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Appeals to tradition usually make me laugh. While I certainly enjoy studying traditional methods and means and even own a few great traditional tools across the various trades I’ve studied, they are almost always made better with application of new technology and knowledge. Sure, I might like a Brown Bess musket and respect her place in history and her capabilities but even in that same form factor I can now have better barrel steel, stronger lock and trigger, better more efficient projectiles, cleaner faster powders, better sighting systems, and stronger more durable stocks. In every way I can make that new rifle perform like an old one, if I wanted, but now it’s capable of so much more. Understand how and why it was done and what the effects were, but then apply that knowledge with better tools. That said, the emotional experience I get shooting a 200year old musket could never be replaced with an AR-15.

Draw a marker through it. Paste/staple a label over it. Some distillers actually paint out the whole head of a used barrel (use something acceptable for food grade, wineries sometimes use whitewash) and then relabel over that. Some will just cross bad info out, and switch to the other head for new labeling.

No - the spirits must be aged in the oak. Buying wine that has been stored in oak means only that you paying someone else to store something you will still have to store for an additional two years,. I'm not competent to comment on whether distilling wine that has been in oak will benefit the brandy produced. Stipping out the excess verbiage to get to the basic, we get, "In the case of brandy distilled from wine of grapes, which has been stored in oak containers for less than 2 years, the statement of class and type shall be immediately preceded, in the same size and kind of type, by the word “immature”. So, I see your logic. Does the phrase "which has been stored in oak containers for less than two years," modify "brandy" or modify "wine of grape." The answer to that lies in the age statement, in §5.40, again simplified for clarity, and referring only to grape brandy, not other fruit brandy: (b) Statements of age for brandy, Age may, but need not, be stated on labels of brandies, except that an appropriate statement with respect to age shall appear on the brand label in case of brandy (other than immature brandies which are not customarily stored in oak containers) not stored in oak containers for a period of at least 2 years." And age means, by the definition at 5.11, "The period during which, after distillation and before bottling, distilled spirits have been stored in oak containers.

I think everyone here can agree that accelerated aging in stainless steel tanks is far superior to traditional barrel aging. Throw some chunks of wood in and you're good to go. amirite ¯\_(ツ)_/¯