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Those searching for answers to the question " Is medical marijuana good medicine? " will find few in Dr. David Sack's Times Op-Ed article.   On the one hand, Sack concedes, "Marijuana can effectively treat neuropathic pain, and it has been shown to improve appetite and reduce nausea," an acknowledgment substantiating the plant's therapeutic utility. However, he later warns that cannabis' ability to provide relief for certain other conditions, such as lupus and anxiety, remains unproven.

An upside-down American flag is considered a signal of distress. And that's the feeling Robert Rosebrock had when he looked up and noticed the red, white and blue street-lamp banners outside the Department of Veterans Affairs' West Los Angeles Medical Center were in disarray - tattered, tangled around the poles or flapping upside-down in the breeze. "It was disgraceful," said Rosebrock, a 71-year-old U.S. Army veteran who arranged for the flags' installation 11 months ago using $12,000 donated by Metabolic Studio, a charitable arm of the Annenberg Foundation.

Rinconia Drive is one of those narrow, tree-shaded roads that snakes up the Hollywood Hills, lined with a mix of older bungalows and towering modern mansions. But when you get to Chris Brown's concrete-and-steel-and-glass Jay Vanos-designed home, the mood changes dramatically. A flashy Lamborghini is parked in front, blocking the sidewalk and part of the street. A creature in a silver spacesuit is perched on a ledge. And on the walls are massive paintings of monsters, standing 8 feet tall in bright neon colors.

The reason the bike lane on Spring Street in downtown Los Angeles is bright fluorescent green is so drivers and bicyclists alike can see it easily and avoid running into one another. However, the very conspicuousness of that color has brought on a collision between politics and business in the city. Bicyclists and downtown neighborhood groups are fans of the 1.4-mile stretch of green bike lane on Spring Street from Cesar Chavez to 9th Street. But location scouts and production managers who bring filming to the city's historic downtown core are not so happy.

Whether by necessity or choice, a quarter of Americans take at least one vacation by themselves each year. Some solo travelers are single. Some have partners who dislike travel or have different interests or can't get away. Some just crave freedom. But all face the same question: What's the best trip for the person traveling alone? "The key is to know yourself," said Beth Whitman, author of a guide for women traveling alone and founder of Wanderlustandlipstick.com , a website devoted to advice and tours for women on the go. "There are times when you just need to get away, to recuperate.

Michele and Russell Poland's credit was shot, but they managed to buy their suburban dream home anyway. After a business bankruptcy and a home foreclosure, they turned to a rare option in this era of tightfisted banking - a subprime loan. The Polands paid nearly $10,000 in upfront fees for the privilege of securing a mortgage at 10.9% interest. And they had to raid their retirement account for a 35% down payment. Most borrowers would balk at such stiff terms. But with prices rising, the Polands wanted to snag a four-bedroom home in Temecula near top-rated schools for their 5-year-old son. By later this year, they figure, they'll be able to refinance into a standard loan.

You can do a lot with smartphones these days, but unless you're downloading the best apps for your device, you aren't really using it to its full potential. So if you aren't sure what to download, just make sure you have these 10 apps on your iPhone or Android device. Google Maps This app comes preinstalled on Android devices and should be the first app downloaded on iPhones. Besides top-notch design, the app is the best free voice navigation app for driving directions.

Your choices in San Francisco hotels are overwhelming. The prices can be too. So during our staff visit to the City by the Bay, we looked for reasonably priced hotels that had charm, location or both. We came back with 14 ideas on places to bed down. It's not a complete list, but it is eclectic, like the city itself. Mystic Hotel. This property, which opened in April, stands on a tunnel-adjacent block of Stockton Street that you'll never see on a picture postcard, yet it has style, as do the Burritt Tavern bar and restaurant downstairs.

WASHINGTON - Sen. Elizabeth Warren, the newest member of the Senate Banking Committee, waited patiently for her first chance to question top financial regulators at a recent hearing on Capitol Hill. When her turn finally came after 90 minutes, Warren quickly showed she wouldn't be following the custom that a freshman senator be seen and not heard. After some pleasantries, the longtime consumer advocate and Wall Street critic lit into the heads of the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.

The sharp cracks echoing from the East Bakersfield street were loud enough to jolt Ruben Ceballos from a midnight slumber. Then he heard screams. The 19-year-old jumped from his living room sofa and hurried to the kitchen door, which offered a view of the violent scene outside - Kern County sheriff's deputies repeatedly striking a man in the head with batons as he lay on the pavement. "I saw two sheriff's deputies on top of this guy, just beating him," Ceballos said in an interview Monday.

Mark Tercek had some horribly awkward moments after he left Goldman Sachs to run a U.S. environmental charity, the Nature Conservancy. At one of his first big staff meetings, he committed a total eco no-no by drinking from a plastic water bottle. When he got to work the next day, his new colleagues had left him a batch of reusable Klean Kanteen bottles. At about the same time, he went to a big event packed with luminaries in the environmental field and found himself face to face with Russell Train, founding director of the World Wildlife Fund in the U.S. "Who are you?"

William C. Cox Jr., the patriarch of the Bancroft clan that controlled Dow Jones & Co. for 105 years and sold it to Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. in a decision sparking a family feud, died Wednesday at his home in Hobe Sound, Fla., according to his daughter, Ann Bartram. He was 82. The cause was complications from diabetes. Cox was at the center of a protracted family dispute that ultimately led to the sale of New York-based Dow Jones, owner of the Wall Street Journal, to News Corp.

How strange to think that Vicki Macchiavello's decision to buy an iPhone after years of using a BlackBerry could be bad news for Apple. And yet, because the Oakland resident opted to buy a cheaper, older iPhone 4 rather than the latest, pricier iPhone 5, she represents a trend that has become a growing concern on Wall Street. In recent months, such an unusually large proportion of consumers are opting to buy older iPhone models that some analysts have begun to wonder whether Apple has lost its ability to create new versions that have enough dazzle to justify their high prices.

Long-time rival shopping centers Americana at Brand and the Glendale Galleria are tying the knot with splashy new improvements on Brand Boulevard in downtown Glendale. The changes come as the side-by-side malls usher in new premium tenants - Nordstrom moving from the Galleria to the Americana in September and Bloomingdale's opening just down the street in the Galleria in November. Los Angeles real estate developer Rick Caruso, who owns the Americana and a portion of the Galleria, announced $60 million in improvements to the Americana focused on linking the Nordstrom and Bloomingdale's stores under construction at the two malls.

PARIS - The French Parliament on Tuesday approved a bill allowing same-sex couples to marry and adopt, voting after months of often angry debate and sometimes violent protests in the streets. Members of the Socialist government chanted "Equality, equality" and stood up to applaud the results of the 331-225 vote in the National Assembly, the lower house of Parliament. The center-right opposition party immediately announced its intention to appeal the law. Justice Minister Christiane Taubira, a strong supporter of the bill, said she was "overcome with emotion.

GIZA, Egypt - The woman with crates of unsold tomatoes breathed in the boisterous music of slum life: creaking shutters, squawking chickens, blowing laundry, clattering junkmen. But the ingrained rhythms only angered Hamid Ali Mohamed, who sat in an alley beside her rusting scales and a slim pile of 12 coins, the equivalent of less than $2 for a day's work at the vegetable stand she inherited from her late husband. "Hey!" she yelled at a passing woman. "Why'd you buy those tomatoes from someone else?"

Casey Kasem, who gained a national radio audience after "American Top 40" launched in 1970, and his wife, Jean, are listing their Westside estate for sale at $42 million. With 12,000 square feet of living space, seven bedrooms and nine bathrooms, the home has been the site of intimate interviews and sleepovers for as many as 20 youngsters a night. The yard has served as the site of elaborate celebrity-studded gatherings and paintball battles. The syndicated radio host bought the property for Jean Kasem in 1989 as a gift.

With more than 4 million people visiting Yosemite National Park last year ? and that number expected to increase this year ? it's no wonder lodging inside the park is snatched up quickly. "We typically sell out during the summer season," Delaware North Cos. spokeswoman Lisa Cesaro said of its Yosemite accommodations (Ahwahnee Hotel, Yosemite Lodge at the Falls, Curry Village and the housekeeping camp on the Merced River; the Wawona Hotel, and in the back country, Tuolumne Meadows Lodge, White Wolf Lodge and the High Sierra camps)

Historical advocates in San Juan Capistrano argued that the jagged hills of southern Orange County were deep under water when dinosaurs first roamed the Earth. No land-roaming dinosaur - neither a T. rex , stegosaurus nor apatosaurus - would have come through unless lost at sea. Many things have changed since the water washed away: Missionaries built a majestic cathedral, settlers established what would become one of California's oldest neighborhoods and a thick cloud of swallows would flock back to their nests here each spring.

BOSTON - The unofficial new slogan of this bomb-scarred city was everywhere Saturday. On highway signs along Interstate 90 and T-shirts in the storied Italian neighborhood of the North End. On placards held up by sticks in the Public Garden, and on race bibs worn by a pair of runners waiting for the T at the Haymarket stop. At Fenway Park, where the Red Sox played for the first time since two homemade bombs tore through the finish-line crowd at the Boston Marathon. At the Bruins-Penguins hockey game, where even the Pittsburgh team's goalie wore a Boston sticker on his helmet.