Don's Tuesday column

         THE WAY I SEE IT   by Don Polson  Red Bluff Daily News   6/18/2013

Justice delayed, denied the right; left sails

Tea Party Patriots meeting note: tonight they’ll host Bev Ross, County Clerk and Recorder, and also in charge of our elections. It’s always been rewarding for Bev to address us and take questions. Even if you don’t regularly show up, you’ll find her a very knowledgeable and gracious source of information on those subjects. Westside Grange, 6 PM.

One of the arguments advanced in support of the IRS’s scrutiny of Tea Party, Christian (Right to Life groups were asked not to march at Planned Parenthood and were asked the content of their prayers!), and other conservative, pro-constitution applicants for tax exempt status, was to prevent improper tax status for electioneering activities. The scrutiny extended to hundreds of groups on the right, and the delays that extended into years over the course of 2010, 2011 and 2012 had a marked impact on fundraising and their efforts to inform and educate. The frequency of applications trended markedly higher after the controversial Supreme Court decision, “Citizens United (CU),” that allowed for expenditures by corporations and unions in the realm of political advocacy.

It’s been a principle for centuries that “justice delayed is justice denied”. By engaging in the kind of intimidating treatment that the IRS unloaded on Tea Party applicants, compared to the remarkably shorter times that liberal-sounding groups were processed, even compared to conservative groups prior to CU, an infringement on rights under the Constitution and Bill of Rights plainly occurred. When the citizens of America are effectively disenfranchised of their rights to free speech, freedom of assembly and the right to petition for redress of grievances in a timely manner, a constitutional travesty occurred the likes of which I can find no historical comparison.

Bryan Preston, writing at the PJ Tatler, asked, “Was the IRS Obama’s Electoral Performance-Enhancing Agency?” I think so, based on a new CNN/ORC poll of 1,104 adults showing that President Obama’s approval is now upside down with 53 percent disapproval vs. 45 approval, the largest declines occurring in the formerly solid under-30s. Among the pronounced reversal of approval numbers, for the first time “50 percent of Americans say they don’t believe Obama is ‘honest and trustworthy’ and 61 percent disapprove of ‘government’s surveillance of American citizens.’”

The NSA spying programs, legality and constitutionality aside, have come on the back of a massive shift in perception of Americans toward their government and its leader, Obama. It’s based on the widely held perception that the most feared and intimidating agency in Washington, the IRS, has used its vast resources to target the political opponents of Obama at a time when, had the various scandalous revelations been front and center in voters’ attention, Obama’s reelection prospects would have been dim, indeed. Look up “Fox News poll: IRS targeting intentional act to punish political opponents; most want Congress to continue probe.” So say two-thirds of polled Americans, while 78 percent support further Congressional investigation. While the Democrat/media complex is urgently moving on, the coverage of the conservative tax-exempt targeting scandal has left volumes of issues simply unmentioned and unexamined.

For a better understanding of the non-conservative tax-exempts, the 501 (c) 3s and 4s of the left, let’s just look at a news item from last Saturday, the 15^th. Type in “Open borders mob descends on home of Kansas Secretary of State” and you’ll see several links. “In a scene reminiscent of the SEIU’s siege of a Bank of America executive’s home in 2010, a mob of around 300 open borders protesters from across the country today descended on the home of Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, who is also counsel to the Immigration Law Reform Institute and, according to the following tweets from 501(c) 3 Sunflower Community Action, he’s called the “King of Hate.” (Twitchy.com) This SCA mob are a bunch of private property-defying, quasi-violent brownshirts (look it up). That 501 (c) 3 status, remember, is for charitable non-profits doing selfless good truly outside the political fray. Hmmm.

In “The Real Scandals of the IRS” for the Daily Beast, Megan McArdle wrote on May 14, “It’s true that 501 (c) 4 organizations are supposed to promote ‘social welfare’, but these days, most people have decided that the best way to promote social welfare is to lobby the government to do something about it. That’s why the Sierra Club, the Human Rights Campaign, and Organizing for Action (essentially an extension of Obama’s campaign) can all be organized under this section of the tax code.”

“USA TODAY analysis of IRS data shows that dozens of liberal groups received tax-exempt approval in the 27 months that Tea Party groups sat in limbo, even though the liberal groups were engaging in similar kinds of activity.” I read elsewhere that one liberal group had their status revoked for, get ready to be shocked, essentially working as a branch of the Democrat Party. No such charge has ever been shown to occur with the conservative groups.

I have only scratched the disgusting surface of this deeply disturbing scandal with its attendant lies, hypocrisies and the oppressive nature of government using its power to squelch the efforts of citizens opposed to that same government. Is anyone surprised that political donations from IRS employees overwhelmingly went to Obama? And that their employee union, as well as lawyers identified in many federal agencies, donated from 95 to 100 percent to Obama?