L’argent fait stealth attacks
Congratuations to David H. Koch for a lavish profile in The New Yorker celebrating his social success with Kennedys and Trumps and especially his munificence with artistic and cultural organizations including the New York City Opera! And further kudos to The New Yorker for noting high up in the article that the publicity-shy philanthropist is “best known as part of a family that has repeatedly funded stealth attacks on the federal government, and on the Obama Administration in particular.” [The New Yorker]
The man’s a fool. And he’s given money to NYC Opera. I do not see any dissonance there.
What is the difference between Mr. David Koch and Mr. Andrew Carnegie? Capitalists with bad karma consciences, tutti e due.
It takes money, money, et plus beaucoup plus d’argent to produce even the most unworthy of spectacles, let alone, the really good ones.
I don’t know. Surely, one of my cohorts and superiors herein will ‘splain it all 2 moi.
“What is the difference between Mr. David Koch and Mr. Andrew Carnegie?”
More than a century.
Kein merde, Dick Tracy.
What is it you choose me to use as your whipping post to infer, this time around, mon tres cher Monsieur Alto?
Has the human heart changed even one tiny iota in the last century? And please don’t give any bullshit about how the world has changed and the information age and outer space and the evolution of the species as human beings are just the same mess as always.
See Ovid, Seneca, Euripides, Marcus Aurelius, and the whole gang. Si annoia.
Andrew Carnegie was a self-made man who said: “”The man who dies rich dies disgraced.” He wrote a book praising the American system of government (Triumphant Democracy) and proudly signed his name to it.
David H. Koch inherited a business from his father. He has created a maze of shell foundations designed specifically to disguise his massive financial efforts to subvert the current American form of government and replace it with one that will maximize his own wealth. Far from “signing his name,” he does his best to distance himself from these organizations.
The difference, then, is between a philanthropist and a scoundrel.
Right you are, if you think you are.
I do not object to the fact this man may be a scoundrel but there were probably many who would have said the same of Carnegie at the time of the Homestead Strike. Same goes for Frick, too, for that matter.
The Medicis and the Gonzagas had inherited wealth — what does THAT matter? I understand that this man’s doings may be unsavoury and, more to the point, not serve your viewpoint, but this argument was already moot with Madame Manou’s pronouncement many rows back:
“PECUNIA NON OLET”.
Sorry, but Pecunia, and neither Thalia nor Euterpe, nor Terpsichore
is the diva regnant of Lincoln Center
“PECUNIA NON OLET”.
Fascinating …(What did we ever do without Wikipedia?
The Urine Tax (Latin: vectigal urinae) was a tax levied by the Roman emperor Nero in the 1st century upon the distribution of urine. The lower classes of Roman society urinated into pots which were emptied into cesspools. The liquid was then collected from public latrines, where it was sold and served as the valuable raw material for a number of chemical processes: it was used in tanning, and also by launderers as a source of ammonia to clean and whiten woollen togas. The buyers of the urine paid the tax.
The tax was eventually discontinued, but it was re-enacted by Nero’s successor Vespasian and applied to all public toilets within Rome’s now famous Cloaca Maxima (great sewer) system. The Roman historians Suetonius and Dio Cassius report that when Vespasian’s son Titus complained to him about the disgusting nature of the tax, his father held up a gold coin and told him, “Non olet! (“It doesn’t stink!”). (Dio Cassius, Roman History, Book 65, chapter 14.) This phrase is still used today to show that the value of money is not tainted by its origins.
Monty – see posts 2 and associated in this very thread.
Basso Profundo sez: “Do I think that the government should fund public schools which instruct in a number of subjects, including art education? Yes.”
Alas, your idol, Mr. Kroch ‘scuse me, COKE, disagrees: because he doesn’t believe in TAXES, he can’t possibly believe in publicly-funded education, let alone same that includes arts education. Get a grip: the guy and his family are using their money to get the U.S. Constitution annulled – so don’t worry much about his funding of the farts, i mean Arts. I BARFED when the NY State Theater took on his name, and i’ll bet dear Bubbala is SPINNING in her grave…
I find this disconnect is common among libertarians/teabaggers. It’s perfectly possible for them to be in favor of things paid for by the taxes they so fervently wish to abolish. I was in DC during some big teabag rally and saw some people wearing their t-shirts emblazoned with “Hands off my money” or whatever terribly clever slogan…in a Smithsonian museum. I shit you not. I wanted to ask them how much they paid to get into the museum and wait for the coin to drop but it seemed like a good way to get a black eye.
You guys, it’s late in the day but I just wanted to say it’s Lenny Bernstein’s birthday.
Anyone here seen the original run Candide or West Side Story?
“social success with… the Trumps” BWAH-HA-HA!!!