For background, Strib, online here. Local content, not a carried nationwide feed; reporting:
ROCHESTER - A conservative Minnesota think tank says it's the victim of cancel culture after "anti-free speech bullies" protested a planned event at the Rochester Golf & Country Club.
Nearly 50 attendees at a luncheon on public safety sponsored by Center of the American Experiment (CAE) last month were left standing in the parking lot when the club shut down the event, the center said. Now the cancellation is the focus of a lawsuit for breach of contract filed by the organization against the country club in Olmsted County District Court.
The club "arbitrarily and capriciously" canceled the luncheon after members circulated a petition against it, CAE said in court documents, causing it "severe reputational harm."
Strib continued:
CAE also is suing Erin Nystrom, a club member who created the petition, for interference with a contract. Nystrom said it's ironic that the same group complaining about being silenced is trying to punish her for expressing her own views.
"The suggestion that I don't have the right to petition — the hypocrisy is too much," she said. "The irony is, when I use my freedom of speech to petition my country club and ask them to cancel the event I am met with a $50,000 lawsuit for perceived damages to CAE."
Strib later added:
In a statement, the country club said it canceled the event "because it generated controversy among Club members." By shutting down the event, the club "was not picking sides or endorsing any political position," it said in a court filing. "[The club] was putting its membership before politics."
In a legal filing, the club included a news story about protesters gathered outside a CAE program in Duluth last summer on critical race theory. The protest, the club said, illustrated the "divisive nature" of CAE's programs.
Furthermore, the club said, its standard event contract gives the club the right, "at its sole discretion, to refuse to allow the use of Club facilities for any proposed event."
In its civil complaint, CAE claims that the club reneged on a valid contract "based on its ulterior motive of mollifying a radical mob.
[bolding added] A radical mob of country club members? Come on.
Litigation happy - because they can?
Clown show? Any operation having Katherine Kerstin as a "Senior Fellow" pushes hard on the Clown show button for me. The operation even has a KK page.
Banker, Scott Honour, on the Board of the operation? Running 2014 as a Republican candidate for governor. Running mate: Karin Housley.
From Wikipedia:
Republican primary election results[13] Party Candidate Votes % Republican Jeff Johnson/Bill Kuisle 55,836 30.33 Republican Kurt Zellers/Dean Simpson 44,046 23.92 Republican Marty Seifert/Pam Myhra 38,851 21.1 Republican Scott Honour/Karin Housley 38,377 20.84 Republican Merrill Anderson/Mark D. Anderson 7,000 3.8 Total votes 184,110 100
Loser. Zero traction, even among 2014 GOP voters! But he got some name publicity for himself and his investment banking operation. More good publicity than, subsequent to Honour's one political venture, a 2018 Strib item showing:
Private-equity firm owner Scott Honour has quietly settled a lawsuit brought earlier this year by business associates who accused Honour and partners of failing to repay principal and interest on $800,000 in loans made in 2016 and 2017.
In late May, Hennepin County District Judge Ronald Abrams ordered several entities involving Honour and his brother, Kirk Honour, to repay the money, plus interest, penalties and attorney fees.
Honour was sued by businessmen Brenton Hayden — who in 2015 sold majority interest in his Renters Warehouse company to Honour’s Northern Pacific Group — and local retailer Dick Enrico, former owner of 2nd Wind Exercise Equipment.
Hayden and Enrico obtained an $828,000 judgment in May, including interest.
“Our guys were successful in getting the judge to award the entire amount due,” said Hayden’s attorney, Jack Harper. “They are very happy. The case subsequently got resolved [with the settlement in recent days].”
Hayden and Enrico were seeking something approaching $1 million, including their legal fees and related costs.
An attorney for the Honours declined to comment.
There is a reason for zero traction in a one-run-and-done shot for guv? Or not?
Back to the current event - "think tank sues country club" - The suing "think tank" - Lead perp. A long term political presence in Minnesota, from whom you'd want to expect good judgment. The "think tank" itself, arguably white heavy when they show their faces.
Monied? That's the bet here, but that answer was not found via online research. Not necessarily guessed to be super-monied and able to hang around country clubs all day while living off the portfolio -- not necessarily that monied, but -- comfortable. Many on the board with jobs. Jobs serving the will of and managing the portfolios of country club owner-retirees.
SO - A little Minnesota bastion of cliquish old-order Republicanism, not of the Tea Party - Jesus Jockey ilk, more urbane, more the self-anointed long-term intelligentsia pool aiming to guide the unwashed into due servitude to the nation's banking and investing elite. Portfolio managers rather than bar owners. A DWT image comes to mind. Or is that too cruel?
BOTTOM LINE: Back to the Strib article and the Clown Show characterization:
You tell me, how smart is it for a "think tank" wanting donations and having speaker booking pages to be suing a country club. Showing how smart they are by pushing around real monied folks, because they can?
Do you suppose the Board was polled on the question of suing a country club before the papers were filed in court? Or was that a management snit fit - brain fart, alone, with the Board not having an advanced say?
Poke a sharp stick in the eye of some folks within the class your business adventures depend on? You decide - Is that something other than a Clown show move?
_________UPDATE________
In fairness to Scott Honour, it is noted that he has not been a focus of this post but more a Board person with name recognition from having run for Governor.
Also, it is unclear how one in a business such as Honour appears to be in, background and all, would wish to remain with an operation touting Republican ties and intelligent "think tank" status, yet one which sues - using pejorative terms - a Rochester, MN, country club - one presumably involving some Mayo Clinic home operations people as members - who likely are within the investor class Honour deals with in his day-to-day business.
As to once researching Honour as a "representative" tank board member with more a business persona than political, the latest (Feb. 14, 2022) online mention found by Crabgrass' websearch, is here, where its blurb Honour bio indicates (dates not given) that he moved from LA to Minneapolis a few years prior to what appears from reporting to have been his single 2014 political effort:
Scott Honour, Managing Partner of Northern Pacific Group, a Wayzata, Minnesota based private equity firm, where he has served since 2012. Northern Pacific is a significant investor in Pineapple Energy. Previously, he was a Senior Managing Director of The Gores Group, a Los Angeles based private equity firm, and before that was an investment banker at UBS Warburg and Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette.
[italics added] Of interest, per that link, another Pineapple person (Adler) with a similar background to Honour, (Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette; Wharton education) is not listed as affiliated with the suing "think tank."
Latest Pineapple news cite found by Crabgrass. It is unclear from scant web information whether the merger of the CSI/Pineapple public and private firms was a SPAC transaction, but if so a low profile might be most advisable. The new merged entity is "Stock Trading on Nasdaq Market, Symbol PEGY" and not CSI.
It is speculative, but perhaps some business people listed as members of the "think tank" Board might decide to dissociate themselves from "spotlight" litigation against country clubs, or against a single country club. They have that option.
Finally, again as almost always, all info Crabgrass has of things in this post is via online web research. With links given to sources.