Smoke ’em while you can.
That was libertarian activist Jon Caldara’s message to 70 fellow travelers who joined him Saturday on Colorado’s Eastern Plains to drink, smoke and shoot.
The event – the Independence Institute’s fourth Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms party – is not a typical summer picnic.
Instead, the party is yet another chance for Caldara, a professional and persistent critic of governmental officials, the media and other do-gooders, to decry infringements on personal freedom.
Speaking on an overcast morning at the Kiowa Creek Sporting Club in Bennett, Caldara said the group’s enjoyment of the “perks of adulthood” would be upsetting to “nannyists.” The party – less a fundraiser than a marketing event for the institute – was a celebration of guns, booze and smokes. Party ers paid a $150 fee to participate in the event, which included 100 sporting clays, ammunition, lunch, libations and cigars.
This year, Caldara offered a eulogy for the soon-to-be-lost right to smoke indoors in most public places. Next Saturday, a new state law bans smoking in restaurants, bars and most other public places.
“One more of our freedoms will be taken away,” Caldara intoned before the party broke into small groups to target clay pigeons at the shooting club.
Syndicated columnist Jay Ambrose, the featured speaker, touted the role of the Independence Institute in challenging the status quo.
“I think the institute is a valuable force (in) Colorado politics,” Ambrose said before his lunchtime speech. “We need something like that to stand up to both the Republican and Democratic parties.”
For several hours Saturday morning, revelers fired shotguns on the scrubby grounds (where no smoking was allowed because dry conditions increased the risk of fire).
The partyers – including a postal service worker, a forest analysis expert and a Republican candidate for the Colorado statehouse – still had a smoking good time.
Before loading her gun, Kelsey Alexander, the forest expert, modestly suggested that the clay pigeons should be spared because she probably wouldn’t hit them. Then she blasted many of them out of the air.
Her son, Keenan, proved that his aim was true, too, popping several sporting clays out of the sky on his first time shooting.
“It’s kind of scary when your mom can shoot better than you,” said the 20-year-old business major at the University of Colorado at Boulder.
Staff writer Mark P. Couch can be reached at 303-820-1794 or mcouch@denverpost.com.
