What’s the best thing to do the day after Christmas? Get up at 4 a.m. to wrestle bargain shoppers at Target of course. Sure you had to hit that old lady with the umbrella when she grabbed that disco dancing robotic Santa that was 60% off before you did, but he ended up in your cart, so it’s all worth it. Or you could just get drunk, which is what I’m guessing 90% of our favorite starlets did. Granted most of them probably didn’t wake up at 4 a.m. to get drunk, they probably just stayed up (and drunk) the night before. Mischa Barton being the notable example of night-after-Christmas drunkenness. The “actress” was pulled over and arrested at 3 a.m. on December 26th for driving under the influence.

Sources tell Hollyscoop EXCLUSIVELY that actress Mischa Barton was arrested in the wee hours this morning! She was handcuffed and arrested at 2:46AM last night and booked at 3:10AM.

Mischa was arrested on the corner of La Cienega and Santa Monica Blvd in Los Angeles late last night in her white Range Rover for Driving Under the Influence and driving without a license.

Her bail amount is set at $10,000.

[From Hollyscoop.com]

PRInsider clarifies that Barton was arrested on December 26th. I know Christmas can be hard, but do you really need to get smashed and then drive? Every time some dumb actress (let’s be honest, more often than not it’s an under-30 actress) drinks her body weight in cosmos, I always ask the heavens why she can’t pay $20 for a cab, or call a friend, or hire a driver. After enough idiots doing this, you start to realize that they absolutely can and they absolutely know that – they’re doing it for attention. And they get it.

A big part of me feels we shouldn’t be reporting on these stories anymore, simply because it seems to encourage these morons. There is no longer this sense of shame – you don’t see most of them issuing statements about how embarrassed and ashamed they are, while quickly being photographed doing volunteer work or rescuing puppies from sewers or anything. They just bask in the attention – especially actresses that were starting to drift towards obscurity, like Mischa Barton. I’m not even going to go through the motions of the whole “I hope you learn your lesson and get help” thing, because we all know this is probably for show. “All the other cool girls are swerving in traffic, why can’t I?” Mischa Barton, I hope you get Paris Hilton’s judge. And I hope he’s cranky.

Picture note by Jaybird: Here’s Mischa at the Save the Children’s 75th Anniversary Celebration at Lincoln Center on September 6th. Images thanks to PR Photos.