You Don't Have To Go Home, But You Can't Stay Here: Nothing like some nosy House Republicans to bring a protest to an end. After last week's hearing in Congress, the National Park Service and U.S. Park Police began enforcing a long-ignored ban on camping in McPherson Square today, which could be the first step toward closing up the Occupy D.C. encampment there. Now if only Congress would show similar concern about all the real problems in D.C.'s national parks. -1

Make Money Money: Turns out 2011 wasn't quite as bad financially for the D.C. government as everyone thought. An audit of the now-ended fiscal year revealed an extra $240 million in unexpected cash, thanks mostly to higher than projected capital gains and estate tax revenues. Predictably, the D.C. Council is already eyeing the windfall for an election-year tax cut. Also predictably, the city is expected to run a $150 million shortfall in the upcoming 2013 fiscal year. +3

Let Them Eat Beer: The District is suddenly awash in breweries, which means a lot of leftover zymurgical grain. The District also has a lot of people going hungry, especially with the economy the way it is. Turns out all that grain can be baked into bread. DC Brau teamed up with Pizzeria Paradiso recently to produce 65 loaves for Bread for the City, recycling barley that would have been turned into cattle feed and feeding people with it instead. The brewers eventually want to produce 500 loaves a month to donate to charity. Which could mean your bar tab is tax deductible. +3

The Circus Leaves Town: Besides the running circuses at the Wilson Building and the Capitol, the D.C. area is also home to one of the largest traveling three-ring productions in the world, Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, which is owned by Feld Entertainment (the same company behind Disney on Ice). That may soon be changing. Feld announced plans today to relocate 190 jobs from its Vienna headquarters to a new office in Florida. Another 100 jobs will remain in Virginia. No word on where they'll send the clowns. -1

Friday's Needle rating: 34 Today's score: +4 Today's Needle rating: 38

Tiger Blood: A spectacularly irritating, if not actually dangerous, man will soon walk among us. Charlie Sheen has announced that his "Violent Torpedo of Truth" tour will stop in D.C. on April 19, when he'll play DAR Constitution Hall. (We suspect using language that the Daughters of the American Revolution might not appreciate.) Tickets go on sale tomorrow morning. With service fees, they'll cost either $60 or $104. Depressing certainty of the day: An alarming number of people will pay more than a hundred bucks to see Charlie Sheen. -1

Mmm... Beer: Things were quite different the last time a commercial brewery was operating inside the District lines—John F. Kennedy was president, for one. DC Brau, the first of several new breweries cranking up production soon, began making its Public Ale pale ale today. Cans of the stuff should be finding their way to stores and bars, and shortly afterwards, drinkers' hands, around D.C. within a few weeks. +2

Why Are You Still in the Office?: March famously comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb; today, though, it's more like a magical unicorn. Beaming sun, low humidity, highs near 80 degrees—the only downside to weather like this is the pollen count. It's the first nice day of the year. Log off your computer, pronto, and walk away. Chances are your boss won't notice; she's too busy watching college basketball streaming video, anyway. +3

More Madness: Speaking of college basketball... Yesterday, one Virginia school (Old Dominion University) was bounced from the NCAA tournament on a buzzer-beater here in D.C.; today, another Virginia school managed to avoid the same type of fate in Cleveland. George Mason came from behind to beat Villanova and advance to the next round, where they'll play Ohio State unless the Buckeyes become the first #1 seed in NCAA history to lose their opening game. In other local basketball news, Georgetown plays Virginia Commonwealth University tonight in Chicago. +2

Yesterday's Needle rating: 58 Today's score: +6 Friday bonus: +2 Today's Needle rating: 66

In this space way back on Wednesday, we mentioned—OK, ranted—about O.J. Simpson's "acquittal suit," which, as part of a ridiculously stupid idea, was being offered as a donation to the Smithsonian. The Smithsonian didn't want it, because what self-respecting institution would?

The Newseum! According to the Washington Post's Reliable Source, the museum is "in discussions to obtain" the suit.

Seriously, can't we just burn it?

In related news, the Los Angeles Police Department has apologized to the family of the late Robert F. Kennedy for exhibiting at a homicide investigators conference the tie, shirt and jacket he was wearing when he was gunned down in 1968. Because, yeah, well, duh.

In other news: how not to run a transit agency;

how to ensure police will come and break up your post-game celebration over the Duke men's basketball team with pepper spray and billy clubs;

how not to go about obtaining beer from CVS (or anywhere);

how to apologize for shooting someone in the parking lot of a mall; and

how to be like Ezra Klein (if doing 20 blog posts a day doesn't appeal to you, skip that last one).

Marion Barry turns 74 tomorrow, and he's planning a quiet celebration. Understandable enough after the week he's had.

Happy birthday, Mayor for Life! And happy Friday!

Yesterday, beer lovers were devastated to hear global warming is hurting beer production. While that news was bad, the Washington Post followed up with a dispatch today suggesting that we can solve global warming if we stop having kids.

Put the two news items together in time-honored “news analysis” tradition and what do you get? A solution! To assure a lasting supply of quality beer, forget about having that The Waltons-style family you were considering. In fact, better not too have any of the little darlings, according to a crack team of researchers at the London School of Economics.

That’s right, if we stopped having kids, we’d pretty much wipe up the climate change problem, according to the U.K. study. And, we’d presumably still be able to drive around in Hummers, live in sprawling suburban McMansions, shop until we drop, and spend every evening at the pub – mugs of a top of the line pilsner in each hand.

I’m not making this stuff up, I swear.

Scientists in the Czech Republic say they think warmer temperatures caused by climate change are hurting the quality of Saaz hops used to make celebrated pilsner beers such as Urquell and Gambrinus. And, they aren’t the only ones claiming that global warming is taking a toll on the brewskies. Last year, Australian scientists predicted that climate change will drive up beer prices by making it more expensive to grow malting barely.

On the baby carbon front, the U.K. researchers aren’t the first to calculate how many pounds of greenhouse gases each child adds to the world. Check out these fun facts compiled by Mother Jones. 

In synthesis: If you want to keep drinking good beer, forget about having those kiddies!

This just in: Our Amazin' Nats are a national punchline. First the Wall Street Journal used the team's woes in the lede of its Sonia Sotomayor hearings coverage, comparing the hopelessness of being a Republican senator with the hopelessness of being a Nat.

Then President Barack Obama, in the broadcast booth during the All-Star telecast, told the country that because of parity fans of all teams still remained hopeful that this season would turn out OK. Then he threw in a caveat: Except fans of the Nationals.

Obama clearly enjoyed his Nats takedown, smiling and looking around the booth for support.

But Fox announcer Tim McCarver reacted as if POTUS had told another Special Olympics joke. McCarver stayed stonefaced and silent and stared straight ahead. It was fabulous TV for everybody.

Except, you know, for fans of the Nationals.

AFTER THE JUMP: Czarniak and Rieger pile on? Tim Lincecum = Mitch Kramer? All-Star Do-Gooder Still Never a Bullet? Beer is bad at parties? Fight, fight in the comments section? Joe Gibbs Comes Back to D.C.?

***

The locals got in on the slam act, too. Last night's WRC-TV sports report ended with Lindsay Czarniak pointing out that the National League hasn't won an All-Star Game since 1996.

"Must be something about the name 'National,'" said anchorwoman Wendy Rieger with a big laugh.

And as the show cut to commercial, Czarniak could be heard saying "Good one!"

Fifteen yards, piling on!

***

It can't be said enough: National League starter Tim Lincecum looks just like Mitch Kramer, the ballplaying kid from Dazed and Confused. He's my favorite pitcher of all time.

Mitch, that is.

***

O what a tangled web we weave...A story from GateHouse News Service in Braintree, Mass., about the pregame All-Star ceremony, in which all living U.S. presidents honored folks who won a People magazine poll about our nation's most charitable folks, identified honoree Rob Dixon as a "former Washington Bullets guard who left the NBA in 1983."

Oh, really? The Wizards organization, keepers of the Washington Bullets records, says there is no record that Rob Dixon ever played for the Bullets.

But Dixon, who runs a group that puts disadvantaged kids in college, added some run with the Bullets to his bio while trying to get voted in by People readers.

This sort of resume puffery really makes me mad, since I've so rarely mentioned my stints as goalie for the Washington Capitals or my tours as a Beatle.

***

Brad Young, a high school softball coach in Walkersville, Md., has been canned by county officials because a kid's parent brought beer to a postseason team party, and another parent ratted on him to the county.

From the WTTG-TV report:

It was a cookout around Brad Young's backyard swimming pool on June 11 celebrating the end of a winning season.

"And one parent brought some beers to the party. A couple of people had those– probably no more than five or six," said Young. "No kid was uncomfortable. No kid had access to it. No kid drank. No parent got more than probably one or two beers. I did not drink."

But another parent called the Frederick County School Board, which tells FOX 5, "The incident in question took place at what is considered an official team function."

In my day, a coach's job would only be in jeopardy if he threw a team party and didn't have enough beer — for kids and parents.

***

Fighter Jimmy Lange, profiled in last week's Cheap Seats column, is getting called out in the comments section of Boxing Along the Beltway, a fabulous local boxing site. Fans and handlers of fellow light middleweight George Rivera are talking up Rivera and talking down Lange in hopes of forcing a fight between the two.

Lange, the most popular fighter in the D.C. market by way of his appearance on the NBC reality show, The Contender, and his well-attended and -received shows at the Patriot Center, needs a fight, now that North Carolina boxing regulators refused to sanction his scheduled July 25 bout with Jimmy LeBlanc (record: 12–16–4, with 10 of the losses coming in his last 12 fights).

I'd never heard of George Rivera before this. But the back and forth between the Rivera side and the Lange side is enough to make me wanna see these guys go at it.

***

Not just a thought, a sermon: Joe Gibbs will appear at Lon Solomon's McLean Bible Church to promote his faith and his latest book, Game Plan for Life.

***

Story tips? Wanna Play the Feud? Tube amps for sale? Send to: cheapseats@washingtoncitypaper.com

The piece has some likely suspects — David Geffen and Google, among them.

But the most intriguing and, for us locals, scariest of the alleged Times takeoverers?

Howard Milstein.

Yes, THAT Howard Milstein.

The Howard Milstein who a decade ago tried to buy the Redskins at the Jack Kent Cooke estate sale! The Howard Milstein who brought Dan Snyder into the fold to give him the local color he thought would get him approved! The Howard Milstein who had too many enemies at NFL headquarters and got kicked out of the buying process! The Howard Milstein who then stepped aside and watched as his former partner took over the buying process!

THE HOWARD MILSTEIN WHO IS RESPONSIBLE FOR DAN SNYDER OWNING THE REDSKINS!

Whew.

According to the Fortune piece, Milstein, identified simply as "a New York-based financier," has been "buying shares" of NY Times stock.

Run for your lives, New York Times readers!

Or, maybe, just renew your subscription and give subscriptions to all your relatives so the Sulzbergers don't have to sell.

Just don't say we didn't warn you...

***

Those streaky Nationals are at it again!

Ryan Zimmerman's hitting skein ended at 30, but the team has picked up where the Face of the Franchise (is that a compliment any more?) left off: The Nats haven't won since Zimmerman's streak stopped, and go for their sixth loss in a row tonight against Pittsburgh.

Back to feel-good streaks: Tonight the Nats will start Shairon Martis, who is 5-0 (really!) and will have to arm wrestle Zimmerman for the team's one set-aside slot at the All-Star game.

***

At Pimlico on Friday I ran into the RoboVendor, Perry Hahn. He was at the track selling Black Eyed Susans by the tray on Black Eyed Susan Day.

Hahn is up there with the most fascinating folks I've ever come across in my years of typing. He got a mechanical engineering degree from Maryland, but has devoted his working life to vending mostly beer at mostly sporting events.

Hahn was planning on going to the Nationals game that night after racing, and he had worked the Nats game a day earlier. He travels the country for Super Bowls and rock festivals and anywhere else a dispenser for hire is needed.

"I'm averaging more than one event per day now," says Hahn, 47.

Hahn is much more than merely a workaholic alcohol vendor, however.

In the early 1990s, back when stadiums sold beer in cans but wouldn't let customers keep the cans, Hahn decided to put his engineering brains to work. He designed what the US Patent and Trademark Office calls a "Tandem High Speed Can Opener," as well as U.S. Patent  #5,228,203. The gadget rips the tops off of two beer cans simultaneously and in a nano-second, which eliminates the need to flip the flip-tops and allows the beer man to empty the beer into cups in no time flat.

Hahn told me back in the day he could open and pour a case of beer cans in one minute.

Fans at Camden Yards noticed him wearing the battery-powered mechanical device on his wrist and dubbed him RoboVendor. Most stadiums have gone to selling plastic bottles, and Hahn designed another machine to twist the caps off of two bottles at a time.

I asked him the other day what his biggest vending day ever was, and, while he didn't give me a dollar figure, he did say it came at a Harley Davidson party in Milwaukee.

(By bizarre coincidence, I'm pretty sure the pair of hands selling beers in the Washington Post's slide show of Saturday's Preakness, with a contraption attached, belong to my guy Perry Hahn! See for yourself — photo #4 in the sequence.)

***

The NBA's draft lottery is tonight.

The Wizards, with the second worst record in the league, have a 17.8 chance of getting the number one overall pick. If they get it, we'll talk even more about Kwame Brown.

For all the badmouthing Brown gets around here — he's Heath Shuler in shorts and no helmet, essentially — he's still in the league, with Detroit. And he averaged 17 minutes and five rebounds a game this season, so he'll be back somewhere.

Can you be rightly called a bust if you last nine years?

***

My hero Robin Ficker is running for office today in the race for the District 4 seat on the Montgomery County council.

His politics are as odd as his antics at the old Capital Centre, but I'm pulling for Ficker. If he gets in, he'll do enough wacky stuff to fill several columns.

If it was really a race and these folks really ran, Ficker wins, no problem. He still runs up and down the Cole Field House steps a few times a week to stay in shape.

He can even run there on Sundays now that he's dumped his Redskins season tickets.

***

Story tips? Wanna Play the Feud? Tube amps for sale? Send to: cheapseats@washingtoncitypaper.com

Among the perks available to residents of the Armed Forces Retirement Home: beer machines.

In the canteen, at the golf course and at various spots in hallways throughout the compound, you'll find vending machines that dispense cold beer.

Any time, day or night, folks with a thirst and some spare change can grab a Miller, Miller Lite, Michelob or Budweiser for $1.50 a can.

Sodas and water are just a quarter less.

In 2008, firms that were nowhere near as leveraged as Six Flags, which is anywhere from $2 billion to $3 billion-and-some-change in debt, tended to sign on for Chapter 11 protections or just go away.

But Six Flags, albeit with its stock still cratered (down from a Snyder-era high of $11.93 to just 16 cents a share a couple months ago) and its future bleaker than Levi Johnston's, made it through with no such filings.

And with the new year has come the first good news of Snyder's disastrous reign atop the corporation, which began with a stockholder coup he led in late 2005 amid promises he'd boost the stock price and make the parks more family friendly: A barrister in Texas on Friday ruled in favor of Six Flags after a nasty battle over the chain's request to be allowed to sell booze at two parks in the state.

From the Dallas Morning News:

The beer taps could be flowing soon at Six Flags Over Texas and its Hurricane Harbor water park after a yearlong licensing fight.

A state administrative law judge issued two nonbinding opinions Friday recommending that the parks be allowed to sell alcoholic beverages. Carolyn Beck, a Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission spokeswoman, said the agency's administrator rarely rules against an administrative law judge.

After the ruling, Sharon Parker, a Six Flags spokesperson, said she "hopes that beer will be on sale" when the two parks open on Feb. 28.

Apparently, in Snyderland, nothing says "family friendly" like tapped kegs. By this standard, the grounds of FedExField must be the familiest friendliest acreage in this time zone. God love the Mayor...

Alas, not all the recent headlines have pulled Snyder's chain the right way.

Also last week, an animal rights group reaffirmed Six Flags' Vallejo, Calif., outpost as one of the "Ten Worst Zoos for Elephants" for 2008.

That's a list the park makes every year. But a Six Flags official named Nancy Chan told the Vallejo Times-Herald that the designation was "a little insulting" to the animal caretakers there.

How you think the elephants feel, Nance?

And Snyder's first run as overseer of a full-blown Golden Globes Awards show (the writers strike in Hollywood last year crippled last year's production) was a disaster.

Despite the presence of his former suite-mate Tom Cruise, the telecast, which was produced by the now-Snyder/Six Flags-owned Dick Clark Productions, garnered what Nielsen Media Research called "the smallest audience since the awards moved to network TV in 1994."

No wonder Snyder wants more booze.

Keep the dial right here for all the breaking news in Snyder's Six Flags soap opera.

Local beer geeks are deciding whether they will remain loyal to the area's oldest microbrew once it abandons Virginia. What do you think? Will you continue to buy Old Dominion? Or will you tell it to kiss off, much like Old Dominion has done to the state after which the company took its name?

In the meantime, I suggest Old Dominion change its name to Small Wonder.

Please give a big welcome to the Beerspotter, aka Orr Shtuhl, whose new weekly column spotlights interesting brews he's found around town. Shtuhl's written a couple pieces in this space, and he knocked out a fine Young & Hungry once. He's really interested in music, specifically lyrics, which he writes about on a blog called Wordsworth, and beer. If you see an interesting beer, drop him a line.

Photograph by Darrow Montgomery