Over at The Weekly Standard, Matt Labash spills the beans on how he has survived 12 consecutive White House Correspondants’ Association Dinners. The answer?

I part with these secrets reluctantly, since when I lecture in schools, I like to tell the kids not to drink unless it’s for a very good reason, like making the pain stop. But our twofold approach is simple: (a) Have no shame, and (b) ingest copious amounts of free hooch. Neither is usually a problem for us. We are, after all, journalists.

Cheers to that.

The city of Eugene has fined the Horsehead bar $12,960 dollars for a row of arborvitae in the bar’s outdoor smoking area. The city’s smoking ordinance mandates that at least 75 percent of a smoking area be open to outdoor air, and, according to the city planning commission, that row of plants constituted a wall, violating the ordinance.

The owners of the Horsehead are understandably pissed, especially since they already spent $10,000 tearing down the old fence that used to enclose the area in an attempt to conform to the 2005 smoking ordinance. The new row of arborvitae was supposed to allow air to circulate and give patrons privacy from downtown Eugene’s omnipresent street kids and hobos.

Apparently the city of Eugene has a very loose definition of “wall” because the planning commission also deemed the wrought-iron fence around Jameson’s outdoor area violated the code. Patrons are no longer allowed to smoke there, either.

Just another ridiculous moment in the annals of bureaucracy. For all those interested, there will be a smoke-in on Monday, May 12, 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. in the EMU amphitheater to protest all such asinine ordinances and laws targeting smokers. See you there.

P.S. The R-G story I linked to up top has a picture with the offending “wall” in the background. See for yourself. If that’s a wall, then I’m the bastard child of Elvis and Mother Teresa.

P.P.S. Hey everyone, we’re on Fark. So, uh … go us.

One of the most popular national news stories this morning is about something near and dear to all of our hearts: a man’s love of Pabst Blue Ribbon.

Photo by Mary Compton, SouthtownStar via AP

Bill Bramanti is his name, and he, at only 67-years-young, has purchased a custom designed PBR coffin, story courtesy of USA Today.

I plan on doing things the cheap way and having my ashes dumped in the empty 1/2 gal of Patrone that’ll presumably kill me.

Happy Cinco de Mayo, people!

Yesterday OC Ed-in-Chief Ossie and I drove up to Kell’s Irish Pub in Portland to hear Gene Healy of the Cato Institute talk about his new book, The Cult of the Presidency: America’s Dangerous Devotion to Executive Power. The good folks at the America’s Future Foundation hosted the event.

Healy is a smart, funny guy, and we enjoyed throwing back some Guinness with him. I haven’t read the book yet, but everything he said last night was spot-on. In short, voters and politicians on both sides of the aisle need to get rid of the idea that the President is the daddy or mommy who will fix all their problems. I did have to disagree with Healy when he started bagging on Teddy Roosevelt, though. Ugly views on manifest destiny aside, Roosevelt was pretty awesome; he gave a 90-minute speech after being shot in the chest. C’mon, Hillary Clinton isn’t even that hardcore in her fantasies.

The ‘Ol Dirty’s front page today has a big spread on all the Earth Day events on campus. Below the fold, however, is a nice little story headlined “Researchers link biofuels to food price increase.” From the opening paragraphs of the article:

A sign outside of the SeQuential Biofuels retail fueling station in south Eugene reads “fight global warming.” But recent studies and media reports have increasingly questioned biofuel’s side in that and another life-and-death planet-scale fight.

As food riots erupt across the globe, researchers and analysts have been scrambling to explain why food prices have exploded in recent months, and the crosshairs are increasingly focused on corn-based ethanol biofuels.

The article goes on to mention the increasing criticism of biofuel production coming from sources such as The Economist (subscription wall), The New York Times and Science. Reason has been all over the subject as well. With all this scrutiny, you would think the government would be less eager to push through new biofuel subsidies and laws. Well …

(more…)

• NORML
• PUMRAA
• Self-Refuting Drug Warriors
• Reefer Madness

I had the pleasure of sitting through a monthly OLCC meeting this morning, and the senior citizen commissioners actually did something, well, respectable for Oregon youth and music business. After rejecting admendements to the minors posting rule in December, which allow venues that could only have 21+ shows to admit minors into shows, the board passed a revised rule change unanimously today.

All of the public testimony was in favor of the amendments, which surprised Commissioner Christine Lewandowski who noted that a MADD representative would generally be at such a hearing in opposition.

The admendment allows Oregon venues that serve alcohol to host all age shows and those that don’t serve alcohol to do so for added income, as long as they set up an approved liquor control plan. The WW’s Local Cut has a story and some video coverage here.

So, Obama thinks poor folks are bitter, but Hillary knows they’re mostly just looking for someone to buy them a shot of mid-shelf booze. That’s why she sprang for a shot of Crown Royal at a media event relaxing evening with close friends at her neighborhood bar (in Indiana). But wait, you say, Crown Royal is Canadian whisky… there’s no “e” before the “y” or anything. While the pundits desperately analyze “the shot heard ’round the world” for implications on Clinton’s NAFTA position, we applaud Clinton for simply making booze an issue in this election. And for providing the evil spirit which is currently possessing our copy of Photoshop with some fresh meat. Cheers!

1. People dressed in garbage.

I saw the garbage monsters walking down 13th today, beatboxing and telling people to recycle.

The Smoke Free Campus Task Force (don’t laugh, it’s paid for) has set up a survey to gauge student, staff and faculty thoughts on making campus smoke-free. From the survey:

The Smoke Free Campus Task Force has been appointed to assess the pros and cons of establishing the University of Oregon as a smoke free campus. To assist in this effort, the task force is asking all faculty, staff, and students to complete a short survey to give feedback about the current campus smoking policy and whether the UO should become a smoke free campus. Establishing campus as smoke free would prohibit smoking anywhere on campus, including all buildings and all campus grounds and properties.

I would advise all freedom-loving students, staff and faculty to fill out the survey … as many times as possible. Also, check out the OC’s response to these efforts from fall term.

Paul Suderman documents the tragic collateral damage in the war on global warming over at Reason. Suderman eloquently recounts the plethora of good reasons to oppose the current generation of biofuels which burn through foodstocks with no benefit to carbon emissions. Moreover, he correctly identifies rising beer prices as the point at which we must all stand astride history and shout “STOP!”

Alright, I know this is redundant since most of the comment threads on this blog veer wildly off topic anyways, but seeing as how it’s spring break and and the staff has scattered to the four winds, here’s your open thread. Go for it.

P.S. And as always, drunken belligerence, vitriol and Big Lebowski references are encouraged.

P.P.S. C’mon, all the cool blogs are doing it.

Barack Obama was the leading presidential candidate in a survey by American University. When asked who they would vote for if the presidential election was held today, 54 percent of respondents chose Obama, with McCain coming in second at 19 percent.

However, a similar poll by the Oregon Commentator found Ron Paul leading by 100 percent. Although Paul has been popular with the college crowd, this is a surprising surge and could cause trouble for current Republican front-runner McCain. The results also indicate that 100 percent of university students are registered Independents, functional alcoholics and named Ossie Bladine.

The Oregon Commentator presents its second issue of 2008, “Special Elections.” There is too much good stuff in it to mention - Billy Squire lyrics for instance - so just click on the cover already. Enjoy

The Oregon Commentator isn’t known for its superb copy editing, but I am sure we would never print the opening line to an opinion by Matt Petryni in today’s ODE. (This was caught by my functional alcoholic roommate.)

So recently I was in a bar, which shall remain nameless for its own defense, and I ordered one of the standard gin cocktails (think: the “martini” or the “Manhattan,” for example).

Bourbon, Matt, a Manhattan is made with whiskey and/or bourbon.