# The Koch Bros. hit a new low -- killing a rapid-bus line in Nashville just because **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [April 1, 2014, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-koch-bros-hit-a-new-low-killing-a-rapid-bus-line-in-nashville-just-because/685112 "2014-04-01T20:07:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![DJ\_Motorbike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/90ced4/32.png) [@DJ\_Motorbike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DJ_Motorbike)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2014, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-koch-bros-hit-a-new-low-killing-a-rapid-bus-line-in-nashville-just-because/685112/101 "2014-04-04T18:20:31Z")
> [@Neidhart](#): > > Can’t find it on Google, but I recall reading about some English aristocrat in the 1830s being dead-set against railways because “these things will allow the _working classes_ to move about!” Just want to point out that I resent commie labels being attached to free people. I’m not part of a permanent fixed “class”. As far as I’m concerned its the same as calling a black person “nigger”. So, go ahead and say it to my 6’5" 250 pound work-hardened face, please. ---
**Author:** ![Lobohan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobohan/32/79_2.png) [@Lobohan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobohan)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2014, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-koch-bros-hit-a-new-low-killing-a-rapid-bus-line-in-nashville-just-because/685112/102 "2014-04-04T18:51:12Z")
> [@DJ\_Motorbike](#): > > Just want to point out that I resent commie labels being attached to free people. I’m not part of a permanent fixed “class”. As far as I’m concerned its the same as calling a black person “nigger”. > > So, go ahead and say it to my 6’5" 250 pound work-hardened face, please. There are people who work harder than you do, who have little chance at upward mobility. So maybe your work-hardened face can use the brain behind it to understand the issues we’re talking about. Or is the air too thin way up there? ---
**Author:** ![Debaser](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3da27b/32.png) [@Debaser](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Debaser)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2014, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-koch-bros-hit-a-new-low-killing-a-rapid-bus-line-in-nashville-just-because/685112/103 "2014-04-04T19:21:36Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > Bucket would be too big. Thimble, maybe. One of those sealed plastic containers they use for stool samples. You’re better than this, **'luce**. Not _much_ better, but better. ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2014, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-koch-bros-hit-a-new-low-killing-a-rapid-bus-line-in-nashville-just-because/685112/104 "2014-04-04T21:26:16Z")
> [@DJ\_Motorbike](#): > > Just want to point out that I resent commie labels being attached to free people. I’m not part of a permanent fixed “class”. Who said socio-economic classes were permanently fixed ? Well, the \*classes \*are, the people in them aren’t. Technically-speaking. In practical fact, yeah, they kinda are. No, I tell a lie, there’s plenty of downwards mobility 😛 ---
**Author:** ![woodstockbirdybird](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/woodstockbirdybird/32/7905_2.png) [@woodstockbirdybird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/woodstockbirdybird)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2014, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-koch-bros-hit-a-new-low-killing-a-rapid-bus-line-in-nashville-just-because/685112/105 "2014-04-04T22:30:07Z")
> [@DJ\_Motorbike](#): > > Just want to point out that I resent commie labels being attached to free people. I’m not part of a permanent fixed “class”. As far as I’m concerned its the same as calling a black person “nigger”. > > So, go ahead and say it to my 6’5" 250 pound work-hardened face, please. Nowhere in the quote did it say anything about class being fixed. It just said “working classes”, which, unless you live in Cloudcuckooland, will always exist. Doesn’t mean _you_ will always be a member of said class, but if you move up, presumably said aristocrat would have no problem with you using the rails. Still, you sure are a manly internet tough guy, I’ll give you that. Unless your post was all sarcastic and I’ve been whooshed. So hard to tell, what with Poe’s Law and all. ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2014, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-koch-bros-hit-a-new-low-killing-a-rapid-bus-line-in-nashville-just-because/685112/106 "2014-04-04T23:52:58Z")
Well, he does have a 250 pound face. That’s more elephantly than manly IMHO. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2014, 11:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-koch-bros-hit-a-new-low-killing-a-rapid-bus-line-in-nashville-just-because/685112/107 "2014-04-05T11:24:12Z")
> [@Debaser](#): > > [Charles Koch: I’m Fighting to Restore a Free Society](http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303978304579475860515021286?mod=hp_opinion&mg=reno64-wsj&url=http%3A%2F%2Fonline.wsj.com%2Farticle%2FSB10001424052702303978304579475860515021286.html%3Fmod%3Dhp_opinion). > > Looks like one Koch brother wrote an op-ed in the WSJ yesterday. Interesting stuff. Interesting for purposes of psychoanalysis, surely. The guy feels threatened by the political equivalent of invisible pink unicorns. His bogeyman is: [QUOTE=Charles Koch] Collectivists (those who stand for government control of the means of production and how people live their lives) [/QUOTE] That’s a political philosophy known as “communism” and there are surely at least a few hundred, maybe even a few thousand, people in the U.S.A. at present who hold that political philosophy. As a political force, they’re nonexistent. But Koch feels they have him on the ropes: [QUOTE=Charles Koch] Collectivists…promise heaven but deliver hell. For them, the promised end justifies the means. Instead of encouraging free and open debate, collectivists strive to discredit and intimidate opponents. They engage in character assassination. (I should know, as the almost daily target of their attacks.) … Such tactics are the antithesis of what is required for a free society—and a telltale sign that the collectivists do not have good answers. [/QUOTE] Yep, this tiny faction, invisible to pretty much the entire American body politic, is supposedly threatening all of our freedoms. Time to fit you for a nice white jacket, Chuck. > [@splatterpunk](#): > > Christ. Get a life. [You must be joking.](https://xkcd.com/386/) ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2014, 11:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-koch-bros-hit-a-new-low-killing-a-rapid-bus-line-in-nashville-just-because/685112/108 "2014-04-05T11:31:16Z")
> [@DJ\_Motorbike](#): > > Just want to point out that I resent commie labels being attached to free people. I’m not part of a permanent fixed “class”. As far as I’m concerned its the same as calling a black person “nigger”. > > So, go ahead and say it to my 6’5" 250 pound work-hardened face, please. [Offensensitivity!](http://yakboy.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/offensensitivity.gif) ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2014, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-koch-bros-hit-a-new-low-killing-a-rapid-bus-line-in-nashville-just-because/685112/109 "2014-04-08T17:47:05Z")
> [@Debaser](#): > > [Charles Koch: I’m Fighting to Restore a Free Society](http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303978304579475860515021286?mod=hp_opinion&mg=reno64-wsj&url=http%3A%2F%2Fonline.wsj.com%2Farticle%2FSB10001424052702303978304579475860515021286.html%3Fmod%3Dhp_opinion). > > Looks like one Koch brother wrote an op-ed in the WSJ yesterday. Interesting stuff. [Aaaannnd the head of the NRSC, Kansas Senator Jerry Moran (R-Servile), goes and reads out the silly thing on the floor!](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/04/03/charles-koch-op-ed_n_5084976.html) ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2014, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-koch-bros-hit-a-new-low-killing-a-rapid-bus-line-in-nashville-just-because/685112/110 "2014-04-21T23:43:06Z")
[And now the Kochs are going after solar power.](http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-solar-kochs-20140420,0,2718030,full.story#axzz2zWz6TwCM) :mad: > [@](#): > > Solar, once almost universally regarded as a virtuous, if perhaps over-hyped, energy alternative, has now grown big enough to have enemies. > > The Koch brothers, anti-tax activist Grover Norquist and some of the nation’s largest power companies have backed efforts in recent months to roll back state policies that favor green energy. The conservative luminaries have pushed campaigns in Kansas, North Carolina and Arizona, with the battle rapidly spreading to other states. > > Alarmed environmentalists and their allies in the solar industry have fought back, battling the other side to a draw so far. Both sides say the fight is growing more intense as new states, including Ohio, South Carolina and Washington, enter the fray. > > At the nub of the dispute are two policies found in dozens of states. One requires utilities to get a certain share of power from renewable sources. The other, known as net metering, guarantees homeowners or businesses with solar panels on their roofs the right to sell any excess electricity back into the power grid at attractive rates. > > Net metering forms the linchpin of the solar-energy business model. Without it, firms say, solar power would be prohibitively expensive. > > The power industry argues that net metering provides an unfair advantage to solar consumers, who don’t pay to maintain the power grid although they draw money from it and rely on it for backup on cloudy days. The more people produce their own electricity through solar, the fewer are left being billed for the transmission lines, substations and computer systems that make up the grid, industry officials say. > > “If you are using the grid and benefiting from the grid, you should pay for it,” said David Owens, executive vice president of the Edison Electric Institute, the advocacy arm for the industry. “If you don’t, other customers have to absorb those costs.” > > The institute has warned power companies that profits could erode catastrophically if current policies and market trends continue. If electricity companies delay in taking political action, the group warned in a report, “it may be too late to repair the utility business model.” > > The American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC, a membership group for conservative state lawmakers, recently drafted model legislation that targeted net metering. The group also helped launch efforts by conservative lawmakers in more than half a dozen states to repeal green energy mandates. > > “State governments are starting to wake up,” Christine Harbin Hanson, a spokeswoman for Americans for Prosperity, the advocacy group backed by billionaire industrialists Charles and David Koch, said in an email. The organization has led the effort to overturn the mandate in Kansas, which requires that 20% of the state’s electricity come from renewable sources. ---
**Author:** ![NDP](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ndp/32/55_2.png) [@NDP](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NDP)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2014, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-koch-bros-hit-a-new-low-killing-a-rapid-bus-line-in-nashville-just-because/685112/111 "2014-04-22T19:18:49Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > [And now the Kochs are going after solar power.](http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-solar-kochs-20140420,0,2718030,full.story#axzz2zWz6TwCM) :mad: It looks like [they’ve already got the politicos in Oklahoma to do their bidding](http://www.kitsapsun.com/news/2014/apr/22/okla-utilities-hit-homes-using-solar-with-extra/#axzz2zdyle7Pe). So, the Kochs are against government intrustion into the free market unless it’s done to discourage consumer use of solar power and keep them dependant on power generated by fossil fuels? ---
**Author:** ![Omar\_Little](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omar_little/32/269_2.png) [@Omar\_Little](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omar_Little)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2014, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-koch-bros-hit-a-new-low-killing-a-rapid-bus-line-in-nashville-just-because/685112/112 "2014-04-22T21:28:15Z")
> [@NDP](#): > > So, the Kochs are against government intrustion into the free market unless it’s done to discourage consumer use of solar power and keep them dependant on power generated by fossil fuels? I can’t speak for the KB’s, but if a business can only survive with government subsidies, then it shouldn’t be in business. The government shouldn’t interfere with competition and pick who it thinks should be the economic winners. The market should decide that. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2014, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-koch-bros-hit-a-new-low-killing-a-rapid-bus-line-in-nashville-just-because/685112/113 "2014-04-22T21:34:46Z")
> [@Omar\_Little](#): > > I can’t speak for the KB’s, but if a business can only survive with government subsidies, then it shouldn’t be in business. The government shouldn’t interfere with competition and pick who it thinks should be the economic winners. The market should decide that. Many businesses have only the government for **customers,** you know, and the arrangement can’t happen until government picks a contractor. The usual procedure, AIUI, is to give the contract to the lowest bidder . . . which might not always be a wise choice. ---
**Author:** ![Omar\_Little](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omar_little/32/269_2.png) [@Omar\_Little](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omar_Little)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2014, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-koch-bros-hit-a-new-low-killing-a-rapid-bus-line-in-nashville-just-because/685112/114 "2014-04-22T21:55:35Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Many businesses have only the government for **customers,** you know, and the arrangement can’t happen until government picks a contractor. The usual procedure, AIUI, is to give the contract to the lowest bidder . . . which might not always be a wise choice. It’s different when the government is a party in the market, such as an employer or a purchaser of goods like military equipment. But in the case where subsidies are being given to producers of solar power, it’s cronyism or corporate welfare. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2014, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-koch-bros-hit-a-new-low-killing-a-rapid-bus-line-in-nashville-just-because/685112/115 "2014-04-22T23:28:35Z")
> [@Omar\_Little](#): > > But in the case where subsidies are being given to producers of solar power, it’s cronyism or corporate welfare. That proves nothing but that cronyism/corporate welfare is not always necessarily a bad thing, which I hope we all knew already. ---
**Author:** ![NDP](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ndp/32/55_2.png) [@NDP](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NDP)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2014, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-koch-bros-hit-a-new-low-killing-a-rapid-bus-line-in-nashville-just-because/685112/116 "2014-04-23T00:02:17Z")
[QUOTE=Omar Little] But in the case where subsidies are being given to producers of solar power, it’s cronyism or corporate welfare. [/QUOTE] > [@BrainGlutton](#): > > That proves nothing but that cronyism/corporate welfare is not always necessarily a bad thing, which I hope we all knew already. Also, I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the Kochs and most of the other backers of the anti-solar legislation are heavily into fossil fuel. They’re just using the government as a tool to snuff out a rival. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2014, 1:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-koch-bros-hit-a-new-low-killing-a-rapid-bus-line-in-nashville-just-because/685112/117 "2014-05-22T01:16:18Z")
Documentary (updated) by Robert Greenwald: [_Koch Brothers Exposed: 2014 Edition._](http://www.bravenewfilms.org/koch_brothers_exposed_2014_edition) Covers [11 things the Koch brothers don’t want you to know.](http://www.salon.com/2014/05/21/11_things_the_koch_brothers_dont_want_you_to_know_partner/) ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2014, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-koch-bros-hit-a-new-low-killing-a-rapid-bus-line-in-nashville-just-because/685112/118 "2014-05-22T19:49:59Z")
[Now they’re trying to block the Detroit bankruptcy settlement.](http://www.salon.com/2014/05/22/koch_brothers_detroit_abomination_stunning_avarice_and_cruelty_reaches_new_low/) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-koch-bros-hit-a-new-low-killing-a-rapid-bus-line-in-nashville-just-because/685112.md?page=5)