Hands off my beer

As a home brewing enthusiast (currently drinking an O.E. clone, Oktoberfest in the bottle, and plans for a double brew of a Black and a Tan in the next few weeks) and craft beer drinker, the recent news about licensing changes has confused and concerned me. The Alcoholic Beverages Control Commission plans to make it difficult for craft brewers, unless 50 percent of their grains and hops are grown in state.

While I'm sure there was deep thought, and a detailed Cost Benefit Analysis of the new proposal, I'm unable to find it.

Increasing costs, and implementing barriers to entry, on an emerging industry, which provides the best regional beers in the US (in my expert opinion) in addition to many local jobs is no way to encourage job growth.

Promoting rent seeking in the agriculture industry, does little to encourage axillary industry boosts, such as tourism.

I think of my daily afternoon lesson on my walk home, presented by the Duckboat Captains the local version of oral history on wheels, 'the Beantown Pub is the only Pub in the world where you can drink a Sam Adams while looking at his grave.'

Helping the local hops industry, in favor of the local craft brewing industry is down right ridiculous. I have seen many policy proposals that use bad logic and reasoning to justify them, but this policy lacks even that low bar (pun intended). It is on par with the Candlemaker's Petition for trade protections from an unfair foreign power, The Sun.