I question this also. Does this mean that the people were breathalyzed and found definitively to have been drinking, or is this anecdotal? I can imagine someone getting arrested and then stating that they had been drinking to deflect some of the blame.

Don't forget the rest of what you started to quote:

Of the class of people who go to prison, a lot of them are drunk a lot of the time. So that doesn't mean that they wouldn't have done it if they had not been drunk. It’s just that being drunk and committing burglary are both parts of their lifestyle. Still, alcohol shortens time horizons, and people with shorter time horizons are more criminally active because they’re less scared of the punishment.

It's disturbing how . . . certain he sounds about this. As if there is a definitive "class of people who go to prison." No, I don't trust this guy at all. He's got Big Brother written all over him.

Taxation is just about the perfect way to control alcohol use. It’s not complete, because you need controls for the real problem drinkers. But if we tripled the alcohol tax it would reduce homicide by 6 percent.

However, the definition of "problem drinker" is something like 5 drinks a day. That's a mighty low number where I come from.

So, you can’t do this solely with taxation. You need some regulation with the tax. But tripling the tax would add something like $17 billion a year in new revenue.

Oh right, that's what he's after. Plus, you've got to love this:

Not that I’d be caught dead drinking a blended Scotch.

Pfft. Preference is one thing, being a dickhead is another.