Billionaire Koch brothers try to buy state’s court

Koch Brothers

September 29, 2012, Miami Herald

The new stealth campaign against three Florida Supreme Court justices is being backed by those meddling right-wing billionaires from Wichita, Charles and David Koch. 

 Last week they uncorked the first of a series of commercials from their political action committee, Americans for Prosperity. The targets are Justices R. Fred Lewis, Barbara Pariente and Peggy Quince. They were three of the five-vote majority that in 2010 knocked down a half-baked amendment slapped together by state lawmakers seeking to nullify the federal Affordable Health Care Act. 

The Florida Supreme Court upheld lower court decisions in finding that the proposed amendment contained “misleading and ambiguous language,” the hallmark of practically everything produced by this Legislature. 

On the November ballot, Lewis, Pariente and Quince are up for merit retention, meaning voters can choose to retain them or not. This simple system was put in place to keep the state’s high court above the sleaze of political races.  

The mission of the Kochs, hiding as always behind their super PAC, is to get the three justices dumped at the polls so that Gov. Rick Scott can appoint replacements. 

The last thing these guys want is fair judges who know the law; they want partisan judges who’ll obediently support their political agenda. It’s worse than just trying to buy an election. It’s trying to hijack Florida’s justice system at the highest levels.

Note: For deeply revealing reports from reliable major media sources on the control of elections by corporations and rich individuals, click here.

New Hampshire Legislature Turns Policy Reins Over To ALEC

Posted: 28 Jan 2012 02:00 PM PST

Republicans in the New Hampshire legislature seemingly have ceded all control of the state to the American Legislative Exchange Council by introducing an unprecedented seven of ALEC's pieces of model legislation in the past week.

ALEC legislation is basically written by corporations to protect their own interests and the organization is behind a rash of legislation across the U.S. that has assaulted working families, attacked unions and sought to unravel the American social safety net. Granite State Progress is watching the progress of the New Hampshire bills:

"This is an incredible illustration of how the current leadership of the New Hampshire House and Senate are selling our state out to the highest bidder," said Zandra Rice Hawkins, Director of Granite State Progress. "Corporations already funnel unlimited money into our political system but to hand them the pen and paper to craft legislation is just plain wrong."
ALEC model legislation heard in committees this week range from repealing new consumer protections under the Affordable Care Act to creating specialized tax credits for businesses and privatizing education to limiting voter access at the ballot box.

"Each of these pieces of legislation benefit special interests at the expense of everyday, hardworking Granite Staters," Rice Hawkins said. "We need to reject corporate-written legislation and focus on ways to ensure New Hampshire state laws benefit New Hampshire state residents."

The ALEC-inspired legislation includes:

HB 1607 "Education Tax Credit": Would divert public education money to private schools in a way to effect vouchers

HB 1560 Health Care Compact: Would allow member states to opt out of any and all national health care rules, including Medicaid and Medicare

CACR 6 Super Majority Act: A thinly-veiled Taxpayer Bill of Rights clone that would handcuff state spending and devastate all services and programs

SB 289 and SB 318 Photo ID to Vote: A photo identification would be required for all voters, despite there being little to no voter fraud in the state, designed specifically to suppress poor and minority voters

HB 1658 Eliminating Support Services for Newborn Children: The title of this one is pretty straightforward and horrific in and of itself. It would specifically target newborn children whose parents are on Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, so it goes after the poorest families

SB 372 "Education Tax Credits": Senate version of HB 1607 The New Hampshire General Court, the state's legislature, is controlled by Republicans 19-5 in the Senate and 298-104 in the House, but the governor is Democrat John Lynch, so it seems unlikely that most of these bills will make it into law. 

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Not an Employee? Herman Cain Had Mailing and Email Addresses at Koch's Americans For Prosperity HQ

Cain's campaign staff say he wasn't an employee of the Tea Party group founded by David Koch. But he did have a desk and an email address at its headquarters.

October 21, 2011

As the New Yorker's Jane Mayer wrote earlier this week, members of Herman Cain's campaign staff are loath to discuss his longstanding ties to Americans for Prosperity and the Americans for Prosperity Foundation, the organizing groups founded by billionaire David Koch, about whom Mayer famously wrote a comprehensive profile last year. AlterNet, which began reporting on Cain's ties to Koch last June, has learned that Cain's work for AFP at one time had all the appearances of a staff position.

In Mayer's 2010 exposé, "Covert Operations," she detailed the network of right-wing think tanks and organizations funded by David Koch and his brother Charles, principals in Koch Industries, the second-largest privately held company in the United States, according to Forbes.

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Now, Mayer has turned her gaze to the ties between Koch and Cain, seeking to find out how much Cain earned from Americans for Prosperity and its foundation, and whether or not Cain has ever been considered an employee of either entity. She writes:  READ MORE