Oh, I Upset One of Tommy's Fan Boys

It was being generous when I said that some of Thomas Jefferson's writing was done under the influence of alcohol, which would account for the bizarre quality of so much of it.   In the corpus of his correspondence, as published, you'll find very lucid, very clear, very moderate and rational letters and some which sound like he was pie-eyed and ranting.  If all of it were like those letters, he'd be rightly considered a nut case.  But, being the "Sage of Monticello" we're supposed to genuflect and pretend we don't see that he's making no sense and needed to dry out.

We do know that, like many 18th century and, even more so, 19th century men he drank a lot, every day.  He said in a letter to Dr. Utley Vine,

..... I double however, the Doctor's glass and a half of wine, and even treble it with a friend; but halve its effects by drinking the weak wines only. The ardent wines I cannot drink, nor do I use ardent spirits in any form. Malt liquors and cider are my table drinks, 

Someone who drinks that much every day is probably justifiably considered an alcoholic.  Or, to put it plainly, a drunk.   Especially considering the possible alcohol content of ale, beer and cider as made on his plantation would possibly have a higher alcohol content than what's sold commercially, today. I also guess by "weak wines" he meant wine of typical strength which wasn't fortified like sherry or port.  If it had too little alcohol in it, with 18th century methods of preservation,  it wouldn't be wine, it would be vinegar.

Lots of the founding fathers were more like potted patriots who were mere mortals, not the demi-gods whose every word should guide us today that the federalist fascists have sold them as being. You'll hear lots of the neo-confederate, federalist-fascist bull shit like that during the Gorsuch hearings.   All that founders junk pretty well came from the white supremacist backlash against the Civil Rights movement.   I'm happy to mock it and diss it and show people they don't have to buy it every chance I get.  Those rotted corpses have no right to strangle our right to equal justice today.