Courtesy of Pam Martens
Public Citizen Issued an In-Depth Report in November 2017 on the 44 Koch Operatives/Allies that Filled Key Posts in the Trump Administration
Last evening the New York Times dropped a bombshell just in time to dominate cable news programming for the next six hours. A “senior official” currently working inside the Trump administration penned an anonymous OpEd which the Times posted on its website last evening and is running in its print edition today. The anonymous writer explains that President Donald Trump is unfit to govern and that there is a coup taking place in the Federal government by unelected men but Americans should be comforted because these are “unsung heroes” and they are the “adults in the room” — even though we can’t know their names.
To borrow a phrase from Bob Woodward’s new book on Trump’s reign in the White House, welcome to crazytown.
Parsing the phrasing in the OpEd, there is a clear pattern of right-wing ideology – the kind that comes from Charles Koch, CEO of the fossil fuels conglomerate, Koch Industries, and the sprawling network of tax-exempt front groups that are funded with Koch foundation money. There is this telling phrase in the OpEd: “…the president shows little affinity for ideals long espoused by conservatives: free minds, free markets and free people.” This is the jargon of the Koch-brand of the libertarian movement which tortuously attempts to equate freedom with the right to pollute the environment with fossil fuels without government interference.
Then there is this sentence in the OpEd: “We want the administration to succeed and think that many of its policies have already made America safer and more prosperous.” The Koch manifesto is that gutting regulations makes America more “prosperous” thus its heavy funding of the front group Americans for Prosperity. This is how the Center for Media and Democracy’s SourceWatch describes Americans for Prosperity: “Americans for Prosperity is a right-wing political advocacy group founded by billionaire brothers David and Charles Koch, the owners of Koch Industries. AFP serves as the Kochs’ ‘grassroots’ operation, also known as astroturf. AFP spends millions on TV ads in election cycles.”
Embedded in the writer’s effort to sell the idea that “many” of the Trump administrations’ policies have “made America safer and more prosperous” is the fact that Koch money, operating through its front group, Freedom Partners, dictated in writing what it wanted the Trump administration to accomplish and got many of those demands met. Repeal the Paris Climate Accord – done. Tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy – done. Gutting federal regulations and the Environmental Protection Agency – much accomplished.
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