Hazelburn 12 Year Old 2010 Release

Great stuff, but alas, it's overpriced like most Springbanks and that's too bad. Note to Springbank: your whiskies are generally priced above what they are worth. Why are you so big for your britches? Get real and lower your prices. You are TOO GREEDY.

The 12 year costs $123 in Oregon. A bottle of Highland Park 12 sells for $48 and a bottle of Glenfarclas 12 sells for $43. The liquor store near where I work bought six bottles due to my suggestion. I need to buy one simply because the liquor store went with my suggestion. There are five bottles left. When I suggested the manager buy a few bottles of the 12 year, I didn't realize it would be so pricey.

Still, in all fairness to Springbank, Oregon's liquor control commission does really jack up the prices on booze, and some bottles get targeted for more taxes in seemingly arbitrary ways that reflect no apparent sense of logic other than the fact that anyone who buys such a bottle can afford it and will buy it even if it is jacked up to an ungodly amount. Ditto with slashing the prices of bottles that once were appraised as boutique items and then sat on shelves for two years. I've seen a bottle of scotch go from $130 down to $68. Which one? Tomatin Decades. Guess who paid the full price right before the price dropped? That's right: yours truly. I was quite irate when I saw it selling for half price the very next month.

The OLCC is allegedly "non profit" and part of the "government" but in practice it's basically a private organization that enjoys excessively high salaries paid to its management, along with a fair amount of corruption regarding which bar gets its liquor license. In other words, it has too much power and not enough oversight on behalf of the general public.

A few years ago, the director was forced to resign after being cited for drunk driving. I would rather have seen her keep her job and overhaul the commission, lowering prices on liquor across the board. I'm sure she wouldn't have driven drunk again. Sending a bunch of spies all over town posing as 19 and 20 year olds is a waste of tax payer dollars in a city with serious heroin and meth problems. In Europe, 19 year olds can drink responsibly. I think that's fair.

Americans need to learn how to drink moderately and responsibly. The college system of indoctrination, treating the over consumption of booze like a sporting event is tragic. I say, if a man or a woman can give her life in a war under the deluded belief they are keeping the "free world safe" then he or she should be allowed a few drinks at any bar in town.

Ditto with voting. If you are old enough to vote for president, then you are old enough to drink responsibly in a restaurant or a bar. Now, I would rather see the OLCC put money into educating bar tenders when to cut people off at the bar, rather than scaring the crap out of bouncers and bartenders to card anyone who looks under 40. That is just absurd.

I was carded in bars up until a few years ago, and I'm in my late 40's now. Get real. That's almost as absurd as Australians being fined monetarily if they chose not to vote in an election. Is that democracy at work? Hardly. It is thinly veiled totalitarianism that treats adults like children. Personally, I don't vote in federal elections. That is my statement of protest. I can't imagine being fined for my right NOT to vote for corrupt cronies as my "leaders." The US is run by corporations that are managed at the top by a small cadre of trillionaire families. If that's democracy, then I'm the Pope.

I see the Hazelburn 12 sells for $73 on Master of Malt. That's more like it. If only the price here reflected that cost plus the cost of shipping to Oregon. That would be quite refreshing. Instead, it's nearly double the price here thanks to the OLCC's system of taxation. Unfair! I wouldn't be surprised if the bottle tax in Oregon is 40% higher than what the OLCC paid for it upon receipt of shipment. Bogus. Dastardly. Fie!