homebrewing – Moe Lane

(Now-Republican) Alabaman[***] legislature strikes blow for individual liberty.

Legalizing homebrewing, of course.

The Alabama Senate tonight gave final passage to the homebrewing bill, possibly ending Alabama’s status as the only state in which homebrewing is still illegal.

“Alabama is literally the last state that makes homebrew legal, assuming the governor signs it,”said Sen. Bill Holtzclaw,R-Madison.

The Alabama legislature was, of course, controlled by the Democratic party until the historic elections of 2010; homebrewing enthusiasts have been fighting for years to get the hobby legalized, but pretty much went nowhere until this current session**. There’s every expectation that the governor will sign this legislation (which does not supersede individual areas that are still ‘dry’). I applaud this development, and only wish that previous (Democratic, remember) legislatures had embraced the future earlier. Continue reading (Now-Republican) Alabaman[***] legislature strikes blow for individual liberty.

#rsrh Hey, the President’s homebrewing!

Cool. (Via Hot Air)

No, really: cool. Home-brewing beer is a fun and very useful life skill to acquire: I don’t do it myself, but I am very lucky to have a good number of friends who do so, at least two of which are at a level of skill that could do it professionally. My wedding reception had home-brewed beers and wines that had my relatives marveling at how good they were: one of the people who crafted the wine told me later that several of my aunts and uncles had waylaid him at the hotel and asked if he had any more bottles of merlot available, as his was superior to the table wine that they were drinking at dinner*.

So I wish the Obamas good fortune and tasty beer as they continue… and may the President have many opportunities to practice it, starting in 2013.

Moe Lane

PS: twist-off caps (and the bottles that take them) will be your enemy; also, you absolutely must keep the tubes and carboys as clean as can be possibly managed. If you have musty beer, that’s why.

*There were not, of course. I am no fool; the leftover wine was the first thing to get packed in the car during cleanup. Admittedly, the almost two cases somehow turned into just over a case between the kitchen and the car; but you have to expect settling in transit, and you do not bind the mouths of the kine treading the grain, or cleaning up the site.

Tim Pawlenty, Homebrew protector.

(via @baseballcrank & The Weekly Standard) This could actually have an effect on my eventual pick for the 2012 nomination:

Pawlenty signs “basement brewing” bill

ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) – Brewers in Minnesota can now legally make their concoctions in their basements.

Gov. Tim Pawlenty signed a bill Thursday that makes it legal for beverages to be brewed in the basement of a building.

I’ve spent twenty years hanging with people who make their own beer, and I am a much better man for it. Aside from everything else, it means that I never blighted my life drinking bad, mass-produced, beer-flavored water. Ending the federal ban on homebrewing is the one of the few good things that Jimmy Carter ever did: that Governor Pawlenty has the good sense to make it easier for people to learn what is a quite useful and very marketable skill speaks well of him.