Prohibition

I thought it was fascinating. Can't wait for the next two nights. Nice part at the end about how people actually thought banning alcohol would cure all of society's ills overnight.

On a personal note, I have friends from Portland and was texting during the parts that ripped on the city's alcoholic past.

 

I don't have cable at the moment, so I wasn't able to watch, but Prohibition is one of my favorite subjects in American history.

On the books thread I mentioned Daniel Okrent's book on the subject which I believe was used in part for the doc. The book was pretty solid.

 

Not as much as Carrie Bradshaw.

 

I thought it was outstanding. I had been looking forward to it, and then forgot about it and was just flipping around when I came upon it, which lead to an "Oh shit, that's right." So missed about the first 45 minutes or so but learned a lot.

 

It's on PBS.

 

I didn't see it, because there was too much else on TV at that time. But one thing I wonder is why the hell no one stood up and claimed that their freedom was being violated by being denied a drink?

 

Is the first part going to be online this afternoon?

 

What makes you think "no one" did? There were plenty of "wets" who did exactly that, just like there are some folks who do that for marijuana today--doesn't matter if opposing political forces are stronger. There's no inherent right to any chemical substance.

 

To answer my own question: It looks like its online.

http://video.pbs.org/video/15393956

 

Same here, thought that part was really interesting. Just think, if we don't go to war with Germany, there's likely no Prohibition, which means likely no Al Capone legend, perhaps no Kennedy dynasty, no all sorts of shit that later became part of our history.

 

Don't know if it's based at all on David Okrent's "Last Call," but that's a very good, readable book on Prohibition. FWIW, he says there's very little evidence Joe Kennedy was a bootlegger, IIRC.

 

A lot of similar laws are based on racial/ethnic hysteria. If I recall correctly, the first anti-drug law in the United States was an opium ordinance in San Francisco aimed at the Chinese in the late 1870s.