Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/306732224?client_source=feed&format=rss
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Sunday, May 19, 2013
Money tangle: The IRS and its tea party tempest
WASHINGTON (AP) ? The Internal Revenue Service is feeling the sort of heat that targeted taxpayers feel from the tax agency. It's the sense that a powerful someone is breathing down your neck.
Republicans in Congress are livid with the IRS over its systematic scrutiny of conservative groups during the 2010 and 2012 elections. Democrats agree that something must be done. President Barack Obama also isn't at all happy with the tax collectors.
That kind of commonality in Washington is about as rare as a budget surplus. So expect a bumpy ride for the IRS, unloved in the best of times, as a Justice Department criminal investigation and multiple congressional inquiries try to get to the bottom of it all.
A look at the matter:
IN BRIEF
The central issue is whether IRS agents who determine whether nonprofit organizations have to pay federal income taxes played political favorites or even broke the law when they subjected tea party groups and other conservative organizations to special scrutiny.
Also foremost in the concerns of Congress: Why senior IRS officials, for many months, did not disclose what they had learned about the actions of lower-level employees despite persistent questions from Republican lawmakers and howls from aggrieved organizations.
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WHY IT MATTERS
The IRS is expected to be pesky, even intimidating, to miscreants, but at all times politically neutral. Nonpartisanship is the coin of its realm, perhaps more so than in any other part of government.
"I will not tolerate this kind of behavior in any agency but especially in the IRS, given the power that it has and the reach that it has into all of our lives," Obama said in ousting the agency's acting chief, Steven T. Miller.
On Thursday, on the eve of House hearings at which Miller has been called to testify, the president named Daniel Werfel, a senior White House budget official, to take charge of the agency temporarily.
IRS actions in the period covering the 2010 congressional elections and the early going of the 2012 presidential campaign have tattered the perception that the agency is clean of political leanings. Whether that was also the reality remains to be discovered.
A report by the Treasury Department's top investigator for tax matters found no evidence that sheer partisanship drove the targeting. But the watchdog disclosed Friday that he is still investigating. His report faulted lax management for not stopping it sooner.
It's a sensitive time for the agency's professionalism to be in doubt because the IRS soon will loom even larger in people's lives. It's to be the enforcer of the individual mandate to carry insurance under Obama's health care law, itself an object of suspicion for many conservatives. To the right, that's insult upon injury from the left.
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WHAT WOULD MAKE IT MATTER EVEN MORE
Any effort from top levels of the administration or political operatives to manipulate the IRS for campaign purposes would put the scandal in the realm of Nixonian skullduggery.
The public record as it is known does not show interference.
No ties to anyone outside the IRS have been discovered. At the same time, early IRS assurances that high-level people inside the agency did not know what was going on have been contradicted by evidence that the head of the agency's tax-exemption operation and later its deputy commissioner were briefed about it and did not tell Congress.
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RED-FLAG WORDS
To qualify for exemption from federal income taxes, organizations must show they are not too political in nature to meet the standard. In the cases in question, applications that raised eyebrows were referred to a team of specialists who took a much closer look at a group's operations. That's normal.
But in early 2010, IRS agents in the Determinations Unit began paying special attention to tax-exempt applications from groups associated with the tea party or with certain words or phrases in their materials, according to the IRS inspector general's report. That's not normal.
The red-flag keywords came to include "Patriots," ''Take Back the Country" and "We the People."
That August, agents were given an explicit "be on the lookout" directive for "various local organizations in the Tea Party movement" that are seeking tax-exempt status. Such organizations saw their applications languish except when they were hit with lots of questions, some of which the IRS was not entitled to ask, such as the names of donors.
In June 2011, after the congressional elections, Lois G. Lerner, in charge of overseeing tax-exempt organizations, learned of the flagging and ordered the criteria to be changed right away, the inspector general said. The new guidance was more generic and stripped of any explicit partisan freight. But it did not last.
In January 2012, the screening was modified again, this time to watch for references to the Constitution or Bill of Rights, and for "political action type organizations involved in limiting/expanding government."
The Constitution and Bill of Rights are touchstones for liberals, too. But in modern politics, they've been appropriated as rallying cries of conservatives and libertarians. Finally, that May, such flagging ended.
Altogether, specialists reviewed a variety of potentially too-political applications, presumably covering the liberal-conservative spectrum. But fully one-third of the cases were of the tea party-patriot variety. During the height of the flagging, the inspector general says, all applications fitting the conservative-focused criteria went to the specialists while others that should have stirred concern did not.
In short, if you were with the tea party, you were guaranteed a close second look and almost certainly months more of delay. If you were leading a liberal activist group, maybe yes, maybe no.
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ON THE RECEIVING END
"Dealing with this was like dealing with tax day every day for 2? years," says Laurence Nordvig, executive director of the Richmond Tea Party in Virginia. "Like your worst audit nightmare."
His group applied for tax-exempt status in December 2009 and finally got it in July 2012.
Tom Zawistowski applied for the tax exemption for his group, the Ohio Liberty Coalition, in June 2010 when the flagging was gathering steam. He got it in December 2012, after the presidential election.
The IRS asked him for the identity of the group's members, times and location of group activities, printouts of its website and Facebook pages, contents of speeches and the names and credentials of speakers at forums. He said the IRS also audited his personal finances and his wife's.
"The intent of this was to hurt the ability of tea party groups to function in an election year," he said.
An Associated Press analysis of 93 "tea party" or "patriot" groups found that most were shoestring operations, with only two dozen raising more than $20,000 a year.
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FIVE-OH WHAT?
If the IRS merely rolled over and played dead when it got an application for a tax exemption, the government would be even more broke than it is and big money would have an even more pernicious grip on campaigns.
The IRS knows better than most that politically driven organizations, out to elect and defeat candidates, can masquerade as "social welfare" or other charitable entities under the tax-exempting articles of Section 501 (c) of the tax code.
Or they can align themselves with one, allowing unlimited donations to be raised and the identities of the contributors to stay secret as long as the nonprofit entities don't go too far in overt politicking.
In recent years, advocacy groups have paired their nonprofit arms with "super" political action committees, moves that took hold after a series of court rulings ? including the Supreme Court's 2010 Citizens United decision ? loosened the rules on money in politics.
The rulings gave rise to such pairings as the American Crossroads super PAC with its Crossroads GPS nonprofit on behalf of Republicans in the 2012 campaign, and the Priorities USA Action super PAC with its own nonprofit arm, for Obama's benefit.
Section 501 (c) (3) can be the most lucrative financially for organizations because in addition to conferring tax-exempt status, it allows donations to qualifying groups to be tax deductible.
Section 501 (c) (4) doesn't permit tax-deductible donations but gives groups more latitude to lobby and to dabble more directly in political campaigns as long as "social welfare" remains their primary mission. They can also keep their donors secret, a big benefit over more blatantly political super PACs.
It's all complex, squishy and in some ways subjective, so it might not come as a shock that the IRS would look for shortcuts such as political buzzwords and slogans when deciding what a group is really up to. But the record as yet known does not show that the scrutiny cut both ways.
In congressional testimony about the discredited IRS actions, Attorney General Eric Holder said there is good reason to take a skeptical look at some Section 501 applications but "it has to be done in a way that does not depend on the political persuasion of the group."
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BY THE NUMBERS
The inspector general's office reviewed 296 tax-exempt applications that had been flagged as potentially too political. Of them, 108 were ultimately approved, 28 were withdrawn by the applicant, none had been rejected and 160 were still open in December 2012, some languishing for more than three years.
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STONEWALLING?
Hearing complaints of IRS harassment from constituents, lawmakers began asking a lot of questions of the agency starting in mid-2011. They got a lot of answers ? just not answers revealing what was going on.
In multiple letters, some as long as 45 pages, as well as in meetings and congressional hearings, senior IRS officials laid out in painstaking detail the process of checking tax-exempt applications but did not disclose what they had come to learn of the flagging.
Miller, for example, was told by staff in May 2012 about the inappropriate screening but did not pass that on in communications with inquiring members of Congress or in his appearance two months later with the House panel most concerned about the reports.
Lois G. Lerner, in charge of overseeing tax-exempt organizations at the IRS, was briefed about the screening a year earlier and ordered an end to explicit tea party-type flagging. But she did not tell lawmakers about that when asked about the constituent complaints.
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ABOUT THAT SKULLDUGGERY
A number of presidents or their operatives have tried to twist the IRS against "dissidents" or political opponents. Presidents Franklin Roosevelt, Dwight Eisenhower and John Kennedy are among them.
President Richard Nixon, though, surely takes the cake here.
The Senate Judiciary Committee cited his IRS manipulations, including his pursuit of those on his "enemies list," in the articles of impeachment accusing the president of high crimes and misdemeanors in the Watergate scandal and of actions "subversive of constitutional government."
Article 2, Abuse of Power, said: "He has, acting personally and through his subordinates and agents, endeavored to obtain from the Internal Revenue Service, in violation of the constitutional rights of citizens, confidential information contained in income tax returns for purposes not authorized by law, and to cause, in violation of the constitutional rights of citizens, income tax audits or other income tax investigations to be initiated or conducted in a discriminatory manner."
Nixon resigned after it became clear that a Senate impeachment trial would drive him from office.
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Associated Press writers Stephen Braun and Stephen Ohlemacher contributed to this report.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/money-tangle-irs-tea-party-tempest-144831224.html
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Saturday, May 18, 2013
Google-built media player hits the FCC, reveals only a Hitchhiker's Guide reference
With much of its information obscured it's hard to say what Google has planned for this new device revealed by its FCC filing, but the model number at least indicates someone has a sense of humor. Called an "H840 device" and rocking the model number H2G2-42 (Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - 42, the ultimate answer to the question of life, the universe and everything) it has WiFi of the 802.11 b/g/n varieties, but that's all we know for sure. The natural question is whether this is a proper revamp of / follow up to the failed Nexus Q project, particularly with its appearance coming so closely after the unveiling of its Google Play Music All Access subscription. Of course, Google has no shortage of mysterious device projects in store, we're hopeful this one will reveal all of its secrets soon.
Filed under: Home Entertainment, Internet, HD, Google
Source: TabletGuide.nl, FCC
Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/XztiuvF_y2A/
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Mayor: Deal to sell Kings has been signed
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) ? Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson announced to screaming throngs of Kings fans Friday that the deal to sell the NBA franchise to a group led by software tycoon Vivek Ranadive has been signed.
The announcement at a City Hall rally brings to an end nearly five months of maneuvering by Johnson to secure a new ownership group, convince the council to commit to building a new downtown arena, and to show the NBA that the capitol city of the most populous state in the nation has the fan base to make the venture successful.
"This was one heck of a comeback," Johnson, a former NBA All-Star, said on a stage shared with two dozen investors, fans and politicians who had worked to keep the franchise in the city.
Earlier this week, NBA owners rejected a bid to move the franchise to Seattle. Investor Chris Hansen, whose agreement to buy the team from the Maloof family and move them to the Pacific Northwest shocked the city in January, fought to acquire the team to the bitter end. He even negotiated to buy a minority share when it became clear the league opposed relocation.
Johnson said that the deal reached between the Maloofs and the Ranadive group did not include an investment from Hansen.
NBA Commissioner David Stern praised Hansen's proposal and said the NBA might consider expansion once a new TV deal is in place.
The mayor was conciliatory toward Seattle, but said he focused throughout the negotiations on promoting Sacramento as thriving city with 19 sellout seasons, one of the longest streaks in the NBA.
"Seattle is a great city and we want them to get a team. For us, it was never a competition. It was about our community telling our story," Johnson said, adding: "It's about not letting someone take something that's not theirs."
The NBA is expected to officially approve the sale next week.
A person familiar with the deal previously told The Associated Press that the Maloofs had reached an agreement to sell a 65 percent controlling interest at a total franchise valuation of $535 million. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to talk publicly.
The plan for the Kings' future includes a $447 million downtown arena that will be built on at the western gateway to the city near the Sacramento River.
The Sacramento ownership group also includes 24 Hour Fitness founder Mark Mastrov, former Facebook senior executive Chris Kelly and the Jacobs family that owns communications giant Qualcomm.
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Coppola's 'Bling Ring' at home at decadent Cannes
Director Sofia Coppola poses for photographers during a photo call for the film The Bling Ring at the 66th international film festival, in Cannes, southern France, Thursday, May 16, 2013. (AP Photo/Francois Mori)
Director Sofia Coppola poses for photographers during a photo call for the film The Bling Ring at the 66th international film festival, in Cannes, southern France, Thursday, May 16, 2013. (AP Photo/Francois Mori)
From left, actors Emma Watson, Claire Julien and director Sofia Coppola pose for photographers during a photo call for the film The Bling Ring at the 66th international film festival, in Cannes, southern France, Thursday, May 16, 2013. (AP Photo/Francois Mori)
From left, actors Emma Watson, Claire Julien, director Sofia Coppola, actors Israel Broussard, Taissa Fariga and Katie Chang pose for photographers during a photo call for the film The Bling Ring at the 66th international film festival, in Cannes, southern France, Thursday, May 16, 2013. (AP Photo/Francois Mori)
Actor Claire Julien poses for photographers during a photo call for the film The Bling Ring at the 66th international film festival, in Cannes, southern France, Thursday, May 16, 2013. (AP Photo/Francois Mori)
CANNES, France (AP) ? Sofia Coppola was just 8 years old when she first came to the Cannes Film Festival. Her father, Francis Ford Coppola, was there to premiere a work-in-progress cut of a film he had spent years wrestling with: "Apocalypse Now."
"I have nice memories of Cannes," Coppola said in an interview Thursday on the roof of the Palais, the festival center. "I remember coming here as a kid and then my first movie, 'Virgin Suicides,' had our first screening ever here. I feel like my career started here."
Growing up in such surroundings, one would think, would have heavily informed Coppola's latest film, "The Bling Ring," a deadpan drama about celebrity-obsessed teenagers in Los Angeles who break into the homes of Paris Hilton and other stars. But Coppola says the movie world she grew up in isn't the same as today's star-crazed culture.
"I definitely noticed that people would act different around my dad. It was just part of my growing up," Coppola says. "This world feels unfamiliar to me, this kind of reality-star, tabloid culture."
"The Bling Ring," which opened Cannes' Un Certain Regard section Thursday, is Coppola's third film in a row that deals heavily with the famous. Following her "Marie Antoinette" (her modern-styled take on the French royal) was 2010's "Somewhere," a minimalist drama about a renowned actor and his 11-year-old daughter.
"The Bling Ring" is based on a true story, recounted in a Vanity Fair article, about high-schoolers who, after seeing online when certain stars are expected at a premiere or other event, take the opportunity to steal designer bags, shoes and clothes from their homes, lingering to pretend to live in celebrity opulence.
There's wry irony in premiering such a film at Cannes, the decadent French Riviera resort town of high-end boutiques and luxury hotels.
"It seems like the perfect setting for 'The Bling Ring' when you see people walking around in their heels," says Coppola, who favors a less flashy style. "It's a glamorous place, so it feels appropriate."
Coppola cast mainly newcomers in the lead roles (Israel Broussard, Katie Chang, Claire Julien), with the notable exception of "Harry Potter" star Emma Watson, who assumes a thick Valley Girl accent for her character. Watson praised Coppola for her easy calm; Chang noted her gentle openness with actors.
"The Bling Ring," which will be released in the U.S. on June 14, has already drawn comparisons to the recent, day-glo debauchery of Harmony Korine's "Spring Breakers." The differences between the two films are many, but both feature the thrill of young, attractive girls breaking bad for the sake of glorious superficiality. (The movies also share a new distributor, A24 Films.)
Though Coppola hasn't seen "Spring Breakers," she says, "I can understand that there's this sort of trash culture aspect that's in the air."
And if there's an epicenter of that culture, it may be Paris Hilton's shoe closet. Coppola shot in Hilton's mansion where the teens rummage through her footwear and lounge in her nightclub room. (The hotel heiress appears fleetingly in the film.)
Like "Somewhere," ''Bling Ring" paints a light, hazy portrait of Los Angeles.
"I wasn't trying to do a story about L.A. I just came across this article, and you couldn't set it somewhere else," says Coppola, who lived in L.A. in her 20s but now resides in New York with her husband, Thomas Mars of the band Phoenix, and their two daughters.
"There's something exotic about it, and it's not like anywhere else. To me, it's the center of this aspect our culture."
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Follow AP Entertainment Writer Jake Coyle on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/jake_coyle
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Disney: Sexy 'Brave' makeover just temporary
Movies 
17 hours ago
A Mighty Girl
Merida, left, dressed to impress, and from the film.
It?s the before-and-after makeover heard around the world.
When Princess Merida of ?Brave? was crowned the 11th princess at Walt Disney World this weekend, she had a new look that included not only a tiny waist, sultry eyes, and cleavage but also the teal gown that the feisty tomboy so detested in the Oscar-winning movie. It was as if Merida stepped onto the cover of ?Vogue? magazine and her rebellious spirit was photo-shopped right out of the red-headed heroine.
Nearly 212,000 of her fans weren?t having it. Through a Change.org petition, ?Keep Merida Brave,? girl empowerment blog ?A Mighty Girl,? demanded that Disney reconsider the redesign. By Wednesday, word had spread on the Internet that Disney had removed the sexified image from its official princess website, and the movement declared itself victorious.
But much of it has turned out to be as fictitious as the bow-and-arrow-carrying princess herself. The party girl image of Merida was never used on Disney?s official sites or Facebook pages, a Disney spokesperson told NBCNews.com Thursday.
?The artwork used on Merida?s official social media sites has always been the imagery from the movie ? there have been no changes," a Disney spokesperson said in a statement. "We routinely use different art styles with our characters and this rendition of Merida in her party dress was a special one-time effort to commemorate her coronation. Merida exemplifies what it means to be a Disney Princess through being brave, passionate and confident and she remains the same strong and determined Merida from the movie whose inner qualities have inspired moms and daughters around the world. ?
Merida?s new look was created for her "special coronation" and is intended to be used in a limited product line this summer and fall. Her image on her official princess page will remain intact, the spokesperson said.
?For a wedding or prom, even a tomboy is going to dress up for a special occasion,? a source familiar with the product line said, describing the idea behind Merida?s newfound glamour. ?That doesn?t change who she is or who she will continue to be or who she remains on the Disney web sites or in most of the products.?
Disney typically creates multiple artwork for each character to use in different platforms for different reasons. But the main look is always the look that everyone knows, the source said.
?It?s not like you walk into the toy aisle and Merida?s flipped over completely to this new look,? the source said. ?This was a one-time special occasion effort.?
Still, the backlash against Merida?s transformation is understandable considering that she was created as an ?anti-princess? of sorts, a tough and feisty warrior resistant to conventional beauty. Creator Brenda Chapman modeled Merida after her own teenage daughter and wants her to be representative of all teenage girls.
?Merida wouldn?t be caught dead looking like that and I think that?s what?s angering everyone,? Chapman told CNN. They?ve totally lost sight of the character in this new design. I understand, with the toys, that they don?t want to put in a lot more money creating a new body for the dolls. But this is a drawing that?s going to be put on tons of merchandise and it doesn?t cost that much money to put a lot of effort into a drawing that portrays the character as who the character is--as opposed to this grotesque, sexist depiction of her.?
The petition also decries the way Disney has introduced Merida into the Princess collection and calls it a "disservice to the millions of children for whom Merida is an empwering role model who speaks to girls' capacity to be change agents in the world rather than just trophies to be admired."
Source: http://www.today.com/entertainment/brave-princess-sexy-makeover-not-permanent-disney-says-1C9952299
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Friday, May 17, 2013
Doctors Say Not All Women with Jolie Condition Need Preventive Mastectomies (Voice Of America)
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