DARK MONEY
The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right
Jane Mayer
Doubleday
449 pages; $29.95
When Jane Mayer published her 10,000-word article about Charles and David Koch in The New Yorker in August 2010, David Koch denounced her piece in print and, as she reports in her new book, a "private investigative firm with powerful political and law enforcement connections was retained." While there was no hard evidence on who had hired the firm, "clues leading to the Kochs were everywhere."
That effort may have backfired: Since that first article, Ms Mayer has followed the trail of the tax-deductible "dark money" the brothers have secretly donated to political causes; absorbed the work of dozens of outstanding independent investigative journalists; ferreted out articles, speeches and interviews the brothers, or their advisers, have given, many of them quite revelatory; and secured access to previously unpublished sources.
Dark Money is a persuasive, timely and necessary story of the Koch brothers' empire. It may read overly long, but only the most thoroughly documented, compendious account could do justice to the Kochs' bizarre and Byzantine family history and the scale and scope of their influence.
Ms Mayer begins with Fred Koch, the family patriarch. "Oddly enough," she writes, "the fiercely libertarian Koch family owed part of its fortune to two of history's most infamous dictators, Joseph Stalin and Adolf Hitler," for whose regimes Koch's company built oil refineries.
Largely because of his experience in the Soviet Union, Fred Koch became a staunch anti-Communist. His son Mr Charles did not fully commit to his father's project until the mid-1970s, when, Ms Mayer writes, Mr Charles "began planning a movement that could sweep the country." His declared goal? Nothing less than destroying what he referred to as "the prevalent statist paradigm."
The 1980 platform of the Libertarian Party, to which the Koch brothers provided financial support and on which Mr David Koch ran for vice president, offered a preview of their anti-government zealotry. The Libertarians opposed federal income and capital gains taxes. They called for the repeal of campaign finance laws; favoured the abolition of Medicaid, Medicare and Social Security and elimination of the Federal Election Commission, the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Food and Drug Administration and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. "The platform was, in short," Ms Mayer says, "an effort to repeal virtually every major political reform passed during the 20th century."
Not surprisingly, given the extremism of their views, which William F. Buckley Jr. characterised as "Anarcho-Totalitarianism," the Libertarians polled less than one per cent of votes. Ronald Reagan was elected president.
Ms Mayer notes, the Kochs, instead of accepting the verdict, chose to spend money changing the way Americans voted.
When the Supreme Court in the 2010 Citizens United case permitted non-profits to spend money on political campaigning, the Koch brothers funded their own political machine, which, in size, dollars and sophistication, rivalled that of the two major parties. Their success in the 2010 midterm election was remarkable, and, Ms Mayer says, took the Democrats by surprise.
The Kochs, Ms Mayer is careful to remind us, are only one of several fabulously wealthy families that have tried to move America to the right. Their outsize influence is a result not only of their outsize fortune - according to Forbes magazine, the brothers are the fifth and sixth wealthiest Americans, with a combined family income larger than that of Bill Gates - but also of their intellectual prowess and organisational skills. For more than a decade, they have organised donor summits to which they have invited like-minded billionaires, political consultants, media celebrities and elected officials.
The Koch brothers and their allies insist, and no doubt believe, that their war on big government has been motivated by their commitment to the individual freedoms that government interferes with. Still, "it was impossible not to notice," Ms Mayer writes, "that the political policies they embraced benefited their own bottom lines first and foremost."
One of the more startling revelations in the book concerns the number of billionaires in the Koch network who have had "serious past or on-going legal problems" and whose companies have been fined for violations of the Clean Air and the Clean Water Acts. Koch Industries, she reports, has been perhaps the most flagrant and wilful polluter and scofflaw. According to the Environmental Protection Agency's database, it was the No. 1 producer of toxic waste in the country in 2012.
To protect their investments in coal and oil pipelines and refineries (somewhat pared down in the last decade), the Koch brothers have, Ms Mayer points out, funded think tanks committed to raising doubt about climate change. They have also spent tens of millions of dollars to roll back environmental regulations and defund or abolish the federal agencies that write and enforce them.
There are signs that the Kochs' influence may be waning. The Republican candidate they appeared to have favoured, Scott Walker, is no longer in the presidential race. Donald J Trump, the candidate out in front, has made clear that he has no need for Koch money and has ridiculed those who "beg" for it. Still, as Ms Mayer reports, twice as many Koch network dollars will be in play in 2016 than were in play in 2012: $889 million, only slightly less than the $1 billion that the Democratic and Republican national committees each expect to spend on the election.
The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right
Jane Mayer
Doubleday
449 pages; $29.95
When Jane Mayer published her 10,000-word article about Charles and David Koch in The New Yorker in August 2010, David Koch denounced her piece in print and, as she reports in her new book, a "private investigative firm with powerful political and law enforcement connections was retained." While there was no hard evidence on who had hired the firm, "clues leading to the Kochs were everywhere."
That effort may have backfired: Since that first article, Ms Mayer has followed the trail of the tax-deductible "dark money" the brothers have secretly donated to political causes; absorbed the work of dozens of outstanding independent investigative journalists; ferreted out articles, speeches and interviews the brothers, or their advisers, have given, many of them quite revelatory; and secured access to previously unpublished sources.
Dark Money is a persuasive, timely and necessary story of the Koch brothers' empire. It may read overly long, but only the most thoroughly documented, compendious account could do justice to the Kochs' bizarre and Byzantine family history and the scale and scope of their influence.
Ms Mayer begins with Fred Koch, the family patriarch. "Oddly enough," she writes, "the fiercely libertarian Koch family owed part of its fortune to two of history's most infamous dictators, Joseph Stalin and Adolf Hitler," for whose regimes Koch's company built oil refineries.
Largely because of his experience in the Soviet Union, Fred Koch became a staunch anti-Communist. His son Mr Charles did not fully commit to his father's project until the mid-1970s, when, Ms Mayer writes, Mr Charles "began planning a movement that could sweep the country." His declared goal? Nothing less than destroying what he referred to as "the prevalent statist paradigm."
The 1980 platform of the Libertarian Party, to which the Koch brothers provided financial support and on which Mr David Koch ran for vice president, offered a preview of their anti-government zealotry. The Libertarians opposed federal income and capital gains taxes. They called for the repeal of campaign finance laws; favoured the abolition of Medicaid, Medicare and Social Security and elimination of the Federal Election Commission, the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Food and Drug Administration and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. "The platform was, in short," Ms Mayer says, "an effort to repeal virtually every major political reform passed during the 20th century."
Not surprisingly, given the extremism of their views, which William F. Buckley Jr. characterised as "Anarcho-Totalitarianism," the Libertarians polled less than one per cent of votes. Ronald Reagan was elected president.
Ms Mayer notes, the Kochs, instead of accepting the verdict, chose to spend money changing the way Americans voted.
When the Supreme Court in the 2010 Citizens United case permitted non-profits to spend money on political campaigning, the Koch brothers funded their own political machine, which, in size, dollars and sophistication, rivalled that of the two major parties. Their success in the 2010 midterm election was remarkable, and, Ms Mayer says, took the Democrats by surprise.
The Kochs, Ms Mayer is careful to remind us, are only one of several fabulously wealthy families that have tried to move America to the right. Their outsize influence is a result not only of their outsize fortune - according to Forbes magazine, the brothers are the fifth and sixth wealthiest Americans, with a combined family income larger than that of Bill Gates - but also of their intellectual prowess and organisational skills. For more than a decade, they have organised donor summits to which they have invited like-minded billionaires, political consultants, media celebrities and elected officials.
The Koch brothers and their allies insist, and no doubt believe, that their war on big government has been motivated by their commitment to the individual freedoms that government interferes with. Still, "it was impossible not to notice," Ms Mayer writes, "that the political policies they embraced benefited their own bottom lines first and foremost."
One of the more startling revelations in the book concerns the number of billionaires in the Koch network who have had "serious past or on-going legal problems" and whose companies have been fined for violations of the Clean Air and the Clean Water Acts. Koch Industries, she reports, has been perhaps the most flagrant and wilful polluter and scofflaw. According to the Environmental Protection Agency's database, it was the No. 1 producer of toxic waste in the country in 2012.
To protect their investments in coal and oil pipelines and refineries (somewhat pared down in the last decade), the Koch brothers have, Ms Mayer points out, funded think tanks committed to raising doubt about climate change. They have also spent tens of millions of dollars to roll back environmental regulations and defund or abolish the federal agencies that write and enforce them.
There are signs that the Kochs' influence may be waning. The Republican candidate they appeared to have favoured, Scott Walker, is no longer in the presidential race. Donald J Trump, the candidate out in front, has made clear that he has no need for Koch money and has ridiculed those who "beg" for it. Still, as Ms Mayer reports, twice as many Koch network dollars will be in play in 2016 than were in play in 2012: $889 million, only slightly less than the $1 billion that the Democratic and Republican national committees each expect to spend on the election.
© 2016 The New York Times News Service