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February 20, 2015

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Germany Gives Greece Just Enough Rope: Varoufakis Says If Troika Rejects Reforms "The Deal Is Dead And Buried"



Submitted by Tyler Durden on 02/20/2015 16:28 -0500



As usual, the fine print of any European "deal" is revealed not only after the agreement, but after the US market close. So for all those waiting for the real punchline, here it is - it also is the reason why Greece got until Monday to reveal the list of "reforms" it would undertake:

"We’re in trouble next week if creditors don’t accept Greece’s reforms", Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis says. "If our list of reforms is not backed by the institutions, this agreement is dead and buried." That's bad. But... "But it’s not going to be knocked down by the institutions."

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HIGH TIMES
By Paul Armentano · Fri Jan 24, 2014



Opponents of legalizing cannabis for medicinal purposes are fond of arguing that the plant must be subjected to the same standards of clinical study and FDA review as conventional medicines. What they fail to mention is that cannabis and its active components have already been subjected to a greater degree of scientific scrutiny than many FDA-approved pharmaceuticals.

According to a just-published analysis of some 200 newly FDA-approved medications, few conventional drugs are tested in multiple, large-scale clinical assessing safety and efficacy trials prior to market approval. “{A}bout a third won approval on the basis of a single clinical trial, and many other trials involved small groups of patients and shorter durations,” reports The Washington Post in its summary of the study, which appears in the January edition of The Journal of the American Medical Association. “Only about 40 percent of approvals included trials in which the new drug was compared with existing drugs on the market.”

By comparison, there exists over 20,000 published studies or reviews in the scientific literature referencing the cannabis plant and its cannabinoids, nearly half of which were published within the last five years, according to a keyword search on PubMed Central, the government repository for peer-reviewed scientific research. Of these, more than 100 are controlled clinical trials assessing the therapeutic efficacy of cannabinoids for a variety of indications.

A 2006 review of 72 of these trials, conducted between the years 1975 and 2004, identifies ten distinct pathologies for which controlled studies on cannabinoids have been published. The review concludes that these trial data “affirm that cannabinoids exhibit an interesting therapeutic potential as anti-emetics, appetite stimulants in debilitating diseases (cancer and AIDS), analgesics, as well as in the treatment of multiple sclerosis, spinal cord injuries, Tourette syndrome, epilepsy and glaucoma.”

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Posted by Jeanne Devon on Thursday, February 12, 2015 ·



Amid a firestorm of gasps, giggles, and moral outrage, Alaska’s Governor Bill Walker (I) has withdrawn from consideration an appointee to the Alaska Commission on Judicial Conduct.

Jeff Landfield’s own conduct came under scrutiny after several Facebook photos came to light, which the governor’s spokesperson Grace Jang said were “disrespectful” and “misogynistic,” a characterization Landfield disputes. No specific images were cited, but Landfield’s personal Facebook page is a cornucopia of party pics, poolside Las Vegas romps, and boozy musings.

The position Landfield hoped to take for the Walker administration handles complaints filed against state judges – an unpaid appointment which would have required legislative confirmation. Landfield currently chairs the Anchorage Federation of Community Councils, and is a former candidate for the Alaska State Senate. He ran a primary challenge against Republican incumbent Lesil McGuire in 2012. She still occupies her seat, currently chairs the Judiciary Committee, and would have overseen the confirmation – requiring a vote of the full legislative body.



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