Society's ChildS

US poised to ease restrictions on marijuana in historic shift, but it'll remain controlled substance

Zeke Miller, Joshua Goodman, Lindsay Whitehurst
AP
Tue, 30 Apr 2024 07:51 UTC

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration will move to reclassify marijuana as a less dangerous drug, The Associated Press has learned, a historic shift to generations of American drug policy that could have wide ripple effects across the country.

The proposal, which still must be reviewed by the White House Office of Management and Budget, would recognize the medical uses of cannabis and acknowledge it has less potential for abuse than some of the nation's most dangerous drugs. However, it would not legalize marijuana outright for recreational use.

The agency's move, confirmed to the AP on Tuesday by five people familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive regulatory review, clears the last significant regulatory hurdle before the agency's biggest policy change in more than 50 years can take effect.

Once OMB signs off, the DEA will take public comment on the plan to move marijuana from its current classification as a Schedule I drug, alongside heroin and LSD. It moves pot to Schedule III, alongside ketamine and some anabolic steroids, following a recommendation from the federal Health and Human Services Department. After the public comment period and a review by an administrative judge, the agency would eventually publish the final rule.

Comment: Should marijuana users bother to vote, it is perhaps +Biden. If not, the next White House occupant will inherit the consequences of +usage.
See also:

Students occupy UK university campuses in protest over Gaza

Ashitha Nagesh
BBC
Wed, 01 May 2024 00:00 UTC

Pro-Palestinian students have occupied some university campuses in the UK, to protest against the war in Gaza.

Students in Leeds, Newcastle and Bristol set up tents outside university buildings, on Wednesday, and called for supporters to donate food, drinks and hygiene products. Elsewhere, student activists held marches and one-off protests. One camp, at Warwick University, has been set up in the town's piazza for a week.

The UK protests follow much larger demonstrations on campuses across the US, most prominently at Columbia University, in New York. More than 1,000 protesters have been arrested in the US - dozens on Tuesday night, after police raided a Columbia building occupied by students for almost two weeks.

From bird flu to climate snakes

Breeauna Sagdal
Brownstone Institute
Wed, 24 Apr 2024 00:00 UTC

Seasoned veterinarians and livestock producers alike have been scratching their heads trying to understand the media's response to the avian flu. Headlines across every major news outlet warn of humans becoming infected with the "deadly" bird flu after one reported case of pink-eye in a human.

The entire narrative is predicated upon a long-disputed claim that Covid-19 was the result of a zoonotic jump — the famed Wuhan bat wet-market theory.

While the source of Covid is hotly contested within the scientific community, the policy vehicle at the center of this dialectic began years prior to Sars-CoV-2 and is quite resolute in force and effect.

In 2016, the Gates Foundation donated to the World Health Organization to create the OneHealth Initiative. Since 2020, the CDC has adopted and implemented the OneHealth Initiative to build a "collaborative, multisectoral, and transdisciplinary approach — working at the local, regional, national, and global levels — with the goal of achieving optimal health outcomes recognizing the interconnection between people, animals, plants, and their shared environment."

US Air Force pays $13 billion for new 'doomsday' planes

Stacy Liberatore
Daily Mail
Thu, 02 May 2024 18:11 UTC

The US Air Forced announced a $13 billion contract to develop craft to replace the aging Boeing planes that are used to protect the president during a nuclear attack

American is set to get a new fleet of 'doomsday planes' that some have said signal the nation could be preparing for World Ward III.

The US Air Forced announced a $13 billion contract to develop craft to replace the aging Boeing planes that are used to protect the president during a nuclear attack.

The funds were awarded to Sierra Nevada Corp, which will design a successor to the E-4B 'Nightwatch' that features a mobile command post capable of withstanding nuclear blasts and electromagnetic effects.

Comment: It's likely that this is also an opportunity to commit more 'astonishing' fraud, however, considering the rapidly deteriorating state of the global affairs, it's likely a sign of what is up ahead:

If the West's recent track record is anything to go by, one probably shouldn't be too confident in the final product:

Ukrainian officers kidnap 14 y/o amid forced conscription drive

Al Mayadeen English
Mon, 08 Apr 2024 11:54 UTC

Amid a dire need for soldiers, Ukrainian conscription officers have turned to extreme measures, including kidnapping people to force their enlistment with the military.

Ukrainian conscription officers kidnapped a 14-year-old during an attempt to forcibly enlist him with the military.

According to the Bessarabia Info website, the teenager was walking to his friend's house in the village of Priozernoye, Odessa, when a white minivan pulled up next to him. Four officers masked in balaclavas jumped him, pressed a rifle onto his head, and forced him into the van.

Comment: It turned out the story already ran in Fourteen-year-old Ukrainian violently abducted by conscription officers - media Tracing the original for this article, there was from Bessarabia Inform the story in Russian and in Ukrainian. The original has this image:

On the background of numerous other reports, and videos from Ukraine, the boy and his family probably have little to complain about. How he was treated is how many are caught in the streets. In this case the soldiers were, shall we say, honourable. They let him go when they found out he was very young. An unanswered question is how old he would have to be to not have been returned?

Having lost hundreds of thousands with the encouragement from the Maidan coup masters and 'friends' in the EU and NATO, the recruiters in Ukraine who are tasked with finding people have a difficult job. Below are some headlines, which in no way do justice to the numerous videos, that have come out from Ukraine.

Outside of Ukraine, conscription is also a topic:
Europe

Middle East

FCC slaps AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile with $200M in fines for sharing user location data without consent

Rebecca Klar
The Hill
Thu, 02 May 2024 15:45 UTC

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) issued a fine totaling $200 million to the nation's four largest mobile carriers after concluding an investigation that found the companies illegally shared access to customers' location data, the agency said Monday.

T-Mobile received the biggest fine of $80 million, along with a $12 million fine for its subsidiary, Sprint, that the company acquired in 2020. AT&T was fined more than $57 million and Verizon was fined almost $7 million, according to the agency's announcement.

The fines follow initial allegations by the FCC in 2020 under the Trump administration of wireless carriers violating laws by not protecting users' location data.

The mobile carriers pushed back on the allegations and said they intend to challenge the fine.

Judge grants Trump leave to attend Barron's graduation

Nicole Silverio
The Daily Caller
Tue, 30 Apr 2024 14:58 UTC

New York Supreme Court Judge Juan Merchan, who is overseeing Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg's hush money trial, ruled former President Donald Trump can attend his son's high school graduation.

Trump's youngest son, Barron, is set to graduate May 17 from the Oxbridge Academy located west of West Palm Beach, Florida, according to The Palm Beach Post. The judge granted the former president permission to attend during Tuesday's hearing, according to MSNBC's Katie Phang.

The former president previously fumed over potentially missing his son's graduation due to the trial.

Comment: Trump is not a danger to the public That he had to fight in court to be able to attend a milestone in his son's life is simply cruelty. Even corrupt Merchan seems to realize that would not play well with the public who sympathize with Trump's political persecution.

Flashback Burned alive: How the 2014 Odessa massacre became a turning point for Ukraine

Evgeny Norin
RT
Mon, 02 May 2022 06:43 UTC

Comment: This article is 2 years old. Today is the 10th anniversary of the 2014 massacre in Odessa

Clashes between opposing activists turned into mass murder. The perpetrators have never been punished.

Eight years ago this Monday, something significant happened in Odessa, a historically important city in the southwest of Ukraine. Although the West didn't see it as such, for Russia and the newly formed Donbass republics, what transpired there became a symbolic episode.

Provincial revolution

From late 2013 into early 2014, a conflict between the government of President Viktor Yanukovich and the pro-Western opposition was unfolding in Kiev, the capital of Ukraine. The series of events that would ensue were dubbed the 'Euromaidan'. Meanwhile, Odessa, a port city on the Black Sea, was of course affected by these events too, albeit to a lesser extent.

Occasional clashes with police and scuffles between supporters of Euromaidan and those aligned with the government, which became known as the 'Anti-Maidan' movement, were nothing compared to the bloodshed in Kiev, where people were being killed.

Many Ukrainians didn't welcome the Euromaidan, and they had their reasons. Lots of Odessa residents had strong ties with Russia, and still do. When Ukraine gained independence in 1991, a large number of ethnic Russians were living in Odessa and many had relatives in the old country. The city was built during the reign of Catherine the Great and has always been seen as an integral part of Russia's history.

Thus, the aggressive nationalism of Euromaidan was largely unpopular there and plenty of locals were frightened by what seemed to be a passion for forming militant units. Euromaidan and Anti-Maidan in Odessa began to form parallel paramilitary organizations. Armed with a primitive array of sticks, biker helmets, and homemade weapons, these groups trained for street fighting. At first, nobody sought a fight to the death - the radicals hadn't yet gained the leading role in either movement.

Comment: See also:

European airlines report ongoing 'GPS jamming and spoofing', hostile gov'ts blame Russia

Vitaly Shevchenko
BBC
Thu, 02 May 2024 12:15 UTC

Russia is causing disruption to satellite navigation systems affecting thousands of civilian flights, experts say.

The Baltic Sea, the Black Sea and the eastern Mediterranean - the regions where Russia's military has been most active - have seen an increase in disruption to the Global Positioning System (GPS).

Comment: Russia's military have been 'active' there because NATO has ramped up its belligerence in the region: Poland & Lithuania to hold joint military exercises on borders near Russia's Kaliningrad enclave in the Suwałki Gap

This has left aircraft unable to receive GPS signals.

In March, a RAF plane carrying Defence Secretary Grant Shapps had its GPS signal jammed while flying close to Russian territory.

Comment: It remains to be seen just what is going on, but what is clear is that the West is using this situation to smear Russia, which in itself is highly suspect.

Whilst Russia may indeed, at certain times, be testing out, or even sending a warning, with certain electronic warfare equipment, it is unlikely to do so at the expense of the safety of civilians.

On a related note, the West has suffered a litany of military blunders of late: Denmark fires defence chief, withdraws frigate from Red Sea operation, over ship's dangerous 'technical issues'

And there have been other odd occurrences in the civilian arena:

Iran offers scholarships for US students expelled for protesting Gaza war

Ilya Tsukanov
Sputnik International
Wed, 01 May 2024 16:53 UTC

Over 1,200 students at universities across the US have been arrested to date as police moved to violently disperse campus protests calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. The past week and a half has seen students put on probation, suspended, and in rare cases even expelled from some of America's most prestigious educational institutions.

Iran's Shiraz University is offering scholarships for American and European students facing expulsion for taking part in the wave of anti-war and pro-Palestine protests rocking Western universities.

"Students and even professors who have been expelled or threatened with expulsion can continue their studies at Shiraz University and I think that other universities in Shiraz as well as Fars Province are also prepared [to provide similar conditions]," Shiraz University head Mohammad Moazzeni said at a gathering of university students and professors.

Expressing solidarity with students over the bravery they have displayed, Moazzeni blasted Western countries' police forces' harsh treatment of the protesters, saying it exposes the true nature of Western civilization.

"They exert a lot of violence in order to contain this raging movement and have even threatened to expel the students from universities and hinder their employment in the future, and such autocratic methods show the decline of global arrogance," Moazzeni said, using the term Iranian officials and military commanders often use to refer to the US and Israel.