Sessions Wants to Take Your Weed From You and Lock You up for It

High court throwdown: Starting today, the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) will issue opinions on cases brought up in the last six months. This will include a number of hot-button issues ranging from immigration to class action limits. Liberals are freaking out amidst rumors that 80-year-old Justice Anthony Kennedy may retire, surely resulting in a Trump-picked successor for one of the coveted permanent positions. You can follow the action on the bench here. Though this Justice League may seem a bit wonky, this small group of people is literally determining what Americans can and cannot do.

Muslim Ban saga continues: President Trump's lawyers are at it once again, trying to persuade a federal appeals court to reinstate the revised travel ban. Trump issued the original executive order on January 28, which most saw as a clear effort to discriminate against Muslims and sparked widespread protests in airports across the country.
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals will begin listening to arguments in its Seattle courthouse today, where three judges appointed by President Bill Clinton will hear the appeal of Hawaii's challenge to President Trump's travel ban targeting individuals from six predominantly Muslim countries.

War on weed: Attorney General Jeff Sessions hashed Obama-era policy on hash in a memo issued on Thursday. Sessions, who has equated weed with heroin in the past, advocates harsher sentences for low-level drug offenses like weed. This move means that many non-violent criminals could be jailed and a return to mass incarceration for people of color.

Past Attorney General Eric Holder has condemned Sessions' reactionary policy of criminalizing bud, saying widespread incarceration is both ineffective and unsustainable. Sessions isn't just targeting drug traffickers, he's going after legal marijuana as well, which should have pot lovers and social justice warriors up in arms.

Arts in action: Advocacy is a central theme of the Christie's high-brow art sale kicking off this week, "Death in America: Selections from the Zadig & Voltaire Collection." Thierry Gillier and Christie's Chairman of Post-War and Contemporary Art Loïc Gouzer have assembled the sale and it's sure to be dope af. It's named after a piece by the late artist Steven Perrino and makes bold inferences to the sorry state of global affairs. The sale is expected to raise over $20 million for environmental protection and clean ocean efforts.

Caught with red handed: The courts found now former Congresswoman Corinne Brown (FL-D) guilty of fraud and tax evasion. Brown scammed $800,000 in donations for a charity in the name of education. Needless to say, it's taken her community by surprise but she wasn't able to slither by unscathed. Brown will be sentenced this summer.

A game of chicken: Food & Water Watch is an advocacy group that fights to make sure what you consume is healthy for your body and the environment. They also believe that people should be put before profits. On May 12, their organization opposed the Trump Administration's new plan for importing poultry, chicken nuggets and such, from China to the United States.

The move makes Trump look like a hypocrite since he's going back on his word to bring jobs back to the US rather than rely on foreign trade and outsourcing work. Worse still, since 2006, Chinese poultry has failed health inspections from the US Dept. of Agriculture. Also, in 2013 there were several incidents of bird flu from contaminated meat which even led to people dying.

If Trump's team goes ahead with his import plan, people in the states will have to be more vigilant about learning where their food is coming from. That's some food for thought. Corporate trolls: What do you when you find out your product has cancer causing carcinogens? Well if your Monsanto, producers of the herbicide Roundup, you hire trolls to do your dirty work by arguing with critics on message boards and social media. The U.S. Public Interest Research Group and members of congress have called out Monsanto for their lack of concern for human health and their Internet tough guy behavior. The company is now on trial and their annoying online thuggery is being exposed. Lulz.

Get over here! Flying on United Airlines is just like a game of Mortal Kombat. No matter where you're traveling it's a fight to the death and your opponent just might be a scorpion. Not this guy, but this guy. A flight from Houston was delayed last week when a scorpion crawled from under a sleeping passenger's sleeve. The plane was evacuated while crew members searched for the sharp-tailed bastard. It's yet another sting for United who had a scorpion-related incident on a different flight also from Houston earlier this year. Ouch!