Totally Hot Brazilian Guy in the NYT

Sander Mecca went to jail for two years for selling ecstasy in Sao Paulo because Brazil has no minimum threshold for when possession becomes dealing.  Sads!  Meanwhile, Argentina is about to decriminalize possession of some drugs. Having spent the semester during and after September 11th there, I can vouch for the quality of Argentine drugs, which are lots of fun and I encourage students to study abroad there and do them.

It’s also nice to see the NY Times comfortably use the word rave without quotation marks, or call it a Ra ve the way they still refer to websites as Web sites.

Sander looks even moodier and cuter in the b/w photo in the print copy.  Who’s that on his shirt?  It looks like Viggo the Carpathian (scourge of the EPA).  What a babe.

Drunk Children in Wisconsin

Interesting.  Wish we hadn’t driven through the state in a matter of hours:

Minors can drink alcohol in a bar or restaurant in Wisconsin if they are accompanied by a parent or legal guardian who gives consent. While there is no state law setting a minimum age, bartenders can use their discretion in deciding whom to serve.

…

Before he owned Wile-e’s, Mr. Whaley said there were some cases where he had to say no to a parent. “I’ve had situations where a parent was going to buy drinks for a kid who looked 8 or 10 years old,” he said, “and I had to say, ‘That’s a no-go.’ ”

Ha!  They don’t identify the opposition to this cultural quirk by party affiliation, but I wonder who it could be?  There is a broad anti-good time bipartisan coalition out there, between Christians and crusaders for the public health.  Other than keeping drunk driving as a misdemeanor until your fifth offense (wtf?), I say hands off my PBR, especially in terms of retroactive consumption in the bizarro-world in which I grew up in Sheboygan.  Suck it!