So over the past few weeks so there has been some Koch news so I thought I would let people know my take on what is going on (after all I believe my blog has more posts about Koch than any other site on the internet).
The semi-annual seminars have been taking place since 2003. With a meeting from August 1-August 3, 2015 with private donors in Dana Point, California at the St. Regis Monarch Beach resort (as I write this rooms start at $655/night) 450 wealth donors (people who have created tremendous value in society) gathered for the semi-annual "Koch Seminar" which was has the title of "Unleashing Our Free Society". Membership fees are around $100,000 per year. Only 9 organizations were invited to the seminar. The conditions were that the media could not interview donors without there permission and had could only take notes pad and paper (very old-school indeed). Although the list of donors are not known this leaked memo from a previous seminar would give you a pretty idea of who would be at the seminar. In the note that Charles Koch sent out to attendees he also attached this 2014 Wall-Street Journal article about William Gladstone who was the 19th century Prime Minster of Britain. Charles Koch said that this current battle is for "the life or death of this country".
The actual text of the speech that Charles gave donors can be found here from Bloomberg. He says that "our mission, as we say, is to unleash our free society and expand opportunity for everyone". He goes on to talk about a free society being a "society that maximizes peace, civility, and well being for everybody". Charles then goes on to discuss how GDP is a bad measure for the economy. This article from FEE does a good job of explaining why GDP is a bad measure for the economy. Charles then goes on to talk about if we can achieve a 4% growth rate we can take the average American from $42,000 per year to $100,000 (just the magic of compound interest).
One area that I think liberals actually agree with the Koch brothers on is criminal justice reform. Even President Obama mentioned the Koch brothers effort on criminal justice saying "You've got to give them credit. You've got to call it like you see it" as this WSJ article discusses. In a recent interview with the Washington Post to the surprise of some people when talking about crime Koch says "to me, if someone is committing a crime, to deal with it to use minimum force necessary to prevent the crime..there has got to be a way to stop that. I mean, I'd let the guy go. No big deal. He's not really hurting-maybe he's avoiding taxes or something, but to end up in death is outrageous". Perhaps to Charles Koch Black Lives Matter.
In a rare interview with the Washington Post Koch talked about the 2016 election and his views. People claim that the Koch brothers have so much power. This of course is just nonsense. Has a Koch brother ever forced you to pay taxes, stop at a stop sign, or get a permit? The answer to all these questions is obviously no. However, government can force people into doing all of these things since they are truly the ones with power. When asked about seeing a Republican in the White House Charles Koch replies that he is a "classical liberal". The problem is that Republicans do pretty much the same thing as Democrats once in office. The best quote from Charles in the whole interview is when he says "I think the Democrats are taking us down the road of serfdom at 100 miles an hour, and I think Republicans are taking us at 70 miles an hour". He is a big fan of Calvin Coolidge who would make modern day Republicans look like middle of the road candidates. One item that Charles would eliminate is welfare for both the rich (corporate) and poor. Koch then goes on to discuss in this article how the banks are the biggest proponents of corporate welfare.The banks he says "got massive bailouts,virtually free money from the Fed, and regulations that are crushing the smaller banks, the community banks". The Federal Reserve now decides what banks can do now, what products they can offer, and even can decide when a bank pays out a dividend. Of course the largest banks are major contributors to both political parties.
Koch Industries benefits from the fact that U.S. based companies are not allowed to export natural gas overseas to foreign countries where the price is actually much higher than it is here in the U.S. Something that I didn't know was that Koch Industries uses about 4% of the industrial consumption of natural gas (the division in charge of this is Koch Global Supply and Gas-company information can be found here. Currently, natural gas prices are near all time lows. Anyways, Koch benefits and as other liberal bloggers have reported Koch has received millions in corporate subsidies. However, Koch is still for abolishing all corporate subsidies. To be perfectly honest Koch does roughly $115 billion in revenue (profit as I estimated in this blog post is roughly $6-$10 billion/year). Koch could still be profitable without the subsidies. Charles Koch relies on the principal of treating everyone equal (this is a libertarian concept after all).
When asked about climate change Koch admits "well, I mean I believe it's been warming some". He goes on to say though there could be a measurement problem with how the temperature is measured (on ground vs. in the sky). What he doesn't agree with is that it will be "catastrophic". According to Koch, "there is no evidence of that. they have these models that show it but the models don't work..to be scientific, it has to be testable and refutable". Let's remember that science is not a democracy. Charles also has a couple of masters degrees in engineering from M.I.T. too. The question is whether you want to reduce economic growth for something that may have a very small chance of happening. Charles Koch even had dinner with Bill Gates in which they discussed climate change (for the record Gates who is a big Democrat pointed out that Koch was a "very nice person". I honestly believe that if there was enough evidence to show that there was a large possibility of "climate change" destroying the earth Koch would shift his opinion on the subject. Brother David Koch has said that global warming is actually a positive since extending the growing seasons in the northern hemisphere which will allow more land will be able to produce food. In a breakfast speech that Bill Koch gave to 600 people at the Palm Beach Chamber of Commerce October 17, 2013 said he isn't a believe in global warming and actually believe we could be lead to a mini-ice age. Bill Koch has some science background since he has a PhD in chemical engineering from M.I.T. saying that people who are calling for carbon dioxide emissions are "on acid". He goes on to say the best way to reduce carbon emissions is to plant trees. Koch says that "to get away from carbon dioxide the human race will have to move to another planet".
It appears that the Kochs are being less secretive as they are now allowing the media to attend their events (although some of them complain about the access as reported here). Let's remember that this is a private party and people can either decide to be there or not. On the other side in this recent WSJ article Koch donors are tired of being demonized. Donors recently wrote a letter to the Dallas Morning News describing what the Koch brothers want.
If I were in charge of the seminar I would videotape and record all the sessions to show the public that these people are really not evil and just want to see more freedom and liberty. Part of the reason I don't think the media continues not to like the Koch brothers is because they still see them as secretive. I personally don't think even some of the crazy liberals would go after 450 individuals who have different beliefs. If there were only 4 donors I might change my view. Part of the reason why I think Koch has been more open recently is the number of death threats, cyber attacks, and name calling that has been going on for years. This transformation was recently talked about by the New York Times here. If I would were advising the Koch brothers I would tell them to continue to be even more open so people can understand their values, beliefs, in order to not distort them which I would think in the long run lead to fewer death threats, cyber attacks, and just fundamental misunderstanding.
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