Koch Industries Takes Credit For The ‘Spontaneous’ Tea Parties: We’re Glad We ‘Helped Stimulate’ The

http://thinkprogress.org/?cat=17

Koch Industries Takes Credit For The ‘Spontaneous’ Tea Parties: We’re Glad We ‘Helped Stimulate’ Them

As ThinkProgress has documented, the lobbyist-run Americans for Prosperity (AFP) has been instrumental in orchestrating the Tea Party movement. The group coordinated “grassroots” protests around the country and provided organizations and communications support to the Tea Parties. AFP staffers are also regular presence at Tea Party rallies. The man behind AFP is David Koch, who is one of the richest men in the world thanks to his oil, chemicals, and manufacturing conglomerate Koch Industries. In 2009, AFP President Tim Phillips said he “launched our organization.”

Koch Industries and AFP have largely tried to keep their distance from the Tea Parties. From a May 2010 interview with the Frum Forum’s Tim Mak:

Most incredibly striking is Koch’s efforts to distance itself from the Tea Party movement. “We’ve been labeled tea party founders or funders – in fact, masterminds – but that’s not consistent with the facts,” said Fink. “To my knowledge, we have not been approached for support by any of the newer ‘tea party’ or other grassroots groups that have sprung up around the country in the past year or so.”

However, now that Tea Parties are becoming institutionalized, Fink is taking some credit. While still calling the Tea Parties “spontaneous,” he says that Koch would be happy to know that he helped “stimulate” these people into action and acknowledged the role of AFP:


More at the link ---

Doro Bush married one of them.

:eyes: