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No. 378925
Political speech is the most important type of speech protected by the First Amendment. In scrutinizing restrictions on such speech, courts are more suspicious of restrictions on such speech than on artistic, personal, or any other kind of speech, because it is the type of unfettered communication most apposite to the functioning of a representative democracy.
And, sadly, money is speech, or at least, essential for it. Technology has leveled the playing field--anyone can be a journalist now with a smartphone with a camera, voice recorder, and internet, and publish directly to their blog or social media page without going through an editor--but if you want lots of people to hear your idea, you still need to buy billboards and airtime, still need to print flyers, pamphlets, and bumper stickers, and still need to train and transport door-to-door advocates for your cause. If there is a means of a group of individuals getting tax-exemption for their group, that provision in the law enables more speech, which is always, in theory at least, a good thing.
The issue of campaign financing reform is not what's at hand in this discussion. Yes, Citizens United opened the floodgates, and yes, our system is full of undisclosed and untraceable donations and massive spending by a few plutocrats which gives, at the very least, an overwhelming appearance of undue influence. I would love to see a system of publicly-financed elections, or at least a hard cap and stringent reporting on individual donations, but that's not the issue. The issue is a supposedly neutral agency abusing its discretion for political purposes.
If partisan groups do not qualify for 501(c)4 status, NO partisan groups should have been given that status; and if partisan groups can be given that status, then all groups meeting the requirements for that classification should have been given that status regardless of political alignment. Legislative and case history on the 501(c)(4) category is sparse, but the IRS has ruled, since the 1950's, that such groups can engage in political activism and lobbying. The idea is that these groups are "promoting the social welfare", and of course that often involves political advocacy on issues they believe helpful or harmful to the public welfare. They cannot count as "furthering the social welfare" campaigning for, or against candidates (Treasury Regulations, Subchapter A, Sec. 1.501(c)(4)-1(a)(2)), but they can do so; their doing so is just subject to a tax ("An exempt IRC 501(c)(4) organization may intervene in political campaigns as long as its primary activity is the promotion of social welfare. IRC 501(c)(4) organizations are subject to the tax imposed by IRC 527 on any expenditure for a political activity that comes within the meaning of IRC 527(e)(2). See Rev. Rul. 81–95, 1981–1 C.B. 332"; http://www.irs.gov/irm/part7/irm_07-025-004.html#d0e332).
Some of the groups, as per >>378923, clearly were pushing the limits of, if not violating, the law, and those in violation should not have been given exemption. But not all the targeted and delayed/denied groups were, while clearly political groups favorable to the party in charge were given a pass (http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2013/05/14/irs-tea-party-progressive-groups/2158831/; http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2013-05-16/politics/39310148_1_tax-exempt-status-foundation-application).
The stalling and favoritism is not the entirety of the scandal. The ridiculous, prying questions are part of it, as is the leaking of private information (http://www.propublica.org/article/irs-office-that-targeted-tea-party-also-disclosed-confidential-docs; http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/federal-eye/wp/2013/05/14/irs-released-confidential-info-on-conservative-groups-to-propublica/). Then there's the targeting of Romney donors. Combined with admissions by the IRS that those groups were targeted, the firing of the head of the IRS, the frequency of the ex-IRS head to the White House during/after the 2010 midterms, there's just so much more there that hasn't been uncovered.
I'm done with partisan politics. I don't like Obama, but he's not a Muslim/commie Manchurian candidate. He's just another crook like Bush, a smug asshole who bought into his own promotional materials and wants a "legacy" but doesn't have the moral courage or zeal to create a genuine one. He's a constitutional law professor with no respect for the constitution or the rule of law. He, like every president we've had since Carter, Reagan included, should be impeached or asked to resign, because a public shaming is the closest we can get to holding rulers accountable for their crimes. he'd still get his retirement pay and book deals and speaking engagements and presidential library, even when he, like Bush Jr. and Reagan, deserves jail time at the very least for the extrajudicial execution of American citizens, including a minor, but an impeachment or resignation to avoid one would still mean that he was held accountable, to some degree, for his misdeeds and the misdeeds he knowingly or negligently allowed to occur. And even that is too much to ask for it seems, in a world where everyone on both sides of the aisle are either crazy, corrupt, incompetent, or some combination of the three.
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