"News just broke that Eric Cantor and Paul Ryan snuck off to the Koch brothers' infamous secret gathering of right-wing millionaires."
Some say snuck and some say sneaked, but either fits Cantor and Ryan. The two low-life Republican congressmen are the kind who look sneaky whatever they're doing. "Rep. Paul Ryan snuck off to church, where fellow parishioners kept a close eye on him.""Rep. Eric Cantor snuck off to the barber shop, and out without tipping."
Meeting with the Koch brothers requires an extra dash of sneakiness, even for Ryan and Cantor. What the Kochs and their cronies are up to is buying politicians and elections, so as to install a government that will never try to regulate their enterprises or levy taxes on them. For too long America has been focused on freedom and bravery, the Kochs and their kind believe; it's time for the land of the privileged and the home of the avaricious. (One of the Kochs' co-conspirators is Jackson Stephens Jr. of Little Rock, who inherited a ton of money and seems to resent those who didn't. Stephens invests large sums trying to defeat politicians who show sympathy for the middle and lower classes. His "Club for Growth"— or "Club for Greed," as fellow Republican Mike Huckabee calls it — is spending freely on television advertising against Sen. Mark Pryor, a moderate who occasionally votes with President Obama. One of the ads says, "Liberal Mark Pryor: He's got a lot to answer for." It's rumored that a later ad will say "President Barack Obama: He's still black.")
Many Arkansas legislators like to hobnob with rich right-wingers. Even a slow study can figure out that this could work to one's advantage. The infamous event that Cantor and Ryan attended was a conference of the American Legislative Exchange Council, a right-wing group funded by the Kochs and others that writes reactionary bills for docile legislatures to approve. ALEC is for privatization of schools, against labor, indifferent to air and water pollution. The legislation enacted in Arkansas and other states to discourage the poor, the elderly and minorities from voting is ALEC's work. A bunch of Arkansas lawmakers were scheduled to attend the same conference as Ryan and Cantor, and at taxpayers' expense. Virtually shameless, the Arkansans weren't particularly sneaky about their participation. These are legislators who don't worry about infamy. Or know how to spell it, in most cases.
The guilty senators were Cecile Bledsoe, Linda Chesterfield, Jane English, Bruce Holland, Jeremy Hutchinson, Johnny Key, Michael Lamoureux and Eddie Joe Williams. The representatives were Randy Alexander, Bob Ballinger, Nate Bell, Ken Bragg, Andy Davis, Jim Dotson, Charlene Fite, Douglas House, Andrea Lea, Mark Lowery, Micah Neal and Richard Womack. Know the enemy. You can be sure that the Kochs know their friends, and that they'll show it.