# Koch Brothers to Spend $900 Million on 2016 Elections **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [January 27, 2015, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967 "2015-01-27T00:52:51Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 20
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2015, 1:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967/381 "2015-02-25T01:48:27Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > It doesn’t mention individuals anywhere in the text of the First Amendment either. In fact, the First Amendment, where it protects free speech, doesn’t protect any individual or collective right. It doesn’t mention any right. It protects the speech itself. Without specifying its source. Correct? That is absolutely correct. Congress may not preemptively restrict speech, no matter the source. And this applies to foreigners as well as citizens. Elucidator’s post notwithstanding. Liberals have never supported censorship of foreign entertainment or news, so they do indeed believe that corporations and foreigners alike have extensive free speech rights. Since political speech is actually the purpose of the 1st amendment, and not art, hard as that may be to believe, the bar for restricting political speech is higher than for restricting any other type of speech. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2015, 5:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967/382 "2015-02-25T05:13:52Z")
So it’s unconstitutional to prohibit any political speech by law. Fair enough. Therefore it is unconstitutional to prohibit any political speech which is based in outright fraud. Correct? ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2015, 7:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967/383 "2015-02-25T07:00:16Z")
Seems that the only factor of speech that is absitively and posolutely sacred and inviolable is the _quantity_ of speech. Unlike, say, voting rights which are very much quantifiable, one person, one vote. In theory, at least. You cannot have more than your allotment of one. Not supposed to. Speech, however, has a different essence, which defies quantity as a measure. All speech of whatever quantity is equally sacred and inviolate. Doesn’t matter how much you got or how little the other guy got, you are both equal. If you have one apple and Timmy has ten apples, you both have apple. And every citizen has a sacred and inviolate right to have as much speech as he can get, by whatever means he gets it. Money being the most practical and hence, preferred. And if that means that a class of inherited money can exert a political will far out of proportion to their actual numbers, really, what could possibly go wrong? The force of their self-interest, enlightened or dark, will naturally result in political persuasion of a somber and prudent view. From people who actually have “skin in the game”! Not just their own, but yours as well! And who knows but that some future generations of political science scholars, in pursuit of a master’s thesis on the origins of **adaher** ian Constitutional theology might find that the light first dawned in an obscure message board… ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2015, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967/384 "2015-02-25T14:03:04Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > The Kochs are natural persons. It should not be in dispute whether or not they can spend as much as they like. That is certainly subject to dispute too. Not everyone agrees with the premise that money equals speech, and that’s been debated to death here. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2015, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967/385 "2015-02-25T14:30:17Z")
Sorry, but freedom of the press covers that. Freedom of speech is not limited to what you can say with your own voice. Freedom of the press is the freedom to use the technology of mass communications to spread your message. This idea that speech that was enabled by the use of money is not speech is illogical and insidious. Such a concept would be used much like the interstate commerce clause is today, to allow regulation of any speech where money was involved, So you buy a microphone, now it’s paid speech and therefore not really speech. This concept also means the media can be regulated at will. Everything the media produces is paid speech, very expensive paid speech. If the law can regulate the Kochs, it can regulate CNN. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2015, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967/386 "2015-02-25T19:43:58Z")
Does the FCC regulate CNN? Is that “unConstitutional”? If everything the media produces is speech, and the media is regulated, then speech is already regulated. The question is not whether or not speech is regulated, it is and pretty much always has been. The question is whether or not it is regulated fairly and equally. You keep insisting on your dogma of Constitutional theology, of sacred rights that cannot be infringed, except that they _have_ been infringed in many ways, some of them odious. But one first has to accept your dogma, your flat statement of truth, or one need not agree with your conclusions. And this one does not. And this one is not alone. It isn’t the Founding Fuckups fault that they did not create a Constitution more directly relevant to our times and our situation, they couldn’t imagine our times and our situation. Trying to solve twenty first century problems and issues by unswerving allegiance to eighteenth century methods is stupid. In the 18th Century, the Constitution was a bold adventure in government. But that was then. And this is now. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2015, 10:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967/387 "2015-02-26T22:19:34Z")
The FCC does not regulate CNN’s content. Claiming that because newspapers can’t just chop down any trees they want, that means that we can regulate what newspapers report on, is pretty thin logic. As is the concept that because our laws are old, that they should just be reinterpreted rather than changed through the proper processes. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 6:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967/388 "2015-02-27T06:58:57Z")
The FCC doesn’t regulate content? Not advertising. Not swears. Not nudity or explicit sexual content? Not public service announcements. Nothing like that? Well, then, what does the FCC do? I mean, I thought they were one of those regulatory agencies, and that they are assigned to regulate “communications”. But they don’t? Do they count boll weevils in Georgia? Pretty sure they don’t deliver the mail… Chase Yogi Bear around Jellystone Park? ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 8:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967/389 "2015-02-27T08:26:42Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > The FCC doesn’t regulate content? Not advertising. Not swears. Not nudity or explicit sexual content? Not public service announcements. Nothing like that? Well, then, what does the FCC do? The FCC’s ability to regulate cable content is very limited. Cable is not “the public airwaves”, so the “compelling interest” that justifies regulation is non-existent. And they certainly cannot prevent CNN from going all-in with their billion dollar budget to back Jeb Bush’s candidacy. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967/390 "2015-02-27T16:26:15Z")
Ah, you are clarifying your position! That’s good, we have clarified from “does not!” to “OK, does, but only a little.” We have great hopes for your future development. Some hope. A little. But CNN is all in for Jeb? Wow, this might just be the break the Draft Romney movement has been waiting for! ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967/391 "2015-02-27T17:06:03Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > The FCC does not regulate CNN’s content. > [@elucidator](#): > > The FCC doesn’t regulate content? Not advertising. Not swears. Not nudity or explicit sexual content? Not public service announcements. Nothing like that? Well, then, what does the FCC do? > > I mean, I thought they were one of those regulatory agencies, and that they are assigned to regulate “communications”. But they don’t? > > Do they count boll weevils in Georgia? Pretty sure they don’t deliver the mail… Chase Yogi Bear around Jellystone Park? > [@adaher](#): > > The FCC’s ability to regulate cable content is very limited. Cable is not “the public airwaves”, so the “compelling interest” that justifies regulation is non-existent. And they certainly cannot prevent CNN from going all-in with their billion dollar budget to back Jeb Bush’s candidacy. > [@elucidator](#): > > Ah, you are clarifying your position! That’s good, we have clarified from “does not!” to “OK, does, but only a little.” We have great hopes for your future development. Some hope. A little. > > But CNN is all in for Jeb? Wow, this might just be the break the Draft Romney movement has been waiting for! As I read **adaher** ’s comment, it was: “The FCC does not regulate CNN’s content.” **elucidator** seemed to disagree, asking about advertising, swears, nudity and explicit sexual content. So far as I understand, that’s correct: since CNN is a cable channel, not a broadcast channel, the FCC does not regulate CNN’s use of advertising, swears, nudity and explicit sexual content. I welcome factual correction on this point; always willing to learn. Please, **elucidator** , educate me: am I wrong? Does the FCC regulate CNN’s use of advertising, swears, nudity and explicit sexual content? Do they regulate any other content of CNN’s? ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967/392 "2015-02-27T18:35:10Z")
Wait, what’s this? This is the path I take through the forest, everyday, on my way to gather nuts and berries. And today, right in the middle of the path, is a circle of leaves! How very odd, not the sort of thing you see everyday, not like wind blown leaves, but almost as if they had been gathered and spread. Like, hiding something. And over there, a pile of fresh dirt, recently dug… And that vague scent of lawyer. I’m wondering, could this be a _trap_? If I step on those leaves, will I find myself at the bottom of a hole, with B’rer **Bricker** frolicking around above, doing his _Gotchaya_! dance? Tell you what, Hoss. Why don’t you just say what it is you got to say, and don’t waste time with this crapola. I wasn’t born yesterday, I just look this way because of clean living and brown rice… ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 10:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967/393 "2015-02-27T22:50:34Z")
I’m trying to engage with the reformers because I sympathize with their concerns. But this is an issue where normally very intelligent people suddenly get very lazy in their thinking. It’s as if they don’t realize that if you’re going to hand power over to Congress to control what political speech reaches the masses that it should be done very carefully. The stampede for campaign finance reform reminds me a lot of the stampede to pass the Patriot Act. Do something, think about it later. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2015, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967/394 "2015-02-28T13:55:41Z")
Yeah, because just about two weeks ago we discovered all this stuff, and we’re totally in panic mode. Right. Sure. You betcha. If only we had the good sense to leave the governance of our country to the guys who own it. But we appreciate your sympathy. Gee, that’s really swell! ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2015, 2:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967/395 "2015-02-28T14:01:49Z")
That’s what makes it worse. Despite years to figure out a solution, the best your side can come up with is an amendment that says, “Congress can regulate any political spending it wants except for the media”. Brilliant, what could possibly go wrong? ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2015, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967/396 "2015-02-28T15:31:42Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > That’s what makes it worse. Despite years to figure out a solution, the best your side can come up with is an amendment that says, “Congress can regulate any political spending it wants except for the media”. Brilliant, what could possibly go wrong? Really just a useless platitude when one sees the results of what the Kochs and others are doing: [http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/national-party-news/233967-tea-party-anaconda-swallows-the-republican-party](http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/national-party-news/233967-tea-party-anaconda-swallows-the-republican-party) > [@](#): > > Tea Party anaconda swallows the Republican Party > > You’ve seen it, too: A giant snake swallowing an even bigger animal, perhaps a wandering cow or feral pig. The image makes for great nature TV. And as a political metaphor, the efficiency of the giant snake best describes how the Tea Party, now in the midst of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) crisis, is swallowing the Republican elephant. > > As Republican factions continue to struggle with getting out of the DHS funding trap they themselves set, seemingly incapable of advancing with a clean bill in the House in spite of the Senate’s overwhelming 98-2 vote in favor of funding America’s premier anti-terrorism agencies, the country looks on with a sinking feeling. > > Sure, Republicans, at least since President Reagan, have identified “the” problem as the government itself. That, of course, did not keep Reagan from working with Democrats on a slew of reforms, including extending the lives of Social Security and Medicare. For a man who grew up in the Depression, the idea of old people falling into poverty after retirement was an all-too-clear possibility for Reagan — and Social Security had forever changed that grim reality of American society. > [@](#): > > So why is the free market failing so badly in consigning trickle-down and the broader Tea Party agenda into the dustbin of history? Short answer: There is no free market of ideas in the United States. You have to pay to play in our democracy now. > > The outsized influence of unregulated corporate and wealthy donor money that now lubricates American politics and policy-making has taken away the possibility to really debate and challenge Republican Party orthodoxy. In an unintentionally revelatory disclosure, anti-immigration hardliner Rep. Tim Huelskamp (R-Kan.), trying to justify the blocking of the DHS funding bill, told The Hill, “If I was a donor to some of these senators that just won election and was told things would be different in a new Senate, I’d be pretty pissed. We put [Senate Minority Leader] Harry Reid [D-Nev.] back in charge of the Senate again?” > > The “we” in Huelskamp’s declaration refers to GOP donors. Without even blushing, the congressman betrays his true priorities: the opinion of hefty wallets driving their private agendas through big donations to people like Huelskamp and the rest of the GOP. > > Conspicuously absent is any concern from the congressman about the voters — or even the citizenry at large — who could be put at risk should DHS lose its funding due to a Tea Party maneuver to destroy President Obama’s immigration executive order, a stunt that has failed spectacularly. > > This progression makes perfect sense. The Tea Party is a manufactured platform, created by Koch brothers money, executed by former GOP operatives, as well as Koch affiliates like Americans for Prosperity, and focused on electing a Congress that would reflect the will and priorities of special economic interests and their beneficiaries. The initial $12 million investment by the Koch machine into Freedomworks to get the ball rolling was a masterful exercise in Machiavellian pure power politics. > > With the anaconda’s awesome strength, the Tea Party has devoured the much larger, supposedly more powerful Republican Party. Americans are paying close attention to the gruesome, yet fascinating spectacle. And that should worry the few remaining real Republicans. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2015, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967/397 "2015-02-28T15:38:58Z")
“See what they are doing? We have to do something!” is not a proposal. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2015, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967/398 "2015-02-28T15:45:04Z")
First, you tell us that we can’t propose anything because it will violate the sacred Constitution. Then you give us shit for not proposing anything. Then you tell us how sympathetic you are, but, really, there’s no practical way to do anything so, goshdarn it, we’ll just have to suck it up. Damned shame about that, but that’s just the way it is! At least there’s some variety, the answer is always NO! but for different reasons. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2015, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967/399 "2015-02-28T16:31:26Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > “See what they are doing? We have to do something!” is not a proposal. The point that you miss is that even the Republicans that want to be reasonable are being pushed aside. If the money flow can not be stopped, voters should at least be able to detect the influence buying that’s likely to follow, incidentally I already mentioned that a lot of corporations are being transparent about what they are doing with their money, and are asking that others do not hide in obfuscations like Donor’s Trust, the implication that you missed is that part of the reform has to include rules to prevent any attempts at hiding the sources of the money. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2015, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967/400 "2015-03-01T14:27:38Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > First, you tell us that we can’t propose anything because it will violate the sacred Constitution. Then you give us shit for not proposing anything. Then you tell us how sympathetic you are, but, really, there’s no practical way to do anything so, goshdarn it, we’ll just have to suck it up. Damned shame about that, but that’s just the way it is! > > At least there’s some variety, the answer is always NO! but for different reasons. Actually, I’ve made some suggestions, but exactly what you think the problem is is a moving target. Define the problem, then come up with a legal solution. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967.md?page=19) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koch-brothers-to-spend-900-million-on-2016-elections/710967.md?page=21)