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IRS Targeting Right Wing Groups

One Brow said:
Was ACORN political? Please give your criteria for easily telling the two apart.
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I would say that it is a matter of degree, and on its face, the Tea Party Groups seem to be the most political of any group of the last 20 years that I know of, aside from the political parties themselves. The criteria that I am using? Whether they have lots of political rallies, where they talk about their support for particular candidates and platforms, for starters. I would say that the Acorn Group is probably more political than an animal shelter, but less political than a Tea Party Group.
 
I just googled Tea Party Groups, and the first link I opened supported fully my characterizations of them. Based on this cursory research , they are clearly an organization whose primary purpose is to influence elections, more so than 99% of other groups, and apparently in violation of the spirit of the criteria for obtaining nonprofit status. I doubt that the boy scouts or the acorn groups would have a comparable primary objective of political influence.

I am sure that some Tea Party Groups will soon be editing their websites, so as to pretend to not have the completely political agenda that they have.
 
MoreFeasts said:
I did not say it was.
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Then don't bring irrelevant facts to the conversation if you are not willing to defend their relevance.

MoreFeasts said:
No, not every group has a political overlap, and there are different degrees of overlap.
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Please name a major non-profit group that has never been used in political discourse. Please spell out how you can know this degree beforehand.

MoreFeasts said:
Also, You did not answer the questions that I asked.
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I think I did, but I will endeavor to answer them more directly for you.

MoreFeasts said:
Are you sure that their lower tax ads don't align with political agendas?
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I'm sure lower tax ads align with political agendas, just like ads from the American Cancer Society (ACS), the ASPCA, and pretty much every other group align with political agendas. It we prevented any group whose mission aligned with some political agenda from having non-profit status, there would be no non-profit groups.

MoreFeasts said:
Are you sure that they are not really persuing a political agenda and using the tax issue as a cover?
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You can have a political agenda as part of a larger social welfare concern. The ACS wants to spend more money on research, which is a political agenda.

MoreFeasts said:
Are you sure that they spend under 50% on nonpolitical ads?
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This question makes no sense. If you don't allow them to engage in fund-raising on a non-profit basis, then they can't spend on anything. Is $0 more or less than 50% or $0, to you?

MoreFeasts said:
If they spend 45% on political ads, and another group spends 0% on political ads, doesn't it make sense to spend time taking a closer look at the app with the 45% political expenditure?
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Again, this question assumes they are already spending, when the IRS is holding up their non-profit status, thus preventing them from having money to spend.
 
MoreFeasts said:
..., they are clearly an organization whose primary purpose is to influence elections, ...
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Social welfare groups are allowed to influence elections to improve social welfare, as long as they are not backing specific candidates. You may not like it, but it's the law.
 
The Thriller said:
Right wing left wing who cares? Tax cheats are tax cheats. If you have nothing to hide why worry about it? It seems like those bitching about it are more concerned with brewing a scandal than the actual crime that they committed.

To me, the IRS could purposely target white Mormons in Utah. Bring it on. I have my ducks in a row and have nothing to hide. I'm not a pansie *** bitch hiding in some downstairs bunker waiting for communist nazis to take over the government. I ain't trying to excuse my own tax cheating immorality by blaming everything on the government. Whether you are left wing or right wing tax cheating is tax cheating. God doesn't look at dishonesty any differently.

And that's what I find most astonishing here. So many folks are upset that they got caught. Do they really understand the gospel so little? Uncle Sam might not catch you. But what about a higher power?
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I'm sorry, but wow, this is so damn stupid. It's clear that you don't really know what the hell is going on here; or you really are dumber than we all thought. (that would really be something, tbh) So, in your scenario, you'd welcome the IRS to target you. Your ducks are in a row, right? Excellent. Now let's just say that you wanted to get a simple tax exemption for your church backed/funded activity (or something like that), but because you're a Mormon, they make you jump through 6 to 12 months of hoops. They require you to give them personal information, fill out forms that nobody has ever heard of, make you attend classes, and make you pay fees that nobody else has to pay. Now imagine that your Catholic buddy down the street is doing the same thing as you, but is granted his exemption in three weeks, without all of the hoops to jump through. Do you see where the problem lies?

One Brow said:
I don't think Obama was personally setting policy for the specific sorts of names to look for in 503(c) social welfare groups. It seems a little below his pay grade.

He needs to hand out some punishments, though.
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If he knew it was going on -- which I believe there is no possible way that he didn't -- then he's as guilty as the "low level employees" that allegedly did it.
 
MoreFeasts said:
Good Morning.
Breaking News
The IRS targeted groups with liberal political sounding names.
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You are referring to incidents that occurred a decade or more ago, I presume, since this was not true three or four years ago. Yes, that was bad then. It does not justify their recent decisions.
 
The law says that this should not be their primary purpose, I assume.
Besides, the IRS did not say that they could not influence elections.
All the IRS did was take time to examine their applications.
Is the the Tea Party asking for an increase of the IRS budget so that the IRS hire more staff to examine applications faster, OR does the Tea Party want their applications to be rubber stamped without research being done, perhaps because they are pressuring to be allowed to set up fronts to do things with a nonprofit status that they should not be allowed to do?
 
One Brow said:
You are referring to incidents that occurred a decade or more ago, I presume, since this was not true three or four years ago. Yes, that was bad then. It does not justify their recent decisions.
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no I am not.
Prove to me that the IRS is has not targeted liberal political nonprofit applications recently?
You are like an NBA ref that rewards floppers for flopping.
 
MoreFeasts said:
Are you a lawyer, with a specialty in nonprofit tax law? How are you sure you know exactly what the law is on this?
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Are we pulling out credentials now? Nope, I'm not a lawyer, just a layman who reads sites that regularly talk about these things.

Now, whats your basis for your claims that these activities are illegal?
 
MoreFeasts said:
I did not see any proof of what I asked to be proved in your evidence.
Please highlight the quote of the proof.
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The article mentions several examples of progressive organizations that had straight-forward approvals. If you can't or won't read, not my problem.

How about your link that liberal groups were targeted?
 
One Brow said:
The article mentions several examples of progressive organizations that had straight-forward approvals. If you can't or won't read, not my problem.

How about your link that liberal groups were targeted?
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This is not proof. Your evidence does not prove what you think it proves.
Again, quote the statement that you think is proof.

The press makes a sensationalist buzz leading to an unsupported false conclusion, and your proof is the media buzz? awesome.
 
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