Archive for the ‘Personal’ Category
The wine industry in America is a trailing indicator of the culture and economy. It always has been. The top stories in wine in 2019 reflect this truism. Politics, powerful social movements, the economy, evolving modes of consumerism and natural disasters all came together to give us the industry’s biggest stories in 2019. These are those stories. Supreme Court Pushes Back on Protectionism Fourteen years ago the U.S. Supreme Court rendered an opinion in Granholm v Heald that created the…
Just the other day while scrolling through my Facebook feed I came across a very simple post by a wine person. It asked the following question: “ARE WINE BLOGS DEAD?” It wasn’t a rhetorical question. Nor was it facetious? Instead, I think the question was ill-formed. I think what they were asking (or should have been asking) is, “DO WINE BLOGS STILL MATTER?” I contemplate this question on the 15th anniversary of FERMENTATION: The Dailly Wine Blog’s founding back in…
I don’t think it’s ever a good idea to mock the American president. One can disagree with a president. One can support an American president’s electoral defeat. One can urge others to oppose a president’s policies and initiatives. But mocking a president almost always seems imprudent and juvenile and destructive of democracy. Or not. I’m a chauvinist. Why I’m a chauvinist I can’t say. Nevertheless, I’m almost always going to be inclined to come to the defense of the…
Tuesday, May 21, 2019, is “Chardonnay Day. It is also my son’s birthday. The two are not connected in any way. However, I do know why May 21 is Henry George’s birthday. I just don’t know why it’s also “Chardonnay Day. Chardonnay is America’s favorite varietal wine. Annually it sells more than 30 million cases, according to Nielsen. (There is, however, only one Henry George, making him a far more valuable commodity on a bottle v. baby basis) On the…
Despite the transition to a digital age, I’ve never left my books go. And there are lots of them. There are many reasons I want books on display in my home. First, I want Henry George surrounded by them. He needs to know that you can go anywhere, be anything, know anybody through books. But on a more personal note, having a home that is filled with books reminds one of where they have been, marks the intellectual paths down…
