KOCH PROBLEM

Billionaire douche bags Charles and David Koch

A disturbing new trend has popped up in corporate America over the last few weeks. It's the so-called Vote Republican or we'll have to lay you off and shut the company down-toned messages that have been finding their way from the boardroom to the workers on the lower floors.

An email sent from Westgate Resorts owner David Siegel to employees seemed to subliminally suggest that those employees should vote for republican candidate Romney, stating "If any new taxes are levied on me, or my company . . . I will be forced to cut back. This means fewer jobs, less benefits and certainly less opportunity for everyone."

ASG Software Solutions President Arthur Allen sent a similar message to employees, stating that “If the US re-elects President Obama, our chances of staying independent are slim to none. I don't want to hear any complaints regarding the fallout that will most likely come."

Richard Lacks, President and CEO of Lacks Enterprises also sent out a similar warning to employees. In that letter, Lacks wrote “The more government takes (a reference to tax increases) the less there will be available to spread around to the working people of this company. It is important that in November you vote to improve your standard of living and that will be through smaller government and less government.”

Perhaps the word "disturbing" is not a dramatic enough word.

This is downright scarifying.

I suppose we could get into the whole "free speech" argument with this issue. However, I'm not sure that when money, in this case, employee wages, is involved, that the "free speech" banner can be waved. I think this could probably fall more under a definition of coercion or intimidation.

The biggest offenders seem to be the Koch (pronounced Coke) brothers. Besides the estimated hundreds of millions of dollars they've spent funding ultra-conservative SuperPAC's - no one really knows the actual amount, as SuperPAC's are not required to disclose funding sources - Charles and David Koch have sent a similar message to their employees at paper conglomerate Georgia-Pacific. In that message, they warned recipients could “suffer the consequences, including higher gasoline prices, runaway inflation, and other ills" if said employees did not vote for candidates supported by Koch-owned companies or its SuperPAC's.

Other ills, huh? Excuse me Charles and David, but what could that possibly mean? Broken kneecaps or slashed car tires? Perhaps envelopes filled with a suspicious white powder sent to employees suspected of voting against company suggestions?

Also included in the Koch brothers email was a list of candidates the company supported, and at the top of that list was none other than the republican nominee for President, Mitt Romney. Interesting, because it was Romney himself who suggested that business owners adopt this plan of action at a town hall meeting with the National Federation of Independent Businesses this past June.

Wow.

Wow.

Thank you, Supreme Court.

msnbc and motherjones.com were used as sources for parts of this post.