[aruanan]

We are facing a new pandemic - alcohol as a major risk factor for poor health.

Here we go again. Back before Prohibition, one out of every five Americans worked in the liquor industry in some way. Per capita alcohol consumption ages 15 and above was about 100 fifths of liquor per year. But we didn't have organized crime (organized crime was a direct result of needing to organize alcohol shipments between different parts of the country). We didn't have an income tax. Once prohibition started an additional source of income would be needed to replace what was lost to the federal government from excise taxes (about 40% of its revenues came from taxes on alcoholic beverages). Those people in the temperance movement were also those behind the income tax. Before, we had alcohol. Now we have alcohol, organized crime, the income tax and the insatiable appetite for more spending that it has made possible thanks to a bunch of busy bodies who thought their cause was so noble that it required the power of the federal government to make it work.

[Vanders9]

Its the law of unintended consequences again. These people meant well, I'm sure, and excessive alcohold consumption IS a problem. The problem was a disconnect. They failed to discriminate between the few people who are riotously, horrifically alcoholic, and the vast majority who just like a drink now and again. Prohibition turned the vast majority of Americans into criminals. Similarly, legislation here will do exactly the same.

There IS a problem yes. But this isn't the way to fix it.