A former Microsoft manager who is acquiring chains of medical marijuana dispensaries announced his plans for a major national, and eventually international, brand at a press conference this week. Jamen Shively’s claims of establishing international trade on marijuana might have seemed a pipe dream, if not for the fact that Shively’s special guest was former Mexican President Vicente Fox.

Fox blasted United States prohibition as imposing an “unbearable” cost on Mexico. “Too high for Mexico, Latin America and the rest of the world,” he said. “The impact in the economy, on income, on tourism investment, loss of talent, and above all, loss of hope, and 80,000 kids dead in the last six years. All this because our neighbor to the north represents such a gigantic consumer market.”

Shively, who now owns the marijuana brand Diego Pellicer, lamented that the world has turned what Carl Sagan called a plant for “serenity and insight, sensitivity, and fellowship,” into “a tool for violence,” exploited by organized crime.

Both men served, in part, as powerful spokespeople for the harms of prohibition. But woven in with their outrage over the drug war was announcement of a national, and eventually international, marijuana business with plans to acquire several sets of dispensaries that reads like a list of keywords to trigger the most virulent federal crackdown. Shively said:

What remains to be done is to safely and systematically dismantle the wall of prohibition and replace it with a system of laws, international agreements, regulations and standards to ensure a prosperous and above all else, safe cannabis industry. We are moving forward. The states of Washington and Colorado are leading the way.

We have waited long enough for some sort of a “green light” from Washington, D.C. telling us that it is ok to proceed. In fact, the silence from our nation’s capitol has been deafening. We are moving forward with our plans to build a national, and eventually international network of cannabis businesses, spanning the production, processing, distribution and retail of cannabis and cannabis-based products. Our network will span both the medical and the social use cannabis markets. […]

With these acquisitions, along with other acquisitions in the works from California to Washington, we are creating the first national brand of retail cannabis.

The phrases “national,” “international,” along with Shively’s stated intent to “move forward” after having “waited long enough” for the green light are almost designed to elicit the federal government’s wrath, so long as marijuana remains federally illegal under the Controlled Substances Act. While the U.S. Supreme Court has made clear that the federal government has the authority to regulate and enforce the marijuana market whether or not it crosses state lines, the purpose of national regulation under the Constitution’s Commerce Clause is to address the interstate flow of these products. And where that flow is open, explicit, and widespread, it is particularly unlikely that federal officials will look the other way, particularly since they have prosecuted medical marijuana businesses for much, much less. Reports on conversations between state officials and U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder have emphasized that the Department of Justice is most concerned that marijuana produced in states that have legalized it will flow to other states where it is not legal.

The benefit of the two state ballot initiatives on recreational marijuana is that they allow for a measured experiment into heavily regulated legalization as an alternative to the failed War on Drugs. What Shively is proposing takes a premature leap that makes even the drafter of Washington state’s new recreational marijuana law uncomfortable, and is likely to make him a federal target. With the political capital of an exasperated Latin American leader by his side and an intractable national political climate, perhaps that’s what is he gunning for.

More than ten years ago, in March of 2003, American-led forces began their invasion of Iraq. Since then, 4,409 American service members died in the Iraq War.

The Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, by contrast, occurred less than six months ago. As of this writing, according to data published by Slate, 4,539 people have been killed by guns in the United States.

Miami-Dade Police allegedly handcuffed and choked a 14 year old boy while he was carrying a newborn puppy for giving them a “dehumanizing” stare. A court case over the incident will begin on July 16th.

Tremaine McMillian was, by his account, playing on a beach with a friend and his puppy on the Miami boardwalk when police came over to tell them to stop “roughousing.” Though the police later admitted the boys’ activity was neither criminal nor violent, they asked the boys where their parents were. McMillian directed the officers to his nearby mother, and that’s where the family and the police’s story diverge.

McMillian and his mother, Maurissa Holmes, say the police chased down McMillian on ATVs and attacked him essentially without provocation. “The police officers were on their ATVs, and my son was walking,” Holmes said. “They jumped off their ATVs, grabbed him and slammed him to the ground.”

The police, by contrast, claim that McMillian gave them “‘dehumanizing stares,’ clenched his fists and appeared threatening.” According to Miami-Dade Police Detective Alvaro Zabaleta, that’s evidence that McMillian posed a potential threat and needed to be subdued. “All of that body language alone is already letting the officers know that this is a person that is now obviously getting agitated and can become violent.” A police report also says that McMillian at one point “attempted to pull his arm away, stating, ‘Man, don’t touch me like I did something.’”

McMillian maintains that he could not have balled up his fists, as he was holding both the puppy and its millk bottle. The puppy’s paw was evidently injured during the incident.

The one thing that’s not in dispute, as it was captured on video, is the aftermath. The officers held McMillian down while one of them put him in a headlock:

“He started choking me, and as he was choking me, I urinated on myself because I couldn’t breathe,” McMillian said.

A Democratic senator who voted against key legislation expanding background checks has a new ad defending this unpopular vote, but his ad understates the impact of the bill he voted against and suggests that Arkansans are far less supportive of ensuring guns do not get into the hands of criminals than they actually are.

Last week, Mayors Against Illegal Guns, a group co-founded by New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, launched an ad campaign criticizing Sen. Mark Pryor (D-AR) for his vote against expanding background checks for gun purchases. Pryor voted against an expanded background checks provision championed by Sens. Joe Manchin (D-WV) and Pat Toomey (R-PA). Instead, he voted for an NRA-backed plan that would have actually weakened gun laws in many respects, such as by making it easier to buy and transport guns across state lines.

Today, Pryor hit the airwaves with his rebuttal to Bloomberg’s ads:

PRYOR: The mayor of New York City is running ads against me because I oppose President Obama’s gun control legislation. Nothing in the Obama plan would have prevented tragedies like Newtown, Aurora, Tuscon or even Jonesboro. I’m committed to finding real solutions to gun violence while protecting our Second Amendment rights. I’m Mark Pryor, and I approved this message because no one from New York or Washington tells me what to do. I listen to Arkansas.

Watch it:

It is simply not true that the background check legislation Pryor voted against will not prevent tragedies resulting from gun violence. In 2007, Missouri repealed its “permit-to-purchase” law, which required gun purchasers to submit to background checks conducted by county sheriffs. In the three years following repeal, the gun homicide rate spiked 25 percent in Missouri. If background checks had been expanded on a national level, as the bill Pryor opposed would have done, it is likely that such a national reform would be even more effective in reducing gun violence than Missouri’s law was, because criminals frequently take advantage of lax gun laws in other states to evade stricter laws where they reside.

Additionally, although Pryor suggests that he decided to vote against expanded background checks because he was acting according to his constituents’ wishes, recent polling data indicates that Arkansans would prefer for him to reverse course. According to a poll released Wednesday, 60 percent of Arkansas voters support “requiring background checks for all gun sales, including gun shows and the internet.” Significantly, a plurality also said that they would be more likely to vote for Pryor next year if he voted for expanded background checks.

Hundreds of New Yorkers rallied in Albany on Wednesday to urge the New York Senate to enact campaign finance reform legislation, including public financing for state candidates. But while the State Assembly has already passed a reform bill, the Senate’s governing coalition has yet to bring forward a bill with less than a month left in session.

Though Democrats outnumber Republicans in the 63-member New York State Senate, the body is controlled by a coalition of Republicans and the five-member Independent Democrat Conference (IDC). Under their power-sharing agreement, the Republican and IDC leaders jointly decide what legislation comes to the floor.

A stunning number of New York State Senators have, in recent years, been charged with ethical violations. While both the Democratic conference and the IDC have proposed comprehensive campaign finance reform bills, the Republicans have thus far opposed any such efforts. Earlier this month, Republican Leader Dean Skelos actually called the proposals “a recipe for political corruption.”

Charlie Albanetti, communications director for Citizen Action of New York, told ThinkProgress, “The IDC made a commitment when they broke away that they’d use this opportunity to make sure progressive legislation is passed. The Assembly has passed legislation, it’s on the IDC and Republicans to do what the majority of New Yorkers indicated they want and they deserve.”

Sen. Mitch McConnell’s (R-KY) reelection campaign released a selectively edited ad on Thursday, linking President Obama to former president Richard Nixon over recent revelations that the Internal Revenue Service had inappropriately scrutinized conservative non-profits’ tax status.

The ominous ad begins with standard campaign fare, splicing McConnell’s past speeches with the current scandal. In the last third of the video, however, McConnell has heavily doctored statements by IRS officials and a presidential aide to make them seem unrepentant. One clip shows former IRS commissioner Stephen Miller responding to the question, “Do you believe it is illegal?” with “I don’t believe it is.” Immediately afterward, Nixon, infamous for spying on his opponents in the Watergate scandal, makes a guest appearance, saying, “When the president does it, that means it is not illegal.”

However, as the Washington Post’s Glen Kessler points out, Miller then went on to denounce his agency’s actions. Similarly, White House aide Dan Pfeiffer’s statement that the IRS did not break the law but still committed “outrageous and inexcusable” activity that needed to be fixed was boiled down to “The law is irrelevant.” Meanwhile, sinister banners ask: “What are they hiding?”

Finally, Obama’s voice says, “We’re going to punish our enemies and we’re going to reward our friends” — a quote from a 2010 speech to encourage Latino get out the vote efforts. Obama has repeatedly said he was not aware of the IRS activity, and there is no evidence connecting him to it. In a fiery press conference earlier this month, he blasted the IRS probe as “inexcusable” and “outrageous.”

Watch it:

The ad follows in the same vein of other Republican efforts to tie Obama to the IRS scandal. McConnell’s colleague Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) compared the IRS to the Soviet Union’s KGB, and falsely claimed that there was written proof that Obama was deliberately targeting his political opponents.

Going into his campaign, McConnell stands as the most unpopular senator in the country, with just 36 percent approving and 54 percent disapproving of his work. Even defiantly liberal actress Ashley Judd trailed McConnell in Kentuckians’ esteem by just 4 points before she ultimately decided not to run.

On Wednesday, the Louisiana House Education Committee voted against repealing a creationism law that has been around since 1981, even though the Supreme Court struck it down in 1987.

The committee voted to remove an amendment that would have repealed the Balanced Treatment for Creation Science and Evolution Science Act, which mandates that teachers give creationism and evolution equal weight in the classroom.

One reason lawmakers have not repealed it is because they hope the Supreme Court decision will be overturned someday, according to Josh Rosenau of the National Center for Science Education in an interview with Raw Story:

This vote is a reminder that recent battles over the misnamed Louisiana Science Education Act, and dozens of similar laws introduced across the country, are part of a larger and longer battle. Today’s efforts may be less overtly religious, but only because that’s the strategy necessary to evade court scrutiny. If today’s advocates of intelligent design and ‘critical analysis of evolution’ had their druthers, they’d be passing ’80s-style equal time laws, or the sorts of outright bans on teaching evolution which brought us 1925′s Scopes trial.

The 7-2 Supreme Court decision in Edwards v. Aguillard was decisive. “The preeminent purpose of the Louisiana Legislature was clearly to advance the religious viewpoint that a supernatural being created humankind,” the Supreme Court noted. Using careful language to avoid explicit mention of religion does not change that Louisiana is violating the separation of church and state.

While Louisiana refuses to repeal its unconstitutional law, it also killed a repeal earlier this month of the 2008 Science Education Act that permits public school teachers to use supplemental class materials that advance creationism.