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Depends. You would have to know a lot more. And it may well be the real villain is the guy who designed or failed to design the workflow. It is rather easy to design error prone system particularly if they just happen.
Nobody designed a system that would send a groups tax information to another group totally unrelated that might then be able to use it against them.
Or you are arguing that the IRS is completely and totally incompetent and I'm willing to go with that and just shut them down.
What do you think about the House Ways and Means Committee dribbling this information out to the press when they are supposed to be conducting a serious investigation?
Nothing is A O K with me. Before this scandal broke I knew nothing about this tax exempt status scam of political organizations that violate tax law.
To me the IRS by law shouldn't allow any of these obviously partisan political organizations tax exempt status.
Lerner is being treated as the master mind by conservatives. Evidently her email account is the key to the whole scandal. Which implies she is the genesis coordinator of the scandal.
Since you don't know why don't you investigate...
Quote:
§ 501(c)(4),(5) & (6) “Self Declarers”
In FY 2012, EO developed a project focusing on § 501(c)(4),(5) & (6) organizations. These entities, which include social welfare organizations; labor, agricultural and horticultural groups; and trade associations, can declare themselves tax-exempt without seeking a determination from the IRS. EO wants to learn more about whether such organizations have classified themselves correctly and are complying with applicable rules. In FY 2013, EO will send a questionnaire to organizations that "self-declared" by filing Form 990 for tax year 2010 or 2011. As in the Group Rulings questionnaire, recipients will be asked to complete the questionnaire online and submit it electronically. EO will analyze the responses and determine next steps.
Using Form 990 Information in Compliance Efforts
In 2008, the IRS released a new version of the Form 990 designed to promote transparency and improve compliance. The form requires filing organizations to supply more in-depth information than previous versions. We are using this information to develop potential indicators of noncompliance for use in our examination process. Once developed, these potential indicators must be tested, and we are in the early stages of that process. As we examine organizations selected through this data-driven approach, we find that the Form 990 responses of some organizations do not always accurately reflect their activities. If those organizations had been more careful in completing their returns, they might not have been identified by our indicators or selected for examination. Because of the new ways we are analyzing return data and selecting cases, it is more important than ever that organizations follow instructions, compute properly and report accurately on their Forms 990. The bottom-line message to organizations and practitioners alike: The IRS uses the Form 990 responses to select returns for examination, so a complete and accurate return is in your best interest.
- Political Activity
In FY 2012, EO combined what it had learned from past projects on political activities with new information gleaned from the redesigned Form 990. Using the Form 990 data, EO developed indicators of potential noncompliance that allow us to better focus our resources. These indicators are now being tested and applied along two tracks:
Based on current Form 990 data, the potential indicators of noncompliance have been used to identify organizations engaging in possible impermissible campaign intervention. Thus far, we have identified approximately 300 cases. This information, along with any other relevant public information, is sent to a committee of career civil servants for evaluation. Based on its review, the committee determines whether an examination of a particular organization is warranted.
When EO receives referrals from outside sources alleging political campaign intervention, that information is also evaluated by a committee of career civil servants. After review, this group selects the cases that will be referred for examination. We also test the referral against our indicators of potential
noncompliance as a way to refine and improve our criteria.
In FY 2013, EO will continue to work on cases that come through these two tracks. In addition, as a regular part of our political activity review, we will determine whether organizations are required to file Form 1120-POL under § 527(f), and if so, whether they have filed. We will use the results of the reviews, as well as other data analytics, to further refine our indicators of potential noncompliance.
It's not up to the IRS it's up to the law and the law allows for tax exempt status.
The law as written actually says these organizations(I am paraphrasing) have to be not for profit and run exclusively for the promotion of social welfare.
The law was reinterpreted in the early 1960's I think, with the word "primarily" substituted for the word "exclusively".
So now the IRS has to determine what primarily means.
It is thus this change in a word that creates the confusion for the IRS who still has to follow the law and attempt to ascertain if these organizations that are asking for tax empemt status are in violation of tax law, which basically they all are.
These partisan political organizations shouldn't ever be given tax exempt status period.
They aren't promoting the social welfare. They are attacking politicians in the other political party and running supportive ads for politicians and political parties.
Tax exempt status was not meant for these partisan political organizations that run attacks ads and advertise for certain political parties.
What do you think about the House Ways and Means Committee dribbling this information out to the press when they are supposed to be conducting a serious investigation?
Considering they were lied to and stonewalled at the beginning of the questioning about the only way they've been able to actually attract attention to all of that has been by way of the media. It serves its purpose until a real investigation can be conducted of which there are some going on on various things but as far as I know nothing in totality.
It's no longer okay for the IRS to investigate itself after having learned about the ridiculous amount of information lost not by 1 person but by as many as 7 in total. The odds of that happening are so extraordinarily high as to not be believable.
Nobody designed a system that would send a groups tax information to another group totally unrelated that might then be able to use it against them.
Or you are arguing that the IRS is completely and totally incompetent and I'm willing to go with that and just shut them down.
Yeah that is my point. The mechanism that sends out FOI requests is likely quite ad hoc. They get a list in from pro publica and some clerical is missioned to pull them together and then sort what can be sent and can't be. And she does not get the piles quite straight.
The question as to whether the organization is doing any good is probably one of how long it takes and how much it costs to determine the proper status for each application that flows through the process.
But that has little if anything to do with fulfilling an FOI request from pro publica.
But overall I think they show a relatively low level of competence at least in the areas requiring initiative. They blew the Tea Party applications no matter what you think about them. Looks to me like a bunch of lawyers with a hot potato that discussed it until the place burned down...
This isn't about whether these groups deserved tax exempt status. It's about equal application of the law.
Actually the only one really suggesting that is you, If it's not Lerner then it is someone above her. What we do know is all roads lead to her at this point and she is certainly the key to unraveling this further.
Again it is objective fact that both liberal and conservative political organizations had their applications delayed.
No conservatives are suggesting it by focusing on Lois Lerner and pretending that her missing emails are the whole key to this phony scandal.
Which means Lois Lerner 2yrs before the scandal broke had co-conspirators damage the hard drive on her computer in such a way to get rid of the exact emails that conservatives elected officials are bamboozling rank and file conservatives into believing are the key to the whole case which can only be found on Lou's Lerner's email account. Which means conservatives believe that Lois Lerner's emails was organizing the whole thing at least in the IRS.
I'd say that is conservatives making Lois Lerner the master mind of the whole phony scandal.
And again what was this big conspiracy supposed to accomplish?
Delaying a few conservative and liberal organizations from getting tax exempt status to which they aren't entitled to receive.
A lot of information coming? As long as the information isn't not uh hum.. "lost". Yea, now why won't Lerner tell us what she knows?
She's the only one who can answer that. But, there is lots of other testimony/information to be gathered from other people in the meantime.
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