Dave Weigel at Slate suggested that the Koch brothers should embrace their new notoriety and strut their anti-populist, anti-progressive, anti-environmental credentials proudly. What’s the point, Weigel seemed to think, of spending hundreds of millions of dollars on everything from climate-change denialism at the Smithsonian to astroturf “Tea Party” groups if you’re too shy to stand up and take pride in your achievements? Especially once all hope of obscuring your connections to everything from your daddy’s role in founding the John Birch Society to your own success in bankrolling every glibertarian outlet from the Cato Institute to Reason magazine to the teabagger-flavored Americans for Prosperity Foundation has been exposed for all the New-Yorker-reading world to examine?
Later that morning, Weigel posted on his blog, under the title “Kochs Keep Tossing Bricks at New Yorker Profile”:
Here’s more on the story I published this morning — a letter that the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation is sending around arguing that Jane Mayer’s New Yorker profile treated the Kochs unfairly.
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“The New Yorker article, and those pieces that have echoed it, rely heavily on innuendo and unsubstantiated assertions,” writes foundation president Richard Fink, who is the public face of the brothers’ ideological work. “Unnamed sources and those with a strong philosophical opposition to the Kochs – many of whom have no current or first-hand knowledge of Koch Industries, Koch Family Foundations, Charles Koch or David Koch – go unchallenged. Supporters of the Kochs are largely ignored (as evidenced by the fact that the reporter chose not to include the vast majority of supportive comments made by a number of people familiar with the Kochs and the organizations they support). On the other hand, those who reinforce the reporter’s preconceptions are given a free pass.”
This letter is a fine exemplar of the Squid-Cloud of Butt-Hurt, but there is a detail here no decent novelist would allow to pass unedited: Are the billionaire “Kochtopus” brothers really being defended (for money) by a man who calls himself… Rich Fink?
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R-Jud
Surely Dick Fink?
I’ve got to be honest: I’ve been trying to get myself worked up about politics and the media for the last month, but can’t. I can’t even sit through the Daily Show.
I have, however, been having my annual round of back-to-school nightmares. The one where you’re naked in class. The one where I have to repeat high school, even though I’m 30. The one where I go to take a final for a class I realize I never attended.
The worst one, however, is the one where I’m a teacher again.
Urza
Definition of FINK (Merriam Webster)
1: one who is disapproved of or is held in contempt
2: strikebreaker
3: informer
JamesC
Universe has a sense of humor. A… dare I say… liberal one.
MikeJ
I see that we’ve got Dickens naming the characters in this novel.
JGabriel
True. That’s the kind of sledgehammer subtlety Ayn Rand would go for. Any decent novelist would cross it out while chuckling to himself, “Too obvious.”
.
El Cid
A wonderful, horrible title. Ew. And Dick Fink.
MattR
Uggh. That first Weigel article is awful.
WereBear (itouch)
There’s the modern conservative for you. Absolutely no sense of irony.
El Cid
Mr. Reasonable Centrist Conservative.
El Cid
Ha ha. TeaTard revenge targets Alaska’s strong pioneer dependence on federal largesse.
Herb
Please tell me you guys aren’t missing the McMegan smackdown.
valdivia
@Herb:
even better I think one of the Sulli underlings actually linked and quotes a part of this smackdown yesterday!
MattR
@Herb: Oooh. That was good. I knew I was gonna like it before McMegan’s name even got mentioned when I saw this.
El Cid
@Herb: Well, since I refuse to pay any attention whatsoever outside of sheer undesired accident to the lying, idiot, fraudulent, rich-and-connected-father advanced McAddled, of course I’ve missed the smackdown. Thankfully there are those who bring them to my attention.
El Cid
@MattR: Unintentional humor:
Some just are either unfamiliar with or cannot accept the notion that highly respected, powerful intellectual institutions would hire and promote absolute liars and fraudulent anti-rational and anti-empirical fools on a consistent basis, and always have.
MattR
@El Cid: To which someone replied in comments:
Herb
@valdivia: Yeah, I think that’s where I saw it first.
ChrisS
Besides driving traffic by being a professional troll, I have no idea how Megan continues to be employed.
Day 12 of the Jack experiment. Tara and I were near tears last night due to the stress. He’s a good dog for the most part, willful, but fairly good. He doesn’t like to play much: fetch is pointless, he likes chase for about 5 minutes and then he lays down, and he won’t leave our side. Recently he’s started to sit down during walks and refuse to move. He’ll heel well on 40% of the walk, try to lead for 30% and do miscellaneous other things for the remainder. He likes people and other dogs and kids. In the yard, he does ok with commands: he’s learning sit, stay, come, and heel. But the second there is a distraction he is off on his own.
We want him to have a good life and we thought we would be good dog-parents. However, we’re both beginning to resent the dog and regret the adoption. What makes it worse is that he is a good dog and we still have these feelings. I think failure to provide love in return is the biggest failing you can have with a dog. John Cole posted below that seeing Lilly is the best part of his day and my friend at work said she loves going home at lunch to let her 6-month old puppy out to play. I just don’t have that urge. I just want to go home and play with the cats. I feel awful every day.
arguingwithsignposts
@Herb:
Funnily, I think I first saw someone mention it on a thread here yesterday.
Stillwater
Excellent post, AL. And excellent title. I think it’s quite nice the Koch’s are squirming under the microscope. And even if nothing changes from shining a light on this, at least we’ll now have a lasting image and handy pop-culture reference for overly emotional uber-
dicksrich.Small victories.
WereBear
@ChrisS: If it’s not working, stop. It sounds like you gave it your all.
Keeping on when it doesn’t work means both of you are in a situation that is blocking you from your best dog; and him from his best home.
daryljfontaine
I was going to make a joke about changing the nomenclature from “teabaggers” to allow the wingnuts to gracefully step out from under their own anvil, but I see the internets beat me to it.
D
Bob
@R-Jud:
Yikes, I thought that was my special dream. Is there a support group for those of us afflicted by this dream?
morzer
It’s the straight-faced innocent assertions that make you roll on the floor with laughter.
mds
@El Cid:
Notice that there’s nothing in there about refusing to take more wads of federal money. No, it’s “more control of its own resources and a reduction in federal regulatory burdens.” I.e., continue to fund us, but with no strings whatsoever attached. So really just American conservatism distilled down to its core greed and stupidity again. “Our politicians got the promise of money for a bridge, and I campaigned for governor on how we needed that bridge, then the feds exercised fiscal responsibility and zeroed out the funding, saying we could build our own damn bridge, and I said, ‘Thanks, but no thanks.'” Is it any wonder that this joker is a Palinite? Yale Law has finally matched Harvard Law’s Ben Shapiro.
mds
@Bob:
Yes, it meets Tuesdays at the community center … but you can’t wear clothes to the meeting.
gnomedad
@R-Jud:
@Bob:
Yup, sign me up for the support group (and I’m 57). Now how about the one where your teeth are falling out?
R-Jud
@gnomedad:
I have that one, too. I’m also having a root canal tomorrow, so it may or may not actually happen.
MattR
@ChrisS: I would stick with it a bit longer to see how things go. When I got Ellie she was 7 months old and a neurotic mess with submissive urination issues. It took me a while to realize that she was never going to be the “perfect” dog I always dreamed of and to learn to live with and adapt to her imperfections. This may not be the case for you and there may come a day when you have to admit defeat, but I would suggest giving it a bit more time. Personally, I would rather regret having tried for too long then for not long enough.
arguingwithsignposts
@arguingwithsignposts:
Correction, saw it at The Hunting of the Snark.
JGabriel
We’ve all noticed how some things happen earlier or later than they used to due to climate changes, like when the tomatoes ripen or birds migrate.
Has anyone noticed changes in their allergies?
My allergies used to begin in between late July and mid-August, but lately, past 2-3 years, they’ve started coming later. For instance, today.
Just me, or has anyone else had similar changes?
.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@daryljfontaine:
It’s just a small move from teabagging to being a Koch sucker. The best part is that they can go back and forth between the two and nobody will think it’s unnatural.
Tattoosydney
Edited because of not reading thread first.
ChrisS
@WereBear:
This(modified) from your blog seems appropriate:
“People who have difficulties with
catsdogs get tripped by one overwhelming expectation; thatcatsdogs should act likedogscats. Whencatsdogs don’t, it’s somehow thecat’sdog’s fault.”I really want nothing but the best for the little guy. We both love animals, but we think possibly that in the time between us having dogs as children and young adults to now, we’ve grown away from being dog-type people. We have two cats that greet us at the door and are legitimately happy to see us. And the one plays fetch better than the dog does.
@MattR:
Personally, I would rather regret having tried for too long then for not long enough.
I’m of a similar thought. It could be that we just need more time together. Tara and I were on the couch last night after Jack’s walk and we were sorting through our thoughts. I said that it’s difficult to reconcile my lack of love towards him when everyone who meets the dog loves him. Tara responded that she didn’t feel love for him either.
But the animal lover in both of us would rather he be in a good home than with two people who could eventually resent him. It’s a difficult line. I’m just getting some input from others. Maybe some people are more well-suited to a dog’s total dependence on them for everything. Maybe we’re selfish. I don’t know, but I’ve been thinking about this about 20 hours of each day it seems like.
kay
@El Cid:
The Tea Party backed Senator Brown.
The moment any of these people are elected, they’re going to become Brown, and we’ll hear the familiar conservative refrain, which is, “they didn’t balance the budget because they tricked us into thinking they’re fiscal conservatives. Elect more conservatives, and the problem will be solved”.
He’s not going to cut any money that goes to Alaska. Alaska is so deep into the national pocket they’ll curl up and die without that money. What’s going to replace the federal subsidies in the vast interior of Alaska? Small business?
Chyron HR
@gnomedad:
Oh boy, sleep! That’s where I’m a
vikingfailure!Do you guys have the one where you’re going to catch a plane that’s leaving right away, but you can’t find any of the things you need to pack?
erlking
@Herb: That slapdown was so good I wanted a cigarette afterward.
“…presumably this is far below her usual intellectual standard.”
As another blog puts it, Sadly, no.
Odie Hugh Manatee
How about those yearly oil checks that get sent out to Alaskans? Maybe he has the nads to redirect the flow from the spigot that fills that Alaskan watering trough and divert it to Alaskan government? I think that and/or of the cutting of federal subsidies to Alaska will be enough to make the natives restless up there.
Naah, he’s going to line up at the feeding trough in D.C. to get his cut of the federal pie. Just like the rest of them. Murkowski brought the gold home for Alaskans and if he can’t do the same and fulfill his campaign promises then he will be an abject failure in their eyes. Pretty funny that Alaskan repubs want government spending cut so badly that they are willing to give up the subsidies that make them the rugged individualists they think they are.
Talk about cutting off your nose to spite your face.
kwAwk
I was reading this article by Weigle last night thinking that while he makes some good points about how others have been demonized for giving their money, he avoids the most damaging accusations against the Koch brothers in the New Yorker article.
The article indicates a behavior pattern in the Koch’s that seems they support a lot of organizations only as long as they support positions that are good for Koch’s business interests. They aren’t necessarily interested in the ‘truth’ about global warming, but only interested in clouding the issue enough so that the status quo remains.
Weigel also seems to miss the notion that the Tea Partiers themselves want to believe that they are part of a spontaneous grass roots movement of people fed up with Washington. If the Koch’s come out and take credit for ‘astroturfing’ the Tea Party movement, it’ll take a lot of the excitement out of it for those who want to believe that they are independent thinkers.
JGabriel
kay:
I don’t know Kay. Angle and Paul are doctrinaire, far right, libertarian ideologists. Miller seems to be cut from the same cloth. That said, his Yale J.D. suggests at least enough pragmatism to get through a competitive law school, so who knows.
.
kay
@JGabriel:
Ron Paul is King of the Earmarks, while delivering sanctimonious lectures on fiscal conservatism. Paul’s earmark requests for FY2009 are amazing. He was a former Libertarian Presidential candidate, was he not?
It doesn’t have to be consistent, and it doesn’t have to be honest. They just have to fill in the appropriate applause lines in the appropriate places.
It’s about deregulating and redirecting federal largess. It has nothing to do with fiscal conservatism.
beltane
@kwAwk: Just because the teabaggers are pawns in the Koch brothers chess game does not mean they are aware of it and want to advertise the fact. Where’s the fun in a movement that openly proclaims itself to be made up of useful idiots instead of proud patriots?
mds
@kay:
kay
@JGabriel:
I’m hoping Rand Paul wins, because it will be interesting to watch Rand Paul pass his father’s goody-laden spending bills.
Except both men will probably vote against, secure in the knowledge that more honest members will pass the wingnut welfare budgets, while the Paul’s deliver another lecture on frugality.
suzanne
Wanna see something alternately frightening and hilarious?
And this woman is up twenty points in the polls.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xUPKKbmWMZ8
jacy
@ChrisS:
Give it a little time, but take the pressure off yourself. If it doesn’t work, it’s not the end of the world, nobody (you or Tara or the dog) has failed. Some things just don’t mesh. But one of the biggest problems you might have right now is the expectation/guilt that you’re working through. Try to let that go, because that’s going to make things worse. If you’re miserable, the dog will be miserable too.
We’ve had Wilson for one year (anniversary last week). To be honest, I regretted adopting him the day after I brought him home. He was needy, he needed training, he upset my routine. I did not find him at all loveable at that point. It took about 6-8 weeks for that feeling to dissipate. (and we’re still working on some of the training) Now, a year later, I can’t imagine life without him, and I just adore him.
I’m not saying that’s going to happen for you, just wanted you to know that you’re not weird or a bad dog parent for having the feelings you’re feeling. During a particularly bad night, I wondered what would happen if I just left the door open and he “escaped.” (disclaimer: I would never actually do anything like that, but it was a seductive fantasy there for a little while.)
Think of yourself as a way station on Jack’s journey. Maybe things will get better and you’ll click and he’ll stay forever. Maybe you’re just a temporary stopping point until Jack finds who he belongs with. DON’T FEEL GUILTY. If, after some time, it doesn’t work out, find him a good home. Best of luck.
ChrisS
Conservatives run on cutting spend and taxes. Only one thing is politically possible. Cutting taxes.
Cutting spending means having to explain to your consituents why it is in there best interest that they pay for their roads and social services out of their own pocket. And that doesn’t bode well for future re-election.
ChrisS
@jacy:
Thank you for your comment. It is appreciated.
Stillwater
@suzanne: Was she drunk? This is her Couric gotcha moment. The host clearly put her in an awkward spot by offering her face time to say something intelligent.
JGabriel
@mds:
Yes, good point.
.
debit
@ChrisS: Well, it was interesting to me that in our list of stuff you’re doing with Jack, you talk about what you’re trying to teach him and how he’s failing. You don’t mention hanging out with him, cuddling him or just getting to know him. Let me hasten to add, I’m not being critical; it sounds like you got a dog because you were eager to train it. I get that. But it sounds like you were more excited about the process of a training a dog than the dog itself.
Bottom line if you don’t have any warm feelings for the animal, let it go to someone else. Jack deserves to be loved.
suzanne
@Stillwater: No, she really is THIS DUMB all the time. God. I wonder how she manages to put her soes on the right feet.
kwAwk
@beltane:
That’s what I was saying. Having the Tea Parties be a corporate sponsored movement would take away a lot of the allure for the people showing up.
It would also serve to illustrate to the general public a bit more the reasons behind the movement. It’s not really about common people, it’s more about very wealthy people trying to defend their own wealth advantage.
John Cole
Reason magazine’s blog has been pretty obsessed with Mayer, with pretty much every poster attacking Mayer. There’s a new video up with Welch talking about Koch, but I don’t have the stomache to watch that smug prick, so I’m not sure if he mentions Mayer again.
But yeah, they are all het up about her. You’d think she was public enemy number one, instead of the woman who exposed something actual libertarians might be concerned about.
jwb
@John Cole: As we all know, a paycheck is far, far stronger motivation than logical consistency.
Ken
In related news*, the Mouth of Sauron today issued a statement complaining that recent reports of the Dark Lord’s activities are biased. “You see interviews with the elves, the Men of Rohan, this Gandalf character,” the Mouth hissed. “But do you hear from the many millions of orcs which Lord Sauron gainfully employs? Or from entities close to Lord Sauron, like the Witch-King of Angmar or the other Nazgul?”
* By related news, I mean related to the original article, not to the several sub-topics the comments have spawned.
kindness
A squid cloud of butt hurt…..do squids have the ability to produce ink like an octopus? I don’t know. I don’t think they do.
In all honesty though, the Koch brothers deserve to be gnawed on by giant squids until they leave their elite mortal coils behind. There’s an ever growing list of folks that also deserve to be in this line…..where to begin? Where to end? We could have our very own Squid/French Revolution right now.
eemom
in unrelated news, at Clownhall, Ann Coulter decries her fellow wingbots for calling Obama a Muslim. He’s not a Muslim, she says. Because he’s an atheist.
aimai
@Bob:
Yes, but the support group meets in the nude, so it doesn’t really help much.
aimai
aimai
@mds:
Darn, mds beat me to my joke. That’s what I get for not reading the entire thread.
aimai
Ken
Sorry about looking like I was shouting up there @56. I used an asterisk as a footnote mark, and apparently that converts into bold-text.
Sharl
@kindness: Just doing the quick Wikipedia search thang:
Sad_Dem
As usual, reality is more over-the-top than fiction. A novelist wouldn’t dare naming the Rich Fink character Rich Fink, but the Fates are not so shy.
Jay in Oregon
Nobody could have foreseen…
Rescue efforts under way after oil rig explosion in Gulf
Stillwater
@Sad_Dem: A novelist wouldn’t dare naming the Rich Fink character Rich Fink
This is an excerpt from a new book I’m working on.
“Richard strolled through the fundraiser with an airy air, a man of confidence, unwilling to let wealthy guests, often seen as a mark, go unmet.
“Hi, I’m Rich Fink. But my friends call me Dick …. Fink.””
Just Some Fuckhead
@debit:
I wept a little when I read this.
mattH
Another part of why the Koch brothers are fighting this is their social standing in those elite upper class circles they travel in. Notice the first part of Mayer’s New Yorker article showcases their charitable giving to non-sectarian entities like the American Ballet Theater, Lincoln Center’s New York State Theatre, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. Acceptance of this social class is just as important to him as hiding his influence in destroying government.
4jkb4ia
In continued success Bradley Klahn and Tim Smyczek have taken the first set 6-1 from Monfils and Gicquel, who will probably realize they have to wake up very soon.
(Also Melanie Oudin won her doubles match fairly easily)
Batocchio
Weigel does some good work, but unfortunately, when he tries to defend the latest libertarian or teabagger stupidity, his accuracy goes way down and his wankery goes way up. The Reason crowd doesn’t like to think they’re useful idiots or the hired help, but if the shoe fits…