Secret memo displays corporate and media tentacles of the Kochtopus
Fresh evidence of the New York billionaires' midterm campaign implicates journalists as well as fat cats
By Joe Conason
Salon.com
Is there a vast corporate conspiracy behind the Tea Party and the midterm resurgence of the far right? The most suggestive evidence involves the well-documented role of the billionaire Koch brothers, their Americans for Prosperity front group and other Koch-funded entities – but now a secret letter from Charles Koch shows that the tentacles of the “Kochtopus” include a high-level “network” of corporate, lobbying, nonprofit, and media organizations that meet regularly to plot right-wing strategy. The letter and accompanying documents first appeared on Think Progress in a post by Lee Fang that is well worth reading in full.
Dated September 24, 2010 and signed by Koch himself on company stationery, the letter urges recipients to join “our network of business and philanthropic leaders, who are dedicated to defending our free society” – and specifically to attend the group’s next meeting at a Palm Springs resort in late January. Most revealing is an attached brochure about the network’s most recent meeting, which occurred in Aspen last June 27-28.
According to that document, the Palm Springs meeting attracted such corporate and financial titans as Stephen Schwartzman of the Blackstone Group, Philip Anschutz of Anschutz Industries, and Steve Bechtel of Bechtel Corp., as well as representatives of Bank of America, Allied Capital, Citadel Investment, among many others – all of whom gathered to learn how to “elect leaders who are more strongly committed to liberty and prosperity” with a “strategic plan to educate voters on the importance of economic freedom.”
Explaining the network’s plan for November and beyond were David Chavern, second in command at the US Chamber of Commerce; Tim Phillips, the president of Americans for Prosperity; Veronique de Rugy of the Mercatus Center at George Mason University; and Gretchen Hamel, the former Bush administration official who runs Public Notice, a group launched last spring under mysterious auspices to attack government spending.
(More here.)
By Joe Conason
Salon.com
Is there a vast corporate conspiracy behind the Tea Party and the midterm resurgence of the far right? The most suggestive evidence involves the well-documented role of the billionaire Koch brothers, their Americans for Prosperity front group and other Koch-funded entities – but now a secret letter from Charles Koch shows that the tentacles of the “Kochtopus” include a high-level “network” of corporate, lobbying, nonprofit, and media organizations that meet regularly to plot right-wing strategy. The letter and accompanying documents first appeared on Think Progress in a post by Lee Fang that is well worth reading in full.
Dated September 24, 2010 and signed by Koch himself on company stationery, the letter urges recipients to join “our network of business and philanthropic leaders, who are dedicated to defending our free society” – and specifically to attend the group’s next meeting at a Palm Springs resort in late January. Most revealing is an attached brochure about the network’s most recent meeting, which occurred in Aspen last June 27-28.
According to that document, the Palm Springs meeting attracted such corporate and financial titans as Stephen Schwartzman of the Blackstone Group, Philip Anschutz of Anschutz Industries, and Steve Bechtel of Bechtel Corp., as well as representatives of Bank of America, Allied Capital, Citadel Investment, among many others – all of whom gathered to learn how to “elect leaders who are more strongly committed to liberty and prosperity” with a “strategic plan to educate voters on the importance of economic freedom.”
Explaining the network’s plan for November and beyond were David Chavern, second in command at the US Chamber of Commerce; Tim Phillips, the president of Americans for Prosperity; Veronique de Rugy of the Mercatus Center at George Mason University; and Gretchen Hamel, the former Bush administration official who runs Public Notice, a group launched last spring under mysterious auspices to attack government spending.
(More here.)
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