 So this is an interesting story to me. The Koch brother who's not dead He just released a book an insid book He apparently kind of had this coming to Jesus moment where he admits that Maybe he did kind of play a little bit of a role in destroying the country and also making the planet less habitable for future generations if at all Now he says this after he got everything that he wanted Bought off our government bought off an entire party radicalized the Republican Party He is culpable for the situation that we are in right now, but yet now he's saying hey guys I'm totally sorry. We should maybe all try to come together now after I fucked everything up for all of you So as the hill explains GOP mega donor Charles Koch said he regrets his decades of partisanship And now wants to focus on bridging the political divide the Wall Street Journal reported Friday That's hilarious in an interview shortly before the election the 85-year-old libertarian tycoon told the newspaper That after funding conservative causes he is turning his attention to issues like poverty addiction gang violence homelessness and recidivism in a new book co-authored by Koch believe in people bottom-up Solutions for a top-down world slated for publication Tuesday He reflects on what he called the divisiveness of his partisan politics quote boy did we screw up? He writes in the book. What a mess despite Koch's call for unity his political contributions largely favored GOP candidates in the 2020 election cycle with 2.8 million donated to Republicans and just 221,000 for Democratic candidates the journal reported still Koch congratulated president-elect Joe Biden and vice president-elect Kamala Harris on their victory saying I hope we all use this post election period to find a better way forward Okay, so let me get this straight after you fought and won and created this dystopia that we are all living in currently after you Remade an entire political party one of two political parties that we have that are electorally viable in your image After leaving us with less than 10 years to take action on climate change in part because you Prioritized your company's profits over the planet's habitability. Now you're saying look, I know I won But we really should consider coming together guys Let's hold hands and sing kumbaya after I fucked up the country How about you eat shit and die? literally Because you don't just get to do all of this cause all of this damage and Say you're sorry have this mea culpa No, go fuck yourself. You absolute ghoul What you have done the damage that you've caused is irreparable Saying sorry isn't going to fucking cut it Just saying oh well man We kind of contributed to this hyper polarization that we're seeing because we literally bought an entire fucking political party That that doesn't pet it and the article implicitly criticizes him because you know He's so relatively partisan. He donated more to Republicans than Democrats But the fact that you're donating to any politicians is Scandalous the fact that you are donating to any Democrats is scandalous and any Democrat who took your money Should be thoroughly Delegitimized and discredited Your money should be toxic Politicians should not want to take your money because it should be you know political suicide But the fact that you still have influence as you say sorry for everything that you've done, but yet still cause damage. I Mean the gull of this motherfucker. It's insane Now I want to share a clip from Bernie Sanders because he was asked about this in an interview with Chris Hayes on MSNBC Bernie said something that was interesting to me because on one hand I agree with Bernie that you can't really just say sorry, but on another hand Bernie's recommendation for coke Charles Coke I think this is Charles Charles with David. It doesn't matter the non-dead one. We'll call him Bernie's recommendation here. I don't necessarily agree with it entirely take a look. I want to ask you something about An interesting quote I saw from Charles Koch who of course is the very conservative billionaire donor Who has spent Hundreds of millions if not billions of dollars. I don't know over time. It's hard to tally up on political interventions on setting up right-wing think tanks in super PAC Contributions and trying to keep Republicans in power Giving an interview. I think it may be from a new book where he says he regrets his partisanship Which he says badly deep in divisions and I'm gonna read this quote for you Boy, did we screw up? He writes in his new book. I'm just curious as a frequent critic of mr. Coke your response to that Look the Koch brothers and they are hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars Help create the right wing extremism that we are seeing right now I'm glad that mr. Koch recognizes the error of his ways But he is one of the wealthiest people in this country today And I think rather than just talking the talk if he really wants to make a difference He could say well, you know what I'm gonna start using my money And I'm talking about a lot of money to bring about justice in this country I made mistakes and I apologize for that and I'm gonna start funding groups who believe in economic justice social justice racial justice Environmental justice that is an important way that he could undo the very very serious damage that he did to this country I'll add something else to that He is one of the people who took advantage of this disastrous citizens United Supreme Court decision It would be very very helpful to this country if somebody like mr. Koch came forward and said, you know what? I helped fund the effort to bring about Citizens united that was a mistake and I think we should rescind that decision That would be a big help as well So I think that most of what Bernie sander said is agreeable You know, he's right that he basically helped create the right wing extremism that we're all dealing with today Bernie also says that he should come out and publicly denounce citizens united, which he's not going to do because he's still funding politicians So Bernie's right about that even if it's wishful thinking However, I'm I'm against what Bernie says when you know, uh, you know, Bernie says put your money where your mouth is effectively Instead of just saying i'm sorry Actual use your money to fund political causes that benefit marginalized communities that benefit the environment But I don't necessarily agree with this I mean on one hand objectively speaking you can't deny that the money that he could be using Would actually, uh, you know help a lot of great organizations Would help marginalized communities But on another hand when billionaires do things like this and donate money It helps them cultivate legitimacy and goodwill. It's why when we criticized the Koch brothers One of the first things that republicans will say is yeah, but look at all of the cancer research that they funded Right It's like pennies to them comparatively speaking They do that so you feel less inclined to criticize them and furthermore, we shouldn't have to rely on well-intentioned billionaires to fund social causes and economic causes They shouldn't have that much wealth the wealth that he is Currently in possession of should be taken from him forcefully. We shouldn't have to ask him nicely. Hey Could you please fund these causes? It should just be funded because nobody should have billions of dollars billionaires should not exist So I don't like this idea that he should put his money where his mouth is I would just like him to not spend that money and for the money to be taken I know like wishful thinking but still Like trying to encourage him to do things like this would just help to rehabilitate his image When we should be demonizing him and all billionaires at every step of the way because billionaires should not be a thing Having a billion dollars is inherently evil and immoral and on top of that billionaire donations It buys complicity So I don't think that the trade-off is worthwhile because if you fund some economic cause or environmental cause then that Environmental organization is going to be less inclined to speak up about all of the damage that your other political contributions the republicans is causing you know, you fund politicians that deregulate and That leads to pollution of the planet. It makes it less habitable But then if you donate to environmental organizations, they're not going to want to speak up because they're not going to want You do not donate to them. So I don't like that idea But bernie's heart is in the right place by saying, you know, you can't just say sorry. You have to actually prove it but To me him proving that he's sorry Would be just stop spending money stop buying fucking politicians But he's not going to do that and he's not sorry. He knows that his legacy is bad I'm sure that he you know the response that he saw after his brother died That scared him and he is probably thinking more about his last thing legacy because let's face it. He's old Uh, but you don't get to just say the right words after a lifetime of actions that have been just Incredibly damaging to the country and the planet. You don't just get to say sorry. Uh, so uh, fuck you I hope that you truly feel guilty about everything that you've done the damage that you've caused but Most likely that's not the case. He doesn't necessarily care about the damage that he's caused. He just cares about his public image So fuck off