JoB
how about this…
David Koch’s tax free charities and tax free foundations have dumped 176 million into campaign contributions in the last decade… funding candidates who are “pro-business” … which in his case translates to “against any environmental controls or pollution restrictions”…
* $120 million from the “David H. Koch Charitable Foundation,”
* $48 million from the “Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation,” and
* $28 million from the “Claude R. Lambe Charitable Foundation,” Charles Koch controls.
Yup.. we the taxpayers subsidized his campaign donations… to the tune of at least 35 million dollars.
This year with contribution limits lifted he is on track to dump $45 million into this election cycle backing republican “pro business” candidates…
pro business sounds so much more American than polluting, tax avoiding, stealing business doesn’t it.
Those campaign contributions are paying off for him… for $176 million :
he was awarded over $100 million in government contracts..
http://mediamattersaction.org/search/tag/americans_for_prosperity
He was allowed to settle huge oil industry pollution fines for pennies on the dollar.. by the administration headed by George W Bush..
lots of interesting reading here..
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Koch_Industries
He was allowed to successfully avoid paying royalties owed to the US government for oil leases on federal and Indian lands by $210 million…
http://www.roberts-partners.com/false_claims_cases_index.html
He was just convicted for this one.. so you can bet he wants to stack the deck when it comes to settling the resulting fines…
and that’s just the short list.
A quick read of the link for his recent conviction is illuminating. Koch may be the most visible businessman investing a government he can control.. but as that list shows he is not the only business in the business of scamming America.
The reason businesses invest so much money in campaigns and in lobbying firms is that those investments pay off.. guaranteed at something like 3 to 1.
He has a vested personal financial interest in convincing America to vote for the candidates he promotes through political advertising…
and through all those tea party functions funded by tax-exempt organizations that form to fund them and fold immediately afterward…
and through his investment in the freedom foundation..
http://politicalcorrection.org/factcheck/200908060005
To put the amount of money Koch is dumping into campaigns in perspective… the amount PACs have donated so far in this campaign season is 200 million…
those are the organizations that were legally able to donate prior to the recent supreme court ruling that opened the floodgates for corporate money … the mechanism Koch used to invest that $176 million that was his limit in the last 10 years…
before the supreme court ruling that allowed corporations to dump unlimited cash into political campaigns… Koch’s political influence was limited to 17.5 million a year funneled through tax exempt organizations… now he is contributing $45 million in a few months .. and that doesn’t count his behind the scenes transfusions to the tea party.
Koch is counting on the best outcome his money can buy in the coming election.
It’s up to us as individuals to ask ourselves if his best outcome is really in your best interests.
And lest you think i am only speaking to the republican half of this equation…
i would like to remind you that every democrat… every liberal.. every independent… who does not bother to vote in this election contributes to his victory…
In light of the disaster that just happened in the Gulf of Mexico.. that should be a sobering thought.