Rolling Stone Report: Tea Partiers, Town Hall demonstrators too dumb to know they're being used by evil rich guys
By: Mark Tapscott
Editorial Page Editor
10/16/09 6:57 PM EDT
Well, isn't that interesting - an Obamacare advocate and former health insurance communications strategist explains why all those angry mobs showed up to protest at the August Town Hall meetings. Those folks thought they were there because they chose to be there, on their own volition, but they were deceived.
Why? Because it turns out that the protesters were actually just a bunch of puppets, unconsciously being manipulated by sinister hidden forces of evil Rich Right Wingers determined to frustrate health care reform yet again, just as they did when the heroic Hillary Clinton tried in 1993. And how do we know this? Because a former top strategist in the manipulation told a Rolling Stone reporter all about it!
In an article headline "The Lie Machine," Rolling Stone's Tim Dickinson breathlessly reported the following:
"The insurance industry is up to the same dirty tricks, using the same devious PR practices it has used for many years, to kill reform," says Wendell Potter, who stepped down last year as chief of corporate communications for health insurance giant CIGNA. "I'm certain that people showing up at these town halls feel that they're there on their own — but they don't realize they're being incited, ultimately, by the insurance industry and the other special interests."
Rarely has anybody on the Left ever dared to speak so candidly in giving their explanation for the Middle American Rebellion of 2009 that turned out thousands of previously non-political Americans of all ages at town halls, tea parties and, most impressively, on Sept. 12 in the nation's capital.
While President Obama's proposal for a government-run health care system was certainly a frequent object of their protests, they were also expressing frustration, anger, disgust and worry about the federal government's exploding deficits, the nationalization of major portions of the economy, including the auto companies and banking, and the general level of corruption, lack of transparency and disdain for accountability displayed by so many members of Congress.
Since folks on the Left can't possibly accept that rational people would oppose more government control over their lives, they are left with only one possible explanation - Opponents must be too stupid, blind or malleable to think for themselves, so they must be nothing more than pawns.
And who is doing the manipulating? Remember Hillary Clinton and the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy (VRWC)? Dickinson echoes and updates the familiar theme with this pack of assertions:
"Call it the return of the Karl Rove playbook: The effort to mobilize the angriest fringe of the Republican base was guided by a conservative dream team that included the same GOP henchmen who Swift-boated John Kerry in 2004, smeared John McCain in 2000, wrote the script for Republican obstructionism on global warming, and harpooned the health care reform effort led by Hillary Clinton in 1993."
And among the other suspects - Dick Scaife, Frank Luntz, Dick Armey - Dickinson pays particular attention to Charles and David Koch, and their foundation, saying "Americans for Prosperity, which has taken the lead in the current fight against reform, is a front group for oil billionaires David and Charles Koch, co-owners of the world's largest private oil and gas conglomerate."
In fact, Koch Industries is a highly diversified, privately owned conglomerate based in Wichita, Kansas. The Koch brothers have for many years been generous funders of mainly libertarian organizations, candidates and causes. Charles Koch lives in Wichita, and is also the author of a management how-to, "The Science of Success," in which he makes clear his strongly held belief in limited government, individual responsibility, and the superiority of private enterprise for generating the most widely shared prosperity.
David Koch is a New York City resident - reputed to be Gotham's second richest, behind Mayor Michael Bloomberg - and is well-known in philanthropic circles for generous contributions to medical, art and charitable organizations. Readers who have visited the nation's capital may have strolled through the Koch-funded dinosaur wing of the Smithsonian's American Museum of Natural History. He was the Libertarian Party's vice-president candidate in 1980.
So the Kochs are readily available for the 2009 rendition of the VRWC meme as folks on the Left reached for an explanation for those huge, angry crowds turning out to remind their senators and representatives of for whom they work. This was especially so considering that David Koch is chairman of the board for the AFP Foundation.
The only problem is, the conspiracy narrative doesn't match the reality, a fact that should be obvious to anybody willing to talk to the demonstrators and listen to their response without filtering them through preconceived ideological suppositions.
Earlier this year when the tea party and town hall events were fresh on the evening news, I asked Koch Industries spokesman Melissa Cohlmia about accusations the Koch brothers were funding the demonstrations. Yes, she said, Koch Industries, the Koch brothers have contributed to AFP and/or the legally separate AFP Foundation, but that support has always been for general operations, not specific projects. The Koch Foundations support only went to the AFP Foundation.
So, I asked, they have not made contributions specifically designated to fund demonstrations aimed at opposing Obamacare?
"Neither Koch Industries nor the Koch foundations have, to date, contributed funds that are dedicated to AFP's and AFP Foundation's efforts on the health-care issue," Cohlmia said.
Cohlmia also pointed out that "over time, as AFP and AFP Foundation have broadened their base of support to include 700,000 members and 50,000 donors, Koch-related funding has become a smaller and smaller percentage of their total donations. In fact, as of today, less than 5 percent of the funding AFP and AFP Foundation have received so far in 2009 has been contributed by David Koch, Koch Industries or Koch foundations."
In other words, just as critics on the left were pointing more and more to the Kochs as the main funders of the angry demonstrations, what money the two brothers and their related resources were giving to AFP represented a steadily declining portion of the organization's revenues.
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