According to a report in the Dallas Morning News Greg Abbott is being quite cagey about a private meeting he attended recently at a posh resort in New Mexico. Charles and David, Koch, right wing Libertarian billionaires, hosted the event. As most of us know by now, the Koch brothers hold a firm grasp on most Republican politicians. The brothers loathe big central government because of its power to tax people like them and the corporations they own. They rely on Republican politicians to keep their taxes low while passing on the burden to middle class Americans.
Introducing David and Charles Koch.
Charles’ many critics on the left–including the President of the United States–accuse him of accumulating too much power and using it to promote his own economic interests through a network of secretive organizations they call the “Kochtopus.” Ironically, the Koch brothers believe they’re fighting against power, at least in the political realm. For the Kochs the real power is central government, which can tax entire industries into oblivion, force a citizen to buy health insurance and bring mighty corporations like Koch Industries to heel.
Charles and David Koch were bitterly disappointed when their millions could not buy the 2012 election for Mitt Romney. Their inability to buy their personal choice as President, however, does not mean the Koch brothers will go away.
No, as we learned from the video above, the Koch tentacles are pervasive and profound.
So their revolution has been an evolution, with roots going back half a century to Koch’s first contributions to libertarian causes and Republican candidates. In the mid-1970s their business of changing minds got more formal when Charles cofounded what became the Cato Institute, the first major libertarian think tank. Based in Washington, it has 120 employees devoted to promoting property rights, educational choice and economic freedom. In 1978 the brothers helped found–and still fund–George Mason University’s Mercatus Center, the go-to academy for deregulation; they have funded the Federalist Society, which shapes conservative judicial thinking; the pro-market Heritage Foundation; a California-based center skeptical of human-driven climate change; and many other institutions.
Most of us have never heard of most of these organizations.
All of these organizations, unknown to 99% of the population, and their common source of support, unknown to most of the rest, have provided the grist for conservative thinking since Reagan. It’s a measure of Koch’s success that 40 years after Richard Nixon was stumping for national health insurance, Paul Ryan’s Ayn Rand-tinged economics are just a little right of center. That the Supreme Court’s conservative majority led by Chief Justice John Roberts has issued a number of pro-property rights, anti-government decisions in recent years that read like they came straight out of a Federalist Society position paper. That when George W. Bush sought a watchdog on regulation costs, he appointed a top Mercatus executive. And none of this was accidental–it just took millions of dollars over decades of time. You can see the same process at work in David’s quest to find a cure for cancer. A prostate cancer survivor like the rest of his brothers, he has given $215 million to fight the disease so far, including $100 million to fund his own research center at MIT.
The Koch brothers, as is the case for many American billionaires, want it all for themselves.
While Charles, more diplomatic as the steward of the business, avoids throwing partisan bombshells, David, who lives in New York City and whose main activities surround philanthropy and politics, is less shy. And he has a message for anyone who thinks the Kochs won’t be a factor in 2016 and beyond: “We’re going to fight the battle as long as we breathe. We want to bequeath to our children a better and more prosperous America.” That means more of the same tactics, as well as whatever new ones election lawyers cook up .
Since the Koch brothers intend to be an influence in the forthcoming election cycles what do they want from Greg Abbott?
Cross posted on Texas Kaos.
Since the re-election of Barack Obama in 2012 many Americans feel as if the Democrat never really won. The President's agenda, no matter what it is, his judicial nominees, no matter how moderate they are, have been routinely and maliciously blocked.
The GOP promised jobs in 2010 and the red states got trans vaginal probes and voter suppression laws instead.
In ruby red states like Texas, Rick Perry and his right wing flank refuse to accept federally expanded Medicaid despite the fact that it would not cost the state a penny. Texas boasts the highest number of uninsured residents so one would think Republican lawmakers, on behalf of their constituents, would have demanded for Rick Perry to accept it.
The 2011 Legislature slashed school budgets and refused to borrow money from the Rainy Day Fund to soften the blow, despite the fact that most of us wanted to dip into the fund.
Texans have become quite used to crony capitalism and the influence that a handful of the powerful have on the members of the Legislature. We are also well aware of the greed and corruption as a result of crony politics.
I guess my question is what do the powerful forces like the Koch brothers see in Greg Abbott? What will he do for them?
“It’s clear that Abbott’s litigation is directly in line with what the Kochs would want done,” said Andrew Wheat of Texans for Public Justice, a left-leaning nonprofit group that tracks campaign money.
Abbott repeatedly has sued the Environmental Protection Agency to stop regulation of greenhouse gases and other pollutants. He has joined other Republicans fighting the health care law.
And he has lamented delays in the Keystone XL pipeline from Canada to Texas. A Koch subsidiary has intervened in the project, which opponents describe as a pollution risk.
Yes indeed, Abbott would be the
perfect puppet for the Kochs. He has already proved his bona fides with right wing religious fanatics given his harsh
assault on women's reproductive rights. The Attorney General also earned an A+ in delivering
voter suppression laws in an attempt to bring back Jim Crow. Rick Perry, Greg Abbott and the Texas GOP has
gerrymanderedthe state to the rigged point that many of us have no voice in government at all.
In short, Greg Abbott would be a worst nightmare than Rick Perry, if that is possible.