The Plot to Destroy America's Beer

I find this article to be an intriguing piece of journalism. In the end, it's not clear to me if the people who like the pre-InBev beers are merely sentimental, or are speaking to a real wide-spread erosion of quality for beers under their sway.

Is InBev -- compared in the article to a private-equity pump-and-dump operation -- buying brands and chipping away at them to turn their hard-earned customer loyalty into the impressive profits reported over a finite period of time, like strip-mining? Or, are they are a positive globalizing force that may make some sacrifices, but generally improves the quality and availability of beers available to all, especially in places without a local micro-brew economy or supply chain?

The answer is probably somewhere in-between, but how much of each?

When I started drinking beer, long ago, the American options were pretty limited, and mostly to light lagers. They lost a lot of ground to imports and microbrews when younger consumers discovered that beers didn't have to taste like Bud/Schlitz/Miller (and when those consumers developed the earning power to pay for them). We'll see how the InBev model holds up if they damage brands.

People still drink macro-brews, and expect them to taste good? Come on.