Aaaaaaaaaaahahahahhaha...ha..hahaha...oh wait? You were serious about that?!?

    That's what I thought when I heard about the impending discussion regarding lowering the drinking age in the United States.

    Apparently, there's been a debate raging in the past few years about lowering the legal drinking age from 21 to 18. Over 100 university presidents from well-known stiff-twig universities like Dartmouth, Duke, and Ohio State are all on board saying that they think by lowering the age three years, it will persuade college students to drink in moderation.

    I heard drinking Drano and punching yourself in the nuts is a good idea too.

    As a libation professional who has a distinctly strict reality when it comes to alcohol and social behavior, I'm going to go ahead and vote that you're a mental deficient if you think that's a good idea.

    Shocking as it may seem, the youth of America are at best obnoxious and ill-informed. Now when intimate with the actual possibility of giving them LEGAL access to alcohol and local watering holes that help them  ascend to the level of "wasted idiot", then yeah, kudos...you did a great job protecting our nations youth.

    Can you imagine graduation day from San Dieguito Academy? How exciting! Caps gathered and thrown into a bag with rumpled gown, replete with tassels and frills from a high school career since matured.

    Instead of going to a handful of parties, our fresh faced grads filter down to the local bars and do their best to ring in a new era of their adult life by drinking themselves into a blackened oblivion punctuated by arrest sheets, public intoxication, and an ignorantly naive hope that someone isn't going to die as result of drinking and driving.

    Unfortunately, these kids don't know the first thing about responsibility or a life lived without Mom or Dad's hand on their every movement.

    So, on graduation day, guess what I would tell every single one of my security personnel? Do not, under any circumstances, let anyone under the age of 21 into the bar. And we have every right to do so with a simple sentence that is every lawyer's dream...

    We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone.

    Or if they wanted to get creative, I'd ask the doorman to make something up, lie, I really don't care what it would take...but there's a bottom line here folks: Regardless of age, I really don't want someone in the bar who can't control themselves and yet I think that's the definition of a high school graduate. Someone who has yet to understand the appropriate parameters for controlling one's self.

    ...And here comes the gigantic hypocritical portion of my argument: I think that America should start letting their children drink even younger.

    If you've had a  beer when you're twelve, then I have a succinct feeling that you also know how to handle your intake of alcohol and understand the adverse affects of over-indulging.

    Put simply...if you don't start letting your children sample a sip of beer or a taste of wine at the dinner table while they're growing up, then it's only going to thirst their taste of the forbidden when they're nearing the age when they can actually do damage to themselves or others.

    Suds or vino, booze and aperitif..it's all relative culturally. We do our best to protect our children, but at what cost? I've been to enough places around the world to know that we're sadly behind the rest of the planet in maturity and a social understanding that moderation and experience is what helps us to make an informed decision.

    Maybe we just need a few drinks to catch up with the rest of the world. Might help us realize it's not all bad, unless you tell us it is...