Ha! This One's Funny!

From today's Tribune-Review:

The George Soros-funded liberal group Media Matters might be violating its tax-exempt educational status by announcing it will engage in "guerrilla warfare and sabotage" against Fox News, says Mark Tapscott of The Examiner in Washington. That's because the group's 501(C)(3) status prohibits partisan political activity. The IRS will nip this in the bud, right? If we had a buck for every snicker just snorted, we'd be rich.

Here's the politico article the Scaife-funded editorial board references. In it, Mark Tapscott writes:

Media Matters, the George Soros-backed liberal agit-prop shock troops based in the nation’s capital, has declared war on Fox News, and in the process quite possibly has stepped across the line of legality.

David Brock, MM’s founder, was quoted Saturday by Politico promising that his organization is mounting “guerrila warfare and sabotage” against Fox News, which he said “is not a news organization. It is the de facto leader of the GOP, and it is long past time that it is treated as such by the media, elected officials and the public.”

To that end, Brock told Politico that MM will “focus on [News Corp. CEO Rupert] Murdoch and trying to disrupt his commercial interests …” Murdoch is the founder of Fox News and a media titan with newspaper, broadcast, Internet and other media countries around the world.

There is nothing in the Politico article to suggest that Brock, who was paid just under $300,000 in 2009, according to the group’s most recently available tax return, has moved to change his organization’s tax status as a 501(C)(3) tax-exempt educational foundation.

Here's the Politico article Tapscott references.

The only problem with this whole argument is that the only way for Fox "News" to defend itself is to declare that it IS a part of the GOP. Fair and balanced, no more.

Even then, it's iffy -because here's what the IRS actually says:

Under the Internal Revenue Code, all section 501(c)(3) organizations are absolutely prohibited from directly or indirectly participating in, or intervening in, any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for elective public office. Contributions to political campaign funds or public statements of position (verbal or written) made on behalf of the organization in favor of or in opposition to any candidate for public office clearly violate the prohibition against political campaign activity. Violating this prohibition may result in denial or revocation of tax-exempt status and the imposition of certain excise taxes.

Certain activities or expenditures may not be prohibited depending on the facts and circumstances. For example, certain voter education activities (including presenting public forums and publishing voter education guides) conducted in a non-partisan manner do not constitute prohibited political campaign activity. In addition, other activities intended to encourage people to participate in the electoral process, such as voter registration and get-out-the-vote drives, would not be prohibited political campaign activity if conducted in a non-partisan manner.

On the other hand, voter education or registration activities with evidence of bias that (a) would favor one candidate over another; (b) oppose a candidate in some manner; or (c) have the effect of favoring a candidate or group of candidates, will constitute prohibited participation or intervention. [emphasis added.]

So unless Mediamatters starts telling people to favor one campaign or set of campaigns looks like they're safe.

Another made up scandal brought to you by the right wing media noise machine.