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The IRS Shoots Itself in the Foot, Then Reloads

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| Sun May. 12, 2013 2:51 PM PDT

Here's the thing that really puzzles me about this whole business of the IRS targeting tea party groups for extra scrutiny: the agency's clumsy handling of the whole thing. And I'm being charitable by calling it "clumsy." I mean, did they really think they could just announce this during an ABA conference on Friday morning and that would be the end of it? Of course not. It's explosive. So why were they seemingly so unprepared for any followup questions?

It's very peculiar. Especially since the evidence suggests this affair probably wasn't quite as outrageous as it seems at first glance. Roughly speaking, what seems to have happened is that three years ago the IRS was facing an explosion of newly formed 501(c)4 groups claiming tax exempt status, something that's legal only for groups that are primarily engaged in promoting education or social welfare, not electioneering. So some folks in the Cincinnati office tried to come up with a quick filter to flag groups that deserved extra scrutiny. But what should that flag be? Well, three years ago the explosion happened to be among tea party groups, so they began searching their database "for applications with 'Tea Party,' 'Patriots,' or '9/12' in the organization's name as well as other 'political sounding' names." This was dumb, and when senior leaders found out about it, they put a quick stop to it:

On June 29, 2011, Lois G. Lerner, who heads the IRS division that oversees tax-exempt organizations, learned at a meeting that groups were being targeted, according to the [inspector general’s] report....Lerner instructed agents to change the criteria for flagging groups “immediately,” the report says.

The problem is that the explosion of 501(c)4 groups is a genuine problem: they really have grown like kudzu, lots of them really are used primarily as electioneering vehicles, and the IRS has been either unwilling or unable to regulate them properly. So the fact that some of the folks responsible for processing these applications were looking for a way to flag potentially dubious groups is sort of understandable.

But understandable or not, they bungled it horribly, leaving themselves open to equally understandable charges of politicizing the IRS. Conservative groups are as outraged as liberals would be if the Bush-era IRS were flagging groups with "environment" or "progressive" in their names. So even if, as seems likely, this whole thing turns out to have been mostly a misguided scheme cooked up by some too-clever IRS drones, it doesn't matter. Conservatives are right to be outraged and right to demand a full investigation. They suspect there might be more to it, and so would I if the shoe were on the other foot. We need to find out for sure whether this episode was just moronic, or if it had some kind of partisan motivation.

What's really unfortunate about all this is that it will probably put an end to any scrutiny of 501(c)4 groups, and that's a shame. The IRS should be scrutinizing them, and it should be doing it on an ongoing basis. More than likely, though, Congress will step in to neuter them completely on this score, and the current Wild West character of 501(c)4 fundraising will continue unabated.

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Bonus Mother's Day Cat Blogging

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| Sun May. 12, 2013 8:01 AM PDT

Happy Mother's Day! What better way to celebrate than to post a picture of my mother's cats? These are the two sibs, Tillamook and Ditto, claiming dibs on my mother's favorite chair. Because, after all, Mother's Day goes just so far, right?

USDA Sticks It to Monsanto and Dow—at Least Temporarily

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| Sat May. 11, 2013 10:51 AM PDT

Back in early 2012, the US Department of Agriculture seemed on the verge of approving new genetically modified crops from agrichemical giants Monsanto and Dow. The two companies were pushing new corn and soy varieties that would respond to the ever-expanding problem of herbicide-tolerant superweeds by bringing more-toxic herbicides into the mix—and likely ramping up the resistance problem, as I explained at length in a post at the time.

Even some mainstream ag scientists were alarmed at the coming escalation in the war against weeds. Scientists at Penn State University—not exactly a hotbed of alternative ag thinking—delivered a damning analysis of the novel crops, which would be engineered to withstand not only Monsanto's Roundup herbicide, but also the highly toxic old ones 2,4-D (Dow's version) and Dicamba (Monsanto's).

Yet in August, the USDA again signaled that approval would be imminent—and by the end of 2012, people who follow ag regulatory issues were telling me that the USDA would almost certainly approve the crops over Christmas break, timing the decision in an effort to minimize the inevitable uproar.

But then Christmas came and went with no announcement—leading Dow to issue a January press statement about how the unexpected delay meant it could not sell its new product to farmers for the 2013 growing season. Yet the company remained confident about the prospects for approval in time for planting in 2014—it told the trade journal Delta Farm Press it "expects all approvals will be in place for sale in late 2013," in time for its novel seeds to be used over a "broad geography" in 2014.

But on Friday, the USDA essentially trampled on those expectations—it announced it was delaying approval of the crops until it could generate full environmental impact statements (known as EIS's) on them. The move effectively means that the crops won't be planted in fields next year, either, a Dow spokesperson told Bloomberg News.

[Read more]

Benghazi Talking Points: "A Bureaucratic Knife Fight Pitting State vs. CIA"

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| Fri May. 10, 2013 7:14 PM PDT

Earlier today, my basic take on the Benghazi talking points was that they exposed some "unseemly bureaucratic squabbling combined with the usual mushiness that you get when an interagency process produces a series of drafts of sensitive information for public consumption." Glenn Kessler has more on this:

This basically was a bureaucratic knife fight, pitting the State Department against the CIA.

....First, some important context: Although the ambassador was killed, the Benghazi “consulate” was not a consulate at all but basically a secret CIA operation which included an effort to round up shoulder-launched missiles. In fact, only seven of the 30 Americans evacuated from Benghazi had any connection to the State Department; the rest were affiliated with the CIA....So, from the State Department perspective, this was an attack on a CIA operation.

....The talking points were originally developed by the CIA....[and clearly imply] that State screwed up, even though internally, it was known that this was a CIA operation. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland especially objects to the reference to previous warnings, saying it “could be abused by members [of Congress] to beat up the State Department for not paying attention to warnings.”

....The final version of the talking points shows what happened: Just about everything was cut, leaving virtually nothing. The reference to “consulate” was also deleted, replaced by “diplomatic post.” From a bureaucratic perspective, it may have seemed like the best possible solution at the time. From a political perspective, it turned out to be a disaster.

I think this sounds almost certainly right: in a set of talking points that was supposed to be about what happened, CIA tried to add a paragraph that deflected blame for the debacle elsewhere. State objected since they considered this a CIA operation in the first place. Read the whole thing for Kessler's full explanation. And see David Corn here for his take on why today's news is bad for the White House even though the substance is thin: "This is not much of cover-up. There is no evidence the White House is hiding the truth about what occurred in Benghazi....But the White House has indeed been caught not telling the full story."

Val Kilmer Was in DC This Week Lobbying for What?!

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| Fri May. 10, 2013 4:52 PM PDT

Val Kilmer is a part-time Washington lobbyist now.

Earlier this week, the film and stage actor (Batman Forever, Top Gun, The Doors, MacGruber) was on Capitol Hill advocating for the Equitable Access to Care and Health Act, which would expand Americans' ability to claim religious exemptions to Obamacare's health insurance mandate. Kilmer alerted the world to his latest foray into political advocacy with a series of tweets, which included a photo taken at the Hart Senate Office Building.

The description of "lobbyist" here should not be taken literally; a search on the House lobbying disclosure webpage does not yield Kilmer's name.

The EACH Act is sponsored by Rep. Aaron Schock (R-Ill.), best known for getting his six-pack abs splashed on the cover of Men's Health. Under the EACH Act, Americans can avoid the insurance mandate if they file an affidavit stating that their religious faith bars them from buying insurance. Various religious groups have fiercely opposed the law, and Obamacare already includes a "religious conscience exemption."

Kilmer did not respond to requests for comment and it's not known whom he met with (he reportedly had dinner with Democratic Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of New York). "We have no idea why he was at the Hill; we have nothing to do with that part of his life," a representative for the actor said. "He doesn't have a publicist now, and he doesn't really do interviews."

Kilmer's visit is likely linked to his religious faith; he is a committed Christian Scientist. "It is quite a challenging faith," he told Esquire in 2005. Certain Christian Scientists' beliefs about health care, particularly their denial of modern medical care to children, are controversial, to say the least.

This isn't the 53-year-old actor first brush with politics. A few years ago, Kilmer considered making a run for governor of New Mexico, consulting with strategists and politicos; then-New Mexico governor Bill Richardson said he liked Kilmer's prospects partly because "he was Batman." He has engaged in some environmental activism and supported Ralph Nader in the 2008 presidential election. In 2010, Kilmer teamed up with the ACLU to win the right to convert his ranch near Santa Fe into a posh bed-and-breakfast.

It's hard to say if Val Kilmer will continue his public charge for Obamacare religious exemptions. As for merging elements of his faith and profession, it's still a work in progress: For more than a decade Kilmer has been working on a "tragicomic" film about Mark Twain—and Christian Science church founder Mary Baker Eddy.

We Just Passed the Climate's "Grim Milestone"

—By and

| Fri May. 10, 2013 3:01 PM PDT
The Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii, where NOAA watched the carbon record break.

Over the last couple weeks, scientists and environmentalists have been keeping a particularly close eye on the Hawaii-based monitoring station that tracks how much carbon dioxide is in the atmosphere, as the count tiptoed closer to a record-smashing 400 parts per million. Yesterday, we finally got there: The daily mean concentration was higher than at any time in human history, NOAA reported today. 

Don't worry: The earth is not about to go up in a ball of flame. The 400 ppm mark is only a milestone, 50 ppm over what legendary NASA scientist James Hansen has since 1988 called the safe zone for avoiding the worst impacts of climate change, and yet only halfway to what the IPCC predicts we'll reach by the end of the century.

"Somehow in the last 50 ppm we melted the Arctic," said environmentalist and founder of activist group 350.org Bill McKibben, who called today's news a "grim but predictable milestone" and has long used the symbolic number as a rallying call for climate action. "We'll see what happens in the next 50."

We could find out soon enough: With the East Coast still recovering from Superstorm Sandy and the West gearing up for what promises to be a nasty fire season, University of California ecologist Max Moritz says milestones like these are "an excuse for us to take a good hard look at where we are," especially as the carbon concentration shows no signs of reversing course.

Scientists first saw the carbon scale tip past 400 ppm last summer, but only briefly; the record reported today by NOAA is the first time a daily average has surpassed that point. For the last several years concentrations have hovered in the 390s, and we're still not to the point where the carbon concentration will stay above the 400 ppm threshold permanently. But that's just around the corner, said J. Marshall Shepherd, president of the American Meteorological Society.

"It's clear that sometime next year we'll see 400 consistently," he said. "Avoiding the future warming will require a large and rapid reduction in greenhouse gases."

Most scientists, environmentalists, and climate-conscious policymakers agree this will require, at a minimum, slashing the use of fossil fuels, and in the meantime, taking steps to adapt for a world with higher temperatures, higher seas, and more extreme weather. For example, according to Hansen, the world will need to completely stop burning coal by 2030 if returning to 350 ppm is to remain possible. What's the holdup? Texas Tech climatologist Katherine Hayhoe blames "the inertia of our economic system, and the inertia of our political system." But she, like most of her peers, believe it can—and must—be done: "We have to change how we get our energy and how we use our energy."

[Read more]

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Benghazi Isn't Watergate. But the White House Didn't Tell the Full Story.

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| Fri May. 10, 2013 1:45 PM PDT
benghazi obama clintonPresident Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton take part in the Transfer of Remains Ceremony marking the return to the United States of the remains of the four Americans killed in Benghazi, Libya. Molly Riley/DPA/Zuma

The latest revelations about the Benghazi talking points—as opposed to what actually happened at the US diplomatic facility at Benghazi, where four Americans died—do not back up Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham's hyperbolic and absurd claim that the Benghazi controversy is Obama's Watergate. But neither are they nothing.

As ABC News reported on Friday morning, the most discussed talking points in US diplomatic history were revised multiple times before being passed to UN Ambassador Susan Rice prior to her appearances last September on Sunday talk shows. The revisions—which deleted several lines noting that the CIA months before the attack had produced intelligence reports on the threat of Al Qaeda-linked extremists in Benghazi—appear to have been driven by State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland, who, it should be noted, is a career Foggy Bottomer who has served Republican and Democratic administrations, not a political appointee. Her motive seems obvious: fend off a CIA CYA move that could make the State Department look lousy. (The other major deletion concerned three sentences about a possible link between the attack and Ansar al-Sharia, an Al Qaeda-affiliated group; last November, David Petraeus, the former CIA chief, testified that this information was removed from the talking points in order to avoid tipping off the group.)

But here's the problem for the White House: It was part of the interagency process in which State sought to downplay information that might have raised questions about its preattack performance. That's a minor sin (of omission). Yet there's more: On November 28, White House spokesman Jay Carney said, "Those talking points originated from the intelligence community. They reflect the IC's best assessments of what they thought had happened. The White House and the State Department have made clear that the single adjustment that was made to those talking points by either of those two institutions were changing the word 'consulate' to 'diplomatic facility because 'consulate' was inaccurate."

Assuming the talking points revisions released by ABC News are accurate—and the White House has not challenged them—Carney's statement was not correct. The State Department did far more than change one word, and it did so in a process involving White House aides. So, White House critics can argue, Carney put out bad information and did not acknowledge that State had massaged the talking points to protect itself from inconvenient questions.

This is not much of cover-up. There is no evidence the White House is hiding the truth about what occurred in Benghazi. My colleague Kevin Drum dismisses this recent Benghazi news ("on a scale of 1 to 10, this is about a 1.5"). But the White House has indeed been caught not telling the full story. Despite Carney's statement, there was politically minded handling of the talking points. Yet in today's hyperpartisan environment, such a matter cannot be evaluated with a sense of proportion. Obama antagonists decry it as a deed most foul, and White House defenders denounce the the critics. The talking points dispute is not a scandal; it's a mess—a small mess—and not as significant as the actions (and non-actions) that led to Benghazi. Yet no mess is too tiny for scandalmongers in need of material.

Friday Cat Blogging - 10 May 2013

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| Fri May. 10, 2013 11:55 AM PDT

As you can see, Domino is quite enjoying our 400 ppm world. She was rolling around in the sunshine yesterday while Marian pulled a few weeds, and then a dog walked by. This very much got her attention. She's OK with 400 ppm, but not so much with dogs.

Need more cats? Or, more accurately, do you need more cat? Click here for video proof that big cats like boxes every bit as much as your average housecat likes them.

Yesterday Was 400 ppm Day

—By

| Fri May. 10, 2013 11:34 AM PDT

Well, we finally did it. We hit a new carbon dioxide milestone yesterday:

Scientific monitors reported that the gas had reached an average daily level that surpassed 400 parts per million — just an odometer moment in one sense, but also a sobering reminder that decades of efforts to bring human-produced emissions under control are faltering.

The best available evidence suggests the amount of the gas in the air has not been this high for at least three million years, before humans evolved, and scientists believe the rise portends large changes in the climate and the level of the sea.

This is from NOAA. The reading from the Scripps instruments for yesterday was 399.73 because they use local time, not Greenwich time. This gives them a slightly different 24-hour window that defines a "day."

But not to worry. They'll hit 400 soon too. And by next year, pretty much every day will be above 400. Congratulations, homo sapiens!

Judge: Obama Admin.'s Emergency Contraception Argument Is "Something Out of an Alternate Reality"

—By

| Fri May. 10, 2013 10:56 AM PDT

On Friday, US District Court Judge Edward Korman went all Dikembe Mutombo on the Obama administration's request to delay implementation of his ruling that emergency contraception be made available over the counter to everyone within 30 days. The Department of Justice announced last week that it is appealing Korman's April 5 decision.

Korman's latest order rejecting the request of a stay is, to put it nicely, highly critical of the Obama administration, calling the DOJ's appeal "frivolous" and an "administrative agency filibuster."

In its appeal, the DOJ claimed that Korman's April 5 decision "undermines the regulatory procedures governing FDA's drug approval process." But Korman calls this argument "something out of an alternate reality," given that the FDA's scientists approved it for use over the counter when Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius overruled their decision in December 2011, implementing an age limit of 17. Sebelius, he writes, "completely lacks" the scientific expertise to decide whether a drug is safe and effective.

Korman also accuses the administration of "sugarcoating" its effort to block access by lowering the age for one brand of emergency contraception, Plan B One-Step, on the day before they filed the appeal. The administration has suggested a three-tiered system that Korman explains as:

  • (1) women 15 years of age or older with adequate proof of age will be permitted to purchase Plan B One-Step, which will only be available on the shelves in stores with on-site pharmacies;
  • (2) other levonorgestrel-based products will remain behind the counter, but will be available without a prescription to women over 17 years of age who have government issued proof of age; and,
  • (3) women who lack adequate proof of age or are under the age of 15 will not have access to Plan B One-Step and must obtain a prescription for another levonorgestrel-based contraceptive product.

Korman calls this proposal "convoluted" and "nonsensical."

Further, he notes, the Obama administration's plan still harms all women seeking access to emergency contraception, because they will need to a government-issued identification to prove their age. This is a particular burden on young women, poor women, and minorities, who are less likely to have that ID.

It would, however, benefit Teva, the company that makes Plan B One-Step, Korman writes:

The benefits the proposal would confer on Teva were not insignificant. Because, as the Assistant United States Attorney observed, 99% of Plan B One-Step consumers are aged 15 and above, Teva would lose next to nothing in the way of revenue by limiting sales to those women. On the other hand, Teva’s proposal would enable it to have its product, and its product alone, displayed on the shelves in the family planning area of stores with an on-site pharmacy. Thus, a consumer looking for an emergency contraceptive would only find Plan B One-Step on the shelves, and if she came in after the pharmacy counter was closed, her only option would be Plan B One-Step. If she were under the age of 15, she would have no option, because she could only obtain levonorgestrel-based emergency contraceptives with a prescription.
Moreover, because the FDA claimed that one of the studies conducted by Teva—the so-called "actual use" study—was essential to the approval of Teva’s proposal, Teva enjoys three years of marketing exclusivity to the 15 and 16 year old consumers. The pharmaceutical companies that sell "brand X" versions of Plan B One-Step as well as the two-pill package of the drug could not display their products on the shelf because the old marketing regime remains in effect for them, and their products can only be sold from behind the pharmacy counter. Anyone under the age of 17 needs a prescription to obtain these products, and anyone over the age of 17 can only obtain them from the pharmacy by showing proof-of-age identification.
While this proposal was a boon to Teva, it did little to eliminate the practical obstructions in obtaining emergency contraception to women of child-bearing age whether over or under age 15. On the contrary, Teva will use its privileged marketing status and exclusivity to increase the cost of the drug. The price of Plan B One-Step under the new marketing regime is expected to be $60, significantly more than the one- or two-pill generic version, and could conceivably go higher, if only to accommodate the more expensive packing, age-verification tags, and anti-theft technology that the new marketing arrangement would require. The cost of all emergency contraception, particularly Plan B One-Step, which is the most expensive, is already an impediment to access for many women and adolescents.

The DOJ has until noon on Monday, May 13 to try to appeal to the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals for a stay.