I don’t know how things were during the 1950s, but today, rule changes are proposed through a process, and that process involves public comment. the IRS started to do that process, got their 150,000 comments, and temporarily withdrew the new rules. Lerner apparently tried to do a rule change on the downlow. And not really a rule change, since no rule would ever be written saying, “Target extremist political groups for extra scrutiny, let mainstream groups pass.”
Plus a part of the scandal that really pissed off the right was the illegal questionnaires that were sent asking for donor lists and such. And the handover of tax records to third parties for publishing. There’s little doubt that someone was running an extralegal crusade in the IRS in the fashion of Joe Arpaio, and I think we now know who it was.
This is laughable. You made a claim and were shown you were wrong. Now, it’s “But, but, but…” followed by a completely different issue. No one would have a problem if groups from both ends of the political spectrum were treated the same. But they weren’t. But because it helped your side, for you, too, it’s hunky-dory. And, again, unsurprisingly.
So the ACLU and Sierra Club would be denied tax exempt status when Bob runs the IRS? Personally, I have no issue with ending tax exempt status for all non-profits that aren’t involved in charity or religion.
Certain kinds of rules are subject to notice-and-comment rulemaking. But not every policy of the IRS with regard to investigation is such a rule. For example, a decision to send all of a certain type of applications to specific personnel for review would not be subject to notice-and-comment rulemaking.
It would potentially be illegal to base an approval decision on the answer (or non-answer) to certain questions–which as we know did not happen. I’m not sure on what basis you would call the questions themselves illegal. Is there some statute or regulation state the scope of investigation that the IRS is permitted to conduct that forbids asking about, say, donors?
How does it help my side if some liberal groups were denied but every single conservative group was approved? And if every single conservative group was approved, what’s all the whining about?
I can say with 100% certainty that the email at my company only resides on the particular PCs and nowhere else.
Email is handled by a host which downloads it to the PCs when the PCs request it. There is NO backup at the host site nor are the PCs at the office backed-up. If the local PCs fry all email on them is gone. Period (unless unbeknownst to us the host is backing up all emails for some reason which I seriously doubt).
The dangers of this arrangement has been brought to the attention of the owner but he doesn’t care (and likely won’t till the day his PC fries unexpectedly then doubtless someone else will get in trouble).
It remains though that it is possible to lose all email when a PC fries even today.
WASHINGTON – In February 2010, the Champaign Tea Party in Illinois received approval of its tax-exempt status from the IRS in 90 days, no questions asked.
That was the month before the Internal Revenue Service started singling out Tea Party groups for special treatment. There wouldn’t be another Tea Party application approved for 27 months.
In that time, the IRS approved perhaps dozens of applications from similar liberal and progressive groups, a USA TODAY review of IRS data shows.
As applications from conservative groups sat in limbo, groups with liberal-sounding names had their applications approved in as little as nine months. With names including words like “Progress” or “Progressive,” the liberal groups applied for the same tax status and were engaged in the same kinds of activities as the conservative groups. They included:
If they were also screening for “Occupy”, then that makes it even worse. It means Lerner was engaged in a general crusade against critics of the administration, right or left.
I don’t really care, because the screening criteria wasn’t the issue. The real issue was where applications were screened. Progressive groups were handled at the Cincinnati level, while TEa Party groups went to DC, where they languished.
So the geographic location of an IRS worker has a direct relationship on how fast he works? The question everybody should be asking is why do these political groups deserve tax exempt status?
Cincinnati is where the applications were normally handled. The Tea Party applications were sent to DC for extra scrutiny. DC is where they keep the political hacks.
We can ask that, but there’s a little thing called rule of law. Bureaucrats can’t make law, or even enforce law, outside the boundaries set by elected officials. It’s why Joe Arpaio can’t arrest illegal immigrants, and why Lois Lerner can’t deny tax exempt status to Tea Party groups.
Outright denying approval and just sitting on the application have the same effect for the upcoming election cycle. That what was done to the conservative groups, but not the progressive ones. My God, man, is this all brand new to you? You might want to read up on things. And I don’t mean on Media Matters.
NO! That is a different question. One can full-on agree with you on that point, but it has nothing to do with the problem at the IRS. Do your really not get that?
Generally applicable rule. It’s entirely likely that a generally applicable IRS rule would still disadvantage Tea party groups more than progressive groups. But that’s still better than what Lerner was doing.
If you want to compare it to voter ID, it would be passing a law requiring only minority voters to provide ID.