Florida Supreme Court Gives Initiative Approval, State to Vote on Medical Cannabis Legalization This November
The Joint Blog
Jan 27, 2014
Today the Florida Supreme Court issued a ruling on the medical cannabis legalization initiative that is vying for this November’s ballot. In a close 4-3 
decision, justices determined the initiative is valid, and will be put to a vote.
This ruling comes just days after campaigners received confirmation that they had collected enough voter’s signatures on the initiative to secure its place in the election (roughly 1.2 million signatures total).
The Supreme Court was incited to issue a ruling by Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi and Republican legislative leaders, including House Speaker Will Weatherford. Detractors claimed the initiative’s summary was misleading by interchanging the terms “medical conditions” and “diseases”. Weatherford says the initiative is not about compassion, but about the “Coloradofication of Florida”.
The Florida Supreme Court responded in favor of the initiative: “We conclude that the use of ‘diseases’ instead of ‘conditions’ in the ballot summary will not reasonably mislead the voters”.
Recent polling shows 65% of Florida voters already in favor of the initiative; written as a constitutional amendment, the measure will need a 60% majority to pass.
John Morgan, an Orlando-based trial lawyer and previous fundraiser for President Obama, is the primary backer of the effort, and says that campaigners won’t be slowing down any time soon. “I think the amendment kind of passes itself. It’s like ‘Are you in favor of fresh air?’”, says Morgan “But with that said, at Morgan and Morgan we don’t take anything for granted. Something that seems obvious might not be so we will play it as if we’re behind. That’s how we will treat this campaign.” Morgan has put $2.8 million into signature gatherers and advertising for this campaign so far, and has made it clear that he will continue to fund the effort, spending “whatever it takes” to get the initiative passed.
– TheJointBlog
VIDEO — Gerald Celente Bitcoin, Economic Turmoil and Revolution in 2014
We Are Change
Jan 27, 2014
In this video Luke Rudkowski interviews business consultant Gerald Celente on the upcoming future U.S economy and revolutionary trends for 2014. Gerald Celente is an American trend forecaster, publisher of the Trends Journal, business consultant and author who makes predictions about the global financial markets and other events of historical importance.
to find out more about Gerald check out http://www.geraldcelente.com/
follow luke on https://twitter.com/Lukewearechange
https://facebook.com/LukeWeAreChange
http://instagram.com/lukewearechange
https://plus.google.com/1023224594778…
Support us by subscribing here http://bit.ly/P05Kqb
http;//www.facebook.com/wearechange.org
Check out our merchandise: http://wearechange.org/store/
Become a member of The Sponsor Lounge and get exclusive behind the scenes content while helping us grow! Join us today! http:///www.wearechange.org/donate
Russian Troops Arriving in Ukraine to Battle Protesters
Intellihub News
Jan 27, 2014
By John Vibes
UKRAINE (INTELLIHUB) — As the protests and uprisings in Ukraine continue to grow, the government is outsourcing troops from Russia to help put down protesters.
“There is information that at 1400 Russian Spetznaz troops were disembarking at [Kyiv local airports] Boryspil and Zhulyany dressed in civilian clothing and that they were going to dress in [Ukrainian riot plice] Berkut uniforms and proceed to the Madan” Rada deputy Andriy Parybiy, of the Batkivshchyna Party said at a recent press conference.[1]
Government agents in Ukraine have had trouble contending with the the large numbers of protesters and have been resorting to the most brutal tactics in some cases. As we reported earlier this week protesters have been kidnapped from the hospital and taken into the woods where they are tortured and executed.[2]
The protests began a few months ago as a resistance to trade agreements that would tie the country even closer to the European union, but now they have grown into a full scale revolution.
Despite an offer to release activists and stop more persecutions, the government continued a crackdown, with over 40 detained in the central city of Cherkasy after a protest, according to CBS news.[3] Today it was confirmed that protesters in Kiev seized the Justice Ministry building where they set up barricades after forcing the police into retreat.
Sources: [1] Regarding Russian Troops arriving in Ukraine [2] Confirmed: Protesters in Ukraine Kidnapped From Hospitals And Executed – Intellihub [3] As Ukraine protests grow, slain demonstrators mourned – CBS News
Writer Bio:
JG Vibes is an Intellihub.com investigative journalist, staff writer and editor. He is also the author of “Alchemy of the Modern Renaissance”, an 87 chapter e-book and is an artist with an established record label. Find him on his Facebook.
For media inquires, interviews, questions or suggestions for this author, email: vibes@intellihub.com or telephone: (347) 759-6075.
Read more articles by this author here.
The Syria Peace Talks: When the “International Community” Supports Terrorism
by Dr. Ismail Salami
Global Research
Jan 27, 2014
A five-minute audio message by al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahri went viral on the internet in which he enjoins the rebels in Syria to end their infighting and focus their energies on battling against President Bashar al-Assad’s forces.
A veritable testimony to the fact that the militants fighting against Bashar al-Assad are affiliated to the terrorist al-Qaeda and as a result, they are stripped of any cloak of legitimacy, it further reinforces the notion that there is more than meets the eye in Syria.
Interestingly, the warring factions decided to patch up their differences and sit down at the negotiating table once they heard their leader’s bezels of wisdom.
The negotiations started on Wednesday in an ambience charged with vitriol and spite. While Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem was trying to clarify the real situation in Syria and give a “Syrian version of facts,” UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon interrupted him and tried to deny him the chance to continue with his speech.
The western media say that he had exceeded his time and that he should not have clashed with the UN head but the fact is that they had gathered together to resolve a Syrian crisis which has been largely engineered by the West and the al-Qaeda elements. In other words, they were there to resolve a West-fomented crisis and the Syrian foreign minister was utterly entitled to finish his speech.
Here’s the exchange:
Ban: Can you just wrap up please.
Moallem: I came here after 12 hours in the airplane. I have few more minutes to end my speech. This is Syria.
Ban: How much do you have left now?
Moallem: I think 5-10 minutes.
Ban: No, no. I will give you another opportunity to speak.
Moallem: No, I cannot divide my speech. I must continue … I will do my best to be fast.
Ban: Can you just wrap up in one or two minutes?
Moallem: No, I can’t promise you, I must finish my speech. … You live in New York, I live in Syria. I have the right to give the Syrian version here in this forum. After three years of suffering, this is my right.
Ban: We have to have some constructive and harmonious dialogue, please refrain from inflammatory rhetoric.
Moallem: It is constructive, I promise you, let me finish.
Ban: Within 2-3 minutes please. I will give you another opportunity.
Moallem: You spoke for 25 minutes, at least I need to speak 30 minutes.
The talks do not seem to yield any fruits as there is a substantial gap between what the government of Bashar al-Assad demands and what the Syrian National Coalition (SNC) and its Western allies want. The opposition group insists that President Bashar al-Assad must relinquish power and that a transitional government be formed in Syria.
VIDEO — (Non)Partisans: Rioters occupy govt buildings in Ukraine, defying opposition leaders
RT
Jan 26, 2014
Molotov-cocktails, home made bombs and cold steel. Sunday night saw rioters capture the Justice Ministry in the Ukranian capital and even the political opposition, who are supposed to be on the same side, could not force them out. And this happens not in the capital alone.
RT LIVE http://rt.com/on-air
Designer babies: Chinese company working on technology to allow parents to pick ‘smartest’ embryos
by Jonathan Benson, staff writer
Natural News
Jan 25, 2014
(NaturalNews) Eugenics is quickly becoming big business in China, where at least one genomics company is attempting to pave the way for parents to literally pick and choose the “best” embryos to obtain the smartest possible children. Quartz reports that the cognitive genomics (CG) division at the Shenzhen-based genomics company BGI is currently working on the controversial project, which could one day allow for pregnancies with “designer” babies.
Like the plot of a bizarre sci-fi flick, the goal is to create detailed maps of the genes of smart individuals (e.g., math geniuses, thinkers and the like) for the purpose of identifying and selecting those genes in the embryos used for in vitro fertilization. Since as much as 80 percent of what determines IQ level is believed to be inherited, researchers believe that it may be possible to identify certain “smart” genes in human embryos that could be used to predict intelligence later in life.
In this case, the BGI team is looking for genes directly associated with intelligence. Once identified, these genes could potentially be used as markers for choosing only those embryos that possess them in the proper sequence. Embryos that do not meet the intelligence threshold, on the other hand, could simply be discarded as “defective,” a controversial proposition that stands to open up a Pandora’s box of both ethical and moral dilemmas.
“Imagine what a couple might pay to ensure that they get the best out of 10 or 50 possible offspring, optimizing over their choice of heritable attributes,” writes Stephen Hsu, a CG lab member currently working on the project, on his blog.
Yet Another ‘Suspect’ Detained and Subjected to Three Enemas By Overzealous Cops
by Matt Staggs
disinformation
Jan 26, 2014
The anal obsessions of our drug warriors continue to be expressed on hapless citizens. This time, a 54 year-old man once convicted of meth possession:
IF you think that protests about overzealous law enforcement are over the top, listen to what unfolded when the police suspected that David Eckert, 54, was hiding drugs in his rectum.
Eckert is a shy junk dealer struggling to get by in Hidalgo County, N.M. He lives a working-class life, drives a 16-year-old pickup and was convicted in 2008 of methamphetamine possession.
Police officers, suspecting he might still be involved in drugs, asked him to step out of his pickup early last year after stopping him for a supposed traffic violation. No drugs or weapons were found on Eckert or in his truck, but a police dog showed interest in the vehicle and an officer wrote that Eckert’s posture was “erect and he kept his legs together.”
That led the police to speculate that he might be hiding drugs internally, so they took him in handcuffs to a nearby hospital emergency room and asked the doctor, Adam Ash, to conduct a forcible search of his rectum. Dr. Ash refused, saying it would be unethical.
“I was pretty sure it was the wrong thing to do,” Dr. Ash told me. “It was not medically indicated.”
Eckert, protesting all the while, says he asked to make a phone call but was told that he had no right to do so because he hadn’t actually been arrested. The police then drove Eckert 50 miles to the emergency room of the Gila Regional Medical Center, where doctors took X-rays of Eckert’s abdomen and performed a rectal examination. No drugs were found, so doctors performed a second rectal exam, again unavailing.
Doctors then gave Eckert an enema and forced him to have a bowel movement in the presence of a nurse and policeman, according to a lawsuit that Eckert filed. When no narcotics were found, a second enema was administered. Then a third.
The police left the privacy curtain open, so that Eckert’s searches were public, the lawsuit says.
After hours of fruitless searches, police and doctors arranged another X-ray and finally anesthetized Eckert and performed a colonoscopy.
“Nothing was found inside of Mr. Eckert,” the police report notes. So after he woke up, he was released — after 13 hours, two rectal exams, three enemas, two X-rays and a colonoscopy.
The hospital ended up billing Eckert $6,000.
PN 