{"id":20348,"date":"2014-08-27T14:59:57","date_gmt":"2014-08-27T21:59:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=20348"},"modified":"2014-08-27T15:01:33","modified_gmt":"2014-08-27T22:01:33","slug":"busted-mitch-mcconnell-secretly-recorded-at-the-koch-brothers-donor-summit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=20348","title":{"rendered":"BUSTED: Mitch McConnell Secretly Recorded At The Koch Brothers Donor Summit"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Every year the Koch brothers hold one or more conclaves of their conservative millionaire and billionaire pals to discuss future strategies and collect donations for candidates and causes that will benefit their parochial interests. These affairs are put on under the tightest security so as to protect the elite attendees from being identified or from having to encounter the riff raff (i.e. ordinary American citizens) they hope to oppress.<\/p>\n<p>Earlier this year, an event in the California beach resort at Dana Point, the Lear Jet Set gathered as usual, but they had a mole in their midst. A recording was just <a href=\"http:\/\/www.thenation.com\/article\/181363\/caught-tape-what-mitch-mcconnell-complained-about-roomful-billionaires-exclusive%23#\" target=\"_blank\">published by The Nation<\/a> that includes some frank talk by participants including GOP senate candidates Tom Cotton (AR), Joni Ernst (IA), and Senate Republican Leader, Mitch McConnell. McConnell kicked things off by expressing his gratitude to his wealthy benefactors, Charles and David Koch saying that&#8230;<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>&#8220;I want to start by thanking you, Charles and David for the important work you\u2019re doing. I don\u2019t know where we\u2019d be without you.&#8221;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/Pix\/GOP\/mcconnell-koch-brothers.jpg\" alt=\"Mitch McConnell \/ Koch Brothers\" width=\"550\" height=\"300\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-20349\" \/><\/p>\n<p>McConnell&#8217;s smarmy sycophancy extended to some blatantly miscast interpretations of the onerous Citizen&#8217;s United decision by the Supreme Court. McConnell said&#8230;<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>&#8220;What did the case decide? Well as you all know, corporations that own a newspaper or a television station (inaudible), they\u2019re free to say whatever they want to say about anybody at any time. But if you were a corporation that didn\u2019t own a newspaper or didn\u2019t own a television station, you couldn\u2019t. So all Citizens United did was to level the playing field for corporate speech. In other words, no longer did corporations have to own a newspaper or a television station in order to say whatever they wanted. It simply leveled the playing field.&#8221;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>That is a deliberate bastardization of the decision and McConnell, a lawyer by profession, knows it. Corporations have always been able to say whatever they wanted at any time. They have the money to run ads in those corporate newspapers and television networks. They can fund any number of public relations campaigns to disseminate whatever message they please. And they can hire lobbyists to promote their interests to politicians and the media. They have always had these avenues of communication.<\/p>\n<p>What Citizen&#8217;s United gave them was a veil behind which they could covertly mold the political landscape to their liking. They can now contribute unlimited sums to Super PACS without disclosing where the money came from. It wasn&#8217;t speech they were angling for, it was anonymity. They needed to disguise their participation in campaigns because American&#8217;s know that these upper-crusters don&#8217;t have the people&#8217;s interests at heart.<\/p>\n<p>It was that secrecy that Citizen&#8217;s United provided. It was never about <em>&#8220;leveling the playing field.&#8221;<\/em> The field was already slanted severely toward the rich, and this just made things worse. It made it more difficult than ever for the voices of average citizens to compete with the wealthy captains of industry who could shout everyone else down.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p style=\"text-align:center;\"><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pages\/News-Corpse\/117899091558228?v=wall\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Like me on Facebook\">Be Sure To \u201cLIKE\u201d News Corpse On Facebook<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>With the publication of this recording we are afforded a view into the luxury suites of the plutocrats who seek to dominate our society. We have always known their self-serving intentions, but it is chilling to hear it from their own lips when they think no one is listening.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Every year the Koch brothers hold one or more conclaves of their conservative millionaire and billionaire pals to discuss future strategies and collect donations for candidates and causes that will benefit their parochial interests. These affairs are put on under the tightest security so as to protect the elite attendees from being identified or from [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20349,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"BUSTED: Mitch McConnell Secretly Recorded At The Koch Brothers Donor Summit","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[152,1],"tags":[706,834,923,301],"class_list":["post-20348","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-election","category-general","tag-citizens-united","tag-koch-brothers","tag-mitch-mcconnell","tag-republicans"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/mcconnell-koch-brothers.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4Ijg-5ic","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":30968,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=30968","url_meta":{"origin":20348,"position":0},"title":"Is Tea Party Godfather Charles Koch Feeling The Bern?","author":"Mark NC","date":"2\/19\/2016","format":false,"excerpt":"The Washington Post (you know, that bastion of the so-called \"liberal\" media) just published an op-ed by Charles Koch of the infamous Koch brothers. The headline declared that \"This is the one issue where Bernie Sanders is right.\" While that's a fairly generous admission, it is hardly representative of Koch's\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Election&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Election","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=152"},"img":{"alt_text":"Koch Brothers Bernie Sanders","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/koch-brothers-sanders.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/koch-brothers-sanders.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/koch-brothers-sanders.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":33964,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=33964","url_meta":{"origin":20348,"position":1},"title":"The &#8216;So-Called&#8217; Trump Presidency Is Crumbling Under The Pressure &#8211; And They Know It","author":"Mark NC","date":"2\/22\/2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Since the day that Donald Trump was inaugurated, the American people have flooded the streets and town halls to express their opposition to his agenda. Unprecedented numbers of citizens turned out for the nationwide Women's March on January 21. A week later, more protesters showed up spontaneously at airports to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;General&quot;","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=1"},"img":{"alt_text":"Mitch McConnell GOP Town Hall","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/mcconnell-townhall.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/mcconnell-townhall.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/mcconnell-townhall.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":28744,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=28744","url_meta":{"origin":20348,"position":2},"title":"What Republican Party? 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However, recently they have begun incorporating the most extreme right-wing opinions disguised as journalism and originating from\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;General&quot;","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=1"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":21661,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=21661","url_meta":{"origin":20348,"position":5},"title":"What\u2019s Wrong With America? Why Is Anyone Voting Republican?","author":"Mark NC","date":"10\/31\/2014","format":false,"excerpt":"A new poll from Fox News affirms what virtually every other poll has found when people are asked to name the most important problem facing the country. 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