This And That Re. Beer

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I'm totally falling behind in my beer-related posts. Frankly, it's about all I can manage these days to post anything, let alone about beer (and it's probably obvious by now that the presidential campaign is much on my mind.) (*1)

But I want to point out two pieces about beer that are worth reading. Jeff Alworth at Beervana alerted me to them, so tip o' the mug to Jeff

. One article is about the politics of the three-tier/distributor system. (For those just tuning in, Cindy McCain's wealth comes from her family's Anheuser-Busch distributorship, so there's been more than a little print about the three-tier system lately).

The other piece comes from a British blogger and is about beer and "class" politics in the United Kingdom, but is worth reading because the author's point is certainly applicable to the U.S. It's worth reading, as is Jeff's comment on it.

As always, I don't necessarily agree with or endorse the entire contents of either piece, but I'm all in favor of thoughtful expression of ideas. So have at it! And again, thanks to Jeff for the fodder.

Added a few hours later: I'd forgotten that Jay Brooks also commented on the Reason magazine article; you can read his post here. And Jeff points out that Patrick Emerson, of the Oregon Economics Blog, has also weighed in.

Again, thanks to Jeff for doing his bit to keep me up-to-date. I'm especially grateful to him for tipping me off to Patrick's blog. I'm totally in favor of academic types doing their bit to communicate with us real folks (me being an escapee from academia and doing my damndest to make history accessible to everyone.)

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*1: So is my new book. I'm pretty much buried in it, and there are only so many hours in the day, and the meat book gets priority....

In Praise Of Colin Powell And Common Sense

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Geez, too bad Colin Powell isn't running for president. I'd vote for him faster than you can say "hanging chad."

On the other hand, maybe I'm glad he's not running for office -- because if he were, he might not be so willing to speak sense. I mean, have you noticed how often the process of campaigning turns candidates' brains to mush, so that they often end up spouting inane bullshit instead of sense?

Anyway -- three cheers for Powell for saying aloud two things that I had hoped at least one of the presidential or vice-presidential candidates would say:

First, as he noted in an interview this weekend, yes, taxes are a way to redistribute wealth. Say it's a nice sunny day and you and your family decide to visit a local park. You get in your car and pull out into the street -- which is paid for with tax dollars. You stop at a traffic light at an intersection. Yup, paid for with tax dollars. You take a walk through the park -- you guessed it, paid for by my tax dollars and yours. Do you have kids in school? The buildings, the playgrounds, the desks, the books -- all paid for by tax dollars.

Because that's what we do with taxes: we pay them to a central treasury, at the municipal, county, state, or federal level, and then we redistribute that "wealth" back to each other in the form of streets, parking lots, sewers, water, schools, and so forth.

Second: Barack Obama is a Christian, but what if he WAS Muslim? Big deal. Is there something wrong with a Muslim child believing he or she could be president? Or a senator or a CEO? Last time I checked, this was still the United States of America (all of it, not just the parts deemed "pro-America" by Governor Palin). And one of the things that defines we Americans is freedom of religion

. I notice, by the way, that no one objects when Muslims pay taxes or vote or die in battle for this country. So why should anyone object if a Muslim wants to run for president? Because, ya know, who's next? No Jews allowed? No Catholics? No atheists?

So -- thank you, Colin Powell, for the audacity of common sense.

Why I Support Barack Obama and Joe Biden

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Every negative has a positive: In my previous post, I explained the negative: Why I won’t vote for John McCain and Sarah Palin.

Now for the positive: I support Barack Obama and Joe Biden. Here’s why.

I am a middle-age (55), white, middle-class woman. And there’s one thing I know for certain: The future does not belong to me. There’s no big shock there in that realization, I might add. When people land at the half-century mark, reality hits, because to turn fifty is to experience one’s mortality. The future no longer seems infinite, the way it did back when I was, say, thirty or forty. I hasten to add that I don’t feel “old" and I’ve certainly not given up on life. Far from it. I am fit and reasonably healthy and ready to tackle whatever life brings in whatever time I have left. But the future is not mine anymore.

Here’s another reality: The planet has changed in the past ten or fifteen years, and has done so with breath-taking speed. You know what I mean: Electronic media have changed the way human beings interact and communicate. Economies and cultures once separated by vast physical distance are inextricably interwoven. Long-standing political alliances have unraveled, morphing into new ones that would not have existed fifty years ago. Attitudes toward the United States have changed, and not necessarily for the better

. I could go on. You get the drift.

So what has the one -- my age -- got to do with the other -- the pace of change? And what have both got to do with Barack Obama?

This: We Americans are racing toward End Game. We’ve been rolling toward it for thirty years. We’ve had warning after warning about political turmoil in various parts of the world. Warning after warning about our dependence on oil, about climatic disruption, about our addiction to debt and affluence. In my opinion as a historian, we’ve run out of time. We can’t keep dodging our self-inflicted bullets. At the rate we’re going, in fifty years we will be a third-rate nation.

(Think I’m wrong? The Brits thought they were invincible, too. In the space of about 30 years, they slipped from Masters of the Universe to Also-Rans.) (Absolutely no offense intended to my son-in-law or my several very dear British friends.)

Okay, so mistakes were made. The question is: What are we doing to do about it? Look backward to the “good old days" of the Cold War and Ronald Reagan? Or look to the present and the future, neither of which bear any resemblance to those “old days."

Put simply, this isn’t the time for old people like me to be running the show. It’s time to turn it over to people who grew up in a multi-culture, multi-racial, post-cold-war, television- and computer-based world. People who understand that what happens in Beijing and Bangalore matters as much as what happens in Washington and on Wall Street. People like Barack Obama, who are willing to challenge “the way things are done," and who envision a future that does not depend on the past.

Here’s a small but telling example of Obama’s willingness to look forward instead of backward: He and his advisers planned a campaign strategy around fifty states, rather than just a handful of “blue" states. [That plan was first proposed by Howard Dean while he was chair of the Democratic Party.] As a result, he’s now running even with, and in a few cases ahead of, McCain in states that are supposed to “belong" to the Republicans.

Consider Virginia. Democrats wrote that state off decades ago. “We can’t win in Virginia," they said, “so let’s not waste any time or money there." Never mind that the demographic makeup up Virginia had changed dramatically in the past half century. Democrats like Bill Clinton and Al Gore didn’t bother. They assumed that the past was a good predictor of the future.

Obama rejected that assumption. Instead, he decided to find out for himself just how “red" Virginia was. Turns out it’s a healthy shade of purple -- so he has spent time and money there reaching out to a new generation of voters who’d been written off by Democrats in earlier races.

Again, that’s a small example, but it’s indicative of Obama’s willingness to challenge assumptions, to think in new ways, to imagine a future that is different from the past.

John McCain’s vision of the future, on the other hand, is rooted in past mistakes and old idealogies. That was evident in the first presidential debate, when he constantly and insistently referenced the past rather than the present or the future. Indeed, as I watched that first debate I wondered what people under the age of, say, 35 made of McCain. How many of those younger viewers knew who Gorbachev is? Or Kissinger or Eisenhower? For that matter, how many knew who Ronald Reagan was?

Don’t get me wrong. I’m a historian. My mission is to persuade Americans that history is relevant. I don’t plan to abandon my mission. But as a historian, I believe that the past is different from the present.

And if that’s true, then it follows that the future can be different from -- and better than -- the present.

Barack Obama is the person to lead us into a future that we must -- WE MUST -- shape before it destroys us all.

I also support Barack Obama for another reason: Because I understand the power of hope. Yes, I know that many people reject Obama’s calls for hope and his message of “yes, we can." Many people believe that those words are naive or, worse, empty rhetoric.

Not me. I understand the power of hope deep in my gut. I am living proof of hope’s power. Over and over and over again in my 55 years, I’ve changed the course of my life; I’ve dug deep and reached high. I’ve used hope to conquer despair. Even now, at middle-age, I believe in the transformative power of hope. I believe the future can be different than the past or present.

I don’t believe in hope because Obama asked me to. I believe in Obama because I believe in hope.

I hope you do, too.

Why I Don't Support John McCain and Sarah Palin

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I'm about as middle-of-the-road as it's possible to get, probably because I'm a pragmatist. I understand, for example, that politicians make promises in order to get elected. I also know that presidents don't write laws governing taxes, immigration, or education. Congress does. A president can cajole, urge, plead, and lead, but in the end he/she can only sign or veto legislation created by Congress.

So when I ponder presidential candidates, their policies matter less to me than do their character and integrity. And that's why I'm not voting for John McCain and Sarah Palin.

I could rattle off a long list of examples, but I'll stick to one: Sarah Palin. As near as I can tell, McCain didn't pick Palin (he wanted Joe Lieberman). Instead, his advisers foisted Palin on him. I gather the rationale was something like this: A female v-p would appeal to disgruntled Clinton supporters. A female v-p choice would signal "change" and thus undercut Obama's main message. Even better, Palin had run for governor as an "outsider" maverick who was opposed to corruption. She was young.

At no time, however, did McCain or his advisers think about who would best serve the nation. I gather that the question was not "Who is best qualified to sit in the White House if something happens to McCain?" but "Who is the most politically expedient"?

Yes, presidential candidates must use expedience as a criteria, but smart ones don't use it as the only criteria. In this case, however, his campaign chose his running mate for self-serving, cynical, selfish reasons.

But I also wouldn't vote for McCain because -- Sarah Palin might end up running the country. And I don't believe that she is interested in anything except what's good for Sarah Palin. Moreover, the idea of her sitting down to negotiate with, say, the president of Iraq or Russia or France -- well, the idea is too frightening to contemplate.

Put another way, McCain's choice of running mate speaks volumes about his character and integrity -- and it doesn't say anything good. But it also tells us about how McCain might behave if elected. Many of McCain's long-time friends say they don't "recognize" the John McCain who is now running for president. That he's become a nasty caricature of his former self. Political observers on both sides say that McCain is not "comfortable" with his campaign's negative tone.

Okay. Fine. But if he doesn't like it, then why is it happening? Who is in charge of the McCain campaign? John McCain or a well-paid political operative? And if it's the latter, then what does that tell us about who will be in charge of a McCain (or Palin) White House? John McCain (or Palin) or a well-paid political operative?

I don't know,and I don't want to find out the hard way.

Why I Don’t Support John McCain And Sarah Palin

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I’m about as middle-of-the-road as it’s possible to get, probably because I’m a pragmatist. I understand, for example, that politicians make promises in order to get elected. I also know that presidents don’t write laws governing taxes, immigration, or education. Congress does. A president can cajole, urge, plead, and lead, but in the end he/she can only sign or veto legislation created by Congress.

So when I ponder presidential candidates, their policies matter less to me than do their character and integrity. And that’s why I’m not voting for John McCain and Sarah Palin.

I could rattle off a long list of examples, but I’ll stick to one: Sarah Palin. As near as I can tell, McCain didn’t pick Palin (he wanted Joe Lieberman). Instead, his advisers foisted Palin on him.

I gather the rationale was something like this: A female v-p would appeal to disgruntled Clinton supporters. A female v-p choice would signal “change" and thus undercut Obama’s main message. Even better, Palin had run for governor as an “outsider" maverick who was opposed to corruption. She was young.

At no time, however, did McCain or his advisers think about who would best serve the nation. I gather that the question was not “Who is best qualified to sit in the White House if something happens to McCain?" but “Who is the most politically expedient"?

Yes, presidential candidates must use expedience as a criteria, but smart ones don’t use it as the only criteria. In this case, however, his campaign chose his running mate for self-serving, cynical, selfish reasons.

But I also wouldn’t vote for McCain because -- Sarah Palin might end up running the country. And I don’t believe that she is interested in anything except what’s good for Sarah Palin. Moreover, the idea of her sitting down to negotiate with, say, the president of Iraq or Russia or France -- well, the idea is too frightening to contemplate.

Put another way, McCain’s choice of running mate speaks volumes about his character and integrity -- and it doesn’t say anything good. But it also tells us about how McCain might behave if elected. Many of McCain’s long-time friends say they don’t “recognize" the John McCain who is now running for president. That he’s become a nasty caricature of his former self. Political observers on both sides say that McCain is not “comfortable" with his campaign’s negative tone.

Okay. Fine. But if he doesn’t like it, then why is it happening? Who is in charge of the McCain campaign? John McCain or a well-paid political operative? And if it’s the latter, then what does that tell us about who will be in charge of a McCain (or Palin) White House? John McCain (or Palin) or a well-paid political operative?

I don’t know, and I don’t want to find out the hard way.