Vomitorium now in progress as AB-InBev hack dupes CNBC stenographer.

Reading this article reminds me of the time 35 years ago when I made it all the way through Mein Kampf, written (screamed?) by some fellow named Hitler.

Wait a minute -- no, it doesn't. There's a crucial difference.

Like AB-InBev's flunky Andy Goeler, Hitler was spouting pure gibberish. Unlike Goeler, Hitler believed in his own gibberish and set about to prove how catastrophic it really was.

Goeler doesn't believe his own corporate gibberish. Unfortunately, many "craft" beer aficionados will, and that's catastrophic, too, so let me remind you of something:

The very existence of AB and its engorged successor, AB-InBev, made it necessary for us to take beer back from the bean-counting Philistines by prying it from the monolith's cold, dead (but profitable) hands, by means of a revolution. There is no way, as in cannot happen, that anything AB-InBev ever does can facilitate better beer in any meaningful sense. It can only subtract from better beer. It can only bastardize. It can only destroy integrity. It cannot add it. Ever.

Death to AB-InBev -- then, now, tomorrow.

Inside Anheuser-Busch’s craft beer deals, by Tom Rotunno (CNBC)

 ... "If you look at craft right now, it's playing a very important role in the industry, and while around 80 percent of consumers still enjoy and drink domestic large lagers, the craft piece of the business is really growing," said Andy Goeler, CEO of craft for Anheuser-Busch InBev's Anheuser-Busch division. "It's adding a lot of excitement and so our strategy is really simple, it's to participate in the excitement that's going on in craft" ...

 ... To that extent the Anheuser-Busch has developed a two-pronged approach: Create its own in-house national brands like Shock Top, while at the same time expanding its portfolio by acquiring established regional craft brewers with room to grow.

"We look for owners that share a passion, have an amazing beer culture and have partners that take a long-term view and who want to keep expanding and do more things in the world of beer," he said.

The Pour Fool on Dick Cantwell's principled resignation from Elysian.

It's been a few months, and The Pour Fool follows up.

The Pour Fool on Elysian and AB InBev's "malignant tentacles."

Folks, a "craft" brewery absorbed by AB-InBev is just as dead as if a nuclear bomb were dropped on it. Huzzahs to Dick Cantwell:

"In his resignation, Cantwell affirms what everyone already knew about him; his integrity and standards and the unwavering dedication that he’s always shown to the craft brewing culture that he helped create."

The Pour Fool rocks it.

Dick Cantwell: Corporate Brewing STILL Sucks, by stevefoolbody (The Pour Fool)

Dick Cantwell has resigned from his position as partner and brewmaster at Elysian Brewing in Seattle, in the wake of the company’s tragic sale to AB/InBev, the Belgian/Brazilian mega-brewer which acquired the brewery as part of a broader plan to insinuate itself into the craft beer community and win back younger drinkers who have abandoned the company’s flagship beers, Bud, Bud Light, and the foundering Michelob.

Following are a few relevant postings from earlier in the year.

Pop open a Trojan Goose and enjoy this explanation of why you shouldn't.

Trojan Cigar?

The PC: Budweiser explains the Doctrine of Trojan Geese Transubstantiation.

Elysian and Sub Pop: "Corporate Beer Still Sucks."

Diary: On the Gooseislandization of 10 Barrel Brewing by the aesthetic assassins at AB-InBev.

Who gives a flying fuck?

10 Barrel's dead as Monty Python's parrot. Find a cheap preacher, pay your respects and bring flowers. Then move on.

10 Barrel's just Zombie "Craft" now.

It's Trojan Ten Barrel.

Don't confuse me with someone who gives a fuck.

You see, back before the beer narcissists were born, we had a revolution to take beer back from the grimy corporatist likes of AB-InBev, which has been, and always will be, the foremost enemy of better beer in this world, as we know it.

Obviously, AB-InBev has the ample resources to buy its way to alleged respectability. Just as obviously, this is the fundamental problem, because money cannot buy authenticity. Even more obviously, drinkers of better beer have hundreds -- nay, thousands -- of legitimate small breweries to choose from, ones that have not been irrevocably bastardized by association (and ownership) with a company that's the closest thing to a Great Beer Satan as we're likely to see in this world ... as we know it.

If you doubt it, do some cursory research on AB-InBev's repellant company history as a symbol of everything wrong with beer and capitalism. It ain't pretty, and I'm sorry if it steps all over your sense of entitlement. Appeasing it does not change the paradigm.

You see, selling one's soul isn't about gray areas. When you sell your soul, you sell your soul. That's what this is about, and whenever possible, in a probably doomed effort to hold onto what tiny bits of soul I may as yet possess, I try not to hand my money over to those who've sold theirs. It's as simple as that. Better beer owes its existence to pride, ideas and principles .. to its very soul.

Sacrifice the soul and you're handing over the revolution to the very same soulless vampires it was fought against in the first place.

It's as simple as that.

10 Barrel's unfortunate demise signals yet again AB-InBev's dull intent to buy what it cannot create. Fortunately, 3,000 other breweries remain that are small, local and real. Pick a few, enjoy their beers, and give your soul some nourishment. Be local. Case closed.

Rest in peace, 10 Barrel Brewing. I'm sure your beers were great, but you're dead now. Who gives a fuck? 

Let's have a better beer, shall we?