The Tea Party is an important part of the Koch brothers multi-pronged strategy to realize their self-serving version of social change.
As quoted in the New Yorker, David Koch said, “To bring about social change, [requires a strategy that is] vertically and horizontally integrated, from idea creation to policy development to education to grassroots organizations to lobbying to litigation to political action.” The project, he admitted, was extremely ambitious. “We have a radical philosophy,” he added.
On the weekend of July 4th, 2010, a summit was held to help Tea Party activists communicate their radical philosophy to America. It was called Texas Defending the American Dream and it was sponsored by a Koch organization known as Americans for Prosperity Foundation. Besides the requisite denunciations of President Obama, part of the summit was dedicated to “educating” Tea Party activists and “channeling” their political energy.
An advertisement cast the event as a populist uprising against vested corporate power. But this was a corporate event masquerading as a grassroots citizens movement.
The Kochs’ involvement goes back beyond the Tea Party’s inception. Today, various local branches of Americans For Prosperity help to direct Tea Party strategy and tactics.
Long before the Tea Party was born, The Koch brothers realized that they needed a mechanism to deliver their ideas to the street, and to attract the public’s support. The Kochs have been trying to develop a popular front to push forward their agenda for more than a quarter century. In 1984 David Koch created a group called Citizens for a Sound Economy, while they seemed like a grassroots movement, according to the Center for Public Integrity, it was sponsored principally by the Kochs, who provided $7.9 million between 1986 and 1993.
Although the Kochs use their capital to influence Republicans, the Citizens for a Sound Economy was a major foray into creating grassroots movements for social change, its objective was to rally voters behind their agenda.
With the Tea Party, the Kochs’ social change experiment has come of age and their war on progressivism is now being served by a “grassroots” movement.
Related Posts
Video Linking the Koch Brothers and the Tea Party
The Kochs’ Citizens for a Sound Economy Feigned Grassroots
Kochs’ Mercatus Center’s Push for Environmental Deregulation
The Koch Brothers and the Cato Institute’s Climate Denial
Koch’s Tea Party Republicans and Climate Change Denial
Kochs’ Climate Science Denial
Koch Spending on Political Influence
The Kochs’ War Against Obama and the Democrats
Supreme Court and the Koch Brothers Clandestine War
Koch Industries War with the EPA
The Kochs War on Industry Oversight and Environmental Regulation
Koch Industries’ Environmental Crimes
Koch Industries Financing Climate Denial
Koch Industries Destroys the Environment and Funds Climate Denial
The Koch Brothers’ No Climate Tax Pledge
Tea Party Bolsters Republican Commitment to Obstructionism
Tea Party’s Climate Change Denial
Tea Party Candidates and O’Donnell’s Constitution Confusion
Republican Strategy for the 2010 Midterms and Beyond
Republican Political Finance and the Midterm Elections
Republicans’ Anti-Science Stance on Global Warming
Environmental Issues in California and 5 Key Senate Races
California’s Proposition 23
The 2010 Midterms and the Fight Against Climate Change
Election 2010 Midterm Predictions
Democrat’s Chances in the 2010 Midterms
The Global Work Party and US Midterm Elections
Republicans Undermining Climate Legislation
What is Wrong with the Right
Health Care Legislation and Implications for the Environment
Green Stimulus Spending and Republican Opposition
Why We Did Not Get A Binding Agreement At COP15
Obama Needs the Senate to Succeed on Climate Change
Deniers Deprived of Misinformation Strategy
The Dangerous Diversion of Climategate
Limbaugh Blames the Sierra Club for Oil Spill
Palin Blames Environmentalists for Oil Spill
Sarah Palin: Tea Party Queen but No Friend of Green
Palin Renews Call for Offshore Oil Exploitation
Sarah Palin Belongs on Fox Not Discovery
Palin is No Friend of Green
The Business of Climate Change Deception
The New International System: The Role of Government
Discover more from Change Oracle
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
