Good Column. Another Federal Agency that is broken beyond repair, the IRS needs to be decimated, depleted and deleted.
On Wed, May 15, 2013 at 9:09 AM, MJ <[email protected]> wrote: > *"As David Burnham noted in "A Law Unto Itself: The IRS and the Abuse of > Power" (1990), "In almost every administration since the IRS's inception > the information and power of the tax agency have been mobilized for > explicitly political purposes."" > > *OPINION > May 14, 2013, 8:18 p.m. ET > *A Brief History of IRS Political Targeting > **One survey found that 75% of IRS respondents felt entitled to deceive > or lie to Congress. > *By JAMES BOVARD > > Many Republicans are enraged over revelations in recent days that the > Internal Revenue Service targeted conservative nonprofit groups with a > campaign of audits and harassment. But of all the troubles now dogging the > Obama administration -- including the Benghazi fiasco and the Justice > Department's snooping on the Associated Press -- the IRS episode, however > alarming, is also the least surprising. As David Burnham noted in "A Law > Unto Itself: The IRS and the Abuse of Power" (1990), "In almost every > administration since the IRS's inception the information and power of the > tax agency have been mobilized for explicitly political purposes." > > President Franklin Roosevelt used the IRS to harass newspaper publishers > who were opposed to the New Deal, including William Randolph Hearst and > Moses Annenberg, publisher of the Philadelphia Inquirer. Roosevelt also > dropped the IRS hammer on political rivals such as the populist firebrand > Huey Long and radio agitator Father Coughlin, and prominent Republicans > such as former Treasury Secretary Andrew Mellon. Perhaps Roosevelt's most > pernicious tax skulduggery occurred in 1944. He spiked an IRS audit of > illegal campaign contributions made by a government contractor to > Congressman Lyndon Johnson, whose career might have been derailed if Texans > had learned of the scandal. > > President John F. Kennedy raised the political exploitation of the IRS to > an art form. Shortly after capturing the presidency, JFK denounced "the > discordant voices of extremism" and derided people who distrust their > leadersPresident Obama didn't invent that particular rhetorical line. > Shortly thereafter, JFK signaled at a news conference that he expected the > IRS to be vigilant in policing the tax-exempt status of questionable (read: > conservative) organizations. > > Within a few days of Kennedy's remarks, the IRS launched the Ideological > Organizations Audit Project. It targeted right-leaning groups, including > the Christian Anti-Communist Crusade, the American Enterprise Institute and > the Foundation for Economic Education. Kennedy also used the IRS to > strong-arm companies into complying with "voluntary" price controls. Steel > executives who defied the administration were singled out for audits. > > A 1976 report by the Senate Select Committee on Government Intelligence on > the Kennedy program noted: "By directing tax audits at individuals and > groups solely because of their political beliefs, the Ideological > Organizations Audit Project established a precedent for a far more > elaborate program of targeting 'dissidents.'" > > After Richard Nixon took office, his administration quickly created a > Special Services Staff to mastermind what a memo called "all IRS activities > involving ideological, militant, subversive, radical, and similar type > organizations." More than 10,000 individuals and groups were targeted > because of their political activism or slant between 1969 and 1973, > including Nobel Laureate Linus Pauling (a left-wing critic of the Vietnam > War) and the far-right John Birch Society. > > The IRS was also given Nixon's enemies list to, in the words of White > House counsel John Dean, "use the available federal machinery to screw our > political enemies." > > The exposure of Nixon's IRS abuses during congressional hearings in 1973 > and 1974 profoundly weakened him during the uproar after the Watergate > hotel break-in. The second article of his 1974 impeachment charged him with > endeavoring to obtain from the IRS "confidential information contained in > income tax returns for purposes not authorized by law, and to cause, in > violation of the constitutional rights of citizens, income tax audits or > other income tax investigations to be initiated or conducted in a > discriminatory manner." Congress enacted legislation to severely restrict > political contacts between the White House and the IRS. > > In the following decades, the IRS regularly sparked outrage by abusing > innocent taxpayers, but there was not much controversy about the agency's > politicizing until Bill Clinton took office. > > In 1995, the White House and the Democratic National Committee produced a > 331-page report entitled "Communication Stream of Conspiracy Commerce" that > attacked magazines, think tanks and other entities and individuals who had > criticized President Clinton. In the subsequent years, many organizations > mentioned in the White House report were hit by IRS audits. More than 20 > conservative organizationsincluding the Heritage Foundation and the > American Spectator magazineand almost a dozen individual high-profile > Clinton accusers, such as Paula Jones and Gennifer Flowers, were audited. > > The Landmark Legal Foundation sued the IRS in 1997 after being audited. > Its brief quoted an IRS official who had explained at an IRS meeting in San > Francisco that audit requests from members of Congress or their staff had > been shredded and also suggested how future requests from Capitol Hill > could be camouflaged. The IRS told the court that it could not find 114 key > files relating to possible political manipulation of audits of tax-exempt > organizations. > > One potential bombshell of the Clinton era that went relatively > unrecognized was an Associated Press report in 1999 that "officials in the > Democratic White House and members of both parties in Congress have > prompted hundreds of audits of political opponents in the 1990s," including > "personal demands for audits from members of Congress." Audit requests from > congressmen were marked "expedite" or "hot politically" and IRS officials > were obliged to respond within 15 days. Permitting congressmen to secretly > and effortlessly sic G-men on whomever they pleased epitomized official > Washington's contempt for average Americans and fair play. But because the > abuse was bipartisan, there was little enthusiasm on Capitol Hill for an > investigation. > > The IRS has usually done an excellent job of stifling investigations of > its practices. A 1991 survey of 800 IRS executives and managers by the > nonprofit Josephson Institute of Ethics revealed that three out of four > respondents felt entitled to deceive or lie when testifying before a > congressional committee. > > The agency also has a long history of seeking to intimidate congressional > critics: In 1925, Internal Revenue Commissioner David Blair personally > delivered a demand for $10 million in back taxes to Michigan's Republican > Sen. James Couzenswho had launched an investigation of the Bureau of > Internal Revenueas he stepped out of the Senate chamber. More recently, > after Sen. Joe Montoya of New Mexico announced plans in 1972 to hold > hearings on IRS abuses, the agency added his name to a list of tax > protesters who were capable of violence against IRS agents. > > With the current IRS scandal, we may have seen only the tip of the > iceberg. Thorough congressional investigations would no doubt help reveal > the extent of the operation, and the criminal investigation announced by > the Justice Department on Tuesday may prove fruitful as well. Regardless of > what these inquiries uncover, though, we can be almost certain that IRS > audits will remain irresistible political weapons. > > > *Mr. Bovard is the author, most recently, of the e-book memoir "Public > Policy Hooligan." > > *A version of this article appeared May 15, 2013, on page A15 in the U.S. > edition of The Wall Street Journal, with the headline: A Brief History of > IRS Political Targeting. > > > http://stream.wsj.com/story/latest-headlines/SS-2-63399/SS-2-232185/ > > -- > -- > Thanks for being part of "PoliticalForum" at Google Groups. > For options & help see http://groups.google.com/group/PoliticalForum > > * Visit our other community at http://www.PoliticalForum.com/ > * It's active and moderated. Register and vote in our polls. > * Read the latest breaking news, and more. > > --- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "PoliticalForum" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. > > > -- -- Thanks for being part of "PoliticalForum" at Google Groups. For options & help see http://groups.google.com/group/PoliticalForum * Visit our other community at http://www.PoliticalForum.com/ * It's active and moderated. Register and vote in our polls. * Read the latest breaking news, and more. --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "PoliticalForum" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
