Political parties and electoral associations. December 1995
8. NON-TRADITIONAL PARTIES
BEER LOVERS' PARTY
Overview: The only non-traditional party which collected the required number of signatures (a feat the parties of motorists and motor-car enthusiasts failed to accomplish). The list includes many young leaders of medium-sized businesses. In general, the Beer Lovers Party (PLP) uses a flippant format to unite staunch liberals among young politicians.
Leading Candidates: Konstantin Kalachyov, 31, who unsuccessfully ran for parliament in 1993 on the ticket of Shakhrai's PRES party, of which he was general secretary; chairman of the PLP Dmitry Shestakov, 32, Director of the Institute of Human Rights and Democracy; Andrei Palchevsky; President of the Moscow Commodity Exchange Yury Miliukov, 38; V.Kuznetsov, 41, the Russian Consul-General in San-Francisco; V. Rybin, 33, leader of the pop group "Dyuna".
Political Orientation: The party unites people of various political persuasions, but deliberately refrains from articulating its views promoting instead the idea of drinking beer as the basis for national consensus and a thoroughly non-political slogan: "May there always be something to drink and to eat". The only articulated political call is for lower taxes and the pledge not to seek representation in the executive branch of power, and to "bring pressure to bear" on the bureaucracy.
Informally allied with PLP are some "orange" groups, i.e. groups campaigning on absurd or parody-like slogans, including the movement "Subtropical Russia" whose declared goal is to introduce a year-round ambient temperature of at least 20 degrees Centigrade for the whole territory of Russia.
In the previous parliament it had 4 deputies who were members of different factions (PRES, the Democratic Party of Russia, Rossiya and the Russian Way). None of them is running on the PLP list.