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44 THE NEW YORKER, AUGUST 30, 2010
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A REPORTER AT LARGE COVERT OPERATIONS
The billionaire brothers who are waging a war against Obama. BY JANE MAYER
n May 17th, a black-tie audience at office said that a scheduling conflict had the Metropolitan Opera House ap- prevented her from attending. Yet had Oplauded as a tall, jovial-looking billionaire the First Lady shared the stage with Koch took the stage. It was the seventieth an- it might have created an awkward tab- nual spring gala of American Ballet The- leau. In Washington, Koch is best known atre, and David H. Koch was being cele- as part of a family that has repeatedly brated for his generosity as a member of funded stealth attacks on the federal gov- the board of trustees; he had recently do- ernment, and on the Obama Administra- nated $2.5 million toward the company’s tion in particular. upcoming season, and had given many With his brother Charles, who is sev- millions before that. Koch received an enty-four, David Koch owns virtually all award while flanked by two of the gala’s of Koch Industries, a conglomerate, head- co-chairs, Blaine Trump, in a peach- quartered in Wichita, Kansas, whose an- colored gown, and Caroline Kennedy nual revenues are estimated to be a hun- Schlossberg, in emerald green. Kennedy’s dred billion dollars. The company has mother, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, had grown spectacularly since their father, been a patron of the ballet and, coinciden- Fred, died, in 1967, and the brothers took tally, the previous owner of a Fifth Ave- charge. The Kochs operate oil refineries nue apartment that Koch had bought, in in Alaska, Texas, and Minnesota, and 1995, and then sold, eleven years later, for control some four thousand miles of pipe- thirty-two million dollars, having found it line. Koch Industries owns Brawny paper too small. towels, Dixie cups, Georgia-Pacific lum- The gala marked the social ascent of ber, Stainmaster carpet, and Lycra, Koch, who, at the age of seventy, has be- among other products. Forbes ranks it as come one of the city’s most prominent the second-largest private company in the philanthropists. In 2008, he donated a country, after Cargill, and its consistent hundred million dollars to modernize profitability has made David and Charles Lincoln Center’s New York State Theatre Koch—who, years ago, bought out two building, which now bears his name. He other brothers—among the richest men has given twenty million to the Ameri- in America. Their combined fortune of can Museum of Natural History, whose thirty-five billion dollars is exceeded only dinosaur wing is named for him. This by those of Bill Gates and Warren Buffett. spring, after noticing the decrepit state The Kochs are longtime libertarians of the fountains outside the Metropoli- who believe in drastically lower personal tan Museum of Art, Koch pledged at least and corporate taxes, minimal social ser- ten million dollars for their renovation. He vices for the needy, and much less over- is a trustee of the museum, perhaps the sight of industry—especially environmen- most coveted social prize in the city, and tal regulation. These views dovetail with serves on the board of Memorial Sloan- the brothers’ corporate interests. In a Kettering Cancer Center, where, after he study released this spring, the University donated more than forty million dollars, of Massachusetts at Amherst’s Political an endowed chair and a research center Economy Research Institute named were named for him. Koch Industries one of the top ten air pol- One dignitary was conspicuously ab- luters in the United States. And Green- sent from the gala: the event’s third hon- peace issued a report identifying the com- orary co-chair, Michelle Obama. Her pany as a “kingpin of climate science
David H. Koch in 1996. He and his brother Charles are lifelong libertarians and have quietly given more than a hundred million dollars to right-wing causes.
TNY—2010_08_30—PAGE 45—133SC.—LIVE ART R19927—CRITICAL PHOTOGRAPH TO BE WATCHED THROUGHOUT ENTIRE PRESS RUN denial.” The report showed that, from called Texas Defending the American to support the tea parties.” David Koch 2005 to 2008, the Kochs vastly outdid Dream took place in a chilly hotel ball- told New York, “I’ve never been to a tea- ExxonMobil in giving money to organi- room in Austin. Though Koch freely pro- party event. No one representing the tea zations fighting legislation related to cli- motes his philanthropic ventures, he did party has ever even approached me.” mate change, underwriting a huge net- not attend the summit, and his name was At the lectern in Austin, however, work of foundations, think tanks, and not in evidence. And on this occasion the Venable—a longtime political operative political front groups. Indeed, the broth- audience was roused not by a dance per- who draws a salary from Americans for ers have funded opposition campaigns formance but by a series of speakers de- Prosperity, and who has worked for against so many Obama Administration nouncing President Barack Obama. Peggy Koch-funded political groups since policies—from health-care reform to the Venable, the organizer of the summit, 1994—spoke less warily. “We love what economic-stimulus program—that, in warned that Administration officials “have the Tea Parties are doing, because that’s political circles, their ideological network a socialist vision for this country.” how we’re going to take back America!” is known as the Kochtopus. Five hundred people attended the she declared, as the crowd cheered. In a In a statement, Koch Industries said summit, which served, in part, as a train- subsequent interview, she described her- that the Greenpeace report “distorts the ing session for Tea Party activists in Texas. self as an early member of the movement, environmental record of our companies.” An advertisement cast the event as a pop- joking, “I was part of the Tea Party before And David Koch, in a recent, admiring ar- ulist uprising against vested corporate it was cool!” She explained that the role of ticle about him in New York, protested power. “Today, the voices of average Americans for Prosperity was to help “ed- that the “radical press” had turned his fam- Americans are being drowned out by lob- ucate” Tea Party activists on policy details, ily into “whipping boys,” and had exagger- byists and special interests,” it said. “But and to give them “next-step training” after ated its influence on American politics. you can do something about it.” The pitch their rallies, so that their political energy But Charles Lewis, the founder of the made no mention of its corporate funders. could be channelled “more effectively.” Center for Public Integrity, a nonpartisan The White House has expressed frustra- And she noted that Americans for Pros- watchdog group, said, “The Kochs are on tion that such sponsors have largely eluded perity had provided Tea Party activists a whole different level. There’s no one else public notice. David Axelrod, Obama’s se- with lists of elected officials to target. She who has spent this much money. The nior adviser, said, “What they don’t say is said of the Kochs, “They’re certainly our sheer dimension of it is what sets them that, in part, this is a grassroots citizens’ people. David’s the chairman of our apart. They have a pattern of lawbreaking, movement brought to you by a bunch of board. I’ve certainly met with them, and political manipulation, and obfuscation. oil billionaires.” I’m very appreciative of what they do.” I’ve been in Washington since Watergate, In April, 2009, Melissa Cohlmia, a Venable honored several Tea Party and I’ve never seen anything like it. They company spokesperson, denied that the “citizen leaders” at the summit. The Texas are the Standard Oil of our times.” Kochs had direct links to the Tea Party, branch of Americans for Prosperity gave saying that Americans for Prosperity is its Blogger of the Year Award to a young few weeks after the Lincoln Center “an independent organization and Koch woman named Sibyl West. On June 14th, gala, the advocacy wing of the companies do not in any way direct their West, writing on her site, described AAmericans for Prosperity Foundation— activities.” Later, she issued a statement: Obama as the “cokehead in chief.” In an an organization that David Koch started, “No funding has been provided by Koch online thread, West speculated that the in 2004—held a different kind of gather- companies, the Koch foundations, or President was exhibiting symptoms of ing. Over the July 4th weekend, a summit Charles Koch or David Koch specifically “demonic possession (aka schizophrenia, etc.).” The summit featured several paid speakers, including Janine Turner, the ac- tress best known for her role on the tele- vision series “Northern Exposure.” She declared, “They don’t want our children to know about their rights. They don’t want our children to know about a God!” During a catered lunch, Venable intro- duced Ted Cruz, a former solicitor gen- eral of Texas, who told the crowd that Obama was “the most radical President ever to occupy the Oval Office,” and had hidden from voters a secret agenda—“the government taking over our economy and our lives.” Countering Obama, Cruz pro- claimed, was “the epic fight of our gener- ation!” As the crowd rose to its feet and cheered, he quoted the defiant words of a Texan at the Alamo: “Victory, or death!” “You’re depressed? My depression makes your depression look like euphoria.” Americans for Prosperity has worked
TNY—2010_08_30—PAGE 46—133SC—LIVE ART A15208 closely with the Tea Party since the move- and the “range of his public interests.” munists have infiltrated both the Demo- ment’s inception. In the weeks before the The Republican campaign consultant crat and Republican Parties.” He wrote first Tax Day protests, in April, 2009, said of the family’s political activities, “To admiringly of Benito Mussolini’s sup- Americans for Prosperity hosted a Web call them under the radar is an under- pression of Communists in Italy, and dis- site offering supporters “Tea Party Talk- statement. They are underground!” An- paragingly of the American civil-rights ing Points.” The Arizona branch urged other former Koch adviser said, “They’re movement. “The colored man looms people to send tea bags to Obama; the smart. This right-wing, redneck stuff large in the Communist plan to take over Missouri branch urged members to sign works for them. They see this as a way to America,” he warned. Welfare was a se- up for “Taxpayer Tea Party Registration” get things done without getting dirty cret plot to attract rural blacks to cities, and provided directions to nine protests. themselves.” Rob Stein, a Democratic where they would foment “a vicious race The group continues to stoke the rebel- political strategist who has studied the war.” In a 1963 speech that prefigures the lion. The North Carolina branch recently conservative movement’s finances, said Tea Party’s talk of a secret socialist plot, launched a “Tea Party Finder” Web site, that the Kochs are “at the epicenter of the Koch predicted that Communists would advertised as “a hub for all the Tea Parties anti-Obama movement. But it’s not just “infiltrate the highest offices of govern- in North Carolina.” about Obama. They would have done ment in the U.S. until the President is a The anti-government fervor infusing the same to Hillary Clinton. They did Communist, unknown to the rest of us.” the 2010 elections represents a political the same with Bill Clinton. They are out Koch married Mary Robinson, the triumph for the Kochs. By giving money to destroy progressivism.” daughter of a Missouri physician, and they to “educate,” fund, and organize Tea Party had four sons: Freddie, Charles, and protesters, they have helped turn their pri- ddly enough, the fiercely capitalist twins, David and William. John Dam- vate agenda into a mass movement. Bruce Koch family owes part of its fortune gard, the president of the Futures Indus- Bartlett, a conservative economist and a Oto Joseph Stalin. Fred Koch was the son try Association, was David’s schoolmate historian, who once worked at the Na- of a Dutch printer who settled in Texas and friend. He recalled that Fred Koch tional Center for Policy Analysis, a Dal- and ran a weekly newspaper. Fred at- was “a real John Wayne type.” Koch em- las-based think tank that the Kochs fund, tended M.I.T., where he earned a degree phasized rugged pursuits, taking his sons said, “The problem with the whole liber- in chemical engineering. In 1927, he in- big-game hunting in Africa, and requiring tarian movement is that it’s been all chiefs vented a more efficient process for con- them to do farm labor at the family ranch. and no Indians. There haven’t been any verting oil into gasoline, but, according to The Kochs lived in a stone mansion on a actual people, like voters, who give a crap family lore, America’s major oil compa- large compound across from Wichita’s about it. So the problem for the Kochs has nies regarded him as a threat and shut him country club; in the summer, the boys been trying to create a movement.” With out of the industry. Unable to succeed at could hear their friends splashing in the the emergence of the Tea Party, he said, home, Koch found work in the Soviet pool, but they were not allowed to join “everyone suddenly sees that for the first Union. In the nineteen-thirties, his com- them. “By instilling a work ethic in me at time there are Indians out there—people pany trained Bolshevik engineers and an early age, my father did me a big favor, who can provide real ideological power.” helped Stalin’s regime set up fifteen mod- although it didn’t seem like a favor back The Kochs, he said, are “trying to shape ern oil refineries. Over time, however, then,” Charles has written. “By the time I and control and channel the populist up- Stalin brutally purged several of Koch’s was eight, he made sure work occupied rising into their own policies.” Soviet colleagues. Koch was deeply most of my spare time.” David Koch re- A Republican campaign consultant affected by the experience, and regretted called that his father also indoctrinated the who has done research on behalf of his collaboration. He returned to the U.S. boys politically. “He was constantly speak- Charles and David Koch said of the Tea In the headquarters of his company, Rock ing to us children about what was wrong Party, “The Koch brothers gave the Island Oil & Refining, in Wichita, he with government,” he told Brian Doherty, money that founded it. It’s like they put kept photographs aimed at proving that an editor of the libertarian magazine Rea- the seeds in the ground. Then the rain- some of those Soviet refineries had been son, and the author of “Radicals for Capi- storm comes, and the frogs come out of destroyed in the Second World War. Gus talism,” a 2007 history of the libertarian the mud—and they’re our candidates!” diZerega, a former friend of Charles movement. “It’s something I grew up The Kochs and their political oper- Koch, recalled, “As the Soviets became a with—a fundamental point of view that atives declined requests for interviews. stronger military power, Fred felt a certain big government was bad, and imposition Instead, a prominent New York public- amount of guilt at having helped build of government controls on our lives and relations executive who is close with them up. I think it bothered him a lot.” economic fortunes was not good.” the Kochs put forward two friends: In 1958, Fred Koch became one of the David attended Deerfield Academy, George Pataki, the former gover- original members of the John Birch Soci- in Massachusetts, and Charles was sent to nor of New York, and Mortimer Zuck- ety, the arch-conservative group known, military school. Charles, David, and Wil- erman, the publisher and real-estate in part, for a highly skeptical view of gov- liam all earned engineering degrees at magnate. Pataki, a Republican who ernance and for spreading fears of a Com- their father’s alma mater, M.I.T., and received campaign donations from munist takeover. Members considered later joined the family company. Charles David Koch, called him “a patriot who President Dwight D. Eisenhower to be a eventually assumed control, with David as cares deeply about his country.” Zuck- Communist agent. In a self-published his deputy; William’s career at the com- erman praised David’s “gentle decency” broadside, Koch claimed that “the Com- pany was less successful. Freddie went to
THE NEW YORKER, AUGUST 30, 2010 47
TNY—2010_08_30—PAGE 47—133SC. Harvard and studied playwriting at the shifted to any kind of regulation at all. ‘So- in the company for nearly a billion dollars. Yale School of Drama. His father report- cialism’ kept being defined downwards.” But the antagonism remained, and litiga- edly disapproved of him, and punished Members of the John Birch Society de- tion continued for seventeen more years, him financially. (Freddie, through a veloped an interest in a school of Austrian with the brothers hiring rival private inves- spokesperson, denied this.) economists who promoted free-market tigators; in 1990, they walked past one an- In 1967, after Fred Koch died, of a ideals. Charles and David Koch were par- other with stony expressions at their heart attack, Charles renamed the busi- ticularly influenced by the work of Fried- mother’s funeral. Eventually, Freddie ness Koch Industries, in honor of his fa- rich von Hayek, the author of “The Road moved to Monaco, which has no income ther. Fred Koch’s will made his sons ex- to Serfdom” (1944), which argued that tax. He bought historic estates in France, traordinarily wealthy. David Koch joked centralized government planning led, in- Austria, and elsewhere, filling them with about his good fortune in a 2003 speech exorably, to totalitarianism. Hayek’s belief art, antiques, opera scores, and literary to alumni at Deerfield, where, after pledg- in unfettered capitalism has proved inspi- manuscripts. William founded his own ing twenty-five million dollars, he was rational to many conservatives, and to energy company, Oxbow, and turned to made the school’s sole “lifetime trustee.” anti-Soviet dissidents; lately, Tea Party yachting; he spent an estimated sixty-five He said, “You might ask: How does supporters have championed his work. In million dollars to win the America’s Cup, David Koch happen to have the wealth to June, the talk-radio host Glenn Beck, who in 1992. be so generous? Well, let me tell you a has supported the Tea Party rebellion, With Charles as the undisputed chair- story. It all started when I was a little boy. promoted “The Road to Serfdom” on his man and C.E.O., Koch Industries ex- One day, my father gave me an apple. I show; the paperback soon became a No. 1 panded rapidly. Roger Altman, who heads soon sold it for five dollars and bought best-seller on Amazon. (Beck appears to the investment-banking firm Evercore, two apples and sold them for ten. Then I be a fan of the Kochs; in the midst of a re- told me that the company’s performance bought four apples and sold them for cent on-air parody of Al Gore, Beck said, has been “beyond phenomenal.” Charles twenty. Well, this went on day after day, without explanation, “I want to thank remained in Wichita, with his wife and week after week, month after month, year Charles Koch for this information.” Beck two children, guarding his privacy while after year, until my father died and left me declined to elaborate on the relationship.) supporting community charities. David three hundred million dollars!” Charles and David also became devo- moved to New York City, where he is an David and Charles had absorbed their tees of a more radical thinker, Robert executive vice-president of the company father’s conservative politics, but they LeFevre, who favored the abolition of the and the C.E.O. of its Chemical Technol- did not share all his views, according state but didn’t like the label “anarchist”; he ogy Group. A financial expert who knows to diZerega, who befriended Charles in called himself an “autarchist.” LeFevre Koch Industries well told me, “Charles is the mid-sixties, after meeting him while liked to say that “government is a disease the company. Charles runs it.” David, browsing in a John Birch Society book- masquerading as its own cure.” In 1956, described by associates as “affable” and “a store in Wichita. Charles eventually he opened an institution called the Free- bit of a lunk,” enjoyed for years the life of invited him to the Kochs’ mansion, to dom School, in Colorado Springs. Brian a wealthy bachelor. He rented a yacht in participate in an informal political-discus- Doherty, of Reason, told me that “LeFevre the South of France and bought a water- sion group. “It was pretty clear that was an anarchist figure who won Charles’s front home in Southampton, where he Charles thought some of the Birch Soci- heart,” and that the school was “a tiny threw parties that the Web site New York ety was bullshit,” diZerega recalled. world of people who thought the New Social Diary likened to an “East Coast DiZerega, who has lost Deal was a horrible mis- version of Hugh Hefner’s soirées.” In touch with Charles, eventu- take.” According to diZe 1996, he married Julia Flesher, a fashion ally abandoned right-wing rega, Charles supported the assistant. They live in a nine-thousand- views, and became a politi- school financially, and even square-foot duplex at 740 Park Ave- cal-science professor. He gave him money to take nue, with their three children. Though credits Charles with opening classes there. David’s manner is more cosmopolitan, his mind to political philos- Throughout the seven- and more genial, than that of Charles, ophy, which set him on the ties, Charles and David Brian Doherty, who has interviewed both path to academia; Charles is continued to build Koch In- brothers, couldn’t think of a single issue one of three people to whom dustries. In 1980, William, on which the brothers disagreed. he dedicated his first book. with assistance from Fred- As their fortunes grew, Charles and But diZerega believes that the Koch broth- die, attempted to take over the company David Koch became the primary under- ers have followed a wayward intellectual from Charles, who, they felt, had assumed writers of hard-line libertarian politics in trajectory, transferring their father’s para- autocratic control. In retaliation, the com- America. Charles’s goal, as Doherty de- noia about Soviet Communism to a dis- pany’s board, which answered to Charles, scribed it, was to tear the government “out trust of the U.S. government, and seeing fired William. (“Charles runs it all with an at the root.” The brothers’ first major pub- its expansion, beginning with the New iron hand,” Bruce Bartlett, the economist, lic step came in 1979, when Charles per- Deal, as a tyrannical threat to freedom. In told me.) Lawsuits were filed, with Wil- suaded David, then thirty-nine, to run for an essay, posted on Beliefnet, diZerega liam and Freddie on one side and Charles public office. They had become support- writes, “As state socialism failed . . . the tar- and David on the other. In 1983, Charles ers of the Libertarian Party, and were get for many within these organizations and David bought out their brothers’ share backing its Presidential candidate, Ed
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TNY—2010_08_30—PAGE 48—133SC.—LIVE SPOT ART R19928C—PLEASE INSPECT AND REPORT ON QUALITY Clark, who was running against Ronald Reagan from the right. Frustrated by the legal limits on campaign donations, they contrived to place David on the ticket, in the Vice-Presidential slot; upon becom- ing a candidate, he could lavish as much of his personal fortune as he wished on the campaign. The ticket’s slogan was “The Libertarian Party has only one source of funds: You.” In fact, its primary source of funds was David Koch, who spent more than two million dollars on the effort. Many of the ideas propounded in the 1980 campaign presaged the Tea Party movement. Ed Clark told The Nation that libertarians were getting ready to stage “a very big tea party,” because peo- ple were “sick to death” of taxes. The Libertarian Party platform called for the abolition of the F.B.I. and the C.I.A., as “We’re not that well organized, but we know where everybody is.” well as of federal regulatory agencies, such as the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Department of •• Energy. The Party wanted to end Social Security, minimum-wage laws, gun three main Koch family foundations gave members have personally spent more than control, and all personal and corporate money to thirty-four political and policy two million dollars on political contribu- income taxes; it proposed the legaliza- organizations, three of which they tions. In the second quarter of 2010, tion of prostitution, recreational drugs, founded, and several of which they direct. David Koch was the biggest individual and suicide. Government should be re- The Kochs and their company have given contributor to the Republican Governors duced to only one function: the protec- additional millions to political campaigns, Association, with a million-dollar dona- tion of individual rights. William F. advocacy groups, and lobbyists. The fam- tion. Other gifts by the Kochs may be un- Buckley, Jr., a more traditional conser- ily’s subterranean financial role has fuelled traceable; federal tax law permits anony- vative, called the movement “Anarcho- suspicion on the left; Lee Fang, of the lib- mous personal donations to politically Totalitarianism.” eral blog ThinkProgress, has called the active nonprofit groups. That November, the Libertarian ticket Kochs “the billionaires behind the hate.” In recent decades, members of several received only one per cent of the vote. The Only the Kochs know precisely how industrial dynasties have spent parts of brothers realized that their brand of poli- much they have spent on politics. Public their fortunes on a conservative agenda. In tics didn’t sell at the ballot box. Charles tax records show that between 1998 and the nineteen-eighties, the Olin family, Koch became openly scornful of conven- 2008 the Charles G. Koch Charitable which owns a chemicals-and-manufac- tional politics. “It tends to be a nasty, cor- Foundation spent more than forty-eight turing conglomerate, became known for rupting business,” he told a reporter at the million dollars. The Claude R. Lambe funding right-leaning thinking in aca- time. “I’m interested in advancing libertar- Charitable Foundation, which is con- demia, particularly in law schools. And ian ideas.” According to Doherty’s book, trolled by Charles Koch and his wife, during the nineties Richard Mellon the Kochs came to regard elected politi- along with two company employees and Scaife, a descendant of Andrew Mellon, cians as merely “actors playing out a an accountant, spent more than twenty- spent millions attempting to discredit script.” A longtime confidant of the Kochs eight million. The David H. Koch Char- President Bill Clinton. Ari Rabin-Havt, told Doherty that the brothers wanted to itable Foundation spent more than a hun- a vice-president at the Democratic-lean- “supply the themes and words for the dred and twenty million. Meanwhile, ing Web site Media Matters, said that the scripts.” In order to alter the direction of since 1998 Koch Industries has spent Kochs’ effort is unusual, in its marshalling America, they had to “influence the areas more than fifty million dollars on lobby- of corporate and personal funds: “Their where policy ideas percolate from: aca- ing. Separately, the company’s political- role, in terms of financial commitments, demia and think tanks.” action committee, KochPAC, has donated is staggering.” some eight million dollars to political Of course, Democrats give money, fter the 1980 election, Charles and campaigns, more than eighty per cent of too. Their most prominent donor, the David Koch receded from the pub- it to Republicans. So far in 2010, Koch financier George Soros, runs a founda- Alic arena. But they poured more than a Industries leads all other energy compa- tion, the Open Society Institute, that has hundred million dollars into dozens of nies in political contributions, as it has spent as much as a hundred million dol- seemingly independent organizations. since 2006. In addition, during the past lars a year in America. Soros has also Tax records indicate that in 2008 the dozen years the Kochs and other family made generous private contributions to
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TNY—2010_08_30—PAGE 49—133SC—LIVE ART A15236—PAGE #2 TEXT CHANGES various Democratic campaigns, includ- antiwar movement had turned its anger ing Obama’s. But Michael Vachon, his on defense contractors, such as Dow spokesman, argued that Soros’s giving is Chemical, and Ralph Nader was leading transparent, and that “none of his contri- a public-interest crusade against corpora- butions are in the service of his own eco- tions. Powell, writing a report for the U.S. nomic interests.” The Kochs have given Chamber of Commerce, urged American millions of dollars to nonprofit groups companies to fight back. The greatest that criticize environmental regulation threat to free enterprise, he warned, was and support lower taxes for industry. Gus not Communism or the New Left but, diZerega, the former friend, suggested rather, “respectable elements of society”— that the Kochs’ youthful idealism about intellectuals, journalists, and scientists. To libertarianism had largely devolved into a defeat them, he wrote, business leaders rationale for corporate self-interest. He needed to wage a long-term, unified cam- said of Charles, “Perhaps he has confused paign to change public opinion. making money with freedom.” Charles Koch seems to have ap- Some critics have suggested that the proached both business and politics with Kochs’ approach has subverted the pur- the deliberation of an engineer. “To bring pose of tax-exempt giving. By law, chari- about social change,” he told Doherty, re- table foundations must conduct exclu- quires “a strategy” that is “vertically and sively nonpartisan activities that promote horizontally integrated,” spanning “from the public welfare. A 2004 report by the idea creation to policy development to ed- National Committee for Responsive Phi- ucation to grassroots organizations to lob- lanthropy, a watchdog group, described bying to litigation to political action.” The the Kochs’ foundations as being self-serv- project, he admitted, was extremely am- ing, concluding, “These foundations give bitious. “We have a radical philosophy,” money to nonprofit organizations that do he said. research and advocacy on issues that im- In 1977, the Kochs provided the pact the profit margin of Koch Industries.” funds to launch the nation’s first libertar- The Kochs have gone well beyond ian think tank, the Cato Institute. Ac- their immediate self-interest, however, cording to the Center for Public Integ- funding organizations that aim to push rity, between 1986 and 1993 the Koch the country in a libertarian direction. family gave eleven million dollars to the Among the institutions that they have institute. Today, Cato has more than a subsidized are the Institute for Justice, hundred full-time employees, and its ex- which files lawsuits opposing state and perts and policy papers are widely quoted federal regulations; the Institute for Hu- and respected by the mainstream media. mane Studies, which underwrites liber- It describes itself as nonpartisan, and its tarian academics; and the Bill of Rights scholars have at times been critical of Institute, which promotes a conservative both parties. But it has consistently slant on the Constitution. Many of the pushed for corporate tax cuts, reductions organizations funded by the Kochs em- in social services, and laissez-faire envi- ploy specialists who write position papers ronmental policies. that are subsequently quoted by politi- When President Obama, in a 2008 cians and pundits. David Koch has ac- speech, described the science on global knowledged that the family exerts tight warming as “beyond dispute,” the Cato ideological control. “If we’re going to Institute took out a full-page ad in the give a lot of money, we’ll make darn sure Times to contradict him. Cato’s resident they spend it in a way that goes along scholars have relentlessly criticized politi- with our intent,” he told Doherty. “And cal attempts to stop global warming as ex- if they make a wrong turn and start pensive, ineffective, and unnecessary. Ed doing things we don’t agree with, we Crane, the Cato Institute’s founder and withdraw funding.” president, told me that “global-warming theories give the government more con- he Kochs’ subsidization of a pro-cor- trol of the economy.” porate movement fulfills, in many Cato scholars have been particularly ways,T the vision laid out in a secret 1971 energetic in promoting the Climategate memo that Lewis Powell, then a Virginia scandal. Last year, private e-mails of cli- attorney, wrote two months before he was mate scientists at the University of East nominated to the Supreme Court. The Anglia, in England, were mysteriously
TNY—2010_08_30—PAGE 50—133SC.—LIVE ART A8862_RD2—PLEASE PULL KODAK PROOF FOR PRESS COLOR GUIDANCE leaked, and their exchanges appeared to “If the answer is to phase out fossil fuels, a name Market-Based Management, or suggest a willingness to falsify data different group of people are going to be M.B.M. In the book, Charles recom- in order to buttress the idea that glo making money, so we shouldn’t be sur- mends instilling a company’s corporate bal warming is real. In the two weeks prised that they’re fighting tooth and nail.” culture with the competitiveness of the after the e-mails went public, one Cato David Koch told New York that he was marketplace. Koch describes M.B.M. as a scholar gave more than twenty media in- unconvinced that global warming has “holistic system” containing “five dimen- terviews trumpeting the alleged scandal. been caused by human activity. Even if it sions: vision, virtue and talents, knowledge But five independent inquiries have has been, he said, the heating of the planet processes, decision rights and incentives.” since exonerated the researchers, and will be beneficial, resulting in longer A top Cato Institute official told me that nothing was found in their e-mails or growing seasons in the Northern Hemi- Charles “thinks he’s a genius. He’s the em- data to discredit the scientific consensus sphere. “The Earth will be able to support peror, and he’s convinced he’s wearing on global warming. enormously more people because far clothes.” Fink, by contrast, has been far Nevertheless, the controversy suc- greater land area will be available to pro- more embracing of Charles’s ideas. (Fink, ceeded in spreading skepticism about cli- duce food,” he said. like the Kochs, declined to be interviewed.) mate change. Even though the National At a 1995 conference for philanthro- Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration n the mid-eighties, the Kochs provided pists, Fink adopted the language of eco- recently issued a report concluding that millions of dollars to George Mason nomics when speaking about the Merca- the evidence for global warming is un- IUniversity, in Arlington, Virginia, to set tus Center’s purpose. He said that equivocal, more Americans are convinced up another think tank. Now known as the grant-makers should use think tanks and than at any time since 1997 that scientists Mercatus Center, it promotes itself as “the political-action groups to convert intellec- have exaggerated the seriousness of global world’s premier university source for mar- tual raw materials into policy “products.” warming. The Kochs promote this sta- ket-oriented ideas—bridging the gap be- The Wall Street Journal has called the tistic on their company’s Web site but tween academic ideas and real-world Mercatus Center “the most important do not mention the role that their fund- problems.” Financial records show that think tank you’ve never heard of,” and ing has played in fostering such doubt. the Koch family foundations have con- noted that fourteen of the twenty-three In a 2002 memo, the Republican po- tributed more than thirty million dollars regulations that President George W. litical consultant Frank Luntz wrote that to George Mason, much of which has Bush placed on a “hit list” had been sug- so long as “voters believe there is no gone to the Mercatus Center, a nonprofit gested first by Mercatus scholars. Fink consensus about global warming within organization. “It’s ground zero for dereg- told the paper that the Kochs have “other the scientific community” the status quo ulation policy in Washington,” Rob Stein, means of fighting [their] battles,” and that would prevail. The key for opponents of the Democratic strategist, said. It is an the Mercatus Center does not actively environmental reform, he said, was to unusual arrangement. “George Mason is promote the company’s private interests. question the science—a public-relations a public university, and receives public But Thomas McGarity, a law professor at strategy that the tobacco industry used funds,” Stein noted. “Virginia is hosting the University of Texas, who specializes in effectively for years to forestall regulation. an institution that the Kochs practically environmental issues, told me that “Koch The Kochs have funded many sources of control.” has been constantly in trouble with the environmental skepticism, such as the The founder of the Mercatus Center is E.P.A., and Mercatus has constantly Heritage Foundation, which has argued Richard Fink, formerly an economist. hammered on the agency.” An environ- that “scientific facts gathered in the past 10 Fink heads Koch Industries’ lobbying op- mental lawyer who has clashed with the years do not support the notion of cata- eration in Washington. In addition, he is Mercatus Center called it “a means of strophic human-made warming.” The the president of the Charles G. Koch laundering economic aims.” The lawyer brothers have given money to more ob- Charitable Foundation, the president of explained the strategy: “You take corpo- scure groups, too, such as the Independent the Claude R. Lambe Charitable Founda rate money and give it to a neutral-sound- Women’s Forum, which opposes the pre- tion, a director of the Fred C. and Mary R. ing think tank,” which “hires people with sentation of global warming as a scientific Koch Foundation, and a director and co- pedigrees and academic degrees who put fact in American public schools. Until founder, with David Koch, of the Amer- out credible-seeming studies. But they all 2008, the group was run by Nancy Pfoten- icans for Prosperity Foundation. coincide perfectly with the economic in- hauer, a former lobbyist for Koch Indus- Fink, with his many titles, has become terests of their funders.” tries. Mary Beth Jarvis, a vice-president of the central nervous system of the Kochto- In 1997, for instance, the E.P.A. a Koch subsidiary, is on the group’s board. pus. He appears to have supplanted Ed moved to reduce surface ozone, a form of Naomi Oreskes, a professor of history Crane, the head of the Cato Institute, as pollution caused, in part, by emissions and science studies at the University of the brothers’ main political lieutenant. from oil refineries. Susan Dudley, an California, San Diego, is the co-author of Though David remains on the board at economist who became a top official at “Merchants of Doubt,” a new book that Cato, Charles Koch has fallen out with the Mercatus Center, criticized the pro- chronicles various attempts by American Crane. Associates suggested to me that posed rule. The E.P.A., she argued, had industry to manipulate public opinion on Crane had been insufficiently respectful of not taken into account that smog-free science. She noted that the Kochs, as the Charles’s management philosophy, which skies would result in more cases of skin heads of “a company with refineries and he distilled into a book called “The Science cancer. She projected that if pollution pipelines,” have “a lot at stake.” She added, of Success,” and trademarked under the were controlled it would cause up to
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TNY—2010_08_30—PAGE 51—133SC. eleven thousand additional cases of skin cancer each year. In 1999, the District of Columbia ON THE INEVITABLE DECLINE INTO Circuit Court took up Dudley’s smog ar- MEDIOCRITY OF THE POPULAR MUSICIAN WHO gument. Evaluating the E.P.A. rule, the ATTAINS A COMFORTABLE MIDDLE AGE court found that the E.P.A. had “explic- itly disregarded” the “possible health benefits of ozone.” In another part of the O Sting, where is thy death? opinion, the court ruled, 2-1, that the E.P.A. had overstepped its authority in —David Musgrave calibrating standards for ozone emis- sions. As the Constitutional Account- ability Center, a think tank, revealed, the lect Committee on Indian Affairs inves- a lot of resources and effort—their judges in the majority had previously at- tigated their business and released a employees, too.” Glickman suffered a tended legal junkets, on a Montana scathing report accusing Koch Oil of “a surprise defeat. “I can’t prove it, but I ranch, that were arranged by the Foun- widespread and sophisticated scheme to think I was probably their victim,” he said. dation for Research on Economics and steal crude oil from Indians and others The Kochs continued to disperse the Environment—a group funded by through fraudulent mismeasuring.” The their money, creating slippery organiza- Koch family foundations. The judges Kochs admitted that they had improp- tions with generic-sounding names, and have claimed that the ruling was erly taken thirty-one million dollars’ this made it difficult to ascertain the ex- unaffected by their attendance. worth of crude oil, but said that it had tent of their influence in Washington. In been accidental. Charles Koch told com- 1990, Citizens for a Sound Economy “ deas don’t happen on their own,” Matt mittee investigators that oil measure- created a spinoff group, Citizens for the Kibbe, the president of Freedom- ment is “a very uncertain art.” Environment, which called acid rain and Works,I a Tea Party advocacy group, told To defend its reputation, Koch In- other environmental problems “myths.” me. “Throughout history, ideas need pa- dustries hired Robert Strauss, then a pre- When the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette inves- trons.” The Koch brothers, after helping mier Washington lobbyist; the company tigated the matter, it discovered that the to create Cato and Mercatus, concluded soon opened an office in the city. A spinoff group had “no citizen member- that think tanks alone were not enough to grand jury was convened to investigate ship of its own.” effect change. They needed a mechanism the allegations, but it eventually dis- In 1997, another Senate investigation to deliver those ideas to the street, and to banded, without issuing criminal charges. began looking into what a minority re- attract the public’s support. In 1984, According to the Senate report, after the port called “an audacious plan to pour David Koch and Richard Fink created yet committee hearings Koch operatives millions of dollars in contributions into another organization, and Kibbe joined delved into the personal lives of commit- Republican campaigns nationwide with- them. The group, Citizens for a Sound tee staffers, even questioning an ex-wife. out disclosing the amount or source,” in Economy, seemed like a grassroots move- Senate investigators were upset by the order to evade campaign-finance laws. A ment, but according to the Center for Kochs’ tactics. Kenneth Ballen, the shell corporation, Triad Management, Public Integrity it was sponsored princi- counsel to the Senate committee, said, had paid more than three million dollars pally by the Kochs, who provided $7.9 “These people have amassed such unac- for attack ads in twenty-six House races million between 1986 and 1993. Its mis- countable power!” and three Senate races. More than half sion, Kibbe said, “was to take these heavy By 1993, when Bill Clinton became of the advertising money came from an ideas and translate them for mass Amer- President, Citizens for a Sound Econ- obscure nonprofit group, the Economic ica. . . . We read the same literature omy had become a prototype for the kind Education Trust. The Senate commit- Obama did about nonviolent revolu- of corporate-backed opposition cam- tee’s minority report suggested that “the tions—Saul Alinsky, Gandhi, Martin paigns that have proliferated during the trust was financed in whole or in part by Luther King. We studied the idea of the Obama era. The group waged a success- Charles and David Koch of Wichita, Boston Tea Party as an example of non- ful assault on Clinton’s proposed B.T.U. Kansas.” The brothers were suspected of violent social change. We learned we tax on energy, for instance, running ad- having secretly paid for the attack ads, needed boots on the ground to sell ideas, vertisements, staging media events, and most of which aired in states where not candidates.” Within a few years, the targeting opponents. And it mobilized Koch Industries did business. In Kansas, group had mobilized fifty paid field work- anti-tax rallies outside the Capitol—ral- where Triad Management was espe- ers, in twenty-six states, to rally voters be- lies that NPR described as “designed to cially active, the funds may have played hind the Kochs’ agenda. David and strike fear into the hearts of wavering a decisive role in four of six federal races. Charles, according to one participant, Democrats.” Dan Glickman, a former The Kochs, when asked by reporters if were “very controlling, very top down. Democratic congressman from Wichita, they had given the money, refused to You can’t build an organization with who supported the B.T.U. tax, recalled, comment. In 1998, however, the Wall them. They run it.” “I’d been in Congress eighteen years. Street Journal confirmed that a consul- Around this time, the brothers faced The Kochs actually engaged against tant on the Kochs’ payroll had been in- a political crisis. In 1989, the Senate Se- me and funded my opponent. They used volved in the scheme. Charles Lewis, of
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TNY—2010_08_30—PAGE 52—133SC. the Center for Public Integrity, de- the Dick Cheney Lobbyist Energy Bill, other organizations, has been instrumen- scribed the scandal as “historic. Triad offered enormous subsidies and tax breaks tal in disrupting the Obama Presidency. was the first time a major corporation for energy companies. The Kochs have In January, 2008, Charles Koch wrote used a cutout”—a front operation—“in a cast themselves as deficit hawks, but, ac- in his company newsletter that America threatening way. Koch Industries was cording to a study by Media Matters, could be on the verge of “the greatest loss the poster child of a company run amok.” their companies have benefitted from of liberty and prosperity since the 1930s.” nearly a hundred million dollars in gov- That October, Americans for Prosperity uring the Clinton Administration, ernment contracts since 2000. held a conference of conservative opera- the energy industry faced increased In 2004, Citizens for a Sound Econ- tives at a Marriott hotel outside Washing- scrutinyD and regulation. In the mid-nine- omy was accused of illegitimately throw- ton. Erick Erickson, the editor-in-chief of ties, the Justice Department filed two law- ing its weight behind Bush’s reëlection. the conservative blog RedState.com, took suits against Koch Industries, claiming The group’s Oregon branch had at- the lectern, thanked David Koch, and that it was responsible for more than three tempted to get Ralph Nader on the Pres- vowed to “unite and fight . . . the armies hundred oil spills, which had released an idential ballot, in order to dilute Demo- of the left!” Soon after Obama assumed estimated three million gallons of oil into cratic support for John Kerry. Critics office, Americans for Prosperity launched lakes and rivers. The penalty was poten- argued that it was illegal for a tax-exempt “Porkulus” rallies against Obama’s stimu- tially as high as two hundred and fourteen nonprofit organization to donate its ser- lus-spending measures. Then the Merca- million dollars. In a settlement, Koch In- vices for partisan political purposes. (A tus Center released a report claiming that dustries paid a record thirty-million-dol- complaint was filed with the Federal stimulus funds had been directed dispro- lar civil fine, and agreed to spend five mil- Election Commission; it was dismissed.) portionately toward Democratic districts; lion dollars on environmental projects. That year, internal rivalries at Citizens eventually, the author was forced to cor- In 1999, a jury found Koch Industries for a Sound Economy caused the organi- rect the report, but not before Rush Lim- guilty of negligence and malice in the zation to split apart. David Koch and baugh, citing the paper, had labelled deaths of two Texas teen-agers in an ex- Fink started a new group, Americans for Obama’s program “a slush fund,” and Fox plosion that resulted from a leaky under- Prosperity, and they hired Tim Phillips to News and other conservative outlets had ground butane pipeline. (In 2001, the run it. Phillips was a political veteran who echoed the sentiment. (Phil Kerpen, the company paid an undisclosed settlement.) had worked with Ralph Reed, the evan- vice-president for policy at Americans for And in the final months of the Clinton gelical leader and Republican activist, co- Prosperity, is a contributor to the Fox Presidency the Justice Department lev- founding Century Strategies, a cam- News Web site. Another officer at Amer- elled a ninety-seven-count indictment paign-consulting company that became icans for Prosperity, Walter Williams, against the company, for covering up the notorious for its ties to the disgraced lob- often guest-hosts for Limbaugh.) discharge of ninety-one tons of benzene, a byist Jack Abramoff. Phillips’s online bi- Americans for Prosperity also created carcinogen, from its refinery in Corpus ography describes him as an expert in an offshoot, Patients United Now, which Christi, Texas. The company was liable “grasstops” and “grassroots” political or- organized what Phillips has estimated to for three hundred and fifty million dollars ganizing. The Kochs’ choice of Phillips be more than three hundred rallies against in fines, and four Koch employees faced signalled an even greater toughness. The health-care reform. At one rally, an effigy up to thirty-five years in prison. The Koch conservative operative Grover Norquist, of a Democratic congressman was hung; Petroleum Group eventually pleaded who is known for praising “throat slitters” at another, protesters unfurled a banner guilty to one criminal charge of covering in politics, called Phillips “a grownup who depicting corpses from Dachau. The up environmental violations, including the can make things happen.” group also helped organize the “Kill the falsification of documents, and paid a Last year, Phillips told the Financial Bill” protests outside the Capitol, in twenty-million-dollar fine. David Uhl- Times that Americans for Prosperity had March, where Democratic supporters of mann, a career prosecutor who, at the only eight thousand registered members. health-care reform alleged that they were time, headed the environmental-crimes Currently, its Web site claims that the spat on and cursed at. Phillips was a fea- section at the Justice Department, de- group has “1.2 million activists.” What- tured speaker. scribed the suit as “one of the most ever its size, the Kochs’ political involve- Americans for Prosperity has held at significant cases ever brought under the ment has been intense; a former employee least eighty events targeting cap-and-trade Clean Air Act.” He added, “Environmen- of the Cato Institute told me that Amer- legislation, which is aimed at making in- tal crimes are almost always motivated by icans for Prosperity “was micromanaged dustries pay for the air pollution that they economics and arrogance, and in the Koch by the Kochs.” And the brothers’ invest- create. Speakers for the group claimed, case there was a healthy dose of both.” ment may well have paid off: Americans with exaggeration, that even back-yard During the 2000 election campaign, for Prosperity, in concert with the family’s barbecues and kitchen stoves would be Koch Industries spent some nine hundred taxed. The group was also involved in the thousand dollars to support the candida- attacks on Obama’s “green jobs” czar, Van cies of George W. Bush and other Re- Jones, and waged a crusade against in- publicans. During the Bush years, Koch ternational climate talks. Casting his Industries and other fossil-fuel companies group as a champion of ordinary workers enjoyed remarkable prosperity. The 2005 who would be hurt by environmentalists, energy bill, which Hillary Clinton dubbed Phillips went to Copenhagen last year
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TNY—2010_08_30—PAGE 53—133SC.—LIVE SPOT ART R19928D—PLEASE INSPECT AND REPORT ON QUALITY—PAGE # 2 TEXT CHANGE and staged a protest outside the United fast. Not a single Republican senator greater than it has been since the nine- Nations conference on climate change, was working with the Administration on teen-twenties, and since the seventies the declaring, “We’re a grassroots organiza- health care, or much else. Pundits were tax rates of the wealthiest have fallen more tion. . . . I think it’s unfortunate when writing about Obama’s political inepti- than those of the middle class. Yet the wealthy children of wealthy families . . . tude, and Tea Party groups were accusing brothers’ message has evidently resonated want to send unemployment rates in the the President of initiating “a government with voters: a recent poll found that fifty- United States up to twenty per cent.” takeover.” In a speech, Koch said, “Days five per cent of Americans agreed that Grover Norquist, who holds a weekly like today bring to reality the vision of our Obama is a socialist. meeting for conservative leaders in Wash- board of directors when we started this Americans for Prosperity, meanwhile, ington, including representatives from organization, five years ago.” He went has announced that it will spend an ad- Americans for Prosperity, told me that last on, “We envisioned a mass movement, a ditional forty-five million dollars before summer’s raucous rallies were pivotal in state-based one, but national in scope, of the midterm elections, in November. Al- undermining Obama’s agenda. The Re- hundreds of thousands of American citi- though the group is legally prohibited from publican leadership in Congress, he said, zens from all walks of life standing up and directly endorsing candidates, it none “couldn’t have done it without August, fighting for the economic freedoms that theless plans to target some fifty House when people went out on the streets. It made our nation the most prosperous so- races and half a dozen Senate races, stag- discouraged deal-makers”—Republicans ciety in history. . . . Thankfully, the stir- ing rallies, organizing door-to-door can- who might otherwise have worked con- rings from California to Virginia, and vassing, and running ads aimed at “educat- structively with Obama. Moreover, the from Texas to Michigan, show that more ing voters about where candidates stand.” appearance of growing public opposition and more of our fellow-citizens are begin- Though the Kochs have slowed to Obama affected corporate donors on ning to see the same truths as we do.” Obama’s momentum, their larger political K Street. “K Street is a three-billion-dollar While Koch didn’t explicitly embrace battle is far from won. Richard Fink, in- weathervane,” Norquist said. “When the Tea Party movement that day, more terviewed by FrumForum.com this spring, Obama was strong, the Chamber of recently he has come close to doing so, said, “If you look at where we’ve gone from Commerce said, ‘We can work with the praising it for demonstrating the “power- the year 2000 to now, with the expansion Obama Administration.’ But that changed ful visceral hostility in the body politic of government spending and a debt bur- when thousands of people went into the against the massive increase in govern- den that threatens to bankrupt the coun- street and ‘terrorized’ congressmen. Au- ment power, the massive efforts to social- try, it doesn’t look very good at all.” He gust is what changed it. Now that Obama ize this country.” Charles Koch, in a went on, “It looks like the infrastructure is weak, people are getting tough.” newsletter sent to his seventy thousand that was built and nurtured has not carried As the first anniversary of Obama’s employees, compared the Obama Ad- the day.” He suggested that the Kochs election approached, David Koch came to ministration to the regime of the Venezu- needed “to get more into the practical, the Washington area to attend a trium- elan strongman Hugo Chávez. The day-to-day issues of governing.” phant Americans for Prosperity gather- Kochs’ sense of imperilment is somewhat ing. Obama’s poll numbers were falling puzzling. Income inequality in America is n 1991, David Koch was badly injured in a plane crash in Los Angeles. He was Ithe sole passenger in first class to survive. As he was recovering, a routine physical exam led to the discovery of prostate can- cer. Koch received treatment, settled down, started a family, and reconsidered his life. As he told Portfolio, “When you’re the only one who survived in the front of the plane and everyone else died—yeah, you think, ‘My God, the good Lord spared me for some greater purpose.’ My joke is that I’ve been busy ever since, doing all the good work I can think of, so He can have confidence in me.” Koch began giving spectacularly large donations to the arts and sciences. And he became a patron of cancer research, focus- sing on prostate cancer. In addition to his gifts to Sloan-Kettering, he gave fifteen million dollars to New York-Presbyterian Hospital, a hundred and twenty-five million to M.I.T. for cancer research, “I like looking at amateur porn, because I like twenty million to Johns Hopkins Univer- seeing other people’s apartments.” sity, and twenty-five million to the M. D.
TNY—2010_08_30—PAGE 54—133SC—LIVE ART A15097 Anderson Cancer Center, in Houston. In stock, while his company was directly lob- mans will continue to adapt to climate response to his generosity, Sloan-Ketter- bying the government to keep formalde- change in the future. People may build ing gave Koch its Excellence in Corporate hyde on the market. (A board spokesper- “underground cities,” developing “short, Leadership Award. In 2004, President son said that the issue of formaldehyde compact bodies” or “curved spines,” so Bush named him to the National Cancer had not come up.) that “moving around in tight spaces will Advisory Board, which guides the Na- James Huff, an associate director at the be no problem.” tional Cancer Institute. National Institute for Environmental Such ideas uncannily echo the Koch Koch’s corporate and political roles, Health Sciences, a division of the N.I.H., message. The company’s January newslet- however, may pose conflicts of interest. told me that it was “disgusting” for Koch ter to employees, for instance, argues that For example, at the same time that to be serving on the National Cancer Ad- “fluctuations in the earth’s climate predate David Koch has been casting himself as visory Board: “It’s just not good for public humanity,” and concludes, “Since we can’t a champion in the fight against cancer, health. Vested interests should not be on control Mother Nature, let’s figure out Koch Industries has been lobbying to the board.” He went on, “Those boards how to get along with her changes.” Jo- prevent the E.P.A. from classifying are very important. They’re very influential seph Romm, a physicist who runs the formaldehyde, which the company pro- as to whether N.C.I. goes into formalde- Web site ClimateProgress.org, is infuri- duces in great quantities, as a “known hyde or not. Billions of dollars are in- ated by the Smithsonian’s presentation. carcinogen” in humans. volved in formaldehyde.” “The whole exhibit whitewashes the Scientists have long known that form- Harold Varmus, the director of the modern climate issue,” he said. “I think aldehyde causes cancer in rats, and several National Cancer Institute, knows David the Kochs wanted to be seen as some sort major scientific studies have concluded Koch from Memorial Sloan-Kettering, of high-minded company, associated with that formaldehyde causes cancer in human which he used to run. He said that, at the greatest natural-history and science beings—including one published last year Sloan-Kettering, “a lot of people who museum in the country. But the truth is, by the National Cancer Institute, on gave to us had large business interests. the exhibit is underwritten by big-time whose advisory board Koch sits. The study The one thing we wouldn’t tolerate in our polluters, who are underground funders of tracked twenty-five thousand patients for board members is tobacco.” When told of action to stop efforts to deal with this an average of forty years; subjects exposed Koch Industries’ stance on formaldehyde, threat to humanity. I think the Smithso- to higher amounts of formaldehyde had Varmus said that he was “surprised.” nian should have drawn the line.” significantly higher rates of leukemia. Cristián Samper, the museum’s direc- These results helped lead an expert panel he David H. Koch Hall of Human tor, said that the exhibit is not about cli- within the National Institutes of Health to Origins, at the Smithsonian’s Na- mate change, and described Koch as “one conclude that formaldehyde should be tionalT Museum of Natural History, is a of the best donors we’ve had, in my tenure categorized as a known carcinogen, and be multimedia exploration of the theory that here, because he’s very interested in the strictly controlled by the government. mankind evolved in response to climate content, but completely hands off.” He Corporations have resisted regulations on change. At the main entrance, viewers are noted, “I don’t know all the details of his formaldehyde for decades, however, and confronted with a giant graph charting involvement in other issues.” Koch Industries has been a large funder of the Earth’s temperature over the past ten The Kochs have long depended on the members of Congress who have stymied million years, which notes that it is far public’s not knowing all the details about the E.P.A., requiring it to defer new reg- cooler now than it was ten thousand years them. They have been content to operate ulations until more studies are completed. ago. Overhead, the text reads, “HUMANS what David Koch has called “the largest Koch Industries became a major pro- EVOLVED IN RESPONSE TO A CHANG- company that you’ve never heard of.” But ducer of the chemical in 2005, after it ING WORLD.” The message, as amplified with the growing prominence of the Tea bought Georgia-Pacific, the paper and by the exhibit’s Web site, is that “key Party, and with increased awareness of the wood-products company, for twenty-one human adaptations evolved in response to Kochs’ ties to the movement, the brothers billion dollars. Georgia-Pacific manufac- environmental instability.” Only at the may find it harder to deflect scrutiny. Re- tures formaldehyde in its chemical divi- end of the exhibit, under the headline cently, President Obama took aim at the sion, and uses it to produce various wood “OUR SURVIVAL CHALLENGE,” is it noted Kochs’ political network. Speaking at a products, such as plywood and laminates. that levels of carbon dioxide are higher Democratic National Committee fund- Its annual production capacity for formal- now than they have ever been, and that raiser, in Austin, he warned supporters that dehyde is 2.2 billion pounds. Last De- they are projected to increase dramatically the Supreme Court’s recent ruling in the cember, Traylor Champion, Georgia- in the next century. No cause is given for Citizens United case—which struck down Pacific’s vice-president of environmental this development; no mention is made of laws prohibiting direct corporate spending affairs, sent a formal letter of protest to any possible role played by fossil fuels. on campaigns—had made it even easier for federal health authorities. He wrote that The exhibit makes it seem part of a natu- big companies to hide behind “groups with the company “strongly disagrees” with the ral continuum. The accompanying text harmless-sounding names like Americans N.I.H. panel’s conclusion that formalde- says, “During the period in which humans for Prosperity.” Obama said, “They don’t hyde should be treated as a known human evolved, Earth’s temperature and the have to say who, exactly, Americans for carcinogen. David Koch did not recuse amount of carbon dioxide in the atmo- Prosperity are. You don’t know if it’s a himself from the National Cancer Advi- sphere fluctuated together.” An interac- foreign-controlled corporation”—or even, sory Board, or divest himself of company tive game in the exhibit suggests that hu- he added, “a big oil company.”
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