Alex Seitz-Wald:

Tucked into Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s (R) much-discussed budget was a little-noticed provision to overhaul the state’s regulation of the beer industry. In a state long associated with beer, the provision will make it much more difficult for the Wisconsin’s burgeoning craft breweries to operate and expand their business by barring them from selling directly to restaurants and liquor stores, and preventing them from selling their own product onsite.

The new provision treats craft brewers — the 60 of whom make up just 5 percent of the beer market in Wisconsin — like corporate mega-brewers, forcing them to use a wholesale distributor to market their product. Under the provision, it would be illegal, for instance, for a small brewer located near a restaurant to walk next door to deliver a case of beer. They’ll have to hire a middle man to do it instead.

But more noteworthy than the provision itself is how it was enacted. The provision was quietly slipped in the massive budget legislation without any consultation from independent craft brewers, who are justifiably outraged by it.

These wholesaler requirements ought to be eliminated entirely, not expanded. I’ve explained in the past how they’re phony Prohibition-era artifacts that create state-sanctioned artificial middlemen who then get enormously wealthy (I’m looking at you Cindy McCain) by limiting consumer choice and inflating the price of alcohol.

I’d love to hear Walker try to explain how crushing microbreweries is consistent with his alleged free market principles.

• With FourLoko out of the way, State AGs are now shamelessly grandstanding about the next “irresponsible” alcohol product.
• Cops once again mistake tomato plants for marijuana. This business of getting probable cause for a search warrant based on purchases of perfectly legal products (like hydroponic equipment) has been going on for years. But it’s still creepy.
• I’m probably going to write my own review of this James Stewart book about white collar lying, but Scott Greenfield knocks it around pretty good here.
• Write your own caption.
• I have more on that Andrew Cohen blog post about online poker over at Hit & Run.
• Another death after a non-lethal Tasering.
• Here is an awesome video illusion.

• Interesting article on social networking sites and their role in police work.
• Nine-year-old kid gets pepper sprayed by cops.
• SCOTUS further restricts habeas claims in federal court. More here.
• DWI registry? Sure! Why not? I think the best strategy at this point may be to support as many registries as possible. Eventually, we’ll all be on one, thus rendering registries useless.
• I’ve written a bit before on the battle between the Cook County, Illinois DA’s office and the Northwestern University journalism class taught by David Protess, which has uncovered a number of wrongful prosecutions. It now looks as if things have taken an unfortunate turn. I only know what’s in the article, but it doesn’t make Protess look good. Which is too bad, because he has done some great work.

• Headline of the day.
• “Guatemala is a good place to commit a murder, because you will almost certainly get away with it.”
• City of Dover digs up, hauls off basketball hoops on private property that were in violation of a new “clear zone” ordinance.
• USA Today report suggests D.C. school officials cheated on standardized tests.
• Disturbing how common these sorts of images have become. Remember, these are domestic law enforcement agents you’re seeing, not military.
• The Tennessee legislature is again considering a bill that would allow grocery stores to sell wine. (Note to local media: Make sure your headline puns are properly aligned with the beverage being regulated. “Wine legislation on tap” = No! “Legislature serves up wine bills” = better.) Rather hilariously, Tennessee’s liquor stores, which have a monopoly on wine retailing, are again warning that this could unleash a wave of binge drinking and DWI carnage on the roadways.
• So I guess atheists and Muslims are the reason Newt Gingrich cheated on his wives.
• Disturbing list of writers and intellectuals who have recently gone missing in China.

• This is either creepy or genius.
• Kid beats a speeding ticket with his smart phone.
• Former MADD chapter president arrested for DUI. Also, .239!
• Another illegal arrest for recording an on-duty police officer, this time in New Hampshire.
• An interview with Brian Aitken.
• Mitch Daniels’ disappearing felony.

• Cops don’t like red light cameras either . . . because they aren’t capable of extending “professional courtesy.”
• Lead investigator for Atlanta PD unit that carried out the raid on the Atlanta Eagle gay bar is arrested on DUI, marijuana charges.
• I’m flummoxed that someone would even ask this question. Speaks volumes about where the debate is right now.
• Obama intervenes to keep a Yemeni journalist in jail.
• Another testament to the perils of foreign entanglements: Is a U.S. company assisting Egyptian surveillance?
• I’m cheering for you fellow Hoosiers, but I’m skeptical. Indiana’s new native-distilled whiskey, on the other hand, is quite good. I’ve had both the bourbon and the rye.
• Just bought the e-version of this book. Looks fascinating. (This one, too.)

• The George Bluth budget plan.
• Sixth graders charged with “terroristic threats” for what appears to be a fake bomb map based on a video game.
• Cliff Kincaid: still an idiot.
• Former U.S. Attorney calls for civil rights investigation of Seattle police department.
• Here are two baby platypi.
• Oh, Michael Ramirez. You were so close to getting it right.
• Strange. Here’s another rape-y typo.
• Gift idea for that hard-to-buy-for Mississippi governor in your life.
• And you thought libertarians were being hypberpolic when we said the same logic behind the Four Loko ban would soon have regulators and Nanny Statists gunning for Irish coffee. Well . . . away we go.

• Town kills off red light cameras because . . . they weren’t making enough money for Redflex.
• Attorneys ask judge to remove himself from a case. Judge refers attorneys to U.S. Attorney for possible prosecution.
• And now: Four Loko stings.
• Florida police chief charged for attempting to undermine the rape case against his friend.
• Study suggests cell phone use may improve driving.
• Knight Kiplinger wants to make 401(k)s  mandatory. Contributing to them, too. Really. Note the justification at the end. Hey, we can force people to purchase health care. So why not? The door has been thrown wide open. Expect more of this.
• I write about this stuff every day, yet sentences like this one never cease to blow my mind: “Tchachoua has the right to file charges in civil court and prove that he had the money legally, police said.”

My crime column this week looks at the notable clemency and pardon stories of 2010.

Also, I have a post up at Hit & Run responding to the Economist‘s criticism of my call to abolish drunk driving laws.

• Egyptian Muslims offer themselves as human shields to protect Coptic Christians from extremists during a Christmas Eve mass.
• Nashville DUI arrests are down by about 35 percent in 2010 due to funding cutbacks. Effect on drunk driving fatalities: None.
• Here’s another fun Steven Hayne case. Hayne determined a woman died of stab wounds to the face and neck even though the body he examined had no head. Note his explanation, which refers to witness testimony. It’s a good example showing why a medical examiner shouldn’t be given that kind of information before he conducts an autopsy.
• Another state legislature wants to let local cops monitor what prescription drugs you’re taking.
• Harvey Silverglate on the folly of anti-bullying laws. Naming a proposed law after a dead person is a pretty reliable indicator that it’s going to be a crappy law.

• TSA pat-down leaves bladder cancer patient soaked in his own urine.
• Marijuana may stop the spread of breast cancer.
• Obama says he supports new TSA security measures.
• Defenestration: The Movie.
• UN vote gives the okay for member countries to execute gay people.
• Classism and the Four Loko ban.
• More unintended consequences from ObamaCare.

I promised to share the hate mail responses to my column on abolishing drunk driving laws. I’m happy to say I actually haven’t received any. I have, however, received about a half-dozen emails from law enforcement officials like this one:

I spent 11 years in police work, from 1978 until 1989. The second most time-consuming thing I could do was arrest an intoxicated driver (second only to committing a mental person). Officers are taken off the street for hours at a time over someone who is barely, if at all, impaired. Meanwhile, grandma is driving the wrong way down a one-way street or driving 30 miles per hour on the freeway, and if you write her a ticket you’re accused of picking on old people….I’m with you all the way. Thanks.

I’ve also done three radio interviews on the column. All of the hosts were supportive. And only one caller was hostile. I’m really pleasantly surprised at the reception. Of course, there’s not a chance in hell that’s going to translate into policy changes any time soon. But still. Feels like public opinion might be turning just a little against MADD and the temperance crowd.

I make the case for doing so in this week’s crime column.

I promise to share any resulting hate mail.

• The Nobel Peace Prize committee gets one right.
• 72,000 dead people received $18 million in federal stimulus money.
• I am shocked that an American president might exaggerate the threat of terrorism for political purposes.
• Cracked explains the science behind Lord Acton’s famous quote.
• A disturbing case from Judge Talmadge “Say the Pledge or You’re Going to Jail” Littlejohn’s days as a prosecutor.
• Conservative icons Brent Bozell and Richard Viguerie come out in opposition to the death penalty.
• DOT Sec. Ray LaHood now pushing for a complete ban on cell phones in cars. He’s also targeting OnStar and Sync.
• Excellent dissection of the latest government scare study about “binge drinking.” Just absurd that the NIAA now defines a “binge” as drinking until your BAC hits .08.

• I don’t know about you, but the name “Wikileakileaks” makes me have to pee.
• Focus on the Family is concerned that anti-bullying efforts in public schools may prevent straight kids from calling gay kids faggots.
• Nerd jokes.
• Heavy drinkers outlive nondrinkers. Moderate drinkers live longest of all. Which means alcohol excise taxes may be killing you!
• Department of Transportation fines non-profit air ambulance service $30,000 for using the wrong pronoun.
• An armful of badgers.

• This comment thread makes me sad. There is no “right” to something someone else has to provide or pay for. That’s an entitlement.
• The city of Chicago The State of Illinois is taking advantage of low housing costs to seize homes to make way for an airport that may never exist.
• Tony Blair to be medal-of-freedomed.
• Investment tip: Buy beach-front property in western Ethiopia.
• Salmon-flavored vodka. Related: This Agitator guest post from Jacob Grier on how to make bacon-infused bourbon still gets linked about once a week. Here in Nashville (right around the corner from me, actually), there’s a great cocktail spot called the Patterson House that makes a delicious maple bacon bourbon drink.

• If you had dreams of going dwile flonking in Britain this summer, well you can just forget it.
• Georgia prosecutor orders a defense lawyer off a death penalty case. Bonus: The state’s supreme court upheld the defendant’s conviction. Double bonus: Same prosecutor is now angling to become a judge.
• Puppycide: Cops shoot man’s medical dog while looking for a burglary suspect.
• Pretty sure this law isn’t going to have the effect its supporters think it will.
• Philly cops under fire for passing around gruesome accident scene photo.
• Nashville mayor thanks city jail inmates for saving the city’s water supply.
• Arizona continues its campaign to become the Mississippi of the West.

• I think they should get the money. And it’s the second time this has happened?
• Meta amusing.
• California NAACP needs a collective hearing test.
• South Carolina state senator needs a damned clue.
• So does the Family Research Council.
• The Economist looks at civil asset forfeiture.
• C-O-N-T-R-O-V-E-R-S-Y
• Gin!
• More evidence that illegal immigrants don’t cause crime.

• New PHD scandal rocks the professional sports world.
• Gene Healy on the chorus calling for Obama to don a cape and fix the oil spill.
• Ohio Supreme Court rules cops can issue speeding tickets based on a guess-timate.
• Just so I have this straight: The suicide rate at the Chinese Foxconn factory is no higher than the rate in the rest of the country, the workers are paid more than they’re paid in other factories, and they’re certainly better off than if the plants had never been built. But consumers should feel guilty about it all anyway?
• Albuquerque police department using its helicopter for the really important stuff . . . like busting parties where there’s underage drinking.

• Alcohol wholesalers: A dying breed in need of one last merciful act of euthanasia.
• That’s one hail of a storm. (You see what I did there?)
• NFL Films + Hulu = A whole lot of awesome. Problem is, I don’t need the temptation to procrastinate right now.
• The New York Times would have you believe that the free market and free association are responsible for Jim Crow. Big government advocates have an incredible ability to blind themselves from the sins of government.
• Turns out, the new Miss USA isn’t a radical undercover Muslim spy ninja after all.
• Mark Twain’s autobiography due out soon, about 100 years after his death. I don’t think even Chinese Democracy took this long.
• Anyone else get the feeling that illegal immigrants are the new sex offenders? Want to get elected (or at least win your GOP primary)? Find something new and mean we can to do them.

Alcohol regulators in California don’t seem to understand the process of infusing spirits with flavors like orange or vanilla. So naturally, they’re prohibiting that which they don’t understand, invoking a ban on on-site distilling that really has nothing to do with the infusion process.

The state of California has suddenly started issuing warnings to bars and restaurants prohibiting them from “infusing” liquors such as vodka with herbs or fruits—a popular and widespread practice. But the state’s Alcoholic Beverage Control Department has no clear explanation for why it has targeted several establishments in the San Francisco Bay Area in recent weeks. And it can’t, or won’t, definitively answer the fundamental question of why it’s illegal in the first place to make infusions without having a special license.

In fact, the law under which the warnings were issued doesn’t have anything to say about infusion, but rather seems aimed at preventing bars from making their own hooch, creating dangerous brews, or adulterating liquor to increase its alcohol content.

“It’s totally insane,” said Bill Owens, president of the American Distilling Institute, which happens to be headquartered in the Bay Area. “I’d never heard of such a thing. It baffles me beyond my wildest dreams.”

Chris Albrecht, an ABCD deputy division chief, said that despite the enforcement actions, the department “does not consider this a priority.” The warnings, he said, were issued to a few establishments where enforcement agents showed up in response to unrelated complaints. Agents saw that infused drinks were being offered for sale, issued the warnings, and, in at least one case, asked an employee to pour the illicit concoctions down the drain, Albrecht said.

State alcohol regulators have to be among the most petty and arbitrary bureaucrats in government. Witness my state of Virginia, where they recently resurrected a Prohibition-era law to arrest a bartender for serving sangria (the state legislature had to pass a bill legalizing sangria and martinis), and went after my favorite bar a couple years ago for serving delicious frozen beer on a stick.

Somewhat related: How to make bacon-infused bourbon.

Various jurisdictions in Texas have made news over the last several years for sending vice squads into bars and arresting patrons for drinking. Not drinking and driving, mind you. Just drinking. In a bar.

In a scary piece for Mother Jones, Adam Weinstein delves into just how ridiculously broad and vague the state’s public intoxication laws really are. Exceprt:

The public intoxication standard, backed by the Texas-based Mothers Against Drunk Driving, is so broad that you can be arrested on just a police officer’s hunch, without being given a Breathalyzer or field sobriety test. State courts have not only upheld the practice but expanded the definition of public intoxication to cover pretty much any situation, says Robert Guest, a criminal defense attorney in Dallas. “Having no standard allows the police to arrest whoever pisses them off and call it PI,” he says, adding, “If you have a violent, homophobic, or just an asshole of a cop and you give him the arbitrary power to arrest anyone for PI, you can expect violent, homophobic, and asshole-ic behavior.”

For some officers, PI has provided a ready-made reason for detaining minorities. A Houston defense attorney, who asks to be unnamed since he specializes in misdemeanors such as PI, puts it this way: “If you’re brown and you’re around—you’re going down.” Nick Novello, a 27-year veteran of the Dallas Police Department, blew the whistle on three colleagues who he claims filled their arrest quotas by picking up people, mostly minorities, for PI. “They were illegally arrested,” Novello says. “It’s an absolute perversion.” (Two were removed from the force.)

According to a recent report by sociology and law professors at the University of California-Berkeley, the Dallas suburb of Irving has used “discretionary” public intoxication arrests to fish for undocumented immigrants.

• Beautiful collection of sled dog photos from the around the world.
• Just so we’re clear, minors who send explicit photos of themselves to other minors get hit with child porn charges. Cops who send explicit photos of themselves to minors get probation.
• Noel St. John’s “Snowlapse” video, first linked here, now has over 300,000 views! Nice job, Noel!
• It’s funny to see a PIRG organization complaining about corporations that take political positions without first consulting shareholders. Shareholders can sell. College students forced or tricked into donating to PIRG, on the other hand, don’t have that option.
• Obama administration wants the government to be able to track you via your cell phone without first obtaining a warrant.
• Forbes now has a blog dedicated to booze.
• Interesting article on Michigan Gov. Jennifer Graholm granting clemency to elderly prisoners.
• Striking new aerial photos of the World Trade Center collapse.

A quick roundup of recent stories on law enforcement officials and DWI laws…

• Ten police officers in Westchester County, New York admit to local newspaper that they routinely let other officers off after catching them driving drunk off duty.
• Off-duty, possibly drunk South Carolina officer pulled over after a chase demands “professional courtesy” she says is customarily granted to other officers. She was charged with reckless driving and disorderly conduct, but wasn’t arrested or given a breath test, and was allowed to go home.
• Chicago police officer shown to have faked dozens of DWI arrests won’t face criminal charges.
• Off-duty Massachusetts state police lieutenant crashes into pickup truck, causing the truck to flip several times. Officer admitted drinking earlier in the day and two open beer cans were found in his car. Other officers don’t administer field sobriety test for 2 1/2 hours, after allowing him to talk to his attorney. He was also never given breath or blood tests. He did get a $20 traffic ticket.
• From last year, DWI charges dropped against Nevada DA who caused two crashes within six hours while in California, and tested over the legal limit after the second. He was allowed to plead to reckless driving.