Senator Valentine needs a Zion Curtain for his mouth

So, it turns out that the "Zion Curtain" not only restricts your from seeing a mixed drink prepared, but it will protect your kids from seeing someone pouring a beer.

Because, really, we all know that every kid who drinks does it because he saw a drink being prepared at Applebees.

Now, what's interesting is to see the arguments the Legislature is spitting out on this one.

First, from the Tribune:

Senate President Michael Waddoups, R-Taylorsville, who supported backrooms to hide bartenders at restaurants serving wine and mixed drinks, said he did not push for partitions at beer-only restaurants — and he doesn’t know who did.

Waddoups suggested that Mothers Against Drunk Driving might have wanted the partitions, but MADD Utah chapter President Art Brown said he is unfamiliar with the requirement.

Does Waddoups think we're stupid? The provision got put in because someone wrote it in there. And last time I checked, Art Brown is not a member of the Legislature or a part of the Legislature's legal teams.

From the same article:

Despite the confusion over who spearheaded the change, Zion curtains are harming business, said Eric Slaymaker, president and founder of Wingers, which has 23 locations in Utah and 14 restaurants in Idaho, Oregon, Washington, Wyoming, Nevada and Tennessee.

“The Legislature says it is business-friendly, but I have a hard time believing that,” he said. “Utah had made some great strides in becoming part of the real world, but now we’re making strides to let the world know they aren’t welcome here again.”

Really,if you don't want your kids to see liquor being poured, DON'T GO TO APPLEBEES! I thought that's what the Free Market was all about.

Then this morning, X96's Radio From Hell interviewed Sen John Valentine, who sponsored the bills. You can listen to the interview here. The part about the Zion Curtain starts about 4:30 in.

In the interview, Sen Valentine said that if you didn't hide the alcohol, then you'd have to ID everyone who comes into the restaurant. Which is stupid. You didn't have to before this law. But wait -- it gets better!

When asked about why the law was necessary, Valentine said it was to draw "a bright line between a restaurant and a bar."

I'm not a drinker, but I can tell when I'm in a restaurant and when I'm in a bar. Restaurants usually have better lighting for one. Bars often have someone at the door checking ID's. Kids are absent in bars. You have to order food in a restaurant, but you don't have to order either in a bar if you don't want to.

When asked about the anti-business image it shows to people outside of Utah, Valentine said ""If you want a true dry area, go to one of the places in the South."

When Valentine said that Utah's Liquor laws work (which makes me wonder why we need this change) because Utah has the lowest DUI rate, the hosts asked him if that wasn't because of the high number of religious non-drinkers here. The reply?

"If religious people are in the majority, shouldn't you reflect that religious value?"

Um, no. If people are really opposed to businesses preparing alcohol in front of their children, they should not take their children to businesses that prepare alcohol in front of children. Let the free market decide.

Besides, Mormon scripture is opposed to Valentine's reasoning:

"We do not believe it just to mingle religious influence with civil government, whereby one religious society is fostered and another proscribed in its spiritual privileges, and the individual rights of its members, as citizens, denied." (Doctrine & Covenants 134:9)

Laws like this make Utah and Mormons look bad.