Mexican military losing support for drug war by Dan Keane FROM The Arizona Republic

OJINAGA, Mexico - This hardscrabble Mexican border town welcomed 400 soldiers when they arrived four months ago to stop a wave of drug violence that brought daytime gunbattles to its main street.

But then the soldiers themselves turned violent, townspeople say, ransacking homes and even torturing people.

The frustration boiled over last week. More than 1,000 people marched through the streets carrying signs begging President Felipe Calderón for protection from his own troops.

Time to Regulate Big Tobacco FROM The New York Times

The House of Representatives is poised to vote next week on a pioneering bill that would give the Food and Drug Administration its first real power to regulate tobacco products, much as it now regulates food, drugs and medical devices. This is a critically important bill, the culmination of more than a decade of struggle to bring the renegade tobacco industry under regulatory control.

Office Pools: a Safe Bet? by Marie Leone FROM CFO.com

Reportedly, a few years ago, the FBI calculated that in aggregate, office pools hit the $2.5 billion mark. But for the most part, single-pool proceeds are relatively small potatoes, ranging anywhere from $200 to a few thousand dollars. So, companies that look the other way when employees run pools really don't run a big risk of being the target of a federal or state criminal investigation, says Steve Miller, a labor employment partner in the Chicago office of Fisher & Phillips.

Still, Miller says there are some risks related to betting pools that management should understand. To start, under state penal codes, sports gambling is illegal. And even in states that allow casino and racetrack betting, for example, running a gambling operation without a license is a violation of the code. As a result, some companies specifically prohibit office pools that involve money, and issue written corporate policies to that effect. That could be a good idea even if a company has no intention of prohibiting pools, just so it has something to point to if the game somehow gets out of control.

Pot vending machines take root in Los Angeles

FROM msnbc

LOS ANGELES - The city that popularized the fast food drive-thru has a new innovation: 24-hour medical marijuana vending machines.

Patients suffering from chronic pain, loss of appetite and other ailments that marijuana is said to alleviate can get their pot with a dose of convenience at the Herbal Nutrition Center, where a large machine will dole out the drug around the clock.

And. . .

Marijuana use is illegal under federal law, which does not recognize the medical marijuana laws in California and 11 other states.

60 Minutes: California's medical marijuana system in 'chaos'

FROM The Raw Story by Mike Aivaz and Muriel Kane

California's Proposition 215 legalized medical marijuana in that state 11 years ago as a treatment for pain, the side-effects of chemotherapy, and other ailments. However, the federal government still views all marijuana use as illegal, and the Supreme Court has upheld the federal Drug Enforcement Agency's right to go after dispensaries, no matter what state laws allow.

Surprisingly some Taiwanese think marijuana possession is legal in the US. It's NOT!

CBS's 60 Minutes is one of the most popular and longest running television news shows in the US.

Gamblers Die Broke, from Steve Leslie

When anyone talks about the greatest poker players of all time, Stu Ungar's name will surface immediately. If it doesn't, it should. His accomplishments in poker are legend. He is considered by many to be the greatest No Limit Hold'em player of all time.

He is a three-time World Series of Poker Champion winning his first championship at the age of 24 in 1980. He repeated as champion the next year and again in 1997 after essentially disappearing from the game for seven years, the last time he competed. Out of 30 major poker events he won 10 of them.

As great as he was in poker, he was better at Gin Rummy. Gin, at one time, was The Game that high stakes gamblers played. He started playing gin in New York moved to Miami and ultimately to Las Vegas. He was so good at the game, that eventually no one would play him.

He was virtually barred from playing blackjack anywhere forcing casinos to eliminate single deck blackjack, as he had a genius IQ and a photographic memory. He could count down multiple decks of cards a feat he would replicate upon demand or for a wager.

He never held a real job. From the age of 14 his was a life of high stakes cards and games of chance. He would gamble on anything and lived for the action. It was not uncommon for him to win a million dollars in cards and lose a million shooting dice.

On the surface, his was a marvelous life, a seductive life one of gambling, action and living. Some will suggest that he made over $30 million playing poker. There was virtually nothing he could not do at a poker table and seeing him at a final table, others resigned themselves to picking up the "left over change".

Unfortunately, there is not a happy ending to this story. After 20 years of leading a storied life of incredible ups and downs of fantastic swings in capital, it all came to a crashing halt in a cheap downtown Las Vegas motel. On November 22nd, 1998 Stu Ungar was found dead and broke. The coroner's report revealed a combination of cocaine, methadone and percodan caused a massive heart attack. All at the age of 42. What a complete waste of a life. Possibly the greatest natural card talent ever completely destroyed before middle age. Imagine what could have been. Where all that talent could have taken him. He could have traveled the world, done incredible things, could have had a life that but a small percentage can only dream of.

I tell this story because it is humbling and to illustrate that the battle in life is ultimately waged not on a card table, or on a quote machine or a trading floor, but within ourselves and within our minds. It is the balanced one, the one who keeps an even keel and a steady approach to life who becomes the victor instead of the victim the living and not a weak faded memory.