Prohibition

A ruling this week in a New Jersey appeals court said that the owners of a tavern can be sued for allowing a customer to drive away drunk, even if they were not serving him alcohol. I had to read that twice when I saw it in the newspaper. The specific bar in question was in the resort town of Cape May. The lawsuit was brought by the family of a passenger killed in a crash in a car driven by the drunk man. The drunk man apparently was already drunk when he got to the bar, and had a flask that he hid away to continue his partying. No one contradicts that the bar did not serve any alcohol to the eventual driver. The story caught my eye for a couple of reasons, one having to do with the accountability issue, the other more convoluted, perhaps. I’m not saying that the death of the twenty-one year old wasn’t tragic, nor am I saying that the driver shouldn’t be held accountable in some way. But could a ruling be more illogical? If the man stopped to buy a paper at a 7-11 and displayed drunken behavior, should the clerk be also held accountable? How about the parking lot attendant, if there was one? At what point does the drunk man become accountable for his own behavior, or the dead man partially accountable for getting in the car with someone so obviously impaired to begin with? The ruling is justice run amok.

When Prohibition began in 1920, the country was caught in an ideological war between the Drys, those against drinking, who were often armed with mandates mined from the Bible, that most flexible of all documents, and the Wets, who thought drinking was none of the government’s business. Thirteen years, five months and nine days later, Prohibition was repealed. The number of bars in New York tripled during Prohibition, by the way, and the repercussions from the legacy of organized crime started in the 1920’s continues today. Unless you live within walking distance of a local watering hole, or live in a city where mass transit is readily available, there is a de facto prohibition taking place today. The driving while impaired laws are harsh, the penalties severe. I’m not saying that they shouldn’t be. I’m just pointing out what is clear to me, that we are in a Prohibition period far more effective than the historical one referenced. Ask any bar or tavern owner. What used to be a lucrative business is now an iffy financial proposition. Listen to the doors slamming closed on bars across America.

I guess I’m a Wet at heart, and I don’t even drink that much. I hate the social climate that fosters such decisions as the one the Jersey court rendered. I hate that everyone is always blamed for someone else’s transgressions. I hate that the government spends more time with such matters than the real issues. It’s an easy position for any politician to take. “I’m against drunks! Vote for me.” Who isn’t? But I can’t help but feel that something is being lost in the transaction. And I have a feeling I’m going to miss it when it’s gone.

I know what you’re thinking, and let me cut you off at the pass. My next blog will not be about the benefits of cigarette smoking, nor a defense for “slapping the old ball and chain around a bit.” It’s just that I get tired of someone’s knee jerk reaction hitting me in the chin.

By Myron Gushlak

Bear Sterns

The fire sale of Bear Stearns to JP Morgan this past weekend is the “Brittany Spears” event of the week. The wave of media has crashed over all the principles. I’m certain Eliot Spitzer is grateful for the relief this event provides him as the media scurries off en masse to cover the newer, hotter, better, sexier story. Experts proliferate on every tv station, armed with the powerful wisdom of hindsight. The incendiary words “government bailout,” are bandied about, looking, I suppose, to rile up the masses into a lather. It’s pretty easy to come down hard against the idea of “rewarding a private industry guilty of egregiously bad judgment and business practices.” But what does that really do towards solving the problem? I don’t know why that is always the approach the media takes with every news story, but this “chicken little – the sky is falling” approach certainly seems intentional to me. Obviously, it sells papers and draws viewers.

If I owned a media outlet, I might try a new approach. I might try to allay the fears of my readers/listeners. How? For example I might tie this story to a report about what happened when the US government bailed out the Savings and Loans twenty some years ago. It is my understanding that the Federal government actually made money on that bailout. Eventually, it sold the properties it took over at a profit. It took a few years to accomplish, and God knows, in a few years this story will be a thousand stories behind us in our rear view mirror, with nary a reporter in sight to record the final fallout of that hot story of March 2008. It seems with the pace of today’s world, that nothing in the past brings any relevant weight to the present. Already there are media sharks searching for the next hot story. What we lose sight of in this media driven society is that these are more than stories and sound bytes. They are “events” with ties to the past and ties to the future. They live on long after the media spotlights are dimmed. It’s called “perspective” and it sure looks like we don’t have any.

By Myron Gushlak

Mr. Spitzer

The governor of New York, Eliot Spitzer, was implicated today in a prostitution ring. Allegedly, he called a prostitute. I wanted to get my two cents in before anything more specific is proven or even alleged, just so I can have an opinion unfettered by facts. When I heard the news, I smiled. I admit it. A big stupid grin came over my face. Not because I have anything against Mr. Spitzer. I know almost nothing about him. Nor do I have anything against his politics. I confess I don’t know where he stands on anything. I just love the irony of a man who runs on an ethics platform, and is known as “Mr. Clean” being tied to a prostitute, no pun intended.

You can consider it a flaw in my personality if you’d like. I have no defense. I also laugh when evangelist preachers are implicated in fraud or sex scandals…Priests with young boys? Yeah, I snickered a few times. I don’t know why. I don’t laugh when people trip and fall on the street, but I probably would if they first bragged to everyone that they were such great walkers. I agree with George Orwell who said “saints should always be judged guilty until they are proven innocent.” I’ll stop smiling soon. Really. Sorry to hear of your news, Mr. Spitzer. Really. I mean it.

By Myron Gushlak

Watching

It is important for Americans to remember that their election process does not exist in a vacuum. The process does not take place in a voting booth behind a drawn curtain. It takes place in the open, often under the far too flaw-highlighting bright lights of world attention. Particularly, I think, the candidacy of a minority man, Barack Obama, and a woman, Hillary Clinton draws international attention to the US process of choosing leaders. I’m certain the chaotic practice of caucuses, delegates and primaries seems quite insane to many people in many different countries. As Winston Churchill said, “democracy is the worst form of government in the world - except for all the others.”

The world court of public opinion is not swayed by jingoistic sound bytes about what America wants to be. It can see American protestations about human rights in China on a split screen side by side with Guantanemo. There is no spin doctoring of the pre-emptive war with Iraq with platitudes about self determination. There are no filters between the juxtaposition of monitors at remote third world polling places and the Supreme Court decision after the Gore-Bush Florida election. World public opinion does not concern itself with being politically correct. It does not have to worry about offending anyone. Value judgments are being made everyday about what the United States says it stands for and what it does. It is important that the United States does not preach one thing while doing another.

The world can also see that the United States has one of the lowest voter turnout rates in the free world. It was forty years ago this summer during the Chicago democratic convention that the chant first went up. “The whole world is watching”. People in Serbia are watching, people in Palestine, Israel, and Venezuela. One vote says a lot to the rest of the world about who America is and what it stands for. So does one non-vote.

By Myron Gushlak