The 2015 elections are a week away and in what will seem like no time at all the 2016, more comprehensive, elections will be here.
The biggest bakers of our politics are already in high gear. The brothers, Charles and David Koch, do their baking with money - LOTS of it. Their ability to pour massive funds into all levels of elections defies the imagination. One of my previous professors provided an example of them being involved in a little tiny school board election in his hometown. Of course, "their" refers to the PACS, SuperPACS, etc. that the Koch's money flows through.
There have been literally thousands of articles about the Koch's, but I would like to quote an article in the Rolling Stone entitled "Together, Charles and David Koch control one of the world's largest fortunes, which they are using to buy up our political system. But what they don't want you to know is how they made all that money"
Excerpts from the article (published just prior to the 2014 elections) "Their political network helped finance the Tea Party and powers today's GOP. Koch-affiliated organizations raised some $400 million during the 2012 election, and aim to spend another $290 million to elect Republicans in this year's midterms." One might wonder what is the reason for the second largest private firm (larger than most public firms, IBM, HP, or Honda) to spend so much on Republicans. I think much of the answer lies in what they produce or invest in to make all their money.
From the article:"The volume of Koch Industries' toxic output is staggering. According to the University of Massachusetts Amherst's Political Economy Research Institute, only three companies rank among the top 30 polluters of America's air, water and climate: ExxonMobil, American Electric Power and Koch Industries. Thanks in part to its 2005 purchase of paper-mill giant Georgia-Pacific, Koch Industries dumps more pollutants into the nation's waterways than General Electric and International Paper combined. The company ranks 13th in the nation for toxic air pollution. Koch's climate pollution, meanwhile, outpaces oil giants including Valero, Chevron and Shell. Across its businesses, Koch generates 24 million metric tons of greenhouse gases a year."
I think this is a great article for a reminder of how massive amounts of money are "baking" our politics and our democracy. It includes some enlightening info regarding the in-fighting within the company prior to David and Charles taking control and the current path of the conglomerate.
(http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/inside-the-koch-brothers-toxic-empire-20140924#ixzz3pmUnmJOC)
