Bandit Gang Writ Large

IRS Official in Charge During Tea Party Targeting Now Runs IRS Obamacare Office

"The Internal Revenue Service official in charge of the tax-exempt organizations at the time when the unit targeted tea party groups now runs the IRS office responsible for the health care legislation, ABC News reports. Sarah Hall Ingram served as commissioner of the office responsible for tax-exempt organizations between 2009 and 2012. But Ingram has since left that part of the IRS and is now the director of the IRS’ Affordable Care Act office, the IRS confirmed to ABC News today." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingIRS Official in Charge During Tea Party Targeting Now Runs IRS Obamacare Office

Director of IRS Tax-Exempt Determinations Office Is Obama Donor

"The director of the Office of Rulings and Agreements, which oversees the determinations of tax-exempt organizations, is a donor to Barack Obama. Holly Paz donated $2,000 to Obama’s 2008 campaign, according to Open Secrets, which maintains a database of individual political donations. An inspector general’s report released yesterday concluded that the IRS improperly targeted Tea Party and other conservative groups for undue scrutiny, and Paz heads the office in which the wrongdoing is said to have occurred. Paz’s donations are consistent with broader trends at the IRS, where agency employees donated overwhelming to President Obama in both 2012 and 2008." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingDirector of IRS Tax-Exempt Determinations Office Is Obama Donor

Obama rejects calls for independent probe of IRS scandal

"President Obama brushed off calls for a special independent investigator into the IRS scandal that has engulfed his administration during a press conference this afternoon, saying the internal audit and criminal investigation headed by Attorney General Eric Holder are 'sufficient.' The press conference comes after Obama scrambled last night to fend off growing concerns about his administration following the news that the IRS targeted conservative groups. He also has been battling other controversies, including questions about the deadly attacks in Benghazi and the Department of Justice secretly obtaining Associated Press phone records." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingObama rejects calls for independent probe of IRS scandal

Anger over East German medical ‘human guinea pigs’

"Germany is confronting another chapter from its past — allegations that Western drug companies used more than 50,000 people in the former communist East as 'human guinea pigs' in 1980s medical trials. Several people were known to have died during trials, and some tests involved infants and delirious alcoholics, said the report on the agreements with the police state that collapsed with the 1989 fall of the Berlin Wall. Calls have grown for full transparency into the agreements overseen by the State Security (Stasi) secret police to earn the communist state tens of millions in hard-currency Deutschmarks." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingAnger over East German medical ‘human guinea pigs’

Maryland: Another City Forced To Refund Illegal Photo Tickets

"Hagerstown, Maryland announced Wednesday that it would refund 808 illegally issued speed camera tickets. Brekford Corporation mailed the citations between the end of December and January using three automated ticketing machines that failed to meet the certification requirements of state law. A motorist who intended to fight a photo ticket requested the calibration certificate for use at trial in January, but the city responded with a March 5 letter denying the request, despite the law's requiring calibration documents be kept on file." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingMaryland: Another City Forced To Refund Illegal Photo Tickets

The IRS War on Medical Marijuana Providers

"The IRS employs Section 280E, a 1982 addition to the tax code that was a response to a drug dealer's successful effort to claim his yacht, weapons purchases, and even illicit bribes as business expenses. Under 280E, individuals involved in the illicit sale of controlled substances -- including marijuana, even medical marijuana in states where it is legal -- cannot claim standard business expenses on their federal taxes. Oakland's Harborside Health Center was hit with a $2 million IRS assessment in 2011 after the tax agency employed Section 280E against it. Similarly, when the feds raided Oaksterdam University, it wasn't just DEA, but also IRS agents." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingThe IRS War on Medical Marijuana Providers

TSA issued $1.8 million in airport firearms fines last year

"There were 1,549 firearms discovered at TSA checkpoints nationwide in 2012. TSA has found 10 guns at Memphis International Airport this year and six at McGhee Tyson. Weapons — included guns — are not permitted in carry-on baggage. Passengers are responsible for the contents of bags they bring to the security checkpoint. Passengers who bring firearms to a checkpoint face a civil penalty from TSA, which last year assessed more than $1.8 million in civil penalties for firearms discovered in passenger carry-on bags." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingTSA issued $1.8 million in airport firearms fines last year

IRS exec got $42k in bonuses in addition to $700k in salary from 2009-2012

"Lois Lerner, the senior executive in charge of the IRS tax exemption department and the federal employee at the center of the exploding scandal over the IRS targeting of conservative, evangelical and pro-Israel non-profits, was given $42,531 in bonuses between 2009 and 2011. That figure was included in data provided by the IRS in response to a Freedom of Information Act request by The Washington Examiner. Lerner is director of the IRS exempt organizations division, which processes and approves or denies applications from groups seeking tax-exempt status. With the bonuses, Lerner was paid a total of $740,931 for the four-year period." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingIRS exec got $42k in bonuses in addition to $700k in salary from 2009-2012

Obama accepts resignation of IRS acting chief over ‘inexcusable’ tea party scandal

"Barack Obama fired the most senior tax official in the US on Wednesday in an effort to bring a speedy end to a scandal over the targeting for special scrutiny of Tea Party organisations and other conservative groups. The president said that the acting commissioner, Steven Miller, was asked to resign and that Miller had done so. Miller’s sacking followed an independent report by the Treasury’s inspector general, which found that the conduct in the IRS office in Cincinnati had been 'inappropriate'. Officials had picked out groups with the words Tea Party or Patriots in their titles and subjected their requests for tax-exempt status to extra scrutiny." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingObama accepts resignation of IRS acting chief over ‘inexcusable’ tea party scandal

Power to Tax = Power to Destroy

"Think, for a moment, about the implications of the IRS’s actions. If you dare to advocate a political position that it dislikes, will your taxes be audited? How much will it cost you to defend yourself? This is not small-time Chicago ward heeler politics. This is serious, criminal official misconduct on a massive scale. High IRS officials knew about and concealed their anti-conservative policy for two years, since at least June 29, 2011. Equally shocking, one of my least favorite bureaucrats, IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman, for a year falsely denied that the IRS had done the very thing they just finally admitted doing." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingPower to Tax = Power to Destroy