Shades of Grey - The Koch Brothers

My knowledge of the brothers Charles and David Koch stem from my left-sided fellow progressives. So, of course, the Koch boys are universally known as evil, power hungry monsters who single-handedly finance the entire fascist right wing of our national bird.

However, recently my bro-in-law 'borrowed' from his laundromat the December 24, 2012 issue of Forbes which featured "Inside the Koch Empire".  He passed it on to me and, I confess, ....I read it.

Turns out that there are four Koch brothers. Fred, the eldest who is 79, a graduate from Yale drama school and with no particular interest in business, lives in Monaco collecting rare books, fine art and opera manuscripts. 

Charles, whose photo is on the cover of the magazine, was next oldest at 77.  He is our vilified MIT graduate with a masters in chemical and nuclear engineering and is also chairman of Koch industries.  KI is an empire which "....boasts 60,000 employees, 4000 miles of pipeline and enough refinery capacity to supply 5% of the U.S. daily fuel demand. KI makes Lycra and Stainmaster carpet, Brawney paper towels and AngelSoft toilet paper [Georgia Pacific]."

And then there are the 72 year old twins, David and Bill who also graduated from MIT with the same degrees as Charles. David is a co-owner of Koch Industries with brother Charles but is less involved with running the business. Rather, his interests are focused upon politics and philanthropy. Bill (and Fred) was forcefully bought out of the business and started his own energy company called Oxbow Carbon.  This reminds me of Ernest, Julio and Joseph Gallo in California where Ernest and Julio focused upon wine and Joseph made cheese.

The article is quite long and in much greater depth than I can produce here, but the part I found most interesting was the strong libertarian beliefs learned from their father resulting in the 'greying' of their business oriented conservatism!

For example; Charles co-founded the libertarian think tank, the CATO Institute, and later they funded George Mason University's Mercatus Center. They also have financed much of the Federalist Society, the Heritage Foundation and several other conservative groups. 

Yet, surprisingly David Koch is a supporter of gay marriage and opposes the war on drugs!  The brothers are now actively fighting federal corporate welfare! Why? ....because they don't want to be invested in any industry "dependent on unpredictable federal largesse"!  Their only business involvement with that was the federal subsidy on ethanol where they reluctantly(?) profited (quoth the raven, "Nevermore").  They suggest that the only way to get rid of lobbyists is to  "...get government out of the business of giving goodies."  Of course, the definition of "goodies" is the real question!

Everyone on both sides are well aware that both the 'left' and the 'right' are controlled by extremists and thus our nation is at a legislative impasse. I find that more and more often, I don't agree with a particular progressive position.... yet, I don't think that I'm moving to the right! 

Perhaps this article about the Koch brothers can show us that 3 second sound bites (bytes?) are not the answer to solving our problems. Whether you agree with the the Koch philosophy.... or not, it is obvious that there are areas of agreement which can be pursued. Perhaps you can't turn an elephant's trunk into a donkey tail, but maybe we can start with some of those things we agree upon.  [AlG]