Perhaps the Pope will prove me wrong. But I doubt it.
Good article at Religion Dispatches: A Pope, a Poet, and a Drug War: Will Benedict stoke flames of culture war, or will he attend to the conflict that is truly devastating Mexico?
With the Pontiff’s upcoming trip to Mexico, there is a real opportunity to make a major statement about the most pressing concern today, and Mexican poet Javier Sicilia has been pushing for exactly that.
“I still believe, but these days it’s a naked belief, it’s a belief that’s in a very dark place. I can’t really comprehend or rationalize it right now, because my grief has been so all-consuming—but the faith is still there inside me.†It is this profound faith that motivated Sicilia to write the pope, hoping that his presence might console a troubled nation.
“In their name, for this us, for this body, I have come to Rome, Benedict, to ask that in your visit to Mexico you embrace it, before anyone, as the Father embraced the pained and murdered body of Christ, that you might carry it in your arms and console it: to help us know the response of resurrection in the face of death and pain that the criminals, a fractured State administered by governments and corrupt parties and a Church hierarchy that seems always attentive to its own political interest, have imputed to us.â€
But,
Mexico’s ambassador to the Vatican, Héctor Federico Ling Altamirano, has said that the pope’s agenda will touch on the family, abortion, euthanasia, stem-cell research, and the morning-after pill.
Morning-after pill. Really?
That’s what you have to offer? Talking about the morning-after pill?
John 11:35
Pete…I love the title of the post!
Prohibitionist solution: ban the morning after pill and lock the people who swallow it in cages.
Every sperm is sacred you know.
I saw an article that reported there was a problem within the church in Mexico,,some are talking about splitting from Rome because the Pope has not become involved,,I will look for it in am,,
Panel approves lower penalties for marijuana
BaltimoreSun / Michael Dresser / 3,21,2012
http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/politics/blog/bal-panel-approves-lower-penalties-for-marijuana-20120321,0,2257102.story
“”The House Judiciary Committee approved legislation Wednesday that would cut the penalties for possession of small amounts of marijuana in a way that curtails the right to an initial jury trial on the charges.
By a 16-4 vote, members said, the panel gave its OK to Del. Luke Clippingers’s bill setting the maximum penalty for possesssion of 7 grams or less of marijuana at 90 days and a $500 fine. Previously those convicted of the charge could have been given up to a year in jail.””
This is more an effort to reduce judicial work loads and save money,,also removes any chance of a jury nullification,,,,
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Legislation would decriminalize marijuana in R.I.
BDH / Kate Nussenbaum / 3,22,2012
http://www.browndailyherald.com/news/legislation-would-decriminalize-marijuana-in-r-i-1.2718743#.T2rew9myGuI
“”Around 15 supporters and one lone dissenter provided testimony on two bills regarding the legality of marijuana possession at a House Committee on Judiciary hearing last night.
The first bill, introduced by Rep. John Edwards, D-Tiverton and Portsmouth, would decriminalize the possession of small amounts of cannabis. The second bill, introduced by Rep. Edith Ajello, D-Providence, would make marijuana a legal drug that could be “taxed and regulated.â€
This is the third year in a row the decriminalization bill has been brought before the committee.””
The SSDP have given a big push for this one.
Thud(just for allan)
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I’m not sure this one is a thud. They had this bill on the table last year and it went nowhere. If it does go somewhere you should remember that this is the Legislature that implemented their medicinal cannabis patient protection law on their own initiative, then another bill which authorized dispensaries. Both laws required overriding the Governor’s veto. The RI Legislature is arguably the friendliest legislative body in the US as far as we’re concerned. Is that pothead Bob Watson still the RI House Minority leader? I know that he hasn’t resigned.
Don’t be too surprised if RI pushes to the front of the line to become the first State to re-legalize.
NEW Zealand’s first cannabis club has installed a vending machine to dispense the drug.
The club, the Daktory in the West Auckland suburb of New Lynn, has been using the machine to avoid any members being charged for dealing in the drug.
The hired vending machine, usually filled with toys or confectionery, sells one-gram bags of cannabis for $NZ20 ($A15.70), the AucklandNow website reports.
And again for Allan: ¡pnɥʇ
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A medicinal cannabis vendor in L.A. had a vending machine a couple of years back. The Feds stole it and now it’s on display at the war on (some) drugs museum in Arlington VA.
Police said they arrested four people and seized the vending machine, NZ$27,000 in cash and around 700 grams of cannabis, as well as bongs, pipes and other utensils when they raided the property on Thursday evening.
http://tinyurl.com/7ud2nyu
Yeah, but do they have a museum?
“After the tour, before sharing an appetizing lunch of Gingernuts, Roast Kiwi and Vegemite Quiche, Junior Detectives wearing snazi uniforms and thigh-high gumboots will test their internal inspection abilities on each other.”
the pope is just following the lead of obama and the repub candidates and desperately trying to avoid the elephant in the room. mexican drug war deaths? lets talk about gay marriage instead.
Sorry to go off-topic, but I felt compelled to share this drug-war-related issue with you fwiw.
Here is the comment that I posted at the WSJ (opinion piece: The Supreme Court Weighs ObamaCare):
“…the individual mandate applies regardless of anyone’s interaction with a commodity, service or other activity, like the interstate sale or transport of marijuana, that Congress can legitimately regulate. Put another way, the Controlled Substances Act is about the regulation of drugs, not people.”
On the one hand, we have an interaction with health insurance. On the other, we have an interaction with marijuana. 100% of the people cannot be forced to buy (interact with) health insurance, but 100% of the people can be forced to avoid interacting with marijuana. That is ridiculous.
The fact is the Commerce Clause (“To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;”) has been irrationally applied to authorize Congress to ban non-economic activities involving certain drugs. The fact is to abandon rationality is to abandon law.
These facts conclude that at some point along the legal path related to the Commerce Clause, our Supreme Court must have stopped doing their job to solely interpret the law, and started engaging in judicial activism at the highest level of our judicial branch.
In Raich, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas opened his dissent by saying:
“Respondents Diane Monson and Angel Raich use marijuana that has never been bought or sold, that has never crossed state lines, and that has had no demonstrable effect on the national market for marijuana. If Congress can regulate this under the Commerce Clause, then it can regulate virtually anything–and the Federal Government is no longer one of limited and enumerated powers.”
All Americans should be sick and tired of the legal dance leading to the arbitrary drawing of legal lines to fit certain agendas across the political spectrum.
As I experience (and witness the history of) the enormous growth of “public servant” power, the word resonating increasingly is “unalienable” as it brilliantly exists in America’s most famous passage (especially as it applies to liberty).
The fact is to legally define risk is to oppose the word unalienable as it applies to the fundamental right to liberty (i.e. defining risk is defining liberty). Even so, most Americans apparently find it civilized to draw legal lines in the name of risk reduction, unaware of the ever-increasing risk ironically resulting from such law.
I hope all Americans understand and passionately care about the ‘Commerce Clause back door’ against the limits of power set by revolutionaries opposing the worst form of abuse (given its generally broad scope of destruction); the abuse of power.
“The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.” — United States Constitution (Amendment IX)
That amendment, despite what our judicial branch has recorded to the contrary, must include the unalienable truths to be held self-evident in the U.S. Declaration of Independence.
Where do we draw our legal lines? Wherever the unalienable right to liberty tells us we must draw them.
To avoid the slippery slope (that “We the people” are on) resulting from laws solely targeting indirect rights infringement (noting the extreme example that breathing indirectly leads to murder — i.e. can’t breath, can’t murder), we must focus solely on direct rights infringement (e.g. murder, assault, theft, etc.)
We must apply the same care towards restricting liberty that a police officer must when deciding to use deadly force.
Back to the topic — The Guardian reports:
The same group that severed the 10 heads then ambushed and killed 12 cops that were dispatched to investigate the slaughter,,,
To them, drug taking is ‘immoral’, just like abortion. They don’t care about the Human implications of the hate they spew. There is after all ‘another life’ waiting for you if you’re lucky enough to be skinned alive and hung from a bridge in the Mexican drug war… The best the Mexican’s would get is ‘drug use is bad and we will work hard to help people who want to stop’.. looking into why people are skinned alive.. they just don’t care as it conflicts with their belief and power structure.