WICHITA — Taking immediate advantage of Monday’s Supreme Court ruling in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc., Charles Koch, the CEO of Koch Industries, announced, moments ago, that Koch Industries has reconfigured itself into a church.
Koch explained the change to a solitary reporter. “My brother David and I run Koch Industries, which is a closely-held, exquisitely privately run corporation. Thanks to Justice Alito, we now know that closely held corporations which have strong religious feelings about themselves and their causes are entitled to receive an exemption from Obamacare.”
“Koch Industries is a warm, cuddly corporation, with deep faith in our version of the American Dream, and because of our devotion to the sacred values of free markets, we are the second largest privately held corporation in America. David and I are very close, and we absolutely run the show.”
“This country was founded on the notion of religious liberty, and the government can’t define what religion is, but I want the world to know that I am a devoutly libertarian tea partier. That’s my religion.”
“Effective immediately,” Koch continued, “not only will our 60,000 employees in 60 countries, if they have the bad luck to be women, not be entitled to contraceptive services; they won’t be entitled to time and a half overtime pay under the federal wage-hour law, since we have strong, religiously-based feelings about the work ethic of our employees.”
“This country is fast approaching financial as well as moral bankruptcy,” Charles Koch continued, "but at least the Supreme Court has made it clear that corporations are people. Justice Alito has done a great service by pointing out to us how devout we corporations are.”
“David and I will soon unveil a plan to construct a megachurch right next to our headquarters building here at 37th and Oliver; its name will be The Church of Free Market Economics. Our three thousand Wichita-based employees have been clamoring for this type of worship space for many years, and it will be a great platform which we can use to evangelize the 47% of Americans who rely on welfare about our deep and abiding faith in free market economics.”
“There will be a chapel inside the church, which we will name the Milton Friedman Chapel.”
“Americans for Prosperity, our 501(c) (4), which David runs, will be housed in the church, and, if we can provide Rush Limbaugh with enough painkillers, he’ll be moving his radio show from Florida to the church."
“The fact that we are a small, closely held corporation under Justice Alito’s criteria,” Koch, the founder of the Cato Institute, continued, "is best illustrated by the fact that we own Georgia-Pacific, a small outfit which makes “Brawny” paper towels, “Angel Soft” toilet paper, “Dixie” paper plates, and many other paper products. Georgia-Pacific has operations in only 27 states, and if we could just get government out of the way -- since government is the problem -- Georgia-Pacific would be the only paper products company in America.”
“SR,” Koch continued, “since you asked me about my heroes throughout history, I can only say that I have modeled myself on Martin Luther, who stood up to ecclesiastical authority, saying, at the Diet of Worms in 1521, ‘Here I stand. I can do no other.’”
“Speaking of worms, SR, on your way out, help yourself to the can of worms which I keep in the outer office to remind all my visitors of the worms and maggots which are consuming our body politic under President Obama."
As he departed from the august presence of Koch, who has a net worth of $31 billion, the solitary reporter asked him about a comment which his wife, Liz Koch, made to reporters Roy Wentzl and Bill Wilson in 2012. In their article in the Wichita Eagle of October 11, 2012, they quote Liz Koch as saying, “Greed is a return on investment.” To which Mr. Koch responded, “Yes sir, that’s my gal!"
Meanwhile, David Green, the founder of Hobby Lobby, announced in Oklahoma City that all 562 of its stores are now churches.
“There is no separation of church and state anymore,” Green said, “we Super Christians are taking over.”
Justice Alito, appointed by Bush Two to replace Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, is spending his summer vacation with Green. “I am so grateful to David for the free publicity which he has given me," Alito said, “I am very close to being ready to convert to David’s evangelical kind of Christianity from being a dogmatic Catholic.”
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