Community | April 21, 2011 | 50 comments

Koch Industries tells it's 50,000 workers how to vote!

source: http://figrd.blogspot.com/2011/04/koch-industries-tells-its-50000-workers.html

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figgdimension

http://figrd.blogspot.com/2011/04/koch-industries-tells-its-50000-wor...

The immediate concern in the wake of the Citizens United decision was that corporate funding would play such a dominant role in election campaigns as to trounce all other interest groups (as if that hadn’t already occurred in large measure).
But a story in The Nation, “Big Brothers: Thought Control at Koch,” by Mark Ames and Mike Elk points to a second channel of influence: major employers pressuring their staff to vote for the company’s pet candidates. Never mind that most workers live in an employment at will regime, so the business has no loyalty to the troops, or that business and wage slave interests are seldom aligned. As the Nation piece depicts, employees of Koch entities like Georgia Pacific are repeatedly told who they should vote for. This is new: before Citizens United, companies could only proselytize its officers and shareholders.
Consider what passes the smell test now:

The election packet starts with a letter from Robertson dated October 4, 2010. It read: “As Koch company employees, we have a lot at stake in the upcoming election. Each of us is likely to be affected by the outcome on Nov. 2. That is why, for the first time ever, we are mailing our newest edition of Discovery and several other helpful items to the home address of every U.S. employee” [emphasis added].
For most Koch employees, the “helpful items” included a list of Koch-approved candidates, which was presented on a separate page labeled “Elect to Prosper.” A brief introduction to the list reads: “The following candidates in your state are supported by Koch companies and KOCHPAC, the political action committee for Koch companies. We believe these candidates will best advance policies supporting economic freedom.”…
After guiding employees on how they should vote, the mailer devoted the rest of the material to the sort of indoctrination one would expect from an old John Birch Society pamphlet (the Koch Brothers’ father, Fred Koch, was a founding member of the JBS). It offers an apocalyptic vision of the company’s free-market struggle for liberty against the totalitarian forces of European Union bureaucrats and deficit-spending statistics….
With Citizens United, it seems, the country is heading back to the days of court-enforced corporatocracy. Already, workers at a Koch subsidiary in Portland, Oregon, are complaining about being subjected to political and ideological propaganda. Employees at Georgia-Pacific warehouses in Portland say the company encourages them to read Charles Koch’s The Science of Success: How Market-Based Management Built the World’s Largest Private Company and to attend ideological seminars in which Koch management preaches their bosses’ “market-based management” philosophy.
Travis McKinney, an employee at a Portland Georgia-Pacific distribution center, says, “They drill into your head things like ‘The 10 Guiding Principles of Koch Industries.’ They even stamp the ten principles on your time card.”

The article provided a sample of one of the mailings, so you can see for yourself how prominent the voting recommendations are.
Koch Industries isn’t alone in these efforts. Dave Dayen reported that employees of a McDonald’s franchise in Ohio were given instructions to vote Republican in a local election, along with their paycheck. And if you think that suggestion was already none-too-subtle, the insert said:

If the right people are elected, we will be able to continue with raises and benefits at or above our present levels. If others are elected, we will not.

This sort of thing does violate Ohio election law, and other states are apparently taking steps to limit election propagandizing by employers. But they have yet to be tested in court.
In the meantime, welcome to the ever more intrusive thought police.Crossposted w/permission from NakedCapitalism/Yves Smith
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  2. tags:
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50 comments // Koch Industries tells it's 50,000 workers how to vote!

  • Prijedor
  • Prijedor
  • Toughth
    • 0
      Toughth  

    • We are at a crossroads for the USA. We can decide if we wish to go back to the ideals of feudlizm or go foward in the rights of man. If we go the way the Koch's wish us to go we may as well have a King, Throw the declaration of independace and the constitution in the trash. I for one will never stand for a king or dictator.
      I wonder if any other american feels the same way. I would probably be dead for treason befor I let such a system exist in this country.

    • 2 years ago
  • Prijedor
  • SAINTJULE
    • 0
      SAINTJULE  

    • And who was that genius Scalia sycophant that sat in the front row and denied the fact that foreign corporations would sway American elections during Obama's state of the union address? Caterpillar 60 off shore, GE in China. IBM Chinese owned, AIG, insurance bank started in China now global. WTF

    • 2 years ago
  • Arizona_Huey
    • 0
      Arizona_Huey  

    • HELLO!!! The pay off and/or threaten politicians, judges, and anybody else they feel can provide them benefit - I doubt that there is one person on this planet that know who these two cocks are would be surprised by this!

    • 2 years ago
  • jonlemnh
    • 0
      jonlemnh  

    • this is the shit that irritates me because when i tell people they need to make lobbying illegal this is the reason why "WE THE CORP" I tell this to people and they look at me like i got 3 heads.

    • 2 years ago
  • Stoneyroad
    • +2
      Stoneyroad  

    • Corporate entities already have undue influence over politicians with their Campaign Contributions & Lobbyists, and the special interests of the wealthy have for too long been able to market themselves as Populist Grassroot movements in the form of PACs or "Citizens" organizations.

      Proselytization of your employees is bad enough, but in this case they actually threatened their workers livelihood if they didn't vote for the corporate masters best interest.
      That should be considered beyond the pale of even our most lax regulations of Undue Influence over politics, And that alone should be grounds for criminal charges, or at the very least prohibiting the Kochs from contributing to Campaigns & PACs.

      It's a shameful day for America when the already power drunk elite are allowed to openly Bully the working class into voting against their best interest.

    • 2 years ago
  • CalgarC
  • samthesixth
  • Steamed_N_More
    • +4
      Steamed_N_More  

    • Vile extortions.
      "Do I take care of my family by keeping my job, or keep a clear conscience?" Are these the only options? If so, the secret ballot is as fictitious a concept or a violated right as any.
      Our electorial system's integrety is further suspect and trust takes another dip in the public's opinion.

    • 2 years ago
  • iowawashington
    • +1
      iowawashington  

    • As long as there is no coercion, or any attempts to verify if employees are voting the company ticket, I don't see a problem with the practice of employers giving election advice. Management is in the best position to know which candidates and issues are best for the company, and there's definitely something to be said for keeping your employer in business.

      However, I do hope that the employees are balancing the good of the company against their own self interests. A steady paycheck isn't worth some concessions.

    • 2 years ago
  • extracrazykiwi2008
  • Paratus
    • +1
      Paratus  

    • My son was in the electricians union in D.C. and they surely would tell their members how to vote. They would not ask the members which candidate to spend dues money on however. If Koch Industries issues opinions as to which candidate would benefit their company and hence, deserve the support of the employees is this any different? This is not fascism. As long as there is no coercion, and there was a LOT of coercion in the union, it is not a problem.

    • 2 years ago
  • outofyounothingmuch
    • 0
      outofyounothingmuch  

    • That does not compare to the labor union I belong too. Union members dues given too political candidates, selected for you, not by you. They call union members on the out of work list to attend protests and pay member 20$ Call members the day of election with voting tips. Complicity is expected! I belong to labors international local ___ in Oregon

    • 2 years ago
  • Warren_Merrill
    • 0
      Warren_Merrill  

    • The Kochs can tell employees how they prefer they vote. But they're not in the voting booth with them. But how is this any different than unions? Or newspaper endorsements?

    • 2 years ago
  • figgdimension
    • +2
      figgdimension  
    • Warren_Merrill:

      Because it's your employer doing it that implies if you don't you'll suffer...who reads the newspaper anymore there all owned by these same people too. Unions are supporting an agenda that supports worker's rights not destroying them like these tools . Also when you receive a pamphlet in your paycheck saying if we don't get what we want you'll get no raise thats not intimidation then I don't know what is.. Not to mention IT IS ILLEGAL in OHIO! Thats the BIG FRICKING difference warren!

    • 2 years ago
  • figgdimension
  • Chukarhunter
    • +1
      Chukarhunter  
    • Warren_Merrill:

      Not that I agree with anything the Koch brothers do, I do agree with your statement that they are not in the voting booth with a person while they vote. Also having worked in a job that had a Union, and also being a Union steward, I tend to agree with your statement about Unions. I do know that they do push certain candidates for their own purposes, which I did tend to agree with. But the bottom line is that you are alone when you vote. No one can tell you what to do in that booth. You need to decide for yourself what is right for you and how you will vote. You need to educate yourself. There were several times that I did not vote strictly down party lines, or with what the Union had recommended. Bottom line, THINK FOR YOUR DAMN SELF! Not what someone is telling you to do.

    • 2 years ago
  • Warren_Merrill
    • -2
      Warren_Merrill  
    • figgdimension:

      Don't tell me one is forcing something on their employees while the other is supporting an agenda. That one be a one sided, hypocritical view. The unions are famous for handouts to members. The unions are currently trying to make union member's vote public knowledge as an an intimidation and fear tactic against unions members who aren't so pro union.

    • 2 years ago
  • Wicks934
  • musicjohnny
    • -1
      musicjohnny  

    • One quick but important point, while it's not good that anyone tells someone else how to vote, are we really going to sit here and be so naive as to pretend that unions don't put the EXACT same pressures on their members? To not acknowledge that fact would be pure ignorance. Like I said, I don't agree with someone telling someone else how to vote regardless of party affiliation or political bent, but let's not pretend like this issue is one sided.

    • 2 years ago
  • figgdimension
    • +1
      figgdimension  
    • musicjohnny:

      Unions support the agenda of the workers rights what these corporations do has no advantage to the workers and is akin to intimidation. Unions used to be accused of this back in the day...But keep in mind what Mcdonald's and Koch's are doing IS ILLEGAL in this state get a grip UNIONHATER!

    • 2 years ago
  • musicjohnny
    • +1
      musicjohnny  
    • figgdimension:

      Wow...your ignorance is striking. Just go google "union voter intimidation" read up on the HUNDREDS of reported and verified cases. I'm not a union hater either, like I said, I simply don't support ANYONE telling someone else how to vote.

      I mean seriously, why can't you go along with that? If a union was out there attempting to influence people....wouldn't you agree that would be wrong? It doesn't make you (or me) a union hater, it just means we're standing up for the rights of the American voting public regardless of part affiliation. Does that seriously not make sense to you?

    • 2 years ago
  • wolfess
    • +3
      wolfess  

    • What's that phrase on the gate to Auschwitz ... work brings freedom? Sounds a helluva lot like the koch[roach] phrase: elect to prosper.These psychopaths scare the hell out of me.

    • 2 years ago
  • figgdimension
  • Milieu
    • +2
      Milieu  

    • Charles Koch seems to have approached both business and politics with the deliberation of an engineer. “To bring about social change,” he told Doherty, requires “a strategy” that is “vertically and horizontally integrated,” spanning “from idea creation to policy development to education to grassroots organizations to lobbying to litigation to political action.” The project, he admitted, was extremely ambitious. “We have a radical philosophy,” he said

      “Ideas don’t happen on their own,” Matt Kibbe, the president of FreedomWorks, a Tea Party advocacy group, told me. “Throughout history, ideas need patrons.”

      David Koch was badly injured in a plane crash in Los Angeles..., ‘My God, the good Lord spared me for some greater purpose.’ My joke is that I’ve been busy ever since, doing all the good work I can think of, so He can have confidence in me.”

      Read more http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/08/30/100830fa_fact_mayer#ixzz1KDmYg8Qr

    • 2 years ago
  • figgdimension
  • letsliveinpeace
  • figgdimension
  • Richard_Wyatt
  • Persecuted
  • letsliveinpeace
  • Leen61
    • +6
      Leen61  

    • figg, great article. It explains how these Koch's have their hands in everything. They have taken over the whole political process. Their father was a founding member of the JBS. Says it all. The Koch's need to keep being exposed. Posting articles like this helps do just that.

    • 2 years ago
  • letsliveinpeace
  • Leen61
  • figgdimension
    • +2
      figgdimension  
    • Leen61:

      Thanks Leen,... yea these kinda practices are draconian to say the least . These self appointed demi-gods think they can run us all into the ground and be their helpless slaves not me not ever ... Thanks for commenting !

    • 2 years ago
  • Leen61
  • August_K
    • +6
      August_K  
    • Image

    • An Extra $11 Billion In Recent Years, They Laid Off Thousands
      "David and Charles Koch, co-owners of Koch Industries and primary financiers of the Tea Party, have amassed one of the world’s largest private fortunes and Koch Industries is the second largest privately held company in America. Koch sycophants in the media have attacked anyone daring to criticize the company because Koch Industries employs nearly 50,000 people, according to a study produced by Koch Industries last week.
      In the last two years, David and Charles Koch have jumped from each being worth $16 billion to now being worth $21.5 billion. That means together they went from being worth $31 billion dollars to being worth $42 billion today. David is now the richest man in New York City, and the pair are now on the nation’s top ten list for richest Americans.

      However, at a time when the Koch brothers were enjoying spectacular financial gains, Koch Industries laid off well over 2,000 people. Using the same approximate “jobs multiplier” Koch Industries used in its study last week, that means Koch Industries extinguished nearly 8,000 jobs in recent years:"

      http://www.alternet.org/newsandviews/article/458013/as_tea_party_koch_brothers_e...$11_billion_in_recent_years,_they_laid_off_thousands/

    • 2 years ago
  • Leen61
  • figgdimension
    • +1
      figgdimension  
    • August_K:

      I read this earlier its just disturbing to know they are making out like bandits they are while our nation suffers and children and elderly are thrown to the wolves thanks for posting this :)

    • 2 years ago
  • extracrazykiwi2008
    • 0
      extracrazykiwi2008  
    • August_K:

      Nobody needs 21.5 billion dollars! Hell nobody needs 1 billion dollars. The world should enforce a personal lifetime income ceiling of 100 million dollars. The mega rich should be fazed out world wide.

    • 2 years ago
  • KB723
  • figgdimension
  • KB723
  • Leen61
  • KB723
  • Leen61
  • KB723
  • figgdimension
    • +7
      figgdimension  

    • FU Koch & Mcdonalds you corporate scum... you are not gettin away with shit you will be exposed every time douche-bags im on you like a bloodhound

    • 2 years ago
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