One of the deepest divides in our alarmingly escalating Class War is one of mutual misunderstanding between the two sides about what money is for: The Job Creators can’t comprehend why the Lower Orders should have such fripperies as food, housing, and medical care (or worse, cell phones and TV’s), while those being steadily ground into mush under their well-shod heels can’t understand why people with enough money to buy their own states don’t at least buy states where the weather is better.

Earlier today AFSCME reported that 100,000 people showed up at the state capital in Lansing to protest the passage of Michian’s “right to work” law by the Republican dominated state legislature. Why anyone thought it was a good idea to throw up an anti-union tent in the midst of that is anybody’s guess, but Americans for Prosperity did, and Michigan protesters tore it down.

The Koch brothers don’t just have a gazillion luxury homes and boats. They’ve been using their wealth to shut out the voices of the 99% — pledging to spend at least $100 million on the 2012 elections. The pro-corporate policies they favor are, of course, antithetical to the public interest. But the TV ads they’re airing so far in this election make it seem like they’re on the side of regular Americans. “Maybe your family is like most, struggling to make it by…The private sector is not doing fine,” says Americans for Prosperity, an organization the Kochs founded and fund.

Australian journalist Taki Oldham, our guest tonight, takes an undercover trip to Tea Parties across the country and into the heart of the Tea Party movement to uncover the astroturfing of America. With Billionaires’ Tea Party, Oldham shows how political messaging is the designed and shaped by corporate-funded think tanks and propagandists.

Now that you know what AFP’s ads look like, what they’re really about, and what sort of sludge they’re feeding your conservative brother-in-law, you can craft a way to counter their nonsense. Go forth and do so.

This week as I premiered my new film, Koch Brothers Exposed — the result of a year-long investigation on how two billionaires are using their wealth to corrupt democracy — Koch Industries has launched an attack on the film and me. The Kochs intimidate, they menace; they have a letter from their lawyer borderline threatening the media if it reports what’s in the film — and they always try to change the subject so their behavior can stay in the shadows: not only are they unwilling to accept my offer of a debate or interview, they also refuse to testify about their interest in the Keystone XL pipeline and may have to be dragged kicking and screaming into revealing their secret contributions to groups doing election work.

This time, the Kochs are using a technique I point out in the film: attacking to avoid dealing with the facts. They are dodging and distorting the truth to avoid confronting our findings on cancer, voting rights, civil rights, and more.

How? Let me count (some of) the ways.

I encourage readers to purchase two copies of The Tea Party and the Remaking of Republican Conservatism – one for themselves and one as a Christmas present for their right wing uncle. That uncle might well stay with Skocpol and Williamson’s highly readable and well-crafted study to the end without throwing it down in anger – something I can’t say with much confidence about my book with DiMaggio.

The AP has a story picked up all over the media that compiles what others have known for awhile. AP traces the raising of Cain as a years-long Koch Bros’ funding and grooming enterprise, pulled off by having Mr. Cain be for the Koch Bros. and AFP’s agenda what Ronald Reagan was for Big Tobacco, G.E. and the anti-socialist crusade.

If the Republicans who continually cry wolf over the imaginary spectre of rampant voter fraud really want to preserve the integrity of our electoral process, maybe they should pay a little more attention to actual dirty tricks like these.

(also note the appearance of Newt Gingrich’s twitter followers at the end of the video.)

I get it, I do. People have exploited those they considered beneath them since the beginning of time. It’s only recently that we’ve begun to tell ourselves we ought to like it and help them to do it, in the hopes we may someday be the exploiters. I don’t know when that became an admirable thing to be, but it seems that’s the motivation: Side with billionaires because someday you’ll be a billionaire and then you’ll want to keep all your money instead of giving it to the government so they can teach unwashed poles like you to read and patrol the filthy streets where you live in your hovel.