Someone had to write it and I am happy to be that guy. New today at Liberal Currents, read the whole thing:

As a longtime affiliate of the libertarian movement, I’ve often shared such pox-on-both-their-houses disdain for the major parties. In the current circumstances, I find it hopelessly dated and out of touch. The threats to liberty, democracy, and the rule of law coming from the Democrats and Republicans are not remotely symmetrical. In no presidential election in my lifetime has the question of whom to vote for been so easily decided.

My libertarian friends, I’m telling you: It’s OK to get excited about a major party ticket. You should endorse Harris and Walz, not with reluctance but with genuine enthusiasm.

For the past few years I’ve been putting together a summer playlist to highlight recent music I’ve been digging. Here’s this year’s: lots of new music, a few covers, and quite a bit from bands I’ve been fortunate to catch live. Enjoy!

Australia is often lauded as a world leader in mainstream tobacco control. But on the ground, things are descending into chaos. New from me at Reason:

Since March of last year, the Australian state of Victoria has been rocked by a series of arsons and firebombings. Some of the targets are victims of extortion; others are caught in an escalating turf war between rival gangs. Two men with links to organized crime have been publicly murdered, one in a broad-daylight shooting at a shopping mall in a Melbourne suburb. Violent conflict is not unexpected in organized crime, but what is unusual is the drug at the center of this conflict: nicotine.

E-cigarettes are already only legally available with a prescription, though widely sold illicitly. The government is now on the verge of passing a bill to penalize suppliers of e-cigarettes with up to seven years in prison. Deadly cigarettes, meanwhile, remain freely available, if exorbitantly taxed. Read the whole thing.

Brett Adams and I had so much fun writing our first book together that we’ve signed on to do a second! From Publishers Marketplace:

In The Bartender’s Library we’ll be taking a much deeper dive into spirits and cocktails inspired by the Multnomah Whiskey Library, the incredible bar in Portland where we first met and where Brett is now the full-time curator and education manager. Save a spot on your shelf for this one, it’s going to be a big project for us.

In the meantime, pick up our first book Raising the Bar if you haven’t already. If you’re in Portland, you can pick up a signed copy from us personally tomorrow (Thursday, May 23) at Cup of Joe coffee:

We were also on the local news yesterday mixing up some spring cocktails. Check out that segment here.

For the Washington Examiner, I reviewed Fuchsia Dunlop’s excellent new book on Chinese food, Invitation to a Banquet:

At first, I lamented the lack of recipes, but many of these dishes would be wildly impractical to cook at home. Bear’s paw, an archaic dish chosen to illustrate interest in the rare and exotic, is not something you’re going to find in the butcher’s counter at Whole Foods. You could perhaps obtain enough duck tongues to prepare a meal, but cooking them for yourself somewhat misses the point. The appeal of duck tongue lies less in its particular culinary qualities than in the blunt fact that there is only one per duck. To be served the duck’s tongue or the pig’s ears or the goose’s feet is a sign of status. “The frisson of knowing that you are the chosen ones, dining on the finest and scarcest ingredients the restaurant has to offer, is one of the secret pleasures of the Chinese gourmet,” Dunlop writes.

Ungated link here.

At Slate, I warned that a federal menthol ban would be an unwisely risky political move for Biden:

The danger for Biden is that while most voters might not care too strongly about a ban either way, the group of people who actually smoke menthols care very much. This wouldn’t matter if the president were elected by popular vote, relative to which the number of menthol smokers motivated to vote on the issue is likely small. But what counts for 2024 are the margins in swing states. Some of these were extremely narrow in 2020, with Biden winning Georgia and Arizona by fewer than 12,000 votes. In that context, the risk of losing votes from some of the millions of Americans who smoke menthol cigarettes is worth taking seriously.

In this case, the Biden admin appears to agree with me! A couple weeks after I wrote this, they announced that the ban has been indefinitely put on hold.

Last week the Massachusetts Multi-Agency Illegal Tobacco Task Force released its annual report. That probably isn’t exciting reading for most of you, but it’s a really useful document for understanding the impact of prohibitionist tobacco policies. In 2019, Massachusetts became the first state to pass a comprehensive ban on flavored nicotine and tobacco products. Flavor bans are studied by health academics for how they affect consumer behavior, but this annual report is one of the few sources that reveals how these policies affect law enforcement.

Advocates for flavor bans portray them as simple product regulations, dismissing concerns that they will lead to arrests and prosecutions. This year’s report from Massachusetts shows once again that these advocates are wrong. A few excerpts from the section on criminal investigations:

In May of 2023, Mansfield PD and State Police investigators seized untaxed flavored ENDS products (to include THC ENDS products) following an investigation and search of a residence. This case is being prosecuted by the Bristol County District Attorney’s Office. [Note: “ENDS” refers to electronic nicotine delivery systems, a.k.a. e-cigarettes.]

In June of 2023, the State Police arrested a Lynn man in possession of untaxed flavored ENDS products, marijuana, and US Currency. This case is being prosecuted by the Essex County District Attorney’s Office.

In June of 2023, the State Police arrested a Boston man in possession of untaxed flavored ENDS products as well as marijuana. He was charged with tax evasion. The case is being prosecuted by the Plymouth County District Attorney’s Office. 

In October of 2023, the State Police arrested a Malden man in possession of untaxed flavored ENDS products as well as Class C and Class D controlled substances. He was charged with tax evasion and motor vehicle offenses. This case is being prosecuted by the Middlesex County District Attorney’s Office. 

In November of 2023, the State Police arrested a Randolph man while in possession of flavored ENDS products. He was charged with Tax Evasion and Motor Vehicle Offenses. This case is being prosecuted out of the Plymouth District Attorney’s Office. 

In February of 2024, the State Police along with CIB, the Woburn and Worcester Police Departments, and Homeland Security Investigations executed 29 search warrants on businesses, residences, vehicles, individuals, and bank accounts. Investigators seized approximately 280,000 flavored ENDS products as well as flavored cigars and unstamped cigarettes. Investigators also seized approximately seventy (70) pounds of marijuana packaged for distribution, hundreds of cases of THC and Psylocibin-laced products (Class C Controlled Substances), multiple jars of pure THC oil and THC crystalline, and one unsecured firearm. Investigators also seized over $1 million as proceeds of the illegal sales of these products. State Police arrested a New Hampshire man on two counts of Possession with Intent to Distribute a Class C Substance and Possession with Intent to Distribute a Class D Substance. This investigation, which is being prosecuted by the Attorney General’s Office, remains open and ongoing. 

Violating the flavor ban is a misdemeanor, but in Massachusetts as in most other states, selling untaxed tobacco products can rise to the level of felony offense. Flavor bans drive sales of e-cigarettes to the illicit market, putting sellers at risk of being charged with tax evasion. In Massachusetts that can lead to penalties of up to five years in prison.

These cases can take years to resolve in the criminal justice system. A Massachusetts case I highlighted for Reason two years ago, for example, has yet to go to trial. A contraband tobacco case there from 2017 didn’t reach sentencing until last week. But arrests and prosecutions are ongoing, so it’s only a matter of time before someone is sentenced to prison in the United States for selling flavored e-cigarettes to consenting adults, and more cases will surely follow.

Other recent research concludes that flavor bans increase sales of conventional cigarettes, shifting consumption from relatively low-risk vaping to extremely high-risk smoking. So in addition to creating illicit markets and leading to arrests, prosecutions, and imprisonment, the policies likely don’t even benefit public health. Flavor bans are a dumb, illiberal idea that progressives need to move on from.

Previous coverage: I wrote about last year’s report for Reason. And of course, see my recent book The New Prohibition for an in-depth case against illiberal tobacco policy.

I’ve published a couple recent articles on new wave nicotine products. First up in Reason, I looked at how heated tobacco (such as IQOS) is transforming the market in Japan:

Japan provides an unlikely model for tobacco policy. The country tends to be more tolerant of smoking than its Western peers; it has high rates of smoking among men, and its government participates directly in the cigarette trade through its partial ownership of Japan Tobacco, the country’s largest manufacturer of cigarettes. It therefore comes as a surprise that Japan is experiencing a dramatic and sustained decline in cigarette sales, a trend that experts credit substantially to heated tobacco products.

And in Slate, I covered the controversy over Zyn nicotine pouches, which have sparked the ire of Chuck Schumer and a vocal “Zynsurrection” among the online right:

Superficially, this might seem like just another dumb culture war among the terminally online, for whom anything from Keurig coffee makers to Taylor Swift can become a symbol of political polarization. But the stakes of tobacco policy matter for the rest of us too, particularly for the health of people who smoke and for the 2024 elections. It deserves to be taken seriously. And as much as liberals and progressives may be loath to admit it, right-wing posters defending the freedom of adults’ right to use Zyn have the better of the argument.

Read ’em both!

I always write an annual post with my favorite books from the past year. Sometimes I even get it done before the year ends. This is not one of those times, but better late than never. As always, these are books I read in 2023, not necessarily ones that were published during the year.

Non-fiction

The Individualists, Matt Zwolinski and John Tomasi — This is now the first book I’d recommend to anyone seeking to understand libertarianism. While it’s not primarily about elucidating Matt and John’s own views, they also hint at a positive vision of what libertarianism could become. Read my review here.

Bottoms Up and the Devil Laughs, Kerry Howley — You don’t need me to tell you about this one. Just read it!

The Real Work, Adam Gopnik — It’s rare to see magic treated as seriously as other arts, so I was excited to see it featured in this exploration of skills mastery by Adam Gopnik. Well, it turns out that learning how to urinate in public restrooms gets its own chapter too, so read into that what you will. Very enjoyable, review hopefully forthcoming.

Don’t Tell Anybody the Secrets I Told You, Lucinda Williams — Memoir from one of the greats of American songwriting, reviewed here.

Amplified, Paul Atkinson — Informative design history of how the Telecaster, Les Paul, and Stratocaster have shaped the electric guitar for 70 years, with forays into their predecessors and modern departures from the form. I bought my first electric (a Strat) in 2023 and this clarified a lot for me.

The Northern Silence, Andrew Mellor — I read this while on a suitably stark and wintry trip to Finland. Niche, recommended if a book on Nordic culture and its uniquely devoted support for classical music appeals to you.

Invitation to a Banquet, Fuchsia Dunlop — No one has influenced my everyday cooking more than Dunlop, whose cookbooks I adore. No recipes here, but a wonderful exploration of Chinese cuisine.

The Heartbeat of the Wild, David Quammen — David’s recent writing has understandably been focused on COVID, so it’s a pleasure to look back on his nature writing, collected here in essays from National Geographic.

Scaling People, Claire Hughes Johnson — I cringe at the idea of reading most management books, but this one from Stripe Press is an exception.

Fiction

Whenever I travel to a new country, I pick up novels from there to read while I’m visiting. In 2023 that included Finland and Estonia, which introduced me to two of my favorite novels last year: Troll: A Love Story by Johanna Sinisalo (aptly described as “Finnish weird,” cleverly weaving Nordic myth into a naturalistic, modern Tampere) and The Man Who Spoke Snakish by Andrus Kivirahk (Estonian fantasy with seductive talking bears and loads of violence, set in the magical pre-Christian forests as modernity encroaches).

Other assorted contemporary novel recs: Cult Classic by Sloane Crosley, Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin, The Candy House by Jennifer Egan (a follow-up to A Visit from the Goon Squad), and White Teeth by Zadie Smith (my first by the author, long overdue).

Obligatory self-promotion

I should also mention my own book that came out in 2023. The New Prohibition: The Dangerous Politics of Tobacco Control collects some of my recent essays on how we’re stumbling into a new era of nicotine and tobacco prohibition and the problems that creates. Unfortunately, it appears likely to remain relevant in the year to come too.