Dan's Papers - July 18, 2008 - Twentysomething...By David Lion Rattiner

Last year I can remember with great clarity emotionally destroying a friend of mine while we were out to dinner in Westhampton. We both ordered a beer; I ordered a Peroni and my friend ordered a Corona. My friend, whose nickname is Chooch, is Mexican-American, and he took a swig of my Peroni. "No way," he said. "I have to have Corona. Mexico has the best beer in the world."

I hesitated to say anything because national pride is national pride, and there is really nothing wrong with it as long as you are ultimately pumped about being an American, as far as I'm concerned. But I just had to correct my friend. "You know, Corona is not really Mexican. It was bought by Anheuser-Busch, which is an American company. You're really drinking an authentic American beer."

My buddy's eyes widened. He couldn't believe it. We chatted about how Corona was still kind of Mexican because it is still made in Mexico, and that made him feel a little better. But I could tell I completely shot a whammy through this poor guy.

I'm Romanian, Irish, English and Russian, but in reality I'm 100 percent American, and proud of it. The most national pride I feel next to that is for my Irish heritage, but that likely has to do with the fact that I love Guinness, Montauk and the movie Rudy.

Either way, though, I take a huge amount of pride in being American, and when I drink a Budweiser or a Bud Light, I can hear the national anthem go off in my head, and immediately want to go watch football and eat a barbeque sandwich while thinking about beef jerky.

And then I was whammied.

Anheuser-Busch, the most freaking American company on the planet, was just bought by a Belgian company called InBev for $50 billion, and I have to say, I feel really weird about it. Honestly, how could we let this happen? The one beer that really makes you feel the red, white and blue is now chocolate. I love Belgian beer, especially Stella, but Budweiser being Belgian feels awkward.

I think I now know how my buddy felt during our dinner in Westhampton.

When I went to Italy two years ago for a traveling vacation, I noticed that at some of the higher-end restaurants you could order a Budweiser as if it were exotic, because to Italians, it is exotic, just like Peroni is exotic to us. But by and large, most places I went to in Italy, Peroni or another Italian beer was the beer of choice.

Here in America, or on the East End of Long Island anyway, most people's beer of choice is non-American. When I go out I usually see people drink Red Stripe, Stella, Peroni and other imported beers. Budweiser is kind of a rare beer to be bought out here - people want the fancier stuff, which isn't really fancier, just imported from further away.

So I'm thinking Budweiser is gonna make a comeback, since it is now a Belgian beer and Belgians apparently make the best beer and can go buy the largest American beer company in the world when they feel like it.

What is going to happen at the Super Bowl? Are we going to have Dr. Evil from the movie Austin Powers promoting Budweiser instead of those ridiculously awesome Clydesdales? Or the frogs? What about the Budweiser frogs?! What the hell just happened? How is Budweiser a Belgian beer?!

In fact, I guess I feel worse for the now even more confused Mexican-Americans who have to deal with Corona being part Belgian, part American and part Mexican.

That's how I like to think about it now. Budweiser, which was started by German-Americans, is really part German, part Mexican (because of Modelo), part Australian (because of Foster's) and now part Belgian, which, really, if you think about it, makes it even more American then ever because it is a combination of different countries mixed into one glorious beer that tastes about as good as battery acid.