Super Bowl Bud Ad Causes Wingnut Frenzy

Aberdeen Times : 

Super Bowl Sunday has become a truly American holiday, and one of its most cherished traditions is the rollout of new, creative, occasionally controversial, and always insanely expensive TV ads.

One that’s already raising a few eyebrows is from a perennial advertiser on sports programs of all kinds, the Anheuser-Busch Corporation. Titled “Born the Hard Way,” the ad provides a highly dramatized version of the journey of A-B co-founder Adolphus Busch. The young and handsome Adolphus comes to our shores via a stormy passage on a rickety boat, experiences anti-immigrant prejudice (“You ain’t wanted here! Go back home!” an unshaven lout yells at him), sees his first black person, is forced to jump overboard after a steamboat explosion, and eventually makes his wet and weary way to St. Louis, where a chance meeting over a beer with the older and prosperous Eberhard Anheuser causes him to reveal his dream of brewing the watery and undistinguished pilsner that would become the catalyst for so many of my own youthful misadventures.

Now, the bit about anti-immigrant sentiment lasts maybe five seconds of the 60-second ad, which in normal times would be regarded as a standard, if hackneyed rags-to-riches story. It should also be noted that the ad was written, produced, and shot months ago, long before Cheeto Mussolini’s disastrous, ill-conceived and chaotically executed Muslim ban-that’s-not-a-ban-but-Trump-said-it-was-a-ban-on-Twitter.

But to the special snowflakes of Trumpland, who spend half their time crowing and thumping their chests about their idol’s recent electoral triumph and the other half stomping their feet and whining about every perceived slight to his (and by extension, their) awesomeness, even a bland ad for a blander beer is a vile and traitorous act of offense to the sovereign. “Budweiser Attacks American’s [sic] Who Want Secure Borders,” blared the wingnut website “Gateway Pundit” (where they apparently find the rules of punctuation too “elitist,” or “politically correct”).

A site called FreedomDaily.com blasted that “Budweiser Airs DISGUSTING Super Bowl Commercial Bashing President Trump.” It should be noted that President Tweety’s name is never mentioned in the ad, but why let little details like that get in the way of right wing butthurt? Breitbart.com, the wretched hive of online scum and villainy that gave us Trump adviser Steve Bannon, accused Anheuser Busch of “playing politics.”

But for the truly unhinged reactions, you have to go to the comments section at Breitbart, where one angry little Trumpkin asserted that “the Super Bowl has been a globalist propaganda machine for a number of years now.” Another raved (in ALL CAPS, of course) that we should BOYCOTT THE SUPER BOWL AND THE NFL!!! #MAGA!”

Yeah, that’s going to happen. Nothing says “Make America Great” like boycotting the Super Bowl, Budweiser, and the NFL.

Oh, they’re also mad at Kellogg’s cereal for some reason. I didn’t dig any deeper, because wading around too long in the fever-swamp that is the Trump-centric blogosphere eventually leads to sensations of disorientation and nausea. All I can say is, if these people keep getting so offended by the “liberal” bias they imagine in one food or beverage company after another, pretty soon they’re going to be living on nothing but Papa John’s pizza and Chic-Fil-A. Scurvy is a distinct possibility.

I suppose it’s not surprising that they’re a little bit touchy. After all, the poor dears find themselves trying to defend an Executive Order that was supposed to help keep us safe but which quickly degenerated into chaos and confusion, including the detention of legal permanent residents, small children, and people who risked their lives to help U.S. soldiers in the Iraq War.

Things reached maximum lunacy (we hope) when we saw Press Secretary Sean Spicer desperately trying to convince us that five year old Iranians really are dangerous and the increasingly haggard Kellyanne Conway making up a fictional “Bowling Green Massacre” to try and “prove” that “Obama did it too!” (He didn’t. Obama slowed down the admission of Iraqis to impose new vetting procedures after a terror plot was discovered; he didn’t blanket ban people from seven countries).

As you may have surmised by now, while Bud was the beer of my misspent youth, I now consider it swill. Apparently the real Adolphus Busch, a wine drinker, felt the same way. But I may just buy a six-pack in their honor after this. I’m not going to drink it, mind you, but in a world where even the beer is a political statement, one must do one’s part.

Advice for Our New (Involuntary) Tar Heels

Opinion | thepilot.com

When we entered a new year at midnight on Jan. 1, a lot of things changed here in North Carolina.

Our new governor, Roy Cooper, was officially sworn in. Numerous changes in laws ranging from foster care to sales taxes to road tolls kicked in. And, in one fell swoop, we got a bunch of new residents from South Carolina.

The new residents of the Tar Heel State came to us as part of the resolution of a long-standing question as to exactly where the border between North and South Carolina is.

It seems that, back in 1735, when the original survey party was sent out to map the border, they got as far as the mosquito-infested swamps and dense woods that covered what’s now York County, south of Charlotte, and decided, “You know what? We are not getting paid nearly enough for this.”

According to The New York Times, they simply “drove a stake into the ground 12 miles too far to the south and went home.”

Subsequent efforts to fix the border only compounded the problem, especially since there’s apparently some sort of “magnetic anomaly” west of Charlotte that’s been mapped by the U.S. Geological Survey and which throws off compasses.

(I feel like somebody really should have looked into this a long time ago. Is there some sort of meteorite buried there? An alien monolith? Gov. Cooper, please get on this ASAP.)

Anyway, it eventually occurred to people that we really needed to get this whole thing settled, and thanks to the miracle of GPS satellites, now we can.

Some wrangling inevitably ensued, however, since the people in the contested borderlands weren’t all that eager to switch states. Eventually, however, compromises were hammered out.

For instance, the Lake Wylie Mini Mart, although suddenly finding itself in North Carolina, can still sell fireworks, and it can keep selling alcohol and gasoline using South Carolina’s lower tax rates. Kids whose state of residence has suddenly changed can get in-state tuition in either state for the next 10 years. And so on.

It’s not clear how many new North Carolinians there are. The South Carolina magazine The State says it’s only 16 (while three families are being shifted to South Carolina), but WRAL’s website pegs the total at “50 homeowners.” Whether it’s 16 or 50, however, we here in the Old North State bid you folks a warm welcome! Now, here are some things you’ll need to know:

First, you’re going to need to pick a North Carolina ACC team to root for. I know some of you former Clemson fans are going to find this traumatic, but that’s just the way it is. The choices are UNC (the Tar Heels), NC State (the Wolfpack), and Wake Forest (the Demon Deacons, a name which we can all agree makes no flippin’ sense whatsoever).

Oh, and some school from Durham. The Blue Meanies or some such nonsense. It’s a school that’s mostly attended by Yankee transplants who aren’t even going to stay here when they graduate, so forget those guys. The choice, of course, is up to you, but I would observe that your new home, North Carolina, is known as the “Tar Heel State.” Just sayin’.

A more emotionally fraught choice involves barbecue. I hear that what South Carolina regards as “barbecue” involves some kind of mustard-based sauce. To which I can only say: I’m so glad we got to you in time. North Carolina ’cue is either Western or “Lexington” style, which usually uses the shoulder of the pig and a tomato-ey sauce, while Eastern, or “the best” style, uses the whole hog, cooked slowly for hours over a wood fire, and a delicious, tangy sauce made of vinegar and pepper.

As I’ve gotten older, my feelings toward Western style have moderated somewhat, which means I no longer consider it an abomination before God. Just no mustard. Please.

Oh, and for the time being, you’re going to have to have your birth certificate handy when you use a public restroom. Don’t ask why, because the answer’s stupid, and we hope we can remedy it soon. But it is what it is.

So, again, welcome to our new North Carolinians, and we hope that, in the words of our State Toast, your weak go strong, and your strong grow great! Just know that they’re never going to do it cheering on some lame team from Durham and eating nasty mustard-based barbecue.

America? I Don't Love It

Opinion | thepilot.com

OK. On this Memorial Day weekend, I have a confession to make. I really don’t care much for America.

Oh, no, not the country. I still love America, the country, a lot. I’ve gone back and forth a few times on America, the band, although I’ll always have a soft spot in my heart for that “Sister Golden Hair” song.

But America, the beer? Not so much.

If you’re unsure what I’m talking about, Anheuser Busch recently announced that, for the upcoming summer, they’re changing the name of Budweiser beer to “America.”

Now, it should be noted that back in the glorious days of my misspent youth, I did drink Bud. I drank a lot of Bud.

On one beach trip, during a period when all the preppy girls were sporting those cute little “add-a-bead” necklaces, I strung a bunch of Budweiser bottle caps on a leather thong around my neck and told everyone it was an “add-a-Bud” necklace. This was widely regarded as hilarious, but only by people who were also drinking a lot of Bud.

In college, I switched to Stroh’s for a long time, but only because my favorite bar offered a 32-ounce cup of the stuff for a dollar.

There’s nothing that builds brand loyalty in a college student like enabling him to get blissfully hammered, play the Stones and George Jones on the jukebox (it wasn’t just cheap beer that made it an awesome bar), and have change left over at the end of the night from a five dollar bill. Good times.

But as the Good Book says, eventually you put away childish things. In the ’90s, beer choices exploded like a can of brewski left too long in the freezer. “Craft” beer became a thing that people talked about, admittedly sometimes to the point of absurdity.

Some discussed beer in the same sort of highfalutin’ terms we’ve come to expect from wine connoisseurs: “It’s a presumptuous little domestic brew that provides subtle notes of clove cigarettes, vinyl siding and motor oil, with a clean finish reminiscent of the 2013 batch of Lemon Pledge.”

Whatever, dude. Whose round is it?

All pretentiousness aside, the fact is that beer choices have gotten a lot better. Beer drinkers can actually find a brand with some taste to it, some personality. So, with all those choices out there, Anheuser-Busch apparently felt that it needed to do something to make its watery, bland flagship brew stand out. What better way for a beer made by a Dutch-owned company to stand out than by renaming it “America” and redesigning the already red, white and blue can to include an insignia that says “U.S.” and an “E Pluribus Unum” banner?

Wait. There’s no “In God We Trust”? Do those tulip-sniffing social democratic Dutch atheists hate God? Bill O’Reilly needs to get right on this.

The rebranding raises other questions. Since the can redesign makes it look like even more like a flag, will it be considered flag desecration to crumple it up and throw it in the garbage when empty?

Am I going to need to stand up off the bar stool and put my hand over my heart when the barkeep puts a tray full of them up on the bar? Will there be an “America Lite,” or will they just call the light version “Canada”?

When Donald Trump says he’s going to “make America great again,” does this mean he’s going to do something to make Bud taste like something other than weak battery acid?

Ah, well, it’s all moot. I’ll continue to drink good American beers, made in America, by Americans. Like Fat Tire, out of Fort Collins, Colo.; Shiner Bock, out of Shiner, Texas; and our own locally made brews, like the wonderfully named Man of Law, from Southern Pines Brewery. And Railhouse English Ale, from down Aberdeen way.

(If I missed any local or N.C. breweries that I should have mentioned, then please feel free to educate me, preferably with a cold draft in a frosted mug.)

God bless them all, and God bless America (the country).

Less to the Perry Indictment Than Meets the Eye

The Pilot Newspaper: Opinion

There was certainly a lot of liberal schadenfreude at the news that Texas Gov. Rick (“Oops”) Perry had been indicted by a grand jury in Austin on two felony counts.

Schadenfreude, as you may remember, is a German word meaning “pleasure at another’s misfortune.” (I love how those Germans have a word for every emotion.) But, as so often happens when it comes to legal matters in the news, there may be less to this supposed “crime” than meets the eye.

I’ll admit, there was a certain amusement value to seeing Perry’s mug shot plastered all over the news and to learn that he’d lost his concealed carry permit while the charges are pending. Heavens! How will he fight off the coyotes on his morning jog, the way he once bragged of doing to The Associated Press? It was even more amusing to watch Perry defenders twist and turn trying to spin this charge.

For example, The Wall Street Journal’s Wingnut Laureate Peggy Noonan appeared on ABC’s “This Week” (or as I like to call it, “David Brinkley Spins in His Grave”) and blasted the indictment as “local Democratic overreach.” When host George Stephanopoulos pointed out that the prosecutor who brought the case was a Republican, Noonan simply handwaved that away: “That may be. But when you look at this case, it just looks crazy.”

In fact, Michael McCrum, the prosecutor in question, worked in the Bush/Quayle White House and was appointed by a Republican judge. Democratic officials in Travis County recused themselves from the case. But Peggy Noonan, like any good conduit for right-wing persecution fantasy, isn’t going to let something like facts turn her aside.

All that said, Rick Perry deserves the same presumption of innocence as anyone else, and he shouldn’t be convicted of a crime unless a crime was actually committed. So let’s look at the case.

It seems there’s this district attorney, a Democrat as it turns out, named Rosemary Lehmberg. Lehmberg was the head of what was called the Public Integrity Unit (PIU), which investigates wrongdoing by public officials.

One fine night in April 2013, Madame DA not only got arrested for drunk driving, but also made a grade-A, world-class ass of herself while doing it. On video. Lehmberg pleaded guilty to the charges, which is about all one can do when the cops find a bottle of vodka in your passenger seat and have video of you raving like lunatic down at the station.

Perry demanded that Lehmberg resign her position. Lehmberg refused, claiming that just because she was convicted of breaking the law, it didn’t mean she couldn’t go on being a DA. (Say what you like about Texans, you have to admire ’em for pure chutzpah.)

Perry threatened to veto the funding for the PIU, then did so when Lehmberg remained defiant. So Special Prosecutor McCrum got a grand jury to indict Perry for “abuse of official capacity” (on the theory that vetoing funding to compel or punish behavior was using said public funds for an improper purpose) and “coercion of a public servant.”

It probably didn’t help that the Public Integrity Unit was, at the time, investigating misuse of public funds in a grant to a major Perry donor. It also didn’t help that Perry didn’t demand the resignations of two other Texas DAs, both Republicans, who’d also been involved in drunk driving arrests.

And let’s be honest: Had Barack Obama pulled a stunt like this, Republicans would be screaming about “tyranny” and “Chicago Thug Politics” and adding it to their long list of impeachable offenses (right after "mentioning that he has things in common with other black people” and right before “inappropriate golfing.”)

However, “failure to do right,” as an old DA in this district once used to put it, isn’t a crime. You have to have violated some actual law, and several legal scholars have pointed out that interpreting the law the way McCrum wants to might very well be unconstitutional.

The Executive Branch, state and federal, uses the veto and/or the threat of the veto all the time to bargain or to get its way. It’s the way checks and balances and separation of powers work. There’s also what’s called the “political question” doctrine, which states that if the question is “fundamentally political and not legal,” the courts should stay out of it.

In other words, hardball politics may be distasteful, even unfair, but they’re not necessarily criminal. If you don’t like the way an executive uses executive power, don’t vote for him. Which is exactly what I suggest when it comes to Rick Perry.

NOOOOOOOOOoooooooo!

A forklift driver in a liquor warehouse has an unthinkable accident:



It is to weep.

In a comic book, after a disaster like that, he'd probably rise after weeks in a booze-soaked coma to discover he'd transformed into a superhero or something.

Hey, is it my imagination, or does the newsreader sound like she's had a couple of stiff ones as well? Drinks, I mean.

Beer...Is There Anything It Can't Do?

Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates and Cambridge Police Sergeant James Crowley Spotted Together - wbztv.com

Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates and Cambridge police Sergeant James Crowley were spotted at a pub in Cambridge Wednesday night.

The owner of "River Gods" told WBZ the two sat in a booth together and talked for about an hour.

Over the summer, Crowley arrested Gates for disorderly conduct while responding to reports of a possible break-in at Gates' home. Gates accused the officer of racial profiling.

The incident led to a nation-wide debate over racial profiling and race relations, when President Barack Obama commented on the situation - coming to Gates' defense. All three men later sat at a table outside the White House in what became known as the 'beer summit.'

You Paid WHAT?

Latest Newspaper Column:

Recently, tequila maker Jose Cuervo ­decided to celebrate the 350th anniversary of the company by making a very special "Extra Añejo" blend, which would go for a ­whopping 2,250 bucks a bottle.

I have to say, I was a little taken aback. In the days of my misspent youth, I was known to ­partake of Señor Cuervo's product on occasion, and "premium" is not the word that comes to mind when I reminisce about it. The words that do come to mind are ­"hurling," "psychosis," and, "Oh, God, just let me get through this and I swear I'll never drink again!"

Nevertheless, the pricey tequila, aged in oak barrels for three years, blended with "select aged tequilas from the family's reserves," then aged 10 more months in used Spanish sherry casks, is reported to be a near-religious experience by one drinker. "A beautifully balanced tequila with an elegance you'll find in few sipping ­spirits," wrote Tony Sachs of the Huffington Post.

Well, maybe. But $2,250 a bottle? For that kind of dough, I want more than smooth taste and a good buzz. I want it to make my teeth whiter, my hair shinier and my eyesight better, and give me a singing voice like Van Morrison. And not just to my own ears.

But it got me thinking about conspicuous ­consumption: the quest for not just the best ­product, but the most expensive one. There's just a special cachet that attaches to products that make people go, "You paid what?!"

Take, for instance, the world's most expensive car, the Bugatti Veyron. You might think that $1.5 million is a lot of money for a car. But when you consider that it packs a 16-cylinder engine generating 1,001 horsepower, goes 0-60 in 2.5 seconds, hits 252 mph top speed in less than a minute, and can be ordered with an interior by Louis Vuitton...

OK, it's still a lot of money for a car. So go for one of life's simpler pleasures, like the world's most expensive bagel. Concocted by Chef Frank Tujague of New York's Westin Hotel, the bagel is "topped with white truffle cream cheese and goji berry-infused Riesling jelly with golden leaves."

As it turns out, those white truffles are the ­second most expensive food in the world (with caviar being No. 1). So if you've got a hankering for a nutritious breakfast featuring a tree ­fungus dug up by pigs, hop on up to the Westin. It'll only set you back a thousand bucks.

If want to gloat to your poorer friends and relations that you just dropped a grand on ­breakfast, why not do it on the world's most expensive cell phone? The Swiss company Goldvish SA sells a phone made of 18k white gold and set with 20 carats of fine diamonds. The phone also features Bluetooth, 2 GB of ­storage, FM radio, a digital camera and MP3 playback. What, no bottle opener?

Of course, you're not going to wash a ­breakfast like that down with Sanka. No, you want the worlds' most expensive coffee, the $600-a-pound brew made from the Kopi Luwak beans found in Southeast Asia.

The Kopi Luwak is cultivated, if you can call it that, in a somewhat unusual way. The raw beans are eaten, but not fully digested, by a weasel-like critter called the Asian Palm Civet. Something in the little beastie's digestive tract alters the chemistry of the beans and apparently creates extra deliciousness. When nature takes its course, the natives gather up and sell the beans, then presumably retire to their homes and ­chortle that they just charged some Westerner a premium price for weasel poo.

It just goes to show: There is nothing so ­outrageously priced that someone, somewhere, won't pay for it. Because as it turns out, the Cuervo referenced above isn't even the world's most expensive tequila. That honor goes to a ­bottle of "Super Premium" tequila made by a company called Tequila Ley .925. Price: $225,000. For a bottle of booze.

P.T. Barnum was right. There's one born every minute.

God, I Love Science

This article from Prospect Magazine's May 2009 issue discusses a possible genetic basis for a link between alcohol consumption and creativity--but only in some people:

Winston Churchill claimed it crucial for The World Crisis, his six-volume memoirs, stating: “always remember that I have taken more out of alcohol than it has taken out of me.” Novelist William Faulkner drank more intermittently, but claimed not to be able to face a blank page without a bottle of Jack Daniels. Beethoven fell under the influence in the later part of his creative life. Among painters, Van Gogh, Jackson Pollock, Francis Bacon and many others liked a drop or two while working.

Such figures make alcohol part of the territory of creativity. An exceptional few seemed to thrive on drink, leading to the idea of a “Churchill gene”: where some have a genetic makeup allowing them to remain healthy and brilliant despite consumption that would kill others. Mark Twain endorsed this view saying: “My vices protect me but they would assassinate you!”

***

Over the last few years, however, evidence has emerged that some have, if not a Churchill gene, then a creative cocktail gene.

While it does not establish a direct link between alcohol and creativity, the gene suggests alcohol has effects beyond sedation and relaxation. A 2004 study carried out at the University of Colorado found that around 15 per cent of Caucasians have a genetic variant, known as the G-variant, that makes ethanol behave more like an opioid drug, such as morphine, with a stronger than normal effect on mood and behaviour.

However, before we all rush to the keyboard with booze in hand, there's this caveat:

This initial euphoria is usually followed by a longer state of relaxation, lasting several hours. For those with the G-variant, this period aids the creative process. Perhaps the odd additional tipple might be needed to keep the fire burning, although too much further consumption douses the flames prematurely, inducing lethargy.

The effect of alcohol on this group is not the same as an opiate. The euphoria is much less pronounced than, say, heroin, while alcohol still exerts depressive effects. A drink too many and the soporific effect predominates, overwhelming the endorphins and sending even the G-variant drinker to sleep. This may be why Francis Bacon, by his own admission, worked well after a few drinks, but not when drunk.

So what do you guys think? Do you often have a beer or a glass of wine or a cocktail at hand while you write? Do a couple of shots get your creative juices flowing, or do you end up doing a face-plant onto the keyboard, with nothing to show for it the next morning but prose that looks like "akjpoN%$hcq;oqohqnvnv"? Do you think there may be a genetic reason why the burning question in the minds of so many writers is "Which way to the bar?"

Discuss.

Hat tip to John Scalzi, an admitted non-drinker who's pretty damn creative without it, and who notes that: This statistic that will no doubt delight a number of artists and writers I know, not that they actually need an excuse to drink, mind you.

He's right. I don't need an excuse.

What I need is an alibi.

Inhaling Your Drinks, Redux

BLDGBLOG: Atmospheric Intoxication

A former boutique storefront in London has become the temporary home for a pop-up bar with a twist: 2 Ganton Street is currently the U.K.'s "first walk in cocktail." Created by Bompas & Parr (known for their earlier experiments with glow-in-the-dark jello and scratch & sniff cinema), the "Alcoholic Architecture" bar features giant limes, over-sized straws, and most importantly, a gin-and-tonic mist.

Lucky ticket-holders (the event has now sold out) are equipped with plastic jumpsuits and encouraged to "breathe responsibly" before stepping into an alcoholic fog for up to 40 minutes – long enough to inhale "a fairly strong drink," according to Wired UK.

Is there a Bacardi Room, by any chance?

Okay, NOW Do You Take Global Warming Seriously?

Global Warming = Expensive Beer

The price of beer is likely to rise in coming decades because climate
change will hamper the production of a key grain needed for the brew - especially in Australia, a scientist warned Tuesday.

Jim Salinger, a climate scientist at New Zealand's National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research, said climate change likely will cause a decline in the production of malting barley in parts of New Zealand and Australia. Malting barley is a key ingedient of beer.

"It will mean either there will be pubs without beer or the cost of beer will go up," Salinger told the Institute of Brewing and Distilling convention.

Similar effects could be expected worldwide, but Salinger spoke only of the effects on Australia and New Zealand. He said climate change could cause a drop in beer production within 30 years, especially in parts of Australia, as dry areas become drier and water shortages worsen.

Barley growing parts of Western Australia, South Australia, Victoria and New South Wales would likely be harder hit than growing areas in New Zealand's South Island.

"It will provide a lot of challenges for the brewing industry," even forcing breweries to look at new varieties of malt barley as a direct result of climate change, Salinger said.

New Zealand and Australian brewer Lion Nathan's corporate affairs director Liz Read said climate change already was forcing up the price of malted barley, sugar, aluminium and sugar.

Read said that in addition to climate change, barley growers are grappling with competition from other forms or land use, such as the dairy industry.

This is very disturbing news. Thank God I'm drunk, or I'd be a lot more upset. Whatever you do, don't tell Gischler. I'm not sure his heart can take it.

Congratulations, Allan Guthrie!

The Winner of the Theakstons Old Peculier Prize is
Allan "Sunshine" Guthrie's excellent novel TWO WAY SPLIT. And well-deserved, I might add.

Congratulations, Allan. I've always dreamed of winning a prize named after a beer.

I'm A Moron--And I VOTE!

N.Y. Town Accidentally Bans Beer:

When they held a referendum in the little town of Potter, New York, to determine if one of the town's restaurants, which already sold beer in its attached convenience store, could sell brewskis in the restaurant itself, well, hijinks ensued:

State alcoholic beverage control laws require that whenever a town wants to expand the way it sells alcohol, it must ask voters five questions — “stupid questions,” according to the town supervisor, Leonard Lisenbee, a retired federal game warden who has been in office six years and who characterized the state-mandated wording as post-Prohibition-era legalese.

The questions, requiring more than 300 words, ask whether alcohol should be allowed in a variety of settings, including a hotel and, separately, a “summer hotel.” “Shall any person be authorized to sell alcoholic beverages at retail to be consumed on premises licensed pursuant to the provisions of Section 64 of the Alcoholic Beverage Control Law?” was the relevant one to the Hitchin’ Rail. But there was also “Shall any person be authorized to sell alcoholic beverages at retail, not to be consumed on the premises, where sold in the town of Potter?” which relates to stores like the Federal Hollow.

“I read it and I couldn’t understand it, and I’ve got a college education,” Mr. Lisenbee said. “When voters get confused, they vote no.”

And they did.

And so, the town of Potter brought back Prohibition.

The voters said no to all five questions, not only keeping the Hitchin’ Rail’s restaurant from serving beer and wine, but also blocking both stores from selling it, upon the expiration of their current licenses. Which means that on July 1, when the Federal’s license expires, the closest six-pack available for purchase will be in a town 10 miles away.

Why Homer Simpson Should Never Turn to Crime

Thief betrays himself to get free beer BERLIN (Reuters) - A German phone thief led police right to his front door when they called the stolen mobile to say he had won some free beer and he willingly gave his address.

"An officer called and said, 'You've won a crate of beer'," said a spokesman for police in the eastern town of Neustrelitz Friday.

"Then he asked where he lived so he could drop the beer off, and the guy told him. I think the man was drunk."

I'm all for catching crooks, but this just feels wrong. I mean, it hardly seems sporting. It's like hunting over a baited field.

Well, THAT'S Good to Know

Yahoo! News: NEWARK, N.J. - It's not drunken driving in New Jersey if it involves a Zamboni.

A judge ruled the four-ton ice rink-grooming machines aren't motor vehicles because they aren't usable on highways and can't carry passengers.

Zamboni operator John Peragallo had been charged with drunken driving in 2005 after a fellow employee at the Mennen Sports Arena in Morristown told police the machine was speeding and nearly crashed into the boards.

Police said Peragallo's blood alcohol level was 0.12 percent. A level of 0.08 is considered legally drunk in New Jersey.

Peragallo appealed, and Superior Court Judge Joseph Falcone on Monday overturned his license revocation and penalties.

'It's a vindication for my client,' Peragallo attorney James Porfido said after the hearing. 'It's the right decision.'

Morris County Assistant Prosecutor Joseph D'Onofrio said no decision had been made on whether to appeal.

Peragallo, 64, testified at his trial that he did drink beer and vodka, but not until after he had groomed the ice. However, he told police he had a shot of Sambuca with his breakfast coffee and two Valium-pills before work."

'Cause, you know, driving that big-ass Zamboni is pretty stressful. A man needs a little bracer before saddling up one of those beasts.

From the Innovations Desk

Milk beer to go on sale in Japan: A brewery here has succeeded in producing a low-malt beer with milk, after the drink was suggested as a product that would help use up surplus milk.

The drink, called 'Bilk' will go on sale on Feb. 1. It reportedly has a fruity flavor that its brewers hope will be popular among women.

The idea for the drink was conceived after dairy firms threw out a huge amount of surplus milk in March last year. The son of the manager of a liquor store in Nakashibetsu, whose main industry is dairy farming, suggested the idea of producing the milk beer to local brewery Abashiri Beer.

The 31-year-old factory head of the brewery was against the idea, saying that fermentation would be difficult because of the high starch content in milk, but went through a trial and error process to produce the drink anyway.

Since milk has a low boiling point, the brewery took care to control the temperature during the boiling process so the milk wouldn't boil over. After they put beer yeast and hops into the drink and began the fermentation process, the beverage looked and smelled like tea with milk. However, when fermentation was complete and the drink cooled down, it had the same color as beer.

Show of hands: How many people here realized that surplus milk was a problem?

Another show of hands: Would anybody here actually be brave enough to try this stuff?

I'm sorry, there are just some things that God meant to be separate. Beer and milk, for example.

Santa's Butt Is Comin' To Court

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I love The Christmas season; don't get me wrong. But I swear, every year it seems to get weirder and weirder. Take, for instance, the strange and terrible saga of Santa's Butt.

It seems that the Shelton Brothers Brewery, located appropriately enough in Belchertown, Massachusetts, distributes an English-made brew called "Santa's Butt Winter Porter." The company swears that the name does not refer to anything naughty. "It was inspired," Shelton Brothers insists on the company Web site, "by this famous line from a well-loved children's story book: 'And Santa sat on his great butt, drinking a hearty brew.'"

A "butt," they hasten to add, is a type of whomping-huge beer keg holding 108 gallons, upon which, one presumes, Santa could take his ease while enjoying a well-earned cold one after a long day in the workshop.

So there's nothing suggestive at all, according to the brewers. This might be a lot more convincing, however, if the label didn't feature a colorful cartoon Santa facing away from the viewer, with his enormous red-clad posterior dominating the frame.

This label ran afoul of the Grinches at the Maine Bureau of Liquor Enforcement, who banned Santa's Butt from the shelves of the Pine Tree State (seriously, that's what they call themselves). The label might cause the beer to appeal to children, a spokesman for the Maine State Police stated.

Yep, nothing gives a drink kid appeal like the exaggerated, bloated rump of a morbidly obese 800-year-old-guy.

Two other beers, a French ale called Les Sans Culottes ("Those Without Pants"), and a Belgian beer called Rose de Gambrinus ("I Have No Idea What This Means And I Am Too Lazy To Look It Up") were banned because their labels featured bare-breasted women.

"Basically, the standard we use is what are people going to see walking up and down a store aisle," the MBLE spokesman explained.

Frankly, I think we could stand to see more bare-breasted women on labels as we walk up and down the store aisles. It'd make things way more festive, so long as it was done, you know, tastefully. Nothing, say, larger than a DD cup. And let's get real, it'd just be the next logical extension of the basic marketing philosophy behind most beer advertising, which is that "if you drink lots of our beer, women with large breasts will want to have sex with you." But I digress.

It's not the first time that Shelton Brothers labels have caused controversy. Their Seriously Bad Elf beer (not to be confused with their Bad Elf beer) was banned in Connecticut. Not because of being risqué, mind you, but because the label (an evilly grinning elf firing Christmas ornaments at Santa's sleigh with a slingshot) might, again, "appeal to children" due to the presence of St. Nick on the label.

I have to ask here: So it "appeals to children." So what? They're not going to be able to buy the stuff.

I have trouble believing that a 5-year-old is going to see a six-pack of Seriously Bad Elf on the shelf , think "Look! Santa! I have to drink that stuff right now!" -- then take it off the top shelf, toddle to the counter, plonk down a sawbuck, and be found passed out in the gutter three hours later. I guess that's the kind of lack of imagination that explains why I'm not on the Massachusetts Liquor Control Board.

Well, you'll be happy to know that the freedom-loving brewers of Belchertown are not taking this blow to our civil liberties lying down.

With the help of the Maine Civil Liberties Union, they've filed a lawsuit in federal court against the MBLE, claiming that their rights under the First Amendment have been violated by not being able to sell Santa's Butt or their other beers with the nekkid ladies on the label in Maine.

"The illustrations on these labels are artistic, and art is entitled to the protection of the First Amendment," said Zachary Heiden, a staff lawyer with the Maine Civil Liberties Union.

Doggone right. If Santa's Butt is suppressed, if the good people of the state of Maine are not free to quaff fruity European beers with partially nude women on the labels -- well, by golly, we just might as well start learning to speak Arabic and eat humus or loofah or whatever it is they eat over there. After all, aren't beer and half-naked ladies two of the very freedoms the Islamofascists hate us for?

The Shelton Brothers may win, or they may lose. But there's one thing I know for sure: I seriously want to party with those guys.

God Bless Santa's Butt, God Bless America, and God bless us, every one!

I Can't Believe I've Never Heard of This Before

I've heard of people inhaling their drinks, but this is ridiculous:

State officials in the land of Old Grand-Dad, Jim Beam and Wild Turkey are pushing to ban a device that vaporizes liquor and allows people to inhale the intoxicating fumes for a quick high without the burn of hard liquor.

Teresa Barton, head of the Kentucky Office of Drug Control Policy, said banning alcohol vaporizers is a matter of public safety, not preserving the state's sipping whiskey industry. She said such devices could become 'a real deadly trap' because they have 'no purpose other than to get you drunk.'

So far, 17 states have banned them, including California, New York, Florida, Illinois, Pennsylvania and Ohio, and several others are considering doing so, said Sherry Green, executive director of the National Alliance for Model State Drug Laws. Tennessee, the home of Jack Daniels, already prohibits the vaporizers.

'When you inhale alcohol right into the lung tissue, that gets drawn right into the blood supply immediately, so it's a very rapid onset of the intoxicating effect, and so has obviously very high abuse potential,' said Robert Walker, an assistant professor at the University of Kentucky Center on Drug and Alcohol Research.

Walker said alcohol vaporizers bypass altogether the tactile pleasures of drinking wine with a fine meal or a cold beer with a pizza: 'You're going strictly to the intoxicating effect of alcohol.'"