Daily Archives: May 29, 2021

Mike Tyson says psychedelics saved his life, now he hopes they can change the world – Reuters

Posted: May 29, 2021 at 4:57 am

During his reign as heavyweight champion of the world, no one was more feared than Mike Tyson, who obliterated opponents with ruthless efficiency.

But all the while, the troubled superstar was at war with himself, battling an abusive voice in his battered head that led "Iron Mike" to the brink of suicide.

He said that all changed when he began taking psilocybin mushrooms, more commonly known as "magic mushrooms," and other similar consciousness-altering substances.

Now the boxing prodigy from Brooklyn is experiencing a career renaissance that he said is the result of psilocybin-powered mental and spiritual exploration.

"Everyone thought I was crazy, I bit this guy's ear off," an upbeat Tyson told Reuters, referring to his infamous 1997 fight against Evander Holyfield.

"I did all this stuff, and once I got introduced to the shrooms ... my whole life changed."

To be sure, many people have had negative experiences with psilocybin, which can cause disturbing hallucinations, anxiety and panic. Medical professionals studying them warn against self-medicating or using them outside of an approved medical framework.

But Tyson, who turns 55 next month, and impressed in his November exhibition bout against Roy Jones Jr, said he has never felt better.

"It's scary to even say that," said Tyson, who is also a cannabis entrepreneur and podcast host.

"To think where I was - almost suicidal - to this now. Isn't life a trip, man? It's amazing medicine, and people don't look at it from that perspective."

"I AM CURED"

Humans have been ingesting psychedelics since the earliest days and as stigmas slowly dissolve, it is beginning to be taken seriously as a psychiatric medicine.

There is still much to learn.

Enter former NHL enforcer Daniel Carcillo, who was nicknamed "Car Bomb" for his violent approach to the sport.

After 164 fights, thousands of hits and at least seven concussions, the two-time Stanley Cup champion was forced to retire in 2015 due to repeated head trauma.

Like Tyson, he was at war with himself and struggling to connect with his wife and young children after his retirement at age 30.

He said psilocybin helped him bridge that gap and the experience led him to found Wesana Health, a first-of-its-kind company dedicated to studying its ability to treat traumatic brain injury (TBI) in athletes, veterans and others.

Wesana recently entered into a clinical research project with the World Boxing Council (WBC) to examine the potential of psilocybin to help boost the brain health of boxers, and Carcillo says he is proof that it works.

"I am cured, for sure, of TBI and any related symptoms. 100%," Carcillo said.

"I do not suffer from slurred speech, headaches, head pressure, insomnia, impulse control issues, anxiety, depression or suicidal ideation," he said.

"I do not suffer from any of that (anymore)."

Carcillo and his team are hopeful psilocybin will become an FDA-approved drug to treat TBI.

OPEN TO THE WORLD

Tyson said he wants to spread word of the benefits of psilocybin as widely as possible, which is why he has partnered with Wesana.

"I believe this is good for the world," said Tyson, who said he thinks its use could also help create a more empathetic and just society.

"If you put 10 people in a room that don't like each other and give them some psychedelics, they'll be taking pictures with each other," he said.

"Put 10 people in a room who don't like each other and give them some liquor, and they'll be shooting everybody. That's real talk.

"(Wesana) was on the same level of thinking that I was. They wanted to share this with the world. This is very limited, us doing this in these small ceremonies.

"It needs to be open to the world."

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NIH Director Praises Psychedelics’ Potential As Therapeutic Treatment, Touts Progress In Access To Cannabis For Research – Benzinga

Posted: at 4:57 am

During a WednesdaySenate budget hearing,Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) expressedpositive remarks about the therapeutic potential of psychedelics such as psilocybin and MDMA.

I think as weve learned more about how the brain works we began to realize that these are potential tools for research purposes and might be clinically beneficial, Collins said.

The NIH is the countrys main health agency responsible for public health research. As its director, Collins stands as the highest ranking health officer in the federal government.

Psychedelics: Collins said there has been a resurgence of interest in psychedelic drugs, which for a while were sort of considered not an area that researchers legitimately ought to go after.

He went on to explain that psilocybin has been tested in three randomized, controlled trials for depression, showing signsof potential interest.

That could be quite exciting, because we all are looking for new approaches to that.

Collins added that MDMA and LSD are also under research and acknowledged that psilocybin is the psychedelic molecule that hasgarnered the most attention of late.

He told the committee hearingthat he hasbeen inconversations with the National Institute of Drug Abuse and the National Institute of Mental Health about whether its a good moment to consider having perhaps a workshop to say, OK, what have we learned so far and what more might we want to do as far as designing the next generation of clinical trials to see where these provide benefits going beyond depression to such things as PTSD?

These agencies, he estimates,will want to have a hard look at these treatments over the course of the next year.

Medical Cannabis: The NIH directoralso referred to progress being made in access to medical marijuana for federal research.

Were making some progress. You may know that in the past, researchers who wanted to do clinical studies on marijuana had all kinds of limitations," Collins said, adding that for the past five decades there had been onlyone source of marijuana for federal research purposes.

That of course is an issue because its a limited opportunity for access.

Collins said that the DEA hadrecently grantedpermission to expand the number of research marijuana providers.

However, Collins said,the best solution is to remove cannabis from its classification as a Schedule I drug.

What we really need is to moderate the schedule 1 limitation, Collins said, proposing the creation of a Schedule 1R category that would create a different pathway for researchers.

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NIH Director Touted Benefits of Psychedelics Including Psilocybin and MDMA – Stockhouse

Posted: at 4:57 am

Psychedelics may be one step closer to decriminalization. All after the Director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Francis Collins touted the benefits of psilocybin and MDMA, as noted by Marijuana Moment . There has been a resurgence of interest in psychedelic drugs, which for a while were sort of considered not an area that researchers legitimately ought to go after,” Collins said. And I think as we’ve learned more about how the brain works, we’ve begun to realize that these are potential tools for research purposes and might be clinically beneficial.” That support could be beneficial for companies, such as NeonMind Biosciences ( CSE:NEON) (OTC:NMDBF), Cybin Inc. (NEO:CYBN)(OTC:CLXPF), Mind Medicine Inc. (NEO:MMED) (NASDAQ:MNMD), HAVN Life Sciences Inc. (CSE:HAVN)(OTC:HAVLF), and Mydecine Innovations Group (CSE:MYCO)(OTC:MYCOF).

Studies have already shown that some psychedelics could be useful for treating anxiety, PTSD, opioid addictions, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), and alcoholism. We may also soon learn psilocybin could potentially assist in treating eating disorders and obesity from a NeonMind Biosciences study. That's because psilocybin activates serotonin receptors, or "nature's own appetite suppressant," as noted by Psychology Today. "This powerful brain chemical curbs cravings and shuts off appetite. It makes you feel satisfied even if your stomach is not full. The result is eating less and losing weight."

NeonMind Biosciences (CSE:NEON)(OTC:NMDBF) to Commence Trading on OTCQB

NeonMind Biosciences announced that its shares will commence trading on the OTCQB® Venture Market on May 28, 2021, under the symbol NMDBF”. NeonMind will continue to trade on the Canadian Securities Exchange under its existing symbol NEON”.

The OTCQB, operated by OTC Markets Group Inc., is designed for early-stage and developing U.S. and international companies. Companies must be current in their financial reporting and undergo an annual verification and management certification process, including meeting a minimum bid price and other financial conditions. With more compliance and quality standards, the OTCQB provides investors improved visibility to enhance trading decisions. The OTCQB is recognized by the United States Securities and Exchange Commission as an established public market providing public information for analysis and value of securities.

With this OTCQB listing, NeonMind has achieved a significant milestone in its mission to advance its psilocybin drug development programs,” said Robert Tessarolo, President & CEO of NeonMind. We expect this listing to increase our financial capabilities and expand our exposure to the U.S. investment community. This capital markets support will be extremely valuable as we continue to execute on our long-term strategy to advance the use of therapeutic psychedelic compounds for weight management conditions including obesity, which is a growing global health crisis.”

Other related developments from around the markets include:

Cybin Inc., a biotechnology company focused on progressing psychedelic therapeutics, announced that it has filed an international patent application that brings the potential to obtain patent coverage in 153 countries. The application, governed by the Patent Cooperation Treaty, grants the Company the right to file future national applications into treaty member jurisdictions, including important potential markets for the Company. The PCT claims a library of psychedelic derivative drug development candidates.

Mind Medicine Inc., a leading psychedelic medicine biotech company, announced the publication of the first pharmacogenetic data on LSD to help personalize dosing . The study results from a pooled secondary analysis of four Phase 1 studies that each used a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, crossover design and were conducted at the University Hospital Basel Liechti Lab, in Basel, Switzerland. The results of this study indicate that pharmacogenetic testing prior to LSD-assisted treatment may inform LSD dose selection at the individual patient level.

HAVN Life Sciences Inc., biotechnology company pursuing standardized extraction of psychoactive compounds and the development of natural health products, is pleased to announce a production and supply agreement with Lobe Sciences Ltd. , an innovative biotech company committed to investigating and developing treatments using psychedelic and non-traditional medicines for better brain health. Pursuant to the Agreement, HAVN Life will produce and supply an offering of Natural Health Products, which will include plant-based compounds and non-psychoactive mushrooms. The Agreement with Lobe Sciences will create an additional revenue stream for HAVN Life, and the team will look to generate additional agreements in the coming months.

Mydecine Innovations Group said that it has received approval from Health Canada to significantly expand” its cultivation capabilities at its current good manufacturing practice (cGMP) facility, at the Applied Pharmaceutical Innovation in Canada. The Denver, Colorado-based biopharma company focused on the research and development of alternative nature-sourced medicine, said that it would use the new guidance from Health Canada to expand its cultivation facilities and rapidly scale up the supply of pharmaceutical-grade psilocybin for both its internal clinical research and for its industry partners. The increased cultivation will also allow the company to more efficiently and quickly study the medical utility of naturally occurring psilocybin and psilocybin-like compounds,” said the company.

Legal Disclaimer / Except for the historical information presented herein, matters discussed in this article contains forward-looking statements that are subject to certain risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such statements. Winning Media is not registered with any financial or securities regulatory authority and does not provide nor claims to provide investment advice or recommendations to readers of this release. For making specific investment decisions, readers should seek their own advice. NeonMind Biosciences Inc. has paid three thousand five hundred dollars for advertising and marketing services to be distributed by Winning Media. Winning Media is only compensated for its services in the form of cash-based compensation. Winning Media owns ZERO shares of NeonMind Biosciences Inc. Please click here for full disclaimer.

Contact Information: 2818047972 ty@LifeWaterMedia.com

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My Turn: To those who fear non-leftists – The Recorder

Posted: at 4:56 am

When information is suppressed and only one side is discussed, those points of view not mentioned fade away and are mostly forgotten. If that wasnt true, non-leftists would be on your Google news feed and have a bigger impact on society names like Justin Amash, Milton Friedman, Candace Owens, Ayn Rand, Ben Shapiro and Thomas Sowell just to name a few. French economist Frdric Bastiat and Austrian-British economist Friedrich Hayek have greatly influenced Justin Amash.

Why wont you question your views? Because there are only two sides, Republican and Democrat? Both sides want to keep it just two for their own benefit. You wont side with Republicans, because the one-sided media has falsely established they are sexist and racist who only care about the rich. You ignore opposing views for every situation you encounter? Do you read the hundreds of pages of a federal bill? Its Ok to realize that youve been duped. I prefer to look for .gov sites. A politicians website could be useful. Otherwise theres spin to avoid on most sites, if not all.

Dont like conservative values? So, you dont know how to spend less money and save? You ring up credit cards like the federal government rings up debt? You cant continually expand government, spend money like water and expect to be debt free. Its an economics fail. Unfortunately, not enough Republicans vote against more spending. How many Democrats vote to reduce spending?

In Thomas Sowells article The Lure of Socialism to the Foolhardy in The Desert Sun on Feb. 20, 2016, he wrote, Worst of all, government giveaways polarize society into segments, each trying to get what it wants at somebody elses expense, creating mutual bitterness that can tear a society apart. Some seem to blithely assume that the rich can be taxed to pay for what they want as if the rich dont see what is coming and take their wealth elsewhere.

In the East Bay Times, on June 23, 2011, Thomas Sowell wrote, Many retired people remember the money that was taken out of their paychecks for years and feel that they are now entitled to receive social security benefits as a right. But the way Social Security was set up was so financially shaky that anyone who set up a similar retirement scheme in the private sector could be sent to federal prison for fraud.

A few years ago, why was U.S. Rep. Jim McGovern so concerned when there was a mass exodus from countries south of the U.S.? Hes part of the problem. Venezuela didnt do socialism correctly? On the SSI website, an illegal immigrant can claim the income of their sponsor to obtain social security benefits. Ellis Island existed till it didnt. In general, Democrats want the votes and Republicans like cheap labor. A path to citizenship yes, but not for everyone at once. Build the wall.

John Stossel cites Thomas Sowells work in Capitalism Magazine on Jan. 19, 2021. John says, todays self-anointed leaders talk constantly about how Americas systemic racism holds back Black people.

Propaganda, Sowell calls it. If you go back into the 20s, you find that married-couple families were much more prevalent among Blacks. As late as 1930, Blacks have lower unemployment rates than whites.

The Mises Institute printed an article from Gary Galles on June 30, 2020, where he cites Thomas Sowells distinction between the market and government.

The market is nothing more than an option for each individual to choose among numerous existing institutions, or to fashion new arrangements suited to his own situation and taste. The government establishes the answer to a given problem. The Market is simply the freedom to choose among many existing or still-to-be-created possibilities . Any comparison of market processes and governmental processes for making a particular set of decisions is a comparison between given institutions, prescribed in advance, and an option to select or create institutions ad hoc . The advantages of market institutions over government institutions are not so much in their particular characteristics as institutions but in the fact that people can usually make a better choice out of numerous options than by following a single prescribed process.

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The GOP Cant Be Savedand Neither Can Paul Ryan – The Nation

Posted: at 4:56 am

Paul Ryan, former Republican Congressman and vice presidential candidate, speaks during a campaign event in 2012, in Swanton, Ohio. (Mary Altaffer/AP Photo)

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I am sick of letting Republicans mangle the narrative of how their party became a clear and present danger to American democracy. I am tired of the media lauding the few Republicans (or former Republicans) who belatedly speak out against the Trumpist cult of bigotry and lies that they themselves helped construct. Liz Cheney, Mitt Romney, John Boehnerthese people are not iconoclasts; theyre complicit. Long before Donald Trump, they greedily made a deal with the devil and are now miffed that the bill has come due. Republicans who speak out against the threat that other Republicans pose to democracy are just dog-whistle salesmen trying to claw back market share from the ascendant bullhorn industry.

The latest entrant into this field is former representative Paul Ryan. Most people will remember Ryan for his mewling cowardice in the face of Trumps bullying and bigotry, despite his being the Republican speaker of the House. Ryan basically invented the I didnt see the tweet defense. Now, he has joined the tiny rump of Republicans trying to wrest their party back from white domestic terroriststhe same people Ryan used to coddle in his own quest for powerby denouncing the GOPs slide toward antidemocratic authoritarianism and urging a return to some made-up principled past.

In a speech last night at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library (of course), Ryan made a big show of warning that the Republican Party is at a crossroads. If the conservative cause depends on the populist appeal of one personality, or on second-rate imitations, then were not going anywhere, he said. He also warned that, should conservatives fail in future elections, it will be because we gave too much allegiance to one passing political figure, and werent loyal enough to our principles.

Given that the Republican Party has now mainstreamed infection and insurrection, I get why mainstream media makers might think its newsworthy when any erstwhile Republican leader is willing to speak out against the party orthodoxy of lies and deceit. But lets not make any mistakes about who Ryan still is and what his principles are. Before he debased himself into retirement, Ryan was an Ayn Rand sock puppet on a personal crusade to starve the government of resources so it could not deliver services. And the glory days hes hoping to resurrect are nothing more than that: a return to the days where Republicans expressed their cruelty through charts and graphs instead of tweets and slurs. Ryan just wants the cult of tax cuts to reassert its dominance over the cult of Trump.

Remember, while the current GOP rhetoric is overtly racist, the old GOP policies have long been as well. This is a party that, for decades, has attacked the social safety net through racist depictions of welfare queens and other takers, while carrying out union-busting in the name of the white working class. Its fiscal plan has long been to give more benefits to the already rich while providing fewer services to the currently strugglingand then call those who struggle lazy or lacking in personal responsibility. When Ryan talks about bringing back his partys principles, of returning to the Reaganite good old days, thats what he means.

But thats not the only problem with his big attempt. Part of Ryans critique of his GOP brethren is that they are too caught up in culture war issues, that they too often mistake reactionary skirmishes in the culture wars with a coherent agenda. That might sound good to anyone desperate to prove that the GOP is not an utterly bankrupt institution. The problem is that the party has always engaged in those reactionary skirmishes, and theyve done it precisely because the above-mentioned economic agenda has been repeatedly rejected by the American people when its been left to stand on its own.

Republican policies are broadly unpopular and empirically ineffectual, so the people peddling them realized long ago that they must be tethered to some hysterical lie or cultural threat to keep just enough white people voting against their own economic interests. Hell, Ronald Reagan launched his 1980 campaign in Philadelphia, Miss., site of the murder of James Chaney, Michael Schwerner, and Andrew Goodman! The only difference is the color of the hood these people wear now.Current Issue

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Heres a one-paragraph history lesson on the Republican Party, 1932present. During the Great Depression, white people demanded more government services and better working conditions, which Democrats reluctantly provided. This freaked out corporate interests that held unpopular beliefs about unfettered capitalismbeliefs which the defeated Republican Party embraced. Recognizing that nobody wanted what Republicans were selling, the party started telling white people in need of government services that various out-groups were coming to take their freedom. In the 1950s, it was communists. In the 60s and 70s, it was communists, immigrants, and Black people, and by the 80s it was communists, immigrants, Black people, and liberated women. Now, white people have literally gone to Congress looking to kill a socialist, brown woman from New York who doesnt care which bathroom you pee in, and the United States has the largest wealth gap of any G7 country. All according to the Republican plan.

So-called fiscally conservative Republicans will occasionally bemoan that they dont have a party anymore, but they have exactly the same party theyve always had: an unpopular group of megalomaniacal robber barons who cannot win elections without the rabid and sometimes violent support of their white cultural grievance foot soldiers. Most people do not like the Republican economic message and proactively hate the CEOs those policies benefit. The natural constituency for tax cuts for the rich, crumbling roads and bridges for everybody else is so small you can fit them all into a moderately sized marina.

To overcome this rather massive barrier, every Republican in office or in the media today has made the same deal. Every one has, at some point, decided to throw their hat in with the MAGA forces before those forces were unified under Trumps banner, and either explicitly or tacitly given aid and comfort to hate and grievance politics to achieve their otherwise unpopular agenda.

So when Paul Ryan tells his fellow Republicans to abandon the cultural battles, hes telling them to abandon the only parts of their platform that their voters actually like. If Ryan were right about the appeal of conservative principles, hed still have a job. Instead, Majorie Taylor Greene does.

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And yet, you dont see most Republicans, current or former, wrestling with that fact. The narrative anti-Trump Republicans paint is one that sees Trump as conducting a hostile takeover of their party. They act like the bigots and racists currently representing the GOP are a minority faction that is feasting on the weakness and low character of their current leadership.

But that narrative is just not true. This form of the Republican Party, the one that doesnt think Black people should be allowed to vote and doesnt accept the legitimacy of a pluralistic democracy, is what the real Republican Party has been about for nearly a century. Republicans have spent my entire lifetime telling their voters that Black people were dangerous and lazy, immigrants were leeches, liberals were godless, and women who want access to their own bodies are in fact conducting mass baby murder. All to support the biggest lie: that tax cuts for the wealthy would trickle down and result in increased wages for all, a theory thats been every bit as debunked as the one that Earth is flat.

Is it any wonder, then, that the group of voters who have been fed this drivel, not for four years but for more than four generations, now believes in pedophile rings and stolen elections? Republicans asked their voters to believe in things that were demonstrably untrue long before Trump came along. They spent decades poisoning the well. They cannot now cry over their partys lying to people about the efficacy of the Covid-19 vaccine when most of them spent decades letting their voters believe that climate change isnt real and Jesus rode around on dinosaurs.

Trump did not change the Republican Party; he just inverted its message. He put the popular stuff, the bigotry and sexism and anti-science articles of faith, out front and sold the unpopular stuff, the corruption and graft and permissiveness of corporate malfeasance, as a small price to pay for all the good white supremacy he was delivering for his people.

Now, establishment conservatives cant take the party back from Trump, because theyve never invested the time in developing a popular message that can be supported without the racism their voters have always really wanted. And theyre not investing that time now either. Paul Ryan has nothing to offer Trump voterswhich is why his message and those like it are falling flat with the base.Related Articles

Though the media desperately tries to prop up the Ryans and Romneys and Cheneys as examples of how the GOP can be saved, the GOP cannot be saved. Republican voters were never in it for the conservative principles; they were in it for the white ethnostate. Now that Trump has said the quiet part out loud, theres no stuffing the message back into a box. This is the Republican Party now. Its the same one its always been, just with their bigoted voters empowered to say what theyve always believed.

But nobodys going to listen to me. Im just a Black person who has been absolutely right about what Republicans are this entire time. Instead, anti-Trump Republicans will keep spinning the same, tired message about fiscal restraint that nobody except three pundits on a Sunday show cares about, and wonder when the racists they used to rely on will come home to the party of Lincolnwhich is a phrase Republicans invented to make themselves feel better while their voters stocked up on Confederate flags.

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The GOP Cant Be Savedand Neither Can Paul Ryan - The Nation

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What Are The Odds On Sports Gambling In Ohio? – WOSU Public Media

Posted: at 4:56 am

In this week's episode of Snollygoster, Ohio's politics podcast from WOSU, hosts Mike Thompson and Steve Brown discuss the chances that legal sports gambling will win big in the Buckeye state. State Senator Niraj Antani (R-Miamisburg) joins the show.

Vax Shot Jackpot

Wednesday evening, Ohio announced the first winners of the Ohio Vax-A-Million drawings.

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine said the lottery idea has exceeded his wildest expectations. The USA Today Ohio Network did an analysis and found vaccinations among people 16 and older increased 40% in the week after the lottery was announced.

People thought DeWine was crazy for this lottery idea but states across the country are following his lead.

Covering The Spread

Ohio lawmakers are considering a bill that would legalize sports gambling in the state. The basic idea of the bill is to have the state issue dozens of licenses to establishments to take bets. Some would go to online sites.

The licenses would cost $1 million for three years. Ohio would tax gambling at 10% and the system would be run by the Ohio Casino Control Commission.

Pennsylvania, Michigan and Indiana already have legal sports betting and some lawmakers feel the state is missing out on revenue.

The bill would ban gambling on sports involving young athletes in K-12 schools.

Snollygoster Of The Week

Former Ohio House Speaker Larry Householder lost his leadership position last year over the federal indictment related to the energy plant bailout, but hes still a state lawmaker.

This week, some House Democrats made it known they were working on a resolution to expel Householder from the House, and now all of a sudden Republicans are too.

House Speaker Bob Cupp (R-Lima) still hasnt called for a vote on the issue and largely dodges the question when asked by reporters. He did issue a statement saying I have consistently maintained that Larry Householder should resign from the Ohio House of Representatives. The resolutions filed will receive the appropriate process according to House rules.

Send questions and comments to snollygoster@wosu.org.

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Not Everyone Supports Expanded Gambling – NBC Connecticut

Posted: at 4:56 am

Its possible that Connecticut residents may be able to place a bet on their phones by Labor Day, but not everyone is happy about it. At least a handful of lawmakers had concerns about the legislation.

It creates the potential for increased addiction, Sen. Tony Hwang, R-Fairfield, said.

Hwang voted against the legislation because it could increase the potential to addict a whole new generation.

You are looking to hook 18- to 25-year-old men and women that are going to be influenced and they could be increased potential for gambling addiction, Hwang said,

The legislation, which is headed to Gov. Ned Lamonts desk, would require the two tribes to contribute $500,000 toward problem gambling. The lottery will increase its contribution to $3.3 million.

It is a scant dollar amount that is looking to address the potential increase in the dangers of addiction, Hwang said.

Other opponents of the legislation which allows for online gaming and sports wagering were upset about the East Windsor casino.

Contract between the tribes and the state of Connecticut which is going to restrict any construction of a casino on that land for 10 years, Sen. Saud Anwar.

Anwar, a Democrat who represents East Windsor, said the first selectman learned about the decision to prohibit a casino to be built in a Facebook post.

That is disappointing thats not coming through. At the same time I understand that things change, Sen. Julie Kushner, D-Danbury, said.

Kushner supported the bill but hopes the state makes things right.

I do hope we recognize the investment that was made by East Windsor and I hope we will see some legislation as we move forward that will address that.

Kushner says the bill will help the economy.

In recent years weve seen this industry change in the way that the gaming is conducted and the entertainment is conducted and those changes have really dramatically impacted our state, Kushner said.

Gov. Ned Lamont said, we want to get going. We want to get this down to the Bureau of Indian Affairs. We want to get approval.

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Minister promises long overdue overhaul of Northern Ireland gambling laws – iGaming Business

Posted: at 4:56 am

Northern Ireland is set to undergo the first significant changes to its gambling laws in over 35 years, including the establishment of a mandatory code of practice for operators.

Currently, gambling in Northern Ireland is regulated under the Betting, Gaming, Lotteries and Amusements Order, which dates back to 1985, but Communities Minister Deirdre Hargey said new legislation will be introduced in the coming weeks. A further update dealing with online gambling, among other topics will then follow in the longer term.

Gambling legislation has remained largely unchanged since it was enacted thirty-five years ago, said Hargey.

As a result, gambling regulation here has not kept pace with industry and technological changes. In my view change is long overdue.

Hargey listed some aspects of the upcoming legislation, including a mandatory code of practice for those holding gambling licenses and allowing gambling contracts to be enforceable by law..

Further proposed changes include making it an offence to allow children to use gaming machines, expanding the definition of cheating to include attempted cheating, and imposing a statutory levy on gambling operators.

Statutory levies has been a frequent topic in the responses to the Department of Digital Culture, Media and Sports (DCMS) Gambling Act review, having been mentioned by GambleAware and YGAM in their responses.

Permitting bookmakers to open on Sundays and Good Friday is also to be included in legislation.

This was supported by the public consultation in 2019, which revealed that 66% of participants thought that bookmakers office hours should be relaxed, while almost all of this percentage thought that bookmakers should be allowed to open on a Sunday.

Politicians in Northern Ireland sought guidance from colleagues in Westminster as the inquiry progressed.

The initial legislation will be introduced in the next few weeks, and will then be followed by a second update over a much longer timescale, which will include a completely new regulatory framework, which will include the regulation of online gambling.

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‘We Thought He Was A Family Man’: Identity Of Man Who Murdered 85-Year-Old Woman Shocks Relatives – Oxygen

Posted: at 4:56 am

85-year-old Anna Mae Branson was a multimillionaire businesswoman, described by those who knew her as glamorous and generous. She was beloved in the small community of Madisonville, Kentucky. Who could have wanted to murder her, and in such a vicious manner?

On January 13, 2003, an elderly man contacted Madisonville authorities to request a wellness check on hisfianc, Anna Mae Branson. When they searched her home. they eventually found her -- dead on the basement steps.

"It appeared first she could have fallen but then upon seeing all the injuries to her body it was obvious Ms. Ann had been murdered,"Kelley Rager-Sawyer, an officer with Madisonville PD, told "An Unexpected Killer," airing Fridays at 8/7c on Oxygen.

She had many stab wounds in the back as well as defensive wounds, and she had been hit multiple times in the head until it changed shape. There was no sign of forced entry, and the place hadn't been ransacked like a burglary gone wrong. The viciousness of the 85-year-old's death horrified those who knew her.

Branson was a beloved local businesswoman who made her millions by owning a Dairy Queen in town, which was a local teen hangout spot. She was known to be generous with her money, lending it to those who needed it, as well as glamorous andeffervescent. Recently, she had become engagedto a retired eye surgeon known as Dr. Bob.

"The very last thing Anna Mae acted like was an old lady," nephew Jack Branson told producers.

The autopsy came in, revealing her time of death was somewhere between 7 and 7:30 p.m. It alsoconfirmedthe attack was as brutal as authorities suspected.

"She was stabbed 97 times, and she was beaten so badly lot of the stab wounds would have been inflicted post-mortem," Kathy Senter, commonwealth attorney, Madisonville, Kentucky, told producers.

So who could have killed her? After clearing herfianc through his phone records, investigators considered an array of suspects, including as handyman who borrowed money from Branson and a tenant with psychotic tendencies. Through a polygraph test and an ironclad alibi, respectively, the two men were cleared.

Then, a tip emerged that changed everything. A call came in from someone who suggested Russell Winstead, Branson's nephew, had killed her.

Winstead was a coal mine worker whoregularly attended church and had a wife and children. However, the tipster said, he also had an extreme gambling problem and owed Branson quite a bit of money.

After searching Branson's residence again, they found her ledger and discovered it was true: Winstead owed Branson close to $100,000. The day before her murder, there was a note adding thathe had written her a check for $1,200. They also learned Winstead had visited the casino 236 times in one year, losing hundreds of thousands in cash.

When questioned by police, Winstead proclaimed innocence and used his wife as an alibi. She backed his story up, but wasshocked to learn the extent of his gambling problem. Investigators also got a warrant to comb through the WInstead residence, finding a burner phone that confirmed Winstead was cheating on his wife with a casino waitress.

Still, cheating and gambling doesn't mean someone is a murderer.

"When we found out Russell had been living a literal double life, we were shocked, but we felt there was no way Russell had done this. We believed it with all our hearts," Branson's niece-in-law, Mary Branson, told producers.

But then Winstead's wife came forward to reveal Winstead coerced her into giving him an alibi and that he actually hadn't come home until later the night of the murder, meaning he was unaccounted for between 7 and 7:30 p.m., the time of the killing.

Police went to arrest him, but at this point Winstead had already fled the country.

Desperate to find him, the family had him featured on "America's Most Wanted." He was eventually located in Costa Rica, but extradition between U.S. and Costa Rica is tricky.

As authorities plotted their next move, they discovered Winstead's father, Earl, had been wiring his son money from Branson's estate so he could live comfortably in Costa Rica. This devastated the rest of the Branson family -- and Earl Winstead was found guilty of seven counts of hindering apprehension and given seven years probation.

Finally, in May 2005, Winstead was arrested at a casino in Costa Rica and sent back to the United States, although the U.S. had to agree not to seek the death penalty in the case.

"I felt like a burden had been lifted. I knew justice was going to be done," Jack Branson told producers. "[...] We all thought he was a family man, we all thought he was a church-goer."

In July 2007, the case went to trial. Prosecutors argued Winstead realized he couldn't afford the $1,200 check he had given Branson, had gone to her home to ask her to tear it up, and when she refused, he had simply snapped, stabbing her and hitting her over the head repeatedly.

Russell Winstead was found guilty of murder and first-degree robbery, and was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole.

For more on this case and others like it, watchAn Unexpected Killer," airing Fridays at 8/7c on Oxygenor stream episodes here.

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'We Thought He Was A Family Man': Identity Of Man Who Murdered 85-Year-Old Woman Shocks Relatives - Oxygen

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A Brief Look into the Indian Online Gambling Industry – India West

Posted: at 4:56 am

The popularity of online casino games in India has grown so much over the years. Indians are known to love gambling. Aside from being the second most populated country in the world, India is also known to be home to so many gamblers. In fact, around 80% of the Indian population admit to gambling at least once a year. In India, gambling can be manifested in many different forms such as house card games, sports betting, and casino games. However, recently, there has been a very big boom in terms of the people who play online casino games in India. The entire gambling industry in India as a whole is worth roughly around US$60 billion every year with around only half of that being regulated. This means that theres a lot of underground and unregulated gambling going on in India. But what about online gambling?

The way that legislation surrounding gambling in India is so weird and ambiguous that it places online gambling on some kind of a grey area. In total, only two states in India are allowed to legally operate physical casinos. These are Goa and Sikkim. The only kinds of gambling that are allowed in India as a whole are lottery sweepstakes and horse race betting. Despite that, there is still a booming online gambling industry in India. There arent any current federal laws that bar or regulate online betting in India. Its mostly up to the individual states to decide on the legality of online casinos in their respective jurisdictions.

Considering that online gambling makes up so much of the Indian economy and the fact that many people are still apprehensive about going to physical spaces for gambling, theres reason to consider that governments are looking closer into legalizing and regulating the online gambling industry in India. But this is all dependent on the state. Goa is one of the most attractive states in India for gambling because it has very loose regulations for both real world and online casinos. However, there are also states like Maharashtra that prohibit gambling in all forms, whether online or offline.

The Federal Information Technology Act that was passed in India in 2011 was made to restrict the online gambling activities in India. The act sought to penalize internet service providers for allowing foreign betting sites to be accessed by Indian users. However, the laws language didnt cover the third-party online betting operators that are very popular in India. So, it has been very easy for Indian online gamblers to circumvent these restrictions by going through the third-party operators who accept rupees or alternative e-wallets for transactions on their sites.

As of this moment, many gambling companies all over the world are eager to penetrate India and try to take a bite out of that large market. Many prominent companies like William Hill and Ladbrokes are desperate to try to win over licensing rights for their operations in the state of Sikkim. It just goes to show that many industry experts understand the potential of the Indian market when it comes to online gambling. This is why many are eager to invest in the penetration of this highly powerful market with lots of spending power.

There are primarily three reasons why Indians have come to really accept online gambling. First, its the fact that Indians consider gambling to be one of their favorite pastimes, as we have already established. Aside from that, India boasts one of the most technologically literate populations in the world. This means that more people are just generally comfortable with integrating and receiving technology into their lives. It makes it easier to seek alternative forms of leisure and gambling as opposed to traditional real-world setups. Lastly, India is also the place that the global COVID-19 pandemic hit the hardest. Many Indians are still hesitant to go out into public spaces and have grown rather reliant on digital alternatives. Online gambling allows many Indian gamblers a safe space to still partake in their favorite hobby while staying safe from the virus.

As access to e-wallets continue to roll out and as technology becomes more sophisticated, its easy to see that the online gambling industry will thrive in India within the near future. Only time will tell how high it can really grow.

(guest article)

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A Brief Look into the Indian Online Gambling Industry - India West

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