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 Post subject: Re: Obama uses IRS to target political opponents.
PostPosted: Tue Jun 11, 2013 6:53 pm 
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IRS Firings For Employee Misconduct Reach 11-Year Low
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It’s easier to bend a spoon with your mind than it is to fire a government worker.

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The Internal Revenue Service, under a congressional microscope for conference spending and improper scrutiny of small-government groups, has fired fewer workers for misconduct this year than at any time since 2002.

The IRS fired half as many people as it did three years ago for such misconduct as unauthorized access to taxpayer information, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The data indicate the tax agency may have been focusing too much on employee satisfaction, said former commissioner Mark W. Everson.

“In the last several years one of the overriding objectives was to make the IRS a better place to work,” Everson, who led the agency from 2003 to 2007, said in an interview. “That, to some degree, gave rise to excessive spending on conferences and maybe changing disciplinary procedures.”

The IRS terminated 74 workers for misconduct in the six months that ended March 31, or less than 0.1 percent of the tax agency’s approximately 90,000-person workforce, according to government data. Firings of IRS employees for any reason declined by 46 percent from fiscal 2008 through 2012 and are on pace for another decline this year.

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 Post subject: Re: Obama uses IRS to target political opponents.
PostPosted: Sun Jun 16, 2013 6:23 pm 
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Obama IRS Targeted And Infiltrated Christian Churches
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The unbelievable Obama Scandalpalooza continues on

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On Thursday the Examiner provided an exclusive report indicating that the Obama administration had implemented a covert program beginning in 2009 that was intended to spy on conservative, evangelical Christian churches.

That program involved infiltration — sending in government operatives to join churches for the purpose of data collection. The government snoops would keep their eyes and ears open for criticism of the Obama administration, talk of Tea Party participation, conversations about gun ownership, and a number of other issues.

But a special report issued today by Fox News indicates that the program went far beyond infiltration and snooping. The IRS was used to harass Christian churches if they were identified as places where large numbers of anti-Obama citizens congregated for worship.

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 Post subject: Re: Obama uses IRS to target political opponents.
PostPosted: Mon Jun 17, 2013 11:21 am 
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IRS Supervisor In D.C. Holly Paz Says She Was Personally Involved In Scrutinizing Tea Party Applications, Claims She Didn’t Know Groups Were Conservative
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You could probably count the number of people who believe her claim she didn’t know Tea Party groups are conservative on one hand.

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WASHINGTON (AP) — An Internal Revenue Service supervisor in Washington says she was personally involved in scrutinizing some of the earliest applications from tea party groups seeking tax-exempt status, including some requests that languished for more than a year without action.

Holly Paz, who until recently was a top deputy in the division that handles applications for tax-exempt status, told congressional investigators she reviewed 20 to 30 applications. Her assertion contradicts initial claims by the agency that a small group of agents working in an office in Cincinnati were solely responsible for mishandling the applications.

Paz, however, provided no evidence that senior IRS officials ordered agents to target conservative groups or that anyone in the Obama administration outside the IRS was involved.

Instead, Paz described an agency in which IRS supervisors in Washington worked closely with agents in the field but didn’t fully understand what those agents were doing. Paz said agents in Cincinnati openly talked about handling “tea party” cases, but she thought the term was merely shorthand for all applications from groups that were politically active — conservative and liberal.

Paz said dozens of tea party applications sat untouched for more than a year while field agents waited for guidance from Washington on how to handle them. At the time, she said, Washington officials thought the agents in Cincinnati were processing the cases.

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 Post subject: Re: Obama uses IRS to target political opponents.
PostPosted: Mon Jun 17, 2013 11:27 am 
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IRS Sending Applications Of Pro-Israel Groups To Antiterrorism Unit For Further Scrutiny
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While applications for Islamic groups are rubber-stamped.

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Applications of pro-Israel groups for tax-exempt status are routinely routed to an antiterrorism unit within the Internal Revenue Service for additional screening, according to the testimony of a Cincinnati-based IRS agent.

Asked whether Jewish or pro-Israel applications are treated differently from other applications, Gary Muthert told House Oversight Committee investigators that they are considered “specialty cases” and that “probably” all are sent to an IRS unit that examines groups for potential terrorist ties.

Muthert, who served as an application screener before transferring to the agency’s antiterrorism unit, was interviewed in connection with the committee’s investigation into the IRS’s discrimination against conservative groups. As a screener, Muthert flagged tea-party applications and passed them along to specialists for further scrutiny.

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“At the core of liberalism is the spoiled child — miserable, as all spoiled children are, unsatisfied, demanding, ill-disciplined, despotic and useless. Liberalism is a philosophy of sniveling brats.”
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 Post subject: Re: Obama uses IRS to target political opponents.
PostPosted: Mon Jun 17, 2013 6:56 pm 
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IRS Reinstated CAIR’s Tax Exempt Status In Time For Ramadan, Rubber-Stamped Other Islamic Groups While Targeting Conservatives
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Must have been those one or two “rogue” employees.

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While the IRS was hassling any nonprofit group with the word “patriot” in its name, it was rubberstamping exemptions for “Islamic” groups, even organizations that violate disclosure laws.

Worse, it was even finding favor with nonprofits tied to terrorism — namely, the Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations, which not coincidentally is yoked to the Democratic Party.

Despite being blackballed by the FBI, which still suspects it’s fronting for Hamas, and despite failing to file annual tax reports as required by federal law, CAIR apparently has found friends in high places at the nation’s powerful taxing authority.

Last year, in the middle of the national election season, the IRS quietly agreed to reinstate CAIR’s tax-exempt status, allowing it to resume raising tax-free donations just in time for Ramadan, a key time for Muslim charitable giving.

According to the Religion News Service, the IRS in June 2012 sent CAIR’s national office a letter stating the nonprofit had regained its exemption after losing it the previous year. Several GOP lawmakers had asked for an audit of CAIR after a book exposing its internal operations, “Muslim Mafia,” reported the Islamist outfit had skipped filing IRS Form 990s for at least three years in a row.

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“At the core of liberalism is the spoiled child — miserable, as all spoiled children are, unsatisfied, demanding, ill-disciplined, despotic and useless. Liberalism is a philosophy of sniveling brats.”
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 Post subject: Re: Obama uses IRS to target political opponents.
PostPosted: Tue Jun 18, 2013 12:07 pm 
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Number Of Americans Say White House Ordered IRS Targeting Jumps To 47%
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Up 10 points from last month.

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Washington (CNN) – A growing number of Americans believe that senior White House officials ordered the Internal Revenue Service to target conservative political groups, according to a new national poll.

And a CNN/ORC International survey released Tuesday morning also indicates that a majority of the public says the controversy, which involves increased IRS scrutiny of tea party and other conservative groups seeking tax-exempt status, is very important to the nation.

Republicans argue that the Obama administration used the IRS to intimidate and harass political opponents. Democrats say poor management at the tax agency, rather than political bias, is to blame. Congressional sources on both sides say that interviews with IRS workers so far have found no evidence of political dealings by the White House. White House Press Secretary Jay Carney, touting an independent IRS inspector general report, has said the scrutiny appears to have originated with “IRS officials in Cincinnati,” where the agency’s tax exempt division is centered.

Last month only 37% of the public thought that the IRS controversy led to the White House, with 55% saying that agency officials acted on their own without direct orders from Washington. Now the number who say the White House directed that IRS program has increased 10 points, to 47%, virtually the same as the 49% who believe the IRS agents acted on their own.

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“At the core of liberalism is the spoiled child — miserable, as all spoiled children are, unsatisfied, demanding, ill-disciplined, despotic and useless. Liberalism is a philosophy of sniveling brats.”
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 Post subject: Re: Obama uses IRS to target political opponents.
PostPosted: Tue Jun 18, 2013 6:01 pm 
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Distrust Growing: 70% Believe IRS Decision to Target Conservatives Was Made in DC – Rasmussen
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But… but… but… rogue employees!

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While the controversy over the National Security Agency surveillance program has dominated the news recently, concern about the Internal Revenue Service’s targeting of Tea Party groups and other conservative organizations remains high and is inching up. Despite the large number of controversies engulfing official Washington, the number of people following the IRS scandal has actually increased in recent weeks.

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 82% of voters nationwide are now following the IRS targeting story, including 44% who are following the story “Very Closely.” The overall number of voters who are following is up from 74% a month ago.

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“At the core of liberalism is the spoiled child — miserable, as all spoiled children are, unsatisfied, demanding, ill-disciplined, despotic and useless. Liberalism is a philosophy of sniveling brats.”
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 Post subject: Re: Obama uses IRS to target political opponents.
PostPosted: Wed Jun 19, 2013 6:41 pm 
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Unbelievable: IRS To Hand Out 70 Million In Bonuses
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Even after all the scandal, and the sequester, they still flout this in our faces

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WASHINGTON (AP) — Already reeling from a pair of scandals, the Internal Revenue Service is drawing new criticism over plans to hand out millions of dollars in employee bonuses.

The Obama administration has ordered agencies to cancel discretionary bonuses because of automatic spending cuts, but the IRS says it’s merely following legal obligations under a union contract.

The agency is about to pay $70 million in employee bonuses, said Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa, a senior Republican on the Senate Finance Committee, which has jurisdiction over the IRS.

Grassley says his office has learned that the IRS was to execute an agreement with the employees’ union Wednesday to pay the bonuses. Grassley says the bonuses should be canceled under an April directive from the White House budget office.

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“At the core of liberalism is the spoiled child — miserable, as all spoiled children are, unsatisfied, demanding, ill-disciplined, despotic and useless. Liberalism is a philosophy of sniveling brats.”
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 Post subject: Re: Obama uses IRS to target political opponents.
PostPosted: Sat Jun 22, 2013 11:37 am 
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IRS Sent Almost 24,000 Refunds Worth Combined $46 Million To “Unauthorized” Alien Workers All At Same Address In Atlanta, GA
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Words fail.

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The Internal Revenue Service sent 23,994 tax refunds worth a combined $46,378,040 to “unauthorized” alien workers who all used the same address in Atlanta, Ga., in 2011, according to the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA).

That was not the only Atlanta address theoretically occupied by thousands of “unauthorized” alien workers receiving millions in federal tax refunds in 2011. In fact, according to a TIGTA audit report published last year, four of the top ten addresses to which the IRS sent thousands of tax refunds to “unauthorized” aliens were in Atlanta.

The IRS sent 11,284 refunds worth a combined $2,164,976 to unauthorized alien workers at a second Atlanta address; 3,608 worth $2,691,448 to a third; and 2,386 worth $1,232,943 to a fourth.

_________________
“At the core of liberalism is the spoiled child — miserable, as all spoiled children are, unsatisfied, demanding, ill-disciplined, despotic and useless. Liberalism is a philosophy of sniveling brats.”
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 Post subject: Re: Obama uses IRS to target political opponents.
PostPosted: Fri Jun 28, 2013 1:12 pm 
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House Committee Rules IRS Official Lois Lerner Waived Her Fifth Amendment Right, Paves Way For Issa To Force Her To Testify
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Excellent!

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(CNN) - Republicans on a House committee overcame strenuous Democratic objections in voting Friday that Internal Revenue Service official Lois Lerner waived her constitutional right against self-incrimination at a prior hearing.

The resolution was the first step in an effort by the House Oversight Committee’s GOP chairman to force Lerner to return to answer questions about targeting of conservative groups by the unit she headed.

_________________
“At the core of liberalism is the spoiled child — miserable, as all spoiled children are, unsatisfied, demanding, ill-disciplined, despotic and useless. Liberalism is a philosophy of sniveling brats.”
P.J. O'Rourke


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 Post subject: Re: Obama uses IRS to target political opponents.
PostPosted: Sat Jul 20, 2013 6:21 pm 
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Dem Rep. Elijah Cummings: “I Don’t Think That The American People Want Us To Destroy The IRS”
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Guess again, Elijah.

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When Republican leaders in 2010 tapped Rep. Darrell Issa to lead the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, a top congressional watchdog panel, Democrats responded with an unusual move.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi passed over Rep. Edolphus Towns, the committee’s most senior Democrat, and tapped Rep. Elijah Cummings to be the panel’s ranking Democrat opposite Issa.

Pelosi never offered much of a explanation for casting aside Towns, who subsequently retired. But Republicans claim Cummings was given the seat because Democrats thought he would be more aggressive in countering Issa, whom they feared would launch partisan investigations into the Obama administration.

_________________
“At the core of liberalism is the spoiled child — miserable, as all spoiled children are, unsatisfied, demanding, ill-disciplined, despotic and useless. Liberalism is a philosophy of sniveling brats.”
P.J. O'Rourke


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 Post subject: Re: Obama uses IRS to target political opponents.
PostPosted: Thu Aug 01, 2013 11:41 am 
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Documents Show IRS’ Lois Lerner Colluded With FEC To Target Conservative Groups
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This can be a Pulitzer for an investigative journalist.

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Embattled Internal Revenue Service official Lois Lerner and an attorney in the Federal Election Commission’s general counsel’s office appear to have twice colluded to influence the record before the FEC’s vote in the case of a conservative non-profit organization, according to e-mails unearthed by the House Ways and Means Committee and obtained exclusively by National Review Online. The correspondence suggests the discrimination of conservative groups extended beyond the IRS and into the FEC, where an attorney from the agency’s enforcement division in at least one case sought and received tax information about the status of a conservative group, the American Future Fund, before recommending that the commission prosecute it for violations of campaign-finance law. Lerner, the former head of the IRS’s exempt-organizations division, worked at the FEC from 1986 to 1995, and was known for aggressive investigation of conservative groups during her tenure there, too.

“Several months ago . . . I spoke with you about the American Future Fund, a 501(c)(4) organization that had submitted an exemption application the IRS [sic],” the FEC attorney wrote Lerner in February 2009. The FEC, which polices violations of campaign-finance laws, is not exempted under Rule 6103, which prohibits the IRS from sharing confidential taxpayer information, but the e-mail indicates Lerner provided that information nonetheless: “When we spoke last July, you had told us that the American Future Fund had not received an exemption letter from the IRS,” the FEC attorney wrote.

The timing of the correspondence between Lerner and the FEC suggests the FEC attorney sought information from the IRS in order to influence an upcoming vote by the six FEC commissioners.

_________________
“At the core of liberalism is the spoiled child — miserable, as all spoiled children are, unsatisfied, demanding, ill-disciplined, despotic and useless. Liberalism is a philosophy of sniveling brats.”
P.J. O'Rourke


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 Post subject: Re: Obama uses IRS to target political opponents.
PostPosted: Wed Oct 09, 2013 5:34 pm 
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Emails Show Top IRS Official Shared Confidential Taxpayer Information With Senior Obama Officials
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Just because it’s a highly illegal offense that carries a five year prison sentence doesn’t mean anyone will be held responsible.

Quote:
Top Internal Revenue Service Obamacare official Sarah Hall Ingram discussed confidential taxpayer information with senior Obama White House officials, according to 2012 emails obtained by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee and provided to The Daily Caller.

Lois Lerner, then head of the IRS Tax Exempt Organizations division, also received an email alongside White House officials that contained confidential information.

Ingram attempted to counsel the White House on a lawsuit from religious organizations opposing Obamacare’s contraception mandate. Email exchanges involving Ingram and White House officials — including White House health policy advisor Ellen Montz and deputy assistant to the president for health policy Jeanne Lambrew — contained confidential taxpayer information, according to Oversight.

The emails provided to Oversight investigators by the IRS had numerous redactions with the signifier “6103.”

Section 6103 of the Internal Revenue Code forbids a federal employee from “disclos[ing] any return or return information obtained by him in any manner in connection with his service as such an officer or an employee.”

Federal employees who illegally disclose confidential taxpayer information could face five years in prison.

“Thanks, David. Thanks for the information on [6103],” White House official Lambrew wrote to IRS official David Fish in a July 20, 2012 exchange. “I am still hoping to understand whether the 50 percent rule is moot if the organization does not offer goods and services for sale to the general public. Do we assume that organizations like [6103] do offer goods and services for sale?”

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“At the core of liberalism is the spoiled child — miserable, as all spoiled children are, unsatisfied, demanding, ill-disciplined, despotic and useless. Liberalism is a philosophy of sniveling brats.”
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 Post subject: Re: Obama uses IRS to target political opponents.
PostPosted: Thu Nov 28, 2013 12:20 pm 
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IRS Chief Counsel Testifies Before House Oversight Committee On Tea Party Targeting Scandal, Answers “I Don’t Recall” A Staggering 80 Times
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William Wilkins is one of only two political appointees at the IRS, and he’s obviously hiding something. Issa is offering him a do-over on his testimony.

Quote:
Behind the scenes and nearly six months after the scandal first made headlines, the House Oversight Committee is quietly continuing its investigation of the Internal Revenue Service’s targeting of tea-party groups. Since May, congressional investigators have interviewed over 30 witnesses and examined thousands of pages of documents.

The latest official called to testify before committee investigators is an important one: IRS chief counsel William Wilkins. Wilkins is one of just two political appointees at the IRS, a generous donor to Democratic candidates and causes, and once represented Jeremiah Wright’s Trinity United Church of Christ. Evidence of his involvement in the targeting would spell trouble for the White House and bring renewed focus to a scandal that has largely receded from public consciousness.

The Oversight Committee has furnished none, to date, but it is expressing gross dissatisfaction with Wilkins’s testimony and, in a letter sent to him on Wednesday, offering him the opportunity to amend it. “In your testimony, you stated ‘I don’t recall’ a staggering 80 times in full or partial response to the Committee’s questions,” committee chairman Darrell Issa and Ohio representative Jim Jordan wrote. “Your failure to recollect important aspects of the Committee’s investigation suggests either a deliberate attempt to obfuscate your involvement in this matter or gross incompetence on your part.”

_________________
“At the core of liberalism is the spoiled child — miserable, as all spoiled children are, unsatisfied, demanding, ill-disciplined, despotic and useless. Liberalism is a philosophy of sniveling brats.”
P.J. O'Rourke


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 Post subject: Re: Obama uses IRS to target political opponents.
PostPosted: Wed Feb 05, 2014 9:48 pm 
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Documents Show IRS Maneuvered To Regulate Tea Party Groups And Keep It “Hidden From The Public”
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“Not even a smidgen” of corruption, ‘eh Barack?

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Documents obtained by the House Ways and Means Committee show that IRS officials first started flagging Tea Party applications for tax-exempt status in February 2010 because of “media attention,” and that Treasury and IRS officials had discussed potentially addressing the tax-exemption rules for such groups “off-plan,” meaning “hidden from the public,” said Committee Chariman Dave Camp (R-Mich.).

In a hearing on the IRS-Tea Party scandal on Wednesday, Chairman Camp questioned IRS Commissioner John Koskinen about the Treasury Department apparently crafting rules to limit the ability of conservative and Tea Party groups to get 501(c)4 exemptions to engage in public debate.

Camp highlighted a June 14, 2012 e-mail from Treasury Department attorney and tax adviser Ruth Madrigal to Lois Lerner, then the IRS official in charge of determining the tax-exempt status of non-profit organizations, and other IRS personnel. (Lerner pleaded the Fifth against self-incrimination before Congress in May 2013 and then retired from the agency.) (See Off-Plan (1).pdf)

The first sentence of that e-mail reads: “Don’t know who in your organization is keeping tabs on c4s, but since we mentioned potentially addressing them (off-plan) in 2013, I’ve got my radar up and this seemed interesting.” The e-mail then discusses a court ruling on determining political committees from PACs, or Political Action Committees.

Camp asked Koskinen, “Do you know what off-plan means?” Koskinen replied, “I do not know what that would have meant in 2012.”

Camp then said, “Well, I’m pretty sure that means hidden from the public.” The chairman went on to comment that if Treasury and IRS officials had fabricated a rationale for a rule change on tax-exemption status, it would raise questions about “the integrity of the rule-making process.”

_________________
“At the core of liberalism is the spoiled child — miserable, as all spoiled children are, unsatisfied, demanding, ill-disciplined, despotic and useless. Liberalism is a philosophy of sniveling brats.”
P.J. O'Rourke


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