While the Kochs do not pay taxes, they exercize their social
responsibility by donating hefty amounts to Cato and Heritage.
On Thu, May 03, 2001 at 12:45:58PM -0400, Brown, Martin (NCI) wrote:
> This same company was convicted of cheating the federal government and
> American Indian tribes of oil royalties by systematically un-reporting the
> amount of oil that they were pumping from these properties. The fraud was
> in the hundreds of millions of dollars, I believe.
> My brother, a computer engineer, worked for a company that was started by
> the Koch brother who blew the whistle on the rest of the family in regard to
> this. He was making super-computers at a time when the market for these
> technological dinasours was disappearing. So he went around the country
> passing out grants to University departments who, in turn, used the money to
> buy the machines. The hope was that this would build market reputation and
> eventually additional customers would materialize and they would actually
> start to sell machines for a profit. This never happened and after a few
> years my brother had to find a new job. (He has now outlived half a dozen
> companies and works for a temp consulting firm). And this was the HONEST
> Koch brother!
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Ian Murray [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> Sent: Thursday, May 03, 2001 12:23 PM
> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Cc: Lbo-Talk@Lists. Panix. Com
> Subject: [PEN-L:11170] The contradictions of methodological
> individualism
>
>
> [this is fascinating even from a Whitehead-Russel "logical types"
> perspective]
>
> Published on Wednesday, May 2, 2001
> Ari & I
> White House Press Briefing with Ari Fleischer
> May 2, 2001, 2:00 p.m.
> by Russell Mokhiber
>
> Mokhiber: Ari, last month, Koch Industries, one of the nation's largest oil
> companies, pled guilty to a felony environmental crime. The Washington Post
> reported,
> also last month, that the company and its employees gave $30,000 to
> President Bush
> during the Presidential race and a similar amount in 1995 as Governor of
> Texas when
> he was running.
>
> Mokhiber: -- is the President now willing to give the money back because the
> company
> has been convicted of a felony? And does the President have a policy of
> accepting
> campaign contributions from convicted felons?
>
> Ari Fleischer: Can you give me a list of who the individuals were who gave
> the
> campaign contributions?
>
> Mokhiber: David Koch --
>
> Fleischer: And were these individuals convicted, or was it just the company?
>
> Mokhiber: The company was convicted --
>
> Fleischer: So, it was not the individuals --
>
> Mokhiber: But the company also gave --
>
> Fleischer: So, it was not the individuals.
>
> Mokhiber: The company was convicted of a felony and the company gave money
> to the --
>
> Fleischer: And therefore every employee of the company is a felon?
>
> Mokhiber: Now, wait, wait, wait, wait -- if I could follow up. The company
> was
> convicted of a felony. The company gave money to the campaign.
>
> Fleischer: The company gave money to the campaign?
>
> Mokhiber: According to the Post, Bush received more than $30,000 from Koch
> Industries
> and its employees in the Presidential race and received a similar amount
> since 1995
> as Governor of Texas.
>
> Fleischer: As you are aware, it is illegal to accept corporate contributions
> in
> federal campaigns, so therefore, any contributions came from individuals.
> So, unless
> you are prepared to say that a company that has a conviction means that all
> of its
> employees are felons -- I'd be careful there.
>
> Mokhiber: Let me just ask one further follow-up. Does the President have a
> policy of
> accepting money from executives of corporate felons?
>
> Fleischer: Again, individuals are free to give money in their own capacity.
> And it is
> illegal to accept money from corporations, as you know.
>
> [Note to readers: On April 10, 2001, the Washington Post's Dan Eggen ("Oil
> Company
> Agrees to Pay $20 Million in Fines, Koch Allegedly Hid Releases of Benzene")
> reported
> the following:
>
> "The company and its employees donated $800,000 to GOP candidates and
> organizations
> during the last election cycle, half of which came from David H. Koch, the
> firm's
> executive vice president, according to campaign finance records. Bush
> received more
> than $30,000 from Koch Industries and its employees in the presidential race
> and had
> received a similar amount since 1995 as governor of Texas, campaign records
> show."
> Fleischer said "it is illegal to accept corporate contributions in federal
> campaigns,
> so therefore, any contributions came from individuals."
>
> True and false. It is true that it is illegal for a corporation to write a
> check out
> of its general treasury to a federal candidate.
>
> But a corporation's political action committee (PAC) can give money. And in
> this
> case, Koch Industries PAC gave $5,000 to Bush during the last election.
>
> I rang up Larry Noble, executive director of the Center for Responsive
> Politics.
> Noble said that Fleischer was engaged in a "diversion" and that it reminded
> him of
> Clinton saying it depends on what the definition of "is" is.
>
> "The PAC is run by the company, it is a separate account within the
> company," Noble
> said. "The company decides who the PAC gives money to."
>
> And most often, the individual Koch executives who give money to the Bush
> campaign
> often give at about the same time - as they did here - indicating that a
> fundraiser
> from the company was in progress.
>
> "It's a distinction without a difference," Noble said of Fleischer's
> parsing.]
>
> -Thanks to Russell Mokhiber
>
> Russell Mokhiber is editor of the Washington, D.C.-based Corporate Crime
> Reporter.
>
--
Michael Perelman
Economics Department
California State University
Chico, CA 95929
Tel. 530-898-5321
E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
