Billionaire David Koch Dead After 79-Year Battle Against Progress

To paraphrase Bette Davis: You should never say bad things about the dead, only good. David Koch is dead. Good.

David Koch, the almost cartoonishly evil billionaire co-owner of Koch Industries, spent his life funneling over $100 million into promoting climate change denial. He and his equally terrible brother, Charles Koch, stood to financially benefit due to their business empire's reliance on fossil fuels.

In exchange for David Koch's endless war against the planet in the name of self-enrichment and libertarian ideology, he was able to bring approximately $0 to his grave.

Alongside funding climate change denial, the Koch Brothers were/are also (unsurprisingly) GOP mega-donors, funding loads of right wing candidates and think tanks to promote their agendas. While David Koch claimed to hold lofty libertarian ideals about freedom from government, many of his efforts revolved around such high-minded campaigns as defunding schools and funding the proto-alt right Tea Party movement.

To be clear, David Koch was a monster. He did more damage to humanity than the vast majority of serial killers combined. There is no reason for anyone to tiptoe around his death, as if he is owed respect or sadness. He was a bad person who did horrible things for selfish reasons, and now he's dead.

In their headline, NBC memorialized David Koch as a "conservative activist" and " philanthropist." Indeed, David donated over one billion dollars during his life to charitable causes, including cancer research and art museums. Many of his charitable contributions were targeted towards institutions already catering to rich clientele (like the State Theater of New York at Lincoln Center, which was subsequently renamed the David H. Koch Theater). All of his contributions likely gave him big tax write-offs. None of them lessen the blame on David Koch's shoulders for our current far right political climate and global warming denial crisis. Doing a few good things does not in any way blunt what a terrible person David Koch was.

Luckily, people seem to realize this on social media.

David Koch made the world a worse place. His death is not a reason to pretend otherwise. The world is a better place now that he's not here to continue battling progress. If there is a Hell for evil people, make no mistake, David Koch is roasting. Charles should take note.