Free Republic

/begin my excerpts [Weekly Chosun] Sino-N. Korean 'Intel War' /snip In October, 2006, when N. Korea did their first nuclear test, there were spies who sneaked in from Chinese fishing boat off the shore of Hwa-dae(near the test site.) They wanted to install GPS system in Hwa-dae and tried to obtain samples from N. Korea's nuclear test, but N. Korean State Security got them. N. Korea made no announcement to the outside about this incident. They nabbed the entire team and executed them without trial. According to a N. Korean defector, he was told by a security agent, "We found...

WASHINGTON, Oct. 13, 2009 – Afghan and international security forces have disrupted several terrorist networks in Afghanistan, including a major drug operation, in recent days, military officials reported. In operations today and yesterday: -- A security force killed more than a dozen insurgents and detained a suspect after searching a mountainside compound in Kunar province known to be used by an al-Qaida commander and his element believed to be responsible for trafficking foreign fighters and conducting numerous attacks in Pech Valley. During the search of the compound northeast of Jalalabad, the force twice received and returned enemy fire, killing the...

SAN FRANCISCO – Marijuana advocates are gathering signatures to get as many as three pot-legalization measures on the ballot in 2010 in California, setting up what could be a groundbreaking clash with the federal government over U.S. drug policy. At least one poll shows voters would support lifting the pot prohibition, which would make the state of more than 38 million the first in the nation to legalize marijuana. Such action would also send the state into a headlong conflict with the U.S. government while raising questions about how federal law enforcement could enforce its drug laws in the face...

CHICAGO (Reuters) - A vaccine helped block the high felt by cocaine users in 38 percent of people who took it, U.S. researchers said on Monday, offering promise of a new approach to treating those addicted to the drug. The aim is to prevent cocaine’s rewarding effects -- the high -- in order to reduce cravings that trigger drug relapses. “The concept works,” Dr. Thomas Kosten of Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas, whose study appears in the Archives of General Psychiatry, said in a statement. Cocaine molecules on their own are too small to draw the attention of...

Security at risk from Russia addicts - Medvedev 08 Sep 2009 14:46:33 GMT Source: Reuters * Up to 2.5 million Russians are drug addicts * Drug use contributes to demographic problem * Students may face tests By Denis Dyomkin MOSCOW, Sept 8 (Reuters) - High drug use among Russia's youth is a threat to national security, President Dmitry Medvedev said on Tuesday. Russia is the world's top consumer of Afghan heroin, fuelling concerns in Moscow about the growth of the opium trade in Afghanistan. "The young age of drug users is a threat to the country's national security, a serious...

Obama is a "charming liar" - and that's the good part! This audio is priceless. "It makes me puke that we've just been 'Cheneyed' by a guy named Barack Obama." "What if the people out there screaming and breaking up the discussions at the town hall meetings are correct?"

I’ve reported several times over the last few months on Team Obama’s hefty funding from the health care industry/drug lobby — see here and here — as well on the deep pockets behind the Astroturf HCAN/SEIU/ACORN campaign. Culture of Corruption also hones in on the cozy cash deals involving Michelle Obama, Valerie Jarrett, Susan Sher, and David Axelrod to create faux grass-roots support for the University of Chicago Medical Center’s patient-dumping scheme. Now, Bloomberg’s Timothy Burger brings news about Axelrod’s latest health care conflicts of interest that will come as no surprise to those who have fully informed themselves of...

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Wildfire investigators in California are looking for marijuana growers tied to a Mexican drug cartel whom they suspect ignited a blaze that has charred more than 87,000 acres of a national forest. The La Brea Fire, which erupted August 8 in the Los Padres National Forest in the remote Santa Barbara County mountains northwest of Los Angeles, is believed to be the first major wildfire in the state caused by drug traffickers, U.S. Forest Service spokesman Jim Turner said on Monday. A joint statement issued Saturday night by the Santa Barbara County sheriff's office and the...

Dirty bombs are one of the biggest threats to the world's urban populations. Now an American molecular biologist has developed a drug that may protect against the effects of radioactivity. Military officials are thrilled, and the discoverers could make billions. On Friday afternoons, as the Sabbath approaches and the sun hangs low in the sky over the Mediterranean, the Restaurant Turquoise north of Tel Aviv is a carefree oasis. Every seat in the place is taken, and the crowd is in high spirits. Only one patron, Yacov Reizman, seems serious as he glances at a stack of documents -- a...

CNN) -- A U.S. soldier arrested in connection with the killing of a Mexican drug cartel member in El Paso, Texas, allegedly worked as a hit man, court records show. Michael Jackson Apodaca, 18, a soldier based at Fort Bliss, was one of three men arrested Monday in connection with the shooting death of the mid-level drug cartel member, who also worked as a drug informant for the United States, according to a complaint affidavit and local reports. Police identified the other suspects as Ruben Rodriguez Dorado, 30, and Christopher Andrew Duran, 17. The three men each face one count...

We're allowing is you standardize the system, you bring the pre--pre-market principles to the marketing of prescription drugs. It's the only product made in the world where there is actually prohibition from free trade. If you brought free trade and competition and choice, actually the market would work.

Canada has recorded a case of Tamiflu-resistant swine flu virus, in a Quebec man who had been given the drug to prevent infection. Meanwhile, Japan revealed Tuesday it had found a second such case of Tamiflu resistance, in a person who has no ties to the country’s earlier reported case.

Some of the world’s leading pharmaceutical companies are reaping billions of dollars in extra revenue amid global concern about the spread of swine flu. Analysts expect to see a boost in sales from GlaxoSmithKline, Roche and Sanofi-Aventis when the companies report first-half earnings lifted by government contracts for flu vaccines and antiviral medicines.

Researchers from Human Genome Sciences have announced positive test results on their drug Benlysta to treat the debilitating and often deadly disease lupus. Lupus is a complicated spectrum of autoimmune diseases that afflicts an approximated 1.5 million Americans and 5 million people globally, the large majority of them women between age 15 and 45. It gets its name from the Latin word for wolf because, in 1851, a doctor saw a patient with red marks on her face that looked like wolf bites. Lupus has not had a new drug approved to treat it in more than 20 years. Researchers...

Can anyone help? The medicine is called “ANALSIK” and is a combo drug of 2mg diazepam (valium) and 500 mg of methampyrone. I need to know what the last chemical is, what can I take along with it (B12, benadryl, antacids, etc), how often and in what dosage should I take with it, and how do I take it, along with food, empty stomach, milk, water, diet coke or tea, AND what are the side-effects? I live overseas, next to a jungle and doctor care here is sparse. We (the ex-pats here) have to be pro-active in diagnosis and treatment....

Jackson death may have been 'homicide', says police chief MIchael Jackson is reported to have been taking a cocktail of drugs James Bone in New York The Los Angeles police chief has raised the prospect of a homicide charge over the death of Michael Jackson. Homicide does not necessarily mean murder — it could mean a manslaughter charge against a doctor. Jackson, 50, died last month in mysterious circumstances but is reported to have been taking a cocktail of drugs including the potent anaesthetic Diprivan, also known as propofol. Los Angeles police are investigating Jackson’s prescription drug history and have...

The cancer establishment now has a 50-year history of vast corruption, incompetence and organized suppression of cancer therapies which actually work. A little over one year ago, a UK cancer survivor advertised a natural anti-cancer pill along with proven scientific research results via a link into the US Government database for medical research on cancer. Proving to the public of a cover-up he was arrested by the UK Medicines Healthcare Regulatory Authority (MHRA).

The latest verdict from the Food and Drug Administration is that Cheerios is a drug. Parents, then, must be drug pushers. The FDA sent a warning to Cheerios maker General Mills Inc. that it is in serious violation of federal rules. "Based on claims made on your product's label, we have determined that your Cheerios Toasted Whole Grain Oat Cereal is promoted for conditions that cause it to be a drug because the product is intended for use in the prevention, mitigation, and treatment of disease" the FDA letter said. "[Cheerios] may not be legally marketed with the above claims...

Mexico Drug Charges Against 7 Mayors, 20 Officials By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Published: June 19, 2009 MEXICO CITY (AP) -- Mexico levied organized crime and drug charges Thursday against seven mayors, the former state attorney general and 19 other officials in the western state of Michoacan for allegedly aiding a drug cartel. Three other mayors detained in raids across the state May 26 have not been charged, but will continue to be held pending investigations, officials said. The seven mayors are the largest group of Mexican elected officials arrested on drug charges in recent memory. They and the other suspects...

A common virus which causes stomach upsets is giving hope to cancer patients - by boosting their immune system and blasting away tumours. Almost 80 patients with advanced forms of liver cancer, head and neck tumours and breast cancer are taking part in trials using a drug made from the reovirus. A number, who have struggled to benefit from chemotherapy, have seen astonishing results, with tumours shrinking and in one case disappearing altogether. Experts say it is too soon to say if Reolysin is the 'magic bullet' that will kill off cancer, but they believe it may offer a way...

BEAUMONT, TX—U.S. Attorney John M. Bales announced today that seven Southeast Texas men have been sentenced to federal prison for drug violations in the Eastern District of Texas. Four of those sentencing hearings were held today before U.S. District Judge Thad Heartfield. ARTHUR RICHARD GERNON, 42, of Colmesneil, pleaded guilty on Dec. 9, 2008, to possession with intent to distribute methamphetamine and was sentenced today to 18 months in federal prison. STEVEN ELDRIDGE HARVILLE, 50, of Silsbee, pleaded guilty on Dec. 10, 2008, to possession with intent to distribute methamphetamine and was sentenced today to 84 months in federal prison....

Obama's newly nominated "drug czar" is Seattle Police Chief Gil Kerlikowske. And just like a real czar, the drug czar, whose formal title is director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, can destroy rights instantly, and he can set the stage for additional harm. Before the dark days of the Clinton administration, few federal government officials had done more to damage Second Amendment rights than William Bennett, the so-called "drug czar" under President George H.W. Bush. In March 1989, Bennett set off a national panic by pushing the first Bush administration to ban the import of so-called "assault...

DARLINGTON, S.C. — Jeremy Mayfield was suspended indefinitely by NASCAR on Saturday for failing a random drug test, becoming the first driver to violate a toughened new policy that went into effect this season. Mayfield tested positive for a banned substance last weekend at Richmond International Raceway. "In my case, I believe that the combination of a prescribed medicine and an over the counter medicine reacted together and resulted in a positive drug test," Mayfield said in a statement. "My doctor and I are working with both Dr. (David) Black and NASCAR to resolve this matter." Black is the CEO...

Here is a report tonight on Special Report with Bret Baier that says the Department of Homeland Security is preparing a contingency plan for the possible collapse of the Mexican Government. Warring drug cartels have killed thousands in Mexico over the past year, and the Mexican Government seems incapable of bringing the situation under control. Should the government collapse, the United States fears thousands of Mexicans will attempt to flee across the U.S. Border (in addition to the thousands who are already getting in illegally!). What a nightmare scenario the Southern Border could become if the Mexican Government totally collapses....

Below is a message from Delegate Craig Blair. He needs your help to get House Bill 3007, the Random Drug Testing of Welfare, Food Stamps, and Unemployment Recipients Bill, passed... It is with a heavy heart that I must report that Chairperson Carrie Webster believes that there is not enough public support to take up and consider House Bill 3007, the Random Drug Testing of Welfare, Food Stamps and Unemployment Recipients bill. In a recent article, she stated, "her office had not received no calls or e-mails on the issue". In the same article she stated, "If it is really...

The use of teenagers as killers by the drug cartels is common in Mexico, and the kids are known as "narco juniors." Earlier this month CNN reported that Los Zetas, a paramilitary organization that provides enforcement muscle for the Gulf Cartel, has recruited U.S. teenagers as young as 13 years old to carry out its enforcement hits on the north side of the border. NPR now reports that "the cartels have begun seeking younger and younger recruits" as sicaritos or child assassins: Mexican drug cartels recruit children under 18 for the same reasons that armed forces conscript boy soldiers in...

When Vice President Biden later today formally announces the nomination of Seattle Police Chief Gil Kerlikowske as the new Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, he will also be in a way formally downgrading the office from Cabinet-level status to non-Cabinet level status. Interestingly, Biden himself criticized a similar move by then-President George HW Bush in 1989.

FORT HUACHUCA — The Phoenix area has literally become the kidnapping capital of the United States, Arizona’s attorney general said Tuesday. The fight to control illegal immigrant smuggling routes into the United States has seen a lot of one gang of coyotes trying to take another gang’s human treasure, Terry Goddard told a number of federal, state and local law enforcement officials. Drop houses, which is where the gangs hide illegal immigrants smuggled into the country from Mexico, are a lucrative business, and that is why gangs belonging to different cartels try to kidnap people staying in those facilities, Goddard...

A new study finds that a botanical drug could provide the key to new treatments for peanut allergies. The findings are published online in The Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology. Lead author Xiu-Min Li, MD, Associate Professor of Pediatrics and Director of Center for Chinese Herbal Therapy for Allergy and Asthma at Mount Sinai School of Medicine and colleagues found Food Allergy Herbal Formula (FAHF-2) produced long-term protection following treatment against peanut-induced anaphylaxis in mice. FAHF-2 treatment protected peanut allergic mice from anaphylaxis for more than 36 weeks after treatment was discontinued.

The entire crew of a South African Airways flight have been arrested on suspicion of drug smuggling - for the second time in a month. Fifteen members of the flight crew, including the pilot, were detained today at London's Heathrow after customs officers found five kilos of cocaine in a bag.  They were being held by officers after the class A drug, with an estimated street value of £250,000, was discovered as the crew tried to clear customs following a 12-hour flight from Johannesburg. Bob Gaiger, spokesman for HM Revenue and Customs, said the drugs were discovered after the...

Phoenix Now Kidnapping Capital of US Thanks to Mexican Drug Gangs

Mexican drug violence spills over into the US U.S. authorities are reporting a spike in killings, kidnappings and home invasions connected to Mexico's murderous cartels. And to some policymakers' surprise, much of the violence is happening not in towns along the border, where it was assumed the bloodshed would spread, but a considerable distance away, in places such as Phoenix and Atlanta. Investigators fear the violence could erupt elsewhere around the country because the Mexican cartels are believed to have set up drug-dealing operations all over the U.S., in such far-flung places as Anchorage, Alaska; Boston; and Sioux Falls, S.D....

Just as government officials had feared, the drug violence raging in Mexico is spilling over into the United States. U.S. authorities are reporting a spike in killings, kidnappings and home invasions connected to Mexico's murderous cartels. And to some policymakers' surprise, much of the violence is happening not in towns along the border, where it was assumed the bloodshed would spread, but a considerable distance away, in places such as Phoenix and Atlanta. Investigators fear the violence could erupt elsewhere around the country because the Mexican cartels are believed to have set up drug-dealing operations all over the U.S., in...

MUNICH – In an effort to strike at a key income source for Taliban militants, the top NATO commander said Sunday that operations to attack drug lords and labs in Afghanistan will begin within the "next several days." Gen. John Craddock, who also heads the U.S. European Command, also said that the U.S. and its allies are making progress in their efforts to fill the need for more troops, equipment and intelligence gathering in Afghanistan. He, however, would not disclose any specific commitments he got this weekend as world leaders met at a security conference here. NATO defense ministers, during...

Mexico is in danger of a “rapid and sudden collapse” due to criminal gangs and drug cartels, according to a troubling new report by the U.S. Joint Forces Command on worldwide security threats. The report also cites Pakistan as a nation facing possible collapse. “In terms of worse-case scenarios for the Joint Forces and indeed the world, two large and important states bear consideration for a rapid and sudden collapse: Pakistan and Mexico,” the report states. “The Mexican possibility may seem less likely, but the government, its politicians, police and judicial infrastructure are all under sustained assault and pressure by...

BY GUY W. FARMER As I've written before, the escalating and increasingly violent drug wars in Mexico represent a serious national security threat to the United States. And recognizing the proven link between drug trafficking and illegal immigration, we should urge our elected representatives to reject amnesty programs disguised as “comprehensive immigration reform.” Last October I wrote a column quoting local terrorism expert Larry Martines, a former homeland security adviser to Gov. Jim Gibbons, on the connection between illegal immigration and drug trafficking in Northern Nevada and elsewhere throughout the nation. According to Martines, four ultra-violent Mexican drug cartels are...

Virtually all the flu in the United States this season is resistant to the leading antiviral drug Tamiflu, and scientists and health officials are trying to figure out why. The problem is not yet a public health crisis because this has been a below-average flu season so far and the chief strain circulating is still susceptible to other drugs — but infectious disease specialists are worried nonetheless. Last winter, about 11 percent of the throat swabs from patients with the most common type of flu that were sent to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for genetic typing showed...

ROCKVILLE, Md., Jan 9 (Reuters) - The first drug made using genetically engineered animals to near U.S. approval won key support on Friday from an advisory panel that judged it safe and effective despite concerns from groups worried about the genetic tinkering. GTC Biotherapeutics Inc's (GTCB.O) experimental anticlotting therapy, called Atryn, is made using a human protein gathered from female goats bred to produce it in their milk.

This video explains the signs and symptoms of drug or alcohol addiction. For more information see http://qcs-okc.com or http://kctxs.com or call 918-835-3017 in Tulsa, OK or 405-672-3033 in Oklahoma City.

There is real danger that Islamic extremist groups such as al-Qaida and Hezbollah could form alliances with wealthy and powerful Latin American drug lords to launch new terrorist attacks, U.S. officials said Wednesday. Extremist group operatives have already been identified in several Latin American countries, mostly involved in fundraising and finding logistical support. But Charles Allen, chief of intelligence analysis at the Homeland Security Department, said they could use well-established smuggling routes and drug profits to bring people or even weapons of mass destruction to the U.S. "The presence of these people in the region leaves open the possibility that...

Nicholas May Soon Fly on Gulfstream G-IV In a decision which could have wide-ranging implications for US law enforcement at all levels, US District Judge Cormac Carney told prosecutors pursuing drug and investment charges against Broadcom executive Henry T Nichols III that they went too far in seizing his Gulfstream G-IV and threatening to impound it indefinitely.As ANN reported last week, the California businessman asked the court's permission for his family to continue flying the bizjet...The 1993 Gulfstream, registry N2107Z, was seized in a July 16 raid at John Wayne Airport. The FBI asserts Nicholas "...distributed ecstasy, cocaine, methamphetamine and...

WASHINGTON, Oct. 2, 2008 – Legislation imposing tough penalties for operating undocumented semi-submersible vessels in international waters would help drug-interdiction efforts, the deputy chief of the Coast Guard’s Law Enforcement Office said Sept. 30. Self-propelled semi-submersibles, or SPSSs, are small sea vessels, usually less than 100 feet in length, designed to sink themselves when detected, Coast Guard Cmdr. Cameron Naron explained to bloggers in a teleconference. Drug traffickers are adapting the technology with increasing success to evade law enforcement, he said. “Drug-trafficking organizations continue to adapt these vessels … to our law enforcement successes,” Naron said. “These SPSSs were once...

An escalating turf fight between warring drug cartels in Mexico is spreading into the United States with federal officials warning that deadly shootouts and ambushes along the southwestern border pose a serious threat to both U.S. law enforcement and American citizens, according to a confidential multi-agency government report. The Aug. 29 report predicts a rise in the use of "deadly force" against U.S. police officials, first responders and residents along the border, and further spillage of drug-gang violence deeper into the United States. Written by the Arizona Counter Terrorism Information Center (AcTIC) and the High-Intensity Drug Trafficking Area (HIDTA) Investigative...

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Suspected drug hitmen attacked a group of sleeping soldiers with grenades in central Mexico, sparking a battle that killed three gunmen, a state attorney general's office said on Wednesday. Around 15 drug gangsters in vehicles surprised the soldiers while they were camped out in the central state of Guanajuato on Tuesday night, shooting at them with automatic weapons. "Two soldiers were injured in the clash in a firefight that lasted several minutes," a spokesman for the Guanajuato state attorney general's office said.

BAHRAIN (July 15, 2008) — Coalition warships operating in the Gulf region have seized 23 tons of narcotics, which could have been used to fund the insurgency in Afghanistan. The British warships involved were frigates HMS Chatham and HMS Montrose, and the destroyer HMS Edinburgh. They were supported by the Royal Fleet Auxiliary helicopter support ship Argus and her embarked Sea King aircraft.Sailors and Royal Marines from the ships discovered hidden drugs in vessels along the so-called "Hash Highway," and often operated in the most unpleasant of conditions. The narcotics they seized included hashish, opiates, cocaine and amphetamines. "The scourge...

A drug developed using nanotechnology and a fungus that contaminated a lab experiment may be broadly effective against a range of cancers, U.S. researchers reported on Sunday. The drug, called lodamin, was improved in one of the last experiments overseen by Dr. Judah Folkman, a cancer researcher who died in January. Folkman pioneered the idea of angiogenesis therapy -- starving tumors by preventing them from growing blood supplies. (snip) "I had never expected such a strong effect on these aggressive tumor models," she said. The researchers believe lodamin may also be useful in other diseases marked by abnormal blood vessel...

World's biggest drug seizure in Afghanistan By David Blair, Diplomatic Editor Last Updated: 12:38AM BST 12/06/2008 Afghanistan's police claim to have made the largest drugs seizure in history after they discovered hashish worth at least £200 million. Afghan counter narcotics officials uncovered 260 tons of hashish hidden in 6-foot-deep trenches in southern Afghanistan About 260 tons of narcotics were found in trenches and bunkers in Kandahar province in southern Afghanistan. No previous haul comes close to matching this find, which weighed roughly the same as 30 double-decker buses. The previous record was set by Colombia's security forces when they uncovered...

Guatemala plans to send hundreds of troops, elite presidential guards and anti-drug police to its border with Mexico to stem growing drug violence, the government said on Saturday. "The unit should be ready within about 90 days. We are talking about 500 troops" and members of the presidential guard, Interior Ministry spokesman Ricardo Gatica said. Gatica declined to say how many counternarcotics police would be sent to the border, where drug smuggling into southern Mexico, bound for the United States, goes unchallenged. In southern Mexico, suspected drug gunmen dumped a man's head outside a newspaper in Tabasco state on Saturday...

The state’s top drug prosecutor was fired on Friday, hours after reports were published that he was under investigation for possessing child pornography. Assistant Attorney General James Cameron of Hallowell, who worked as the drug prosecution coordinator for the Attorney General’s Office, had been on paid administrative leave for several months, according to one law enforcement source.

snip... James Colomb spent the bulk of his career working in an oil field, then was injured. The family’s sole source of income now is his disability check. Ann Colomb—“Miss Ann” to those who know her—is a homemaker. It was from this unlikely setting, the United States alleged, that Ann Colomb and three of her four sons ran one of the largest crack cocaine operations in Louisiana. Over the course of a decade, prosecutors said, the Colombs bought $15 million in illicit drugs with a street value of more than $70 million... ...But in the ensuing months, the government’s case...