Right Wing Beer Baron Pete Coors Now Proposing Lowering Drinking Age (to make more money?)

Bellant, Russ. The Coors Connection: How Coors Family Philanthropy Undermines Democratic Pluralism. Political Research Associates, 1990. 96 pages.
Coors was behind much of the influence of think-tank Reaganism, as shown by this detailed analysis. Some of the 1980s groups that received Coors money are profiled: the Heritage Foundation (pages 11-20), the Free Congress Foundation (pages 21-36), the Council for National Policy (pages 37-45), and smaller sections on the National Strategy Information Center, the American Security Council Foundation, and the Conservative Caucus. Obligatory sections on PC diversity are also included: Coors and women, Coors and gays, Coors and African-Americans, Coors and Chicanos, etc.

http://www.namebase.org/sources/NT.html

Question: What do you do when you discover that a member of the board of directors of an organization you founded and monetarily support is a former state leader of the Ku Klux Klan? Answer: keep him there -- if you're a member of the Coors family, that is.

In this case, the organization in question is the Council for National Policy, which Bellant describes as "a secretive group of the foremost right-wing activists and funders in the United States" (p. 36). According to Council member Morton Blackwell, "The policy [of CNP] is that we don't discuss who attends the meetings or what is said" (p. 36). However, it is known that convicted Iran-Contra felon Oliver North and extreme right-wing Louisiana politician Louis "Woody" Jenkins were founding members of the Council for National Policy. The organization appears to be a secret breeding ground for ideas among this country's most reactionary political leaders.

Now, about that KKK business. One of the directors of the Council for National Policy was Richard Shoff, who in the early 1970's was Grand Kilgrapp of the Indiana Ku Klux Klan. (For the uninitiated in Klan titles, that makes him state secretary of the organization.) "According to the head of the Indiana KKK," writes Bellant, "Shoff was also a generous funder of Klan activities" (p. 54). Shoff was also involved with a other hate organizations, including the Conservative Caucus, "a group which cheerleads for the apartheid regime in South Africa" (p. 38). Shoff was also caught in a fundraising scandal in which "funds [he] collected under the name "Children with AIDS Foundation" were slated to support a homophobic right-wing religious activist, Rev. H. Edward Rowe..." (p. 38).

In short, Richard Shoff was a despicable right-wing nutcase with KKK ties. So why would the Coors family retain him on the board of their Council for National Policy? Simple -- because the Coors family has Klan ties of its own.

"The Coors Foundation," writes Bellant, "gave $2500 in 1981 to the ultra-rightist Patriotic American Youth, Inc., a group which also distributes explicitly racist literature. The masthead of their related publication mailed from Jackson, Mississippi included names of figures active in the segregationist Citizen's Councils and the Ku Klux Klan. Also active with the group was Judge Tom Brady, whose efforts inspired the formation of the segregationist Citizen's Councils in the 1950's to oppose the 1954 Supreme Court decision striking down the concept of separate but equal in Brown v. Board of Education" (p. 72).

Even with this direct Coors connection to the KKK, though, we can't fully recognize the depth of racism inherent in the Coors family until we examine the words of William Coors, Pete's uncle. In 1984, he told a group of African-American businessmen in Denver that "probably the greatest favor that anybody ever did you, was to drag your ancestors over here in chains, and I mean it. ... [Blacks] lack the intellectual capacity to succeed..." (p. 67)

Suddenly it doesn't seem so strange that the Coors family would maintain a Klan leader as director in one of their pet organizations -- the family holds racist views similar to, or even more extreme than, the KKK.

The Pete Coors Connection

Once again, Peter Coors managed to keep himself free of any personal responsibility for the Coors family's racist views -- at least that we can prove, that is. But he can't escape the fact that the Coors Foundation, in which Peter played an influential role after the handover of power to his generation in 1987, continued to fund the Council for National Policy after that year, while Richard Shoff sat on the board of the CNP. (pp. xiii, 46) KKK connections, it seems, make a wonderful background for a U.S. Senate candidacy.

http://nonpartisan.dailykos.com/story/2004/7/24/65346/3902

Peter Coors’ suggestion that we “reopen the debate” on lowering the drinking age comes as no surprise to anyone who has seen Coors Brewing’s youth-oriented advertising. Perhaps now that he is a candidate for the US Senate, Mr. Coors wants legal sanction to do what his company has been doing without it for years—targeting kids with beer promotions. Twenty years ago Coors Brewing was the first to exploit Halloween as a beer-drinking holiday—launching what became a brewing industry practice of using Halloween images to market beer. More recently, public outcry forced Coors to withdraw a TV campaign that featured a howling, shirtless young man with “Coors” painted on his chest. This past October teen moviegoers filled theaters to see Scary Movie 3—a PG-13 film co-promoted by Coors, featuring Coors Light and an appearance by the Coors Twins.

Mr. Coors may be uncomfortable that so much of his company’s profits come from underage drinking. But, rather than curb youth access to alcohol, as the National Academy of Sciences recommends, he wants to make the problem go away by dropping the drinking age. Sadly, it isn’t that easy to reclaim the thousands of young lives lost each year to alcohol-related homicide, suicide, motor vehicle and other injuries, even with a national drinking age of 21.

No serious person doubts the effectiveness of our national age 21 drinking law. Since its adoption 20 years ago, it has saved nearly 20,000 young lives from alcohol-related motor vehicle crashes alone. If Mr. Coors wants a debate on something relevant, he should focus on why beer taxes remain so low. Despite the fact that alcohol-related problems cost our nation upwards of $184 billion a year, young people can buy beer that is cheaper than water. That is a question worthy of debate and worthy of a candidate for the US Senate.

See examples of Coors youth-targeted promotions at: http://www.MarinInstitute.org/coors/