Beer-distribution policy battle: Resist temptation to 'do something'

KyGA

The so-called "beer bill" passed by the Kentucky House on Tuesday has nothing to do with protecting small craft-beer makers and everything to do with Anheuser-Busch's distributor-competitors using the force of government to drive a competitor out of the marketplace.

These opponents of competition feign concern that failing to take away Anheuser-Busch's property will somehow result in the brewer monopolizing the distribution industry.

Such arguments stink up Frankfort worse than a team of Clydesdales in a scorching summer-day parade.

The craft-beer industry is booming in Louisville and elsewhere in Kentucky, even with Anheuser-Busch owning a distributor in the commonwealth for nearly four decades.

The fact that so many Republicans voted for House Speaker Greg Stumbo's proposal , including House Minority Floor Leader Jeff Hoover, R-Jamestown, confirms the continued existence of inherent vice of politicians in both parties: they think that they have to "do something" just because they are elected officials.

The best response to bad policy always -- always -- is to do nothing to aid and abet it. Yet sometimes "doing nothing" is the very hardest temptation for a politician eager to please his or her special-interest masters to resist.

This would be a great time for our state senators to continue overcoming -- as they have done in the past -- and stop yet another bad bill, courtesy of the redistributionists and their weak-kneed representatives from the minority party in the so-called "people's House."

Read my recent Bluegrass Beacon column here about developments related to this policy.