Friday, August 18, 2006

State Liquor Authority Unfair to Minority-Owned Businesses

Channel 13 is reporting that the most evil Authority of all, the New York State Liquor Authority, has taken action against a number of local businesses. All four businesses were guilty of selling alcoholic beverages to underage patrons. As one of the 95% of American adults (my estimate) who was once an underage drinker, I think the punishment simply does not fit the crime. The Under-21 crowd will do whatever it takes to get alcohol, their levels of deception know no bounds. I should know, I've been going to bars since I had my learner's permit. Why should businesses be punished because of the actions of our youth? Okay, so maybe there is some law or something that says so, but laws are made to broken, aren't they? Apparently not.

The State Liquor Authority, the same jerks who tried to stop Park Ave restaurants from serving alcohol to customers at their sidewalk tables, have punished Oxford's on Monroe (frat boy meat market - I could care less about them), Jim's tavern in Brockport (ask the Monroe County Bars Blog about that one), the Full Moon Saloon (they've also been cited for having insects in their liquor bottles - close them, that's disgusting), and the Gujar Mart on Mt Hope Ave. It's the punishment against the "Guj" that I take issue with. The Guj is pretty much the only place to buy beer at night in that section of the city, it is patronized by scores of University of Rochester students, and is run by hard-working Pakistanis. Just because they sold beer to a few underagers recently, they've lost their license to sell alcohol for two years and have been fined $2,000. Isn't that more than a bit extreme? Why not just say, "minorities are not allowed to do business in this state"? This reeks of racism and you should be outraged. Or maybe you never used a fake ID or some other means to buy beer when you were underage? Pot (to Kettle): "You're black."