Comments about ‘Shurtleff asks Congress to let Utah, states keep control of liquor laws’

"The people of Utah feel differently about alcohol than the people in Detroit,"

I am one of the people of Utah and believe that you are dead wrong. Utah espouses conservatism but does not live it. This makes us hypocrites. Our system is wrong on so many levels.

Utah state government needs to affirm anti-socialism and get OUT of the liquor business.

Utah needs to step up and affirm states rights.

alcohol and liquor is neither a power, right, or responsebility of the federal government.

Alcohol is a legal product. The government, fed or STATE, has no business regulating the sale of a legal product.

Utah likes socialism. Utah supports socialism. Utah legislates socialism.

"He (Shurtleff) acknowledged that it was drafted by Paul Pisano, the general counsel for the National Beer Wholesalers Association, which supports the bill." And why do we suppose the beer wholesalers support the bill? Answer: because it protects their monopolies or near monopolies from competition from small niche breweries. In return for his cooperation, Shurtleff should ask for a lifetime supply of suds!

So the AG thinks that people should be compelled about their use of alcohol? I thought conservatives promoted less government interference and involvement in our personal lives. The patchwork of laws is having stupid results, like a nice small business wine producer not being able to grow the business because of excess regulations. Again, don't you believe in what you say, conservatives?

Jason, why are you so afraid of the free market?

If the liquor stores were privatized the state would lose revenue.
What happened to the point of view of less government?

If you belong to a state, and fail to acknowledge you are part of a country, please...

leave the country.

Utah is not even a boarder state. It enjoys many of the beneifits of statehood, and then claims it is 'in the world, but not of the world.'


For example, prohibition failed. Alchohol is a legal product. For all the 'evils of alchohol....


'Study: Higher alcohol taxes reduce alcohol-related deaths, disease, crime’ — ‘By Kelly McConkie Henriod - Deseret News — 09/30/10'



...Utah is now fighting to keep having state run liquor stores.


If this is SO bad, and SO evil, then why does Utah fight to continue to get tax dollars from it's sale?

Rhetorical question. Because the people who live in Utah are not as moral as they may claim. And that money, often outweighs morality, even if some use that morality against others.


The hypocrisy, is evident.

What happened to getting government out of the way of businesses and out of the lives of citizens? This smacks of communism.

I am in favor of state control of the sale of alcohol, and we are one of 18 states with more restrictive control, so we are not unique. a related article published by the DN 4/16/10 said 39 of 50 states' AGs agreed with local control.

that being said, I'm not sure what Chaffetz's bill would do. If the courts overturned the state laws, could they not also overturn Chaffetz's bill should it get passed? Am I missing some nuance here?

the repulicans talk free trade but dont live it in utah. total socialistic or even toltalitarian rule over the trade of this product is funny. and mark has helped the pay day loan people so much because they help people to get money when they need it and never get out of debt. they charge more than a loan shark. people would be better of going to a loan shark.

@Peace: If the liquor stores were privatized the state would GAIN revenue. Private liquor stores would carry what people want to buy, and would have lower prices, so sales that are currently going out of state would return to Utah and be subject to sales tax as well as the liquor tax. Privately owned stores would be on private property, where the owners would pay property and payroll taxes. Employee benefits for workers in private liquor stores would not be paid by Utah taxpayers but by the employers. All the liquor warehouse workers would work for private employers. The delivery trucks currently maintained and staffed by state employees would all be operated privately, saving the state payroll, vehicle operating and maintenance costs, and insurance charges. And the members of the DABC wouldn't be needed on the public dole anymore, either.

I hear non-stop complaints of government intervention being socialism, communism ... you name it.
But it's okay for government to intervene when it comes to liquor stores.
Does the term "flip-flopping" mean anything to you?

lost in DC | 11:41 a.m. Sept. 30, 2010
West Jordan, UT
I am in favor of state control of the sale of alcohol

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Why?

Aren't you a conservative? Don't you believe in small government? Don't you believe in the free market?

What are your reasons for wanting the government to have their hands all over alcohol?

Getting rid of state control of alcohol would only push the control level to the counties and cities--those like Abe Sarvis above don't realize that getting their wish would make all but the most populous of Utah's counties dry as dust (including Cedar City, Abe). One benefit of Utah's current system is that city and country governments have no say over whether or not the state can locate a liquor store in their jurisdiction. Privatizing liquor sales in Utah would cause more harm to those advocating it than I think they realize.

The Utah liquor tax funds the school lunch program. Some simple math, and logic will tell you that large families fill the classrooms, but most of those large families ostensibly don't drink. So they want those who DO drink to feed their kids.
hmmmmmmmm.....

End the state socialist monopoly on liquor sales!

How does Mark Shurtleff know how I feel? I am a Utahn?
Who are these "people of Utah" he speaks of?

Martin Blank,

Let the free market system work. When chain restaurants will not build in the dry counties, when those counties go without all the sales tax they collect from alcohol, watch the free market come into play and watch their reversal.

Let it happen.