude” after living much longer and even shooting a TV-series in the following months. He seemed to be a truly great person and has some amazing films behind his name. He played a drag queen in Too Wong Foo, Thanks for everything and who hasn’t seen the great movie Ghost ,with Whoopie Goldberg and Demi Moore. But he will be most remembered for his role in the musical Dirty Dancing. He sure made many girls and gays fall in love with him in that role, what a hunk.
Everybody was interested in the outcome of the interview between Oprah Winfrey and Whitney Houston but it wasn’t all that. Some interesting tidbits though were that Bobby spit on her during a fight and she hit him back three times under the watchful eye of their daughter. She was addicted to Bobby and could not do anything without him. He resented her more and more for her success and even cut her head of pictures and other childish things like that. Nothing we all didn’t more or less know after seeing “Being Bobby Brown”. Whitney seemed to make up answers as they spoke sometime. Will she stay sober for much longer??, my guess is no.
Michael Douglas and Matt Damon will play the lead characters in the biopic of Liberace. Now that is a movie I would like to see. And Matt Damon was apparently also behind the prank on George Clooney at the Film Festival in Venice where a man stripped and asked for a kiss.
In this week’s edition, The New Scientist adds a bit of perspective to what Associate U.S. Attorney-General Thomas Perelli called ”the largest criminal fine in history,” leveled against pharmaceutical giant Pfizer. Pfizer was charged with illegally marketing drugs for “off-label” purposes, treatments for which the drugs had not been tested and granted FDA approval.
By any standard, the $2.3 billion sum that pharmaceutical giant Pfizer will pay to settle charges of improper drug promotion is big. But will it change anything?
Doctors can prescribe medications in situations other than those approved by drug regulators, but drug firms in the U.S. are not allowed to promote these “off-label” uses.
The payout settles claims by whistleblowers and the U.S. government that Pfizer broke these rules for a range of drugs including the painkiller Bextra, pulled from the market in 2005 because of evidence suggesting it might increase the risk of heart attack and stroke.
The sum represents less than three weeks of sales for Pfizer, based on 2008 figures …
…thanks to the total fuck-up that was last year, thanks to my first semester being completely lost due to the state I was in, and the second not much better because let’s face it I was still getting better, I wasn’t just better straight away, thanks to my being an arrogant, lazy little shit, thanks to the way I hardly worked this summer because I really wasn’t feeling too great, thanks to all of this, thanks to the fact that I just don’t work hard enough for things I want, or didn’t work hard enough for things I wanted, thanks to the fact that I thought I might just be clever enough to breeze through and didn’t want to work hard when I knew I wasn’t going to do well, and I just didn’t want to put in the effort only to not do particularly well because if I had started working it would have been too late, and I would feel like working wasn’t worth it because if I work, I want to do well, damn you, not just passably OK, thanks, basically, to the fact that I am an arrogant, lazy little cunt who totally deserves everything she’s got, I failed two of my exams, which means I lost thirty credits, which means I can’t progress onto Level Two of my degree, which means that next year, I’m going back as a part-time student to retake the two modules I failed, I’m going to get a job to fund me through this year and to give me something to do with the time when I’m not working, and actually, maybe this is a chance for me to learn a lot about myself. Maybe this will be a good thing for me.
I’m just really angry that effectively it’s all mainly a consequence of being too depressed for too long to do anything about it. That someone who is as clever and potentially brilliant as me should be scuppered by an illness she can’t control or understand, that I’m buggered before I begin because I’m just weighed down with a condition, a weakness, and however good I could be half the time I’m fighting something which I shouldn’t have to fight. I don’t know why I shouldn’t have to fight it, I guess I really mean, no-one should have to deal with this because you think of your mind as being something that’s in your control and so it’s being ill is just not fair, frankly. That’s enough of me being a petulant little brat. I probably deserve this.
So now, I do organised things, I register, I work out how I’m going to get the money to do all of this, and simply, I pray.
This weekend was all about the rediscovery of my childhood. The word that best describes this weekend is ‘Fantastic,’ and it ended up being so relaxing that they were the most enjoyable days ever.With my excitement from the past 2 weeks under me, I couldn’t wait for what lay ahead.
It was two weeks ago that I found out about the movies playing at the local independent theatre about a block away from my house. Every weekend they have a midnight double feature, and this Friday was The Dark Crystal and The Labyrinth. Two mystical classics that are so amazing. I had actually never seen The Dark Crystal, and was amazed by its awesomeness once it was over.
I ended up getting home at 4am that night, but knew that I had another day ahead of me the next, so went to bed as soon as I got home. Waking up at 930am, I headed towards the theatre again for old Saturday morning cartoons including Scooby Doo and The Bugs Bunny Show. This was followed by the most epic movie of my childhood, The Never Ending Story. Watching this movie brought back so many childhood memories. I remember watching that movie over and over, and eventually had reoccurring nightmares of a wolf chasing me through the wilderness. I had never connected the two until yesterday, and was completely horrified by the wolf in the movie. But that didn’t stop me from enjoying it. I left there feeling like I was a part of the never ending story and that if I had stopped having hopes and dreams like Bastian then I would ruin Fantasia forever.
The weather was incredible when we got out of the theatre. Bright and hot, it felt like the rain and grey had never ever been in Vancouver! A friend and I headed to Trout Lake close to my house and we ate Pez candy while daydreaming about life. We were learning to love everything around us as if every piece of the world was new to us. Like small children, we experienced the colours and plants and clouds around us, and were amazed by it all.
The fact that children think to themselves with so much more wonder fascinates me. It’s like you’re in your head way more when you’re younger. You look at something, and accept its existence, but wonder where it comes from, what it feels like or tastes like. What made it, and how did it get here? Then you try to put your thoughts into words and it is all jibberish and doesn’t make any sense. But it all makes sense in your head, and that’s when it gets to confusing for you to understand. Psychedelics may have had a big influence of rediscovering this, but it was definitely refreshing.
“[...] Darpa’s human-enhancement programs were looking promising. In February 2002, Darpa asked Congress for a new, $78 million-per-year push for research including ‘the development of biochemical materials for enhancement of performance.’ That was on top of $90 million to explore how ‘biological systems … adapt to wide extremes.’ The human being, a Darpa fact file proclaimed in April 2002, ‘is becoming the weakest link in Defense systems.’ [...]
Roth knew that some animals hibernate – slowing their metabolisms until environmental conditions improve. He also knew that some cells can enter a kind of dormancy and then spring back to life – essentially, they go into suspended animation. Roth wanted to better understand this ‘metabolic flexibility.’ He started testing various chemicals that slowed metabolism, like heavy water and tetrodotoxin (puffer fish poison, used in Haiti to turn people into zombies). Nothing worked. But then Roth found a loophole in one of nature’s seemingly absolute rules: Animals need oxygen. But some creatures, like nematodes, fruit flies, and zebra fish, don’t die if oxygen levels drop. Instead the critters suspend. Their hearts stop beating for up to 24 hours. They don’t breathe. And they don’t die. Wounds stop bleeding; nearly any injury becomes survivable, and the brain shuts down without damage. ‘If you were shot, this is exactly what you would want,’ Roth says. [...]
From one of the Englewood kids I used to volunteer with. Met Jasmine when she was in third grade, she’s now in seventh. Have kept in touch with her and her cousins (Devonte, Tomika, and Emmanuel). Take them out every few months or so, last outing was to a high school football game and then to my place for make your own sundaes. Promised them I’d take them out again “soon” — that was months ago. Sigh. Nothing like a text from a seventh grader from a neighborhood infested with common struggling-neighborhood infestations – drugs, gangs, violence, children who struggle academically, teen parents, unemployment – to remind you how lucky you are. And that it’s really sucky to not keep promises to kids. Especially on the heels of this text, that I got a week ago:
BOGOTA – Colombia’s Supreme Court ruled that possession of illegal drugs for personal use is not a criminal offense, citing a 1994 decision by the country’s Constitutional Court, Caracol Radio said Wednesday.
Drug consumption “generates in a person problems of addiction and slavery that turn one into a sick, compulsive individual deserving of therapeutic medical treatment instead of a punishment,” the judges said.
Their ruling came in a case involving a man prosecuted for possession of 1.3 grams (.04 ounces) of cocaine. The court overturned his conviction and ordered him immediately released.
“In the exercise of his personal and private rights, the accused did not harm others,” so his conduct “cannot be the object of any punishment,” the Supreme Court found.
Colombia’s Constitutional Court said in 1994 that possession of illegal drugs within fixed limits was not subject to prosecution, but the hard-line government of President Alvaro Uribe is currently trying to undue that decision with a constitutional amendment.
The administration’s proposal was approved in June by the lower house of Congress and is now under review by a Senate committee.
Bogota receives around $500 million a year in mainly military aid from the United States as part of Plan Colombia, an initiative targeting the drug trade and armed irregulars.
The Argentine Supreme Court moved toward decriminalizing drug possession in a ruling last month that was hailed by President Cristina Fernandez’s government, which says the battle against the illegal drug trade should focus on high-level traffickers, not users.
In the Argentine case, the judges quashed a conviction for marijuana possession, though they did not proclaim the legalization of pot or any other drug. EFE
I do hope you all enjoyed your Labor Day, a holiday that originated in Canada out of labor disputes in the 1870’s… who knew? Funny how these disputes press on some 200 years later as I remind you of the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act recently passed by Obama.
Although, I can’t say I was in much of a celebratory mood this Labor Day as I absorbed the news of the recent death of Ted Kennedy and a lesser known, DJ AM. Loved him or hated him as a politician, Ted Kennedy leaves behind five kids and a slew of grandchildren. After listening to his children speak this past week, it is clear that their hearts are heavy. My thoughts go out to the Kennedy’s and to those who are mourning the loss of DJ AM, also known as Adam Goldstein. Adam was found dead in his apartment with a half-used bag of crack cocaine, two pipes and prescription pills close by. To recap, in September of 2008, DJ AM and Blink-182 drummer Travis Barker were severely burned, but survived a plane crash in South Carolina that killed four others. DJ AM’s Twitter post on Aug. 25, read: “New York, New York. Big city of dreams, but everything in New York ain’t always what it seems.” If we teach our children ONE THING- please let’s teach them NOT TO USE DRUGS!!!!!!
As parents we are especially saddened by this tragic death. I do have mixed emotions about another headlining news story: Jaycee Dugard, a 29 year-old set free after an 18-year nightmare. As you now know, Jaycee was kidnapped on June 10, 1991 from her school bus stop in South Lake Tahoe, California at age 11. For two decades Jaycee was being hidden in a shack as a sex slave, ultimately giving birth to her rapist’s two girls (who are now 11 and 15)! I want to vomit and breakdown at the sheer thought of my own kids being taken from me. I cannot conceive of it! While
I am fully aware that MyWorkButterfly.com was built to house resources, to offer support and advice to return to work and working moms, I recognize that we are first and foremost parents. We are mothers to our children, wives to our husbands and tragedy exists. So, when you think that getting that proposal out is a matter of life or death or returning that one last call is more important than anything, think again. We are parents before we are workers and it is the aforementioned tragedies that remind of this very truth. After you’ve kissed your children one more time, come back and watch our amazing video with single mom, attorney and award-winning journalist, Lisa Bloom. While you’re logged on to MyWorkButterfly.com read the inspiring interview with Laurie Gelman, Co-Host of Toronto’s “The Mom Show.” Next, head over to read of our recent events as we partner with the NY Liberty and Junior Achievement’s Fly Girl. And, if that’s not enough, I will tease you with this: At the end of September, we are auctioning off a date with one of the most attractive men in Los Angeles. Start saving your money as a portion of the proceeds will go to a VERY good cause. Stay tuned… you DO NOT want to miss this!
Kamagra helps to improve the sabotaged erectile functioning. It does this by regulating the blood supply to the male reproductive system. This medication is found to be one of the best medications for treating the erectile dysfunction in men. Kamagra is the generic Viagra that ensures that blood flow is proper to the penis to cure the impotence problem. Rather than treating the impotence it resolves the problem by preventing the occurrence of the impotence. I assure you that impotence is no more a problem of concern if you have taken these pills. With the help of the Kamagra pills both young as well as old men get the same effect. You can rely on this medication as it has treated about every man’s erection problem who has taken it.
Kamagra makes it possible for the men suffering with the erectile dysfunction to once again enjoy the sexual encounter to its fullest. Its dose changes the boring sexual activity into the fantastic sexual ecstasy. It shows the effects for about 4 to 6 hours. The dosage of Kamagra is to be taken only once in a day and only when you are sexually stimulated. Please don’t take this medication in concentration of more than 300 mg in a day because it may lead to the serious consequences. Kamagra makes it possible for the men suffering with the erectile dysfunction to once again enjoy the sexual encounter to its fullest. Kamagra dose changes the boring sexual activity into the fantastic sexual ecstasy. It improves the sexual stamina of the men and helps him to satisfy his partner.
Erectile dysfunction is mainly found to be caused by the lack of blood supply to the penis during the sexual activity. Erectile dysfunction is the consistent failure in either getting the erection or holding the erection during the sexual activity. Erectile dysfunction is the condition observed in around 65% of the men in this world. Kamagra treats the erectile dysfunction on the men who have failed to overcome erectile dysfunction by all other treatments. Kamagra shows the side effects like blurred vision, stomach upset, and headache. Please note that the side effects caused by the Kamagra are generally temporary and do not cause any serious harm to your health.
Kamagra augments the sexual appetite of the men and help get the desired erection. Kamagra worked in a similar pattern like the original Viagra and gave a sigh of relief to the common man by improving the sexual intercourse. Kamagra then became a favorite choice of the customer to overcome erectile dysfunction because of its very low price and same effect. Kamagra pill should be taken as whole, please avoid crushing, chewing, or powdering it because it will reduce the productivity of the pill. Kamagra should be taken along with the 6 ounces of water to get the desired effects quickly.
Kamagra helps the men to combat erectile dysfunction by improving the blood supply to the penis by the inhibition of the enzyme PDE-5 that is responsible for reduction of blood to the penis during the sexual activity. It initiates the production of the enzyme cGMP that increases the blood supply to the penis. Kamagra make the penis erect that hardens the arteries and the veins in the penis, as a result the blood flow out of the penis is restricted. Thus, men are able to get the erection and hold it too for the long time during the sexual copulation. This way Kamagra helps to improve the sabotaged erectile functioning. Whatever may be your age this pill will surely show the desired effect. Also, the cause of the impotence is not at all important for the Kamagra pills; they will show you the effect.
Una de mis webs favoritas, Drowned In Sound, publica semanalmente numerosas listas, los viernes una lista con acceso directo para Spotify con lo mejor de la semana, y los lunes una con los nuevos singles presentados. Esta semana aparecen varios interesantes, pero por encima de todos, el primer single de Muse, Uprising, que ya se habia filtrado hace unos dias, pero que ahora se puede escuchar con una calidad decente. En la web lo definen como un tema glam, pero vamos a mi la mejor etiqueta que se me ocurre es simplemente Muse.
Otros singles que aparecen con video esta semana son de Black Lips, Florence And The Machine y Mika, que vuelve con disco nuevo proximamente.
Ojo con esta chica, que están muy pesados en las islas con ella.
And here is yet another concept image of megatron. For all you transformer haters the movie has made 400 million domestically as well as 400 million overseas dam that’s alot of bank……cheers.
800 million dollar decepticon megatron.
And last but not least karma is starting to affect people that i know. People that intend to manipulate situations will never come out on top. Regret is such a fucked up thing to have, too bad i have none. But listen to this song i practically listened to everyday for a long time and listen to the lyrics. The deal is done. peace.
“Describe one living person that you admire and hope to meet one day.”
It’s funny how I was hoping that a prompt like this would pop up sometime, and it already does on only my third response to a prompt.
If you know me, you already know the answer. If you don’t, it’s about time that you know that I absolutely adore Josh Hamilton.
Josh Hamilton’s story of redemption is most likely the greatest I’ve ever heard, and that’s not hyperbole. If you don’t believe that God still does amazing things, I suggest that you take a look at what He has done in Josh’s life. It’s seriously amazing.
Rather than try to summarize Josh’s story myself, I’ll let Josh do the talking:
Here’s another good one:
If you’re a Christian, I don’t think there’s even a need for me to explain why I love Josh Hamilton, but I will anyway. The guy hits a record 28 home runs in the 2008 Home Run Derby and is asked during this year’s All-Star Break what his favorite part of it all was and he says that his favorite part was sharing Christ to millions on TV. Josh is using his platform to give glory to God on and off the field. I can only hope that I can live my life in a similar way.
Josh’s story gives hope to drug addicts and warns those who aren’t addicted to never even be put in a situation that could cause one to fall into an addiction. I hate the taste of alcohol, so I doubt I’ll ever drink, but even if I liked the taste, after hearing what happened to Josh, I really don’t think I would start drinking.
I hope with all my heart to meet Josh one day. I want to encourage him and talk with him about what God has done in his life. I think that would be so cool. Josh, if you read this, contact me, lol.
I’ll conclude this with the verse that Josh found so helpful when he was trying to get his life back together:
“So humble yourselves before God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.”
—James 4:7 (NLT)
It’s always bugged me, at least as long as i can remember. People demand that someone should be there for them. Now, I am all for a caring society where we do our best for each other. We have built and maintain a social society that has done an amazing job of raising the standard of living. But, you can only go so far with the resources that we have to hand.
I live in the UK so if you are reading this elsewhere some of the details might not be too familiar but the principles are, I believe, universal.
There are some people that understand the principles of scarce resources but many do not, or don’t want to think about it. And of those that do understand, most don’t follow through to the logical conclusions or dare not talk about them.
I suspect that for most people I am going to end up being controversial at some point or other, please don’t be offended, I believe that if we truly took hold of these issues then we could have a far better society.
So, what is the real issue here? Let’s take a couple of specific examples and then come back to the underlying principles to tie it back together again. Please bear in mind that for the two examples I am not judging either way, i don’t have enough information to do that, but merely using them as an example to illustrate a point.
Example One: The Health Service
I recently heard on the news about a gentleman that died of cancer. Relatives of the man were upset that he had not been allowed to have a relatively new, and rather expensive, drug that would probably have extended his life by several months – but not cured him. I would argue most strongly that we should be making decisions to withhold drugs like this on both a national level because some drugs are just too expensive to use widely and also on an individual level because the cost benefit to society is too low.
Whoah ! I just measured several months of someone’s life against a cost to provide drugs. I know many people will be horrified by that and in one sense I would agree – life cannot be measured. However, the simple truth is that there are lots of expensive drugs and treatments out there that would benefit many people, extending their lives, improving the quality of their lives etc. If we were to apply a rule stating that anyone who would benefit from a treatment should get it then the NHS (National Health Service) would be bust very quickly or, if government increased their budget to match, the whole country would be.
In practise, our health professionals make decisions like this all of the time. But, we, as a society, don’t like to talk about it too much. The reason we don’t like to talk about it is because of the underlying resource scarcity and the fact that some people will not get treatments that would benefit them and ultimately, there is nothing we can do about it. Even worse, if we do raise it we find that the public has many different views ranging from we have a right to whatever we need, through a variety of views, based on values, on what is important right through to, what I believe is that the health service does an incredible job of managing resources and expectations most of the time. (Not that it couldn’t be improved of course, but I don’t have time for that here).
Occasionally these health service issues make the news as did the story I heard on the radio. We hear debates on talk shows. We obviously don’t have it all worked out because if we did we would not need to talk, and argue, about it every once in a while.
Example Two: Afghanistan
Recently there has been quite a lot of discussion here in the UK about our role in Afghanistan. More UK soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan recently and it is beginning to raise more questions. Most specifically though has been the question of resources. There has been quite a high level argument over whether the UK troops have enough helicopters. The argument was that without enough helicopters the troops are having to travel by road much more where they are a lot more susceptible to roadside bombs.
In the last few days I also saw a report on TV that when UK troops are hit by explosive devices while travelling they sustain higher casualties than US troops because they are not so well armoured.
Both of these issues come down to resources and, ultimately, cost.
I am not going to pretend to know enough about the particular issues here to know whether we should be sending the additional money for extra helicopters in particular and I don’t want to get into that here. I am simply pointing out that we again have a need and a resource / cost constraint. Decisions have to be made based on a cost benefit basis. And again, like in the health service, the cost/benefit involves people’s lives and the issues are complex.
The Big Picture
Resource at the National Level becomes a balancing act between the interests of lots of different needs. The health service and our role in Afghanistan are just two, albeit high profile, examples. It can’t be easy to perform this balancing act of allocating resources amongst all of the competing resources.
Essentially, most people don’t see this big picture and just want to fight their own corner which leads to well, metaphorically of course, one big fight.
But, there are a lot of people out there who actually have to manage public budgets and to make the required decisions as to who gets what budget – even if it does affect peoples lives and sometimes come down to life and death.
Personally I think it would help a lot if more people said that they appreciate the work that these decision makers have to put in. Even better if they could be supported in some of the more difficult decisions and not criticised so much. Maybe one day they will even be able to talk more openly about the hard decisions that have to be made regularly and even daily in some circumstance. And then we will be able to make decisions that produce the best overall for everyone rather than having so many special interests pulling budgets in directions that really are not the best.
But first, we need to do a lot more work with the values of our cultures to open up the dialog and ensure we meet the basic needs of everyone for which I would turn to Spiral Dynamics – a socio psychological model that enables actions that support the multivaried needs of a society.
Well, I’m sitting here in a kind of mellow mood. I’m thinking of everything right now. I’m thinking of the past hurt that happened to me. I’m thinking of the pain I still feel in my aching heart. I’m thinking of the face that caused me the pain. That face is also the face that get’s me aroused as soon as I see it. My boyfriend, Spence, is my true love. Though he may be stubborn and hesitant, I love him. Whenever I see those beautiful hazel eyes, I feel the butterflies flying around in my stomach. Whenever I see his gorgeous feature, I think of kissing him. Whenever I see his huge arms, I bite my lip-ring so fucking hard that I sometimes drawl blood. I think of him and then I think of us. I think of a future.
I sometimes wonder if what he says is true. I don’t doubt for a moment that he loves me. But sometimes I ask myself if he is really in love with me. Some of the things he does or says hurts me terribly. But I stick it out as much as I can because I’m madly in love with him. I want to make it to the alter with him. I want a pug and a morbidly obese cat that hates the world. I want scrapbooks and pictures framed on the wall. I want Christmas’ and Thanksgiving’s at our families houses. I want to visit Disney World and road trip to concerts together.
I look at him and I can see us with wedding rings on. I can see us going on gay double dates with our neighbors (whom I love). I can see myself, twenty years from now, still getting hard every time he walks in the room. And I can see myself waking up to pancakes every morning and falling in love over and over again.
So… I’d say, probably this time next year, Spence and I will be moved in together. I’m not trying to jynx myself (knock on wood). I think things will get so much easier when we live together. We’re both just kind of bitter because we live so far away.
So… I’m not a party hearty type of guy. I don’t drink very often. And I have NO tolerence for drugs. And I don’t take well to bullshitters or cheaters. And I can’t stress that enough. I’ve never touched drugs in my life. Never will. Some people think when I turn twenty-one that I will be a big drinking, sort of slutty pot smoking boy who experiments with drugs. Can’t wait to prove those people wrong.
Well, I’m counting down the hours until tomorrow. And the years until I make it to the alter.
Argentina Court Ruling Allows Pot Use
By CNN – Tuesday, August 25 2009
Tags:
* Headline News
* Argentina
* decriminalization
* Latin America
* legalization
The Argentina Supreme Court ruled Tuesday it is unconstitutional to punish an adult for private use of marijuana as long as it doesn’t harm anyone else.
Argentina becomes the second Latin American country in the past four days to allow personal use of a formerly illegal drug.
The seven-member Argentina Supreme Court decision was unanimous, the court’s Web site said.
The case in question involved five young men who were arrested for having a few marijuana cigarettes in their pockets.
Supreme Court Justice Carlos Fayt, who at one time supported laws that make personal use of marijuana illegal, told the state-run Telam news agency that “reality” changed his mind.
Argentina’s action came amid growing momentum in Latin America toward decriminalization.
Mexico enacted a law Friday that decriminalizes possessing low quantities of most drugs, including marijuana, heroin, cocaine and LSD.
Earlier this year, a Brazilian appeals court ruled that possession of drugs for personal use is not illegal.
Peter Hakim, president of the Inter-American Dialogue policy institute in Washington, sees the shift in attitude toward drugs as recognition that current policy is not working.
“It’s all part of a harm-reduction approach,” Hakim said, noting that policy is shifting toward figuring out how to reduce harm to the users and to society.
The king of blue collar movies is back, and this time Mike Judge brings us the tale of Joel, played by Jason Bateman, whose life just seems to be going nowhere fast. Joel’s small extract company is doing very well, but his employees never quite seem to be satisfied. Their hours are too long, their pay is never enough, and when rumors of Joel selling the company hit the floor, what little moral they had left goes right out the window. As if that wasn’t enough trouble for poor Joel, his marriage and sex life seem to be nonexistent, and when there’s an accident on the factory floor that causes one of the workers to loose a testical, things go from bad to worse. The incident not only threatens the buyout, but also catches the eye of a local grifter, played by Mila Kunis. Add to all this, a pain in the ass neighbor, brilliantly played by David Koechner, and a best friend bartender, played by Ben Affleck, who gives a surprisingly funny performance. This only seems to add to Joel’s troubles, when he suggests that Joel hirer a ringer to test his wife’s fidelity, so he himself might feel better about his thoughts of having an affair. Take all that and mix in Mike Judge’s unmistakable brand of comedy, and you have a bonafide hit.
Nobody can play an everyman quite like Jason Bateman. His timing is always just dead on. I could watch him all day, and I think I have on a few “Arrested Development” marathons. The entire cast does a phenomenal job, and Mike Judge’s writing/directing takes an average story and makes it something extraordinary. Just like “Office Space,” you’ll be quoting this movie in no time. Just ask ingus or dingus.
It’s not a bad way to start the fall movie season. After this past summer, we desperately need some good solid movies in the fall, and not just Oscar good movies either. No, we need fun, entertaining, and most of all funny movies. You know like… “Extract.” I can’t think of a better way to spend your Labor Day, than watching a bunch of people hate their jobs. It might even be safe to say that, “Extract” is so funny, you’ll bust a nut.” Too corny? Just go see it.
The Associated Press is reporting that three NASCAR crewmen have been suspended from competition due to violations of the substance abuse policy. The story seems to indicate the the three were caught actually using drugs or a banned substance at the track, which was Bristol. We thought those guys were thrashing all weekend. No wonder they are always so cheery.
The report also says that, with these three, the total number of crew-member suspension for the season is ten. As we all know, Jeremy Mayfield is the only driver who has been whacked by the new system.
Ten guys is a fair amount. It seems that the mentality that they’ll not get caught doing stupid or illegal things is still in the forefront of the offenders’ brains. Not surprising as it sounds like they have been cooking brain cells for a while.
“Poems. Prayers and Promises” is a song written by the late John Denver. I was playing and singing the song just the other day. I need to look at the lyrics and see how they apply to me.
I’ve been lately thinking
About my life’s time
All the things I’ve done
And how it’s been
I have been doing that a lot lately. I have been going through a middle-aged crisis since I was 30. I am saddened by what I missed and the mistakes I’ve made.
And I can’t help believing
In my own mind
I know I’m gonna hate to see it end
You betcha. I am not looking forward to dying, not just yet. I have so many dreams that need to be realized. The Caribbean calls.
I’ve seen a lot of sunshine
Slept out in the rain
Spent a night or two all on my own
I enjoyed being on my own sometimes. I was very lonely, mind you, but I did enjoy not having to care about or for anyone else. Sometimes I am just as lonely now as I was then.
I’ve known my lady’s pleasures
This goes without saying. Note the past tense in the lyric is correct.
Had myself some friends
Also past tense. I still do have a few friends, but none of them are close. That has to do a lot with me. I am very critical of people, but not to their faces. Just in my own snarky, secret way, which I think is a big turn off for the general population. Plus, I have a hard time enduring the fools of my life.
And spent a night or two in my own home
Which is a good feeling. I know some folks out there are wishing for more. I can’t complain too much about my crap shack.
And I have to say it now
It’s been a good life all in all
It has been a rollercoaster, but I do admit nothing catastrophic has happened. I am fed, have a home and loving wife and son, and am gainfully employed. Looking at the macro view, it has been good. It is the minutia (and a horrific childhood and adolescence) that bothers me and is hard to let go.
It’s really fine
To have a chance to hang around
And lie there by the fire
Fire = computer screen
And watch the evening tire
= watching my EVE Online character mine ore.
While all my friends and my old lady
Sit and pass the pipe around
Pipe = my wife’s addiction to digital scrapbooking. I actually wish we could pass a pipe around. I need to be more mellow, but random drug tests makes the mental health benefit not worth the risk.
And talk of poems and prayers and promises
And things that we believe in
I believe in free markets, personal freedom, and limited government. I believe in the right to do to one’s own self what they will. I believe in firearm ownership. By most common perceptions, I must be a red-neck hillbilly hippie corporate weasel.
How sweet it is to love someone
How right it is to care
And you wouldn’t believe how many people don’t care. I do care. However, my definition of care is different than the popular television versions. I care for your soul, your individuality, and your well-being. I don’t care to force what I believe or follow onto you, though, in order for those things to exist.
How long it’s been since yesterday
And what about tomorrow
And what about our dreams
And all the memories we share
Our dreams and memories are both alike in that we can’t seem to be able to grasp either. You can’t live in a memory, and our dreams seem well out our grasp. Ok, MY dreams are our of MY grasp.
The days they pass so quickly now
Nights are seldom long
Ain’t that the truth. My son is growing up so fast. I feel that every minute I spend here or in my one leisure activity I am missing out on an eternity of development of my kid. And nights, well, it is hard to get up in the morning. A lot.
And time around me whispers when it’s cold
The changes somehow frighten me
Still I have to smile
It turns me on to think of growing old
It does, somewhat. Being a teenager sucked, but being a twenty-something didn’t. Maybe that because my 30s suck, my 40s will be great.
For though my life’s been good to me
There’s still so much to do
So many things my mind has never known
Sailing the Caribbean forever more. And maybe the South Pacific. New Zealand calls me as well.
I’d like to raise a family
Doing so…
I’d like to sail away
You betcha.
And dance across the mountains on the moon
Not really, but is niftily poetic.
I have to say it now
It’s been a good life all in all
It’s really fine
To have the chance to hang around
And lie there by the fire
And watch the evening tire
While all my friends and my old lady
Sit and watch the sun go down
And talk of poems and prayers and promises
And things that we believe in
How sweet it is to love someone
How right it is to care
How long it’s been since yesterday
What about tomorrow
What about our dreams
And all the memories we share
EVE Online has really gotten me hooked. I am so enjoying it. Nothing like MMPORG-crack to keep me up at nights. It does keep me from trolling the dating sites looking for, well, anything. EVE is awesome and incredibly complex as well.
I went to a Brazoria Gamers group get together Saturday evening. I learned to play a new game. The folks are friendly, but I wonder if I could be friends. Outside of wanting some mental exercise in games, collectively we have little in common.
Still no definite takers to go see Dethklok and Mastodon in November. I am thinking now of just selling the extra ticket online or something.
My swimming is really wearing me out, which is a good thing I think. Hopefully, my stamina will slowly improve as my weight starts to slowly come down.
My meds are really doing a number on me. If I don’t take some of it with a wine cooler, then I get side effects. More Seagram’s Margarita-flavored booze, please.
