Now the Kochs are the subject of a blistering (but to all appearances factual) documentary by the activist filmmaker Robert Greenwald. Koch Brothers Exposed aims to show how the brothers’ machinations affect the lives of “living, breathing human beings,” as Greenwald put it to me at the film\u2019s New York premiere in late March. “When I learned about the damage the Kochs were doing to our democracy, I wanted to make sure more Americans understood what they’re up to.”<\/p>\n
On the evidence of Koch Brothers Exposed, the more relevant question is: What aren’t they up to? The film \u2013 scrappy and low-budget, but effective all the same \u2013 weaves together a string of shorter videos produced over the past year by Greenwald\u2019s nonprofit Brave New Films, each looking at a separate tentacle of the “Kochtopus,” as lefty wags have dubbed the Kochs’ network. It recounts how the brothers have:<\/p>\n
\u2022 helped fund efforts to undo a model diversity policy in the Wake County school system in North Carolina, effectively resegregating the district \u2013 part of a larger campaign, the film alleges, to weaken the public school system and prepare the way for widespread privatization;<\/p>\n
\u2022 pushed voter ID laws \u2013 purportedly aimed at combating ballot fraud but really designed to keep Democrats from voting \u2013 through their financial support for the American Legislative Exchange Council, an increasingly radioactive business group specializing in the drafting of corporate-friendly pick-up-and-pass legislation for state lawmakers. (ALEC is also behind the insane “Stand Your Ground” gun laws at issue in the Trayvon Martin shooting case);<\/p>\n
\u2022 pumped millions of dollars into more than 150 colleges and university in exchange for control over hiring and curriculum decisions, to ensure students will be exposed to the free-market fundamentalism of Ayn Rand, Freidrich von Hayek and like minds;<\/p>\n
\u2022 bankrolled a coordinated campaign to swing public opinion in favor of privatizing Social Security, deploying Koch-funded think tanks, experts, and pundits to spread the myth that the program is on the brink of bankruptcy.<\/p>\n
(Greenwald might equally well have documented Koch-funded efforts to repeal Obama’s health care law, deny climate change, undermine collective-bargaining rights, or block Wall Street reform, but there’s only so much a single film can cover.)<\/p>\n
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