5 ms·

The article would have been improved by giving some insight into what changed his mind. You don't just go from what he and his brother have done to the US to:

by aazaa 6y ago

The article would have been improved by giving some insight into what changed his mind. You don't just go from what he and his brother have done to the US to: > Boy, did we screw up! Without an inkling as to how or why they screwed up, there's no way to gauge what, if any, change to expect.

tedivm 6y ago
I don't think he changed his mind at all, this is 100% a rebranding and legacy repair operation.
- rch 6y ago
  Not even that. The EPA, public lands, etc. might be on the ropes, but they're not dead yet. This looks to me more like the next salvo to make sure they go down, and stay down.
smnrchrds 6y ago
> The article would have been improved by giving some insight into what changed his mind. The article would have been improved by at least proving he has changed his mind. Charles Koch is 85. There is a decent chance he is not going to live long enough to see another Republican administration. It would be in the best interest of maintaining some political influence and making some more change for him to change his public position like this. If he were 60, I would have expected him to wait 4–8 years for the next Republican administration instead.
- Wowfunhappy 6y ago
  How can an article "prove" that someone has changed their mind?
  - qzw 6y ago
    Wait for actions instead of reporting whatever they self-proclaim? But that would take longer and lose the “newsworthiness”.
    - Wowfunhappy 6y ago
      I think you're being overly harsh on the Wall Street Journal. The headline is "Charles Koch _Says_ His Partisanship Was a Mistake". There's a valid discussion to be had about whether Charles Koch is full of crap, but I don't think it's wrong for newspapers to report on what people with power say.
      - lmm 6y ago
        I think it's wrong for a newspaper to uncritically report what someone said in cases where a falsehood would serve that person's interests.
  - smnrchrds 6y ago
    I agree that it would be impossible to prove anything. However, it would have been nice to express skepticism.
pjc50 6y ago
As I posted last time this came up, the problem to him is that the Tea Party they backed went out of their control. They wanted a nice biddable anti-government party. They got chaos. They've not come to Jesus on global warming, they're upset they lost.
- aniro 6y ago
  Exactly. They whipped the mob into a frenzy with lies and bullshit so they could use its power to get what they wanted. Then they lost control of it. It is the loss of control they regret, not whipping it up in the first place.
  - CryptoPunk 6y ago
    Libertarianism/free-markets is not "lies and bullshit".. In Wisconsin at least, the biggest opposition to the Kochs was the state's public sector teachers union. During their protests, you saw some promoting full blown "abolish private property" Marxism. The conspiracy theories emanating from these rent-seeking tax dollar consumers in the public sector, alleging that the Kochs are trying enslave America with low taxes, and are brainwashing Middle America to go against its own interest by advocating a reduction in the size of the bloated public sector, and a scaling back of the privileges given to public sector unions, is the "lies and bullshit" that so many have been whipped up into a frenzy by. You have an entire generation of extremist radicals who are convinced now that the advocacy of the free market is a giant con being perpetuated by a small cadre of billionaires, and that the Economics profession has been coopted by this sinister elite as well. This conspiracy theory was generated by the rent-seeking public sector unions, and its spread was faciliated by unionized journalists. When only three out of New York' state's 55,000 teachers were fired in an entire year, you know that this group is wielding enormous power and has managed to completely hoodwink the masses with their anti-free-market/class-warfare conspiracy theories: https://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/24/education/24teachers.html https://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/24/education/24teachers.html
    - tclancy 6y ago
      No, lies and bullshit would require self reflection. Both of those things have always been things the well fed and well off let their children play pretend with while making sure they never have to figure out how to feed themselves. I am 44. My entire life, speaking as someone who grew up conservative, libertarianism has either been about weed or drugs. And then about what degree of freedom one should have when arrested with either. Ask a poor person or a minority what it is like to be arrested with either. Stop role playing nonsense and join the real world.
hashtagmarkup 6y ago
They screwed up by putting themselves in this position where their only hope for a future is desperately trying to distance themselves from what they've done and who they are.
freshhawk 6y ago
Journalists have to leave this kind of thing mostly implied for ethical reasons if nothing else. The answer is clearly: because his research showed that this particular messaging (this story and the book) was the most advantageous to his political goals. If any part of it was literally meaningful then it would have the explanations you noticed were missing. But you don't call out a Kock brother on his weak sauce image management in the WSJ, you just promote his book, do what you're told, and avoid making that kind of enemy. He's got fairly conservative and finance friendly Democrats to influence right now and taking his money can't be too much of a public scandal.

by aazaa 6y ago

tedivm 6y ago

I don't think he changed his mind at all, this is 100% a rebranding and legacy repair operation.

rch 6y ago
Not even that. The EPA, public lands, etc. might be on the ropes, but they're not dead yet. This looks to me more like the next salvo to make sure they go down, and stay down.

smnrchrds 6y ago

> The article would have been improved by giving some insight into what changed his mind. The article would have been improved by at least proving he has changed his mind. Charles Koch is 85. There is a decent chance he is not going to live long enough to see another Republican administration. It would be in the best interest of maintaining some political influence and making some more change for him to change his public position like this. If he were 60, I would have expected him to wait 4–8 years for the next Republican administration instead.

Wowfunhappy 6y ago
How can an article "prove" that someone has changed their mind?
- qzw 6y ago
  Wait for actions instead of reporting whatever they self-proclaim? But that would take longer and lose the “newsworthiness”.
  - Wowfunhappy 6y ago
    I think you're being overly harsh on the Wall Street Journal. The headline is "Charles Koch _Says_ His Partisanship Was a Mistake". There's a valid discussion to be had about whether Charles Koch is full of crap, but I don't think it's wrong for newspapers to report on what people with power say.
    - lmm 6y ago
      I think it's wrong for a newspaper to uncritically report what someone said in cases where a falsehood would serve that person's interests.
- smnrchrds 6y ago
  I agree that it would be impossible to prove anything. However, it would have been nice to express skepticism.

pjc50 6y ago

As I posted last time this came up, the problem to him is that the Tea Party they backed went out of their control. They wanted a nice biddable anti-government party. They got chaos. They've not come to Jesus on global warming, they're upset they lost.

aniro 6y ago
Exactly. They whipped the mob into a frenzy with lies and bullshit so they could use its power to get what they wanted. Then they lost control of it. It is the loss of control they regret, not whipping it up in the first place.
- CryptoPunk 6y ago
  Libertarianism/free-markets is not "lies and bullshit".. In Wisconsin at least, the biggest opposition to the Kochs was the state's public sector teachers union. During their protests, you saw some promoting full blown "abolish private property" Marxism. The conspiracy theories emanating from these rent-seeking tax dollar consumers in the public sector, alleging that the Kochs are trying enslave America with low taxes, and are brainwashing Middle America to go against its own interest by advocating a reduction in the size of the bloated public sector, and a scaling back of the privileges given to public sector unions, is the "lies and bullshit" that so many have been whipped up into a frenzy by. You have an entire generation of extremist radicals who are convinced now that the advocacy of the free market is a giant con being perpetuated by a small cadre of billionaires, and that the Economics profession has been coopted by this sinister elite as well. This conspiracy theory was generated by the rent-seeking public sector unions, and its spread was faciliated by unionized journalists. When only three out of New York' state's 55,000 teachers were fired in an entire year, you know that this group is wielding enormous power and has managed to completely hoodwink the masses with their anti-free-market/class-warfare conspiracy theories: https://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/24/education/24teachers.html https://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/24/education/24teachers.html
  - tclancy 6y ago
    No, lies and bullshit would require self reflection. Both of those things have always been things the well fed and well off let their children play pretend with while making sure they never have to figure out how to feed themselves. I am 44. My entire life, speaking as someone who grew up conservative, libertarianism has either been about weed or drugs. And then about what degree of freedom one should have when arrested with either. Ask a poor person or a minority what it is like to be arrested with either. Stop role playing nonsense and join the real world.

hashtagmarkup 6y ago

They screwed up by putting themselves in this position where their only hope for a future is desperately trying to distance themselves from what they've done and who they are.

freshhawk 6y ago

Journalists have to leave this kind of thing mostly implied for ethical reasons if nothing else. The answer is clearly: because his research showed that this particular messaging (this story and the book) was the most advantageous to his political goals. If any part of it was literally meaningful then it would have the explanations you noticed were missing. But you don't call out a Kock brother on his weak sauce image management in the WSJ, you just promote his book, do what you're told, and avoid making that kind of enemy. He's got fairly conservative and finance friendly Democrats to influence right now and taking his money can't be too much of a public scandal.