Monthly Notes

Briefly Noted: June 2014


An ultra-secretive left-wing money machine for super-rich radicals is bringing more representatives of Big Labor into the fold, in hopes of preventing a possible Republican takeover of the U.S. Senate this November. New members of the George Soros-dominated Democracy Alliance identified by the Washington Free Beacon are Noel Beasley, president of Workers United, a textile union affiliated with the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), and Keith Mestrich, president of the union-owned Amalgamated Bank. Other new members from Big Labor include Larry Cohen, president of the Communications Workers of America, and Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers. The names of the members were found on an official Alliance document Soros’s son Jonathan left behind at the group’s meeting in the Chicago Ritz hotel.

Other new members of the Democracy Alliance, a donors’ collaborative focused on funding left-wing political infrastructure, include Adam Abram (insurance and real estate), Rick Segal (financial services), and Paul Boskind (behavioral health). Among the heirs and heiresses to recently join the group are Amy Goldman (real estate), Henry van Ameringen (manufacturing), and New School professor Philip Munger, son of Berkshire Hathaway vice chairman Charles Munger.

Judicial Watch released a new batch of internal IRS documents revealing that the agency’s handling of applications from Tea Party nonprofits was directed out of the agency’s headquarters in Washington, D.C., contrary to earlier official denials by the White House. The documents also show extensive pressure on the IRS by Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) to shut down conservative-leaning tax-exempt organizations. The IRS emails by then-tax exempt division chief Lois Lerner detail her misleading explanations to investigators about the targeting of Tea Party organizations. The documents were handed over because Judicial Watch filed an October 2013 Freedom of Information Act (FoIA) lawsuit after the agency failed to respond to four FoIA requests dating back to May 2013.

The Internal Revenue Service revoked the charitable status of a conservative nonprofit group that disseminated statements critical of Democrats Hillary Clinton and John Kerry a decade ago. The Patrick Henry Center for Individual Liberty headquartered in Manassas, Virginia, “has shown a pattern of deliberate and consistent intervention in political campaigns” and issued “repeated statements supporting or opposing various candidates by expressing its opinion of the respective candidate’s character and qualifications,” according to an IRS determination. The tax agency found that the group functioned as an “action organization” by publishing alerts on its website for columns written by its president, former FBI agent Gary Aldrich, in which he was harshly critical of Clinton and Kerry, who at the time were both U.S. senators. The ruling takes effect July 1 unless appealed by the group.

Former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge quit Michael Bloomberg’s new gun control group, delivering a setback for the former New York mayor after he said he will spend $50 million on efforts associated with the group and this year’s midterm elections, according to reports. A Ridge spokesman said the former Bush administration cabinet member does not want to be part of an attack on gun rights by the new group, which is called “Everytown for Gun Safety.” “When I signed on as an adviser to Everytown, I looked forward to a thoughtful and provocative discussion about the toll gun violence takes on Americans,” Ridge said. “After consultation with Everytown, I have decided that I am uncomfortable with their expected electoral work.” Bloomberg’s other anti-Second Amendment group, Mayors Against Illegal Guns, was profiled in the March 2014 Organization Trends.

We grieve a longtime supporter of CRC, Kenneth Y. Tomlinson, who died at the age of 69. Tomlinson spent most of his life at the Reader’s Digest, where he retired as editor in chief in 1996. President Reagan nominated him to be director of the Voice of America, and President Clinton named him to the board of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Our condolences to his wife of 39 years, Rebecca Moore Tomlinson, and his family.

Matthew Vadum

The author of Subversion Inc.: How Obama’s ACORN Red Shirts are Still Terrorizing and Ripping Off American Taxpayers (WND Books, 2011), Vadum, former senior vice president at CRC, writes and speaks widely…
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