It’s very unfortunate I was out to dinner when this story broke last night. Already a number of other blogs have posted and provided commentary. You can see posts at both BigGovernment and RedState this morning.

Basically, Democrat Senatorial Campaign Committee Chair Patty Murray (WA) called the evil Koch Brothers and asked them for a five-figure contribution. The nerve! Back in March, Senate Democrat Leader Harry Reid (NV) emailed DSCC supporters and attacked the Koch brothers in the text of the email — even though the Kochs gave nearly $200,000 to Democrats during the 2010 election cycle (including $30k to the DSCC)!

Koch’s Government & Public Affairs division has finally pushed back. In a letter to Senator Patty Murray and the DSCC, President Philip Ellender writes:

For many months now, your colleagues in the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee leadership have engaged in a series of disparagements and ad hominem attacks about us, apparently as part of a concerted political and fundraising strategy. Just recently, Senator Reid wrote in a DSCC fundraising letter that Republicans are trying to “force through their extreme agenda faster than you can say ‘Koch Brothers.’”

So you can imagine my chagrin when I got a letter from you on June 17 asking us to make five-figure contributions to the DSCC. You followed that up with a voicemail* indicating that, if we contributed heavily enough, we would garner an invitation to join you and other Democratic leaders at a retreat in Kiawah Island this September.

I’m hoping you can help me understand the intent of your request because it’s hard not to conclude that DSCC politics have become so cynical that you actually expect people whom you routinely denounce to give DSCC money.

It is troubling that private citizens taking part in the discourse have become the targets of White House and DSCC fundraising missives, and we would certainly encourage you to rethink that approach. Ultimately, I expect voters will see through that and will weigh the issues on the merits alone. But in the meantime, if you could provide me some insight on what exactly you are asking of us and why, I would be most grateful.

Wow, just wow. It doesn’t end there, though. Not only did Senator Murray send the evil Kochs a fundraising letter, she also followed up with a phone call. I’m sure you’d like to hear it, so just click here to do that.

Various elements within the Democrat Party apparatus have made countless hundreds of thousands of dollars by demonizing an organization that has given them money from time to time.

For the Kochs, the reason for contributing in the past is very simple. Big Business, like anyone, wants access. More often than not, big business will give to both Democrats and Republican in an attempt to (1) hedge their bets and (2) have access to the decision-makers on both sides of the aisle.

Remember real estate mogul Donald Trump? Yea, he gives money to Democrats as well as Republicans.

There’s no shortage of corporatism in both parties, but the audacity of the DSCC to ask for money from their 6-month-long ideological punching bag is just laughable. I’m proud that Mr. Ellender gave Senator Murray and the DSCC the one finger salute.

Check out the story at The Weekly Standard, The Right Sphere, the Seattle Times, and an eerily silent blog post on the DailyKos (the ONLY one of its kind at the time of this posting).

Kossacks (DailyKos contributors), the silence is deafening.

The evil Kochs have an evil video about the evils of economic freedom:

From the video summary:

Economic Freedom and the Quality of Life is a short, informative video centered on the ideas of economic freedom and the societal benefits it produces. The video helps explain what economic freedom is and why it’s key to improving society.

If you want to continue the discussion, click through to their Economic Freedom’s Facebook page.

Briefly, I like videos like these. They’re easy to absorb, short, and informative. In our quest for instant gratification, most of us can’t focus on something for more than five or ten minutes, so this is about as good as it gets for someone who can’t… hey, look over there! You get the idea.

But… if you can stand to read a few more words, the Cato Institute publishes a book called “Economic Freedom of the World” annually. You can check that out here.

While the title of this post refers to my favorite exchange between Tennessee Lieutenant Governor Ron Ramsey and Nashville Democrat Thelma Harper during a debate over concealed carry legislation (“I’d like to declare Rule #13″), I want to talk a little bit about Saul Alinsky today. I can’t seem to find the Ramsey/Harper exchange at the moment, but it’s pretty funny.

Staying on message today:

The thirteenth rule: Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.

Arguably one of the most important of Alinsky’s rules, number thirteen provides the foundation for public debate over a given topic. It has been used by elements among both the left and the right recently. Let’s take a look at how the left is using this rule today:

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