The Republican Party. It was up for grabs and the Kochs grabbed it.

[kpete]

“The junk merchant doesn't sell his product to the consumer, he sells the consumer to his product. He does not improve and simplify his merchandise. He degrades and simplifies the client.”
― William S. Burroughs, Naked Lunch

coup d’état: koch brothers are warlords

****
A nation is manipulated through a series of fiendishly planned rolling crises. Inchoate mass fear grows but its targeting is skillfully re-directed toward infighting, such that it becomes diffuse and rather impotent against the actual instigators. Trust for government and national institutions grows rancid.

:large


much more:
http://theobamadiary.com/2013/10/07/coup-detat-koch-brothers-are-warlords/
http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-09-26/jim-demint-congressional-republicans-shadow-speaker#p2
http://www.nationaljournal.com/politics/the-long-arm-and-hidden-hand-of-jim-demint-20131001
http://www.nbcnews.com/id/45755883/ns/msnbc-the_last_word/vp/53213073#53213073