Back in early 2008 I posted an article about:

Russia: Beer Is Not Alcohol?

I was poking fun at a sign in that article at a grocery store, who was apologizing for not having alcohol. They had every kind of beer in the world but hard liquor was not available. Beer was considered a softdrink…

Well the Kremlin just made the connection and made it law. Beer is now an alcohol…

Medvedev signs law that likens beer to alcohol

They also are going to reenforce rules that have been in effect ever since Soviet times but have largely been ignored.  Such as no selling alcohol to minors and no walking around with a bottle of beer…

They also, according to what the news is saying, will by 2013 make kiosks stop selling beer. Now that will shut down about 80% of the eyesore kiosks…

I have mixed feelings about rules like this. It seems that rules like this are just enforcing the obvious and I always wonder why we have to be such lowlifes that we have to force governments to enact rules to protect ourselves from ourselves…

Simple example is: There is a beer place near us parents send there 8,9,10 and what every year old kids with a note/money in hand to the beer store. The young kid then carries a bag of beer back home. This is common and I tell Sveta all it is about is a lazy ass parent who can not even walk to get their own beer. Well the laws are going to be enforced… (I hope?)

(Reminds me of so many people I knew in America, who always had their kids get them a beer out of the fridge. Just plain lazy.)

So most rules have been on the book for ever in Russia and most people do not realize that. Many of these rules were just stopped being enforced after the Soviet Union died. But the most important rule that beer was never classified as an alcohol was missing. Now beer is an alcohol in Russia…

Windows to Russia!