The War on the Koch Brothers

May 11, 2011 — John Hinderaker

The Politics of Personal Intimidation

A disturbing new element has crept into our political life: organized efforts to intimidate private citizens who choose to support certain political causes or otherwise participate in civic affairs. This, as far as I know, is unprecedented in our modern history. Our democracy depends on citizen involvement, and until now, Americans have felt free to participate in public life and to support whatever causes, political and otherwise, they choose. But »
May 5, 2011 — John Hinderaker

The Times Promotes Far-Left Propaganda, Uncritically

Robert Greenwald was once a Hollywood director. He is best remembered for making Xanadu, a box office bomb that has been described as “Possibly, the worst musical ever made.” Greenwald ultimately retreated from commercial movie-making to the world of far-left documentaries. He operates under the name Brave New Films, which is part of Brave New Foundation, an entity which Greenwald founded. Greenwald has made propaganda films attacking Wal-Mart, Fox News, »
April 23, 2011 — John Hinderaker

Mistaken Identity

It came out last week that the owners of an office supply company in Des Moines, whose last name happens to be Koch, have received at least one death threat after being confused with the owners of Koch Industries in Wichita: A case of mistaken identity has entangled a small family-owned Des Moines company in union protests and led to a death threat. Angry callers are mistaking Koch Brothers, a »
April 22, 2011 — John Hinderaker

Speculation

It is getting hard to keep track of all of the disgraceful things Barack Obama is doing, but we shouldn’t overlook his effort to blame high energy prices on “speculators.” In fact, the high price of petroleum, which in turn raises the cost of everything else, is due to a combination of market forces and the Obama administration’s terrible energy policies. When you have an administration that openly wishes for »
April 20, 2011 — John Hinderaker

Communicating With Employees? The Horror!

The Nation joins the Koch-bashing that has become obligatory on the Left with an “expose” of the fact that last year, Koch Industries sent information to some of its employees on the November elections that included identification of candidates that the company thought would help to create a positive economic environment. This gives The Nation the vapors, but why? Most employees understand that their interests are closely tied to those »
April 14, 2011 — John Hinderaker

Correction Number Two

We summed up here our coverage of the New York Times’ smear campaign against Charles and David Koch and their company, Koch Industries. The Times has printed one false or misleading claim after another about the Kochs. On April 7, the paper issued a correction of its own editorial attacking the Koch brothers. Today came correction number two, which related to an op-ed column by David Callahan, an employee of »
April 12, 2011 — John Hinderaker

The Times Smear Continues

We have documented here, here, here, here, here, here and here the New York Times’ sordid campaign against the Koch brothers, Charles and David. In its news stories, op-eds and editorials, the paper has peddled one untruth after another, demonstrating once again that its highest loyalty is to left-wing politics rather than journalistic competence. On April 7, Times political writer Tim Egan stepped into the lists. His subject was “Billionaires »
April 11, 2011 — John Hinderaker

No Fact-Checking, No Correction

I wrote last night about the New York Times’ vendetta against the Koch brothers, which has been pursued through a series of false and misleading news stories, editorials and op-eds. So far, the Times has issued one correction of its false reporting, but has allowed other errors to stand. My post last night related to an op-ed by David Callahan. On Koch Industries’ web site, you can read this email »
April 10, 2011 — John Hinderaker

The Times Vendetta Continues

The New York Times is carrying out a vendetta against Charles and David Koch, two of the very few rich people who support conservative and libertarian causes. The Times is offended, apparently, that the Left does not quite have a monopoly on big money. The paper’s editorialists flat-out lied about the Koch brothers, and had to issue a retraction. But that editorial attack was just the tip of the iceberg. »
April 7, 2011 — John Hinderaker

The Times Retracts

In Anatomy of a Smear, Part II, we described how the editorial writers at the New York Times had irresponsibly repeated a false claim about the Koch brothers, Charles and David, that they got from a far-left web site. Indeed, the Times editorial was even more cavalier with the facts than the internet activists had been. Here, I reproduced the email that I sent to the Times, asking for a »
April 5, 2011 — John Hinderaker

Fake Astroturf at Think Progress

Yesterday the AFL-CIO organized demonstrations in a number of cities around the country. The idea was to associate public employees’ understandable desire to hang on to their high salaries and lavish perks with the civil rights movement. One of those rallies was in Washington, D.C. The AFL-CIO summed up their demonstration this way: In Washington , D.C., more than 1,000 marched in solidarity with workers under attack in Wisconsin, Ohio »
April 1, 2011 — John Hinderaker

Correction Requested

Following up on this post, I have sent the following email to the New York Times corrections desk, with a copy to Arthur Brisbane, the paper’s Public Editor: I am writing to request a correction relating to an editorial that was published on March 30, 2011. I wrote generally about the editorial, which I read online, here: [URL omitted] The specific statement with respect to which I am requesting a »
March 31, 2011 — John Hinderaker

Anatomy of a Smear, Part II

I wrote here about the sinister symbiosis between contemptible left-wing web sites and the supposedly respectable liberal press. The specific subject of the post, titled Anatomy of a Smear, was the left’s attacks on Congressman Mike Pompeo, a former soldier who ranked first in his class at West Point and was an editor of the Harvard Law Review, and who, after a successful career as an entrepreneur, now represents Kansas’s »
March 26, 2011 — Scott Johnson

Addicted to Koch

No one has done more to expose the left’s absurd attacks on Koch Industries and the Koch brothers than our own John Hinderaker. To John’s work we must now add Matthew Continetti’s Weekly Standard cover story “The paranoid style in liberal politics.” Continetti observes the process that has provided so much grist for John’s mill: By the time the Tea Party was getting started in 2009, the left-wing counter-counter-establishment was »
March 22, 2011 — John Hinderaker

Anatomy of a Smear

The Center for American Progress is generally regarded as a front for the Obama administration. Its President and CEO is John Podesta, formerly Bill Clinton’s Chief of Staff and the chairman of Barack Obama’s transition team. CAP is lavishly funded by George Soros and several other left-wing billionaires. It runs, among other things, a web site called Think Progress, which cranks out a steady stream of slimy hit pieces for »
March 16, 2011 — John Hinderaker

A Case Study In Liberal Hypocrisy

On Monday, the House Committee on Energy and Commerce began its consideration of the Upton-Imhofe bill, which would bar the EPA from regulating carbon dioxide emissions. Upton-Imhofe is critical to any effort to restore our economy, so the Democrats are against it. Ranking Democrat Henry Waxman went on a hysterical rant against the legislation: This is dangerous legislation. Climate change is real; it is caused by pollution; and it is »
March 13, 2011 — John Hinderaker

Guilt By Association By Association By Association

Over the last few weeks, I have followed and responded to the Left’s baseless attacks on its bete noir du jour, Koch Industries and its owners, Charles and David Koch. Of all of these attacks, perhaps the most bizarre is the one that seeks to associate them with prostitution and forced abortion. At Think Progress, boy videographer Lee Fang took the first swipe on Tuesday: In the late 90s, Christian »