In what, I'm sure will be the second to last post I ever make about Groupon, and how much of a dog company I think it is (the last post will be a "I told you so" when Groupon becomes a penny stock), I'd like to show you Groupon stock performance over the past two days.
Pretty shocking stuff. Especially if you own shares in this company!
On Monday, Nov. 21, 2011. The Dow Jones Industrials (DJI) had a bad day dropping 249 points or -2.1% to finish at 11,454. The NASDAQ Composite Index (IXIC) closed 1.92% lower at 2,529.14. On the other hand, Groupon (GRPN) had an even worse day by dropping almost 10% and another nearly 1% after-hours! See chart:
Today, Tuesday Nov. 22, 2011 (USA time) it wasn't as bad as yesterday's market saw the DJI down 53.59 or -0.49% to finish at 11,493.72. The NASDAQ closed 1.86% lower at 2,521. But! Groupon was one of the top three losers for the day dropping a whopping 3.51 or -14.89% to close at nearly their IPO price. The final closing was 20.07.
Head for the life rafts! If anyone knows where or how they can short GRPN shares, please comment and let us all know. Opportunities of a lifetime, like this one, don't come very often.
I'll make a prediction here: GRPN stock price will be under $5.00 by December 15, 2012 (maybe $1.00?) So if you want to be stupid and "BUY" then wait for their 60% off Groupon share price coupons! (Or, as Karl Denninger says, "There's crazy and then there's really crazy!")
UPDATE: Zerohedge writes, "Groupoff - Groupon back to IPO price":
As of this moment, everyone who has bought and held GRPN stock since the IPO price is at best flat, and almost certainly at a massive loss, as only a few banks were allotted shares at the $20.00 offering price, which were quickly flipped to subsequent greater fools. As of this moment, GRPN is back to the IPO price or precisely $20.00. We expect once this is taken out for the one way Grouponzi Red Light Special to fair value, somewhere around $0.00, to take a few months at most.
PS: I have made some really good bucks buying and selling stocks over these 35 years... Actually, only three. I've only ever bought three times. I won big three times. Great opportunities only come once every ten years or so (unless you have insider information) one day soon I will write about these exploits. I found these chances of a lifetime just simply from reading the news. You can too. Sometimes things are just painfully obvious. As a loser, Groupon was one of them.
Had I been able to invest huge money instead of my piddling amounts, on the good ones....I might have been rich!
Sometimes in posts on this blog, I want to warn people with small children about dangerous diseases and illnesses that can be prevented easily. But sometimes people will write thing like, "Who are you to make such claims?" Or like in yesterday's post, a comment like this, "You seriously are comparing the worst nuclear disaster ever, to flu shots. (sic) You are a sick individual." I get lots of hate mail especially when I compare the risks of everyday occurrences with a media sensationalized story like Fukushima. Challenges. Those are comments that I often get... Along with invective and personal insults. I try not to insult these people back. I like to think that the big electrode, God, Buddha, Zig Zag, what-have-you, in the sky put these people on the earth to teach me patience and how to be a better person. Kindness to people works wonders!
My third daughter Wendy. Some say she is handicapped. I say she is "just perfect!"
The most recent attacks I have received are because I have warned parents about serious problems, diseases and illnesses that can affect their children and I use Fukushima sensationalism as a comparison. People will grossly overreact to Fukushima, over a hundred miles away, but when serious causes of diseases (that get little media attention) are right under their noses, they are oblivious. To pat myself on the back (once again) as a mass media professional for over thirty years, I know what kind of BS goes on with news reporting and sensationalism as I have seen it from the inside. And, with four kids, I hope I know a bit about raising children. In fact, because of 4 kids, and one of them defeating a rare, deadly childhood disease - yet remaining handicapped for the rest of her life - I know more than most parents would ever want to know about raising kids and diseases like childhood cancer. Many times I have pointed out that we cannot believe what we hear on the TV news and even so-called alternative media. The sensationalism sells advertising. That's the point and, in this day and age, it astounds me that most people today say they know that, but when it comes to something like Swine Flu or Fukushima, they seem to forget it. I am beginning to think that this selective response is due to some childhood phobias. Please refer to: Japan Nuclear Disaster Update & Strong Criticism of Western Media Sensationalism:
Actually, it astounds me that people do accept what what the media says as gospel truth. Don't forget that this is the very same media that told us 3 years ago that Swine Flu was going to kill more than 50 million people worldwide. This was the same media that told us that the USA had to invade Iraq because of Saddam's nooklar weapons. This was the same media that told us that SARS also was a killer virus that was going to wipe out entire populations. This was the same media that told us that Bird Flu was going to do the same.
As of today, worldwide deaths from Swine Flu: 82. No nuclear weapons for Saddam (if he had any, do you really think we would have invaded Iraq?). Worldwide deaths from SARS: 100. Worldwide deaths from Bird Flu: 80. Don't even get me started on Man Made Global Warming!
Fact of the matter is that this is the same media who constantly exaggerates stories in order to sell advertising space to an extremely gullible public. When will people ever learn? If history is any example then the answer is: Never. They'll never learn.
Just wait a year or three for the next killer disease and we can start all over again.
So, I write posts like the above pointing out problems with the media. Then I write articles alerting people to serious cancer and disease causing problems that, while not trendy, nor spectacularly newsworthy, are actually much more dangerous to our children than Fukushima will ever be. For one example of that, please refer to:
Benzene in Cars! This Will Kill More People Than Fukushima Will
Do not turn on A/C immediately as soon as you enter the car! Please open the windows after you enter your car and do not turn on the air-conditioning immediately.
According to research done, the car dashboard, sofa, air freshener emits Benzene, a cancer causing toxin (carcinogen - take note of the heated plastic smell in your car). In addition to causing cancer, it poisons your bones, causes anemia, and reduces white blood cells. Prolonged exposure will cause Leukemia, increasing the risk of cancer. may also cause miscarriage.
Acceptable Benzene levels indoors is 50 mg per sq. ft.. A car parked with windows closed will contain 400 - 800 mg of Benzene. If parked outdoors, under the sun, at temperature above 60 degrees F (15.5 C), the Benzene level goes up to 2000 - 4000 mg, 40 times the acceptable level... And the people inside the car will inevitably inhale an excess amount of the toxins.
It is recommended that you open the windows and doors to give time for the interior to air out before you enter. Benzene is a toxin that affects your kidney and liver, and it is very difficult for your body to expel this toxic stuff.
Or even my most recent post:
Massive Cover-up! Worse Than Fukushima? Japan (and the World Over) Danger Levels at More Than 250 X Safe Limit!
Because of these posts, though, I will get attacked by people who ask me what right or authority I have to mention anything about diseases like this or children's cancer. Perhaps I am confused, but here is where I think my authority lies. My authority lies in my dearest third daughter whom I love deeply and will spend the rest of my life caring for and trying to help other parents (and their children) to prevent a similar struggle. So let me give my qualifications. First, my darling daughter, Wendy. One day, when she was age 1 1/2, she suddenly could not walk anymore. It was very strange. One day she was running around, the next day she couldn't stand. Soon after, she was diagnosed with 4th stage of a rare form of children's cancer called Rhabdomysarcoma. The doctors said it was incurable and her diagnosis was poor. She, like all children diagnosed with this horrible disease, was only expected to live for 2 ~ 6 months. As some may know, 4th stage cancer is the worst and final stages. The doctors at Setagaya Children's Hospital told me that she had virtually no chance. But I fought back. We fought back. I fired those doctors and hired the #1 expert in Japan (and top doctor in the world for this type of cancer - Dr. Mugishima at Nichidai hospital in Itabashi Tokyo) to handle my daughter. I fired the first group of doctors because they said, "Virtually zero chance." Dr. Mugishima gave us a 7% chance. Good enough. Better than zero. If your doctor doesn't think you have a chance, then that's not good. Fire them. As part of the new doctor's regime, my then wife had to move into the hospital with my daughter 24/7 and that left me at home with two small girls to care for by myself and to try to hold down a job too! In spite of that, I took care of those two girls, and visited my daughter and wife in the hospital everyday religiously for nearly two years. The hospital cost me an impossible amount to pay. It was well over $5,000 a month every month for those 2 years (insurance doesn't pay for private hospitals and choices) and yet I paid it out of my pocket with no loans (Heck, I was a foreigner in Japan, my wife was in the hospital with my daughter, I had no assets, who's going to give me a loan? No one.) Yet, even with all this, I held down my job, paid for everything, cooked and cleaned and we came out victorious in a war with a deadly disease. When my daughters cancer was declared in full remission she was released from the hospital with one big caveat: Because of the treatment, her immune system was so damaged that she was not allowed to live with other children for six years because she would be catching all sorts of illness (from her sisters who played with other children at school who caught colds all the time). And those illnesses might kill her. After two years apart in the hospital and then another six years apart (at least) for the future, and me with a 11-year-old and a 9-year-old from a previous marriage, my wife and I decided it was best to get a divorce. In over 80% of all cases where a child in Japan gets cancer in Japan, the parents wind up in divorce. The pressure and stress are too great. My daughter is now a high school student and looking forward to college. She is wheelchair bound for life but one of the happiest and most positive people you could ever hope to meet. I wish my other daughters were so happy! Japan has a population of about 130 million people. Only about two or three children per year get this rare form of cancer. Nearly all of them do not survive. My daughter was only the second one in history of Japan, since it started cancer study with Germany and the USA in 1971, to do so. These are my qualifications. I don't think they are so bad. UPDATE: People need to get their priorities straight. For example, did you know that: In the U.S., the odds of being killed by conventional medicine are almost 20 times (2,000%) greater than being killed in an automobile accident and almost 30 times (3,000%) greater than being killed by a gun. - From Confessions of a Drug Industry Insider. *If any parents have such a challenge to deal with, please write to me and perhaps I can give some advice that may be helpful... I will try.
This will ruin more lives this year than the Fukushima nuclear accident will. The government and industry is lying. They've been lying and they always will lie to us. It is our duty to protect ourselves and our children especially when the government that we elect fails to do so.
Thimerosal is a widely used vaccine preservative that is present in the majority of flu shots and other vaccines. Thimerosal is 49% mercury by volume, an extremely toxic chemical element that wreaks havoc on the nervous system, neurological function, and overall biological function [1]. Each dose of flu vaccine contains around 25 micrograms of thimerosal, over 250 times theEnvironmental Protection Agency’s safety limit of exposure.
Mercury, a neurotoxin, is especially damaging to undeveloped brains. Considering that 25 micrograms of mercury is considered unsafe by the EPA for any human under 550 pounds, the devastating health effects of mercury on a developing fetus are truly concerning.
Though thimerasol is not entirely mercury, the mercury content is still extremely high, making it very toxic to the human body. Despite highly exceeding the EPA safety standards for mercury content by over 250 times, flu shots are still recommended for children over 6 months and pregnant women.
It seems that the age groups that are urged to receive the flu shot are actually most affected by mercury exposure. Young children, pregnant women, and elderly are the ‘targeted’ demographic of flu shot manufacturers, and these individuals also happen to have the least defense against the elemental neurotoxin mercury.
When my son was just two years old we took him to the doctor who recommended flu shots. My wife wanted them, I was quite skeptical but I relented. Just before administering the shots I asked the doctor if these shots had Thimerasol in them and that Thimerasol had been banned in California. I had printed out an article that stated as such. As I was handing the article to the doctor he got angry and said, "Of course! That's obvious!"
I said to the doctor, "If it is obvious, then why do you have both shots with Thimerasol and those without? And why is it that you give the vaccinations without Thimerasol only upon request? If it is so obvious, then why do you even have vaccinations with Thimerasol on hand?"
I tell you why. The vaccinations with Thimerasol are cheaper and the doctor makes more money from them and the government subsidises them.
Healthy baby gets the flu? Sick for a few days. Gets autism because
of flu shots? A families dreams ruined. Don't do this to your kids.
The flu season is upon us. The flu is a dangerous disease and should be handled with care. Generally speaking, though, the flu only kills the old and very weak and sick. The risk of receiving Mercury filled vaccinations and a lifetime of medical problems or autism do not justify the vaccination.
Don't do this to your kids.
UPDATE:Dear readers, I knew someone would write in who was low on facts and big on fears (see comments below). Before anyone else writes in to complain, let me explain. Fukushima is a big problem but here are the facts. Towns near Fukushima have been evacuated, and that's a problem, but no one has died or gotten sick (maybe locals have gotten depression). Fukushima radiation as a dangerous and a cause of cancer is a localized problem (High levels of dangerous radiation found within 50 mile radius).
This column is about Japanese Rock stars versus Western Rock Stars in Japan. It was inspired by my friends Allison Sane and JP Valentine. The premise is that, in spite of the hype and hoopla in the western press, USA and UK artists have seriously fallen out of their position of "Most Favored" in Japan (and China and elsewhere in Asia). That's what this post is about. Allison had asked me if Eric Burdon was "big" in Japan. I replied that he was in the sixties, but not now. That's not to say that Eric Burdon doesn't have fans in Japan, he does. But, over these last fifteen years, whether it's Eric Burdon or not, (or any other modern western pop star) sales of albums from US and UK artists, and in turn their popularity, have dropped off a cliff. Western artists are just not the draw or as popular as they were a few decades ago.
Eric Burdon today might be able to do some shows in Tokyo but drawing more than a few hundred people is highly questionable. Expensive dinner show is more practical and profitable for this type of artist in Japan.
The biggest (and worse sounding) venue in Japan is the Tokyo Dome. Performing there is considered the pinnacle of success for an artist. I hate concerts at the Tokyo Dome. The sound is terrible (like all large venues). The dome roof is kept up like a big balloon so the sound reverberates around the dome and it sounds like you are listening to a concert inside of a canyon. Heck, you are. The place holds 55,000 people. The last big western artist who could come to Japan and quickly sell out a few nights at Tokyo Dome was Michael Jackson at the height of his popularity in the early nineties. Madonna has played there. The Backstreet Boys have. I saw David Bowie with Adrian Belew in 1990 at the Tokyo Dome. David Bowie was the last time I went there to see a concert that I actually wanted to go to. I had tickets in the eighth row right in front of the stage and Bowie was 20 yards in front of me. He could have been a mile away. The echo was so bad it sounded like he was singing inside of an airplane hanger. But that was a long time ago. Very few western artists can come to Japan anymore and sell out the dome even for one night. Most today don't even try. Coldplay certainly couldn't do it. They played at Saitama arena last time which holds 37,000 maximum. The Tokyo Dome is just out of reach for western artists today. In fact, I don't think there are any bands in the entire world (excepting, perhaps a Rolling Stones reunion) that could sell out a few days at Tokyo Dome these days. Aerosmith is playing there next week, for one night, but they are having a hard time selling tickets and will be lucky to sell out the arena seats on the first floor. Their popularity isn't what it used to be so I imagine they don't ask for green M&M's anymore. But, I also imagine that Aerosmith insists upon playing there because Steven Tyler is so insecure that he needs to say "We're playing the dome" because perhaps he's afraid of meeting Nigel Tufnel in the lobby.
Really good Japanese rock bands don't become famous in this country.
(Pictured, The Neatbeats - Japan's Beatles)
As an aside, I once interviewed Aerosmith and I said to Steven Tyler, "I go back with you guys since high school. I have all your records. My question is which one of you guys was wearing the makeup as the cat? Which one of you had the star on your eye and which one had the long tongue?" Tyler got pissed off for a second but Joe Perry and the other guys laughed. It think it was the first time in history that a TV interviewer got Aerosmith to sing the Kiss song, "Rock and Roll all Night" on national TV. Later I overheard Perry tell his manager, "Now THAT'S the kind of interview we want to do in Japan!" I'm sure he said that because Japanese interviewers always ask dumb questions about what is their favorite food or color. But I digress.... I'm sure they'll be giving away lots of Aerosmith tickets to industry related people just to try to fill the place. (Edit: As suspected. The Aerosmith was sold only the arena seats. The other half of the seats were empty. That's a disaster!})
Big Bang at Tokyo Dome. This band sold out three days straight at the Dome in under thirty minutes.
But when it comes to Japanese (or Korean) artists, playing in Japan, it's a completely different story. You might think that major Japanese and Korean pop artists all suck and I might well agree. But I will add that they suck no more or less than most big western (especially Top 40) artists! But no one can sneeze at these bands that can sell out an entire week at the Tokyo Dome. And the list of bands that do is long. Just a few weeks ago, I went to see Complex who sold out two nights in a row at Tokyo Dome. Complex is Hotei Tomoyasu and Koji Kikkawa. They sold out two nights a short while back and donated all the money to charity! So laugh all you want. These guys are not a joke. Do the math. Let's see: ¥9,800 a ticket times 54,000 people equals: ¥529,200,000. This amount of yen at today dollar rate (¥76.91 yen to $1 USD) equals: $6,880,769.00. Now take that times two and you have over $13 million dollars for two nights performance. (Please someone double check this math. I've done it over and over and still come up the same. It's astounding to me this number... But Muhammed Ali got $5 million dollars for a 45 minute fight with Joe Frazier in 1975, so I guess this is correct. If I am wrong, please comment!)
Complex at Tokyo Dome - Total David Bowie ripoff? yes. But the fans don't care. And David Bowie doesn't sing in Japanese.
Now imagine a bunch of other Japanese artists who can do this for an entire week straight! The top bands in the west? Nope. One night, maybe. Like I said, there's not a western artist in the world today who could do that excepting a Rolling Stones reunion, maybe. They might be able to pull off two nights, but not three.
For many years, Japan and Japanese rock stars have had an inferiority complex towards western artists as they deservably should have. But nowadays, things have changed in Japan. And, when they can make this kind of money playing in Japan - and never make near that amount in the west - all the while western artists come here to make big money - why bother going to play in the USA? Sure, the big name artists still dream of becoming big in the west too, but the west doesn't hold the allure it once did for people. And that's not just people in Japan, but, I think for people all over the world. Sure, some dream of Hollywood and New York, but when it comes to the big name Japanese artists (who don't sing in English anyway) it's no longer practical to even consider trying to break into the USA market... Most certainly isn't profitable. These big name Japanese artists can stay at home, in their comfy chairs, and copy the western artists that they are inspired by and make those musicians' music their own. The domestic audience doesn't know the difference.
Glay at Tokyo Dome 2005. Massive in Japan. They suck, but were fans of my radio show, so that's OK.... But they still suck.
NOTE: It might sound like I am dissing these Japanese artists or even Aerosmith, but I am not. When anyone can sell their music and become professionals, regardless of how crappy I might think their music is, that is to be respected. After all, who cares what I think and isn't everyone a music critic?
Playing music and actually getting paid to do so is great. Getting paid very well to do so is the dream of a lifetime.
The title of this post should be "Idiot Pot Users in Japan." Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against marijuana or any other drug use for that matter. I think all drugs should be decriminalized... But what I think doesn't matter. If you are in Japan, you'd have to be stupid to do or smoke (possess) marijuana. Because if you're caught, they will throw you in prison.
Mailing marijuana cookies to Japan. Doh! Did anyone ever stop to think, "I guess they might have candies and cookies in Japan! I wonder if sending cookies will look suspicious?" Perhaps this could be proof that marijuana cause brain damage
Sure, some people will say that marijuana is not bad for you at all and, even though some will disagree, I might agree with them totally that marijuana isn't all that bad for your health. It might even be good for you. I don't know.
But good or bad, marijuana certainly was lots of fun when I was a university student in the USA. But that was in the USA back in the days when small amounts of marijuana wouldn't land you in jail.
Is marijuana really all that bad for you? I don't know. But I can guarantee you that, without a shadow of a doubt, getting your ass thrown in jail in Japan for a decade because a little marijuana will certainly be bad for your health.
The point is that this is not a question of whether or not marijuana is bad for you or not. It is not a question of whether or not marijuana should be illegal or not. The question here is this: Is possession of marijuana in Japan a serious offense in the year 2011? The answer is "Yes. It is! It is a serious crime that holds prison as a penalty."
Interestingly, it is not against the law to smoke marijuana in Japan. The law states that possession of marijuana is a crime. Possession always pre-dates usage. So it is against the law to have any amount of marijuana.
Since it is against the law, if you do possess marijuana in Japan, you take the risk of getting arrested and you face the possibility of a long prison sentence. Once you are caught and arrested, making idiotic claims that, "Marijuana isn't that bad for you!" or "It was only a little bit!" or "I didn't know my friends were going to send it to me in the mail!" Just isn't going to fly. They've heard them all before.
Everyone who gets caught says this kind of stupid thing. The result is always the same: The law will be upheld.
I remember several years ago when an American friend of mine came to Japan to visit her son. She didn't know her way around and the son he was too much of a selfish brat to pick up his mom at the airport so, since she was an old friend, I picked her up.
On the way back in the car, she started asking questions about Japan and telling me all sorts of nonsense that went on between her "Parent of the Year" parenting skills and her dysfunctional kid. She also told me that she sometimes sent her son marijuana in the mail. She said she hid the marijuana, in small amounts, in packages from the USA. I almost hit the roof. I told her to cease that immediately.
In a typical stupid, ethno-centric, typically American reply, she said to me,
"Oh. It's OK. I don't use my real address! It's not that much marijuana. Just a little bit. They won't put him into prison for a few grams."
"No!" I said, "No one here cares about your address. Trust me. It doesn't matter if it's even one little speck. If they catch him with that marijuana, they will put him in prison. No ifs ands or buts."
She wouldn't believe me.
I had to repeat myself, "No. If they find that marijuana on him or in his home, they will put him in prison!"
She then took the stupidity up a few levels higher by telling me how she so cleverly hid the drugs;
"Oh, they won't find it anyhow. I hide it in ball point pens and cassette tapes."
Jeez! What a fricking stupid woman! Had she never heard of X-ray machines? Didn't she know that they already have ball point pens in Japan? And, incredibly, and as hard as it is going to be to believe, cassette tapes were also plentiful in Japan. In fact Japan manufactured those things!!! I know the genius and technological prowess of the Japanese and, trust me, Japan has had ball pens and cassette tapes for a long time (Pssst! They sell them here at places called, interestingly, "Convenience Stores.") I told her again to stop that practice and also pointed out the obvious that cassette tapes and ball point pens, being mailed from the USA to Japan might look a tiny bit suspicious, no?
I have no doubt that that stupid woman is continuing this foolishness today.
Well, maybe it's OK, it seems her son is so useless that he can't keep a decent job to feed himself or pay his own rent so maybe it's better for him in prison. What the hell? Free rent and food!
Now, in Japan, today we have another story of another moron coming to Japan from the USA and now facing jail time for marijuana. Now, once again, I am not saying that I agree with Japan's drug laws. I don't. But, the law is the law, and when you go to a foreign country (or even in your own) and you take risks with those laws, you also accept the risk of penalties.
I hope this idiot kid doesn't go to jail, but if he does, I will say, "Just another in a long line of stupid foreigners." Here is the story in yellow with my comments included.
ARVADA - A Colorado School of Mines chemical engineering student remains in a Japanese jail after a friend of his says he mailed the student three cookies and four pieces of candy infused with marijuana.
With friends like this guy, who needs enemies?
Japanese prosecutors appear to be using the country's very strict anti-drug laws to go after 25-year-old Tim Wilson.
That's their job.
Wilson was attending Tohuku (sic) University in Sendai, Japan, as an exchange student when he was arrested back in August.
He's remained in custody ever since.
"They keep pushing the trial back," his father Jeff Wilson said on Wednesday. "Originally, they told us it would be no later than Oct. 24. Then they told us December, and then two weeks ago we found out it would be in January."
Japanese law says that a person can be arrested and detained for 22 days before charges are brought against them. If the prosecutors go to the judge at the end of the 22 days and ask for an extension, the judge will usually allow it. These extensions cane be repeated twice for a total of 66 days. If Tim never accepted these cookies into his possession, they will probably release him at the end of the 66 days and he will be put on the first plane back to the USA under a deportation ruling. He will never be allowed back into Japan again. If the police and prosecutors find marijuana at Tim's apartment or they find his friends in Japan have some and they got it from Tim then I hope Tim has fun with his new friends in prison.
Tim Wilson's friend agreed to speak with 9NEWS on Wednesday if we agreed not to use his name. He said in May he mailed three peanut butter cookies and four "Cheeba Chews" to Tim Wilson inside a package containing other items such as books and CD's.
Duh! Moron! He doesn't want them to use his name? Why not? he doesn't want the whole world to know how much of an ass he is? Amazingly, but true, Japan is one of the riches countries in the world and we have lots of cookies and candies and cakes... Hasn't it struck "friend" for even a second that mailing $1.00 candies and cookies to Japan is a red flag and might look real suspicious?
That package never made it to Wilson.
If this is true, and it never made it to Wilson, and Wilson has no marijuana at his residence, he will probably be deported at the end of 66 days.
In June, Japanese customs officials flagged the package and then started an investigation which eventually led to Wilson's arrest on Aug. 3.
Jeff Wilson has been told his son faces up to 10 years in prison.
"We really believed this would be cleared up in the first 10 to 20 days. We thought he'd be released," Jeff Wilson said.
Well, you believed wrong.
Tim Wilson was registered as a medical marijuana patient with the State of Colorado when the marijuana edibles were sent, although federal and state laws prohibit the mailing of such items. He was given a medical marijuana card for pain in his back.
Medical Marijuana patient, eh? That's supposed to means he needs it to survive or live a life without pain. Well, his coming to Japan is a good argument for the people who don't want to allow medical marijuana. If this guy can go to Japan and do without it, it must not be that much of a medical priority. PS: Card or no card, marijuana is illegal in Japan.
Jeff Wilson insists his son never requested the edibles and that the friend took it upon himself to send the package to Japan. The friend told 9NEWS the same thing.
Sure, you can go to any prison in America and every person instituted there will tell you the same thing, "I didn't do anything wrong! They go the wrong guy!"
Some of the confusion may be due to an email exchange between Tim Wilson and his friend in which Wilson wrote, "That would be a good idea," when asked about sending marijuana edibles to Japan.
Jeff Wilson believes his son was simply being sarcastic when he wrote that and that language issues between the two countries was at play at the time.
Oh yeah. Dumb friend goes out and spend his money on marijuana; then spends his time making cookies; then spends his own money again on sending marijuana to Japan and it's all a misunderstanding between friends? Well, that's completely believable, right? Wrong. Bullshit! I believe Tim Wilson's father believes wrong and I don't think for a second he actually believes that cock and bull story.
Tim Wilson was also volunteering with the country's ongoing earthquake relief efforts.
Aha! Playing the sympathy card? Isn't that nice? By the way, volunteering is something that Tim (and every other person) in this country has done. No big deal. Sentimentality, or the lack of it, should not guide decisions concerning whether or not the law has been broken and if actions should be taken.
Tom McNamara is a Denver attorney with Davis, Graham and Stubbs and specializes in international law. He calls Japan's anti-drug laws "some of the most severe in the world."
"The amount [of marijuana] matters not," he said on Wednesday. "We could be talking about one gram or five kilos."
He says Japanese authorities have recently started to concentrate on cases involving drugs mailed into the country.
Finally, someone who says something that makes sense.
Jeff Wilson is now actively trying to bring more attention to his son's case.
"They've got the wrong guy," he insisted.
Bwa! Ha! Ha! Ha! "I'm innocent! Innocent, I tell ya!"
They arrested Paul McCartney for marijuana in Japan. They will most certainly throw your ass in jail for the same. Here, too, McCartney says he "didn't know"!
Tim Wilson has a 3.98 grade point average at Mines and his father showed 9NEWS a letter where faculty members were recommending he consider trying to become a Rhodes Scholar.
Well, with a 3.98 grade point average, Tim sure doesn't seem to be all that bright.
NOTE: The purpose of this post is not to kick this dimwit kid and his naive father. It's, hopefully, to make sure that someone will read this and make damn sure that they aren't the next Tim Wilson.
Tim is lucky, actually, that this happened in Japan. In some other Asian countries the penalty for what he is involved with is death.
NOTE TWO: I can bet you a donut that the friend that baked these marijuana cookies and sent them to Tim in Japan was high when he did so. Just goes to show that great ideas when you are high are usually not such great ideas later on when you are sober
Ebisu is one stop from Shibuya. It's a big town. I hated going there because I thought that there were no good places to eat or drink. Oh, sure, there are lots of expensive places (and expensive places are supposed to taste good, right?) but I didn't know any good, cheap, old fashioned Japanese style, places to eat and drink in Ebisu until last night.
Finally! I found one. It's called "Ebisu Yokocho" and it's actually, not just one shop. There's several all in one place! "Ebisu Yokocho" (Ebisu Street) and it's only 1.5 minutes walk from the station! Sapporo in Hokkaido has it's own Ramen Yokocho and there's Okonomi-mura in Osaka. Now, thank the lord, I've found a great and cheap place to eat and drink in Ebisu.
Ebisu Yokocho opened in 2008 and it really looks the part of an old, out of the 1950's or 1960's Japanese style drinking and eating establishment. Here's their webpage (sorry only in Japanese): http://www.ebisu-yokocho.com/access.html
There is now a reason to look forward to going to Ebisu!
I was only there for 30 minutes so I didn't have time to get all the details, but here's a load of photos for you and, as they say, a picture speaks a thousand words. Here, have a quick and fun vacation to Japan (and a location map):
View from outside
Kampai!
There's at least ten shops down this aisle. Lots of women too so that means the food is good!
My best friend, Michio
Everywhere was full of customers
All sorts of tastes
The atmosphere of Japan from a long time ago
Like garlic? They got garlic!
Hoppy and Haippi
I love this yakitori place!
Did I say ten shops? Nope. Nineteen shops shown!
I highly recommend this Yakitori shop. Easy to find too! It's called Kappa chan and it's the first shop when you step into the door on the right side!
