The Coaster Correspondence

More of the very expensive words of Edwin John Coaster, contributing editor

BRYAN BURROUGH Feb. 3. 2005 Boss: My investigation of journalists on the take from the Bush administration continues apace. While I was unable to find any smoking gun in Bob Novak's garbage-~just lots of Pepcid bottles and spent razors (a Lady Schick?!) - I have unearthed a paper trail that connects several name writers to a secret slush fund kept by the Department of Health and Human Services. That's the good news. The bad news is: one of these name writers is Ed Coaster. It's no secret that the alcohol lobby has some powerful friends in the House Republican leadership who can lean on the folks at H.H.S. Last summer, Ed wrote a curious column, widely syndicated in red-state newspapers, that called for the legalization of under-age drinking. (See attached clipping.) Well, turns out that around that time, H.H.S. made a payment of $28,000 to Green Dinghy Associates of l3lue Hill. Maine, for "media-relations consulting." Green Dinghy Associates is just a P.O. box registered to Ed. In addition, Ed. under the pseudonym Amy Fine Collins, last year published a hook called The God of Driving that was a transparent sop to Detroit and the oil lohh~. Well, let's roll hack the calendar a little-not long after Puhlisherx keI~Iv announced that Simon & Schuster had signed "Collins" to do the hook in 2002, Green Dinghy Associates received a $200,000 check from the U.S. Energy Information Administration. I feel kind of awkward telling you all this, since Ed was kind of a mentor to me back in college, when he was a visiting professor at the University of Missouri. But what can I say?

* COrpUS Christi POst * July 27, 2004 Guest Commentary WHY NOT LOWER THE DRINKING AGE TO 12? BYEDWINJOHN COASTER My first sip of bourbon came on a chill winter night when fever fell and my throat felt like shattered glass. Big Ed. as my fa ther was known, reached for the flask he kept on the sideboard and poured a finger's worth of amber liquid into a tumbler. "Pops got something that'll make it all right." he said, and I downed the fiery. oaky liquid with dispatch. All at once, my body went warm and my hands and feet unclenched. I slept dreamlessly through the night and awoke the next morning revived and ready for hockey practice. I was six. You hear a lot of fretful hoop-de-doo about alcohol and kids these days. but I think its in every American's best interests to start drinking early, to acclimate the body to the medicinal wonders of distilled spirits. Recent studies indicate that super vised early drinking is actually healthful, mentally stimulating, and beneficial in the awakening of clean, heterosexual desires. I'm a living testament to this fact, having en joyed a vigorous, zestful life and quaffed

EDWIN COASTER 2/8/05 Gra~,donz Got sour tirade on my ans~ering machine. So my question to you is, Did an~one get hurt? Did an~one sui~Ler as a result of these transactions, besides that blond little biddy Burrough, the erst'..'hile editor of the .1. of Li. Lianeater (prett1 phooi'y name for a student paper), who couldn't keep his nose out of my arse back in Liissour-a but no'. has his knic~ers in a t~;ist because his `~sense of ethics" has been violated? Who has the better track record, me or that draw1in~ sack of guts? Taj,~e a deep breath, GraS,. Think this through ... There, that's better.