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Climate Progress

Trick Or Treat: A Koch Brother Dresses Up As An Environmentalist In His Fight Against Cape Wind

By Climate Guest Blogger on Oct 11, 2012 at 2:00 pm

by Michael Conathan

It’s not even halfway through October, but Bill Koch has already put on his Halloween costume. This year, the black sheep of the billionaire band of brothers has decided to “trick or treat” as an environmentalist.

Yesterday, the Alliance to Protect Nantucket Sound — a group established by Koch and his cronies to wage war on Cape Wind, the first offshore wind farm proposed in U.S. waters — dredged up an old lawsuit against the project. The frivolous nature of this latest tilt at the project’s offshore windmills is enough to make even Don Quixote blush.

This time, the plaintiffs allege the turbines would violate the Endangered Species Act, creating unacceptable risks to protected birds, sea turtles, and the north Atlantic right whale. What they fail to acknowledge is that any potential negative effects from the wind farm’s construction have already been looked at over and over again during the project’s 11 year trek through the regulatory process. The Environmental Impact Statement finalized by the Department of the Interior in 2009 carefully considered endangered species and determined that Cape Wind would not pose any population risks.

A handful of smaller green groups have joined the ersatz enviro Alliance to Protect Nantucket Sound in this most recent filing, but the vast majority of big time regional and national environmental groups have expressed unequivocal support for the project. These include Greenpeace, the Natural Resources Defense Council, Oceana, the Conservation Law Foundation, and the Audubon Society (a group with a pretty good reputation for protecting endangered birds).

Perhaps most galling was the Alliance calling out the Sierra Club in its press release as an organization that has “sounded the alarm” about Cape Wind. The Sierra Club is, in fact, a vocal supporter of the project. In August, the Club released a report, “Clean Energy Under Siege,” detailing the carefully executed campaign launched by Koch and other oil and gas industry leaders against Cape Wind and the rest of the clean energy economy.  The Sierra Club has also joined the Conservation Law Foundation in launching Cape Wind Now, an initiative with the goal of combatting the endless stall tactics from Koch and the Alliance.

Koch’s environmentalist costume comes with a lofty price tag. As a co-director of the Alliance, he has been one of its biggest donors since its inception in 2003. According to the Sierra Club’s report:

  • as of 2006, he had contributed more than $1.5 million to the cause. If those contributions have held steady over the years, that would mean he’s approaching $5 million of personal money spent opposing the project.
  • in 2009, his company Oxbow Energy, paid virtually the entire salary of the Alliance’s President, approximately $150,000.
  • Oxbow also spent more than $600,000 to lobby the FAA against approving Cape Wind.

Why? In addition to protecting his investment in dirty energy, Koch also owns a massive, oceanfront mansion in a country club community on Cape Cod with ample views of the area of the Sound where the project will be constructed, Koch has openly opposed the project even though from his manse, the turbines would appear as tiny twigs on the horizon.

And then there’s also that other matter of preventing a commercially-proven, immediately available renewable source of energy from gaining a foothold in a region desperate for additional power capacity and establishing itself as a legitimate alternative to the Koch brothers’ precious oil, gas, and coal.

Just remember, Massachusetts, when the Alliance to Protect Nantucket Sound comes ringing your doorbell all dressed up as an environmental group, you better take a peek behind the mask. Otherwise, the trick will be on you.

Michael Conathan is the Director of Ocean Policy at the Center for American Progress.

Justice

Koch Front Group Joins Revenge Campaign Against Florida Justices With Pro-Nullification Ad

By Ian Millhiser on Sep 25, 2012 at 12:00 pm

Nineteenth century nullificationist Senator John C. Calhoun

Last week, the Florida GOP launched a campaign to remove three sitting state supreme court justices who previously ruled against Gov. Rick Scott (R-FL). If this campaign succeeds, Scott will be able to appoint three of the court’s seven justices, giving the Tea Party governor control over nearly half the court.

Today, the Tea Party group Americans for Prosperity — which is chaired by GOP energy billionaire David Koch — joined this effort as well. The Koch group’s first ad attacks the three justices because they joined a 5-2 opinion blocking an unconstitutional ballot initiative seeking to nullify the Affordable Care Act:

Many states, like Ohio, gave their citizens the right to vote against [the Affordable Care Act]. But not Florida. Our own supreme court denied our right to choose for ourselves. Shouldn’t our courts protect our rights to choose?

Watch it:

First of all, the Florida Supreme Court’s decision had nothing whatsoever to do with denying people their “right to choose.” To the contrary, the court removed the unconstitutional ballot initiative after the initiative’s own defenders admitted that the ballot language accompanying this initiative was misleading. So the court’s opinion stood simply for the very banal point that voters should know what they are voting for before they cast a ballot.

More importantly, however, by praising this ballot initiative, the Koch group is also endorsing a misguided constitutional theory known as “nullification.” Because the Constitution provides that duly enacted federal laws “shall be the supreme law of the land,” states simply do not have the authority to block an Act of Congress such as the Affordable Care Act, whether through a ballot initiative or otherwise.

Although nullification was very much in vogue among nineteenth century slaveholders and Civil Rights era segregationists, it has largely been avoided for most of American history because the Constitution speaks so clearly and unambiguously that it is not allowed. Nevertheless, it has experienced a moderate renaissance among Tea Partiers after a right-wing pseudo-historian named Tom Woods published a book defending the idea. Woods also once published an article declaring the Confederacy to be “Christendom’s Last Stand.” In it, he endorsed the view that the Civil War was a battle between “atheists, socialists, communists, red republicans, jacobins on the one side and the friends of order and regulated freedom on the other.” He concludes that “[t]he real watershed from which we can trace many of the destructive trends that continue to ravage our civilization today, was the defeat of the Confederate States of America in 1865.”

So the Koch group’s ad does not simply seek to punish three justices for placing the law before conservative ideology and turn Florida’s highest court over to the mercies of a Tea Party governor, it also endorses one of the most outlandish misreadings of the Constitution ever conceived by states’ rights advocates — many of whom later wielded it to defend the most abhorrent practices in American history. The Koch ad demonstrates that one of the most powerful and well-moneyed interest groups in the Republican coalition embraces the worst kinds of constitutional thinking, and that they are eager to seek revenge against a judge or justice who rejects their twisted view of the Constitution. If the Koch group succeeds in taking out these three justices, if will send a clear message to every elected judge in the country that they follow the Constitution at their own peril.

Climate Progress

Five Ways Charles Koch Benefits From Practices He Criticizes In Absurd Wall Street Journal Op-Ed

By Rebecca Leber on Sep 10, 2012 at 5:14 pm

In today’s Wall Street Journal, Charles Koch laments “crony capitalism,” complaining about “partisan rhetoric,” corporations’ eagerness “to lobby for maintaining and increasing subsidies,” and rewards for “politically connected friends.”

Hilariously, he is not writing about himself or his brother David.

Drawing on just a small portion of their net worth, the Koch brothers bankroll a network of Tea Party groups and Republican political war chests. In return, they receive continued subsidies, government contracts, and pro-polluter policies that benefit their interests.

So while David Koch hypocritically complains about “crony capitalism,” here are five ways his company, Koch Industries, is benefiting from policies it has specifically campaigned, donated, and lobbied for:

1. Billions of dollars in oil subsidies: In his op-ed, Koch acknowledges government support of renewable energy, but he doesn’t point out the billions of dollars in tax breaks the oil industry receives every year. Koch Industries reaps billions in these century-old tax breaks, and spends millions lobbying specifically to ensure they stay in place. Koch is guilty of what he writes in his op-ed: “Far too many businesses have been all too eager to lobby for maintaining and increasing subsidies and mandates paid by taxpayers and consumers.”

2. Koch Industries has had at least $85 million in federal government contracts: Lee Fang reported that the Bush administration awarded the corporation expensive contracts, after Koch Industry contributions to Bush’s campaign. Many come from the Department of Defense, but they also include an exclusive contract to supply the nation’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve and prior access to Iraqi crude oil.

3. They’ve asked for bailouts: A Koch refinery located in Alaska, Flint Hills Refinery, repeatedly asked former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin for a bailout. Sen. Lisa Murkowski also asked for reduced royalties on the company’s behalf, arguing it plays a “vital” part in the economy.

4. After launching a campaign on behalf of the Keystone XL pipeline, they stand to benefit from taxpayer subsidies: Price of Oil calculates that refineries for the Keystone XL pipeline would receive over $1 billion in tax breaks for tar sands equipment. The Kochs have avoided talking about on how this would benefit the company. But InsideClimate News recently reported that a Koch subsidiary told regulators it has “direct and substantial interest” in the pipeline. Through its political contributions to Canadian lawmakers, the corporation help itself maintain a stake Canada’s tar sands.

5. Koch Industries contributes millions of dollars to advance anti-environment legislation, and has been accused of outright bribery: Koch argues that the point of business is to “act lawfully and with integrity.” However, Grist points out a telling anecdote that undermines Koch’s point: Koch Industries was accused of bribing French government officials to win contracts. The Seattle Times reported that a Koch ethics manager highlighted bribes and activities that were “violations of criminal law” in France; however, the whistleblower was fired soon after she alerted executives to the issue.

Koch Industries has spent nearly $13.6 million on lobbying since 2011 — almost all of which has gone to Republicans. The Koch brothers have personally pledged $60 million to defeat President Obama, according to the Huffington Post. In the U.S., Koch Industries’ biggest political recipients in Congress advance anti-environment and anti-climate legislation, giving Koch Industries the freedom to emit 300 million tons of carbon annually.

Related Post:

Climate Progress

Fossil Fuel Magnate Bill Koch Seeks Public Lands To Shelter His ‘Private Old West Marvel’

By Public Lands Team on Aug 21, 2012 at 5:19 pm

By Jessica Goad

F. Scott Fitzgerald once wrote, “Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me.”  A story in yesterday’s Denver Post about fossil fuel magnate William (Bill) Koch’s construction of a private old western town in Colorado provides yet another example of this truism.

Koch has built for himself:

… an unpopulated, faux Western town that might boggle the mind of anyone who ever had a playhouse. Its full-size buildings come with polished brass and carved-mahogany details and are fronted with board sidewalks and underpinned by a water-treatment system. A locked gate with guards screens who comes and goes….

Koch’s project manager has told county officials that the enclave in the middle of the 6,400-acre Bear Ranch won’t ever be open to the public. It is simply for Koch’s amusement and for that of his family and friends.

Koch is building the town on his ranch in Gunnison County, Colorado.  But he has proposed highly controversial land exchanges that would swap tracts of public lands for areas that he has the rights to in order to expand his ranch and provide more privacy for the old western town.

The “Central Rockies Land Exchange” would give Koch control of 1,800 acres of land managed by the Bureau of Land Management in exchange for various other parcels that he owns in Colorado.  Local opponents say that the land exchange will deny access to public lands where they hunt and hike.  Koch has hired a public relations firm to sell local residents on the idea.

Bill Koch is brother to David and Charles Koch, conservative heavy hitters who are virulently anti-climate science and have bankrolled right-wing groups like Americans for Prosperity and the Heritage Foundation.

While Bill Koch maintains some distance from the political zeal of his brothers, he has given at least $2 million to Restore Our Future, a pro-Romney super-PAC.  He is also the founder and CEO of the Oxbow Corporation, which has interests in various energy ventures including coal, natural gas, and petroleum coke.  Forbes has listed his value at $4 billion.

Koch’s western town that will be entirely for his own benefit brings into relief the remarkable contrast between public and private lands and the value of places that belong to all Americans, not just the wealthy few.

Koch isn’t the only one who is interested in privatizing our public lands.  Indeed, Republican Vice Presidential candidate and Congressman Paul Ryan’s (R-WI) budget contains a provision to sell millions of acres of public lands to the highest bidder.  The language is largely based on Rep. Jason Chaffetz’s (R-UT) bill that would get rid of three million acres of public lands without clarifying how taxpayers would receive a fair return for them.  And Florida Representative Cliff Stearns (R), who just lost his primary election, called for selling off national parks last March.

Jessica is the Manager of Research and Outreach for the Public Lands Project at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

Alyssa

Review: ‘The Campaign’ Angered the Kochs, But It’s Kind of Naive About Politics

By Alyssa Rosenberg on Aug 10, 2012 at 10:36 am

The Campaign, directed by Jay Roach and starring Will Ferrell and Zach Galifianakis, as rival Congressional candidates fueled by Super PAC donations and campaign staff provided by a pair of sinister industrialist brothers, appears to have already gotten under the skin of its main targets. Earlier this week, a spokesman for major right-wing and libertarian donors Charles and David Koch went on the offensive, suggesting it would be stupid to take advice or ideas from comedians and their movies. Whether the movie, a blunt indictment of the influence of money in politics, affects audiences the same way is another question. At 85 minutes, it’s a slight gathering together of several ideas and a number of brutally brilliant jokes, the two best of which don’t even involve the brawling incumbent Congressman Cam Brady (Ferrell) and insurgent Marty Huggins (Galifianakis, in high holy fool mode). But given that the point of The Campaign is that we’re governed by people other than our elected officials, perhaps that makes artistic as well as political sense.

The action begins when Cam, a Congressman with the hair and weakness for hot superfans of John Edwards, the faux-folksy barn jacket of Scott Brown, and the willingness to boink anywhere that Hustler once attributed to the Rev. Jerry Falwell, accidentally leaves a dirty phone message that he intends for his mistress on the machine of a nice evangelical family (lead by 30 Rock‘s Jack McBreyer). Sensing his vulnerability, billionaires Wayne and Glenn Motch see an opportunity to implement a plan they’ve been wanting to try out, and one of the movie’s most effective jabs. If they elect a sufficiently dumb Congressman in a district where they own property, they can convince him to request waivers that would lower the district’s wage and environmental standards below China’s, and save money on shipping by bringing in Chinese immigrant workers to make their products in toxic conditions in the United States. They settle on tourism bureau director Marty, a genial idiot obsessed with his two pugs, his family, and the withheld approval of his father (Brian Cox), a man so nostalgic for the racist past that he pays his his housekeeper, Mrs. Yao (a very funny Karen Maruyama), to do her best Butterfly McQueen. “Isn’t he the weird one,” Glenn Motch asks of Marty. “Has weird ever stopped us before?” Wayne Motch asks him.

The Motchs dispatch ace political candidate Tim Wattley (Dylan McDermott) to Hammond County to, as he puts it to Marty, “make you not suck,” given that “the focus group words that come up about you are odd, clammy, probably Serbian, looks like the Travelocity gnome.” Making Marty not suck mostly means replacing the pugs, earlier maligned as “Chinese dogs,” with a chocolate lab and a golden retriever— “One is named Sergeant, the other Scout. They will wear bandanas.”—giving Marty’s wife Mitzi (Sarah Baker) a Katie Couric haircut, and schooling Marty in the dark art of political bullshit. One of the deep and disturbing pleasures of The Campaign is watching Marty and Cam sling platitudes at each other and realizing how close they are to the pablum and evasions of questions politicians regularly deploy on the trail. When Cam declares that “Filipino tilt-a-whirl operators are this nation’s backbone,” or explains that “My father worked with his hands, as head stylist for Vidal Sassoon,” it reveals how the forms of our political language gilt meaning onto substancelessness. And the movie gets a very funny sequence out of Marty accusing Cam of being a closet Communist because of a picture book he wrote about “Rainbowland” as a child that depicts a fictional country where everything is free. “I don’t want to live in Rainbowland,” hollers an angry constituent. “It’s a fictitious place!” Cam despairs. The picture book, of course, ends up at the top of the Amazon bestseller list.

The Campaign‘s feisty nastiness dissipates, however, in the final third of the movie, when its candidates try to free themselves from the influence of big money, spurred on by their children, wives, various hideous playground scars, and dogs. I understand the movie’s desire to end with a moral. But it’s weirdly naive, for a movie that can be so sharp and mean about the willingness of politicians to be bought to end up suggesting that we rely on their reawakened consciences rather than on legislation to keep big money out of politics. Though even when they do, the winning candidate’s promise to the residents of his district that “You will not be sold to China, or Brazil, or Nova Scotia, ro any other country…And I want to end Daylight Savings time. I hate it when it gets dark,” is a reminder that stupid free from corporate influence is, well, still stupid—and unlikely to be gone from our politics any time soon.

NEWS FLASH

Koch Brother Will Be Official Romney Delegate At Republican National Convention | David Koch will be an official delegate for Mitt Romney at this month’s Republican National Convention and will represent the New York Republican Party, according to National Journal. Koch, an oil billionaire currently ranked number five on the Forbes U.S. billionaire list, has pledged along with his brother Charles to spend $100 million in their effort to oust President Obama this November. For years, the Koch brothers have used their vast wealth to finance the tea party and attack progressive policies on health reform, Wall Street reform, and climate change. It’s unclear if David Koch will attend the RNC in person, which kicks off August 27.

Justice

Better Know A Right-Wing Attack Group: Americans for Prosperity

By Josh Israel and Scott Keyes on Aug 8, 2012 at 5:10 pm

Americans for Prosperity logoPart three of ThinkProgress’ profiles of right-wing groups that are taking advantage of the Citizens United ruling to flood the airways with independent attack ads. See Part 1 and Part 2.

Americans for Prosperity (AFP) is a tax-exempt 501(c)(4) organization.

Created in 2004 when Citizens for a Sound Economy (a conservative organization founded in 1984 by oil billionaires David and Charles Koch) split, AFP calls itself “an organization of grassroots leaders who engage citizens in the name of limited government and free markets.” Its goals include “cutting taxes and government spending in order to halt the encroachment of government in the economic lives of citizens,” “removing unnecessary barriers to entrepreneurship,” and “restoring fairness to our judicial system.”

Though generally associated with the Koch Brothers, the organization is led by president Tim Phillips. Phillips, a former chief of staff for Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-VA), co-founded Century Strategies with Ralph Reed — the former Christian Coalition executive director and Jack Abramoff-scandal figure. Phillips has made a career in corporate “astroturfing.”

The group’s directors include controversial millionaire and former North Carolina State Rep. Art Pope (R) and former Reagan administration budget director James C. Miller.

The group has funded efforts to “incubate” Tea Party organizations and was highly visible in the Wisconsin gubernatorial recall election running ads and sending staffers in the state to support Gov. Scott Walker (R).

Sample AFP ad:

Affiliates:

YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/AforP
Twitter feed: https://twitter.com/AFPhq

Graphics by Adam Peck. Christina Lewis and Ellie Sandmeyer contributed to this report

Alyssa

The Koch Brothers Go After Zach Galifianakis and ‘The Campaign’

By Alyssa Rosenberg on Aug 7, 2012 at 11:57 am

In The Campaign, out this weekend, Will Ferrell plays an incumbent Congressman who’s running what’s supposed to be an uncontested race, when a pair of wealth brothers by the name of Motch put up a genial dummy, played by Zach Galifianakis, to run against him. Unsurprisingly, Galifianakis confirmed that the brothers, played in the movie by Dan Aykroyd and John Lithgow, are meant to be a stand-in for the real-life industrialists and right-wing political funders Charles and David Koch, and mentioned in a recent interview that he found the pair “creepy.”

Other public figures might consider the movie, and Galifianakis’ uneasiness about their influence to be a tribute to their effectiveness. But the Kochs don’t seem to be taking it that way. Phillip Ellender, Koch Industries’ president for government affairs, issued a statement on the brothers’ behalf, saying:

Last we checked, the movie is a comedy. Maybe more to the point is that it’s laughable to take political guidance or moral instruction from a guy who makes obscene gestures with a monkey on a bus in Bangkok…We disagree with his uninformed characterization of Koch and our beliefs. His comments, which appear to be based on false attacks made by our political opponents, demonstrate a lack of understanding of our longstanding support of individual freedom, freedom of expression, and constitutional rights.

While the Koch brothers have become a staple of political coverage, it’s taken longer for them to become fixtures in popular culture, and Ellender’s response suggests they’re not enjoying the attention. This summer, they’ve made an appearance by name in Aaron Sorkin’s HBO drama The Newsroom, when anchor Will McAvoy (Jeff Daniels) attacked guests on his show who were members of Tea Party groups for not being aware of who their funders were. His coverage earned a rebuke from network owner Leona Lansing (a scenery-munching Jane Fonda), who cautioned Will’s producer against further coverage of the Kochs lest they pull their brands’ advertisements from the company. declared “I got where I am by knowing who to fear,” she said. “They drop Brinks trucks on people they disagree with.” It was a weirdly sinister portrayal, in contrast to the lighter satire The Campaign is expected to offer up.

But as long as the Koch brothers are making heavy investments in political campaigns and grass-roots organizing, they’re probably going to keep popping up in movies and television, at least until someone gets the idea of painting casino magnate Sheldon Adelson as a malevolent power behind the throne, which will probably take Adelson deciding to support someone more credible than Newt Gingrich. Until then, Charles and David Koch might as well enjoy the spectacle of liberals fearing them, and the debate over which one of them Aykroyd and Lithgow are each meant to be.

Climate Progress

A Letter To Charles Koch: Do You Consider Climate Science To Be On A ‘Solid, Firm Foundation’ As Richard Muller Does?

By Stephen Lacey on Aug 7, 2012 at 10:35 am

When infamous industrial billionaire Charles Koch funded a study to review the science of global warming, it’s very likely he didn’t expect the chief scientist, Richard Muller, to conclude that “humans are almost entirely the cause” of an accelerating warming trend.

So will Charles Koch ignore the study he supported? Greenpeace’s Executive Director Phillip Radford sent a letter to Charles Koch yesterday, asking him if the science he funded is enough to convince him of the urgency of climate change. Here’s the letter in full:

As you know, one of your grant recipients – Dr. Richard Muller of University of California Berkeley – recently published an op-ed in the New York Times about his “total turnaround” from climate skepticism based on the results of his latest study. The Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation granted at least $150,000 to Dr. Muller’s Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature (BEST) study. Dr. Muller’s results are consistent with decades of scientific evidence, fully convincing him that global warming is happening and “humans are almost entirely the cause.”

Based on Dr. Muller’s evidence and the views of virtually all climate scientists, I am writing to inquire about the influence of these findings on your previously expressed skepticism about climate change.

Dr. Muller explained in a recent Greenpeace Radio interview that he spoke directly with you about the BEST project and your personal interest in his analysis:

“I did talk to Charles Koch. He emphasized from the beginning that he was concerned about valid issues in the science. He wanted us to straighten out those issues. He didn’t know what answer we would get. He just wanted it to be put on a solid, firm foundation. That’s what we’ve done.”

For years, you and your brother, David Koch, have directly provided over $61 million to organizations that deny science and cast doubt on global climate change, in addition to millions more in hidden funding through your “Knowledge and Progress Fund.” This includes support for the Heartland Institute, which is currently supporting a project run by the retired TV weatherman Anthony Watts in attempts to discredit the results of the BEST study. You may recall that the Heartland Institute ran the infamous billboard comparing the Unabomber with those who acknowledge the existence of global warming.

Organizations you finance continue to delay action to curb global warming even as the United States is experiencing unprecedented heat records, drought, wildfires, and violent storms. Your own home state of Kansas is at the center of the summer’s extreme drought, which has led to prairie fires and forced ranchers to sell their cattle due to lack of grass and water. Your oil and gas business activities, not to mention the political funding you can afford, have helped ensure that these all-too-real disasters will become more frequent as the global climate continues to warm.

Our country desperately needs to reduce carbon pollution in order to take a lead on the global stage, and you have an opportunity here to stop obstructing such leadership. Please tell us, Mr. Koch: do you now consider anthropogenic global warming to be on a “solid, firm foundation” as Dr. Muller does? Will groups that deny climate science continue to receive support from Koch Industries and its associated foundations? If so, will you urge them to discontinue such unscientific and unproductive interference in policy-making focused on addressing climate change?

We look forward to your response and urge you to take this inquiry seriously. Too much is at stake to continue delaying solutions to civilization’s largest challenge.

Meanwhile, Charles and his brother David say they plan to raise and spend nearly $400 million this election season — with most of those millions going toward ads designed to cut down the clean energy industry.

Related Post:

Alyssa

‘The Newsroom,’ Process, and Progressive Triumph

By Alyssa Rosenberg on Jul 10, 2012 at 11:37 am

As much as I’m not enjoying The Newsroom, recapping it for Press Play has actually helped me clarify some things that I care about in progressive television. I don’t just want to see progressives or progressive-coded characters win because they’re factually or morally correct, or because they do the right thing against the odds. I want to see clear explanations of systems, and to see the characters work through them. As I explained in this week’s recap, that’s part of why Don is becoming my favorite character on the show, because he’s all muddled up in the gears:

After Will’s epic on-air apology for falling down on the job, Don sits down to have a heart-to-heart with Jim, who has effectively replaced him. “I would have loved to be part of that. I could have done the show you guys want to do. I’m equipped for that,” he confesses. “You’ve got a mandate. Bring viewers to ten o’clock. I don’t . . . I have to cover Natalee Holloway. And you guys set me up to look like an asshole before I even got started.” Don is like Will, to a certain extent, a talented man who succumbed to the pressure to put on a show that was likable rather than substantive. But unlike Will, he’s relatively anonymous. He could be fired and Elliot’s show would keep ticking on without him. If Don is going to live in hopes of being able to make the kind of show that Jim and MacKenzie are making for Will, he has to keep his job. And that means kowtowing to a lot of unattractive people’s unattractive senses of what counts as news…

And I’m not even sure Jim gets the message later when Maggie, in one of the few moments in The Newsroom where a woman gets to explain something to a man, tells Jim that Don’s failure has more complex roots than Jim acknowledges. “Don’s hands are tied,” Maggie says. “He got marching orders to get the ratings up at ten. And he’s driving a different car than McAvoy. Elliot’s smart, but he can’t do what McAvoy does. Plus, his salary’s tied to ratings.” That, not a studied, cowardly commitment to blandness for its own sake, is the reality of cable news—and the actual source of journalism’s problems.

The show just seems to me like it’s giving up an enormous amount of dramatic potential in having characters spend most of the show making speeches, on air or to each other, dealing with their personal lives, and then, throwing us five minutes of people pulling together the guests who will appear on air or Charlie negotiating with Leona and Reese. Sorkin wants us to think his characters are Interesting Hero Journalists but we essentially never see them doing actual journalism, so we don’t get a sense that Maggie is great at weeding out idiots, or that Jim is terrific at developing relationships with sources, or that Neal is unbelievably good at sorting through documents, something that would have been particularly useful in this last week’s episode in documenting the Koch brothers’ funding of Tea Party operations.

I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it again: the most important thing in news, cable or otherwise, is not what Will McAvoy says on air. It’s what his staff has the resources to dig up. It’s what kinds of pressures producers like Don are under, and what they can negotiate to broadcast. State of Play did a particularly nice job of this in the scene where Bill Nighy’s editor went to meet with a suit who laid out the specific issues at stake in their negotiations with the government over broadcast licenses, and then capped the budget for a big scandal story the reporters were working on. The miniseries spent serious time negotiating with editors over content, whether they’d proved a story well enough, whether they were at risk of getting sued. By the time something gets to someone like Will McAvoy, or to the front page of the paper, most of the pressure’s already been exerted on the information. We get flashes of that with Don. But The Newsroom can only get better the more it focuses on actual process and on actual journalism, not on telling Will, or anyone in the audience, that we’re good people because we have certain facts at our disposal and hold certain opinions.

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