Increasingly annoyed that the common masses do not like them and consider their omnipresent involvement in our political process to be a bit sketchy, the Koch brothers are stepping up their public relations efforts. Americans for Prosperity, the pro-corporate, anti-tax, anti-regulation political organization planning to spend nearly $1 billion dollars to shape the outcome of the 2016 presidential elections, will be dropping a few million on the little people in order to convince them that everything is on the up-and-up.
The outreach includes everything from turkey giveaways, GED training and English-language instruction for Hispanic immigrants to community holiday meals and healthy living classes for predominantly African American groups to vocational training and couponing classes for the under-employed. The strategy, according to sources familiar with it and documents reviewed by POLITICO, calls for presenting a more compassionate side of the brothers’ politics to new audiences, while fighting the perception that their groups are merely fronts for rich Republicans seeking to game the political process for personal gain.
If you really wanted to prove you were not merely a front for rich Republicans seeking to game the political process, maybe you'd offer up the free turkeys and holiday dinners without stuffing them with mini-lectures on why rich Republicans should be allowed to game the the political process, but that's just me.
Bridge to Wellbeing last week served hot dinners to crowds of dozens of primarily African American attendees at a church in Miami and a community center in Orlando. A chef offered tips on how to prepare “dinner on a dime,” while attendees were guided into “learning about freedom,” according to the Twitter feed of one AFP staffer.
So for the price of a few hot meals to "crowds of dozens", you too can be seen as Good Folks. And it makes good, solid sense. Rich people do not want to pay taxes, so the government will necessarily be cutting back on food to the poor. Instead, poor people will receive pamphlets on "couponing" and how to make the most of their remaining can of beans.
Rich people want the government to help them outsource middle-income jobs to nations with less rigorous standards on what might or might not constitute "slavery." A few rounds of vocational training for the left-behind (so that they can aspire to other jobs that no longer exist) may not solve the problem, but it sounds very boot-strappish and if there's one thing rich people who want to be richer can all agree on, is that everyone else would be fine if they just applied themselves more.
That's right, kids. The organization that has been lambasting poor Americans and minorities for only voting for Democrats because Democrats give them "free stuff" has come to the conclusion that all they need to do to make poor Americans and minorities like Charles and David Koch—is to start giving out free stuff.
I'm beginning to think our betters are not quite the geniuses they continue to portray themselves as. Ah well. A few million dollars worth of free turkeys and couponing classes is better than none.