Monday, December 16, 2013
CONTACT ME AT: manessmorrison2@yahoo.com


News Clips For The Day

Judge Becomes Target of Criticism in "Affluenza" Case – NBC
By Greg Janda

Saturday 12/14/13

The judge who handed down a sentence of probation and treatment for a wealthy North Texas teen who killed four pedestrians in a drunken driving wreck is facing public outrage and calls for her removal.

Controversy surrounding the sentence has become focused on the defense's strategy which included testimony that 16-year-old Ethan Couch suffered from "affluenza" -- a diagnosis not recognized by the American Psychiatric Association which refers to an upbringing so privileged that a person is unable to discern right from wrong.

Victim's Family, Attorneys Speak Out After Ethan Couch Sentenced to Probation
Tuesday, Judge Jean Boyd sentenced Couch to 10 years of probation and treatment, possibly to be served at an expensive California rehab facility that would be paid for by the teen's parents. Prosecutors had sought the maximum sentence of 20 years in state custody.

Boyd's decision has led to public calls for her resignation and an online petition on Change.org demanding that Gov. Rick Perry remove Boyd from the bench.
Under current Texas law, the governor can remove a sitting judge from the bench with approval of two-thirds of Texas House and Senate members.

Boyd, who previously announced she is retiring at the end of her term next year, declined to comment on both the sentencing decision and the calls for her removal when contacted by NBC 5.  Boyd said speaking about the situation would be unethical.
The outrage over the sentencing decision is largely linked to the testimony of psychologist Gary Miller, a witness for the defense who said  Ethan Couch suffered from "affluenza," a term suggesting his parents' wealth and privilege taught him there were no consequences for bad behavior.

Related Stories
"Affluenza" Doesn't Excuse Teen in Fatal Crash
"Affluenza" Judge Becomes a Target of Criticism
Victim's Family, Attorneys Speak Out After Ethan Couch Sentenced to Probation
Teen's Sentence in Fatal DWI Crash Sparks Ire
Teen Sentenced in Drunken Crash That Killed Four
Teen Admits Responsibility in Drunken Crash That Killed Four
Teen Charged in Death of Youth Pastor, 3 Others

In addition to the APA, other mental health practitioners believe that diagnosis should not have been used by the defense to justify wrongdoing.
Other critics feel the sentence, and the use of the "affluenza" defense, sends a bad message about personal responsibility.

"I think once you're behind the wheel it doesn't matter where you're from, who you are, how famous you are, how poor, how rich, how anything ... I think when we're given a driver's license, that's a privilege and a part of that privilege has a responsibility," Jeff Miracle, with Mothers Against Drunk Driving, told NBC 5.
Couch's attorneys argue that the judge's sentence will have a significant impact on the convicted teen and his life going forward.

Scott Brown, Couch's lead attorney, said the teen could have been freed after two years if he had drawn the 20-year sentence. Instead, the judge "fashioned a sentence that could have him under the thumb of the justice system for the next 10 years," he told the Star-Telegram.

"And if Ethan doesn't do what he's supposed to do, if he has one misstep at all, then this judge or an adult judge when he's transferred can then incarcerate him in prison," Brown said. "He's taken away from his family, he's taken away from all the things that he's been given."


Affluenza
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Affluenza, a portmanteau of affluence and influenza, is a term used by critics of consumerism. The book Affluenza: The All-Consuming Epidemic defines it as "a painful, contagious, socially transmitted condition of overload, debt, anxiety and waste resulting from the dogged pursuit of more".[1]

A potential criticism of the idea of affluenza is that it presents subjective social critique as an objective, inevitable and debilitating illness.

British psychologist Oliver James asserts that there is a correlation between the increasing nature of affluenza and the resulting increase in material inequality: the more unequal a society, the greater the unhappiness of its citizens. Referring to Vance Packard's thesis The Hidden Persuaders on the manipulative methods used by the advertising industry, James relates the stimulation of artificial needs to the rise in affluenza. To highlight the spread of affluenza in societies with varied levels of inequality, James interviewed people in several cities including Sydney, Singapore, Auckland, Moscow, Shanghai, Copenhagen and New York.

James also believes that higher rates of mental disorders are the consequence of excessive wealth-seeking in consumerist nations.[3] In a graph created from multiple data sources, James plots "Prevalence of any emotional distress" and "Income inequality", attempting to show that English-speaking nations have nearly twice as much emotional distress as mainland Europe and Japan: 21.6 percent vs 11.5 percent.[4] James defines affluenza as 'placing a high value on money, possessions, appearances (physical and social) and fame', and this becomes the rationale behind the increasing mental illness in English-speaking societies. He explains the greater incidence of affluenza as the result of 'selfish capitalism', the market Liberal political governance found in English-speaking nations as compared to the less selfish capitalism pursued in mainland Europe. James asserts that societies can remove the negative consumerist effects by pursuing real needs over perceived wants, and by defining themselves as having value independent of their material possessions.

Clive Hamilton and Richard Denniss' book, Affluenza: When Too Much is Never Enough, poses the question: "If the economy has been doing so well, why are we not becoming happier?" (p vii). They argue that affluenza causes over-consumption, "luxury fever", consumer debt, overwork, waste, and harm to the environment. These pressures lead to "psychological disorders, alienation and distress" (p 179), causing people to "self-medicate with mood-altering drugs and excessive alcohol consumption" (p 180).

As a legal defense[edit]
In December of 2013, State District Judge Jean Boyd sentenced a North Texas teenager, Ethan Couch[6], to 10 years probation for driving while drunk and killing four pedestrians after his attorneys successfully argued that the teen suffered from affluenza and needed rehabilitation, and not prison. The teen was witnessed on surveillance video stealing beer from a store, driving with seven passengers in his Ford F-350, speeding, and had a blood-alcohol content of 0.24. A defense psychologist testified in court that the teen was a product of affluenza and was unable to link his bad behavior with consequences due to his parents teaching him that wealth buys privilege. The rehabilitation facility near Newport Beach, California that the teen will be attending will cost his family $450,000.00 annually.[7][8]


http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2013/12/12/250490841/probation-for-teen-who-killed-4-heres-the-judges-thinking

­ Most of the reports we're seeing focus on the argument from the boy's attorneys that he suffered from "affluennza" — a coddled upbringing during which his wealthy parents have never held him accountable for his actions. The reports have relatively little mention of State District Judge Jean Boyd's reasoning or go into much detail about the conditions of the sentence.

"Boyd ordered the 16-year-old to receive therapy at a long-term, in-patient facility. He will stay in Tarrant County juvenile detention until the juvenile probation department prepares a report about possible treatment programs.

"If the teen violates the terms of his probation, he could be sent to prison for 10 years. ...
"In delivering the sentence, Boyd told the victims' families in the packed courtroom that there was nothing she could do that would lessen their pain. And she told the teen that he, not his parents, is responsible for his actions.

The Star-Telegram adds that "Scott Brown, an attorney who represented the teen with Reagan Wynn, said the teen could have been freed in two years if Boyd had sentenced him to 20 years. 'She fashioned a sentence that could have him under the thumb of the justice system for the next 10 years,' Brown said."


When I started to read this article I was expecting to end up feeling very cynical about the judge's ruling, but as was pointed out in the NPR blog which I posted above, the judge “fashioned a sentence that could have him under the thumb of the justice system for the next 10 years,” and that if he had been sentenced to ten years in prison he would probably be out after two years. All I can say is that the judge could have sentenced him to two years in prison plus 10 years of probation. However, she wanted him to go into the long term treatment for his mental condition, however it was acquired.

Books on Affluenza are mentioned in the articles above, for closer reading. As the term was first used it referred to people who inherit or win large amounts of money and are as a result separated from the life that they had built over the years, such as alienation from old friends and family who wouldn't have money, and removal from their daily habits, for instance going to work and having a feeling of usefulness as a result. They also may feel worried that the money which so suddenly appeared might be taken away, leaving them impoverished again. We adjust to our living conditions and form a life around them as we mature, and removal from that can feel disturbing, like no longer knowing who we are. There is also a feeling of guilt because the money wasn't earned and amassed slowly, and because so many people are still poor.

This case was about something darker, though, the fact that the boy's parents had apparently taught him that the privilege and freedom from consequences that goes along with wealth is legitimately his, and the sentence of the judge seems to acknowledge that line of thinking. This case is the first time such an argument has been used as a defense, according to the NBC article, and as a result is genuinely shocking to the American mind. But this very set of privileges have been firmly in place in human society since the beginning of mankind, and have influenced both juries and judges before, and even the arresting police officers, especially in small town, closed environments like the deep South where one or two prominent families may well get away with all kinds of crimes and still retain their social standing.

Those who doubt it should read The Great Gatsby. It's a great read, and has much to say about an extremely unequal distribution of wealth such as the US and much of the world had in the 1920's. Some think that the disparity between rich and poor is again heading in that direction in the US, with a resultant loss of our Middle Class, who have stabilized our society so far against class warfare. It certainly causes me to worry about our future.




Climate change expert's fraud was 'crime of massive proportion,' say feds – NBC
By Michael Isikoff


The EPA’s highest-paid employee and a leading expert on climate change deserves to go to prison for at least 30 months for lying to his bosses and saying he was a CIA spy working in Pakistan so he could avoid doing his real job, say federal prosecutors.

John C. Beale, who pled guilty in September to bilking the government out of nearly $1 million in salary and other benefits  over a decade, will be sentenced in a Washington, D.C., federal court on Wednesday. In a newly filed sentencing memo, prosecutors said that his “historic” lies are “offensive” to those who actually do dangerous work for the CIA.

Beale’s lawyer, while acknowledging his guilt, has asked for leniency and offered a psychological explanation for the climate expert’s bizarre tales.

“With the help of his therapist,” wrote attorney John Kern, “Mr. Beale has come to recognize that, beyond the motive of greed, his theft and deception were animated by a highly self-destructive and dysfunctional need to engage in excessively reckless, risky behavior.” Kern also said Beale was driven “to manipulate those around him through the fabrication of grandiose narratives … that are fueled by his insecurities.”

The two sentencing memos, along with documents obtained by NBC News, offer new details about what some officials describe as one of the most audacious, and creative, federal frauds they have ever encountered.

When he first began looking into Beale’s deceptions last February, “I thought, ‘Oh my God, How could this possibly have happened in this agency?” said EPA Assistant Inspector General Patrick Sullivan, who spearheaded the Beale probe, in an interview with NBC News. “I’ve worked for the government for 35 years. I’ve never seen a situation like this.”

Beyond Beale’s individual fate, his case raises larger questions about how he was able to get away with his admitted fraud for so long, according to federal and congressional investigators. Two new reports by the EPA inspector general’s office conclude that top officials at the agency “enabled” Beale by failing to verify any of his phony cover stories about CIA work, and failing to check on hundreds of thousands of dollars paid him in undeserved bonuses and travel expenses -- including first-class trips to London where he stayed at five-star hotels and racked up thousands in bills for limos and taxis.

Until he retired in April after learning he was under federal investigation, Beale, an NYU grad with a masters from Princeton, was earning a salary and bonuses of $206,000 a year, making him the highest paid official at the EPA. He earned more money than Gina McCarthy, the agency’s administrator and, for years, his immediate boss, according to agency documents.

In September, Beale, who served as a “senior policy adviser” in the agency’s Office of Air and Radiation, pled guilty to defrauding the U.S. government out of nearly $900,000 since 2000. Beale perpetrated his fraud largely by failing to show up at the EPA for months at a time, including one 18-month stretch starting in June 2011 when he did “absolutely no work,” as Kern, Beale’s lawyer, acknowledged in his court filing.

To explain his long absences, Beale told agency officials -- including McCarthy -- that he was engaged in intelligence work for the CIA, either at agency headquarters or in Pakistan. At one point he claimed to be urgently needed in Pakistan because the Taliban was torturing his CIA replacement, according to Sullivan.
“Due to recent events that you have probably read about, I am in Pakistan,” he wrote McCarthy in a Dec. 18, 2010 email. “Got the call Thurs and left Fri. Hope to be back for Christmas ….Ho, ho, ho.”

In fact, Beale had no relationship with the CIA at all. Sullivan, the EPA investigator, said he confirmed Beale didn’t even have a security clearance. He spent much of the time he was purportedly working for the CIA at his Northern Virginia home riding bikes, doing housework and reading books, or at a vacation house on Cape Cod.

“He’s never been to Langley (the CIA’s Virginia headquarters),” said Sullivan. “The CIA has no record of him ever walking through the door.”
Nor was that Beale’s only deception, according to court documents. In 2008, Beale didn’t show up at the EPA for six months, telling his boss that he was part of a special multi-agency election-year project relating to “candidate security.” He billed the government $57,000 for five trips to California that were made purely “for personal reasons,” his lawyer acknowledged. (His parents lived there.) He also claimed to be suffering from malaria that he got while serving in Vietnam. According to his lawyer’s filing, he didn’t have malaria and never served in Vietnam. He told the story to EPA officials so he could get special handicap parking at a garage near EPA headquarters.

When first questioned by EPA officials early this year about his alleged CIA undercover work, Beale brushed them aside by saying he couldn’t discuss it, according to Sullivan. Weeks later, after being confronted again by investigators, Beale acknowledging the truth but “didn’t show much remorse,” Sullivan said. The explanation he offered for his false CIA story? “He wanted to puff up his own image,” said Sullivan.

Even at that point, prosecutors say, Beale sought to “cover his tracks.’” He told a few close colleagues at EPA that he would plead guilty “to take one for the team,” suggesting that he was willing to go to jail to protect people at the CIA. This has led some EPA officials to continue to believe that Beale actually does have a connection to the CIA, Sullivan said.

Kern, Beale’s lawyer, declined to comment to NBC News. But in his court filing, he asks Judge Ellen Huvelle, who is due to sentence Beale Wednesday, to balance Beale’s misdeeds against years of admirable work for the government. These include helping to rewrite the Clean Air Act in 1990, heading up EPA delegations to United Nations conferences on climate change in 2000 and 2001, and helping to negotiate agreements to reduce carbon emissions with China, India and other nations.

Two congressional committees are now pressing the EPA, including administrator McCarthy, for answers on the handling of Beale’s case. The new inspector general’s reports fault the agency for a lack of internal controls and policies that allegedly facilitated Beale’s deceptions.

For example, one of the reports states, Beale took 33 airplane trips between 2003 and 2011, costing the government $266,190. On 70 percent of those, he travelled first class and stayed at high end hotels, charging more than twice the government’s allowed per diem limit. But his expense vouchers were routinely approved by another EPA official, a colleague of Beale’s, whose conduct is now being reviewed by the inspector general, according to congressional investigators briefed on the report.
Beale was caught when he “retired” very publicly but kept drawing his large salary for another year and a half. Top EPA officials, including McCarthy, attended a September 2011 retirement party for Beale and two colleagues aboard a Potomac yacht. Six months later, McCarthy learned he was still on the payroll

In a March 29, 2012 email, she wrote, “I thought he had already retired. She then initiated a review that was forwarded to the EPA general counsel’s office . But the inspector general’s office was not alerted until February 2013 and he didn't actually retire until April.

Sullivan said he doubted Beale’s fraud could occur at any federal agency other than the EPA. “There’s a certain culture here at the EPA where the mission is the most important thing,” he said. “They don’t think like criminal investigators. They tend to be very trusting and accepting.”

In a statement to NBC News, Alisha Johnson, McCarthy’s press secretary, said that Beale’s fraud was "uncovered" by McCarthy while she was head of the Office of Air and Radiation. “[Beale] is a convicted felon who went to great lengths to deceive and defraud the U.S. government over the span of more than a decade,” said Johnson. “EPA has worked in coordination with its inspector general and the U.S. Attorney's office. The Agency has [put] in place additional safeguards to help protect against fraud and abuse related to employee time and attendance, including strengthening supervisory controls of time and attendance, improved review of employee travel and a tightened retention incentive processes.”


This article is so extreme that it's actually funny. I wonder, though, what the other employees at EPA are doing. There may be a major scandal if they start investigating the management there in other ways and find eve more abuses. It's a prime example of waste in the Federal government, and I think is probably a drop in the bucket around the government departments. The military has been shown to be very wasteful also more than once. This is one problem with having a government that is so large in scope – minor details like phantom employees get ignored. The Republicans don't do any better than the Democrats about such problems. Beale's activities started in 2003 and were not caught until he retired and kept on collecting his salary.





­ Another Partisan Divide: Mitt Romney's Looks – NPR
by Adam Wollner

­ Mitt Romney speaks at the Conservative Political Action Conference on March 15. New research suggests Democrats and Republicans had different perceptions of his physical appearance during the 2012 election.

It's clear that Republicans and Democrats had different political opinions about Mitt Romney. But did Romney literally look different to the two sides? A forthcoming study suggests that might be the case.

According to new research from Ohio State University psychologists, individual political biases might have caused 2012 GOP presidential nominee's physical appearance to appear different to Republicans and Democrats.

Here's how the study worked: Researchers brought in 148 undergraduate students and asked them about their views of Romney and President Obama, how likely they were to vote in the election (or if they had already voted) and to rate themselves as a Democrat or a Republican, and as a liberal or conservative.

Then the students were directed to compare 450 pairs of slightly different images of Romney's face and asked to select the one in each pair that they thought looked the most like him. (The participants were plenty familiar with Romney; the study was conducted over the course of several weeks in November 2012, both in the days just before the presidential election and in the immediate aftermath.)
­
Once the photos were selected, researchers created two sets of composite photos of Romney's face — one based on the choices of the GOP-leaning participants, and another based on the Democratic-leaning participants.

When a separate group of 213 adults were asked which images of Romney looked more trustworthy and more positive, overall they chose the ones generated by the Republicans.

"That our attitudes could bias something that we're exposed to so frequently is an amazing biasing effect," said Ohio State University psychology professor Russell Fazio, the senior author of the study, in a release. "It suggests that people may not just interpret political information about a candidate to fit their opinion, but that they may construct a political world in which they literally see candidates differently."

The full report, Political Attitudes Bias the Mental Representation of a Presidential Candidate's Face, will soon be published in the academic journal Psychological Science.


Psychological experiments are often very interesting, and this is no exception. I am a Democrat and I didn't vote for him, but I have always thought Romney is a handsome and clean-cut looking man. He may look a little smug compared to Obama, but he mainly knows the art of having a nice smile in political persuasion. When he gave his reason for courting the rich instead of the poor, however, he said that the Republicans can never win over the poor, so he is not ignorant of the main issues dividing the parties, and accepts his side's involvement in the debate without guilt. He, to me, is clever enough to keep from showing his feelings, but in reality has little sympathy with the underprivileged.



­

How Plastic In The Ocean Is Contaminating Your Seafood – NPR
by Eliza Barclay
­
We've long known that the fish we eat are exposed to toxic chemicals in the rivers, bays and oceans they inhabit. The substance that's gotten the most attention — because it has shown up at disturbingly high levels in some fish — is mercury.

But mercury is just one of a slew of synthetic and organic pollutants that fish can ingest and absorb into their tissue. Sometimes it's because we're dumping chemicals right into the ocean. But as a study published recently in Nature, Scientific Reports helps illuminate, sometimes fish get chemicals from the plastic debris they ingest.
"The ocean is basically a toilet bowl for all of our chemical pollutants and waste in general," says Chelsea Rochman, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of California, Davis, who authored the study. "Eventually, we start to see those contaminants high up in the food chain, in seafood and wildlife."

For many years, scientists have known that chemicals will move up the food chain as predators absorb the chemicals consumed by their prey. That's why the biggest, fattiest fish, like tuna and swordfish, tend to have the highest levels of mercury, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and other dioxins. (And that's concerning, given that canned tuna was the second most popular fish consumed in the U.S. in 2012, according to the National Fisheries Institute.)

What scientists didn't know was exactly what role plastics played in transferring these chemicals into the food chain. To find out, Rochman and her co-authors fed medaka, a fish species often used in experiments, three different diets.
One group of medaka got regular fish food, one group got a diet that was 10 percent "clean" plastic (with no pollutants) and a third group got a diet with 10 percent plastic that had been soaking in the San Diego Bay for several months. When they tested the fish two months later, they found that the ones on the marine plastic diet had much higher levels of persistent organic pollutants.

"Plastics — when they end up in the ocean — are a sponge for chemicals already out there," says Rochman. "We found that when the plastic interacts with the juices in the [fish's] stomach, the chemicals come off of plastic and are transferred into the bloodstream or tissue." The fish on the marine plastic diet were also more likely to have tumors and liver problems.

While it's impossible to know whether any given fish you buy at the seafood counter has consumed this much plastic, Rochman's findings do have implications for human health, she notes. "A lot of people are eating seafood all the time, and fish are eating plastic all the time, so I think that's a problem."

And there's a lot of plastic out there in the open ocean. As Edward Humes, author of Garbology, told Fresh Air's Terry Gross in 2012, the weight of plastic finding its way into the sea each year is estimated to be equivalent to the weight of 40 aircraft carriers.

Consider the five massive gyres of trash particles swirling around in the Indian, Atlantic and Pacific oceans alone. Those gyres, Hume told Gross, contain "plastic that has been weathered and broken down by the elements into these little bits, and it's getting into the food chain."

One of those gyres is the infamous Great Pacific Garbage Patch. Fish could encounter the plastic in those gyres, but also much closer to shore, says Rochman.
Even so, the consensus in the public health community still seems to be that the benefits of eating fish — because of their omega-3 fatty acids, among other assets — exceed the potential risks. And many researchers advocating for Americans to increase their fish consumption argue that the levels of dioxins, PCBs and other toxic chemicals in fish are generally too low to be of concern.

The Environmental Protection Agency does put out advisories to warn consumers when fish get contaminated with chemicals in local U.S. waters. But a lot of our seafood now comes from foreign waters, which the EPA does not monitor. Just a tiny fraction of imported fish get tested for contaminants.

As for Rochman, she says her research in marine toxicology has persuaded her to eat seafood no more than twice per week. And she now avoids swordfish altogether.


I don't like fish enough to eat very much of it, but I do eat sardines in olive oil and smoked oysters. In a seafood restaurant I eat shellfish and calamari or shrimp and lobster. Fresh salmon baked with herbs tastes very good to me, but it is usually expensive, so I don't often get it. Besides, salmon are endangered, or were, so I wouldn't like to see a whole species die out.

These five gyres that are in the oceans are news to me. I had seen one gyre – only one – on a cable television documentary about the plastic in the ocean. That was around ten years ago. There is a huge amount of plastic that has washed down into the ocean, and as it breaks up into small particles the little fish are eating it and, I understand, some die of starvation as a result, because plastic has no food value, but fills up their stomach. That's sad. That's like the polar bears which are beginning to starve now as the North Pole sea ice melts and they can no longer hunt seals. This news article is not uplifting and happy. It's one more story about our environment being overwhelmed by human-caused damage.




Ga. student suspended for year after hugging teacher – CBS

DULUTH, Ga. - A high school senior won't graduate on time after being suspended for one year for hugging a teacher.

CBS Affiliate WGCL reports that a hearing officer at Duluth High School found that the boy violated the Gwinnett County Public Schools' rules on sexual harassment.
Surveillance camera video captured Sam McNair, 17, entering a room, placing his arms around the back and front of the teacher and tucking his head behind her neck.
The teacher alleged in a discipline report that McNair's cheeks and lips touched the back of her neck and cheek, according to WGCL.

The 17-year-old denied he sexually harassed his teacher or that he kissed her. He said he has hugged his teachers many times before, including this one, and has never been warned about doing so. WGCL reports McNair has previous suspensions, but none for sexual harassment.

However, the teacher alleged in the discipline report that she warned McNair about giving teachers hugs and that they were inappropriate, the station reported.
The boy's mother, April McNair, was shocked when the district told her that her son was suspended for giving a hug. She told WGCL that the district should have notified her prior to taking any action that could jeopardize his college plans.

"He's a senior," April McNair said. "He plays football, getting ready for lacrosse. And you're stripping him of even getting a full scholarship for athletics for college."

A spokesperson for Gwinnet County Public Schools would not comment on the case specifically, but said in a statement that "hearing officers consider witness testimony, a review of the known facts, and a student's past disciplinary history . . . when determining consequences."

Sam McNair (who says he and his mom are both huggers) told WGCL's Jeff Chirico he does not think that he should be punished for a hug. "You never know what someone's going through. I hug might help. But in this case it hurt, right?"

A district spokesperson couldn't comment on the case but says parents can appeal the decision to the school board.


This article is a little distressing to me because I understand “huggers,” who have warm rushes of good feeling toward their friends and can only express it by a hug. A co-worker of mine on my last job brought me his key to the office and, our business transacted, surprised me with a hug. I was grateful and it made me happy.

I can see how a teacher may feel that a “proper distance” must be maintained as a part of the respect of her position. I can also see how she would be made afraid if “his lips and cheek touched the back of her neck.” That was one step beyond a warm, friendly hug.

I wish our society were more open in general about feelings, however. I prefer being around people who may occasionally hug me. It restores some part of me that was starved when I was a girl. We had a loving family at base, but the hugging and praise were rare and the arguments were commonplace. I grew up a little distant as a result. I have changed in my adult years to be more enthusiastic and open. I am going to continue to hug people.




Marijuana linked to brain-related memory woes, schizophrenia risk in teens – CBS
ByRyan Jaslow

Marijuana use may harm teens' brains, new research suggests.
Researchers have found structural changes related to memory in former pot smokers who were in their young 20s but used during their teenage years. The changes look similar to what schizophrenia does to the brain, according to the study, published Dec. 16 in Schizophrenia Bulletin.

"The study links the chronic use of marijuana to these concerning brain abnormalities that appear to last for at least a few years after people stop using it," lead study author Matthew Smith, an assistant research professor in psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, said in a statement.
With more states legalizing or decriminalizing marijuana, Smith says more brain studies are essential.

Marijuana is the most commonly-used illicit drug in the U.S. The U.S. government considers it illegal, but two states, Colorado and Washington, legalized recreational use following Nov. 2012 elections. An estimated 7.3 percent of Americans older than 12 use marijuana, and more than 7.6 million people use it daily. Roughly 6.5 percent of all high school seniors smoke marijuana daily, up from 5.1 percent five years ago.
 
Medical marijuana: What does science say?
More states are legalizing medical marijuana but Dr. Margaret Haney, director of the Marijuana Research Laboratory at Columbia University, tells ...
Experts also argue marijuana can be addictive for about 10 percent of users.
But,are the young putting their brains at harm by smoking? To find out, researchers recruited 10 young adults who smoked pot daily when they were 16 and 17 but had quit at least two years earlier, and compared them to 15 people with schizophrenia who had smoked, 28 people with schizophrenia who had never used drugs, and 44 healthy control subjects.

They found changes in gray matter areas of the brain associated with working memory, which is the ability to process information and transfer it to long-term memory, if needed. Gray matter is rich in neurons (nerve cells) and plays a role in routing signals to areas responsible for numerous functions like memory and movement. 
Researchers saw memory-related structures of the brain, including the thalamus, stratum and globus pallidus, appeared to shrink and collapse inward, which may be a result of a decrease in neurons. They say their study is different because previous pot studies focus on the outer layer called the cortex, but this study looks deeper in the brain at "subcortical" regions.

The younger the participants were when they started smoking pot chronically, the more abnormal the shape of the brain regions. That suggests that regions related to memory may be more susceptible to pot’s effects if abuse starts at an earlier age, according to the researchers.

They concede their study only looked at one point in time, so more research is needed to track brain development in young adults who use marijuana.
A closer look at the 15 pot-smokers with schizophrenia found 90 percent of them smoked heavily before they developed the mental health disorder. They also had more deterioration in the thalamus, which also controls for motivation along with memory. Other research has shown that this area is typically impaired in people with schizophrenia.

While previous studies have linked schizophrenia to pot use, the researchers said, “this paper is among the first to reveal that the use of marijuana may contribute to the changes in brain structure that have been associated with having schizophrenia."
 
Marijuana like you've never seen it before
What's next for medical marijuana? Hint: it doesn't involve a match, pipe or rolling papers. Some of it doesn't even get you high
 "If someone has a family history of schizophrenia, they are increasing their risk of developing schizophrenia if they abuse marijuana,” the researchers explained.
One expert disagreed with that statement.

"I thought that was a little bit of a jump," Dr. Scott Krakower, assistant unit chief of psychiatry at Zucker Hillside Hospital in Glen Oaks, N.Y., told HealthDay. "We know people with schizophrenia use marijuana. It's going to be very hard to say that someone has schizophrenia because they used marijuana. That's going to be hard to prove."

Previous research has tied to marijuana use in teens to IQ drops, but that link has been challenged by subsequent studies.
"Future research needs to be done to verify the implications of marijuana use on the ... structure of the brain," said Krakower. "It needs to be studied in a group of people over a period of time."


Like so many college aged young people in the late 1960's, I smoked marijuana for a short period of time with friends. It didn't seem to do me any great harm, but I did notice that its effect is at least slightly hallucinogenic, and schizophrenics do have hallucinations.

I do strongly question medicinal use of it unless scientists can eliminate the euphoria and hallucinations. Even more do I object to the legalization of it, as that marijuana would not be chemically changed to make it safer. I can see the “decriminalization” of it, since so many young people are put in jail or prison simply for possessing or using a small amount of it. I think we should be mandating mental health treatment for them instead.