IRS Rationale for Tea Party Scandal Is Debunked by Data

The Chronicle of Philanthropy ^ | 5/15/2013 | Doug Donovan

[dirtboy]

Applications for tax exemption from advocacy nonprofits had not yet spiked when the Internal Revenue Service began using what it admits was inappropriate scrutiny of conservative groups in 2010.

In fact, applications were declining, data show.

Top IRS officials have been saying that a “significant increase” in applications from advocacy groups seeking tax-exempt status spurred its Cincinnati office in 2010 to filter those requests by using such politically loaded phrases as “Tea Party,” “patriots,” and “9/12.”

Both Steven Miller, the agency’s acting commissioner until he stepped down Wednesday, and Lois Lerner, director of the agency’s exempt-organization division, have said over the past week that IRS officials started the scrutiny after observing a surge in applications for status as 501(c)(4) “social welfare” groups. Both officials cited an increase from about 1,500 applications in 2010 and to nearly 3,500 in 2012. President Obama ask Mr. Miller to resign on Wednesday.

The scrutiny began, however, in March 2010, before an uptick could have been observed, according to data contained in the audit released Tuesday from the Treasury Department’s inspector general for tax administration.

The number of 501(c)(4) applications for all of 2010 was actually less than in 2009.

[dirtboy]

Caught in yet another lie.

[NormsRevenge]

You know what spiked today? jobless claims. More pizza? or is popcorn OK? :-}

[dirtboy]

This article was referenced over here, thought it deserved its own thread.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/3020252/posts

[MrB]

It’s clear what was happening when the liberal sounding groups sailed through while the conservative groups were stymied,

even to the point that the same guy, after being thwarted with a conservative sounding name, reapplied with a liberal sounding name and was approved immediately.

[NormsRevenge]

ThX! Good job! I hear Maalox futures are up.. Tums futures are up.. I hear alittle tea helps settle the tummy.. but you know Obama.. beer beer beer..

[Still Thinking]

Exactly. That's what I didn't understand, is when this became apparent, just start naming your groups with liberal-sounding names, and make sure to apply before actually engaging in any political activity, so you're not negatively on the radar of any lib pols. If they want a mission statement, go on about "educating people in progressive and liberal activism" (conservatism is far more about actual progress than the modern left, and "liberal" actually has to do with liberty, so...), and "civil rights" and "community organizing for political action", and so on.

If the IRS came back later and complained that you misled them, they'd have two problems: first, all that stuff applies just fine in its dictionary definition to conservative causes and action, and second, if you were honest about your proposed degree of political involvement, in order to complain about you misleading them about your political bent, they have to admit there's two sets of rules, which they can't do.