Twitter Panties Bunched By Charles Koch Supposedly Supporting Hillary
Of course, that's not what he actually said.
Kristen East reports at Politico that Koch spoke to ABC News' Jonathan Karl for an interview airing on ABC's This Week. Koch's words:
"As far as the growth of government, the increase in spending, it was two-and-a-half times under Bush that it was under Clinton," he said.Karl followed up by asking about whether or not Koch could see himself supporting Hillary Clinton.
Koch hesitated before giving an answer that didn't rule out the possibility.
"We would have to believe her actions would have to be quite different than her rhetoric, let me put it that way," he said.
Here's some of what Koch stands for -- from a WaPo op-ed he wrote about -- drum roll...Bernie Sanders:
The senator is upset with a political and economic system that is often rigged to help the privileged few at the expense of everyone else, particularly the least advantaged. He believes that we have a two-tiered society that increasingly dooms millions of our fellow citizens to lives of poverty and hopelessness. He thinks many corporations seek and benefit from corporate welfare while ordinary citizens are denied opportunities and a level playing field.I agree with him.
...Democrats and Republicans have too often favored policies and regulations that pick winners and losers. This helps perpetuate a cycle of control, dependency, cronyism and poverty in the United States. These are complicated issues, but it's not enough to say that government alone is to blame. Large portions of the business community have actively pushed for these policies.
When it comes to electing our next president, we should reward those candidates, Democrat or Republican, most committed to the principles of a free society. Those principles start with the right to live your life as you see fit as long as you don't infringe on the ability of others to do the same. They include equality before the law, free speech and free markets and treating people with dignity, respect and tolerance. In a society governed by such principles, people succeed by helping others improve their lives.
I don't expect to agree with every position a candidate holds, but all Americans deserve a president who, on balance, can demonstrate a commitment to a set of ideas and values that will lead to peace, civility and well-being rather than conflict, contempt and division. When such a candidate emerges, he or she will have my enthusiastic support.
And note that Koch said these things about Bernie despite Bernie vilifying him and his brother.
And here, from Marketplace's Kai Ryssdal, is Koch on welfare:
Koch: But here, let's go back through welfare. When LBJ started the war on poverty in 1965, his goal was to get rid of the dole as, these are his words, "I want to get rid of the dole and turn tax eaters into tax payers." OK, that's our goal, but now we've spent over 20 trillion since then on the war on poverty, and the poverty levels are the same, so this isn't working. So we need to reform it so it doesn't create these obstacles to the disadvantaged becoming productive, contributing citizens, and just sit there on the dole. And I don't believe for a minute people want that.They say, "Oh, well people are lazy." Yeah, because you block all opportunities. They smoke a joint, and they go to prison, and they can't get a job, they're ruined. Whereas we have a president who smoked a joint, and he becomes president. We have a candidate who says he smoke a joint, he's running for president. Now what's the equity, what's the fairness in that? We need to get rid of those distinctions and those differences in opportunity, and then we need to teach these kids the values and skills required for success.
Now, there will still be some who can't make it. So there needs to be a safety net. Now the question is, what's the balance between force, which our current welfare system is based on, and voluntary cooperation and competition? I would argue we have too much force just like we have in the criminal justice system, and it needs to be a balance, and we need to use local knowledge. That is are all these so-called benefits, are they helping people or hurting them? They're probably helping some, and they're hurting others because they have a disincentive to work. And as I learned that unless you start working, if you're frozen out of work, you will never learn the habits, the discipline, the values of cooperation and improvement unless you get a job, and that's what statistic show. It's, unless you get a job and keep it, you will not get out of poverty. If you do, you have a very good chance of working out of poverty.
So that's, we want the emphasis more on education and opportunity than, than dole, just like Lyndon Johnson wanted. Now, exactly how to do it? We don't have all the answers, but we think directionally we know that what's been done, in a large part isn't working, but there still needs to be a safety net.
Not the quite the demonspawn he seems to be, per how people react whenever his name comes up, huh?
He and his brother are actually for small government, criminal justice reform (especially for the poor and minorities), and gave $25 million to the United Negro College Fund. They've given tens of millions to museums for dinosaur and human evolution exhibitions. They gave $10 million to the ACLU to fight the Bush admin on the PATRIOT Act. And he condemns big bank bailouts and government handouts for the rich.
I'm sure don't agree with him on everything and approve of everything he and his brother do, but, well, I think it's pretty childish to expect that of anyone.
He is a bit naive about these programs. Government employees understandably work in their own self interest. And that is not in and of itself a bad thing. But you have to understand that when designing a bureaucracy. More people on the dole means more government works handing out that dole. So understandably the government inevitably works to expand welfare and keep people from escaping. Either the program is so small as to be insignificant and ineffective or it becomes what we currently have.
The only alternative I can think of is a defined contribution plan instead of a defined benefit plan. There is an inherent negative feedback to such structures that stabilizes them over time. As more people pile into the plan there is also less money going in to pay for it. Hence people get fewer benefits and have an incentive to get out. As fewer people take advantage of the plan benefits increase taking better care of those without other options.
As for Bush, he was an incredibly weak president. If you could get a bill to his desk he would sign it, no matter what was in it. So once we had a Democrat congress you effectively had a Democrat president. Despite how some would like to portray him he was the least imperial president in living memory.
Ben at April 24, 2016 5:52 AM
When he's not-too-subtly threatening to fire employees if they vote for Obama, I guess not.
Patrick at April 24, 2016 8:20 AM
Bush would sign almost any bill that made it to his desk, but he would use signing statements to define his position in signing it - to clarify how he would enforce it rather than straight up veto it. This is a definite sign of a president unwilling or unable to stand up to Congress and veto a bill he doesn't like.
Media reporting didn't help Bush. If he'd vetoed a welfare bill, the headline would have been "Bush hates the poor" rather than an examination of what about the bill he didn't like. He never took control of the media message (like Reagan and Clinton did).
Conan the Grammarian at April 24, 2016 8:21 AM
Koch didn't threaten to fire employees if they voted for Obama. He wouldn't know how the voted anyway.
He warned that new taxes on the company, the kind of new taxes likely to be levied by the renewal of Obama's term of office, would very likely result in further economic difficulties ("higher gas prices, runaway inflation, and other ills") that could have severe consequences to the company.
How much different was that than the Dems near-constant distortions of Romney's business record and proclamations of dire economic ruin and the massive off-shoring of jobs if Romney was elected?
Conan the Grammarian at April 24, 2016 8:39 AM
Reminds me of Standard Oil back in the day: rape, plunder, and steal, and then when you've amassed billions, fund libraries and "support the little guy".
Classic PR move.
Gog_Magog_Carpet_Reclaimers at April 24, 2016 11:28 AM
Kinda like Joe Kennedy Gog?
Bob in Texas at April 24, 2016 12:18 PM
Harry Reid hates them, so they can't be all bad.
MarkD at April 25, 2016 6:19 AM
"Kinda like Joe Kennedy Gog?"
Feel free to reference whichever overpaid sociopathic asshole you prefer.
As I have said many times on this blog, regardless of which reactionary a-hole ignores it, I'm more than sick of the left/right GOP/DNC false narrative the mainstream parties want us to buy into.
The current Sanders/Trump maelstrom is one of the greatest things that's happened to the political process in the last 30 years. The voters are disgusted with 'the system' and it's showing.
Gog_Magog_Carpet_Reclaimers at April 25, 2016 11:38 AM
Yes, but the voters are in danger of destroying a good system in their anger.
And just who elected the people that have so angered the voters? Uh, the voters.
Electing a bad president in a fit of pique is not the way to fix the system. Besides, the angry voters cannot even agree on what has them so angry. Half the voters are angry because half the people are getting too much free stuff and the other half is angry because their half is not getting enough free stuff.
Conan the Grammarian at April 25, 2016 2:13 PM
"...overpaid..."
Says yet another person prone to the "you make too much money!" argument.
Radwaste at April 26, 2016 10:41 AM
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