Synthetic pot and the 1960s military – Boing Boing
In the 1960s, retired US Army colonel James S. Ketchum led efforts to develop a nonlethal incapacitating agent as a weapon for a “war without death.” Along with LSD, they experimented with synthetic cannabis, apparently similar in effect to hash oil but much stronger.
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New York Yankees ban sunblock “to fight terrorism” — sell replacements at $5/oz – Boing Boing
The NY Yankees banned sunblock at Yankee stadium “to prevent terrorism.” On a blistering hot day. And sold high-markup, crappy sunblock inside the gates. You know, as soon as we said “There is no price too high to pay in the war on terror,” we lost — and every sleazy con-artist, profiteer, greedhead and crook won.
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“The last Supreme Court term, which ended in June, was the stormiest in recent memory, with more 5-to-4 decisions split along ideological lines than at any time in the court’s history. In a series of controversial cases about abortion, racial integration in schools, faith-based programs and the death penalty, the court’s four more conservative justices prevailed, with Justice Anthony M. Kennedy providing the crucial fifth vote. The four more liberal justices were often moved to dissent in unusually personal and vehement terms. ‘It is my firm conviction,’ Justice John Paul Stevens wrote in the case striking down race-based enrollment policies in public schools, ‘that no Member of the Court that I joined in 1975 would have agreed with today’s decision.’ According to the gossip among Supreme Court law clerks, the level of tension among the justices is higher than at any point since Bush v. Gore in 2000…”
A Fascinating profile of Justice John Paul Stevens from the New York Times magazine a couple of weeks ago.
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Justices Begin Work on a Polarizing New Docket
” The Supreme Court has so many polarizing cases on the docket for its new term that the deep ideological divisions that characterized the last term are all but certain to remain on display after justices reconvene on Monday.
The conservative majority under Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. drove the court to the right in a series of high-profile rulings during the term that ended in June. That performance, as well as a series of books and articles by and about justices, has placed the court in an unusually bright spotlight as the new term opens…”
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