Because it was the Kochs' brownshirts, the self-styled "Freedom Caucus," that, in a bestial assault, crushed a sitting President and their own leader of Congress, Paul Ryan. The thugs' secret weapon: heavy bags of cash, Koch cash.
Kochs front groups, including Americans for Prosperity (the XL promoter, promised unlimited funds to any far-right Congressman who would vote against the bill. The Kochs' Freedom Partners Executive Director told members of the uber-right Congressional Freedom Caucus, "We will stand with lawmakers who keep their promise and oppose this legislation" with a "seven-figure" war chest. In the old days, that was called "bribery." But today it's called, "Koch."
Blow-hard Trump threatened them, but Koch's money protected them.
The Kochs don't want ObamaCare, TrumpCare, nor any care at all for Americans that add to their tax bill. Call it KochDon'tCare.
Billionaires versus Billionaires
But keen observers of TrumpCare would note that it was not really a health care bill, but a tax bill--specifically, a tax cut of some $157 billion that has been charged to the richest Americans to fund ObamaCare through a 3.75% tax on passive investment income--that is, money earned, not by working, but by speculating.
Because behind the public creator of the bill, Speaker Paul Ryan, stood Ryan's number one funder, a billionaire known as The Vulture. The Vulture, aka Paul Singer, makes all his money by nasty methods excoriated even in the Wall Street Journal.
In Trump's weird psycho-babbling press conference last month, he said, "So I want to thank Paul Singer for being here and for coming up to the office." Reporters scratched their head, not knowing who this "Singer" is nor why Trump brought it up.
Now, you know what that was about.
Singer makes all his money from speculation income. The Ryan-Trump "healthcare" bill was first and foremost a tax cut for Singer, likely worth billions to The Vulture (and more to his cohort including Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin).
Paul 'The Vulture' Singer, from The Best Democracy Money Can Buy
(Image by Keith Tucker) Details DMCA
But to the Kochs, this tax break is nearly worthless. So, behind the curtain, this was a fight of billionaires versus billionaires.
The Kochs, having built up their army of useful idiots--the Koch-funded Tea Party and Freedom Caucus, won this one. (Hey, no hard feelings. The Vulture still dines with the Kochs in Vail and donates to their super-PACs.)
Sure, let's breathe a sigh of relief that, with ObamaCare momentarily saved, we won't have more amputees begging in the subway, meth addicts croaking in New Hampshire and my bank account emptied for my next heart surgery.
It's not Trump's victory that portends fascism--it is the bending of Trump by the hands of the poisonously greedy Brothers Koch that brings the fascist corporatist state one day closer.
And that is nothing to celebrate.
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