Well from the number of beer cans that I've seen strewn across the roadside over the past 20+ years I would say that Fannin has had a problem with drinking and driving for a long time. The biggest problem is that nobody wants to enact some form of control; to regulate it. The same goes for land development and zoning. Nobody around here wants to go through the difficult buy necessary ordeal of developing a form of zoning for Fannin County until someone’s porch light is shining across the hollow into their bedroom. Only then do they cry foul.
Listen liquor by the drink is not some great white hope descending from the heavens to lead us all to better lands. It is pure and simple economics. I'll spell it out in simple, easy to understand terms
Scenario Status Quo:
Tourist come to Fannin-->Tourist spend money in shop-->Tourist work up an appetite and wants to wet his/her whistle with a little brewsky-->Tourist ask shop owner where to find restaurant with beer or wine-->Tourist told to go elsewhere-->Tourist may decide next time that other places are better to stay and spend hard earned cash.
Scenario Personal Choice:
Tourist come to Fannin-->Tourist spend money in shop-->Tourist work up an appetite and wants to wet his/her whistle with a little brewsky-->Tourist ask shop owner where to find restaurant with beer or wine-->Tourist told of various locations within the county and soon to be in city-->Tourist decides that this is best vacation ever and plans to return next year.
It’s so simple an amoeba could comprehend. It is simple economic law of Supply and Demand.It’s not about rendering asunder some unwritten law that nobody can back up with scripture. It’s not about some hair-brained idea of turning Blue Ridge into some metropolis. It’s about regulating something that a vast majority of the tourist that visit us and that many local citizens do themselves (whether in public or secretly in restaurant far, far away). It’s about giving our wonderful county a fighting chance to be something; to make its mark. Sure we want to preserve the beauty and we are glad that people come here. But we can't expect people to be laying down 50+ dollars to ride a smoky train around to look at dead leaves without giving them some other reason to be here. I wonder when it was that the citizens of our Great Republic began to lay down their God given freedoms and accept the ebb and tide of the angry majority? When did we lose our willingness to stand on our own two feet and make our own decisions about what was right for ourselves? When did God get into politics? Sometimes I see and hear the fervor of some of the zealots who rail against giving people an opportunity to choose for themselves, and I think to myself: What is the difference between many of us Americans and the radical Muslim terrorist?
What is the difference between some Islamist radical plotting and planning to bring about Sharia Law through atrocious acts of violence against our citizens and the pastor who mandates that it is God's will that this evil abomination of alcohol be wiped from the face of the earth? Why is it that we cower in horror as Islamic extremist, full of cowardice, preach to their followers that in the name of God they must go forth, sacrifice their lives to bring about social and political change and yet we think nothing of local parishioners who fight with such vehemence against alcohol in our county, but can be seen almost every week at local establishments that either serve or sell that which they hate?
Now I will be the first to admit that I have just made an apples to oranges comparison. I know that many on the “Temperance” bandwagon are very nice and wonderful citizens with no ill malice meant toward any. Yet some of the underlying truth does cry out to be examined by each and every one of us. Why do we fight bravely against the darkness of tyranny and radical theocratic rule set out to rip away the personal freedoms we enjoy so much, and yet we take no heed and voluntarily watch as our personal freedoms and choices are being ever-so-cleverly eroded away from us right in plain view? I wonder if sometime in our future we will lift our heads from the burden of a fight against militant oppression and realize that the enemy we’ve been so bravely and boldly fighting against didn’t have to invade us to take away our freedom our liberty. I wonder if we will realize that we ourselves forfeited our own independence.

Ok it’s late and I’ve built my soapbox way too high for my own good and I’m getting nauseated when I look down.

Ecclesiastes 9:7: "Go, eat your food with gladness, and drink your wine with a joyful heart, for it is now that God favors what you do."
Ecclesiastes 10:19a: "A feast is made for laughter, and wine makes life merry."
Psalm 104:14-15: "He causeth the grass to grow for the cattle, and herb for the service of man: that he may bring forth food out of the earth; And wine that maketh glad the heart of man, and oil to make his face to shine, and bread which strengtheneth man's heart."