{"id":1559,"date":"2004-04-09T12:26:24","date_gmt":"2004-04-09T17:26:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/1559.html"},"modified":"2004-04-09T12:26:24","modified_gmt":"2004-04-09T17:26:24","slug":"running-for-the-senate-while-running-from-a-family-history","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/running-for-the-senate-while-running-from-a-family-history\/","title":{"rendered":"Running for the Senate while running from a family history"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the Rocky Mountain News’ article<\/a> yesterday about Peter Coors’ plans to run in Colorado for the U.S. Senate, there was one sentence at the very end that hinted at a broader story.<\/p>\n

[Jennifer Duffy, Senate editor for the nonpartisan Cook Political Report in Washington, D.C.] said that Coors faces intense scrutiny — not just of himself, but of his company.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

If all you know of the Coors company is that it brews cheap beer, Duffy’s comment may not make a lot of sense. The fact is, however, that Coors may best known as for alcohol, but political junkies know that when it comes to conservative causes, this isn’t just any brewing dynasty; it’s a right-wing powerhouse.<\/p>\n

Chris Gates, chairman of the Colorado Dem Party, said yesterday<\/a>:<\/p>\n

“I predict the Republicans will try very hard to say he is a different kind of Coors, maybe a Coors light,” he said. “But I think most people in this state will always associate Coors with alcohol and right-wing politics.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

What are these folks talking about? It’s kind of a long story.
\n
\nCoors has been around since 1873, but the company has been extremely political for a couple of generations. In the 1970s, the AFL-CIO launched a national boycott of the company’s beer to protest Coors’ union-busting activities. Civil rights groups have also singled out Coors for criticism after William Coors delivered a speech<\/a> to a Denver minority business group in which, according to a Rocky Mountain News report, he told a largely African-American audience that “one of the best things [slave traders] did for you is to drag your ancestors over here in chains.” In the same speech, Coors also argued that weaknesses in Zimbabwe’s economy at the time were due to black Africans’ “[l]ack of intellectual capacity — that has got to be there.” (Coors later said his remarks were taken out of context and threatened to sue the newspaper.)<\/p>\n

But the real politics behind Coors isn’t in what the family members have said, it’s seen in where the company’s money has gone.<\/p>\n

The Coors family has been instrumental in providing a financial foundation to the nation’s conservative infrastructure. Consider the Heritage Foundation, for example. Heritage is the nation’s pre-eminent conservative think tank, with unparalleled influence and power in GOP circles. Joseph Coors is the man who was primarily responsible for creating the group, giving Heritage $250,000 in start-up money in 1973, plus an additional $300,000 for an office building in DC.<\/p>\n

As Heritage Foundation President Edwin Feulner once said<\/a>, “Without Joe Coors, the Heritage Foundation wouldn’t exist — and the conservative movement it nurtures would be immeasurably poorer.”<\/p>\n

Heritage is hardly the only conservative outfit to benefit from Coors’ generosity. Coors has also helped finance fringe right-wing outfits such as the Free Congress Foundation, Phyllis Schlafly’s Eagle Forum, and the John Birch Society.<\/p>\n

Coors has also helped sponsor the Council for National Policy, a “Christian Reconstructionist” group that seeks to replace American democracy with a theocracy based on a harsh and literal interpretation of the Old Testament. Jeffery Coors has even served<\/a> on the CNP’s board.<\/p>\n

The brewery has also been instrumental in its support for the religious right political movement in general. As People for the American Way explained<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Unlike some other foundations that shy away from explicit identification with Religious Right causes, Coors family heirs have a long-standing relationship with many prominent Religious Right leaders. Coors grantee Paul Weyrich, together with Robert Billings, then director of the Coors-founded Free Congress Foundation, engineered the formation of the Moral Majority with Jerry Falwell at its head. Phyllis Schlafly has received money from Joseph Coors for her STOP-ERA organization; Coors supported Bob Simonds’ National Association of Christian Educators\/Citizens for Excellence in Education (CEE) which has sought to “reclaim our Christian heritage in our public schools.” Other recipients include Pat Robertson’s Regent University, Morality in Media and the Rutherford Institute.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Ironically, Peter Coors is supposed to be the moderate of the GOP Senate candidates in Colorado.<\/p>\n

Rumor has it that Peter is far less conservative than his siblings, father, and grandfather, and that he hasn’t been responsible for the company’s financing. I frankly have no idea if this is the case or not. But I did a quick search at the Federal Election Committee<\/a> and discovered that he’s personally donated over $100,000 in recent election cycles to some of the most conservative Republican candidates in the country, including fellow Coloradoans like Tom Tancredo and Marilyn Musgrave (the FMA creator), Wyoming’s Barbara Cubin, and even John Ashcroft.<\/p>\n

Because Peter Coors has never served in government at any level, he will effectively have to run on his family’s name. Considering Coors’ history, that may become very controversial through the course of the campaign. Something to look out for.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the Rocky Mountain News’ article yesterday about Peter Coors’ plans to run in Colorado for the U.S. Senate, there was one sentence at the very end that hinted at a broader story. [Jennifer Duffy, Senate editor for the nonpartisan Cook Political Report in Washington, D.C.] said that Coors faces intense scrutiny — not just […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1559","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1559","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1559"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1559\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1559"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1559"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1559"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}