Archive for the 'Politics' Category

Now this is how to make a statement in politics.

Click the image to watch the video out of Kentucky.

So much delicious bourbon and whiskey poured down the drain to prove a point — a noble point, no less.

Kentucky’s master distillers and liquor company executives stood outside the state’s capitol and poured out bottles of the sweet nectar of life their own liquor hoping to stop the legislature from adding more booze taxes.

Kentucky is not the only state eyeing higher taxes on booze, New York, California and others are looking for ways to covers their asses in the budget department by taxing a whole slew of items, including alcohol sales, smoking and porn.

But lawmakers going after liquor and beer companies, in any state, seems like a bad idea to me (same goes for the other vice industries).

Like it or not, liquor companies, no matter what their politics, hold a lot of sway in state government. With the kind of money they command and lobbying power, liquor companies are usually pretty quiet about their political involvement.

So, to see a dozen liquor execs and distillers staging a protest on the steps of the Capitol like a bunch of Tea Party revolutionaries, you know the situation in the Bluegrass State has gotten dire.

Liquor companies prefer the hushed, behind-the-scenes kind of influence. Back in the State Capitol in Missouri (when I was working as a “real reporter”) it was not uncommon to see St. Louis-based Anheuser-Busch products stocked in lawmakers’ offices and in state employee refrigerators. No one really asked where it came from and everyone was free to enjoy.

Let’s hope the situation turns around for those KY distillers. But if they are going to keep pouring out bourbin tell us next time and we will bring our Sham-Wow to help clean up afterward.

[via]