KOCH BROTHERS ARE UNAMERICAN

This morning on #Morning Joe (MSNBC) the standard tirade was against Senate Majority leader #Harry Reid. What was remarkable about it was that #Joe Scarborough explained why he thought Koch brothers were “not un-American”, as Reid accused them of being. Joe’s reasoning revealed that he, like an isolated cadre of Republicans from among the economic elite, just does not have the slightest clue about what the Citizens United Decision is doing to America. He sees it as being a good thing. Joe, you are a smart man, so let me try to explain, in sophomoric terms, in the hope that you just might understand even through the fog of his southern right wing bias often obscures your vision.

America was founded on the principle of democracy, which is a system of government by the whole population or “all the eligible members of a state”, typically through elected representatives. This means we all have and equal say in selecting representatives to represent out interests. This happened because the people learned that “royalty”, in the form of a hereditary monarchy, was often an extremely unfair; thus, was a failed form of governance. The people also abhorred dictatorships, which are a form of royalty. Everything in our Constitution and Bill of Rights was written to avoid the possibility of electing a dictator or establishing a royal family, but mainly was written to establish the individual as the basic decision unit—the voter. We established a hierarchy of governments, village, city, county, state, and eventually federal governing bodies. The tumultuous period of 18^th century saw, the “power of the people” replaces royalty; sometimes violently, some times peacefully. “Royalty” did not give up “power” easily. Most often, dictators replaced royalty. In the untied States, for the first time, the people replaced royalty.

In 1945, after two world wars and a long period of maturation of the idea, the world established the United Nation, which extended that “concept of representative voting” to the entire countries. Our inbred format for hierarchy dominance or establishment of “peck order” was compatible but was modified by establishing fairness in voting to pick leaders. The conflict of selecting leaders, within the context of individuals, was obvious but manageable. However, first royal families, then states, and eventually entire countries felt compelled to establish a hierarchy within the context of each unit, thus, people and organizations fought battle that were with won or lost.

The Charter of the United Nations point out how distorted the fight for equality can become; it was a Battle lost but was still better that no organization. The Security Council is the result of an agreement to share power among countries that did not want to give up power based on equality—one country one vote. Certain countries demanded deference based on their power and wealth just as royalty demanded deference from the people governed. They wanted and got that power in such a way that popular vote could not remove them or lessen their power. With that in mind, the most powerful nations in the world established the Security Council and gave themselves veto power over every thing the Untied Nations does. Guess what? China, France, USSR, the United Kingdom, and the United States, the countries that formed the United Nation are the nations that have vote power, so much for one country one vote.  

In the United States, our ancestors fought the same battles among the 13 original states but avoided these pitfalls; the result is that we have “codified” equality among all units of government in the form of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights starting with states. These documents serve as a guideline for fairness in the hierarchy dominance fight.

We, as a people, have worked hard to live within the spirit of those words. They have worked and worked well until now. However, the Koch Brothers corrupted Supreme Court justices Scalia and Thomas. It is also true; these two justices were radical before the Koch brothers fed their radicalism with bribe money but there is no way the Citizens United Case would have even been heard let alone decided on the way it was if these two guys were not on the court. The decision grossly violated every rule of jurisprudence.

Where is Joe wrong and where does he fit into all of this? What Joe said this morning is the Koch brothers “earned their money so they can spend it to fashion the government to their liking”. How many times have you heard a Republican say it is their money, they earned it, so they should be able to spend it the way they like. This is the standard cry of the “economic elite”. The same cry was heard from royalty and dictators; they have the power so they can use that power to fashion the government the way they want. What Joe is saying is that money is power. It is the same cry we heard from and the five members of the U.N. Security Council as well as heard from the most primitive dictators from the beginning of time; “We have the power so we should be able to govern the way we like”. What Citizens United Decision says; what Joe Scarborough and the economic elite are saying; and what Koch brothers are saying is to hell with the people, to hell with the Constitution, to hell with the Bill of Rights; money is power and to hell with the people; this is what Harry Reid is pointing out. Koch brothers are UN-AMERICAN and so are you if you agree with them.

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