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Brewery pours scorn on NY mayor

From CNN's Meki Tate

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Bloomberg with the cast of the Broadway musical "Chicago."

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Michael R. Bloomberg

NEW YORK (CNN) -- New York's Rheingold Beer Company is taking aim at Mayor Michael Bloomberg in a new advertising campaign critical of what a company spokesman calls "silly laws" like the city's smoking ban.

Another target is the 1926 cabaret law that requires licenses for bars and restaurants that have three or more people dancing.

The 120-year-old brewery's television campaign is entitled, "Don't Sleep: This is New York, and we can't sleep until we take it back."

The commercials are set to begin airing Wednesday.

The company's marketing director, Fara Ribbler, said the ad campaign was designed to critique "silly laws that are dampening the character of the city."

Rheingold wants to encourage freedom of expression" through the "Don't Sleep" campaign, Ribbler added.

Each spot features a different law enforcement issue. One ad depicts hipsters walking into a bar with ashtrays in their pockets that they place on the bar before ordering a Rheingold Beer.

Another, titled "Cabaret," features actors dancing around the New York City until a banner comes up announcing "No Dancing. Fine: $3000."

Bloomberg has hit back by accusing the company of abandoning New York "when times are tough," only to "exploit the city to sell their product."

He said he could recall a time when "people were pouring Rheingold beer in the streets after they abandoned Brooklyn, laying off 4,000 New Yorkers."

Ribbler said the Libeman family, which owns Rheingold Beer Company, did not have a controlling interest in the company at the time of the 1976 layoffs.


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