A glass-enclosed area in downtown Falkoping, Sweden, giving alcoholics and drug users a place to socialize, was proposed and then tabled by local politicians.

The proposal by two members of the Moderate Party called for a space akin to a bus shelter in the central square of the village of 13,000 where addicts could spend time with each other, not feel isolated from society and lessen their public disturbances, party member Christine Joremus told the newspaper Aftonbladet.

"They should also be able to live the good life," her proposal read in part.

"The proposal does talk about giving them a place where they can see other people," said co-sponsor of the proposal Hakan Arnesson.

Other politicians voiced their opposition, the Swedish news website The Local reported.

"This just feels like an updated version of a... [Read More]

The House of Representatives will soon decide whether states should be able to make food stamp recipients pee in cups to prove they're not on drugs.

The drug testing measure is one of more than 100 amendments to the House farm bill up for a vote in the coming days. The underlying legislation would cut the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which currently serves 47 million Americans, by roughly 2.5 percent, resulting in 2 million fewer people receiving benefits. Among the amendments are a Democratic one that would undo the cut and a Republican one that would make it deeper.

The drug testing amendment, sponsored by Rep. Richard Hudson (R-N.C.), is the latest in a longstanding Republican... [Read More]

The philosophical underpinnings of America have traditionally been based on constraining the federal government through the interpretation of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Americans though, have willingly given up their rights based on security concerns, fear and perception of crime.

These fears have largely been driven by politicians, the media and “the crime du jour” which sensationalizes horrific events with the promise that one more law will fix our communities, or save America from terrorists. These public safety security concerns started with the Drug War and have expanded in a further deterioration of our civil liberties in the post 9/11 decade.

But it appears Americans are finally awakening to the fact that... [Read More]

The scientific cooperation between chemists, biotechnologists and physicists from various Catalan institutes, headed by Pau Gorostiza, from the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC), and Ernest Giralt, from the Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB Barcelona), has led to a breakthrough that will favor the development of light-regulated therapeutic molecules.

The "Design, synthesis and structure of peptides and proteins" lab headed by Dr. Giralt, also senior professor at the University of Barcelona and holder of the 2011 Spanish National Research Prize, has synthesized two peptides (small proteins), which, on irradiation with light, change shape, thereby allowing or preventing an specific protein-protein interaction. The association of these two proteins is required for endocytosis, a process by which cells allow molecules to cross the cell membrane and enter. The Italian scientist Laura... [Read More]

During his 2008 campaign and upon taking office, President Obama said he would shift the federal government's drug control resources from a criminalization-centered approach to one based on public health. His drug czar, Gil Kerlikowske, even announced in 2009 that he would end the war on drugs: "Regardless of how you try to explain to people it's a 'war on drugs' or a 'war on a product,' people see a war as a war on them," he said. "We're not at war with people in this country."

This rhetoric, however, does not match the reality experienced in... [Read More]

Call me crazy but I find it absurd to claim we're a free country while our government dictates what adults can or can not do in the privacy of our own homes. We've accepted a massive blow to a fundamental expression of individual freedom if our own minds and bodies are off-limits to personal exploration. I say this not as a drug taking enthusiast -- but as a true believer in freedom and non-violence.

Now let's talk social responsibility. I experimented with a few drugs over the years. But I don't do drugs today. That choice has nothing to do with the law. I don't... [Read More]

9 nabbed after shipping container system used to transport heroin, cocaine

Police in the Netherlands and Belgium have seized a tonne of cocaine, a tonne of heroin and a suitcase stuffed with €1.3m after uncovering a massive drug smuggling operation that used hackers to break into the systems of shipping companies.

According to the Netherlands public prosecutor, a Netherlands-based drug ring hired hackers to manipulate systems in the major port of Antwerp in their neighbouring country, Belgium, in order to arrange... [Read More]

A POLICEMAN's farts helped officers seize £12,000 worth of cannabis.

The bizarre incident occurred as a group of cops waited to arrest a suspect as part of a burglary investigation.

They were forced to wind down the windows of their cop car, in order to escape a smell they believed to be coming from one of their colleagues.

But, once the fresh air reached them, they realised the strong stench was actually OUTSIDE the car.

The officers then followed the pungent aroma to a house, where they found a cannabis-growing operation.

And their inquiries soon led them to discover more plants at a second house nearby, reports the Leicester Mercury.

In total, seven suspects were arrested and the value of the crop was later valued at £12,000.

"We get some bizarre stories from officers and this really caught my... [Read More]

London's DJ Jack arrested at Ben Gurion Airport over suspicious chemical found in his luggage after landing in Israel to kick off events for Pride Week; held for four days. Police eventually discover substance was eye drops

DJ Jack Chang from London, who was invited to play at a party organized by the LGBT community to kick of Pride week events, was arrested upon arrival at Ben Gurion Airport on the grounds that the date rape drug was found among his belongings.

Law enforcement officials rushed to issue a statment about the "arrest of a big drug courier," but after four days in detention, their error came to light: the seized chemical was not the date rape drug, but ... eye drops.

Eventually the... [Read More]

A British doctor faked test results during clinical trials for an asthma drug in which one person died and others contracted cancer and pneumonia, The Independent has learnt.

Dr Edward Erin’s fabrications were not detected until he was arrested and jailed for six years for lacing his lover’s coffee with drugs in an attempt to have her miscarry.

His sentence was later extended by two years after it emerged that he had tried to persuade a former cellmate to kill the woman and their baby son, and he is still in prison.
... [Read More]

For seven months in 1953, William S. Burroughs journeyed through South American jungles on an expedition to find the near-mythical drug ayahuasca ("yage," as he preferred to call it). Burroughs, hoping to kick junk, but also experience the substance's so-called "space-time travel" and telepathic qualities, documented a great deal of his adventures and misadventures in letters to Allen Ginsberg. The letters, written in Burroughs typical meandering style, would later be published as The Yage Letters by City Lights.

One could almost say that Burroughs was... [Read More]

The medical marijuana bill was turned down unanimously - 10 voted against, 3 abstained.
Unlike the forecast, not one of the ministers voted for the bill to reclassify Cannabis as a substance with medical qualities.

The members of the minister committee gathered on Sunday (June 16 2013) to discuss the new bill introduced by MP Tamar Zandberg to classify Cannabis as a substance with medicinal value. The bill failed to pass with 10 voting against and 3 abstaining.

*The article lists the names of those who voted against, but since no... [Read More]

A 52-year-old California man told authorities in Alabama he was behind not only a homicide there but more than 30 killings as part of his job as a “debt collector” for Mexican drug cartels, CNN reported on Friday.

Sheriff’s officials in Lawrence County identified Jose Manuel Martínez as the suspect in the shooting death of 32-year-old Jose Ruiz on Thursday and linked him to 13 other violent deaths after his confession. Authorities said he was caught after his DNA was found on a cigarette butt inside a truck belonging to one of the victims in a 2006 double-murder in Marion County, Florida.

“It’s how he fed his family, is how he explained it,” Marion County Detective T.J. Watts said to CNN. “And if he didn’t do the job, someone... [Read More]

The hysteria over drugs like Spice, bath salts and kratom is drowning out the facts.

The market for legal—or until recently legal—highs is booming. A recent report by the EU’s drug agency, for example, shows that... [Read More]

A 2-year old child from Ohio County, Kentucky remains in critical condition after ingesting sulfuric acid her mother, 20-year old Racheal Arroyo, and her mother’s boyfriend, 23-year old Jared McStoots, used to make meth; the child has severe caustic burns on her lips and in her mouth and esophagus.

According to Tristate homepage.com, the couple waited 6-hours before bringing the child to an Owensboro hospital for treatment, where the doctors assessed the child, sent her to Kosair Hospital in Louisville, and notified the police.

McStoots and Arroyo were brought in for questioning and the police determined that the child swallowed the sulfuric acid drain... [Read More]

There was outrage and confected outrage, but mostly there was mirth. ''Joel Madden proves that in Australia the grass really is greener!,'' tweeted one wag. ''I think it's pretty obvious the weed belonged to Joel Madden's hairdresser,'' quipped another.

Not even the police could summon much enthusiasm over the discovery of a small amount of cannabis in Madden's hotel room when they were alerted to it on Sunday afternoon. They took six hours to turn up and then let The Voice judge off with a caution. Among Madden's co-judges and the public at large, more scorn was... [Read More]

The term "designer drug" became popular with the acid house and ecstasy boom in the 1990s, but it was never really accurate. The main ingredient in ecstasy pills – MDMA – was first synthesised in 1912 and began its life as a recreational drug in 70s California, years before it became notorious on the rave scene. The drug was never created for the party crowd, but the "designer drug" label... [Read More]

Alex Grey just hit the crowd-sourced lottery. The king of visionary art will be building the “sanctuary” for his trippy, visual-laced spiritual paintings and structures that he calls the Entheon. His Kickstarter campaign received over $210,000 from more than 1,500 backers. That sum is the second-most amount of money ever donated to an art project on Kickstarter.

The Kickstarter campaign ended on May 31st, which was the 39th anniversary of Alex and Allyson Grey’s first meeting. The two have been making visionary art ever since. It was also the 39th anniversary of the first time Alex every dropped acid. “We spent the night together and never left,” said Allyson at their fundraising party in LA last month.

As Grey posted on his blog, “It... [Read More]

Are the Young People That Shrinks Label as Disruptive Really Anarchists with a Healthy Resistance to Oppressive Authority?

Many young people diagnosed with mental disorders have acted on their beliefs in ways that threaten authorities.

Many young people diagnosed with mental disorders are essentially anarchists who have the bad luck of being misidentified by mental health professionals, who 1) are ignorant of the social philosophy of anarchism; 2) embrace, often without political consciousness, its opposite ideology of hierarchism; and 3) confuse the signs of anarchism with symptoms of mental illness.

The mass media equates anarchism with chaos and violence. However, the social philosophy of anarchism rejects authoritarian government, opposes coercion, strives for greatest freedom, works toward “mutual aid” and voluntary cooperation, and maintains that... [Read More]

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has a humble disclosure to make: there is still no accurate estimate of the global scale of counterfeit medicines. Perhaps as compensation, the multilateral body has hung a new name on such products: substandard, spurious, falsely labelled, falsified and counterfeit (SSFFC) medicines.

Various reports by others suggest that the size of the global fake drugs industry could run into hundreds of billions of dollars. Deloitte's vice-president Terry Hisey says it could be in the range of $50 billion to $200 billion annually. Health economist Roger Bate, who is also the author of the book Phake, which is an outcome of years of research into counterfeit drugs, says countries such as India and China are at the... [Read More]