Bernie Sanders is wrong about the Koch brothers: They’re even more dangerous than he thinks

Sanders says his campaign is about a "political revolution." If so, he'll have to 

take his enemies more seriously

Elias Isquith

http://www.salon.com/2015/08/25/bernie_sanders_is_wrong_about_the_koch_brothers_theyre_even_more_dangerous_than_he_thinks/

Bear with me for a second, because this is going to sound like a #Slatepitch or a hot take at first, I know. But after catching up on the latest from U.S. senator and presidential aspirant Bernie Sanders, who “delighted” a crowd of roughly 3,000 South Carolinians at a campaign rally this weekend, according to the Associated Press, I feel compelled to register a mild criticism. And it’s probably one of the last you’d expect to be leveled against this longtime, unapologetic democratic socialist.

Here it is: I think Sanders is going way too easy on Charles and David Koch.

Granted, that probably sounds ridiculous. After all, it was only a few days ago 

that Sanders was calling out the 1 percent, telling the folks in South Carolina that “a handful of very, very wealthy people have extraordinary power over our economy and our political life and the media.” He even bothered to single out the Kochs for special opprobrium. “For the life of me,” he confessed, “I will never understand how a family like the Koch brothers, worth $85 billion, apparently think that’s not enough money.”

Like their fellow plutocrats, Sanders said, the Kochs “are very, very powerful.” What makes them different from the rest, though, according to Sanders, is the fact that the Kochs are “extremely greedy,” too. Sanders didn’t come out and say it, of course, but the implication was quite clear: As far as the senator from Vermont was concerned, what motivated the billionaire Koch brothers to spend untold millions on turning America into a Randian paradise was greed, one of humanity’s most mundane and timeless vices.

Oh, if only it were so simple. If only the pseudo third-party the Kochs have constructed were designed for no higher purpose than its owners’ enrichment. Because if that were true, defeating the Kochs — and their mammoth, unwieldy so-called Kochtopus — wouldn’t be so difficult. The venal are easily coopted; and while many a popular movement has been manipulated for the wealthy, few if any have admitted it. (Stripped of any idealistic veneer, the allure of such a cause is rather weak.)

In that circumstance, reducing the Kochs’ status within American politics to that of any other ultra-wealthy special interests would be a breeze. With the notable exception of sociopaths who thought Gordon Gekko was the hero of “Wall Street,” no one thinks greed is a good thing; and “I want more, more, more!” is not a winning campaign slogan. Exposed as covetous misers, the Kochs would become pariahs. Maybe their example would convince other plutocrats that such public corruption wasn’t worth the risk.

Thing is, if we lived in such a world already, we wouldn’t need Bernie Sanders. 

If the hollowness and impracticality of Koch-style libertarianism were so obvious, there’d be no need to portray them as such menaces to society at large, because their influence would be meager already. That’s not to say that the Kochs’ wealth doesn’t bestow on them a disproportionate level of power. It does, absolutely. But it is to say that for those who aren’t on Sanders’ side already, the Kochs’ villainy is not self-evident.

However, there’s another reason why Sanders’ shrugging off the Kochs as purely greedy is a mistake, and it’s one that has more to do with the mindset of his followers than any potential recruit. Simply put, if those who support Sanders and social democracy in general want to defeat the Kochs, they’ll need to take them more seriously. And they’ll need to grapple with the possibility that despite being out-of-touch anti-government zealots, the Koch brothers, like the road to hell, really do have the best intentions.

That doesn’t mean the rest of us should lay off or play nice, mind you. It just means recognizing that, as the American Prospect’s Paul Waldman once wrote, “no one thinks they’re the villain of their own story.” And in this respect, if no others, the Kochs aren’t any different.

Now, having said all that, my argument that Sanders is being “too easy” on the Kochs might seem odd. But I don’t mean that he’s going too easy on them in respect to their character or their overall impact on the world. Rather, I mean that he’s selling them short with regard to their seriousness as a threat to not just the welfare state but the whole idea of popular government. Because what the Kochs have built, and what they are still building, is not about them or their bank accounts. It’s far more ambitious.

If the Kochs were to pull a “Leftovers” and disappear tomorrow, for example, it wouldn’t cause the many far-right and libertarian organizations they support to vanish, which is what you’d expect to happen if increasing the family’s fortune was the true goal. Instead, some other coalition of plutocrats from above and reactionaries from below would step in. Because, ultimately, American conservatism is bigger than the Kochs, no matter how many billions they have at their disposal. It’s an ideology, not a scheme.

And since conservatism promises to maintain many social privileges (and not only those of the wealthy) that’s not a superficial distinction. Yet even if you don’t buy that analysis, there’s this: If you want to defeat your opponent, you need to understand them first. Sure, the Kochs are secretive and their motivations can be murky. But whatever it is that keeps them fighting, greed — and greed alone — isn’t it.

Why the Koch Brothers Will Pour All Their Money into Making Bernie Sanders President

by Jon Schwarz

https://theintercept.com/2015/08/31/koch-brothers-care-much-eliminating-corporate-welfare-arent-backing-bernie-sanders/

I have a prediction: Charles and David Koch will soon announce they’re backing Bernie Sanders for president.

Here’s my logic, which is irrefutable:

We know the Koch brothers, and the organizations they fund, hate corporate welfare more than anything. They hate it!

The top priority of Freedom Partners, which oversees the Koch network of donors, is “tackling ‘rent-seeking,’ ‘corporate welfare,’ and other forms of cronyism.”

Charles Koch himself just told Politico’s Mike Allen that “We have to show that this corporate welfare and cronyism is unjust.” Sure, said Koch, it makes their friends unhappy, but “so what? You’ve got to do the right thing.” So as Allen wrote, “Rolling back corporate welfare is one of the top issues Koch is pursuing.”

Similarly, when Koch spoke recently to 450 of his fellow big donors at a recent Koch event in California, he demanded that “they have to start opposing, rather than promoting, corporate welfare.” In the Wall Street Journal, Koch wrote that “I have spent decades opposing cronyism and all political favors, including mandates, subsidies and protective tariffs.”

Cynics might suspect that the Kochs are talking up this part of their stated agenda because it’s one of the few things on it that’s genuinely popular with Americans — unlike most of their other treasured goals, like gutting Social Security and Medicare and radically slashing taxes on billionaires like themselves.

I, however, choose to believe.

And if you hate corporate welfare like I believe the Koch brothers do, it’s obvious that Bernie’s your candidate. He’s been railing against it for decades, and way back in 2002 estimated that it’s costing us $125 billion per year. Corporations “line up for billions in corporate welfare from the federal government,” Bernie says, because of a “greed culture.” And he specifically hates the Export-Import Bank, just like the Kochs.

By contrast, take a look at the presidential candidates whom the Kochs invited to audition for them a few weeks ago, like Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio and Scott Walker. They LOVE corporate welfare. Scott Walker just committed $400 million in taxpayer money to build a new arena for the Milwaukee Bucks. Bush and a business partner got a bailout worth over $4 million in 1990 during the Savings & Loan Crisis, and Bush has said the 2008 Wall Street bailout was “probably the right thing to do.” Rubio defends his support for subsidies for sugar farmers in Florida because they somehow protect our national security.

Sure, there are some issues on which Bernie and the Koch brothers disagree. 

But Bernie’s also the best fit with their purported beliefs about ending the war on drugs, gay marriage, and a less militaristic foreign policy. 

And the Kochs obviously disagree with all the GOP candidates on tons of things too.

The alternative to taking the Koch brothers at their word is to conclude that all the stuff they say that progressives love is just a scam — that when it’s time to get out their checkbooks to put people in office, the only thing they actually care about is whether those politicians will make them richer. (This is what free market economists call “revealed preference.”)

But I do take the Koch brothers at their word, so I look forward to seeing them sitting proudly in the front row when Bernie Sanders takes the presidential oath of office on January 20, 2017. Unless they decide to go with Jill Stein.

The Vanishing Arctic Ice Pack & Changing Global Weather Patterns

http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/34276-the-melting-arctic-s-dramatic-impact-on-global-weather-patterns

[…]

The Vanishing Arctic Ice Pack

Dr. Julienne Stroeve is a senior research scientist with the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colorado. She specializes in the remote sensing of snow and ice, and works in the Arctic measuring changes in the sea ice.

"Eventually we should see an Arctic Ocean ice free in summers as global temperatures continue to warm," Stroeve told Truthout. She expects us to begin seeing summer periods of an ice-free Arctic ice pack around the year 2040.

Bob Henson is a meteorologist with the Weather Underground, and author of The Thinking Person's Guide to Climate Change.

He believes that while there will most likely be some small areas of year-round ice clinging to far northern Canada for decades to come, "I would expect a summer in the next 20 to 30 years in which sea ice covers as little as 10 percent of the Arctic for at least a few days in August or September," he said.

Henson pointed out that if we extrapolate data and make predictions from more recent conditions in the Arctic, the timeline for seeing a total loss of sea ice seems faster, but he said we will most likely see summer sea ice declining "in a two-steps-forward, one-step-back process, with record ice loss in some years (as in 2007 and 2012) and a temporary, partial 'recovery' in other years (as in 2009 and 2013)."

Regardless of the specifics of the timeline, many agree that an ice-free Arctic will appear before the next century begins.

Dr. Steven Vavrus at the Center for Climatic Research at the University of Wisconsin-Madison focuses on the Arctic and serves on the science steering committee for the Study of Environmental Arctic Change. "The precise timing is nearly impossible to pin down, but most estimates range from around 2040 until the end of this century," he told Truthout. "I would be very surprised if seasonally ice-free conditions during summer do not emerge by 2100."

Dr. David Klein is the director of the climate science program at California State University, Northridge. Like others, he pointed out how the Arctic is warming two to three times faster than the rest of the planet, and pointed out how ice loss there is "proceeding more rapidly than models have predicted."

"The loss of sea ice decreases albedo [reflectivity] and results in greater absorption of energy in the water, and the warm water then heats the air above it," Klein told Truthout. "NASA's CERES satellites have observed an increase of 10 watts per square meter of solar radiation absorbed by the Arctic Ocean from 2000 to 2014."

By way of comparison, overall net planetwide warming from greenhouse gases thus far is only one-twentieth that amount of heating.

While that might not sound like very much, as James Hansen has pointed out, cumulatively that amount corresponds to 400,000 Hiroshima atom bombs per day, 365 days a year, across the planet.

Changing Global Weather Patterns

Stroeve explained why the Arctic is vitally important in terms of its impact on the global climate system.

"The Arctic is typically covered by snow and ice year around," she said. "Snow and ice have a high albedo, meaning they reflect most of the sun's energy back out to space, helping to keep the region, and the planet, cooler than [they] otherwise would be. As the sea ice melts, or snow [and] glaciers melt, it lowers the albedo, allowing more of the sun's energy to be absorbed by the ocean and land surfaces, further warming the region."

Hence, all of our large-scale weather and ocean patterns are tied to the temperature difference between the poles, which receive less solar input, Stroeve said, and the equator, which receives most of the solar input.

"If that temperature difference changes, we would expect the large-scale weather patterns, i.e. the jet stream pattern, to respond," she added. "This would then [have an] impact on precipitation patterns, perhaps frequency of extreme weather events etc."

Henson warned that we are entering "uncharted territory" when it comes to the loss of Arctic sea ice.

"The ice loss in recent years has been unprecedented since satellite coverage began in the 1970s, and all signals point to a continued decline in summer sea ice over the next few decades," he said. "We may already be seeing the effects of Arctic sea ice loss in mid-latitude weather patterns."

Henson warned that in the coming decades, an Arctic Ocean that is completely open for even a few days or weeks per year, could well shape the atmosphere "in ways that are not yet fully understood."

"The 'climate system' is a complex interconnection of air, land, plants, sea and ice," he said. "Any transformation to this system as large as the loss of summertime Arctic sea ice should concern all of us, especially since it could reverberate in yet-unknown ways."

Vavrus explained how the Arctic is the "refrigerator" of the global climate system, acting as the cold region that balances out the hot tropics.

"In this role, the Arctic helps to regulate the energy balance of the climate system and the weather circulation patterns both within high latitudes and elsewhere," he said.

He went on to point out that the most common expectation among scientists about the impact that the loss of summer sea ice will have on global climate patterns is that more solar energy will be absorbed by the Arctic Ocean and land, and the added heat from the earth's surface will then be released back into the atmosphere during autumn and winter.

"That will then make the region much warmer during those seasons than in the current climate," Vavrus said. "That will likely lead to a weakening of jet-stream winds and probably a wavier jet-stream flow pattern."

This will then result in shifting jet-stream winds, and lead to more persistent and extreme weather patterns both within and outside of the Arctic, he added.

Extreme weather patterns don't necessarily mean a universal trend toward hot weather. Henson pointed out that research by some scientists is showing that sea ice loss may be helping to cause colder mid-latitude winters like those seen recently in the Northeastern United States. Why? According to Henson, this could be because "the heat released from the newly opened ocean may be helping to slow and weaken the polar jet stream."

Another mechanism Henson mentioned is how open water in the Barents and Kara Seas may be moistening the autumn atmosphere over Siberia, leading to heavier autumn snows and triggering a chain of events leading to midwinter Arctic outbreaks.

Stroeve said that while exact ramifications of an ice-free Arctic continue to remain unclear, "There is some thought that the warming Arctic has already led to a slowing down of the zonal wind speeds, and perhaps also causing a wavier jet-stream pattern, which would allow for more extreme (or 'stuck') weather patterns to persist."

Klein pointed to how the melting Arctic sea ice "can disrupt normal ocean circulation because of the influx of freshwater from the melted ice, and rising air heated by the water can change wind patterns and even perturb the jet stream, which in turn might alter weather patterns thousands of miles away."

Some current research states that this contributes to the extreme "polar vortex" weather events we've seen in recent years, in addition to the extreme drought plaguing much of the western United States.

Klein also pointed out another dramatic impact the loss of ice is having within the Arctic itself.

"With ice no longer stabilizing land along coasts, erosion will increase and fragile permafrost areas will release more greenhouse gases," he said. "Permafrost coasts [permanently frozen soil next to open water bodies] comprise a third of the world's coastline. This is another positive feedback leading to further warming."

[…]

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