1. These people, mainly referring right now to the Koch
brothers David and Charles, like to hide things they are doing that
might be unpopular.* This is about stripping away their veil. It
is also about working to maintain civilization at least in some
places.
One interesting thing this movie co-producer Carl Deal said about the Koch brothers in this interview was: "I don’t know we have any insight into the Kochs. My observation is they’re not people who’ve ever not been part of the wealthy elite. Their father pioneered a refining process and made a killing in the Soviet Union with it and built an energy empire here, which they’ve inherited. Their father was also a founder of the John Birch Society and was a fierce anti-communist in the most irrational ways. If I had to guess, it’s a combination of not having much interaction with normal people and being indoctrinated with this right-wing ideology."
"‘Citizen Koch’ Filmmakers: Watching This Movie Is ‘Civil Disobedience,’" by Emily Wilson, truthdig, July 2, 2014.
From co-producer Tia Lessin: "We hope people will watch the movie, because that act in itself is sort of civil disobedience. Because of Koch money, this film was kept off the airwaves with PBS. We are doing our best to make sure this movie is seen far and wide. If people come see it that sends a message to the Kochs, and also to public media, that money should not trump the public interest.
"Afterwards, there are a lot of local ballot measures to try and reverse Citizens United for folks organizing around, and we hope this film will be a tool. It’s such a big issue, and sometimes we feel so helpless and powerless. It’s not just money and politics. It affects everything we do: where we send our kids to school, how much we pay their teachers, the curriculum they study, the water we drink. All this money has a direct impact on us and our children and our communities, and we’ve got to do something about it—at least engage in conversation about it. That’s the start."
To my knowledge, all of the above is true except the part about "...we've got to do something about it--at least engage in conversation about it." That exception is based on the edgy principle: "No one has to do anything." That might go along with Marshall Rosenberg's words, "Never do anything that isn't play."** Otherwise though, while I myself might not be directing a lot of my attention to the work on overcoming the U.S. Supreme Court's hugely damaging decision known as Citizen's United--me I'm busy with brightening your day, I think it is important just to know and be aware of the Koch brothers' major influence going on in the background even when we can't see all of it. And that's a start if you are inspired to join the many all over the country who are working on doing something about it.....
2. But I think just talking about it helps to maintain civilization whether it affects the Koch brothers' activities directly or not. Please allow me to share with you this:
"Henry A. Giroux | Data Storms and the Tyranny of Manufactured Forgetting" (link), truthout, June 24, 2014. Somewhere along the way you might like to see who Henry Giroux is, if you don't happen to know already. (Wikipedia link) He's famous to lots of smart audiences and has written lots of books. And check out the footnotes in the article!
For in the world in which we live it is no longer merely a question of the decay of collective memory and declining consciousness of the past, but of the aggressive [assault on] whatever memory remains, the deliberate distortion of the historical record, the invention of mythological pasts in the service of the powers of darkness. -- Yosef Hayim Yerushalmi, Zakhor: Jewish History and Jewish Memory (New York: Schocken Books, 1989), p. 105.
All reification is forgetting. --Herbert Marcuse, The Aesthetic Dimension (Boston: Beacon Press, 1978), p. 73.
--------------------------------------------
References you may have seen from me recently about the Koch brothers and civilization:
Koch Brothers Exposed: The Chilling New Documentary Republicans Don’t Want You to See--intro to that new Robert Greenwald movie at DemocracyNow (video) with Amy Goodman, May 21, 2014, link contained in my May 31, 2014 message (link).
One interesting thing this movie co-producer Carl Deal said about the Koch brothers in this interview was: "I don’t know we have any insight into the Kochs. My observation is they’re not people who’ve ever not been part of the wealthy elite. Their father pioneered a refining process and made a killing in the Soviet Union with it and built an energy empire here, which they’ve inherited. Their father was also a founder of the John Birch Society and was a fierce anti-communist in the most irrational ways. If I had to guess, it’s a combination of not having much interaction with normal people and being indoctrinated with this right-wing ideology."
"‘Citizen Koch’ Filmmakers: Watching This Movie Is ‘Civil Disobedience,’" by Emily Wilson, truthdig, July 2, 2014.
From co-producer Tia Lessin: "We hope people will watch the movie, because that act in itself is sort of civil disobedience. Because of Koch money, this film was kept off the airwaves with PBS. We are doing our best to make sure this movie is seen far and wide. If people come see it that sends a message to the Kochs, and also to public media, that money should not trump the public interest.
"Afterwards, there are a lot of local ballot measures to try and reverse Citizens United for folks organizing around, and we hope this film will be a tool. It’s such a big issue, and sometimes we feel so helpless and powerless. It’s not just money and politics. It affects everything we do: where we send our kids to school, how much we pay their teachers, the curriculum they study, the water we drink. All this money has a direct impact on us and our children and our communities, and we’ve got to do something about it—at least engage in conversation about it. That’s the start."
To my knowledge, all of the above is true except the part about "...we've got to do something about it--at least engage in conversation about it." That exception is based on the edgy principle: "No one has to do anything." That might go along with Marshall Rosenberg's words, "Never do anything that isn't play."** Otherwise though, while I myself might not be directing a lot of my attention to the work on overcoming the U.S. Supreme Court's hugely damaging decision known as Citizen's United--me I'm busy with brightening your day, I think it is important just to know and be aware of the Koch brothers' major influence going on in the background even when we can't see all of it. And that's a start if you are inspired to join the many all over the country who are working on doing something about it.....
2. But I think just talking about it helps to maintain civilization whether it affects the Koch brothers' activities directly or not. Please allow me to share with you this:
"Henry A. Giroux | Data Storms and the Tyranny of Manufactured Forgetting" (link), truthout, June 24, 2014. Somewhere along the way you might like to see who Henry Giroux is, if you don't happen to know already. (Wikipedia link) He's famous to lots of smart audiences and has written lots of books. And check out the footnotes in the article!
For in the world in which we live it is no longer merely a question of the decay of collective memory and declining consciousness of the past, but of the aggressive [assault on] whatever memory remains, the deliberate distortion of the historical record, the invention of mythological pasts in the service of the powers of darkness. -- Yosef Hayim Yerushalmi, Zakhor: Jewish History and Jewish Memory (New York: Schocken Books, 1989), p. 105.
All reification is forgetting. --Herbert Marcuse, The Aesthetic Dimension (Boston: Beacon Press, 1978), p. 73.
--------------------------------------------
References you may have seen from me recently about the Koch brothers and civilization:
Koch Brothers Exposed: The Chilling New Documentary Republicans Don’t Want You to See--intro to that new Robert Greenwald movie at DemocracyNow (video) with Amy Goodman, May 21, 2014, link contained in my May 31, 2014 message (link).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_activities_of_the_Koch_brothers
--------------------------------------------
Reminding you of James Lovelock: Most of all, he says, it's about everybody "absolutely doing their utmost to sustain civilization, so that it doesn't degenerate into Dark Ages, with warlords running things, which is a real danger. We could lose everything that way."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Lovelock#Sustainable_retreat
love,
Larry
* "unpopular" is a serious understatement.
** http://www.nonviolentcommunication.com/freeresources/nvc_social_media_quotes.htm
--
"Young brothers and sisters, welcome to the non-MTV version of the real world and please take the following advice for what it's worth. Fear and scapegoating — not economic turmoil or welfare moms or illegal immigrants — pose the greatest threat to freedom and human dignity. And if you're looking for smooth sailing, don't waste your time. But I can leave you with a bit of Eastern wisdom I learned in my America of the 1960s:
"Where you stumble and fall, there you find the treasure." By Larry Durstin, "An Independence Day Message for Millenials: America Wasn’t Always Like This," July 5, 2014 (link). [Emphasis added, LAS]
