Tales from the Darkside-Alcohol & Tobacco News #2

[Knock, knock, knock] helllllllooooo, can anybody see that bloody great big elephant in the “community pub?”

The Government has unveiled measures to protect community pubs in an effort to stem nearly 40 closures a week. What is your reaction?

The measures include £3.3 million to be spent on business support to make pubs more successful and to help communities buy into struggling premises to keep them open. Pubs will also be allowed to extend into ventures ranging from restaurants to
gift shops and book shops without planning permission.

Pubs minister John Healey said, "This package of tough, practical measures aims to put some real support behind our community pubs, giving publicans more support to
diversify and punters more choice". [Ed: more choice eh, will they be able to offer me the choice to smoke then? No… thought not.]

I wonder if CAMRA (The Campaign for Real Ale) can see Nelly the elephant then?

The Campaign for Real Ale (Camra) welcomed the announcement. Camra chief executive Mike Benner said: "This is a great day for people who care about the future of our community pubs". [Ed: Well one can dream, can’t one!]

Talking about CAMRA, those beardy types that take an out of focus picture, The Pub Curmudgeon takes a sharp, clear and concise picture of that elephant.

Forgive me for thinking this is all just pathetic fiddling while Rome burns. As long as we continue to see no amendment of the smoking ban, above-inflation duty hikes and the constant insistence that drinking two pints at a sitting will lead to an early grave, not to mention the prospect of slashing the drink-driving limit and thus rendering thousands of pubs unviable, the pub trade will remain under serious threat, and for government ministers to pose as its friend is laughable. There couldn’t be an election imminent, could there?

Giving up the filthy weed can be a bloody killer, try Chantix!

An anti-smoking drug, combined with heavy drinking, contributed to Warner Robins Mayor Donald Walker's suicide, according to autopsy results.

The results released by Houston County coroner Danny Galpin confirmed that his cause of death was death by self-inflicted gunshot wound. The manner of death was ruled as suicide.

Ah, heavy drinking, it must have been the nasty alcohol wot done it?

The GBI crime lab report says, "He was taking Chantix to stop smoking, which caused severe depression. On the day of his death, his severe depression caused him to consume large quantities of alcohol. This acute ethanol intoxication state, superimposed upon his severe depression, severely impaired his remembering, reasoning and cognitive abilities."

In 2008, an FDA public-health advisory warned that Chantix could cause mood and behavior changes, including "anxiety, nervousness, tension, depressed mood, unusual behaviors and thinking about or attempting suicide."

Rest in piece Donald, the righteous can’t get at you now…but they WILL try, make no mistake about that.

God, I need a fag and a drink so I’m off down to our local village pub…Where’s my pub gone?

Things must be desperate: the Government is trying the old warm-beer-and- maiden-ladies-bicycling-to-matins routine. It is making a bid for that piece of the village green that is forever England (or Britain, if you must): the pub. [Ed: Warm beer? Maidens? Bicycling??? Matins? boy how pubs have changed since this old fart was a 16 err 18 year old lad.]

How desperate Clive? NO, don’t answer that.

Having noticed that rural pubs are closing in droves, the Government has rallied round, offering to match funds raised by local people to support efforts to run such places themselves as community enterprises. Picture Gordon Brown, [Ed: Do I have to? Is this a test or something?] pint mug in hand, swapping wit and wisdom with the village elders, while the horse brasses twinkle in the firelight.

Oh, you did answer Clive, tell it how it is mate.

There is a tiny irony in this. Not only might it be argued that the Government itself has precipitated the closure of many pubs by making it illegal to smoke in them — a blow to the traditional boozer, where sons of toil would spend all evening, perhaps several nights a week. [Ed: Wow, that is TINY, isn’t it?] Without this trade, licensees have only been able to survive by reinventing their establishments as gastro pubs, serving meals at prices that few locals could afford. I shouldn’t worry; I don’t smoke. I like the fact you can get a decent meal on your travels. But now the Government is considering making it impossible to get into a car if you’ve had so much as a single pint of bitter. That means they’ll lose my custom too. [Ed: And mine.]

And of course the bastion of non bias journalism, the BBC, just have to stick their oar in!

Pubs? Minister for pubs? That tie just makes me see RED. 

The measures include £3.3 million to be spent on business support to make pubs more successful and to help communities buy into struggling premises to keep them open. Pubs will also be allowed to extend into ventures ranging from restaurants to
gift shops and book shops without planning permission.

Pubs minister John Healey said, "This package of tough, practical measures aims to put some real support behind our community pubs, giving publicans more support to diversify and punters more choice". [Ed: Really John, go tell it to Nick Hogan.]

Nick Hogan, ironies of ironies.

A MAN who was kicked out of smoke ban rebel Nick Hogan’s pub for lighting up returned brandishing a knife.

Surely Nick was putting on a Carvery, all you can eat for a fiver and bring your own cutlery?

Mr Hogan, landlord of The Swan with Two Necks, in Hollinshead Street, Chorley, spent 12 days in jail for non-payment of fines he received for flouting the smoking ban at one of his former pubs in Bolton.

The reveller was kicked out by security staff on Saturday night after smoking on the dance floor, but returned at around 3am with a knife, although he didn’t approach anyone with it.

Shit, does that mean I cant bring my own cutlery or you don’t do “all you can eat for a fiver” Nick?

"I just find it so ironic that I have actually been to jail after allowing customers to smoke and this should happen.”

But, care in the community apart, did the knife wielding victim perpetuator  of the governments your “no smoking” policy get his bloody dinner?

"Luckily the security staff locked the doors and the man went off. The police are now looking for him.”

Guess not! Bloody unpaid police landlords/ladies, upholders of draconian laws, defenders of their trade…off with their heads I say, but please ensure that the blade is well sharpened because they will rise up and fight against unjust laws like the smoking ban, it’s a given.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Bloggers who unknowingly contributed to this blog piece were,  in no particular order:

Dick Puddlecote

Anna Raccoon

That bastard Old Holborn

That defender of the drinking faith classless classes doh, you know I mean you, The Pub Curmudgeon, a man after my own heart.

To name but a few, because they are many, those libertarian bloggers, god bless ‘em.

And, as ever, my thanks go to the good people on the Freedom2Choose forum, who scan the hinternet for the anti-smoking, anti-alcohol absurd bansterbators.

Blogger Tags: Nick Hogan, ban drinking, ban everything, lets hear it for the libertarian.