The Ten Biggest Beer States

I ran across a story in the New Jersey Star-Ledger that listed the top ten beer states based on sales per capita from The Beer Institute. Here's the list:


10. Delaware (34.3 gallons)
9. Nebraska (34.6 gallons)
8. Texas (34.6 gallons)
7. Vermont (34.7 gallons)
6. Wisconsin (36.2 gallons)
5. Nevada (36.5 gallons)
4. South Dakota (38 gallons)
3. Montana (40.6 gallons)
2. North Dakota (42.2 gallons)
1. New Hampshire (43 gallons)

That's an interesting list in and of itself, but the article's writer, Tom DePoto, supplemented the data with information from the Center for Disease Control. Gems such as, "Delaware is among the top 15 states in the country for both binge drinking and heavy drinking," and "Binge and heavy drinkers account for nearly 26 percent of the adult population in the state [of Texas], and "Consumption has dropped nearly 2 percent, but a lot of binge and heavy drinkers remain."

So DePoto took a statisical list of beer sales with would generally be reported with a wink and a nudge, and editorialized the rest. Whatever happen to journalists' objectivity?