SpinnyNuNu

From Real Life Adventures.

An interesting article in Politico this past week suggests that Jeff Sessions' to reimpose federal restrictions on state cannabis policies may lead to a backlash that may eventually favor nationwide legalization.

Business leaders in an industry that was worth $7.9 billion in 2017, called Sessions’ action revoking “outrageous” and “economically stupid.”

Capitol Hill screamed just as loudly. And it wasn’t just the Democratic members of the Congressional Cannabis Caucus. It was Republican senators, too...

Thursday may well turn out to be a pivotal moment in the marijuana industry’s evolution as a political force. Nearly 70 percent of Americans believe in some form of legalized marijuana, but does the nascent industry have the sway to rewrite nearly 50 years of federal drug policy?..

“There’s a lot of [legislators] trying to have it both ways who are now going to have to make up their mind,” said Tick Segerblom, the Nevada state senator who is considered the father of the state’s legalization movement. “Are they going to go with what the voters of their state support, or are they going to join Sessions and crack down and try to re-instate prohibition?”  Right now, the answer seems to be the former...

The fact that marijuana has now risen to the height of top-tier budget negotiations is a sign that the pro-marijuana coalition is no longer merely a menagerie of loud-mouth hippies, stoners, and felons, as the pro-pot crowd has been characterized in the past. The community of Americans who now rely on legal medical marijuana, estimated to be 2.6 million people in 2016, includes a variety of mainstream constituency groups like veterans, senior citizens, cancer survivors, and parents of epileptic children...

As of late Friday, POLITICO Magazine could not find a single member of Congress who had issued a statement in support of Sessions’ actions. 

There are many ways to teach your child about the sacrifice Jesus supposedly made for us.This is not one of them.

A Texas woman died after consuming raw oysters and contracting a flesh-eating bacteria.

Ah, the early morning.  All is quiet, so it's time to put on the coffee, look forward to a nice hot cup of joe.  Because there's nothing better at this time of day than a dark French roast...

... which, I must state for the record, I would prefer to take by mouth.

The reason I have to specify is, unsurprisingly, because of noted scientific researcher Gwyneth Paltrow, who is now selling a device for $135 whereby you can get your morning coffee squirted up your ass instead.

For what it's worth, I'm not making this up, although I sure as hell wish I was.  The device, called the "Implant-O-Rama" (didn't make the name up either, I swear), is basically just a glass bottle with some silicone tubing.  So I can think of a great many other better uses for $135, and that includes using it to start a fire in my wood stove.

It will probably not shock you to hear that this is all in the name of "detoxification."  A coffee enema is supposed to "detoxify your blood," which should only be a concern if your liver and kidneys aren't working properly.  (And if this is the case, you need to see a doctor immediately, not put your morning Starbucks where the sun don't shine.)

Why coffee, you might be asking?  Why not orange juice or iced tea or Snapple or Mountain Dew?  The answer: I have no fucking clue.  My guess is that Gwyneth Paltrow doesn't know, either.  If you asked her, she'd probably tell you it had to do with the quantum resonant frequencies of your chakras or something.  But we haven't worried about explanations from her before, so why start now?

At this point it will also come as no particular surprise that people have injured themselves administering coffee enemas.  Emergency rooms have reported colon inflammation, perforated rectums, sepsis, and blood electrolyte imbalances from people doing this to themselves, including at least two people who died of the aftereffects.  Then there were a couple of cases where people suffered severe internal burns, since folks who are stupid enough to squirt random liquids up their ass are evidently also stupid enough not to wait until said liquids are cool.

What's wryly funny about all this is the list of things they say a coffee enema can cure.  Implant-O-Rama, says the website, “can mean relief from depression, confusion, general nervous tension, many allergy related symptoms and, most importantly, relief from severe pain.  Coffee enemas lower serum toxins.”

If it gets rid of confusion, you have to wonder why people in the middle of a coffee enema don't suddenly frown and say, "Wait.  Why do I have a tube up my ass?  This is idiotic."

And about relief from severe pain -- I guess getting scalding hot coffee up your backside would take your mind off any pain you're experiencing elsewhere, just as smashing your toe with a hammer makes you temporarily forget you've got a headache.

Then, of course, we have the disclaimer:

The information contained in these pages and on this website is not intended to replace your medical doctor.  This information has not been evaluated or approved by the FDA and is not necessarily based on scientific evidence from any source...  These products are intended to support general well-being and are not intended to treat, diagnose, mitigate, prevent, or cure any condition or disease.

"Not intended to mitigate any condition?"  So what the fuck does "relief from depression etc. etc. etc." mean to you?

The whole thing is kind of maddening, but even more maddening than the idea that hucksters are trying to bilk you out of your hard-earned cash (that, after all, is what hucksters do) is the fact that there are bunches of people just kind of nod and go, "Oh.  Okay."  It apparently never occurs to them to ask how the hell a coffee enema could help you, or even to ask the person making the claim to name one specific toxic substance the body produces that your liver and kidneys are incapable of handling.

So anyway.  My general advice is "just don't."  There's a good reason that the slogan doesn't go, "The best part of waking up is Folger's up your butt."  There's nothing wrong with a good cup of coffee in the morning, but please put it into the correct orifice.

Oprah Winfrey's moving speech at the Golden Globes has some fans and fellow celebrities calling for her presidential run.

Eve was rescued from Placer County

President Donald Trump wants people to know he's "like, really smart" and "a very stable genius" - a case he's trying to make in a series of tweets in which he defends his mental fitness and boasts about his intelligence.

A Florida man called 911 on New Year’s Eve and told dispatchers he was driving drunk and needed to be taken off the road.

Cathy Speck’s beloved tricycle was stolen

“The hand flapping is a concern. We don’t want our son to learn do to that!”

A Davis woman battling ALS and cancer has had her decorative tricycle stolen overnight.

Despite requiring permission, they can continue listening while the apps run in the background.

One of the early Fleetwood Mac classics, first recorded way back in 1975, written when Stevie Nicks was experiencing some major changes in her personal and professional life.

This recording is from two decades later, in 1997 in a live performance. Her introductory comment "This is for you, Daddy," refers to her father, who was in the audience that night.



Reposted in 2009 after discovering another version of "Landslide," this one performed by the students of PS22 in New York City. I still prefer the Stevie Nicks version, but this one has a certain charm...


Reposted again for 2018.

Because he can.  And there's no generic available.  So fuck you.

Prices for a cancer drug called lomustine have skyrocketed nearly 1,400 percent since 2013, putting a potentially life-saving treatment out of reach for patients suffering from brain tumors and Hodgkin's lymphoma. Though the 40-year-old medication is no longer protected by patents, no generic version is available.

According to the Wall Street Journal, lomustine was sold by Bristol-Myers Squib for years under the brand name CeeNU at a price of about $50 a capsule for the highest dose. The drugmaker sold lomustine in 2013 to a little-known Miami startup called NextSource, which proceeded to hike lomustine's price nine times since. It now charges about $768 per pill for the medication.

More details at CBS News.

Photo of Nextsource CEO Robert Dicrisci via BoingBoing.

Schiaparelli | c.1939 — Recommended attire for when you tell your ex- husband you obtained 51% share of his company. #whattheywore #historicalfashion #fashion #fashiondesign #fashionhistory #historyoffashion #vintagefashion #art #vintage #historicfashion #defunctfashion #historicalfashion #costume #costumedesign #couture #costumehistory #elsaschiaparelli #schiaparelli #impossibleconversations #ocelot #ocelotfur #furcoat

Evening Coat | Shannon Rodgers | c.1968 — What you wear when you greet your boyfriend’s wife at Christmas Mass. #whattheywore #historicalfashion #fashion #fashiondesign #fashionhistory #historyoffashion #vintagefashion #art #vintage #historicfashion #defunctfashion #historicalfashion #costume #costumedesign #couture #costumehistory #foxfur #metmuseum

Evening Dress | c.1850 —This elegant dress is made of mull with applications of jewel beetle elytra. 1942 of these glistering forewings, with its color oscillating from green to purple, can be found on the dress, 1548 on the shawl.
India was colonized by the British Empire during the mid-18th century, and from the latter half of the 19th century onwards a vast variety of products using jewel beetle embroidery was being exported to the western European markets.
Beautiful and splendid decoration design with jewel beetle elytra originated during the time of the Mughal Empire that dominated most of the Indian subcontinent from the 16th to the mid-19th century. Examples of luxurious turbans with gold thread embroidery and wedding gowns from the Maharajas with jewel beetle applications are preserved in the National Museum, New Delhi, as well as in the Jai Singh II. City Palace Museum in Jaipur. Furthermore, there has been a tradition in India of applying jewel beetle elytra as an adornment to jewelry and paintings alike. This technique is thought to have derived from embroidery. #whattheywore #historicalfashion #fashion #fashiondesign #fashionhistory #historyoffashion #vintagefashion #art #vintage #historicfashion #defunctfashion #historicalfashion #costume #costumedesign #couture #costumehistory #victorian #victorianfashion

Charles James | c.1949 — Perfect ensemble to wear when your husband’s mistress arrives unannounced to your Christmas party and you have to tell the butler to release the hounds. #whattheywore #historicalfashion #fashion #fashiondesign #fashionhistory #historyoffashion #vintagefashion #art #vintage #historicfashion #defunctfashion #historicalfashion #costume #costumedesign #couture #costumehistory #charlesjames #redvelvet

I don't know who shot this, but you are my hero.

An Indiana woman said a hotel charged her $350 for writing a negative review of the business.

With the sale of recreational-use marijuana set to become legal in less two weeks throughout California, the city of Marysville chose to do the opposite Tuesday night -- ban it.

The dad's attempt to convert his son backfired in a beautiful way.

Yesterday, the Washington Post broke a story noting that CDC officials are no longer allowed to use the following seven words: “vulnerable,” “entitlement,” “diversity,” “transgender,” “fetus,” “evidence-based” and “science-based” as part of a larger Orwellian attack on science at large and specific communities and topics more generally.

It’s horrible on its face and not even trying to pretend it’s anything but an attack on science and the most vulnerable among us–forcing out the scientific term “fetus” (clearly to allow for the idea that terms like “baby” should be used instead, in a nod to the anti-choice movement); the poor who receive “entitlements;” minorities and LGBTQIA who are no longer allowed to be referenced by terms like “diversity” and “transgender.” And it attacks the very background of scientific research, taking away “evidence-based” and “science-based” as descriptors for policy recommendations. It’s hard to believe this is real life in the United States and not Soviet-era Lysenkoism.

But what chills me more, even beyond the removal of these words from the CDC’s formal lexicon, is the suggested replacement given for “science” or “evidence-based” is instead: “CDC bases its recommendations on science in consideration with community standards and wishes.”

Soak that up. This opens the door for official CDC documents to support, say, abstinence-based education in conservative areas as a “recommendation based on science in consideration with community standards and wishes.” In other words, not science-based at all, even though many communities support it *despite* the scientific evidence. Or anti-vaxxers in Oregon who believe vaccines are “toxic” to have that now become a CDC recommendation based “on science in consideration with community standards and wishes.”

If this policy is allowed at the CDC, there’s no reason to think this will stay in that agency, either. Imagine all of HHS, NASA, NOAA, the Department of Education, and many others requiring similar definitions of science/evidence-based. It’s programmatic approval of the idea that facts are anything you want them to be.

It’s literally turning “truthiness” into Federal policy.

“War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength” never felt quite so close to home as it has in 2017.

"This lady just suddenly says, 'Don't you dare say that again.'"

SLAPP LAWSUITS: THE BIGGEST THREAT TO THE RESISTANCE YOU NEVER HEARD OF

Have you heard of SLAPP lawsuits? You soon will.

SLAPP stands for “Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation.” It is a lawsuit brought by big corporations intended to censor, intimidate, and silence critics by burdening them with the overwhelming costs of a legal defense until they’re forced to abandon their criticism or opposition. And it may be the biggest threat to the resistance you’ve never heard of.  

Here’s an example: Resolute Forest Products, one of Canada’s largest logging and paper companies, has sued, in a U.S. court, environmental groups that have been campaigning to save Canada’s boreal forest. 

Resolute based its lawsuit on a U.S. conspiracy and racketeering law (RICO) intended to ensnare mobsters. Resolute alleged that the environmental groups have been illegally conspiring to extort the company’s customers and to defraud their own donors. 

The suit wasn’t designed to win in court. It was designed to distract and silence critics. This is punishment for speaking out. Thankfully, a federal court agrees and a judge just dismissed Resolute’s claims. But other corporate bullies are still trying to use this playbook.

Here’s another example: Remember the indigenous led movement at Standing Rock, when hundreds of nations and their allies came together and stood up against the destructive Dakota Access Pipeline? 

In August, Energy Transfer Partners, the company behind that pipeline, filed a similar RICO case against Greenpeace entities and two other defendants over Standing Rock. The suit accuses them of participating in a sprawling criminal conspiracy to disrupt business and defraud donors. The lawsuit even alleges they support eco-terrorism and engage in drug trafficking.

The lawsuit claims Greenpeace cost the company $300 million. Since RICO claims entitle plaintiffs to recover triple damages, the case potentially could cost Greenpeace $900 million. That would be the end of Greenpeace.

But, again, winning isn’t necessarily the goal of SLAPP suits. Just by filing the suits, Energy Transfer Partners and Resolute are trying to drain environmental groups of time, energy, and resources they need, so they can’t continue to fight to protect the environment.

Connect the dots, and consider the chilling effect SLAPP suits are having on any group seeking to protect public health, worker’s rights, and even our democracy. 

Who’s behind all of this? Both the lawsuits I just mentioned were filed by Michael Bowe. He is also a member of Donald Trump’s personal legal team. Bowe has publicly stated that he’s in conversations with other corporations considering filing their own SLAPP lawsuits.

If the goal is to silence public-interest groups, the rest of us must speak out. Wealthy corporations must know  they can’t SLAPP the public into silence.

A friend and loyal reader of Skeptophilia responded to yesterday's post, about a high school biology teacher who decided to name a chemical reaction after himself with the result that it became semi-official on the internet, with an email that said, "I'd love to talk to you more about this phenomenon.  How 'bout we meet at The Shed at Dulwich for lunch tomorrow?"

Which was a little puzzling, until I clicked the link he sent, which was about how a non-existent restaurant became an internet phenomenon.

It started earlier this year when a freelance writer with the unlikely name of "Oobah Butler" decided to create a TripAdvisor page for a fake restaurant, and gave the address as the location of a garden shed next to his house in the town of Dulwich, England, which is a suburb of London.


Once the page was created, Butler and a few friends lauded The Shed at Dulwich in gushing tones.  They got a burner cellphone to be the restaurant's phone number.  They created a fake menu, each dish based upon a human emotion (my favorite one was "Lust:  Rabbit kidneys on toast seasoned with saffron and an oyster bisque.  Served with a side of pomegranate soufflé.")  They created photographs of entrées out of non-food items such as bleach tablets and shaving cream, which included the following:


Which, honestly, looks a lot like stuff I've eaten at upscale restaurants, although I assume it wouldn't taste like it.

The reviews kept pouring in.  "The best shed-based experience in London!" one of them said, which you would think would have tipped people off.

But no. The positive reviews, combined with the menu and photographs, made The Shed at Dulwich rocket upwards in TripAdvisor.  (Another said, "Spent a weekend in London and heard through the grapevine that this place is a must-visit.  After a few mildly frustrating phone calls I was in.")

The phone began ringing off the hook.  Butler told the callers, "Sorry, we're booked up."  He was sent free samples by restaurant supply companies.  The Dulwich governing council called Butler about relocating the restaurant to a more business-friendly property.  People contacted him looking for employment.

At this point page for The Shed was receiving 89,000 hits a day.  It rose to #1 in the TripAdvisor restaurant category for the Greater London area.

Have I made it clear enough that this place doesn't actually exist?

This is like the Swanson conversion from yesterday's post, only more so.  Like a thousand times more so.  Of course, eventually Butler was found out, and he 'fessed up, and the page was taken down.  But not before he was receiving hundreds of calls daily, from all over the world, asking for reservations -- some of them for months in advance.

So if you needed further indication that you should view anything online with a good dose of skepticism and critical thinking, this is it.  A guy and a few friends, armed with nothing more than a burner cellphone, some photographs of household items dolled up to look like food, and a good imagination, punked TripAdvisor and thousands of eager foodies.  I don't know what would possess someone to do this, other than a warped sense of humor and way too much free time, but it does illustrate the human capacity for hoaxing.

You can't even trust webpages for highly-rated restaurants.  You see why I'm dubious about online claims for ghosts, UFOs, and Bigfoot?

Coverage of Alabama special U.S. Senate election.

Dave Daubenmire began his rant by saying, "I read a lot of stuff."And then he spouted a whole bunch of nonsense.

The theft of a dog in the Rio Linda area of Sacramento County was captured on surveillance video.