Last Wednesday was our 25th wedding anniversary. We celebrated with a bottle of Billecart Salmon and some Peking Duck – the meal we had on our wedding night back in 1991. We then sat back and watched the last episode of ‘Narcos’ the Netflix story of Pablo Escobar. Five final deaths in a long series of incredibly brutal ends, an unrelenting litany of violence.

25 years ago Escobar was one of the world’s wealthiest individuals, commanding a drug trade that supplied billions of dollars of cocaine to the USA and helped make Colombia the murder capital of the world, with over 25,000 victims a year. When we were getting married Senor Escobar was negotiating the building of a private prison in which he would serve out a nominal sentence and continue to run his business.

The series has focused almost entirely on the Colombian end of the story, but while poverty stricken Colombians, hoping to make a buck or two as loyal Sicarios were being sacrificed, in the USA thousands of middle class Americans were at the other end of the line, merrily snorting the white stuff, without a care in the world.

Today, the violence has moved north and increased in its viciousness; the Mexico cartels cut heads off willy nilly and make Escobar look like a choirboy. Meanwhile we middle class Westerners are still busy snorting away, without a care in the world.

I see two options.

One, let’s legalise coke – like the end of prohibition it would lead to a massive reduction in death and destruction, plus an improvement in the bottom lines of various government – with massive tax revenues versus crazy crime fighting expenditure.

Or two, drink champagne instead.

Champagne is cheaper, won’t rot your nasal septum and yet creates a similar feeling of playful euphoria. Not only that, but it’s highly unlikely that anyone involved in the making of champagne has ever decapitated anyone, planted a car bomb, or murdered a large number of policemen. True, the odd grape-stealing starling might meet a sticky end, but generally speaking, champagne is innocent. Netflix will never make a crime series called ‘Winos’. If Escobar had become a wine merchant instead of a Narco it’s unlikely he would have become so wealthy, but he and a lot of other people would still be alive.

Option One could take sometime, so I’d recommend number two. The Billecart Salmon NV is consistently reliable – no chance of it having been cut with any inferior material. Just don’t try snorting it.