bloomberg - Anheuser-Busch InBev NV (ABI), the world’s biggest brewer, was sued by consumers in three U.S. states for allegedly overstating the alcohol content in its Budweiser beer. AB InBev’s St. Louis-based Anheuser-Busch Cos. routinely adds extra water to its finished products to produce malt beverages with significantly less alcohol content than displayed on its labels, violating state statutes on consumer protection, according to in a complaint filed yesterday in federal court in Philadelphia. Similar lawsuits were filed in federal courts in New Jersey and San Francisco. “AB’s customers are overcharged for watered-down beer and AB is unjustly enriched by the additional volume it can sell,” Thomas and Gerald Greenberg said in the Philadelphia complaint. AB InBev, the maker of Budweiser and Stella Artois, controls 39 percent of the U.S. beer market. The company is seeking government approval to buy the rest of Grupo Modelo SAB, Mexico’s largest beermaker, for $20.1 billion. The Modelo brands account for 7 percent of the U.S. market. AB InBev shipped 98.5 million barrels in the U.S. in 2011, according to Beer Marketer’s Insights. The claims against Anheuser-Busch are “completely false,” Peter Kraemer, the company’s vice president of brewing and supply, said in an e-mail. “Our beers are in full compliance with all alcohol labeling laws,” Kraemer said. “We proudly adhere to the highest standards in brewing our beers, which have made them the best-selling in the U.S. and the world.” The complaints accuse the AB InBev unit of also mislabeling the amount of alcohol in Bud Ice, Bud Light Platinum, Michelob, King Cobra, Busch Ice, Black Crown, Bud Light Lime, Hurricane High Gravity Lager, Natural Ice and Michelob Ultra.

This is a tremendous blow to those of us who trusted Anheuser-Busch’s labeling and depended on their products to get us as drunk as they claimed they would. So many of my personal favorite “I need to get fucking hammered tonight” beverages are on here: Stella Artois, Bud, Bud Light, Bud Platinum, Bud Ice, Natty Ice, Bud Goth, HURRICANE. Jesus if the people of America can’t rely on getting all 5.9% of the alcohol in their Hurricane and KING COBRA 40s then what the hell are we even doing? Does this company have anything to do with America at all anymore??

Thank goodness these Philadelphia patriots stepped up and are challenging these assholes in court. Americans need every tenth of a percentage of that alcohol in their booze. Our people fought too damned hard during the War of Prohibition to settle for anything less.