Corking the Bottle

"So much wasted time." These were the last words of David Cassidy as he died of liver shutdown due to alcohol poisoning. He was a heavy drinker and alcoholic going clear back to his Partridge Family days. Much later, he was arrested for DUI in 2010, 2013, and 2014. He was sentenced to three months of rehab. After his release, David told Piers  Morgan, "If I  take another drink, I’m going to die, physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually. I’m dead. … It’s very humbling, and it’s also humiliating,” adding that admitting to his disease gave him hope. "'I dropped  to my knees, and I felt something go through me that was like, I felt this experience that was just, thank you God. I felt this relief,” Cassidy said. “I begged it, and I was crying and weeping like a little boy, like a, like a sobbing little infant, like I’m sure I did many times as a kid. And I felt this incredible sense of relief, because I stopped lying to myself.'” ( https://us.blasting...

This is David Clayton, age 25 of Louisville, Kentucky. I don't know him, but as Will Rogers said, "I never met a man I didn't like. For the sake of argument, I'll assume he has a job and is a contributing member of society. Today he is in jail. At 12:30 a.m. Saturday, he swerved to miss a vehicle in front of him and hit a disabled car on the side of the road. LaDavid Delorch, 35, of Louisville, had run out of gas and was sitting in car with his flashers on. He was pronounced dead at the scene. Clayton is charge with driving intoxicated, murder, and driving without insurance. "Delorch's little sister Ebony described him as a loving father, who pushed his 10-year-old son to pursue sports. "'I was numb because I felt like I was supposed to be there. He was on his way to me, and I was supposed to be there,' Delorch said. "The family says the road to healing will be difficult but with Clayton behind bars they hope it could help with t...

A few years ago, I was charged with drunk driving and spent the night on the floor in a crowded jail cell. I was humiliated and, upon release, embarrassed beyond words. I was pulled over just down the road from my house. It was late morning. I hadn't had a drink since sometime the night before. I had no way of knowing my BAC was above the .08 legal limit. I felt fine. I thought. I checked out a website this morning ( https://www.factretriever.com/drunk-driving-facts ) and learned a few things: A driver with a BAC of .08 g/dL is 11 times more likely to be in a fatal accident than a driver who has consumed no alcohol. Drugs other than alcohol (such as marijuana and cocaine) are involved in about 18% of fatal collisions, usually in combination with alcohol. Drinking just three or four beers for a 170-pound male is enough to make him too drunk to drive. For an average-size woman it may take just one to three. The country with the highest rate of drunk driving deaths is So...

Drinking is expensive. If you do it or did it, you know that. If you don't imbibe, you're paying a price anyway. The Centers for Disease Control estimates that excessive alcohol consumption costs the U.S. about $250 billion a year, mainly due to losses in workplace productivity, health care expenses, criminal justice costs, motor vehicle crashes, and property damage. ( https://www.cdc.gov/alcohol/data-stats.htm#economicCosts ) If you are a binge drinker (four or more drinks per occasion for women, five or more for men) you were responsible for 77% of the cost of drinking alcohol. Whether you drink or not, federal, state, and local taxpayers got stuck with $2 of every $5 of those economic costs. The CDC has the costs of intoxication broken down by state, if you're interested. States where I lived or have many Facebook friends include Kentucky (cost per capita $736), Pennsylvania ($751), Idaho ($726), Washington ($863), California ($940), Ohio ($739), Texas ($748), and...