We are indebted to a publisher of tax information called Tax Analysts for its efforts to make the Internal Revenue Service slightly more accountable.
The IRS finds itself beleaguered, sort of, by scandal — the fallout from their practice of impeding applications for tax-exempt status of Tea Party and other “patriot” and “constitutionalist” groups. But the agency doesn’t always cooperate with investigations of its conduct.
Using the Freedom of Information Act, Tax Analysts has sued the IRS to obtain all materials used since 2009 to train Cincinnati personnel in the art of handling applications for tax-exempt status.
Folks at the IRS had at first “agreed” to comply with the FOIA request for these instructions ─ which will shed light on what, exactly, employees have been told at various times about how to deal with applicants of various ideological hue. But the agency kept dithering, first telling Tax Analysts that it would supply the stuff pronto, then saying it needed more time; then saying the same when the next-named comply-by date arrived; etc., ad infinitum.
Like the ever-slowing competitor to Zeno’s tortoise, the IRS found it impossible to ever cross the finish line or actually supply any documents.
Yet these guys slap us with penalties if we’re late with the taxes. . . .
Well, Tax Analysts has seen the IRS’s delaying tactics before. So now the matter is in court. Sooner or later we shall learn whether the agency’s own written instructions counsel ideological discrimination, or these instructions are untainted by such but have been flouted by IRS officers.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
5 replies on “The Tax Agency and the Tortoise”
The documents will only prove what is already known. There’s really nothing much to learn here. The IRS, the NSA, the EPA, possibly the FBI and the upper echelons at the very least are all Obama. No instructions were needed. They were all of one mind. Do you really question what their aim is?
The upper echelons at least of the military, I meant to complete that thought there. Sorry!
By the time the courts rule, any relevant document will have been shredded.
It’s the Chicago way.
The vast majority of folks working for the IRS are just regular Joe’s, no different than the vast majority of regular Joe’s working to get by in the jobs available in Syria under Assad. And like the regular Joe’s in Syria, who we are about to commence a rain of terror and death upon, tomorrow, most of them do not deserve bad consequences.
Some do.
Not enough people realize that the IRS abuses our right to not testify against ourselves, by forcing us to provide any information in tax returns. An income tax is incompatible with freedom.