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Old 07-01-2011, 02:08 PM
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Jeanfromfillmore Jeanfromfillmore is offline
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Default Amid Media Matters Backlash, IRS Has Precedent for Stripping Tax-Exempt Status

Some of you have read my past complaints about the nonprofits that have received federal grants into their 501c3's and funneled parts of the grant money over to their 501c4's for political propaganda purposes. Well here is a 501c3 that is getting some attention for actually using that nonprofit for political purposes, a move that takes corruption to an even higher level than ACORN did and still does. Pay attention to these nonprofits, they're receiving billions in grant money from our gov and there's basically no money trail to follow on where it goes or how it's spent.



Amid Media Matters Backlash, IRS Has Precedent for Stripping Tax-Exempt Status
The IRS isn't saying much about calls to investigate claims that Media Matters may be violating the terms of its tax-exempt status for waging "guerilla warfare and sabotage" against Fox News. But while the agency rarely revokes nonprofit status over political advocacy concerns, there is precedent for such punishment.
Those who charge Media Matters is running afoul of the rules point most commonly to a 1989 ruling in which an organization was stripped of its 501(c)3 designation because of ties to Republican entities. The organization, the American Campaign Academy, was set up to train people for careers in political campaigns. But the U.S. Tax Court found the Republican-backed group was generally training people to work on GOP campaigns -- and ruled the academy served the private interest of GOP entities and candidates.
The case underscored a key distinction for nonprofits. They should serve the public, not private, interest. That rule was hammered home again in 1998 when a federal judge let the IRS strip a GOP-backed commission of its tax-exempt status. The judge determined the group, The Fund for the Study of Economic Growth and Tax Reform, was supporting a particular agenda and did not meet nonprofit criteria.
C. Boyden Gray, White House counsel during the George H.W. Bush administration, has cited the American Campaign Academy case in arguing that Media Matters is on thin ice with its IRS designation. Recent questions about the group's activities stem from a campaign against Fox News which founder David Brock described in an interview earlier this year.
Under IRS rules, nonprofits like Media Matters formed for "charitable" and "educational" purposes are free to engage in advocacy. But they are also required to offer "full and fair exposition of pertinent facts" and, in most cases, avoid "use of inflammatory and disparaging terms." They also are prohibited from advocating on behalf of campaigns for or against political candidates, and are mostly restricted from lobbying.
Jeffrey Hurwit, founder of the nonprofit-focused Hurtwit & Associates law firm, suggested Media Matters was above board on those two standards. Where the group runs into trouble, he said, is the public interest standard.
"Though I .... abhor what the right-wing talk show hosts say, to me this crosses the line in a subjective way of deciding what is public benefit versus private benefit," Hurwit said. "By attacking a single entity or network and utilizing such adversarial terms as 'guerrilla warfare' and 'sabotage,' that may well cross the line moving from public benefit to private agenda."
The IRS revokes tax-exempt status for dozens of organizations every year. In a unique case, the IRS also just stripped nonprofit status for 275,000 groups -- though for paperwork violations, many involving already-defunct groups.
"It is important for the service to be vigorous in its oversight of the tax-exempt sector," former IRS Commissioner Mark Everson said, noting these cases often start after an agent notices a red flag. "The service has wide latitude in these areas."
But the agency rarely revokes nonprofit status over political advocacy concerns. More common are cases where the IRS scrutinizes a nonprofit over suspicions that it's being used to financially benefit stakeholders. Everson recalled how, during his tenure in the George W. Bush administration, the IRS moved against a number of credit counseling companies after charging they were geared more toward generating income than doling out credit advice.
In the case of Media Matters, Everson noted that while IRS rules clearly prohibit "advocacy related to candidates," there's more wiggle room when it comes to "issues advocacy."
"It doesn't matter if you have a particular orientation," he said. "It's hard to draw a clear line in a lot of those areas."
The IRS, citing agency procedure, declined to say what action it might be taking with regard to Media Matters.
James King, a tax attorney with Jones Day, reiterated that nonprofits can advocate a point of view, "and you may do so strongly."
"But you can't have it just be unsubstantiated opinion," he said. "And you have to be reasonably objective about the way you present your views. So an excessive use of inflammatory language would be one factor that the Internal Revenue Service could look at."
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011...exempt-status/

Viewers Stand Up to Media Matters
http://video.foxnews.com/v/103328055...-media-matters

Media Matters, the War on Fox News and Me
At first glance “Media Matters” is a group that monitors the wild and crazy comments that are made on radio and television. There is nothing wrong with that. People should be accountable for their words – words have power.
Since they began work in 2004, however, the watchdog spirit of the group's founding has turned into an outright assault on its political opponents. That means they delight in attacking anyone with a conservative point of view on radio or TV. In fact, they have now announced they are engaged in a “war” against Fox News Channel and anyone who appears on their airwaves. They have also admitted to engaging in a despicable campaign to dig up dirt on Fox News executives and producers in an attempt to do personal damage to people who are guilty of offering the public political perspectives they find disagreeable.
That means they have targeted me. Yes, I am paid by Fox News to do political analysis. It is also true that on most issues I am left of center – what most on the far right call a liberal. And I go to political battle over ideas and policies by offering my views, hearing other viewpoints and often challenging conservative arguments on Fox.
Yet, apparently as part of their assault on Fox and its employees, Media Matters has targeted me for years for making what they smugly and fatuously call “false claims.” They cheered as I was fired from National Public Radio last October and praised NPR’s management for their courage. Their only complaint was that NPR did not also fire my friend and Fox News colleague Mara Liasson, at the same time.
Media Matters has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars, courtesy of far-left donors like billionaire George Soros, to silence me and other media figures with whom they disagree under the guise of fighting back against the power of conservative media outlets.
But the honest way to win an argument is with ideas, facts and the power of persuasion. It is not about smearing people, playing “gotcha” over statements taken out of context and destroying news organizations.
Winning does not mean getting in the gutter by bullying sponsors in to pulling their advertising dollars from news outlets they do not like.
There are many words one could use to describe Media Matters but there is one thing they are not: liberal.
The people who run Media Matters do not believe in honest discourse or the free flow of ideas. They are in business to protect and promote one brand of political orthodoxy – far left -- by slandering and intimidating any voice in the media who disagrees with them. That is the opposite of free speech. And that means Media Matters is the opposite of liberal.
Real liberals do not try to destroy their opponents with character assassinations. Instead, they engage them in debate using facts and ideas. Real liberals favor intellect over invective. Real liberals like to win arguments by proving their case better than their opponent – they do not try to dig up dirt on executives and producers to undercut the legitimacy of media outlets that have a different editorial bent.
I am a proud liberal and secure enough in my beliefs to refrain from ad hominem attacks and dishonest cheap shots at conservatives whom I disagree with.
I cannot imagine the great liberal heroes of my life time like Thurgood Marshall, Bobby Kennedy and Daniel Patrick Moynihan having anything but contempt for liberal bullies like Media Matters. With the manic obsession of a stalker, they record and monitor every hour of broadcasting on Fox looking for examples of conservative “misinformation.”
Every news organization makes mistakes. Check the corrections box in your local daily paper if you have any questions about it. But Media Matters focuses only on people they don't agree with at news outlets and sometimes twists comments for maximum outrage as they disseminate their slanted, context-free interpretation of conservative news and commentary to politicians, pundits and sympathizers in the mainstream media.
Their tactics and view of politics are more like those of the late Senator Joseph McCarthy (R-Wis.) who zealously accused anyone who disagreed with him of being a communist or a communist sympathizer.
Media Matters is run by the credulous David Brock, a former conservative writer whose previous claim to fame was admitting that he knowingly and repeatedly lied in articles he wrote for the conservative magazine, The American Spectator, in an attempt to destroy liberals. Now, Brock makes a living in service to trying to destroy conservative news organizations.
In an op-ed for the Washington Times last week, former White House Counsel C. Boyden Gray noted that the group is allowed to receive tax-deductible contributions because of its status as a 501 (c) (3). Gray suggested that the activities of Media Matters “do not merit tax-exempt status” and that by granting them this status, the IRS “may be infringing on Fox News’ First Amendment rights.”
The IRS should seriously reconsider Media Matters’ tax status. In the meantime, the rest of us can only call them out for their dishonest and underhanded tactics. Liberals should be in the forefront of every effort to use our freedom of speech to push back against their efforts to chill, in fact destroy, the free speech of others.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2011/...#ixzz1QtSzSJgj
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