The lead of the week comes from the NY Post: “Here’s one thing New Yorkers do not need – Colorado pinheads telling us what to think.”
It’s just some more fallout from this month’s Aspen Institute Ideas Festival.
Seems word is out in NYC that the Aspen Institute has been tapped to develop some cultural programs at the International Freedom Center near Ground Zero. And that scares them.
NY Post columnist Andrea Peyser wrote that members of the Coalition of 9/11 Families object to the the institute’s involvement. She describes the AI as a “left-listing think tank boasting a high-fallutin’ roster of billionaires, moguls and retired government types, who regularly gather in a circle in the Rocky Mountains to think Big Thoughts.”
Also adding to the anti-Institute mix: Saudi Prince Bandar bin Sultan is on the board of the Aspen Institute. And it didn’t help that Hillary Clinton compared President George W. Bush to Alfred E. Neuman at the Ideas Festival.
Peyser talked to AI boss Walter Isaacson, who assured her that the AI was “scrupulously nonpartisan” and pro-American. But Peyser ain’t buyin’, and she’s worried about an Aspen spin at the International Freedom Center.
Drink up!
I wrote here last week that folks from Flying Dog Brewery were gearing up to make Stranahan’s Colorado Whiskey – Colorado’s first. Well, maybe it is, maybe it isn’t.
A number of readers remember Con Moore Distillery at Carr Street and West Grandview Avenue in Arvada in the ’30s and ’40s. And according to the Arvada Center’s museum curator, Bill Henning, they’re right. It did make Bourbon whiskey, bottled under the label International Distillery Corp., and the museum has a bottle of it.
Bottoms up to Stranahan’s anyway.
Woody
For the first time, the Smithsonian’s Woodrow Wilson Awards will be handed out in Denver on Sept. 22. Pete Coors chairs the dinner, which will honor Charles Gallagher and Hank Brown.
This is a bigish deal. Former honorees include James Baker, William Cohen, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, Sen. John Glenn, Betty Ford, Gov. George Pataki, Veep Dick Cheney, Steve Case, Ray L. Hunt, Sherry Lansing, Ted Turner and Leslie Wexner.
City spirit
On stage at the Sept. 2-5 Taste of Colorado at Civic Center: Kansas, Foghat, Craig Chaquico, Joan Osborne and Hanna-McEuen … Happy ninth birthday to the Palm … Sightem: Phil Lesh and Billy Idol both staying at Hotel Teatro … The Hotel Jerome will be closed for a total redo next April through November – meaning it’s out for rooms, classroom and ballrooms for Aspen Food & Wine Classic. It’s gonna be tough, but organizers are sure they can pull it off Jerome-less … bd’s mongolian barbeque has sent manager Brian Rychee to Mongolia for the summer to work at the bd’s in Ulaanbaatar, a nonprofit franchise that aids the Mongolian Youth Development Foundation … Tour de France Wine Dinner Thursday at Del Frisco’s, $145 … Sez who: “It takes one to know one – and vice versa!” Alfred E. Neuman
Bill Husted’s column appears Sunday, Monday, Tuesday and Thursday. Husted also appears on Fox 31 News. You can reach him at 303-820-1486 or at bhusted@denverpost.com.
