Charles Koch: A billionaire sings the blues. (Wichita Eagle photo)
If I were one of the Koch brothers, right now I’d be staring into the middle distance. I’d be wondering: What does an obscenely wealthy person have to do to get a break in this country? Now that the Kochs’ “quest to save America” is beginning to resemble the quest to find Bigfoot, somebody in that company has to be wondering how wise it is to keep throwing good money after bad. The cash went out by the boxcar load and the train came back empty. Not exactly in line with Charles Koch’s quasi-religion of “market-based management.”
That’s the brightest spot in the election for me. Obama’s re-election might not amount to much in the fullness of time, but it’s nice to know that billionaires can’t yet buy an American election outright. If there’s hope for the future, it’s less in the president’s windy rhetoric than in the images of people waiting hours to vote here in Florida. I get antsy after five minutes in line at Winn-Dixie; I salute those — Democrat and Republican — who stuck it out long enough to make their small voices heard. Just between you and me, I’d have taken one look at those lines and kept on driving.
The last thing anybody wants is more political bloviating after so many months of it, but here are a couple other observations from the least-informed pundit in America:
(a) I salute Todd Akin and Richard Mourdock for demonstrating why candidates who aren’t very smart should, when in doubt, just keep their mouths shut. Good of them to fall on their swords like that, and send the Tea Party back into the tall weeds from whence it came.
(b) You’ve got to hand it to Romney, he was classy in defeat. As I’ve mentioned before, if he’d stayed the same guy who was governor of Massachusetts, a guy like me might have voted for him. As it was, his constant shape-shifting — and being in the same party as Akin and Mourdock — that was just a few tar-babies too many. I still wish him well.
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Dave, reading your stuff is always a pleasure.
Thank you! I live for compliments.
“it’s nice to know that billionaires can’t yet buy an American election outright.” well said.
I’ll tell you something else Koch money bought: the first Republican controlled state house of representatives in Arkansas since Reconstruction. Don’t know how many other state legislatures Koch and Citizens United money bought.
Paula, I was just hearing that their money played a part in buying local and state offices in Kansas and North Carolina and a governorship in Washington. I guess massive amounts of money can buy more at the state and local level than it can at the national level.
Well said, and I can’t think of many more happy results from the election than the Koch brothers winding up a little poorer with little to show for it! 🙂 NPR did an interesting bit on just this fact today: http://www.npr.org/blogs/itsallpolitics/2012/11/07/164621525/outside-groups-spend-big-on-elections-but-dont-have-much-to-show-for-it
I wholeheartedly agree with you on the Romney of yore vs. the Romney of the campaign. Same thing happened to McCain while he was on the trail, too. He also picked a far right running mate who hurt more than helped his chances, methinks. Same thing happens to the Dems too, when they aren’t the incumbent. What is it that is so broken about our primary process that it turns leaders and coalition builders into foaming party extremists?