Obama and The New Yorker Team Up to Target Americans for Prosperity and Koch Industries

Obama spoke in Austin, Texas in early August and tried to lay a landmine for conservative grassroots organizations with "harmless sounding names, like Americans for Prosperity." Alluding to scary Big Oil foreign-controlled corporations and evil banks, Obama complained that Americans for Prosperity (AFP) are spending millions in ads against Democrats without revealing "exactly who they are." Hear it in the video below, newly released on Wednesday, August 25th.

David Koch

The problem for Obama is America's prosperity, and for him the name (AFP) and what it stands for is not "harmless." The President and his congressional lemmings are in big trouble precisely because America's prosperity is feared to be missing. Obama places the blame on Justice John Roberts and his Supreme Court, when earlier this year it ruled that free-speech can rightly be extended to corporations and labor unions, and they can speak with their money.

Right now all around this country there are groups with harmless-sounding names like Americans for Prosperity, who are running millions of dollars of ads against Democratic candidates all across the country.  And they don't have to say who exactly the Americans for Prosperity are.  You don't know if it’s a foreign-controlled corporation.  You don't know if it’s a big oil company, or a big bank.  You don't know if it’s a insurance company that wants to see some of the provisions in health reform repealed because it’s good for their bottom line, even if it’s not good for the American people.

A Supreme Court decision allowed this to happen.  And we tried to fix it, just by saying disclose what’s going on, and making sure that foreign companies can’t influence our elections. Seemed pretty straightforward.  The other side said no.

They don't want you to know who the Americans for Prosperity are, because they're thinking about the next election.  But we’ve got to think about future generations.  We’ve got to make sure that we’re fighting for reform.  We’ve got to make sure that we don't have a corporate takeover of our democracy.

Obama knows who Americans for Prosperity is and who funds it - and I'll prove it as you read on. It's not a secret, and much to his distress, it is legal and he can't do anything about it, other than to vilify one of the most prolific philanthropists of this time, billionaire David Koch, the CEO of Koch Industries who formed Americans for Prosperity Foundation and American's for Prosperity years ago- two separate entities with separate governing boards and both committed to educating citizens about economic policy and restoring the Constitution in government. Koch is a Libertarian who once ran as the Libertarian Vice Presidential nominee in 1980 against the Reagan campaign.

The New Yorker magazine has an eleven page (yes, 11) hit piece (Covert Operations) on David Koch and his brother Charles. Apparently it is just too much that a conservative has contributed multi-millions to New York City's most sacred places: $100 million to modernize the Lincoln Center's New York State Theatre building, $20 million to the American Museum of Natural History, $10 million to the Metropolitan Museum of Art for repair of the fountains, and $40 million to the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. Perhaps New York is testy that Koch bought Jackie Kennedy's Fifth Avenue apartment in 1995 but sold it years later (it was too small). According to the article, the sale price was $32 million - likely a very nice profit. The New Yorker, of course, sees "profit" as a four-letter-word when that "profit" is the handiwork of a conservative.

So how do I know that Barack Obama knows who Americas for Prosperity is and what it does? The New Yorker article makes it clear in the story they told of the May 2010 "seventieth annual gala of the American Ballet Theatre:"

...David H. Koch was being celebrated for his generosity as a member of the board of trustees; he had recently donated $2.5 million toward the company’s upcoming season, and had given many millions before that. Koch received an award while flanked by two of the gala’s co-chairs, Blaine Trump, in a peach-colored gown, and Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg, in emerald green. Kennedy’s mother, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, had been a patron of the ballet...

One dignitary was conspicuously absent from the gala: the event’s third honorary co-chair, Michelle Obama. Her office said that a scheduling conflict had prevented her from attending. Yet had the First Lady shared the stage with Koch it might have created an awkward tableau. In Washington, Koch is best known as part of a family that has repeatedly funded stealth attacks on the federal government, and on the Obama Administration in particular.

"Stealth attacks?" Oh my! Michelle missed her big night to stand next to Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg on the American Ballet Theatre stage - Caroline dressed in emerald green (also MO's favorite color - would Caroline have relented and chosen something in petal pink?), because it would be a tad awkward for her, the wife of a man who hates private industry, has never met a payroll, to stand beside an enormously successful man who disdains your husband policies with every ounce of energy he has, and had the audacity to generously gift New York City from his own private funds.

Those mysterious people at Americans for Prosperity, concerned about the absence of limited government, looming ObamaCare, the revisionist education of our children, leviathan tax increases, and the administration's energy plans, are people like you and I...and Glen Beck. Watch as Beck talks about the "stealth" organizations behind Obama et al, in the second video. The first video is the illuminating release from Americans for Prosperity.



Americans for Prosperity Response to Obama Attacks (video) Glenn Beck on Obama's "Alliances" (video)
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