It is generally known the Koch brothers are universally reviled by the Left as “evil vote-buying election-rigging union-busting wannabe air/water polluters” or some such nonsense. It matters not a fig that the portrayals of the Koch's and Koch Industries in general is not much more than propaganda of the “Big Lie” kind so well used by Left over the past 100 years or so.
Imagine the hew and cry should the Koch's actually speak out about their beliefs and how they've been portrayed. Well, actually you don't have to imagine because Charles Koch penned an opinion piece for the Wall Street Journal and the response by the Left has been anything but welcoming, but not unexpected.
Most WSJ opinion pieces garner all kinds of comments from across the political spectrum, but this one has over 80 pages of comments and still counting, something I haven't seen in years of perusing the Opinion section. I wish I could say there was reasoned debate, but that was only wishful thinking on my part.
The invective within the comments was predictable, with many of those commenting negatively using copy-and-paste tactics to repeatedly tell us how the “evil” Koch brothers were corrupting everything or pointing to reports in such 'unbiased' media outlets as Mother Jones, HuffPo, Daily Kos, MSNBC, and the other usual suspects as the only proof needed to back up their accusations. In other words, they were responding just as programmed “useful idiots” would – with unthinking and irrational emotion.
Any counterclaims against leftist multi-billionaires were sloughed off because, after all, their politics were correct. One of the better counters I saw related the differences between George Soros and the Koch brothers, showing that Soros was a destroyer, a looter, making his billions by manipulating currencies and bringing down banks, bankrupting businesses and individuals, in turn leading to the loss of jobs over a wide swath of the world. The Koch's, on the other hand, provide jobs, are known as being highly ethical in their business dealings, and do what they can to make things better for their employees and the communities where they live. But because Soros is a self-proclaimed socialist he gets a pass from the self-righteous Left.
Reading the comments I wish I could say the leftists commenting there brought up anything new, but there wasn't. Some of the pro-Koch commenters anticipated what the Leftists would post, pre-empting some of their invective and showing the anti-Koch commenters as unimaginative since they used the same old tired accusations without providing a shred of proof or a single cite from a reputable source about the supposed wrongdoings of the brothers. Not one. It was all feelings, not facts from the usual suspects. In other words, it was nothing new.
And so it goes.....
