Complaints filed with IRS on Hannity and North charity

Complaints filed with IRS on Hannity and North charity

Two weeks ago conservative blogger Debbie Schlussel alleged that Sean Hannity’s Freedom Concerts were “a huge scam,” then Sean Hannity and the Freedom Alliance quickly and quietly dismissed her as a kook who was trying to make a name for herself, and the Main Stream Media never bothered to pick the story up.

But they will now.

It appears that there is merit to her accusations and Debbie Schlussel may get the last word.

Today, CREW (Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington) filed complaints with both the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) against Sean Hannity, his Freedom Concerts, the Freedom Alliance and Lt. Col. Oliver North.

The Freedom Alliance was founded by Col. Oliver North Ret. (Fox News Host) to raise money to support the troops and their children through Freedom Concerts along with private donations, have raised millions over the last several years.

“FTC complaint alleges Hannity and Freedom Concerts have engaged in illegal and deceptive marketing practices by suggesting that all money generated by ticket sales for the Freedom Concerts he sponsors each summer goes to scholarships for children of killed and wounded service members. In fact, the concerts are staged by Premiere Marketing, which is headed by Duane Ward – also the head of Premiere Speakers Bureau, which exclusively represents Mr. Hannity and Lt. Col. North. After staging the concerts, Premiere donates an unknown portion of the concert proceeds to the Freedom Alliance.”

“IRS complaint against Freedom Alliance asks the IRS to consider revoking its charitable tax status because the organization has engaged in prohibited political activities. When Freedom Alliance first formed in 1999, the IRS conditioned its charitable tax status on the organization removing politically partisan materials from its website and warned it not to intervene in political campaigns. Despite those warnings, Freedom Alliance’s website includes links to Lt. Col. North’s columns, which are largely political, rents its mailing list to a communications firm that works for organizations that “seek to reach Republicans and conservatives across the United States,” and hosts an annual “Freedom Cruise” with Republican politicians such as former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele. In addition, Freedom Alliance appears to have a relationship with Team America, a PAC formed by Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-CO), dedicated to anti-immigration efforts and supporting conservative candidates.”

When Hannity promotes the Freedom Concerts on his TV and Radio shows he says, “Every penny, 100 percent of the donations are applied to the Freedom Alliance scholarship fund.”

The 2006 tax returns for the Freedom Alliance proves that Sean Hannity is lying about “every penny, 100 percent” going to the Freedom Alliance scholarship fund”. (See more tax returns covering other years for the Freedom Alliance in the related documents below)

Sean Hannity has said very little about this other than to say “its not true“, conservative websites such as Newsbusters have posted their support of Hannity and a statement from the president of the Freedom Alliance, Thomas P. Kilgannon who surprisingly also says its not true.

While Sean Hannity and Col. Oliver North may wish these allegations would go away, they will not being going away any time soon since the complaints have been filed with the IRS and the FTC.

More to follow in the coming weeks and months.


Related Documents (PDF)

* 3/29/10 - Freedom Alliance FTC Complaint - Citations // 14.3 mb
* 3/29/10 - Freedom Alliance FTC Complaint and Exhibits // 5 mb
* 3/29/10 - Freedom Alliance IRS Complaint - Citations // 9.5 mb
* 3/29/10 - Freedom Alliance IRS Complaint // 2.2 mb

Tea Party protesters In D.C. against Health Care Reform (Video)

Tea Party protesters In D.C. against Health Care Reform (Video)
By: David Phillips
Las Vegas Democrat Examiner

This past Tuesday about 300 hundred Tea Party teabaggers gathered in Washington DC to protest Health Care Reform and to hear some speech’s from a few republicans who help fan the flames.

The protest rally was labeled the "Code Red Health Care Rally," and featured a bevy of Republican speakers, including Reps. Mike Pence (R-IN), Michele Bachmann, (R-MN) Tom Price (R-GA) and Marsha Blackburn, (R-TN).

Red meat was spewed to the crowd along with lies and misinformation that is echoed by Fox and the right wing noise machine. The protest rally was a perfect example of how Fox has led these people like sheep, and who can only speak in broad generalizations because that is what they get from Fox. And to Fox's credit, they drilled their lies into their heads so well that they ALL speak exactly the same talking points and when asked for any specifics, they all say they don't know. They say its a government take over of health care, but they don't know how it’s a government take only that it is, because that is what they have been told.

Why, Fox and republican politicians do not speak to the facts, in fact, they use absolutely no facts, just their twisted opinions smeared onto placards that have ten words or less so they can be easily remember by a right wing audience.

The people in the video you are about to watch will tell you exactly what I just said in their own words.

This New Left Media film was produced and edited by Chase Whiteside (interviews) and Erick Stoll (camera).

Click Here to Watch Video

The ugly Tea Party

This past Tuesday the republican backed “ National Honk Against Health Care Takeover Day” took place in cities across America. Angry Tea Party protesters were asked to drive to their nearest congressional district office and drive around honking their horns at precisely 12 noon.

The Tea Party teabaggers who are now well known for their crudeness which they proudly put on display last summer in dozens of protests, and who have shown that they have a total misunderstanding of why we need health care reform, or any other reforms for that matter, have again reminded the nation why they are seen as a populist group with no moral foundations and a deep seeded hate for their fellow Americans.

The video you are about to watch took place this past Tuesday March 16, 2010 in Columbus, OH near the office of Rep. Mary Jo Kilroy (D-OH) at a counter protest by Democrats in what they called “Honk and Wave in Support of Health Care”. The counter protests were also planned for cities across the country.

The Columbus Dispatch video from the “Honk and Wave in Support of Health Care” contains a segment where teabaggers mock and scorn an apparent Parkinson's victim telling him "he's in the wrong end of town to ask for handouts", calling him a communist and throwing money at him to "pay for his health care".

This all took place outside the office of Rep. Kilroy.

Conservative says Reid should “pull the plug” on his wife

Conservative says Reid should “pull the plug” on his wife
By: David Phillips
Las Vegas Democrat Examiner

A couple of days ago both the wife and daughter of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) were rushed to the hospital after they were rear-ended by a tractor trailer in a minivan while traveling on I-95 near Washington.

Landra Reid the Senators wife suffered a broken neck, broken back and a broken nose, Reid’s daughter Lana suffered cuts to her face.

Landra Reid had surgery and is expected to recover without any permanent paralysis.

Dan Riehl a conservative writer posted a story on his blog titled, “Isn't It Time To Euthanize Reid's Wife?”  The article is about as repugnant as it gets, and the comments (below article) left by his readers are just as disgusting.

Right wing talking heads keep saying that they don’t see the hate that the Democrats and Liberals see coming from conservatives. And on the rare occasion were they have to concede that someone did say or do something that was sick and laced in hate and violence, they say that it is a rarity and its just one or two people on the far right fringe that say and do acts of hate and violence.

Well, its not a rarity it is happening more and more frequently and openly and those in the right wing media as well as the so called main stream media, don’t say a word unless someone is killed.

Dan Riehl is all about fueling hate and fanning flames and unfortunately he too, is not a rarity.

Nevada Tea Party candidate Jon Ashjian files for Reid’s Senate seat

Yesterday in Carson City the Nevada Tea Party’s candidate Jon Scott Ashjian filed for the November ballot, and will contest the U.S. Senate seat currently held by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV).

The Nevada Tea Party has created some controversy as other Tea Party organizations accuse the Nevada Tea Party candidate of being a stalking-horse for Senator Reid in order to siphon votes from the Republican candidate that will be on the ballot.

Ashjian appeared on Jon Ralston’s show Face to Face yesterday and Ralston asked him if he was a plant for Senator Reid and he said “no“, he’s never even met the man.

And in a short interview with Jon Ashjian that appears in the Nevada News Bureau in a blog by Elizabeth Crum, she writes; “To my Readers who are convinced that Ashjian is a Reid plant designed to pull votes from the GOP candidate: I am not convinced that this is so.”

In a recent poll done for the Review-Journal, a conservative paper in Las Vegas that is openly hostile to Senator Reid, the poll shows that both front runners from the Republican Party, Sue Lowden and Danny Tarkanian have a double digit lead over Senator Reid.

• Lowden 52%
• Reid 39%

• Tarkanian 51%
• Reid 40%

But when the poll includes a third contestant from the Nevada Tea Party, a dramatic change appears.

• Harry Reid 36%
• Republican 32%
• Tea Party 18%

So it’s understandable why Tea Party members here in Nevada not associated with the Nevada Tea Party might want to see a conspiracy, real or not.

Another point or conspiracy to consider, is that the GOP has planted operatives here who are trying to discredit the Nevada Tea Party, because they know that a vote for a Tea Party candidate, is a vote lost by the Republican candidate. So the Republican Party has a vested interest in declaring that this group is a fraud and a front for Senator Reid.

Sarah Palin recently told the Tea Party faithful that they are not strong enough to field their own candidates and that they need to pick a party, either the “R” or the “D”, and she told that that she would prefer that they pick the “R”, of course.

The Republican Party leaders have been trying to figure out ways to sway the Tea Party followers into the GOP, and discrediting candidates backed by various Tea Parties across the country will most certainly be part of their political strategies

Sen. Jim Bunning continues stand against unemployed

Today Senator Jim Bunning (R-KY) continued objections to unemployment benefits extension, COBRA extensions and funding for highways by blocking the Senate from voting, again.

Last Friday Senator Bunning held a mini-filibuster to prevented the Senate from voting on a unemployment and health care extension bill that also including funds for State highway projects. Bunning’s actions have since cause the furlough of 2,000 transportation workers, halted construction on 41 economic recovery projects in 17 states, halted 400,000 Americans from relieving unemployment checks and forced doctors to take big cuts in Medicare payments and left 1.2 million jobless Americans without COBRA.

On Monday Senator Bunning spent most of the day avoiding the press and sometimes even running from the press as he flipped them the bird.

Today Bunning spoke out in an attempted to justify his callus regards towards American workers by reading a letter from a constituent that stands with him that it was OK to put people out of work and to keep those out of work from being able to eat and look for work.

"One single Republican senator is standing in the way of unemployment benefits for 400,000 Americans," Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) said from the Senate floor

"One single Republican senator has put posturing before people, politics before families and point-scoring before the needs of struggling Americans," she said. "The American people are sick of this, and the backlash to the blockage of this bill is evidence of that."

Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-NY) said 54,000 people in his state, the most seriously affected, will lose unemployment benefits this week if Bunning continues to block the extensions. "It is vital, vital, vital that we move this forward," he said.

White House spokesman Robert Gibbs on Tuesday this morning told a morning meeting with reporters, “I don’t know how you negotiate with the irrational.”

And the GOP can’t understand how Americans could possibly see them as obstructionists

Tea Party Express: Obama is “our half-white, racist President”

Mark Williams one of the leaders of the Tea Party Express and a conservative radio host sent out an e-mail to his associates where he called Obama, “our half-white, racist President”

TPMmuckraker obtained the e-mail sent last September by Mark Williams in which he was trying to respond to allegations of racism. Amazingly this right wing flame thrower didn’t even understand that he tried to defend the claim that he’s a racist, by calling the President of the United States “our half-white, racist President”.

Some Tea Party organizations know that the Tea Party Express is a GOP-affiliated AstroTurf operation that has nothing to do with grassroots Tea party members, but there are even more that have aligned themselves with the populist movement who have no clue.

And it is fake groups like the Tea Party Express that cause main stream America to think that the majority of those in the populist movement are racists as well as right wing extremists.

Robin Stublen, a Tea Party organizer who runs the Punta Gorda Tea Party in Florida, told The Huffington Post: "Mark Williams is not someone I would want being my spokesman. He comes off as an arrogant, self promoting, egotistical jerk. In politics, people like Mark Williams are a dime a dozen, even when you factor in inflation."

The Tea Party Express has logged thousands of miles on their bus and have appeared in many cities and towns across America where they help to perpetuate racism. Of course there are some other Tea Party groups that keep the racial hate alive. Maybe they got the idea from Mark Williams and the Tea Party Express at some of their stops along the highways and byways of America.

And this is not the first time Mark Williams used racism, racial overtones and hate towards President Barack Obama. Last September while on CNN (watch video here), Anderson Cooper called Mark Williams out and said to him “on your blog you call the President [Obama] an Indonesian Muslim turned welfare thug and a racist in chief."

The Tea Party Express is supported by "Our Country Deserves Better PAC," it operates out of the Republican Strategy firm Russo Marsh. Their mission is to stir anti-government sentiment amongst the masses, promote protest rallies and drive a wedge into the fabric of our nation in order to get votes for the GOP.

There is a motto that dates back to the time of the American Revolution, “United We Stand, and Divided We Fall”, but groups like The Tea Party Express, right wing talking heads and even Republicans in Congress see it differently, their motto is, “Divide We Rule“.

And divided we are.

Those that want to divide America and keep us divided, are un-American, and they have no problem using Americans as cannon fodder to keep us divided.

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