webodec3ARCHIVEPreview
Open in TheBrain

COORS 2

disambig no dollar sign also bak --> TWO

COORS promoted to primary, as still a player eg funding Regent law school (913 back)

DTR GAY NOT NOT SPLC LIST?

see tag

capt 9/17

===

We unraveled the $122 million web of climate denial, political extremism, and Trump ties to Project 2025

Mapped: How 6 Billionaire Family Fortunes Fund Project 2025 - DeSmog

As scrutiny of Project 2025 continues to grow, defenders of the Heritage Foundation-led initiative, which would reshape federal governance and give the next Republican president unprecedented new powers, say it’s the criticism — not the 922-page plan itself — that’s too extreme.

In a piece published last month, Fox News cited prominent conservatives who feel there’s “nothing radical” about the endeavor. The Wall Street Journal’s editorial board has accused detractors of “panic-mongering” and tried to reframe Project 2025’s sprawling “Mandate for Leadership” blueprint as more boring than scary — a milquetoast white paper that simply “melds the work of some 400 scholars and analysts from an eclectic mix of center-right groups.” This echoes Heritage’s insistence that Project 2025, while conservative, is anything but fringe.

But the findings from DeSmog’s recent investigation into Project 2025’s funding sources tell a very different story. Our wide-ranging analysis of public financial disclosure forms found that the groups on Project 2025’s advisory board — whose experts largely helped to draft the plan — are heavily funded by just six family fortunes. Since 2020, foundations linked to these billionaire families have contributed over $122 million to Project 2025 groups, including at least 290 individual donations to 49 nonprofits that contributed to the Mandate for Leadership documents or are on the initiative’s advisory board. We’ve mapped the funding ties between the billionaire families and the Project 2025 individuals and organizations in an interactive graphic, below.

Groups that received funds from the six family fortunes are far from the political mainstream, according to DeSmog’s analysis, including entities that actively deny the science of anthropogenic climate change — as well as organizations that have been classified as hate groups by the Southern Poverty Law Center. DeSmog’s review also uncovered additional ties between the six families and the Trump/Vance ticket, though both candidates have tried to distance themselves from the initiative in recent months. Indeed, Richard and Elizabeth Uihlein — the billionaire founders of the Uline packaging company, whose charitable donations tie them closely to Project 2025 — are among the former president’s biggest donors.

Project 2025 styles itself as populist, moderate, and far from the politics of Washington. Heritage Foundation President Kevin D. Roberts hails it as a plan for the perennially downtrodden, hard-laboring folks “who shower afterwork instead of before.” Its funding sources — elite, extreme, and closely tied to the Trump campaign — suggest exactly the opposite.

The Donors

Though the Mandate pledges to “prioritize the economic prosperity of ordinary Americans” and pry influence away from “America’s corporate and political elites,” the funding that produced it comes from the upper echelons of the billionaire class.

And not just any billionaires. The six family dynasties providing significant support to Project 2025 — Bradley, Coors, Koch, Scaife, Seid, and Uihlein — all have long histories of fighting for financial and environmental deregulation. Three of the six families have promoted climate denial consistently enough to appear in DeSmog’s Climate Disinformation Database, which tracks the people and organizations doing the most to undermine decarbonization efforts.

They include oil and gas magnate Charles G. Koch and his Koch Family Foundations; the Scaife Family Foundations, which tap vast wealth from the Mellon aluminum, oil, and banking fortune; and chemicals-and-electronics industrialist Barre Seid, whose recent, record-setting $1.6 billion gift to a nonprofit controlled by Federalist Society co-chair Leonard A. Leo has been a major source of Project 2025 money.

While the Heritage Foundation suggests a diverse conservative coalition gave rise to the Mandate for Leadership, the six family fortunes’ giving patterns were remarkably similar. Of the 49 Project 2025 groups, 37 percent received funding from at least three of the six families. 70 percent of the 49 groups received funding from at least two of the families. (In a few cases, the donations were to sister 501(c)4 lobbying arms that share offices and staff.) The average donation was over $420,000.

*Related:See DeSmog’s coverage of Trump Megadonor Tim Dunn’s Plan That’s More Extreme Than Project 2025

Links to Climate Denial

For decades, oil and gas magnate Charles G. Koch and his late brother David fought vigorously for environmental deregulation, including by supporting groups that sow doubt about the science of manmade climate change. Foundations linked to Koch gave at least $9.6 billion to 15 Project 2025 groups since 2020. But four of the lesser-known families — Bradley, Scaife, Seid, and Uihlein — gave even more, and all six family fortunes helped to fund Project 2025 groups that have denied the science of manmade climate change.

Of the 10 groups that the six families funded most heavily, seven are in DeSmog’s Climate Disinformation Database. That includes more than $11 million to the Heritage Foundation; $8.3 million to Turning Point USA, which has provided a platform for well-known climate deniers like Alex Epstein; and $4.6 million to the Texas Public Policy Foundation, which in 2015 published an op-ed claiming warming is “obviously not initiated by the burning of fossil fuels”. In total, foundations linked to the six families gave to 15 Project 2025 groups with entries in DeSmog’s Climate Disinformation Database.

That wasn’t the only form of extremism DeSmog uncovered. Four Project 2025 organizations that received donations from the six billionaire fortunes since 2020 are classified as hate groups by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), a leading civil rights watchdog group. These include the Alliance Defending Freedom, an anti-LGBTQ group that received over $1.6 million in donations from Bradley and Koch; The Center for Immigration Studies, an anti-immigrant group that received $650,000 from Scaife; Eagle Forum, an anti-government and anti-immigrant group that received over $100,000 from Koch and Uihlein; and Family Research Council, an anti-abortion group that received $25,000 from Seid.

Of the six billionaire families, only Coors-linked foundations — run by heirs to the Coors brewing fortune — did not donate to at least one SPLC-designated hate group.

Links to the Trump Campaign

For months, Donald J. Trump has publicly disavowed Project 2025, claiming to know nothing about the initiative. That stance conflicts with subsequent media reports, including resurfaced video of the former president and current Republican presidential nominee saying, as a keynote speaker at a 2022 Heritage Foundation event, that Heritage would “lay the groundwork & detail plans for exactly what our movement will do.” The Washington Post reported that Trump flew in a private plane to the event with Heritage President Kevin Roberts.

Trump’s running mate, Ohio Senator JD Vance, has also been the subject of intense scrutiny for numerous ties to Project 2025 — including writing the foreword to Roberts’ forthcoming book. DeSmog’s investigation also uncovered numerous ties between Vance and Project 2025 advisory groups, including a previously unreported 2017 keynote speech at a Heritage event.

But while the candidates continue to downplay any Project 2025 connections, one link is unavoidable: a billionaire family that heavily supports Project 2025 groups is among their campaign’s biggest donors, according to Federal Election Commission data.

In May, Richard and Elizabeth Uihlein, the founders of the Uline packaging company, each donated $5 million to Make America Great Again, Inc., a super PAC supporting Trump’s reelection. That’s not including the more than $48 million Richard contributed to Restoration PAC, a pro-Trump political action committee, last quarter alone. Restoration PAC has spent over $12.9 million this year on political advertising, including ads supporting Trump and attacking his opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris.

Since 2020, the Ed Uihlein Foundation, which is run by the Uihleins and named in honor of Richard’s father, has donated at least $13.4 million to 13 different Project 2025 groups.

The map below is interactive. Click on a donor to see the groups it funded with dollar amounts, or a nonprofit to see which of the six family fortunes made donations.

[GFX]

---

colo key wise use

http://www.westword.com/news/wheres-the-rest-of-him-5079773

==

recent:

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Coors

hmmn

Joe Coors

-Past U. of Colorado Regent

-Requested that Students for a Democratic Society be banned from the CU campus (request denied)

-Criticized while on the Board of Regents for passing John Birch Society literature to other regents.

-Labelled "one of the country's leading anti-environmentalists" by the conservative Reader's Digest, 1983)

-Well-known for his desire to minimize government interference in his Corporate interests.

-Belongs (with brother Bill) to the Bohemian Grove, an elite club to which Ronald Reagan and other "ruling class" members belong

-Testified that he had given $65,000 to Oliver North which was used to buy a plane for the Contras.

-Helped found the Committee for the Survival of a Free Congress, effectively training over 7000 workers for the Moral Majority, Phyllis Schlafly's STOP-ERA, the Eagle Forum, right-to-life campaigns and anti-union groups.

==

http://booknotes.org/Watch/157234-1/Dan+Baum.aspx

citizen coors

bellant update:

Bellant, Russ. The Coors Connection: How Coors Family Philanthropy Undermines Democratic Pluralism. Political Research Associates, 1990. 96 pages. 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. http://www.namebase.org/sources/NT.html

http://www.amazon.com/The-Coors-Connection-Philanthopy-Undermines/dp/0896084167

angola/pro apartheid: RENAOmozambique, UNITA in Angols backed by S africa xv

moonie: fight, as HF wanted pat Buch to edit vs Borchgrave p9

weyrich grew upo in german ppl Wisc;  ties fj strauss post? nazi Laszlo Pasztor, fascist network p v aslo A Haas (straus rep)

250K$ 1sr yr heritge; chair Conge ben Blackburn, ord nominee told comm public hanging good msg for ppl who don't make rent in public housing p3 (Chair bd trustees)

Heritage got in W Va textbook fght //kkk

feulner Pearson

1980 mandate doc for trans RR: more % mil and intel, less ed, welfare, rx etc, writers hired to run pgms; 2/3 adopted 1st year p10 MfL2 86 or cut food stmps, medicare, kid food, farm legal help for poor, elderly 10-11

eileen gardner wants to turn dept of ed into a schoolhouse; exterior handicaps reflect inner spiritual development, cause thier own problem, resigned consult gig, back to HF 11

make 100K fed employees clear speeches/arts, limit vote rights enforce, end help minority contractors 11

staff 135 ppl, dereg

kitchen cab actually set up shop in Exec Off bldg across from WH till bounced

Meese used to raise $

PO's cap when crit weapons sys; Lehman adm sent rebut to coors (roomates georgtown w/ feulner)

watt; free congr put out pro watt book to deflect (arnold)

mlk commie

viguerie DM (trio: vig, feulner  Howard Phillips

xian teacher org

Natl Endowmwnt for democ // CIA (agentina , funded by Co

RENAMO massacre 100K

UNITA, contras, muj, cambodia, laos, VN: weyrich

CNP devos; hunt nelson baker, lehaye, gave ollie $ for contras 37 shoff, mcgoff, blackburn, rushdoony fgalwell, blackwell, phylis 43

jbs 43, infl cnp

NSIC //cia

holly coors 9devout, 1st born again?) P Robertson[altered marr date to cover illeg baby] he baled for mon on rel retreat cda month at end of preg], CBN Regent U, pro contra and renamo 50

falwell, MSLF

womw3n,

gays,

AA: bill c called co mtg to oppose 1964 CRA 67  84 inamous talk chains; AA not smart

HF //S africa mil intel ~ SWAPO 70

1978 IRS said xiasn schools lose status if ~ minorities p70  --> billings 9bb j univ) Moral Majority, RR ept of ed

Latinos : larry pratt GOA

CONTRAS; singluab, train by arentine mil intel, (death squad leadr summit 1980) 76

1982 arg intel w/ barbie K and Moonie to put nazi gov in Bolivia note 213 p 76

coors fundraiser  1985$ to NFF moon)Kirkpatirk, wm simon, MICHAEL novak p 76

CBN big $, telethon PRobt may 1985 also HF, FCF

JC met w. Casey june 1985 (knew frm 1980 campaign and org) Casey sent ollie to JC, small airplane, 65K$ (HF too)

UNION

...bar OSHA w/o warrant,  2 kia 1984; plant inspection 20 to 4 post RR

1982 woman w/ exrternal air supply died, 2 empl rescue too , 3 of 4 insp promppted by '82 kia; fine $810 p82

Low OSHA rate, guy fired but got job back in review

ENV: reader's d says JC leading anti-env 84  mill gal water, waste

Nat legal Ctr after pacific to sue Nader style by corp

MSLF watt hire mid 77  has bd of litigators to give cover/buffer to Bd (and co'sthey rep; phiilips oil amoco, marathon)

Burford, anne g   colo mafia ;robt wanted to shut blm, ran it instead

haz waste sanderson coors and epa; coors backed

crit by ron arnold eye of th storm: greens are totalitarians, "anti- tech, civ, humanity"; arnold may have

plagiarize'd larouche; laruche met w. watt 1981 (thot to

hire?!) p 89 funded CDFE, hared offices w/ moonie

herit mandate for lead says JB ltd mining surface coal , so reinterpret Wild Act; sttate over fed law, esp water; pendley from heritag

delegate  decision to states and pvt indiv?! 89 so says gale n from mslf

cnp: http://laroucheplanet.info/pmwiki/downloads/Bellant%201991%20The%20Coors%20Connection.pdf

MEDIA:

TVN ur FOX may 1973 weyrich, ailes, Kling

no stoire on nader, ellsberg, mlk, native activist 91

Acc in Media reed irvine  Am Spec, campus papers Coll Net 41  bork, feulner, bennet wm

philan roundtable

EDUC Gablers Tx: xians like free mkt, anti socialst, thus no coverage of Gt Depr 96

Hillsdale college 97  manion papers  Roche gren new red 1990, newagers, satanist, tax-takers, bureaucrats; talk by guy lnked to guate death squads Man Ayau (note 275 p 99) Acc in Aca; mlk plagiar, Mandela commie, support Rushton (// bell curve0 100

Holly regent

Pepperdine 101

home school

rfk2

eastern anatum facon gone after earth day 1970 (20 mil in street, #1 in us hist),

28 mrs laws passed in 120 yrs 22; b2 is win of 30 yr stealth attack.  1976 coors

Mtn states Legal fdn to ctr eco law (one of colo biggest poluters) also philips

petrol, exoon, texaco, amoco , shell ford chevron; coors also heritage doc to news

dir, staffers, hate radio  23  heritage wants ot "strangle the envio movment...the

greatest single threat to the Am economy" hw etc "henny-pennyism" 24  #1 w/ top 5

fdn: olin, scaife, coors, koch, bradley (40Mil saince 1985.  exxon chev dupont etc

give 34m/yr

1980 coors etc spearheaded Sagebrush Rebellion(corp and rw) turned ctt into pol

power 25 RR: I am a S rebel"  Heriage shadow cabinet, 2k pp Mandate for Change

became blueprint (Coors in kitchen cab).  Coors picked assoc Anne Gorsuch for epa;

hubby cattle baron to head BLM, tho had declared to shut it  25

Watt dominion theology, "subdue" nature is duty; sold off pub;ic assets at fore

sale prices : GAO 26  "I do not know how many generations we can count on till the

Lord returns"  grens are plot to delay energy development and "weaken Americ" , a

"left-wing cult which seeks to bring down the type of gov't i believe in" 26

1980 coors etc spearheaded Sagebrush Rebellion (corp and rw) turned ctt

into pol power 25 RR: I am a S rebel"  Hertiage shadow cabinet, 2k pp

Mandate for Change became blueprint (Coors in kitchen cab).  Coors picked

assoc Anne Gorsuch for epa; hubby cattle baron to head BLM, tho had

declared to shut it  25

Watt dominion theology, "subdue" nature is duty; sold off pub;ic assets at

fore sale prices : GAO 26  "I do not know how many gneerations we can

count on till the Lord returns"  grens are plot to delay energy

development and "weaken Americ" , a "left-wing cult which seeks to bring

down the type of gov't i believe in" 26

Gorsch cut budget 30% so no new laws or enforcement; killed Superfund at

start, beame a welfare pgm of corp lawyers 26 appt lobbyist to run depts

CoS timber lawyer, enforecenmt chief ex-exxon

by1981 1.1 mil signatures on petition to get rid of watt;after out, 25

counts felony, perjury, coNcealment and obstr of justice.Gorsuch and 23

others forced to resign, sweatheart deal w/ coors (her #2 Rita :aVelle

jailed perj and obstr.  26

blow to sagebrushbut regrouped at aug '88 nugget hotel reno and rename

Wise Use

appt to cpb by nixon? see dark genius

Bellant, Russ. The Coors Connection:How Coors Family Philanthropy Undermines Democratic

Pluralism. Political Research Associates, 1990. 96 pages.

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

McH Stacks E839.5.B43 1991    NOT CHECKD OUT

Citizen Coors : a grand family saga of business, politics, and

beer / Dan Baum eh

New York : Perennial, 2001

http://www.amazon.com/reader/0060959460?_encoding=UTF8&query=republican#reader_0060959460

2001

BOOKS

Location Call Number Status

McH Stacks HD9397.U54 C667 2001    DUE 07-08-10

http://www.campusprogress.org/rws/2471/the-dark-side-of-coors-light

Plane to Contras

humanities

Joe Coors himself was not only a member of Reagans "kitchen cabinet" but also assisted in funding the construction of Heritage's headquarters building

in Washington, D.C....

At the instigation of Weyrich, in 1973 Joseph Coors provided $250,000 in seed money for the Heritage Foundation, probably the most influential "think tank"

in the United States. No less a power than Newt Gingrich has described the Heritage Foundation as without question the most far-reaching conservative organization in the country in the war of ideas."

COORS: scu had thru linkplus

Bellant, Russ. The Coors Connection: How Coors Family Philanthropy Undermines Democratic Pluralism. Political Research Associates, 1990. 96 pages. 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. http://www.namebase.org/sources/NT.html

http://www.amazon.com/The-Coors-Connection-Philanthopy-Undermines/dp/0896084167

angola/pro apartheid

moon

weyrich ties fj strauss post? nazi

250K$ 1sr yr heritge

haz waste sanderson coors and epa; coors backed

watt; free congr put out pro watt book to deflect (arnold)

crit by ron arnold eye of th storm: greens are totalitarians, "anti tech, civ, humantiy may have

plag'd larouche; laruche met w. watt 1981 (thot to

hire?!) p 89 funded CDFE, hared offices w/ moonie

herit mandate for lead says JB ltd mining surface

coal , so reinterpret Wild Act; sttate over fed

law, esp water; pendley from heritag

delega  decision to states and pvt indiv?! 89 so says gale n from mslf

cnp: http://laroucheplanet.info/pmwiki/downloads/Bellant%201991%20The%20Coors%20Connection.pdf

 McH Stacks      E839.5.B43 1991        NOT CHECKD OUT

sjpl Vineland Nonfiction338.7663 Baum   AVAILABLE

http://www.amazon.com/Citizen-Coors-Family-Business-Politics/dp/0060959460

Citizen Coors : a grand family saga of business, politics, and beer / Dan Baum

New York : Perennial, 2001

Location     Call Number     Status

 McH Stacks      HD9397.U54 C667 2001        DUE 07-08-10

nyt: The family soon stunted their company's growth, however, through a mix of closed-mindedness, extreme suspicion and business practices that included, among other things, wiretapping and cover-ups of environmental contamination. Baum gives accounts of the quirks that he says characterized the family. Adolph Coors Jr., the son of the brewery's founder, cut ties with one branch of his grandchildren whose father, Adolph's son, was murdered. Another son, Bill, proceeded with plans to give a party the day he learned of his daughter's suicide. Joe, Bill's brother, sometimes called ''the Daddy Warbucks of the Republican Party,'' supported Ronald Reagan, the Heritage Foundation and various conservative initiatives, like aid to the contras. However, for the most part, Baum does a respectable job avoiding gratuitous swipes at this proud and bumbling clan.

murder? kidnap?

--

joe paranoid of zip codes p 72

brought RR to spk at CU, backed him vs nixon fro pres, asked to be treas sec, sponsoered imp radio pgm p 90

113, ailes worked for TVN? rmn appt him to pbs day before resignation 122

jbs

coors joe knew teller (invite RR to lab to pitch star wars)

recyclying 114

contras p 315-6

--

The Dark Side of Coors Light

The Coors family has been supporting conservative causes for decades.

By Annika Carlson

February 1, 2008

Coors Light may be the official beer sponsor of the National Football League at this year’s Super Bowl, but for years it has been the unofficial sponsor of right-wing causes across America. The company has a shady past, from the owners offering grants to rightwing organizations to policies of screening potential employees for communist sympathies. Lately Coors has been trying to make up for its checkered past, but it’s time for a trip down memory lane.

The Coors Brewing Company was founded in 1873 in Colorado and produces American favorites like Coors, Coors Light, Blue Moon, Killian’s Irish Red, and several refined Keystone varieties. Coors merged with Canadian brewer Molson in 2005, in hopes that both companies could boost their sales in the United States and Canada. In 2007, Molson Coors merged again, this time with beer behemoth SABMiller’s operations in the United States and Puerto Rico. Today, Coors Brewing Company is thethird largestbrewer in America.

Coors’ works hard to maintain a pearly, progressive sheen to hide its deep, conservative pockets. It was one of the first corporations in America to offer same-sex partner benefits, and it makes corporate donations to a variety of African American, Asian American and Hispanic organizations. This makeover, however, does not obscure Coors’s union-busting, minority-hating past. In addition to unleashing Zima on the world, the company grappled with a crippling boycott of its products after the union at the company’s flagship facility in Colorado went on strike and was subsequently broken by the company. As then-president of Adolph Coors Co. Jeff Coors said in a Los Angeles Times articleagreeing to union demands is like “inviting the Russians in to take over America.”Until 1986, prospective Coorsemployees were sometimes required to take lie detector tests, answering questions about their sexual orientation, communist leanings, and how often they changed their underwear. (Yeah, really.) Hardly best business practices.

While the corporation itself doesn’t directly fund the massive right-wing infrastructure, Coors family members make donations with their beer-fed fortunes. The Adolph Coors Foundation, named for the brewery’s founding patriarch, was established in 1975 to help divvy up the family riches. Since some assets in that family trust can only be used within Colorado, Adolph Coors Foundation board members set up a new organization in 1994 that could spend unrestricted assets across the country. Through the Castle Rock Foundation, otherwise unspecified Coors family funds are used to finance national conservative organizations likeIndependent Women’s Forum and Young America’s Foundation.

The Coors family tree reads like a who’s who of conservative philanthropy—nearly all the men in the family work for the company, and nearly all share the same right-wing ideology. Adolph Coors, the founder of Coors Brewing Company, passed it down to his grandsons, brothers Joseph and William Coors. Joseph’s five sons—Joe Jr., Pete, Jeff, Grover, and John—all work in the Coors empire, and all of them are self-described born-again Christian fundamentalists. William’s son Scott also works for the family business.

In both the extremity of his conservatism and high levels of funding for conservative organizations, Joseph Coors set a precedent for the family. William affectionately called him “a little bit right of Attila the Hun.” Joseph was an active member on Reagan’s kitchen cabinet, funding the Gipper’s campaigns and providing him with unofficial counsel. Joseph gave right-wing godfather Paul Weyrich the founding grant for theHeritage Foundation, paving the way for decades of research, spin, and messaging by the country’s preeminent conservative think tank. And because one conservative think tank is never enough, Joe also gave a founding grant to Weyrich’s Free Congress Foundation, which on its Web site asks the eternal question of our generation: “Will America return to the culture that made it great, our traditional, Judeo-Christian, Western culture?” If not, the organization asserts, the United States will become “no less than a third world country.”

Joseph Coors also funded the Council for National Policy, a secretive enclave in which influential conservatives discuss the future of conservatism in the United States. Several members of the Coors family regularly attend CNP’s meetings, rubbing elbows with the likes of Jerry Falwell and Phyllis Schlafly.He donated an airplane worth $65,000 to the Nicaraguan Contras. In fact, it’s hard to avoid Coors money in the conservative movement: The foundation funds the John Birch Society, the Landmark Legal Foundation (aka the Ronald Reagan Legal Center), and Pat Robertson’s Regent University, among many others. Despite his legacy of supporting socially conservative causes, Joseph had a fairly public mistress throughout the late 1980s—an indiscretion that eventually led him and his wife to separate, according to his son Jeff Coors. So much for family values.

Though it didn’t bring familial bliss, Joseph’s conservative political advocacy inspired his son Pete Coors to join the fight. In 2004,Pete ran for an open U.S. Senate seat in Colorado against state attorney general Ken Salazar,whose popularity and progressive politics contrasted sharply with Coors family history. During the campaign, he battled the Coors’ family’s ultra-conservative legacy almost as much as his Democratic opponent, and tried to slap the same friendly face on his candidacy that the brewing company used to repair its image decades before. While his family and its various foundations continued to pour money into, for instance,litigation against environmental regulation, Pete tried to sell himself as a conservationist, leveraging his former presidency of Ducks Unlimited.Ultimately, Colorado voters didn’t buy Pete’s Coors Light image, and he lost the race. After election Salazar refused to support Bush’s proposed federal ban on gay marriage, and even became the target of one of Dr. James Dobson’s Focus on the Family ads that asked, “Why doesn’t Senator Salazar believe every child needs a mother and a father?”

But Joseph and Pete aren’t the only family members getting in on the game. Joseph’s brotherWilliam infamously told a group of minority business leaders that the best thing slave traders did was “to drag your ancestors here in chains,” as recorded in a 1985 New York Times article. Not incendiary enough? He went on to note that Africans “lack the intellectual capacity to succeed.” He went on tosue the Rocky Mountain News for publishing his remarks, claiming they were taken out of context.In a later interview, though, he clarified his position, remarking that slaves came out on top by being brought to America—after all, he said in a 1988 Los Angeles Times article, “you don’t see Jesse Jackson, or any of these other blacks, making any mass exodus back to Africa, do you?” The company donated upwards of $750 million to African American and Latino groups after William’s tirade—so it’s no wonder hegot shunted from the company to the Castle Rock Foundation shortly thereafter.

William’s son Scott is in on the act, too. He did a stint as Coors Brewing Company’s ambassador togay consumers,[vs Mary cheney?]  traveling across the country shaking hands and donating to GLBTQ nonprofits. Does Scott see any conflict between him family’s socially conservative legacy and the equal rights organizations he visits? Apparently not: His father told him that if any of the organizations Coors’ foundations support “are blatantly contrary to the rights of gay and lesbian people, I want to know about it, I will investigate it and put a stop to it.” Such an effort would probably require shutting down major portions of the Heritage Foundation—not to mention the rest of the right-wing organizations sponsored by Coors—but it doesn’t seem that William’s made much progress in that area.

So when cracking open a cold one, remember to toast the things that make the Coors family great: union-busting, lie-detecting, Heritage-funding, double-talking and, of course, its beer.

Annika Carlson is Special Assistant to the Director of Campus Progress.

http://www.campusprogress.org/rws/2471/the-dark-side-of-coors-light

In the 1920's, the KKK held their cross burnings on property adjoining Coors property. In the 50's, the Coors family were funders of the John Birch Society.

Red Dot In 1966, Chicana/os called for the boycott of Coors beer because of its racist hiring practices. In 1969, Coors was charged with racial discrimination. Coors was found guilty in 1970. Not until 1977 was Coors finally forced to settle out of court, paying thousands of dollars and rehiring several workers.

Red Dot From 1967 to 1972 Joseph Coors was a regent at the University of Colorado where he opposed the existence of campus groups such as UMAS (United Mexican American Students), BSU (Black Student Union), and SDS (Students for a Democratic Society). He was always known for distributing John Birch Society literature to fellow regents. He was quoted as saying the University should strive for quality students and not quantity.

In 1971, Joe Coors along with Jack Wilson and Paul Weyrich founded Analysis and Research Inc., to establish a political research entity. After $200,000 of Coors money and two years, the group failed to attract supporters. Eventually, Coors and Weyrich started a committe for the Survival of a Free Congress to carry out political activities and the Heritage Foundation as a tax exempt educational research entity. Joe Coors coughed up $200,000. Paul Weyrich was the president. Seems Weyrich had ties to Josef Strauss of Bavaria Germany who was active in a political party that coalesced with repentant Nazi's after World War II. Strauss came to the United States in the early 1970's. Weyrich and Strauss' aid by the name of Armin K. Haas planned Strauss' schedule. Joe Coors helped Haas make political contacts in Congress.

In 1974, the Heritage foundation sent an advisor to help Kanawha County school with a text book protest movement. This political movmement was portrayed as a parent rights case but the Klu Klux Klan was involved. The books that they wanted to ban were books on African-American authors or texts that dealt with the culture of African Americans.

Through their philanthropic donations, Joseph Coors and other family members have bankrolled a right-wing agenda of union-busting, homophobia, sexism, racism, and covert operations. The Coors family has served as the cornerstone of the right-wing movement known as the New Right. For details, read "Coors Connection: How Coors Family Philanthropy Undermines Democratic Pluralism" by Russ Bellant (ISBN: 0896084175)

After years of boycotting this racist, sexist, and homophobic company on a national level, National Council of La Raza (NCLR) helped broker an agreement to put an end to the boycott. It was signed by the directors of the GI Forum, NCLR and League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC). The agreement called for Coors to provide sponsorship money to these organizations and help Chicanos become distributorship owners, i.e. Tom Flores in CA, for which these organizations agreed to increase Coors' "market share" of Latino drinkers. That means the promotion of drinking Coors beer and increasing the number of drinkers and alcoholics in our communities.

Today, Coors can be found giving money to foundations and organizations in an effort to promote a positive image for the company. The truth is that Coors only puts on this mask of kindness in order to make money while poisoning the minds, bodies, and spirits of nuestra gente. Coors has and will continue to be our enemy. Chale con Coors!

Coors, the right beer now

Books exposing Coors:

Confused about Coors official's claims that the company no longer funds anti-labor, anti-environmental and other right wing groups? Read the following section on how Coors now funnels money through their Castle Rock Foundation...

Coors vs. the Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual community

Coors vs. the Environment:

In practice: Under the Colorado law, golden aluminum, a company formerly owned by Coors brewing company (the colo audit law's biggest corporate backer), disclosed that it was discharging nine times more volatile organic chemicals than allowed under its state air pollution permit under the law it is entitled to legal immunity having made this disclosure and launched a corrective program. What about the impact on competitors who for years have spent more money to comply fully with the law? Well, apparently golden aluminum can write off those savings... thanks to the audit law!

These fact sheets are a bit out of date, but still very relevant to the corporation's background:

This first item is from the Pledge of Resistance, a group that was focusing on issues in Central America at the time. It's a bit dated, but it makes a good intro to the boycott.

DON'T BUY COORS

Here's why:

1. COORS SUPPORTS TERRORISM IN NICARAGUA

Each sale of Coors beer helps the contra terrorists in Nicaragua, who have been ambushing and killing civilians, murdering teachers and medical workers, and destroying rural schools and medical centers. The contras, a band of mercenaries established by the CIA, are attempting to overthrow the elected government of Nicaragua. Joseph Coors has contributed to and helped to raise millions of dollars for the contras. (Washington Post, May 3, 1985). The Heritage Foundation, funded and established by Coors, provided a report in 1984 to the Reagan Administration on how to destabilize Nicaragua.

2. COORS IS ANTI-LABOR

Coors has a long history of violating federal labor laws and union-busting - breaking 19 unions in the last 20 years. Coors has blocked the efforts of federal safety inspectors to investigate workplace hazards, which have led to the death of Coors employees (San Francisco Examiner, July 5, 1984).

3. COORS IS RACIST, ANTI-WOMEN'S RIGHTS, AND ANTI-GAY

William E. Coors fought against passage of the U.S. Civil Rights Act, and in 1984 told an audience of black businessmen that blacks don't succeed because they "lack intellectual capacity". (Rocky Mountain News, February 24, 1984). The Coors Company, cited for unlawful employment discrimination in 1970, settled out of court IN 1977 and paid thousands of dollars in back pay and rehired minority and female workers. Joseph Coors supported the campaign against the Equal Rights Amendment and is a major contributor to the Moral Majority, which has called for the imprisonment of gay persons diagnosed as having AIDS.

4. COORS SUPPORTS NAZI SYMPATHIZERS

When Joseph Coors established the Heritage Foundation in 1974, he chose Roger Pearson, an outspoken anti-semite and pro-nazi, as co- editor of the Heritage Foundation publication Policy Review. Pearson is the author of a book on Aryan supremacy called "Race and Civilization", and has been the editor or co-editor of several racist and neo-nazi magazines. (National Guardian, May 1, 1985). The Heritage Foundation is a right-wing think tank which seeks to abolish civil rights laws, minimum wage laws, affirmative action, rights for the handicapped, and arms control.

5. COORS POLLUTES

In contrast to the advertised association of Coors beer with "pure mountain spring water", Coors is one of the largest dumpers of hazardous waste in Colorado. (National Catholic Reporter, March 25,1983).

THE NATIONWIDE COORS BOYCOTT has been extremely effective. Begun in 1977 by brewery workers at the Coors plant in Colorado, the boycott has been endorsed by the AFL-CIO, the NEA (National Education Association) and NOW (National Organization for Women). As a result, Coors has steadily lost sales every year since 1977. Coors is now looking for sales in eastern markets (such as Boston) but here too the boycott has affected sales. At the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and at Brandeis University, for example, sales of Coors beer were recently halted.

DON'T DRINK COORS

We urge you not to buy Coors products (Coors Beer, Killian's Irish Red Ale, Masters Beer). Tell your friends about the boycott, and encourage the liquor stores you frequent to stop selling Coors products.

(This leaflet is published by the Pledge of Resistance, whose objective is to stop U.S. intervention in Central America - both by the U.S. government and by private sources, such as Coors.)

This item is from aStudent Environmental Action Coalition chapter in Colorado.

Coors vs. the Earth

"Waste the High Country"

-Coors was cited twice in 1990 for water pollution, once in 1986 and once in 1985 (Pat Nelson, Co. Dept of Health)

-In 1981, Coors first identified the groundwater pollution, but did not notify the Co. Dept. of Health or EPA (Rocky Mountain News, 8/31/90

-Current State's Attorney criminal investigation of Coors for suspicion that plant officials knowingly concealed leaking pipes at the company's can plant that tainted at least 2 and as many as 5 underground springs with toxic chemical solvents contributing to irregular heartbeat, unconsciousness, pulmonary edema, and death (Rocky Mountain News (R.M.N.), 8/31/90)

-This civil investigation has broadened with State officials citing Coors with illegally dumping contaminated wastewater into Clear Creek tributaries (R.M.N. 8/31/90)

-Contaminated water destined for Clear Creek was later rerouted into Coors infective General Waste Treatment Plant which does not remove certain types of Cancer causing chemicals (ibid)

-The water pollutants from the Coors plant are contributing to higher-than- usual incidence of low birthweights and early childhood cancer in areas which receive water from Clear Creek. (National Toxics Campaign, 9/27/90)

-Coors has been singled out as a large contributor to Denver's brown cloud. (EPA 1989)

-Coors has dumped 20,000,000 (yes, that's 20 million, not a typo!!) gallons of toxic liquid waste at the Lowry Landfill (EPA 1989)

-Coors holds a contract to provide high-technology ceramic materials for heat-seeking Stinger missiles. (Denver Post, 12/29/88)

-Coors Ceramics Co. secretly manufactured fuel elements for nuclear reactors in Golden Colorado, and stored liquid radioactive waste at the Rocky Flats nuclear weapons plant. (Company Executive, 2/27/90)

Coors and Human Rights Fact Sheet

-1966, Joe Coors was installed as a regent of the University of Colorado. He became known for his advocacy of repressing campus dissent. Coors also sought to abolish Chicano and Black studies programs at the University, and to curtail the admissions of low-income students, because he believed such students would lower academic standards.

-The Heritage Foundation is often characterized as a "conservative think tank", with origins in New Right activism... The "founder" beer magnate Joe Coors, donated the first-year Heritage budget of $250,000 from the coffers of the Coors Corporation.

-1974, Heritage injected itself into a textbook censorship case in Kanawha County, West Virginia... The protest was publicly framed as a parent's rights case, but in fact was focused substantially on African-American authors or texts that dealt with the conditions and culture of African- Americans. The Ku Klux Klan was involved in the protest from the start.

-1984, In a speech to a minority business group in Denver, William Coors told the group that if they thought it was "unfair" that their "ancestors were dragged here in chains against their will... I would urge those of you who feel that way to go back to where your ancestors come from, and you will find out that probably the greatest favor that anybody ever did you, was to drag your ancestors over here in chains, and I mean it."

-Later in the same speech Coors said, "... they (Blacks) lack the intellectual capacity to succeed."

-Joe Coors was actively anti-feminist, and a financial supporter of Phyllis Schlafly's organization opposed to the Equal Rights Amendment, STOP- ERA.

-It is true that the Coors family, foundation and corporation, through grants and advertising have expanded their funding in recent years to include groups who historically have not been allies, such as feminist, lesbian and gay, African-American, and Chicano organizations. This shift, however, reflects the families pragmatic business sense rather than any change in overall political orientation. Significant funding continues to flow toward rightest groups. The Coors Corporation's public image has been substantially improved through a relatively small investment of time and money.

Sources available upon request

Student Coalition for Human Rights. 492-5449

Coors VS. the Earth II

Adolph Coors

-Permitted KKK meetings and cross-burning ceremonies on the brewery property.

Bill Coors

-Reputation as a racist due to his comments regarding ethnic groups.

-Paid employees to attend a mandatory meeting where he "urged employees of the Adolph Coors Company to write their congressman opposing the Civil Rights Act.

-Delivered the "slave trader speech of 1984 in which he told minority businessmen in Denver that one of the best things slave-drivers did to American blacks "is to drag your ancestors over here in chains" because blacks in America have greater opportunity than those in Africa.

-Admits the Coors Company move to recycling was prompted by economics.

-Gave money (with brother Joe) to the anti-union National Right to Work Committee

Joe Coors

-Past U. of Colorado Regent

-Requested that Students for a Democratic Society be banned from the CU campus (request denied)

-Criticized while on the Board of Regents for passing John Birch Society literature to other regents.

-Labelled "one of the country's leading anti-environmentalists" by the conservative Reader's Digest, 1983)

-Well-known for his desire to minimize government interference in his Corporate interests.

-Belongs (with brother Bill) to the Bohemian Grove, an elite club to which Ronald Reagan and other "ruling class" members belong

-Testified that he had given $65,000 to Oliver North which was used to buy a plane for the Contras.

-Helped found the Committee for the Survival of a Free Congress, effectively training over 7000 workers for the Moral Majority, Phyllis Schlafly's STOP-ERA, the Eagle Forum, right-to-life campaigns and anti-union groups.

The Investments and Involvements

-Fall of 1975, faced a complaint of race and sex discrimination by the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission

-Twice found guilty of discrimination against black employees by the Colorado Civil Rights Commission

-Coors Foundation has donated money to the following anti-Earth organizations:

(works to fight bureaucratic intrusion particularly regarding environmental regulations)

(fights against the EPA, Sierra Club, EDF, Dept. of the Interior on environmental legislation, emission standards, dumping limits, etc. Joe Coors has served on the MSLF's board of directors)

(dedicated to "saving homosexuals from their 'sinful lifestyles'")

(a California group pressing for reinstatement of criminal penalties for homosexuals)

The Impacts

-Opened a ceramics plant in Brazil to take advantage of the rapid growth of the Brazilian paper and pulp industry. This endeavor relies on the exploitation of tropical rain forests.

-Operates Coors Energy while drills for natural gas in Easter and Western Colorado to be used by the Coors company alone.

-Bulldozed into a BLM Wilderness Study Area outside of Grand Junction for oil and gas exploration by the Coors subsidiary (Sept. 1982)

-Has effectively fought against Gov. Roy Romer's suggestion that the enormous coal-burning operation help "do everything we can to clean up coal."

-Dumped an estimated 20 million gallons of toxic liquid waste into nearby Lowry Landfill while refusing to disclose the barrel's contents.

-Holds "apparent favoritism" within the Occupational Safety and Health Administration according to Sen. Edward Kennedy (April, 1984). News reports stated that this "may have contributed" to the deaths of two brewery workers in 1982.

-Coors is not at the forefront of the recycling battle, as their propaganda would suggest. Rather, Coors lobbied heavily against mandatory deposit legislation and effectively defeated a Colorado state "bottle bill" which would have ensured more recycling of glass and would have prompted the recycling of aluminum and other valuable resources.

The Solution

In their effort to get wide-spread media attention by supporting national events and placing their name on large buildings on public university property, we must say NO TO COORS! Our university is not the place for a private self-interest such as Coors to seek publicity and to further their insane social and political practices. Dave Sickler, the coordinator of the 10 year AFL-CIO Coors boycott, said "If you can get two cockroaches to race, Coors will show up with t-shirts and sponsor it."

complete source list available press contact: Eric J. Kessler (303) 492-8308

=o= A word about that "10 year AFL-CIO Coors boycott:" At that writing the Coors boycott was about 10 years old, but the AFL-CIO had not been in on it for 10 years. What happened is that the boycott was started by a coalition of human rights and environmental groups and the AFL-CIO joined the coalition.

=o= Unfortunately the AFL-CIO sold out the coalition as soon as they got what they wanted. You may have heard press reports that the Coors boycott had ended -- these reports were issued unilaterally by the AFL-CIO. Groups working for human rights and for the environment continue the boycott, and some labor groups continue the boycott as well.

=o= This final piece is the most recent thing I've seen written about Coors.

Still Backing the Hard Right: Coors Money Undermines Democracy

By Russ Bellant & Chip Berlet Insight Features

While the past involvement of the Coors family in conservative causes is well-established, most people are unaware that the family's rightist goals are still in place and that their political influence remains strong. Although the survival and growth of the corporation has required some financial concessions and a shift in public image, the Coors family empire still represents a threat to peace, social justice, pluralism and democracy. Coors family funding continues to flow toward rightist groups, and the family's political involvement plays a crucial role in the establishment and maintenance of key organizations defining the political dialogue for both the New Right and the Religious Right. Ironically, the family derives the bulk of its wealth from working-class and middle-class people who purchase Coors beer products. The Coors family, through its political operations, then uses its share of the profits from beer sales to perpetuate and encourage regressive governmental and social policies serving only the narrow interests of a handful of the very wealthy in this country. That they are able to cloud this reality is due to the Coors Corporation's high-visibility advertising campaign.

"The pattern of Coors family funding and activism stands in stark contrast to the mainstream image projected by the Coors Brewing Company, whose advertising and funding reach out to the African-American, women's and gay communities," charges Dr. Jean Hardisty of Political Research Associates in Cambridge, Mass. "In fact, Coors family funding underwrites a broad and effective attack on the democratic rights of people of color, gay men and lesbians, and women."

Pillars of New Right

The Coors family is highly influential in shaping the activities of three organizational pillars of the New Right -- the Heritage Foundation, the Free Congress Foundation (FCF) and the Council for National Policy (CNP) -- which comprise an influential force in Washington, DC. Involvement with these key groups provides the Coors family with a conservative political base. From this base, the family is connected to prominent activists in other New Right organizations, to groups on the Religious Right, and to allies in governmental agencies and in Congress. For example, FCF is the major New Right political power base for White House Chief of Staff John Sununu, who engineered the David Souter Supreme Court nomination. In reality, the Coors family is a powerful, wealthy, highly organized force for social change. The change they support with their time and money is a return to Social Darwinian political and economic morality framed by the unrestricted demands of market and capital. They see racism ending with the Civil War and leaving no enduring legacy in the 20th century. In international affairs, they expect Third World countries to embrace U.S. capital investment without restrictions. They give money to groups that support the apartheid government in South Africa, the violent RENAMO army in Mozambique and the Pretoria-supported UNITA forces in Angola.

The Coors family also funds a right-wing sector of Christian fundamentalism, which seeks to replace democratic pluralism with so-called "traditional family values" -- that is, an authoritarian, gender-based social order. They support groups that say homosexuals are an abomination and AIDS is God's judgement on sinners. They have supported Reverend Sun Myung Moon and Christian Reconstructionists, both of whom have called for the abolition of U.S. democracy and the establishment of a theocratic state.

What is surprising is the extent of Coors family involvement with groups that belong properly to neither the New Right nor the Religious Right, but to the fringes of the ultraright. Even more disheartening is the extent to which mainstream political organizations evince a willingness to work with these denizens of the fringe. The Coors far-right links include the following:

Power Brokers

There are other powerful New Right funders, but it is the Coors family who time and again appear in leadership roles in New Right institutions, offering a guiding hand along with their signed checks. The family is seen, by critics and compatriots alike, as being in the front rank of conservative U.S. power brokers.

Some observers contend that the Coors empire has moderated politically because the Coors Corporation now financially supports some women's, civil rights and gay and lesbian groups. These donations and advertising dollars, however, merely represent a pragmatic, investment- oriented response to the consumer boycott of Coors products -- not a rejection of the bedrock rightist and anti-democratic beliefs held by the Coors family.

With the thawing of the Cold War, the views of the New Right's major funders will to a large degree shape the nature of conservative activism in the coming decades. To study the past action and ideas of the Coors family provides an imperfect yet useful glimpse into the future of the U.S. political right.

Return to theCorporate Dirt Archives

http://www.corporations.org/coors/

===

WED JUL 21, 2004 AT 02:53 AM PDT

Pete Coors' July Surprise, Part One

byNonpartisanFollow

Bob Schaffer likes to say that Pete Coors isn't conservative enough for the Colorado GOP.  But Schaffer, a principled conservative Republican in his own right (and also relatively easy for Salazar to beat in November), doesn't know Coors so well as he thinks.

Specifically, he hasn't read The Coors Connection: How Coors Family Philanthropy Undermines Democratic Pluralism, a book written in 1990 by award-winning investigative reporter Russ Bellant as an exposé of the Coors family's extreme right-wing causes.  According to Bellant, the Coors family, including Pete himself, has personally bankrolled a number of America's most hateful reactionary groups.  These include the Heritage and Free Congress Foundations (both founded by Pete Coors' father Joe); various KKK members; Laszlo Pasztor, a convicted Hungarian Nazi; and Roger Pearson, who was at one time the world's leading advocate of militant eugenics.

Here on DailyKos, I will examine in series each and every one of these allegations.  The goal: to spead the truth and keep faux-moderate Pete Coors from becoming America's most reactionary Senator.

Part One: Pete Coors and the Eugenicists

"When Ed Feulner became president of the [Coors-bankrolled] Heritage Foundation in 1977," writes Bellant, "Roger Pearson, a person virtually unknown in the United Stats outside of white supremacist groups and Washington's New Right networks, joined the editorial board of Policy Review, the monthly Heritage publication"(p.3).

Who was this Pearson fellow? Apparently he "was better known in Europe's racialist networks, where he had been a writer and organizer for the Northern League.  The Northern League, peppered with veterans of the Third Reich, was a bizarre pagan Nazi group active in the countries of Northern Europe"(p.4).

Pearson was friendly with Hans Gunther, a "racial theoretician" working under Hitler.(p.4)  Pearson also wrote a pamphlet which said, "If a nation with a more advanced, more specialized, or in any way superior set of genes mingles with, instead of exterminating, an inferior tribe, then it commits racial suicide"(p.4). This wasn't a quaint eugenicist of past centuries, folks -- Pearson wrote this in 1966.(p.4)

And it gets worse. According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, Pearson "claims that the demise of ancient Greece was the result of a 'decline in Nordic blood,' adding that 'Nordic decay was heralded in by ideas of 'enlightenment' and individualism.'" Pearson has also "claimed that Nordics are 'the very peak of evolutionary progress,' far removed from 'the ape-like appearance of our original ancestors' who were more like 'Negroes and monkeys.'"

Pearson was eventually kicked off the Heritage magazine because of a 1976 Washington Post exposé of the World Anti-Communist League, the American branch of which was chaired by Pearson.(p.4)  According to the Post, the WACL was run by people including "terrorists, Nazis and Latin American death squad leaders"(p.4).  Pearson left the Heritage Foundation, but the Coors connection with his views didn't stop there.  The Coors Foundation contributed money to Pearson's Council on American Affairs in 1977 and 1978, after the Post article came out.(p.5)

The Pete Coors Connection

As usual, Pete Coors didn't have any direct connection to the Pearson group.  However, he hasn't renounced his father's decision to fund Pearson-allied projects -- and since he controls the family assets as of now, he is wilfully contributing to more Pearson eugenicist mayhem.

==

It's no accident that Coors is the right beer in America

Coors beer is owned by the Coors family; a powerful, wealthy family that funnels the money it gets into hundreds of ultraright wing movements from neo-Nazi groups to anti-environmental think tanks. Founded by Adolph Coors, the Coors empire is a very influential force in the U.S. government. All of the information here has been well documented by civil rights and environmental groups and also in a heavily footnoted book, The Coors Connection.

The Coors family has always had strong ties to neo-Nazis. Adolph Coors allowed KKK meetings and cross-burnings on brewery property in Colorado. In 1984, Bill Coors fought against passage of the Civil Rights Act, telling an audience of black businessmen that blacks don't succeed because they "lack intellectual capacity." After encouraging them to go back to Africa, he said that one of the best things slave-drivers did to American blacks "was to drag your ancestors over here in chains" because blacks in America have greater opportunity than those in Africa. Joe Coors is a major contributor to the Moral Majority, which has called for the imprisonment of gay persons with AIDS. The Coors family funds a right-wing sector of Christian fundamentalism, which seeks to replace democratic pluralism with so-called "traditional family values" that is, an authoritarian, gender-based social order. They support groups that say homosexuals are an abomination and AIDS is God's judgment on sinners. They have supported Reverend Sun Myung Moon and Christian Reconstructionists, both of whom have called for the abolition of U.S. democracy and the establishment of a theocratic state ( . . . one nation under God, or else).

Coors family members have sat on boards of groups with people like a former Indiana KKK leader, apartheid supporters and ultraright Christian Reconstructionists calling for the execution of homosexuals, adulterers and blasphemers.

Coors is fiercely anti-labor, having broken 19 unions in 20 years and having blocked OSHA inspectors from investigating workplace hazards which led to the death of Coors employees. Coors supported the National Right to Work Committee, an anti-worker group out to destroy unions.

Coors has supported terrorist activity in many foreign countries, including the Contras in Nicaragua, who have ambushed and killed civilians, murdered teachers and medical workers and destroyed rural schools and medical centers in order to help the CIA take over their government.

Coors is one of the largest dumpers of hazardous waste in Colorado. They’ve been cited many times for water pollution and have been caught covering up known pollution including contamination of multiple underground springs where toxic chemical solvents contributed to irregular heartbeat, unconsciousness, pulmonary edema and death.

Joe Coors was one of a small group of people with ready access to Presidents Reagan and Bush. Joe and his brother Bill both belonged to a since-exposed secret all-male club called Bohemian Grove that Reagan, Bush and other ruling class figures such as the Secretary of Defense and mass media executives (but no reporters) would attend. Coors also funded the Parental Music Resource Center, a pro-censorship group with strong ties to the religious right. The PMRC was led by Al Gore’s wife.

Joe Coors started the Heritage Foundation, a right-wing think tank seeking to abolish civil rights laws, minimum wage laws, environmental laws, affirmative action, rights for the handicapped and arms control. He chose a neo-Nazi author of an Aryan supremacy book as co-editor of their publication, "Policy Review."They have sponsored forums for pro-Nazi groups and have funded the work of a convicted Nazi collaborator.

In the summer of 1996, the Heritage Foundation did a huge mailing to voters telling them to support Republican Senator Bob Dole for President. In the letter, Dole promised to abolish the federal departments of education, housing, transportation and energy. Right in line with libertarian rhetoric, they would have government off of corporate America’s back and no social safety net for the people.

When Coors commercials used to brag that they are the "right beer now," they weren’t kidding. Coors also owns Zima, Killian's Irish Red and Masters Beer.

Sources:

-The reference to Bohemian Grove is from a book from Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting (FAIR), a media watch-dog group that explains about the formerly secret, all-male club that the executives of Time-Warner attend, amongst others. A reporter from People magazine (owned by Time-Warner) snuck in once before getting kicked out. He tried to uncover the story, but before it went to print, it was suppressed. The reporter's story is available from FAIR. The book is called Adventures In Medialand.

-The reference to the Parent's Music Resource Center (PMRC) and Tipper Gore's involvement can be confirmed in the speeches of former Dead Kennedy's leader and political activist, Jello Biafra on his spoken word album, No More Cocoons. His group was bankrupted by the PMRC and he is the founder of the No More Censorship Fund.

-The reference to Dole's campaign is from a mailing that was done on Heritage Foundation letterhead supporting Dole for president.

-Explanations of what some of the various foundations that Coors funds can be found, besides in the Coors Connection book, in the Greenpeace Guide to Anti-Environmental Groups.

Return to: Corporate Dirt Archives: Coors   http://www.corporations.org/coors/article.htm//