In memoriam of quite exceptional stupidity.

For a nation created in the joint beliefs of self determination and freedom of religion and expression, the United States still boasts more loony puritanical cranks per acre than most. Never was this better illustrated than in the 18th Amendment to the Constitution, passed by the drunken louts in Congress in 1919. This stunning piece of idiocy prevailed until repeal by the 21st Amendment passed in 1933.

There were only two groups who approved. The peddlers of illegal hooch who became wealthy overnight. And Hollywood, which made movies about …. the peddlers of illegal hooch. Congress had proved, yet again, that a basic, unarguable principle of economics could not be changed.

All control drives up price.

The poppy farmers in the Golden Triangle and the hemp growers of South America and the California hills bow daily in the direction of a Congress still in denial of this Great Truth. Or maybe those legislators are simply on the payroll? Either way, we continue to support the drug trade and its extraordinary profits by doing for drugs what we did between 1919 and 1933 for booze. Go figure.

Please. No lectures about your kids getting higher than a kite. It’s called ‘parental responsibility’.

There’s a fine brew pub with a nice selection of craft beers not far from the ballpark in San Francisco named, appropriately, The 21st Amendment, and you can get a beer there for a whole lot less than you paid Al Capone back in the day. My waiter knew his stuff too when I asked him which Amendment made the Volstead Act law, right down to the date! Click ‘No’ on their home page and nothing happens! Gotta like that.

Panasonic G1, kit lens @ 14mm, 1/80, f/3.5, ISO 1600.

As the snap shows, they are proud of their brewers here and I confirm that I was enjoying a light New Belgian Mothership wheat beer with my fish and chips when snapping this, purely to steady my hand, you understand,