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“I knew it was going to be provocative because it felt like another situation where a black baby is not wanted or is less worthy or less desirable than someone else and that evokes some really strong feelings.” Washington says.

Strong feelings is putting it lightly.

His story, sparked a heated debate on Â鶹¹ÙÍø’s Facebook page Monday night. Within an hour of being posted, there were more than 100 hatred-filled comments, mostly calling Â鶹¹ÙÍø racist.

One reader reached out to Â鶹¹ÙÍø’s General Manager Joel Oxley and wrote:

“This Facebook posting (attached) by your news organization was repugnant and racist. I have been a reporter and editor who has lived and worked in this market for 25 years, and I have never seen anything this blatantly offensive coming from a news group that is supposed to be unbiased…and certainly not bigoted.

“Are you comfortable with your news staff sinking to this level of race baiting? If you are, then shame on you as well.”

In reaction to the comments on Facebook and the email, Â鶹¹ÙÍø managers decided to delete the post.

John Meyer, Â鶹¹ÙÍø’s director of digital media, says it was a difficult decision.

“While the headline was provocative, the story did a great job exploring some uncomfortable issues. We did leave the story on our homepage and it was actually on the homepage for most of the day.”

“When we posted to Facebook, the feedback we received was predominantly negative. Things got heated pretty quickly, so we pulled the post,” he says.

It did appear as though a majority of those commenting on Facebook hadn’t actually read the article and were in fact reacting to the headline and first two paragraphs of the story.

Washington says he deliberately wrote the headline and opening paragraph.

“Why write the headline that way? OK. We boil it down to the essence. But at the end of the day, we call this baby a mistake. And that’s hurtful,” Washington says.

The headline and his decision to use the word “brown” in describing the girl produced a similar reaction on AP’s Twitter feed:

Should a white mom be paid for sperm bank mixup that gave her a brown baby?

— The Associated Press (@AP)

One Twitter user replied “the wording of the piece is terrible”

Another said, “Is this an offensive choice of words? Yes”

Washington has received several emails on his personal website, as well, with regards to the story.

In his decision to use the word brown, Washington explains he was being literal.

“I’m not going to call this little girl black because she’s got a white parent. She’s bi-racial. She’s mixed. She’s literally brown,” he says.

On the surface it appears this is a story about a couple looking to have a child through sperm donation who was given the wrong sperm.

This is about much more than that, Washington says.

“This case was absolutely about race, not because of the mix up itself, which was one issue. The mom made it about race when she put in her lawsuit

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But not with the familiar, choreographed 21 paces that the public typically sees.

Spc. Brett Hyde, Tomb Sentinel, 3d U.S. Infantry Regiment (The Old Guard), is one of several sentinels keeping guard over the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier during inclement weather caused by Hurricane Sandy at Arlington National Cemetery, which closed before the storm.

Afterward, when morning funerals were completed, the Old Guard soldiers were still on duty but had moved into an enclosure covered by a green awning known as “the box,” about 20 feet away from the tomb, according to regiment spokesman Maj. John Miller.

He said if the weather becomes intolerable, the tomb can also be guarded from a room inside a nearby amphitheater. But no such order was given on Monday afternoon.

The Tomb of the Unknowns is guarded 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, and in any weather by Tomb Guard sentinels. Sentinels, all volunteers, are considered to be the best of the elite and headquartered at Fort Myer, Va.

While on duty the crosses a 63-foot-rubber surfaced walkway in exactly 21 steps. He then faces the Tomb for 21 seconds, turns again, and pauses an additional 21 seconds before retracing his steps.

The 21 is symbolic of the highest salute according to dignitaries in military and state ceremonies.

Members of The Old Guard have guarded the Tomb every second, of every day regardless of weather or holidays since April 6, 1948.

The Associated Press and Â鶹¹ÙÍø’s Meera Pal contributed to this story. Follow on Twitter.

(Copyright 2011 Â鶹¹ÙÍø. All Rights Reserved.)

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In a video from 2009 that is now making the rounds of the Internet, the air traffic controller can be heard telling the pilot that he had planned on proposing to his girlfriend, on the Montreal to Vancouver flight from Air Canada, but had “chickened out.”

After some encouragement from the pilot, the man is broadcast over the plane’s intercom system to propose to his girlfriend sitting in 25C.

“The reason I am speaking to you is because there is a very special lady on the flight this evening,” he is heard on the video.

Following the proposal, the pilot tells the man “Everybody is jumping up and down and she said yes I can hear her all the way back here.”

Watch the video below. Skip to 1:20 for the part that is guaranteed to make you cry:

Â鶹¹ÙÍø’s Meera Pal contributed to this report. Follow on Twitter.

(Copyright 2012 Â鶹¹ÙÍø. All Rights Reserved.)

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WASHINGTON – In a previously empty warehouse in Northwest D.C., two longtime friends are hoping their soon-to-open brewery will solidify the District’s growing reputation as a world-class craft beer destination.

has been taking shape over the past year in a 15,000-square-foot building, in the city co-founders Dave Coleman and friend Mike McGarvey have called home for years.

“We’ve lived here for a long time, we met our ladies here, built our careers here, have homes here,” Coleman says.

“It’s about being residents of D.C. and an opportunity to give back to a city that has given us so much.”

There was no question 3 Stars Brewing Company would be located in D.C. The three-star symbol (an homage to the D.C. flag) appears on all brewery merchandise and is proudly tattoed on Coleman’s right bicep.

Despite the lack of properly zoned spaces in the District, the pair turned down sites in Maryland and Virginia, waiting and knowing the right space would come to them.

They were thrilled to find the old warehouse in Takoma at 6400 Chillum Place because of the neighborhood’s reputation for supporting local businesses.

The project, nearly five years in the making, has been a true labor of love for the friends.

The two began brewing beer at home in 2007, sharing their brews with family, friends and other local beer lovers.

“We were enjoying craft beer and we questioned why we didn’t have a D.C. craft beer,” McGarvey says.

It took the duo years to go from the recipe production phase to developing a business plan to construction on the site.

“And we’re still good friends,” McGarvey says with a laugh.

Coleman and McGarvey have one goal in mind: Produce local, hand-crafted artisan ales, adding to the already growing local craft beer community, a community they’ve both been members of for years.

“We’re focused first and foremost on being the best craft brewers in D.C.,” Coleman says. “For us, it’s always been about brewing. Making the best beer you can possibly make. Finding new ways to use products and push boundaries on things.”

The brewery is in its final inspection stages this week and the two expect to clear the zoning and health inspections soon. They should begin releasing beer for public consumption in early July.

In the meantime, the 3 Stars Homebrew Company is open to the public. The shop opened June 1, offering malts, yeasts, hops and a variety of homebrew kits for beer geeks of all experience levels.

“We see this as a great spot for people to come out, gather, discuss what’s happening in the beer culture,” Coleman says. “It’s really a gathering place for like-minded individuals.”

Since the two started out as homebrewers, supporting that community is hugely important to them.

“The more homebrewing grows and the more people get educated and involved in it, the better for the beer community,” Coleman says.

“It was really important that we had something that could support where we came from.”

As the former general manager and beer director of The Big Hunt in Dupont Circle, Coleman worked for years to elevate the level and quality of beer offered to customers.

He has seen the craft beer market explode in D.C.

“I’ve been in the beer scene since the beer scene wasn’t that great,” he says. “I’ve seen it change drastically.”

“Our on-premises consumption changed and we were allowed access to better beers and different beers,” he says. “People are getting more educated and when consumers get more educated about the products they are consuming you have to elevate the game, which is great.”

McGarvey says they want that level of interaction at 3 Stars, as well. They want customers to provide feedback on beer. They want to build an experience for anyone who comes out to the brewery.

“They may come for one reason and then end up doing something else. They might come for tastings and get into homebrew,” he says.

They both agree beer should be an experience and that’s what they’re working to produce.

Around the same time they found their space in Takoma, the two began introducing 3 Stars beer to the local beer market through collaborations with other area breweries such as Salisbury Md.-based (released the 3 Stars Syndicate Saison) and Baltimore-based (brewed a special rye-based ale). The latter beer won a silver medal in the 2011 Maryland Governor’s Cup competition.

The brewery website already lists the variety of beers they plan to produce. They include:

• “the District” – an American IPA, which they describe as having a smooth hoppy bitterness with a smooth, slightly sweet finish.
• “pandemic porter” – an American Imperial Porter, which they describe as having a huge malt and coffee nose, chocolate and roasted malt flavors up front with a smooth and strong coffee finish.
• “the relentless” – an American Rye IPA, which they describe as having a strong spicy rye nose, with a dry hoppy bitterness throughout and a smooth, slightly bitter finish.

“Our beers are full-flavored, very complex ales that showcase the different ingredients that we use,” Coleman says. “We like to push the limits on what is considered a traditional style.”

The two also like to push the limits when it comes to getting a brewery up and running.

“Mike and I are working-class Irish kids,” Coleman says. “It takes serious money to open a brewery with new equipment.”

The brewery found investors among bartending friends and family members. Without millions of dollars, the friends have improvised along the way.

“I wouldn’t use the word ‘easy,'” Coleman says. “We didn’t set out to buy a brewery. We wanted to build a brewery.”

“It’s been nice that we actually built it with our hands.”

And the hands of a dedicated team of weekend volunteers, made up of friends and family.

For instance, in need of a walk-in freezer that would normally cost $30,000 to $50,000, Coleman and McGarvey found a cheaper, used freezer for a little more than $1.

The only catch was they needed to disassemble and move the 40-by-13-foot freezer. They gathered a group of their friends and got it done.

Both had been working full-time while developing the brewery. McGarvey is director of marketing business intelligence at Sirius XM Radio. Recently, Coleman dropped down to bartending one night a week at The Big Hunt.

It is their passion for beer and creating a brewery they have envisioned for a number of years that keeps them going.

“In D.C., our (beer) scene is more propelled by the passion of young people,” Coleman says. “We elevate each other.”

They take inspiration and support from a number of other local beer afficionados.

Coleman cites , the beer director for Neighborhood Restaurant Group, Greg Jasgur, beer director at Pizzeria Paradiso and Sam Fitz, beer director at , as examples of colleagues who are working to establish the D.C. beer scene.

“The better they do, the better we do,” Coleman says.

When 3 Stars Brewing Company opens later this summer, it will be open for tastings and tours.

The tasting room will feature eight taps, including exclusive tastes. Growlers and kegs will be available for purchase to the public.

They expect to produce 2,000 to 3,000 barrels in the first year.

The pair have 11 to 12 recipes ready to market. Their beer also will be available at local restaurants and bars, including Churchkey, Meridian Pint, The Big Hunt and Pizzeria Paradiso.

“Once we have produce for market, we’re in the local bars and restaurants and we’ll have the tasting room open,” Coleman says. “Any place in town that is a destination for great beer, you can count on finding 3 Stars.”

And while building what they hope is D.C.’s next great craft brewery is important to the two friends, giving back to the community they’ve called home for years is equally important.

“One of the things we feel strongly about is anyone going hungry in D.C., in particular, children going hungry in D.C.,” McGarvey says.

To help eradicate childhood hunger in the District, the two are cultivating special relationships with local chefs and charities who can use the brewery’s spent grain to develop food products.

“As a responsible business we feel it’s something we want to do,” Coleman says. “It’s unbelievable that in the nation’s capital there are children who don’t have one square meal a day.”

The two see the spent grain program as a pivotal way to give back to the District.

Coleman explains that the grains, which have been soaked in hot water, can be used to make bread products like pretzels.

Anyone who is interested in fighting hunger with 3 Stars can contact them via email.

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WASHINGTON – Shortly after securing the Republican nomination for president, the Mitt Romney campaign celebrated by releasing the official iPhone app, “With Mitt.”

The app lets users take a photo using one of 14 overlays with banners like, “I’m With Mitt” and “I’m a Mom for Mitt.”

The celebration was short-lived, however, when the election team realized one of the banners had misspelled a word.

And not just any word.

One banner says “A Better Amercia.”

A few hours after the app was announced and the error discovered, the social network Twitter exploded with snarky comments and retweets.

And of course, several hours after the gaffe, someone had already created the inevitable “Amercia Is With Mitt!”

Romney’s digital director, Zac Moffat, told earlier that the “app was meant to be a simple way for Romney backers to show their pride as the candidate took a big symbolic step toward the White House.”

By Wednesday afternoon, the Romney camp had edited the app and removed the offending banner entirely.

Mashable has created a gallery of some of the best Tweets about the error. Read them by follow this .

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reports after Swift saw a video made by Sgt. Wade Wilson’s friends, she made a personal phone call and sent flowers to Wilson’s family.

Wilson, from Leona, Texas, died in action in Afghanistan, May 11.

Swift also told the family she plans to wear Wade’s dog tags in her next video to show her support for his military service, KBTX reports.

In a video uploaded to YouTube, an unnamed friend of Wilson makes a plea to Swift to “please remember the ones who have fallen.”

In the video, the friend says Wilson worshipped Swift and “slept with a poster of (Swift) between our beds in Afghanistan.”

The friend notes in the YouTube clip the recent trend of service men and women asking out celebrities via social media. Last year, service members successfully scored dates with Justin Timberlake and Mila Kunis.

“I know a lot of people get on here and ask celebrities to go to dances and s*@t with them. All I’m asking is for you to think about him,” the friend says.

Watch the video below:

Â鶹¹ÙÍø’s Meera Pal contributed to this story. Follow on Twitter.

(Copyright 2012 Â鶹¹ÙÍø. All Rights Reserved.)

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The club offers coaching and group support for women who are ready to make a major transition in their career.

After earning her masters degree, Mims worked her way up the corporate ladder at a large company. She managed multi-million dollar client portfolios, lead staffing, recruiting, and business development.

She admits she spent plenty sleepless nights wondering about what else was out there. She eventually found a coaching program.

Her goal is to help woman stop doing what they don’t love and start feeling energized by what they are doing every day.

For an hour Thursday, Mims answered career questions from Â鶹¹ÙÍø.com readers.

Her advice ranged from how to prepare for a job interview and how to find your true calling.

To determine what your true calling may be, Mims recommends taking a piece of paper and writing “My Life Purpose Is:”

“Spend 20 minutes answering that question until you start to cry. That will give you some insight. When you have a reaction that makes you cry, you’re on to something,” she says.

To prepare for an interview, Mims had several steps to follow for interviewees.

She recommends doing research on the company and the job; going to the website and taking a look at the language that they use so that you can use similar language during the interview process; study the company’s strategy and mission and develop some questions about what interests you in the company.

Other topics Mims talks about during the live chat are balancing family and work, negotiating a salary and getting excited about a job again.

You can read more advice from Mims by clicking on the archived live chat below.

Â鶹¹ÙÍø’s Meera Pal contributed to this report. Follow on Twitter.

(Copyright 2012 Â鶹¹ÙÍø. All Rights Reserved.)

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WASHINGTON – The escape of a high-profile Chinese dissident, who may be in the care of U.S. diplomats, could be the biggest test for U.S./China relations in 20 years.

“The Chinese believe that if they were to let Chen (Guangcheng) to go free this could cause a lot of other activists within China to rise up and create a real problem for that state,” Norah O’Donnell, chief White House correspondent for CBS, said on Â鶹¹ÙÍø Tuesday morning.

In advance of high-level strategic and economic talks between the two countries, the Obama administration is handling the situation very delicately, she says.

And with the sensitive nature of the issues surrounding the blind Chinese lawyer, Forbes.com columnist Gordon Chang says the situation creates a crisis for China, not the United States.

“We see some indications that the splintering of the Chinese political system, which became evident in the beginning of February, has gotten worse over the Chen matter,” he says.

Chang, an expert on China and North Korea, says the talks set to begin Thursday between China and the U.S. “have been going on since 2006 and have yielded very little for the United States.”

“So if the talks are derailed it isn’t really going to affect things between the United States and China,” Chang says.

The situation becomes even more difficult for the Chinese government, he adds, as they search for a resolution.

Chang says the government could give up and let Chen and his wife go to the United States.

“But Chen has indicated he does not want to leave China. He wants to change China,” he says.

“This puts the Communist party in a very difficult position. It’s already fragile at this point because of the intense infighting at the top,” Chang says. “This is something that potentially could split the party even further and lead to even more social unrest and turmoil in China.”

Related Story:

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WASHINGTON – Determining what makes a really good grilled cheese sandwich is like trying to determine which came first, the bread or the cheese.

It could be the type of bread, or maybe it’s the type of cheese — or cheeses — used. Either way, grilled cheese sandwiches are one of the most popular comfort foods in the world.

In celebration of the crunchy, buttery, cheesy goodness, Thursday, April 12 is “National Grilled Cheese Sandwich Day” and April is “National Grilled Cheese Month.”

Charlotte Devilliers, manager of — a specialty cheese shop in Del Ray and Shirlington — says she doesn’t know why April 12 was chosen, but it’s the perfect month.

“There are days like today, where it’s a little bit chillier and colder out and people want that comfort food,” she says. “April, obviously, is known for April showers. Days like that anybody would want a grilled cheese. It’s a very homey type of food.”

says Ancient Romans were the first to make a cooked bread and cheese sandwich. But many cultures have adopted the sandwich and created their own spin on the classic.

In France, people enjoy a Croque Monsieur, which is a grilled ham and cheese sandwich. In Switzerland, the custom calls for melting the cheese and toasting the bread separately before bringing them together.

Punchbowl.com reports the classic American grilled cheese came out in the 1920s when inexpensive cheese and affordable sliced bread became available.

Devilliers says it’s hard to pin down just one thing that truly makes a great grilled cheese sandwich.

“It’s definitely quality cheese to start,” she says. “You want something that’s a little bit tangier that kind of gives you a little bit of sharpness. Obviously, a cheese that melts well because not all cheeses melt well, contrary to popular belief.”

“And, obviously a good bread. We use sourdough from from D.C. We get it fresh everyday,” she says.

And, rather than use the traditional butter, Cheesetique brushes each sandwich with olive oil instead.

“I just creates a better crunch. It gives it that extra crispiness,” Devilliers says.

Luckily, grilled cheese fans can find their beloved sandwiches at cafes, diners, school cafeterias and even at some of the finest restaurants around the world.

The in 2010 that a Michelin-starred chef created the world’s most expensive grilled cheese sandwich, with a price tag of

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ALEXANDRIA, Va. – From the carpet and walls to the chairs and tables, almost every aspect of Walker’s Grille restaurant was designed with an eye to efficiency and sustainability.

It is the owners’ attention to detail that recently earned the restaurant, in Alexandria’s Franconia neighborhood, LEED Gold certification by the .

In fact, has the distinction of being the only restaurant to receive LEED certification in the state of Virginia.

, or Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, is a rating system for the design, construction and operation of high-performance green buildings.

According to the USGBC website, “LEED certification provides independent, third-party verification that a building, home or community was designed and built using strategies aimed at achieving high performance in key areas of human and environmental health.”

While more and more homes, corporate offices and buildings are being designed to meet LEED requirements, finding a restaurant that takes the time and financial commitment to do so is unusual.

“I think with the restaurant industry, specifically, it’s been a challenge,” says Michael Babcock, chairman of the USGBC National Capital Region chapter.

“When you start to see thinner margins, you start to see a reluctance to invest a little more effort and time. You don’t see it that often in restaurants,” he says.

Walker’s Grill co-owner Jason Musleh says after the landlord suggested he and his partner pursue LEED certification, they decided it fit perfectly with the history of the property and the restaurant’s concept.

The property, off Beulah Street in a corporate park, is the site of landmarks that pre-date the Civil War. The Walker family — among the first black landowners in the area — owned the property where the restaurant now stands. The restaurant name is an homage to the family.

“We knew we wanted to do a green concept,” Musleh says. “We felt it would tie in with (the property) being farmland in the past and the whole farm-to-table cliche.”

Last month, the restaurant celebrated its one-year anniversary and was awarded the LEED Gold certification in a special ribbon-cutting ceremony.

Co-owner Sam Misleh says the certification means a lot to them, especially given the investment they made to the project.

“The costs were more because of all of the materials,” he says. “All of the materials had to be sustainable materials brought in from within a 500-mile radius.”

“Initially, we didn’t know what we were getting into. We had built other restaurants, but not to this level,” Misleh says.

Construction began in November 2010 and the restaurant opened four months later. He says the attention to LEED certification probably added an additional month.

Besides recognition by the USGBC, Walker’s Grille also has seen energy savings in electric and water bills, Musleh says.

The partners (and cousins) are proud to have the only LEED-certified restaurant in the state. And the sustainability goes beyond construction materials for the two.

The restaurant uses a recycling program to reduce waste, as well as high-efficiency equipment to reduce water and energy consumption. They also support local farmers and dairies, buying from all-natural beef and poultry producers.

On the restaurant’s website, the owners tout, “Our meats and poultry are hormone, antibiotic and pesticide free; they are raised on all-natural vegetarian diets that are free from animal by-products.”

Babcock hopes Walker’s Grille will serve as a model of how other restaurants and smaller businesses can be green.

“It’s a soup-to-nuts sustainability,” he says. “It’s not just locally sourced foods, it’s changing the paradigm from the materials to the air quality and energy efficiency.

“I’m hopeful this illustrates (sustainable building) isn’t just reserved for big projects. Anybody can do it.”

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The happy hour is just as great at their Tysons Corner location, they say, but the restaurant can’t advertise those drink or food specials online or using its Twitter or Facebook accounts.

In the state of Virginia, it is illegal for bars and restaurants to advertise happy hour online or via any type of social media. The law has been on the books since the early 1980s, before the Internet was as omnipresent as it is today and before anyone knew what a Tweet or Facebook post was.

“You can’t really tell anyone about (happy hour) outside the four walls of your restaurant,” says Geoff Tracy, the owner of all four Chef Geoff locations.

Last month, Tracy lit up Twitter when he tweeted about the law from the Twitter account.

Tracy isn’t the only Virginia restaurant or bar owner who is frustrated by what they call an antiquated law.

Earlier this year, on behalf of its members, the worked with Virginia State , R-Springfield, to craft bill that would have required the Virginia Alcohol and Beverage Control Board to adopt regulations allowing bars and restaurants to advertise their happy hour specials on a website or social media site.

The bill passed the House unanimously, but was pulled in the state senate by Albo.

“My bill said a restaurant can put its happy hours on its own website,” Albo says. “The bill started running into problems because people were wondering whether or not a social media site is a website.”

He was contacted by groups concerned about underage drinking and disseminating drink specials via social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter. The concern being that social media sites are a prevalent form of communication among young adults.

“I respectfully disagreed with them,” Albo says. “Even if a person who was underage saw the happy hour prices, they still couldn’t drink.”

But he says he agreed that the bill needed more review because “you really can’t stop the dissemination if the website is on Facebook.”

“I think the restaurateurs have a good point. They should be able to advertise what’s going on at their restaurants,” Albo says. “But we need to be able to figure out how to do that without having it automatically blasted out to everybody who happens to be on a fan page of a social media site.”

Lisa Adler, a Fairfax County resident, is one of Albo’s constituents who contacted him about the pending bill. Adler is president of the . The group’s mission is to prevent violence, alcohol and drug use by youth and young adults.

“We had concerns because there is really consistent research … that has shown an increase in happy hours leads to an increase in binge drinking and drinking and driving,” she says.

at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health notes “Research clearly indicates that, in addition to parents and peers, alcohol advertising and marketing have a significant impact on youth decisions to drink.”

Adler says the concern is about advertising the drink specials on social media sites, predominantly used by young adults.

“Our concern with this in particular is, right now, establishments are only allowed to advertise things like happy hours within their four walls. If they were all of a sudden allowed to advertise on websites and able to get Twitter accounts and start to tweet these messages, it would just go viral and it might really exacerbate the problem that already exists,” she says.

“The message gets out quickly enough as it is from young person to young person because they are so adept at social media,” Adler says. “We were concerned that this would give them one more avenue to expose underage drinkers and binge drinkers to more than they need to consume.”

Mark Tate, government relations consultant for the Restaurant Association of Metropolitan Washington, says the intent of the bill is not to encourage underage drinking. But they agreed to work with the concerned groups.

“We’re very sensitive to underage drinking. We’re very sensitive to anything that looks like encouraging excessive drinking or underage drinking and we don’t want it to be seen as or to be used as a tool to encourage that,” he says.

That being said, Tate adds, he has not seen a study that specifically links advertising happy hours and increased underage or binge drinking.

“It’s still our responsibility to regulate who drinks in our establishments, whether they drink excessively or responsibly,” he says. “It’s a shared responsibility of restaurateurs to make sure there’s not excessive drinking or drunk driving.”

While D.C. and Maryland don’t have laws specifically preventing advertising of happy hour specials online or on social media sites, many states have some sort of restriction on happy hours, says Curtis Coleburn, chief operating officer of the Virginia Department of ABC.

The state of Massachusetts has banned happy hours since 1984. More recently, the state of Utah banned happy hours in 2012 and Illinois restricts certain drink specials.

And until 2008, Virginia had a law prohibiting restaurants from serving sangria. Several Northern Virginia restaurants were charged by the ABC with violating the law. The General Assembly passed SB 584, allowing restaurants with mixed beverage licenses to make sangria.

Coleburn says the Virginia ABC board is in the process of reviewing happy hour regulations. They have gathered comments from the public and all interested parties over the past six months.

“The whole idea of restrictions on happy hour is because of the fact that happy hours can be an invitation to over-indulge. The idea that reduced prices might get somebody to drink more than they would if they had pay the full price. That’s the reason behind restricting happy hour,” he says.

Several years ago, the board did pass an amendment that allows bars and restaurants to post a 17-by-22 sign on the outside of the building to advertise happy hour specials.

During the current review process, the board will decide whether to keep the existing law, repeal it or amend it in some way, Coleburn says. A recommendation from the board will most likely come early next year.

Tracy says he’s glad more attention is being focused on the happy hour law.

“It raises some questions as to why this law exists. Just because laws exist doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be questioned,” he says. “Running restaurants is hard enough without having to jump over these additional hurdles that sometimes get thrown in the way.”

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WASHINGTON – A group of young filmmakers is hoping to “shape human history” by harnessing the power of social media.

Since the organization uploaded “KONY 2012” to YouTube on March 5, their video had been viewed more than 30 million times by Thursday morning.

The film launched a campaign called, “Kony 2012,” and the group hopes it will eventually lead to the arrest of Joseph Kony. Kony is the rebel leader of the Lord’s Resistance Army, which has been known to utilize child abduction, rape and intimidation to further its cause in the African country of Uganda. They claim to be furthering the Holy Spirit Movement, which is in direct opposition to the government of Uganda.

The African Union last year formally designated the LRA as a terrorist group, a move that followed President Barack Obama’s decision to to Africa to advise local forces in their efforts to capture Kony.

It’s estimated that Kony has abducted more than 30,000 Ugandan children to aid in his army. According to Invisible Children, Kony “often forced children to kill their parents or siblings with machetes or blunt tools. He abducted girls to be sex slaves for his officers. He brainwashed and indoctrinated the children with his lies and manipulated them with his claim of spiritual powers.”

“[Kony 2012] aims to make Joseph Kony famous, not to celebrate him, but to raise support for his arrest and set a precedent for international justice,” the mission text for the film states.

The video features images of the Holocaust and the Rwandan genocide and includes the story of Jacob, a Ugandan boy the filmmakers met in 2003 when they traveled to Africa. At the end of their visit, Jacob — whose brother was killed by the rebel army — tells the filmmakers he would rather die than be alive.

Kony 2012 is furthering the promise the filmmakers made to Jacob.

“Our goal is to change the conversation of our culture … and get people to ask, ‘Who is Joseph Kony?'” says director Jason Russell in the most recent video.

Viewers are asked to order the Kony 2012 kit, which includes red string bracelets with unique ID numbers that can be registered online.

The kits also include posters, which are part of a larger movement on April 20 called, “Cover the Night.” On April 20, Invisible Children calls for activists involved in Kony 2012 to take their posters and plaster the walls and surfaces of every city in every country.

“The city will go to bed Friday night and wake up to 100,000 posters demanding justice on every corner,” Russell says.

Watch below the roughly 30-minute video for Kony 2012. The video does include some disturbing images.

“Cover the Night” groups have popped up in many cities across the world. In D.C., Maryland and Virginia, the “Cover the Night” group has nearly 18,000 people listed as attending its April 20 gathering on its .

On Toronto’s “Cover the Night” , there are plans to blanket the streets in hundreds of thousands of posters.

On Twitter, #StopKony has been trending since the campaign launched earlier in the week.

“It’s obviously an effective campaign because there are people talking about it,” says Mandy Jenkins, a professor in Georgetown University’s Master of Professional Studies program. She is also the former social media editor at Huffington Post.

The question, Jenkins says, is whether the group can sustain the momentum created by the video.

“On social media alone, it’s not going to be very easy to keep it going very long,” she says. “There’s so much new stuff coming out on social media every day.”

Jenkins says Invisible Children is not the first campaign to use social media to spread a message of change. She points to the days and weeks following the Haiti earthquake, and more recently, the controversy surrounding Susan G. Komen when a high-ranking Komen officer resigned due to pressure from a social media campaign.

“The reason why it does effect change isn’t because of the huge amount of people using social media,” she says. “Those people who are on Twitter tend to be people who are very plugged in and very social or have large social networks of their own.”

It’s for that reason Kony 2012 is targeting a key group of what they call “culturemakers” and “policymakers” via Twitter, Facebook and a letter-writing campaign.

The campaign also has stirred up controversy surrounding Invisible Children, with questions about its finances and methods — along with the current location and impact of Kony — taking on a viral life of their own. On YouTube, the video had garnered nearly 27,000 dislikes.

“This is probably a ‘white man to save the Africans’ concept and the spread of the film bears witness to an extremely low level of knowledge among people,” says user “stoofn93.” “It is sad that it gets such attention.”

The blog alleges Invisible Children spent more than $8.6 million last year with only 32 percent spent on direct services. They argue that a majority of the money has been spent on staff salaries, travel and transport, and film production.

notes, “Social media allows making anything viral, quickly. People often do not look into the substance of the message, or even watch the video you are sending. Once you become a brand, you can do anything. Invisible Children has successfully become a brand, but is sharing information that is far from nuanced and based on emotional reactions. It fails to paint the full picture.”

On , Invisible Children addresses the criticisms surrounding the organization and the Kony 2012 campaign.

“Let’s focus on what matters, and what we DO agree on: Joseph Kony needs to be stopped,” the group says. “And when that happens, peace is the limit.”

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WASHINGTON – While on a three-day trip to the West Coast for fundraising last week, President Obama got more than he ordered at a San Francisco Chinatown restaurant.

As he was waiting for his Chinese food from Great Eastern Restaurant, Obama took time to pose with the public.

One woman, who was considerably shorter than the Commander-in-Chief, posed with Obama and took hold of what was within arms reach. Unfortunately, it turned out to be the president’s tukis.

It appears Secret Service did not feel the woman was a threat, based on the photographic evidence.

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(Copyright 2012 Â鶹¹ÙÍø. All Rights Reserved.)

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