Warning: What follows may throw you into a xenophobic panic and scare you out of having any level of fun next time you travel abroad.

1. Do Not Use Drugs Nobody ever follows this one, despite the lessons of Brokedown Palace. Even if you're careful and know the rules, being in an altered state of mind reads differently abroad. Some attribute Amanda Knox's bizarre interactions with Italian police to being stoned, while others say the use of marijuana tipped the circumstantial evidence:

In Britain and Italy, "Foxy Knoxy" was portrayed as an angel-faced "she-devil", a promiscuous pot-smoker who went shopping for underwear with her boyfriend straight after Meredith Kercher's murder and did cartwheels during questioning by detectives.

I can't think of any reason to turn cartwheels during cop questioning other than being stoned, so I'm going to assume that's what happened here. Point being: if it's your dream to smoke weed on the same Rishikesh hillside that the Beatles did? Do your best not to be near the scenes of any vicious felony murders.

2. Know that Pranks Are Always Lost in Translation Four American military brats on Tokyo's Yokota Air Base were arrested this weekend for the attempted murder of a woman whose motorbike hit a trip line strung across a road. In a nation where base-related crime is a "delicate issue"—and where "boys will be boys" was a most unwelcome strain of discourse when three servicemen raped a schoolgirl in 1995—a bunch of American kids nearly killing someone won't be taken lightly. Ditto the infamous tale of Michael Fay, the American teen whose street vandalism resulting in a "moistened rattan cane" flogging.

3. Never Underestimate How Prude the Rest of the World Is Even in Italy, the nation that gave us amore and invented the sonnet, Foxy Knoxy's "sexual appetite" was central to her case. First she "leapt to notoriety in the days after the murder, kissing and cuddling [boyfriend and convicted accomplice] Mr Sollecito in front of the lenses of the cameras." Then prosecutors concocted a story about a ritualistic satanic orgy that got tossed out of court. Knox ultimately may have been convicted based on forensic evidence, but there's still a vocal Team Knox arguing that the sexual smear campaign did her in.

4. Learn This Sentence in the Native Dialect "I am an American, I want to call my embassy." If you get arrested, start saying it and don't stop until until you hear an American accent on the other end of the phone. You'll feel like a douchebag, but when you're not drinking bilgewater from a gutter in a Turkish prison, you'll be glad you did. It's your best chance at a lifeline, since even the pettiest local officials don't want to deal with a diplomatic mess.

5. Don't Start Shit In some countries, being accused of a crime is enough to warrant imprisonment. Case in point: This harrowing account from an American who spent three grueling weeks in a Japanese prison without bail or a trial, following a drunken altercation with a cabbie and ill-prepared self-report to the police:

I was pretty tired and drunk so I didn't have much patience... I also noticed that he didn't have his car navigation system switched on so I yelled at him to use it and called him a f*cking idiot (well, the equivalent) in Japanese. I didn't give him much chance to turn it on, as I soon reached over and started pushing the buttons to switch it on myself, all the while yelling at him that he was an f*king idiot....

I decided in my drunken mind to stop him from calling the cops and I reached over and grabbed the phone from him. He of course started screaming robbery and completely went nuts...

The next day when I came to my senses, I decided to go to the cops and sort it out. ... However, when I got to the police station, I found out that the driver had told them a very different story. ... In Japan it turns out that you are 100% guilty until proven otherwise and I kind of went to the cops without having thought through the potential outcomes.

He was interrogated repeatedly. His lawyer spoke no English. By day 15 he "really started getting desperate" and watched as his prison mates gave false confessions. He loses weight, eats terrible food, and is generally terrified. Point being: Don't start shit, and if you do, find someone who can explain what's going on before you throw yourself at the mercy of an unfamiliar system.

6. Don't Go Places You're Not Allowed There are legitimate reasons for going places where you are not allowed. (Like killing Nazis in Inglourious Basterds) But if you don't want to get arrested, don't do it, because even if you run away and apologize profusely, your foreign captors may not care. From journalists-turned-North Korean hostages Euna Lee and Laura Ling's account of their capture:

Feeling nervous about where we were, we quickly turned back toward China. Midway across the ice, we heard yelling. We looked back and saw two North Korean soldiers with rifles running toward us. Instinctively, we ran.

We were firmly back inside China when the soldiers apprehended us. Producer Mitch Koss and our guide were both able to outrun the border guards. We were not. We tried with all our might to cling to bushes, ground, anything that would keep us on Chinese soil, but we were no match for the determined soldiers. They violently dragged us back across the ice to North Korea and marched us to a nearby army base, where we were detained.

Via the AP report:

The official tells The Associated Press that it's unclear whether the 23-year-old daughter of pop star Billy Joel and supermodel Christie Brinkley had attempted suicide. The official says a friend of Joel's frantically called 911 from Joel's downtown Manhattan apartment around noon on Saturday and said the singer had taken several pills. The official didn't know how many or what kind of pills were taken. The official wasn't authorized to publicly disclose the matter and spoke on condition of anonymity.

Obviously, this brings to mind DJ AM's overdose, and for that matter, Heath Ledger's overdose on pills last year. Both were spiraling into exhaustion and depression; Joel had two performances scheduled for the next week and most recently, her mom was in the tabloids for a rough divorce (second item) with scuzzy architect Peter Cook, which her Dad, Billy Joel, came to Brinkley's defense for. The family's got problems. Alexa's career's been going well, not incredible, but pretty decent: the average amount of press for whatever the kid of a celebrity who embarks on a music career would get, and there's really no indication of the kind of dark shit that would lead to drug abuse or chronic depression in her music, or, for that matter—hold the above issues of her parents—any news about her. Signs, though: they're elusive, if they exist. Update: Uh, nevermind. Per the George Rush-penned New York Daily News report:

Alexa Ray is the only daughter of Joel and Brinkley, whose nine-year marriage ended in divorce in 1994. A source said Alexa has been an emotional wreck since breaking up with her boyfriend, ex-bandmate Jimmy Riot, years ago. "She has battled depression," the source said. "She had a rough breakup with a boyfriend, a musician in her band, several years ago. It was her first love." A family friend said Brinkley's ugly split with ex-husband Peter Cook and Joel's marriage with a woman "almost her own age" took a heavy toll on Alexa Ray.

Heartbreak's awful. Ugh.

Again, Joel's publicist noted that she's in stable condition, and that they're "assessing her needs." We can laugh all we want about the kids of celebrities, but really, who knows how easy (or hard) they have it? It's not a third-world problem, but it's not one most of us can speak from experience on, either. Here's hoping she gets better.

According to NORML, the following states have medical marijuana laws in place already: Alaska, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington. You may notice that with the exception of New Englandish states that don't even count because of all the hippies there, the list is dominated by West Coast states. What would Biggie think?

New Jersey would be a powerful step towards getting the East Coast back in the game. The WSJ says that even incoming NJ governor and rotund Republican Chris Christie says he'll support the bill if it has "enough restrictions," which we assume means that Redman can't bogart all of Chris Christie's shit. Fair enough.

Christmas specials were feeding you messages to accept gays, love women, embrace Jesus, and do lots and lots of LSD. Yes, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeeris on CBS tomorrow night, and watching it can be like playing a Judy Garland record backward looking for Satanic messages. This is our early present to all of you out there. Free your minds from the traps set up by network executives and watch with your eyes wide open for the first time. These are our thoughts on five classics, but in the seasonal spirit of giving, please share the subtext of other more obscure specials in the comments. We know some of you out there speak the truth.

Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer
The Story: A reindeer that is born different casts himself out of normal society, until everyone realizes what makes him different also makes him strong, and he and the other "misfits" must save Christmas.
The Subtext: Rudolph's nose should shine with fabulous, because this is a tale of gay empowerment. Aside from Rudolph, his fey elf friend Hermey is also a big old queen and the Island of Misfit Toys looks like the craziest gay bar this side of the Ramrod.
Favorite Example: Yukon Cornelius was the first bear ever in an animated television special.
Nice List: Babygays, PFLAG moms, tom boys, anyone who might be a little bit odd, Levi Johnston.
Naughty List: School bullies, Fred Phelps, girlie girls, people who voted for Prop 8, Sarah Palin.

Frosty the Snowman
The Story: After being brought to life by a magic hat, Frosty has to flee the hot city or else he'll melt. An evil magician traps him in a greenhouse, where he melts, but Santa brings him back to life.
The Subtext: Global warming is a figment of your imagination, and praying to Jesus will save the environment and return the ice caps to their former glory.
Favorite Example: Seriously, Santa magically undoes all the damage from "greenhouse gases" with a flick of his wrist.
Nice List: People who think evolution is a joke, monkeys, your mother's pastor, Sarah Palin.
Naughty List: Scientists, thinking people, your rabbi, Al Gore.

The Grinch Who Stole Christmas
The Story: A furry green thing hates a bunch of strange insect-like creatures so much that he steals all their bizarre looking holiday accoutrement so that they can't celebrate. Then they sing in an alien language.
The Subtext: Do a shitload of drugs. The Grinch is Timothy Leary geeked out on acid and tripping so hard that he thinks that hoo-hinkers are real. By the end of the program, he sobers up and gives everything back.
Favorite Example: The hoo-roast beast is really the kid that the babysitter put in the microwave instead of the turkey.
Nice List: Stoners, Dead heads, ravers, Marion Barry.
Naughty List: Frat boys, Celine Dion fans, addiction counselors, Sarah Palin.

A Charlie Brown Christmas
The Story: Charlie Brown is sad because Christmas has become about fake trees and commercialism. He finds salvation in Jesus.
The Subtext: Do we have to spell it out for you? This cartoon special has converted more people than death row and foxholes put together.
Favorite Example: Linus lisping the message about three wise men coming to visit baby Jesus.
Nice List: Fundamentalists, Kirk Cameron, anti-consumerists, Marcie, Sarah Palin.
Naughty List: Scientologists, Alan Thicke, Wal-Mart, Peppermint Patty, Barney Frank.

The Year Without a Santa Claus
The Story: Santa is sick and wants to take a year off. Mrs. Claus gets two elves to go to Earth to get someone to convince Santa to get off his lazy ass and work. The humans will only do it if the elves can make it snow in the warm south. They have to go to Cold Miser and Heat Miser and convince them to let it snow where it should be sweltering. The two squabbling brothers won't do it, so Mrs. Claus goes to Mother Nature, who makes it happen and saves Christmas.
The Subtext: Fuck the patriarchy, women rule! With all the inept, lazy, fighting, macho men bumbling about, it's the ladies who get everything done.
Favorite Example: Mrs. Claus dresses up as Santa and says she could do the job if she really wanted to.
Nice List: Naomi Wolfe, diva worshipers, third-wave feminists, your mom, Hillary Clinton.
Naughty List: Dr. Ruth, misogynists, Girls Gone Wild, dear old dad, Sarah Palin.

Okay, before we delve into Med Grow Cannabis College and its myriad innovations in marijuana education, let's get all the dumb dope jokes out of the way: Yes, Med Grow Cannabis College does give new meaning to the phrase "higher education."

They didn't even use the extra two days to change this lead. Dude.

[Sorry, losers. Pic via]

Dean Meminger is a 62 year-old former New York Knick and dad of Dean Meminger, Jr., a reporter and anchor at NY1. Police found discarded crack pipes at the scene of a fire in the Bronx that put the elder Meminger in critical condition last Sunday, and proceeded to leave 16 families homeless. Meminger has been battling cocaine addiction for much of his adult life, according to the NYDN.

Two's not quite an official trend. But if Pat Kiernan so much as stubs his toe any time soon, we advise everyone at NY1 to flee while you still can.

It's real name is mephedrone and you snort it. Reading from the big book of newspaper cliches, it is a 'designer drug,' which is a phrase that means nothing and that no-one under the age of 50 has ever used. The Daily Mail, Britain's resident outrage-sheet sums it up:

The 'legal' drug, also known as Mephedrone and MCAT, can be bought over the internet and is billed as a cross between Ecstasy and cocaine

The paper was reporting on it after a 14-year-old girl suffered a heart attack while high on Ketamine and mephedrone. They play down the heart-attack-causing tendencies of the former, because then there's no story. The Australian press are making even more tenuous excuses to scare people. This story is about a teenager who died while on Ecstasy. See if you can spot where they conflate it with mephedrone for no apparent reason.

The most interesting report is from Vice. They ordered some off the internet and tried it. See also: this.

he allegedly brewed the distilled resins of pot fermented with 180-proof grain alcohol.
The concoction was supposed to be mixed with juice or soda.

"Liquid marijuana," shit. At $120 for a Pepsi bottle full! In my day we called that "drinking the bong water," and it was free.
[Pic of what this probably looked like, via]

About 15% of actual working physicians are members of the AMA, which means they're not terribly representative of doctor opinions, but it's all they got, and it has generally not been a fan of government health care. In the '60s, the AMA warned that Medicare would destroy the fabric of American society and kill all the olds. (Now they oppose any cuts to Medicare of any kind, of course.) But then they endorsed the House health care reform bill! And then, apparently drunk on liberal praise, they went on to endorse gay marriage and the abolition of Don't Ask Don't Tell and medical marijuana.

The AMA noted that bans on gay marriage lead to health coverage disparities. Then, in a counterintuitive bit of logic, they said DADT was also hazardous to the health of the LGBT population (you'd think banning them from the military would, on the whole, do a lot to keep gays and lesbians alive, but there is an issue with doctor-patient confidentiality and military doctors being forced to report the sexual orientation of personnel who go to see them).

Finally, they reversed their 12-year position on the demon weed. The AMA used to say marijuana should remain a Schedule I controlled substance, which is insane what is wrong with this country, but now they say that if it is going to be used medicinally that there should probably be some controlled clinical trials involving it, which is impossible under its current classification as "a substance that will get your daughter raped by a colored jazz musician."

So aside from that whole "arranging a doctor shortage" thing the AMA is looking pretty good these days!

Klein donned his very best sequin-enhanced suit for a 96-minute interview with TMZ last night. "I've flown to Tokyo to see a patient. I've flown to the Middle East to see patients, where Jews shouldn't go," he explained. He's treated Charlie's Angels and moguls' wives. He's treated famous singers.

Famous people are not like the rest of us. For one thing, they trust men like this with their corporeal well-being. But they have other peculiar practices, too, which Dr. Klein was only too happy to outline. Here are a few:

• If at first their faces don't succeed, they try, try again. When Klein last saw Jacko, he looked like crap, so "I rebuilt his face." It was so far gone "we blew it up" and started with a fresh slate. "That's why I rebuilt his nose. His nose looked perfectly normal [after he fixed it, in This Is It], right? Michael Jackson looked like a nose ... It's not like rebuilding Babylon, but you have to do a lot of work to do this."
• 
  
• They like to pee in eccentric places. Asked how Jackson's alleged 1993 molestation victim was able to describe "in great details discolorations and markings in Michael Jackon's genitals," Klein doesn't miss a beat, first suggesting that the child had "studied the penis like studying a map," then offers an reasonable explanation for how the study session came about in the first place: "He pees in cups. I guess he was raised in a situation where they peed in a cups. I know a very famous country singer who pees in bed because it was the only way to keep herself warm in bed in the country."
• 
  
• They do not get addicted to crystal meth. Meth, Dr. Klein explains, is physically not addictive. "I could give Michael meth." He had a long line of reasoning for this, which involved asking for a show of hands of who, on TMZ's set, had ever had tried crystal meth. Unfortunately, nobody raised their hands, so I guess we'll never know the secret to non-addictive methamphetamine, now.
• 
  
• They get creative with skincare. Jacko had very bad acne. "Do you know how much acne he had?" Klein asks, full of indignation. "He wouldn't go to school. ... He used to love to go and scrub his face with Brillo. He thought it would cure his acne."
• 
  
• They find Prince rather boring. Bad was supposed to be an M.J.-Prince duet, Klein says. But it fell through when Prince showed up at Jacko's house and wouldn't shut up. Guy just talked and talked and talked and then, when he finally left, Jacko didn't bother calling him back and the two-man version of the song never happened.

We even got a tipster email about it from someone at the Post!

The New York Post is reporting that an assistant deputy director of NJ Gov. Jon Corzine's re-election campaign was arrested last night after cops found ecstasy tablets wrapped and ready to be sold in his car.

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/corzine_campaign_staffer_arrested_90W38gZ0Z0ZRfYDxgrAh3N

And that link from the Post now leads to a blank page. Same with WABC. Someone grabbed the Post report, which read like this:

Jason Shih, 25, was pulled over by East Rutherford cops at about 11:30 p.m. last night because he was talking on his cell phone on Route 17, said Lt. Chris Conforti of the East Rutherford police. Officers wound up finding 19 "blue star" ecstasy tablets in Shih's car, each wrapped in its own little plastic bag. Shih — who was stopped within 100 feet of Becton Regional High School — also had had "several hundred" empty plastic bags in his car, Conforti said. Shih told police he worked for Corzine's campaign, and had several campaign-related items in his car, police said. Corzine spokeswoman Elisabeth Smith said Shih is not on the payroll of the campaign or the New Jersey Democratic State Committee, and that the campaign doesn't know who he is.

That was at 2:30 PM, and the article's timestamp said that it was posted at 9:53 AM and updated at 12:53 AM, most likely with the Corzine staff denial that this guy had anything to do with them. So...what happened? One of three things. Conspiracy Theories, go!

1. Shih was planted by opposition to get busted by cops, to try and move bad press for Corzine. They only hosed the Post and one TV station. Weak.

2. The Corzine campaign actually knows this clown and there's a massive cover-up. Yeah, because a relatively high-ranking deputy working for Corzine's driving around Jersey today with a grip of Blue Star E instead of working at the campaign headquarters. This is about as likely as ecstasy becoming hip again is.

3. Some B & T ravebro was like, Brah. I work fah Jahn Cahrzine! And then the Corzine campaign got pissed, and called up these outlets, who then either removed the story because they didn't want to be on the bad side of the future Governor of New Jersey, or they're going to run a new story tomorrow about how this dumbass used a dumb excuse to not get out of a drug arrest, which you just know the Post can't wait to do. As far as the bust, the cops either saw what an assclown this guy was in plain sight, or they just don't give a shit who you work for in Dirty Jerz. You cross Johnny Law, it's oveh. And now you know. Also, 20 of Shih's "boys" in Jerz are gonna be so totally bummed, brah. They were gonna get the E and take it with their honeys and now they're gonna have to just drink a bunch of Patron, bro. Patron? PATRON!!!

It is TV on shrooms, of course, just like Lee Abrams' day job is running a newspaper on shrooms. You don't think Lee Abrams himself wrote this description of his edumacational teevee project? It bears a certain resemblance to his memos!

We can't embed but there's a nice clip here about sperm that Lee Abrams dug up. Go, Lee! Straight to Jupiter!

• SEX: In Los Angeles, high schools fed up with kids doing their sexy, sexy dance moves out on the dance floor are drawing up "binding agreements that parents and students must sign before a teenager can step onto the dance floor" regulating sexxxy dance moves such as, quote, "sexual bending." What ever happened to doing the mashed potato?
• DRUGS: Now that Obama's federal government has shamefully abdicated its duty to arrest weedheads, states are "Taking up the torch," heh, to ensure that you medical marijuana hippies don't get away with your toking and your smoking, of marijuana. Most states are run by old jerks.
• ROCK N ROLL: Police are working with the club owners to keep the noise down, and it's really working out well.

Straight from Politico: Cross says he went to the White House Correspondents Association dinner and was sitting right up front and because he like to do crazy things to impress his friend, he did this:

"I've got photos of all this. ... I'm there and the president is right here and with all these people at the table" Cross snorted some coke, he said. "Maybe 40 feet from the president of the United States!"

Pics or it didn't happen, David Cross. This is the edgiest thing to happen at the White House Correspondents Association dinner since Steven Colbert devastatingly spoke truth to power, simultaneously bruising the egos of the White House lapdog press corps and making Bush squirm through a sparkling recounting of his tragic flaws. This is a close second.

UPDATE: The friend he was trying to impress was Gavin McInnes, formerly of Vice. Of course.
[Pic: Getty]

Gawker gets results, when it comes to The Real Issues. Earlier this week, we brought you the shameful tale of ALM's bathrooms, which were shamefully littered with reading material. Now, our tipster says, the tempest has passed:

For the past two days our facilities (at least on the men side) have been free of reading material. People still read, but they take the ESPN article with them or throw the stuff out. And I have not noticed anyone walking out minus a pit stop at one of sinks for some hand washing.

It was signed "Underpaid but Grateful For The Little Things," which is a healthy attitude for a media employee.


BLIND ITEM RUMORMONGER: Which newspaper executive was recently (allegedly) fired for expense account forgeries? Leave your guesses in the comments.


The Pottsboro (Texas) Press accidentally ran this ad even though it has bad words in it and is about drugs. When will the Pottsboro (Texas) Press stop trying to get our kids "stoned," on LSD sex freakouts?


NBC straight man Chuck Todd is going to have to shave his trademark goatee(!) because he lost a bet to god damn Jake Tapper, about who would win the baseball playoffs. Oh Chuck. Don't lose all your power!