Federal government threatens brewer over a pun

By GottaLaff

Freedom of speech doesn't seem to apply to jokes. A small brewery owner is being threatened by our federal government for this slogan:

"Try Legal Weed"

It's. A. Joke. Vaune Dillmann is trying to eke out a living. He is not a drug dealer, guys. Besides, wouldn't Bush recognize a real druggie when he sees one?

The bottle-top slogan of a brewer with a head for business in Weed, Calif., draws a warning from U.S. drug watchdogs. All he's pushing is a respectable local enterprise, backers say. [...]

The U.S. Treasury Department's Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau says those three little words allude to marijuana use.

Vaune Dillmann, owner of Mt. Shasta Brewing Co., says he was just trying to grab attention for his beers and this tough-luck place in the morning shadow of Mt. Shasta. [...]

The bureau's bureaucrats have told Dillmann he needs to stop using the "Try Legal Weed" bottle caps. If he doesn't, he could risk fines or sanctions. His worst fear: being forced out of business.

But Vaune isn't one to back down.

"This is ludicrous, bizarre, like meeting Big Brother face-to-face," he grumbled recently. "Forget freedom of speech and the 1st Amendment. They are the regulatory gods, a judge and jury all rolled into one. This is a life-or-death issue for my business."

Besides, he said, the town itself was named for a man, not a plant. Abner Weed was a lumber baron who served as a state senator from these parts a century ago.

The local paper will have none of this. Their editorial:

"Government is keeping us safe from bottle caps," mocked the headline above an editorial in the Record Searchlight newspaper of Redding, an hour's drive south down Interstate 5.

"Let's get real," the editorial concluded, "anyone old enough to legally buy a six-pack . . . is mature enough not to be dragged into a life of drug-addled debauchery by a message on the bottle cap."

It goes without saying that Big Biz doesn't get the same treatment:

What irks him most, he says -- even more than the feds' lack of a funny bone -- is what he considers a double standard.

While stomping on him, Dillmann says, the government treats Budweiser with kid gloves, despite the fact that "This Bud's for You" also could be mistaken for marijuana slang.

"They sell Bud. We sell Weed," he said. "What's the difference?"

It's BushCo who is dazed and confused. The rest of us are finally waking up.