Thursday, February 6, 2014

Oh Boy, Another Confidential Koch Brothers Document Is Public

Mother Jones reports:

[L]ast week, following the Kochs' first donor gathering of 2014, one attendee left behind a sensitive document at the Renaissance Esmeralda resort outside of Palm Springs, California, where the Kochs and their comrades had spent three days focused on winning the 2014 midterm elections and more. The document lists VIP donors—including John Schnatter, the founder of the Papa John's pizza chain—who were scheduled for one-on-one meetings with representatives of the political, corporate, and philanthropic wings of Kochworld. The one-page document, provided to Mother Jones by a hotel guest who discovered it, offers a fascinating glimpse into the Kochs' political machine and shows how closely intertwined it is with Koch Industries, their $115 billion conglomerate.

 he more than 40 donors courted by the Kochs include hedge fund and private-equity billionaires, real estate tycoons, and executives of top corporations, including Jockey International and TRT Holdings, owner of Omni Hotels and Gold's Gym[...]

Another top conservative contributor on the list is TRT Holdings' cofounder Robert Rowling, whose net worth is estimated at $4.9 billion. During the 2012 election, Rowling directed $3.5 million to American Crossroads, the super-PAC spearheaded by Karl Rove, and he cut a $100,000 check to the pro-Romney super-PAC Restore Our Future. According to the document, Rowling was scheduled to sit down with Charles Koch at the "Koch residence"—presumably a reference to the Wichita businessman's vacation home at the Vintage Club, a short drive from the resort where the donor conference was held. Top Koch operatives were expected to participate in this session, including Kevin Gentry, the Koch brothers' fundraising guru; Daniel Garza, the director of the Libre Initiative, a Koch-funded organization dedicated to Latino outreach; and Marc Short, who runs Freedom Partners, the centerpiece of the Kochs' political network, which distributes donor funds to a large web of conservative nonprofit groups. (Rowling did not respond to requests for comment.)

Other heavy hitters slated for meetings with the Koch brothers or their representatives included Carl Berg, a Silicon Valley real estate tycoon worth $1.1 billion; Ken Griffin, who founded the hedge fund Citadel and clocks in at No. 103 on the Forbes 400 (net worth, $4.4 billion); John W. Childs, a top private-equity investor; and Fred Klipsch, the chairman of the headphone and speaker company Klipsch Group.[...]

At least half of the one-on-one sessions involved representatives of Americans for Prosperity, the political advocacy group founded by the Koch brothers and their top political adviser and strategist, Richard Fink, a Koch Industries executive vice president and board member

5 comments:

  1. Mother Jones; shocked!!! Shocked!!!! rich people organised in politics

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  2. You seem to hate these people who create jobs. Perhaps we should wait for obama to create the jobs.

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    1. Anon 8:30AM: We do not hate people who create jobs. We take exception to people who seek to use governmental force as a means of securing advantages and privileges for themselves. There's a name for those of this ilk (several actually), and "libertarian" is not one of them. Answer Tony's question below and you'll have it.

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    2. Big deal they create jobs. They use government to get privileges which ultimately makes them richer at the expense of potential competitors and ordinary people.. As cronies, they are part of the same fascist system as Obama that has made America bankrupt..
      Jobs would be created much more easily in a free market rather than a crony market.

      Of course, superficial thinkers can't think that deep. They look at the surface and don't care about what's below.

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  3. Oh yeah, these Koch guys seem *really* libertarian.

    What was it what they called 'businessmen looking for advantageous ties with statist politicians'?

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