Almost prohibition

Big merchants won, and the family-values crowd lost, with the passage of I- 1183 which has dismantled the state liquor stores. Let’s look at one of the cheerleaders for the big merchants.

On October 31, 2011, just before the election, Susan Fagan launched a column in the Moscow-Pullman Daily News. She said, “As a Washington state lawmaker... I strongly urge a yes vote on Initiative I-1183.

“Selling and promoting liquor is not a core function of government. I-1183 focuses the state’s role on regulation and enforcement, where it should be.”

Susan Fagan was confused, or was engaging in sales talk. Use of state liquor stores was (note the past tense) an effective way to regulate the availability of liquor. Let’s return that regulatory function to the state.

Susan Fagan said, “I-1183 strengthens public safety.” This goes beyond sales talk: this is patently false. Among the recreational drugs, alcohol is the number one drug related to crimes of violence, including domestic violence and assaults on police. To make hard alcohol more available will probably expose us to more violence.

Susan Fagan said, “I-1183 ... returns hundreds of millions in increased revenues to state and local government...

Notice how she stirs this pot. “...state and local government... state and local government ... Pullman....” Forgive me for getting the impression that local governments would get wealthy if I-1183 were to pass.

But, but, but! Last fall, the financial officer for the City of Pullman told me that Pullman already receives income from liquor sales, and that we might lose it to state budgeting powers. And now, the Whitman County Gazette opines that we will lose that income. The budgets for local governments will soon tell us who is worth listening to, the lawmaker or the citizens.

In the financial aspect, Susan Fagan says, “The initiative also dedicates a portion of these new revenues to increase funding for local public safety programs, including police, fire and emergency services in communities throughout the state.”

But this business of dedicating revenues, by initiative, only lasts two years. Historically, the legislators have waited the two years, then kicked dedicated funds into the general fund and spent them as they liked. As a Washington state lawmaker, she surely knows that. This fig leaf is transparent.

Susan Fagan doesn’t represent you or me, or the families in our neighborhoods. She wants liquor in our grocery stores. Families in our towns should be able to send their life-long recovering alcoholics to the store for a bottle of milk, with a reasonable hope that they will return, still sober.

But Susan Fagan doesn’t seem to care about these families or their neighbors. I’ve met some of the families Susan Fagan represents. They’re nice people, just like you and me. But they’re quick to show their hard side, if they learn that you’re working for the well-being of Washington’s families. Susan Fagan’s true constituents have invested big money in their alcohol production, and they want to sell their product.... too bad about the families that have an alcoholic in their family or in their neighborhood.

Susan Fagan is not a keeper. Do you know a capable, fiscally conservative person who would work for family-friendly policies? A pleasant dream.

And then, lastly, why does Susan Fagan say, “Initiative 1183 will effectively prevent liquor from being sold at gas stations, small convenience stores and minimarts?” Is it because her true constituents are big business people who want her to step on small business people? Or does she recognize that restricting availability is a good public safety policy?

The Washington State Supreme Court would agree with her, that it’s a good public safety policy to restrict availability. The Daily News reports, “In a separate dissenting opinion, Justice Tom Chambers concurred with the majority that there is a ‘rational unity’ between liquor regulation and public safety.”

Susan Fagan refers to this safety aspect in her column, saying “The initiative also dedicates a portion of these new revenues to ... police, fire and emergency services in communities throughout the state.”

It seems she recognizes that increased availability (her desired result) will create a mess that we will have to live with - throughout the state - and she proposes that we tax ourselves to get help dealing with her mess. Surely it’s cheaper, more peaceful, and more vomit-free to reduce the availability -don’t you think?

A natural reaction to all this might be to bring back prohibition. Old timers tell me that those were peaceful, family-centered years. They were good. But prohibition also empowered organized crime, and taught the public that law enforcement could be corrupted.

So, let’s restrict availability almost to prohibition levels, but not quite. Let’s bring back the state liquor stores. And let’s ban the retail sale of two things: bottled alcohol and, while we’re at it, tobacco products, because health professionals are telling us that this recreational drug is still killing 440,000 Americans each year. You and I know that “the government” pays part of the cost of these early and ugly deaths. These addicts are reaching into our pockets. Let’s also ban all advertising for alcohol and tobacco, except in state liquor stores. I’m not talking about banning saloons, home brewed, or home distilled. Every family’s home is its castle.

This almost prohibition would reduce the availability, and it would avoid prohibition’s defect of enriching the gangsters and their bankers.

I want to have this system in place before marijuana gets legalized because I want to keep marijuana, too, out of the grocery stores and not have it advertised.

Wiley Hollingsworth,

Pullman