Large whisky, please

Apparently giant cracks have appeared in the earth’s surface and the sun did not come out this morning, because Americans are being out-drunk (per capita) in the whiskey stakes. By the French. And by the Uruguayans.

This according to a story encapsulated in the Washington Post last month. Here it is, in shocking pink:

It came to my attention via one of the email lists I’m on, and of course I was stunned. Not by the French so much (although I really don’t feature them drinking mass quantities of Johnny Walker or Jim Beam when they've got Courvoisier) as by the Uruguayans. I mean—what’s going on there?

Plus—United Arab Emirates coming in ahead of the UK?

So naturally I did a bit of further research. Basically all that accomplished was to confirm Mark Twain’s observation about lies, damned lies and statistics. Really hard to get down to comparing whiskey with whiskey—or even with whisky. The Economist broke out Scotch, but not other types of whiskies, but still had France ahead of the US and Britain (but no sign of UAE or Uruguay):

Of course, everyone is pretty much a piker when compared to the Russians. They apparently suck down 13.9 liters of vodka each year—about seven times the next load of lushes (the French and 1.9 liters of Scotch). They should have made it an Olympic sport.

(I suppose they still could if things don’t pick up in Sochi pretty sharpish.)

I did not find anything else pointing up UAE, which of course comprises seven emirates, with Islam being their state religion. I don’t know where you’d find data on alcohol consumption in a place like that, where it is apparently sold legally, but you need to get a drinking license from the government to, you know, imbibe.

The population is about 9.2 million people, but the impression I’m getting is that liquor concessions are only made for foreigners, not citizens. So someone is drinking a whole lot extra to make up for the majority. Could there really be that many ex-pats and tourists there to account for the per capita statistics? If so, how the hell are they not in a permanent state of picklement?

Well, I dunno. But I’d purely like to be on the research team that sorts it out. And finds out what’s up with the Uruguayans, too, while we’re at it.