Earlier today, a fellow Kossack passed along what I consider to be a very valuable bit of information: Namely, this Yahoo! Politics story from June on how the Koch brothers are trying to hijack the Republican Party right out from under the RNC - and that their tool of choice is a form of elections database software called i360:
The Kochs’ political arm, Freedom Partners, which oversees i360, views the issue as one of capability. Koch aides — several of whom used to work at the RNC — want to win elections, and in their view the RNC has inherent challenges to helping the party win. Party committee fundraising is severely limited by federal election law, while building, maintaining and enriching a database is expensive.What's very interesting here is that very few Republicans besides Priebus seem to be willing to openly criticize the Kochs or side with the Republican National Committee. Mitch McConnell is among the establishment Republicans who sides with the Kochs on this. In my view, there are at least possible reasons for this: they like the Kochware, they get money from the Kochs or Koch fronts, or they fear angering a Koch-riled-up GOP base.Michael Palmer, president of i360, emphasized in an email that his firm is a “private company that provides data, technology and analytical services to dozens of candidates, campaigns and other organizations that promote free market principles.”
“Our clients own their own data and are free to share it as they see fit. We believe that a robust marketplace of political technology and data is a healthy way to advance past the single monopoly model that has failed the Republican Party in recent presidential elections,” Palmer said.
So what do you think will happen? What do you think should happen? Poll is below.