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U.S. growers produce nearly $35 billion worth of marijuana annually, making the illegal drug the country's largest cash crop, bigger than corn and wheat combined, an advocate of medical marijuana use said in a study released on Monday. The report, conducted by Jon Gettman, a public policy analyst and former head of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, also concluded that five U.S. states produce more than $1 billion worth of marijuana apiece: California, Tennessee, Kentucky, Hawaii and Washington. California's production alone was about $13.8 billion, according to Gettman, who waged an unsuccessful six-year legal battle to...

On May 14, 2005, PAX-TV's Faith Under Fire broadcast a debate that I took part in against Mahdi Bray, the executive director of the Muslim American Society's (MAS) Freedom Foundation. Bray had selected the debate topic in advance, and chose to argue about "The United States of Islam?" -- that is, whether American Muslims wanted to see Islamic law sharia) implemented in the United States. While I unwaveringly agreed that most American Muslims don't want to see the United States ruled by Islamic law, I nonetheless jumped at the chance to debate this topic against Bray. After all, the Chicago...

The farm-produced fuel that is supposed to help wean the United States from its oil addiction is under scrutiny for its potentially corrosive qualities. E85, a blend of 85 percent corn-based ethanol and 15 percent gasoline, could be eating away at metal and plastic parts in gas station pumps, Underwriters Laboratories, the private product-safety testing group, said this month. BP, the British oil company, said Thursday that it would delay the expansion of E85 at its U.S. outlets until the laboratories certified an E85 dispensing system.

Cosmic rays may solve global warming problem By Roger Highfield, Science Editor (Filed: 04/10/2006) Cosmic events could help soften the impact of global warming by triggering cloud formations, suggests research published yesterday. A team of Danish scientists concluded in the Proceedings of the Royal Society that making clouds is plausible, using the Sun's magnetic field. The Sun has been at its strongest for more than 60 years and a period of high solar activity could be approaching its end. "This would produce a cooling effect that could counter part of the global warming predicted for the next century," said Dr...

WASHINGTON, Sept. 11, 2006 -- A group of American seamstresses is working to apply an old-fashioned skill -- sewing -- to help today’s wounded veterans. The nonprofit group “Sew Much Comfort” includes more than 2,000 people who sew specially made clothing for wounded servicemembers, who often find clothing off the rack doesn’t accommodate a variety of medical devices. Sew Much Comfort is a member of the Defense Department’s America Supports You program, which highlights grassroots and corporate efforts to support U.S. troops and their families. Several of the groups set up tables at the end of the America Supports...

WASHINGTON - Capturing the immigration debate in political ads this campaign season — without upsetting Hispanics — is proving tricky for the parties and candidates. An ad criticizing Stephen Laffey, who is challenging incumbent Sen. Lincoln Chafee (news, bio, voting record) for the Republican nomination in Rhode Island, set off grumbling in the Latino community. The ad criticized Laffey, mayor of Cranston, for allowing city police to accept ID cards issued by the Mexican government as identification. Chafee's spokesman had no comment about the ad. Laffey's campaign called it an insensitive attack on the mayor's attempt to empathize with "people...

SAN FRANCISCO The majority of Californians view illegal immigration as a "very serious" problem, although most say they oppose deporting those already living in the United States, according to a new statewide poll released Thursday. The Field Poll showed that 53 percent of voters in the state see illegal immigration as a very serious problem, and another 30 percent see it as somewhat serious. Republicans tended to take a stronger view, with 69 percent seeing it as a very serious problem, compared to 46 percent of Democrats and 43 percent of nonpartisans, according to the survey. An overwhelming majority, 80...

Meth still No. 1 drug problem, study findsBy SAM HANANEL, Associated Press Writer 28 minutes ago A pouch containing crystalized methamphetamine and a homemade pipe are shown March 21, 2006 in Window Rock, Ariz. A survey says Meth abuse continues to fuel an increase in crimes like robbery and assault. (AP Photo/Matt York, FILE) WASHINGTON - Meth abuse continues to fuel an increase in crimes like robbery and assault, straining the workload of local police forces despite a drop in the number of meth lab seizures, according to a survey Tuesday. Nearly half of county law enforcement officials consider methamphetamine...

California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is "part of the problem" of illegal immigration into the United States. That according to Rep. Tom Tancredo, a fellow Republican, who blasted Schwarzenegger's reluctance to secure the California-Mexico border with additional National Guard troops, despite such a request from President Bush. Appearing on "The Big Story" on the Fox News Channel, the Colorado congressman and author of the just-released book "In Mortal Danger" was asked by host Julie Banderas, "What do you think about Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger not upholding the president's wishes?" "I'm very disappointed in it, of course," responded Tancredo. "Disappointed in the fact...

MARINE CORPS BASE CAMP LEJEUNE, N.C. (June 28, 2006) -- When many people think of a field hospital, often scenes from the popular sitcom “M.A.S.H.” come to mind. For the sailors of Bravo Surgical Co., 2nd Medical Battalion, 2nd Marine Logistics Group, a field hospital is serious business. “We are setting up an mock (Surgical/Shock Trauma Platoon) you would see set up as a quick reaction force,” said Petty Officer 1st Class Michael D. Whaley, the lead petty officer for Bravo Surgical Co. “This SSTP can provide everything from surgical to basic care and ancillary services such as X-ray and...

SALT LAKE CITY - Kicking off a four-day, three-state tour, Mexican President Vicente Fox said Tuesday that his nation wants to be part of the solution in the immigration debate, not the problem. "We don't set up walls, and that's not the way you're going to fix this situation," Fox said in Spanish to representatives of groups active in Utah's Mexican community. "It's not with fences that we are going to solve this problem." There were cheers of "Viva Mexico" as Fox shook hands before leaving for an official dinner at the governor's mansion. Earlier in the day, at a...

This is Europe's problem too, says Madrid By Mike Elkin (Filed: 19/05/2006) Spain has issued its most urgent international appeal for help in coping with illegal immigrants flooding into the Canary Islands. Madrid announced it will dispatch diplomats to several countries in western Africa, where the migrants come from, while a European parliament delegation will arrive next month to assess a problem that the Spaniards say is not just theirs but Europe's. Over 2,000 migrants have reached the Spanish coast this month The calmer seas of early summer have seen a sharp rise in the numbers reaching the holiday islands,...

NEW ORLEANS - A foundation problem — although not the one targeted by earlier studies — caused the 450-foot-long break in a floodwall and levee on New Orleans' western edge when Hurricane Katrina hit, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said Friday. A naturally occurring, 20-foot-thick layer of clay that helped support the floodwall was too weak for the job, according to a report by a Corps task force set up to find out why the levees broke. Had the floodwall and levee held, much of the western half of the city would have escaped flooding. Previous analyses by other...

In December, the FBI was worried that Border Patrol agents' lives were in danger. But many of those officers never got the memo. Instead, agents say, they first learned of the threat -- that smugglers planned to hire gang members to murder Border Patrol agents -- when a Daily Bulletin reporter called to ask for their opinions. The fact that many officers didn't know about the threat, described in an "Officer Safety Alert" disseminated by the Department of Homeland Security, shows how poor communication among law enforcement agencies can be. The warning is "proof that we're being targeted," said a...

The disciplinary arm of the N.C. State Bar dropped charges of felonious misconduct against two former Union County prosecutors Friday because of a 1999 clerical error at the state Supreme Court. The State Bar had charged Kenneth Honeycutt and Scott Brewer with lying, cheating and withholding evidence in a 1996 death penalty case. The ruling Friday marks the second time that Honeycutt and Brewer won on procedural grounds before the bar's Disciplinary Hearing Commission, which sits as judge and jury in disciplinary cases. . . . Prosecutors around the state are concerned that the case is damaging their reputation and...

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger will face a hugely difficult problem tomorrow when he delivers his annual State of the State address: the Grand Canyon-sized gap between the lazy conventional wisdom about California's problems and reality. When Schwarzenegger ran during the 2003 recall campaign, his analysis of Sacramento's dysfunction was acute: Gov. Gray Davis and the Democratic-run Legislature had gone on a four-year binge in which spending grew much faster than population and inflation. This binge occurred both during the windfall years of the tech boom and as revenues plunged when the stock market tanked after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Only...

The Scribe’s Problem I found Robert McHenry’s recent piece (http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=121305E) on the superiority of Britannica over Wikipedia to be fascinating, for I think he’s allowed himself an error of logic that we more usually encounter in economics. It was also a little unkind of the publishing gremlins to schedule his piece the day before Nature came out with that research ( SEE: http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/online-encyclopedias-put-to-the-test/2005/12/14/1134500913345.html) into the relative accuracies of the two approaches. The, umm, research that showed roughly comparable levels of errors in the amateur thing thrown together on the web and the one expensively and carefully produced by multiple levels...

Everyone agrees that California has a chronic fiscal problem - five straight years of deficit budgets being graphic proof. The state, which had experienced serious budget problems in the early 1990s, thanks to a severe recession, was recovering nicely until 2000, when then-Gov. Gray Davis and the Legislature blew most of a one-time tax windfall on billions of dollars in tax cuts and new spending. --snip-- The budget crisis eventually cost Democrat Davis his job and propelled Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger into the governorship on his promise to clean up the mess in Sacramento. But while Schwarzenegger has made some incremental...

God Causes the Problems—And all along you thought it was President Bush Rabbi Daniel Lapin September 28, 2005 Once upon a time in St Louis, there lived a husband who yearned to vacation in Los Angeles while his wife craved a few days in New York. Averaging their desires and finding the midpoint, the couple went to Kansas City. Averaging doesn’t always work. Averaging doesn’t work when you are dealing with two very different things like Los Angeles and New York or like traditional Americans and those of the secular fundamentalist persuasion. Now, in one of the best examples of...

Dean’s immigration view too simple for problem By Joseph Dolman, Newsday Published: Sunday, Aug. 21, 2005 Poor Howard Dean. The Democrats keep looking for their breakout moment. They keep searching for a way to show skeptical Americans they aren’t just hand puppets for a cast of familiar interest groups. They keep struggling to develop some fresh ideas. Yet there was Dean – the party’s national chairman – on “Face the Nation” last Sunday, whiffing away at a fine chance to show Americans a smart Democratic mix of thoughtful policy and savvy politics on the crucial matter of immigration. Host Bob...