"He instinctively can find the shining greatness of our American culture and does a good job of highlighting it (although he also does have those rare lapses when he writes about hockey, but that is something caused by impurities in the Eastern waters or something)." Erik Keilholtz
Under the patronage of St. Tammany
Mark C. N. Sullivan is an editor at a Massachusetts university. He is married and the father of three children. Email
Mencken was...a staunch wet, meaning he was against Prohibition from start to finish. He coined a term ombibulous to describe his prejudice in favor of alcohol and against the affront to liberty that Probibition imposed on the Republic. "I'm ombibulous. I drink every known alcoholic drink and enjoy them all." Bud Johns has written "The Ombibulous Mr. Mencken", a chronicle in book form of Mencken's views on the merits of alcohol and the demerits of Prohibition. Here's one such nugget from The American Mercury:
"Five years of Prohibition have had, at least, this one benign effect: they have completely disposed of all the favorite arguments of the Prohibitionists. None of the great boons and usufructs that were to follow the passage of the Eighteenth Amendment has come to pass. There is not less drunkenness in the Republic, but more. There is not less crime, but more. There is not less insanity, but more. The cost of government is not smaller, but vastly greater. Respect for law has not increased, but diminished."
In honor of the day, let's sing along with Louis Jordan as he asks the musical question:
![[SMMMHDH]](http://www.mgilleland.com/music/smmmhdh.png){kind=small}
