[speechlesstx]

By all means, get back to us on that. My link does offer this tidbit:

By contrast, Shulman's predecessor Mark Everson only visited the White House once during four years of service in the George W. Bush administration and compared the IRS's remoteness from the president to “Siberia.”

Read more: Shulman had more White House visits than any Cabinet member | The Daily Caller

[excon]

Hello again, Steve:

Douglas Shulman visited the White House at least 157 times

Visitor, schmizitor.

Yawnnnnn...

Excon

[NeedKarma]

I see.. they are targeting liberals...

[tomder55]

For a non-policy making officer that is a hell of a lot of visits . There weren't that many Easter egg roll days at the White House. Even if you take into account the extra capo role the IRS will take on with Obamacare ,those vists are an unusual amt.

[speechlesstx]

Hello again, Steve:

Visitor, schmizitor.

Yawnnnnn...

excon

You aren't the least bit curious why the IRS commissioner was in the White House more times than 3 of his closest cabinet members combined, more times than his boss Tim Geithner?

No of course not because that could lead to some of that evidence of a scandal you can't see yet. Like the White House you're satisfied with the non-answers we've been given thus far.

[speechlesstx]

P.S. Americans overwhelmingly aren't satisfied with the non-answers we're gotten, including 63% of Democrats.

Special IRS Prosecutor Favored as Obama Support Drops

Three-quarters of U.S. voters want a special prosecutor to investigate the Internal Revenue Service’s targeting of Tea Party groups, according to a poll that showed a drop in PresidentBarack Obama’s approval and trust ratings.

In the survey released today by Hamden, Connecticut-based Quinnipiac University, registered voters favored a special prosecutor by 76 percent to 17 percent. Those backing such a move included 63 percent of Democrats.

“There is overwhelming bipartisan support for an independent investigation into the IRS,” Peter A. Brown, assistant director of the Quinnipiac polling institute, said in a news release.

[talaniman]

And 80% of Americans want background checks and that didn't happen either.

[tomder55]

The Nixon defenders all wanted the see the "smoking gun " too even though everyone knew he was guilty .

[speechlesstx]

And 80% of Americans want background checks and that didn't happen either.

And Americans overwhelmingly said not to pass Obamacare and we got it rammed down our throats anyway, but both are another thread. This one's about the IRS scandal.

[cdad]

And 80% of Americans want background checks and that didn't happen either.

And of those that supported background checks they did not want a national registration for guns. But that is what they tried to pass. Why? They could have made it simple and said no gun sales without a FFL. That is all they had to do. They screwed it up in a sneek attack power grab. Go figure??

[talaniman]

That's the reason the right gives for voting down Toomey/Manchin but that's been debunked as a lie already.

[cdad]

That's the reason the right gives for voting down Toomey/Manchin but that's been debunked as a lie already.

Where is the link to the debunking because here is a link in support of what I had said.

The Problems of Toomey-Manchin | National Review Online

[talaniman]

That was an interesting read and it bears study, but a national registry is a concern for a some but not others, and some like myself support a national registry. But if that's the only sticking point, so be it, but there is still the matter of what a majority of Americans want.

No doubt the right will find another sticking point if this one gets solved as its still early in the process. The last bill started in '86, and took half a decade to pass. I expect no less this time. But I hope it comes sooner.

[speechlesstx]

If it's about what the people want we wouldn't have Zerocare, but that's another thread. The people want to get to the bottom of the IRS scsndal.

[paraclete]

Opps

[talaniman]

If it's about what the people want we wouldn't have Zerocare, but that's another thread. The people want to get to the bottom of the IRS scsndal.

The people want a job, not right wing hollering.

[speechlesstx]

Lol, and yet your guys have hammered away at everything but jobs.

[tomder55]

Larry Kudlow today makes the tax reform as a means to reigning in the corrupt powers of the IRS ,and spurring economic growth case today . He is right on!

Apart from criminal prosecution, the best way to strip the power of politics and corruption from the IRS is to initiate broad-based, pro-growth tax reform and simplification.

It's the complexity of the tax code that nurtures the corruptness of the IRS. There's a buzz in Washington about this possibility, where both Democrats and Republicans are interested in reform. We need a simpler and flatter tax code. We need to get rid of the crony-capitalist insider deductions and exemptions, which have given the IRS so much power.

These deductions and exemptions are precisely what nurtured the political corruption that led to a major scandal. Some conservatives—like my great pal Jim Pethokoukis—don't believe tax reform can be done. Old habits die hard, he believes. And the budget numbers from a pure flat tax never add up. Well, Pethokoukis may be right in his concerns. But that's no reason to give up the fight. I'm going to argue for a modified flat tax in the personal code, and a single-rate flat tax—or a sales tax net of investment—for large and small businesses. Here's a quick example of the need for this reform.

The Wall Street Journal editorial page just ran a tax-exempt IRS primer surrounding the 501(c), which unbelievably covers 28 categories of organizations.

That's a gigantic mess. And I say scrap the whole thing — take the IRS' power away. If people want to give to political campaigns, fine.

Give as much as you want to whomever. But post it on the Internet for all to see. No secret donors. No tax deductions. And no IRS interpretations. I don't know how many other examples of tax-exempt craziness there are in the code.

The Journal itself says "The tax code would be cleaner, and our politics fairer, if no one enjoyed any tax-exempt advantages."

Right on. That's where the simplicity comes from. And then let's put a limit on numerous other tax deductions. Trillions of revenue dollars are lost from mortgages, charitable contributions, health care, and state and local spending deductions. We don't need them.

But to make the tax-reform transition easier, and promote economic growth, let's go the way of Reagan in 1986 and slash marginal tax rates. For example, we have six brackets today: 10, 15, 25, 28, 33 and 40%. How about two brackets? One at 10% would have a high income threshold, and one at 28% would take over from there.

And lower tax rates make the remaining deductions far less valuable, even unnecessary.

And the low tax rates spur economic growth by providing new incentives to work, save, and invest. Housing and charitable deductions went through the roof during the prosperity years that followed the 1986 reform.

Really, why should Warren Buffett enjoy a $15 billion tax-free charitable loophole merely by donating his fortune to the Bill Gates Foundation? And why should the tax code stimulate non-profits when the economy needs profitable job-creating startups and companies?

Middle-income folks would benefit enormously from a flatter approach. Right now, a middle earner pays roughly a 15% payroll tax and a 28% income tax. That's a 43% tax rate, which is actually higher than the 40% top rate.

This is wrong. At a 10% income tax, the total burden for a middle-income family would drop to 25%. That's a major tax cut and a great increase in take-home pay.

Lower rates, fewer brackets, and a major cutback in cronyist deductions and exemptions won't end the IRS. But these measures surely will cut back on its arrogant power to make political judgments. That's the point. Budget cuts also will be necessary to make the deficit numbers work. That's as it should be.

But dynamic scoring will show a burst of economic activity that will reduce the short-term cost of tax-rate reduction while increasing the long-run growth of the American economy.

Coming out of this deep recession, we need 4% to 5% growth over the next 10 years, not 2%. Tax incentives are not the only instrument, but taxes change behavior. Taxes matter.

Of course, Team Obama thinks the IRS problem is just a few bad apples. They're wrong.

The IRS' institutional corruption has been enabled and encouraged by one of the craziest tax codes in the world. Tax reform can solve this.

IRS Reform Begins With Tax Reform - Investors.com

[speechlesstx]

Rep Jim McDermott blamed the victims of the IRS abuse for bringing it on themselves. That's right, you darn Teabaggers wouldn't have been harassed by the IRS if you hadn't tried to exercise your rights.

If the IRS scandal lacked a bully figure, it has one now. McDermott repeated the same attacks on 501(c)4 organizations that other Democrats have recycled in their talking points since the scandal began. But he made the mistake of attacking the witnesses--and misrepresenting the testimony of at least one in particular. All of them, he said, were before Congress because they had been seeking tax subsidies; but as Dr. John Eastman of the National Organization for Marriage--already a tax-exempt organization--had just testified, his specific complaint was about the apparently criminal leak of their donors' names to a liberal organization.

Earlier in the hearing, it fell to Dr. Eastman to correct Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY) in his attack on 501(c)4 groups and the anonymity of their donors, noting that the NAACP had relied on that anonymity as it was targeted by state governments in the Jim Crow South of the 1950s. Now, it was Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) who came to Eastman's defense, setting aside his prepared questions to remind McDermott that no left-wing groups had been targeted. That point, in turn, was disputed by Democrats--who failed, however, to call any left-wing witnesses.

The basic--and deliberate--fault in McDermott's attack is the idea that being denied tax-exempt status does not mean being denied freedom of speech and assembly. It certainly does in a context in which applications for tax-exempt status were followed by intrusive questions about speech (and prayer!), and also, in some cases, further investigation of donors and organizers by the IRS and other federal agencies, creating a chilling effect. And, of course, if the government is seen to favor some groups and not others, that effectively discourages certain kinds of speech and assembly. The issue at stake remains constitutional liberty, not tax exemption.

McDermott and other Democrats showed a greater willingness to push back than they had previously done. But their resistance was as desperate as it was abusive. They pointed out (again) that former IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman (a Democrat) was a Bush appointee, and claimed that the Bush administration carried out similar targeting of liberal groups such as the NAACP.

In the NAACP's case, however, the recent scrutiny was legitimate: it had run highly political advertising against George W. Bush. In this case, the sweeping investigation and obstruction of every Tea Party group, before they had engaged in any kind of questionable political conduct, is what qualifies the IRS scandal as the national travesty that it is.

National Organization for Marriage chairman John Eastman, whose group's confidential information somehow found its way into the hands of their biggest rival the Human Rights Campaign, also ripped into Dems for their nonsense and explained how their donors have been harassed because their donor lists were released.

One of the members of the tea-party groups that were targeted by the IRS fired back at two Democratic congressmen for their “scurrilous” comments dismissing the agency’s actions.

John Eastman, chairman of the National Organization for Marriage, addressed Representative Earl Blumenauer of Oregon first. Blumenauer had just finished arguing that the groups before the committee were political and should not be considered social-welfare organizations.

“It’s your kind of statements that have empowered IRS agents to make determinations about which organizations qualify for the public good and which don’t,” Eastman said to a round of applause. “The notion that defending traditional marriage doesn’t qualify as a defense of the public good is preposterous.”

Later, Eastman spoke to Representative Lloyd Doggett of Texas. “How sad it is that efforts to educate about our Constitution have become a partisan, political issue that you think people ought not to get tax-exempt status for that,” Eastman said.

[excon]

Hello again, Steve:

Damn that IRS. Let me know when you link Obama to it.. Yaaaaaawn..

excon