Fightdirecto
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THE MERCATUS CENTER WAS FOUNDED AND IS FUNDED BY THE KOCH FAMILY FOUNDATIONS. According to financial records, the Koch family has contributed more than thirty million dollars to George Mason, much of which has gone to the Mercatus Center, a nonprofit organization. Democratic strategist Rob Stein described the Mercatus Center as "ground zero for deregulation policy in Washington.”
THE MERCATUS CENTER HAS ENGAGED IN CAMPAIGNS INVOLVING DEREGULATION, ESPECIALLY ENVIRONMENTAL DEREGULATION. IT NOW FILLS THE ROLE ONCE PLAYED BY THE ECONOMICS DEPARTMENT AT CHICAGO UNIVERSITY AS THE ORIGINATOR OF EXTREME NEOLIBERAL IDEAS.... Mercatus Centerquote:
With his brother Charles, who is seventy-four, David Koch owns virtually all of Koch Industries, a conglomerate, headquartered in Wichita, Kansas, whose annual revenues are estimated to be a hundred billion dollars. The company has grown spectacularly since their father, Fred, died, in 1967, and the brothers took charge. The Kochs operate oil refineries in Alaska, Texas, and Minnesota, and control some four thousand miles of pipeline. Koch Industries owns Brawny paper towels, Dixie cups, Georgia-Pacific lumber, Stainmaster carpet, and Lycra, among other products. Forbes ranks it as the second-largest private company in the country, after Cargill, and its consistent profitability has made David and Charles Koch - who, years ago, bought out two other brothers - among the richest men in America. Their combined fortune of thirty-five billion dollars is exceeded only by those of Bill Gates and Warren Buffett.
THE KOCHS ARE LONGTIME LIBERTARIANS WHO BELIEVE IN DRASTICALLY LOWER PERSONAL AND CORPORATE TAXES, MINIMAL SOCIAL SERVICES FOR THE NEEDY, AND MUCH LESS OVERSIGHT OF INDUSTRY - ESPECIALLY ENVIRONMENTAL REGULATION. THESE VIEWS DOVETAIL WITH THE BROTHERS’ CORPORATE INTERESTS. In a study released this spring, the University of Massachusetts at Amherst’s Political Economy Research Institute named Koch Industries one of the top ten air polluters in the United States. And Greenpeace issued a report identifying the company as a “kingpin of climate science denial.” The report showed that, from 2005 to 2008, the Kochs vastly outdid ExxonMobil in giving money to organizations fighting legislation related to climate change, underwriting a huge network of foundations, think tanks, and political front groups. Indeed, the brothers have funded opposition campaigns against so many Obama Administration policies - from health-care reform to the economic-stimulus program - that, in political circles, their ideological network is known as the Kochtopus.....
Rob Stein, a Democratic political strategist who has studied the conservative movement’s finances, said that the Kochs are “at the epicenter of the anti-Obama movement. But IT’S NOT JUST ABOUT OBAMA. They would have done the same to Hillary Clinton. They did the same with Bill Clinton. THEY ARE OUT TO DESTROY PROGRESSIVISM.”....
Gus diZerega, a former friend of Charles Koch, believes that THE KOCH BROTHERS HAVE FOLLOWED A WAYWARD INTELLECTUAL TRAJECTORY, TRANSFERRING THEIR FATHER’S PARANOIA ABOUT SOVIET COMMUNISM [THEIR FATHER WAS ONE OF THE FOUNDERS OF THE ULTRA-RIGHT-WING JOHN BIRCH SOCIETY] TO A DISTRUST OF THE U.S. GOVERNMENT, AND SEEING ITS EXPANSION, BEGINNING WITH THE NEW DEAL, AS A TYRANNICAL THREAT TO FREEDOM....
IN THE MID-EIGHTIES, THE KOCHS PROVIDED MILLIONS OF DOLLARS TO GEORGE MASON UNIVERSITY, IN ARLINGTON, VIRGINIA, TO SET UP ANOTHER THINK TANK. NOW KNOWN AS THE MERCATUS CENTER, it promotes itself as “the world’s premier university source for market-oriented ideas - bridging the gap between academic ideas and real-world problems.” Financial records show that the Koch family foundations have contributed more than thirty million dollars to George Mason, much of which has gone to the Mercatus Center, a nonprofit organization. “IT’S GROUND ZERO FOR DEREGULATION POLICY IN WASHINGTON,” Rob Stein, the Democratic strategist, said....
AN ENVIRONMENTAL LAWYER WHO HAS CLASHED WITH THE MERCATUS CENTER CALLED IT “A MEANS OF LAUNDERING ECONOMIC AIMS.” THE LAWYER EXPLAINED THE STRATEGY: “YOU TAKE CORPORATE MONEY AND GIVE IT TO A NEUTRAL-SOUNDING THINK TANK,” WHICH “HIRES PEOPLE WITH PEDIGREES AND ACADEMIC DEGREES WHO PUT OUT CREDIBLE-SEEMING STUDIES. BUT THEY ALL COINCIDE PERFECTLY WITH THE ECONOMIC INTERESTS OF THEIR FUNDERS.”....
The Kochs have long depended on the public’s not knowing all the details about them. They have been content to operate what David Koch has called “the largest company that you’ve never heard of.” But with the growing prominence of the Tea Party, and with increased awareness of the Kochs’ ties to the movement, the brothers may find it harder to deflect scrutiny. Recently, President Obama took aim at the Kochs’ political network. Speaking at a Democratic National Committee fund-raiser, in Austin, he warned supporters that the Supreme Court’s recent ruling in the Citizens United case—which struck down laws prohibiting direct corporate spending on campaigns—had made it even easier for big companies to hide behind “groups with harmless-sounding names like Americans for Prosperity.” [OR THE MERCATUS CENTER] Obama said, “They don’t have to say who, exactly, Americans for Prosperity are. You don’t know if it’s a foreign-controlled corporation” - or even, he added, “a big oil company.” Covert Operations - The billionaire brothers who are waging a war against Obama
A report by the Mercatus Center on "Freedom In The Fifty States" is like a report by the Association of Street Pimps on the positive benefits of human sex trafficking.
< Message edited by Fightdirecto -- 3/30/2013 8:44:21 AM >
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"I swore never to be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.””
- Ellie Wiesel
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