As Vladimir Putin continues to work up his reputation as the world’s most despicable and despotic leader, it appears as though he does have some jitters when it comes to dealing with the mighty USA. Over the course of the last several weeks, the two superpowers have exchanged a number of insults and threats, centered around any number of issues – all of which are of Putin’s own doing. First, US President Joe Biden went ahead and told the world that he believed Putin to be “a killer” – a statement that reportedly irked Putin to no end.  And then there were the hack attacks against the United States that saw Biden slap a number of hefty sanctions on Moscow. Now, as anti-Putin journalist Alexei Navalny continues a slow and agonizing march toward death at a Russian prison camp hospital, Biden and the US government have warned Putin that his demise could brings a world of pain to the Kremlin. This has pushed Putin to enact a total blackout of news on Navalny’s condition. Russian state TV has imposed a virtual blackout on coverage on Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny amid claims he could die at “any minute” in a prison hospital. The imprisoned 44-year-old, a prominent critic of President Vladimir Putin, has been on hunger strike and there are planned protests in 77 cities as a show of support. The protests on Wednesday will coincide with Vladimir Putin’s key annual state of the nation address to parliament. The Russian Government have said the protests are illegal. Putin and Biden had briefly considered a summit meeting to discuss this latest dissonance, but there is no telling where those negations stand after this latest malfeasance by the Russian government.

They say that money doesn’t grow on trees, but that’s because cannabis isn’t a tree. As our nation prepares to reopen its economy after a lengthy pandemic, there are many financial analysts out there who have been wondering aloud if cannabis or marijuana could be a powerful catalysts for fiscal stimulus.  The more potently psychoactive version of the plant is now either legal or decriminalized in a majority of US States, with cannabis, (diet weed, essentially), being federally legal as of this very moment. In states where marijuana is legal, massive economic booms have occurred, which have in turn prompted other legislatures to take a look at adjusting their own laws. One of the main issues in growing this cash-flush business has been the banking sector, on account of the fact that large national banks don’t wish to take on the liability of working within an industry that is under the thumb of federal criminality. The House of Representatives is now looking to change that, and just in time to turbocharge our pandemic recovery. The U.S. House of Representatives on Monday passed legislation that would allow banks to provide services to cannabis companies in states where it is legal, a step towards removing what analysts say is a barrier to development of a national industry. Lawmakers voted 321-101 to approve the bill and send it to the Senate. The bill clarifies that proceeds from legitimate cannabis businesses would not be considered illegal and directs federal regulators to craft rules for how they would supervise such banking activity. Bankers around the nation have been clamoring for such a bill for some time, hoping to cash in on this green gold rush before it’s too late. Both Canada and Mexico have federally legalized marijuana, leaving the USA as a laggard in western society.