Chris Tack made seven unloading trips to Goodwill before moving into the tiny home he and his wife Malissa designed and built. Constructed on a trailer bed and parked in Snohomish, Washington, the house is more than enough space for them, the couple says. And one advantage of an abode on wheels is that you can always move, says Malissa.
As the IRS released an 83 page internal review of the political targeting of Tea Party groups, Democrats in Congress leaked out documents which appeared to show the IRS keeping tabs on "anti-Republican" groups as well.
"Common thread is the word "progressive," notes the internal lookout list, which noted that the groups "are partisan and appear as anti-Republican."
In some of the same documents, both progressive and Tea Party groups are listed by the IRS for scrutiny, along with groups that focus on medical marijuana, the Arab-Israeli dispute, the Obama health reform law and more.
The discovery of such "Be On the Look Out" lists (BOLO) aggravated Democrats, as they demanded to know why the internal watchdog at the IRS so forcefully said that only conservative-leaning groups were given the once-over by tax agents.
"The American public expects competent, impartial, unbiased, and non-political treatment from the IRS," said Rep. Sander Levin (D-MI) in a letter to IRS inspector general J. Russell George.
"That same standard is also applicable to you and your organization," Levin fumed.
Republicans said just because the word "progressive" was found on a BOLO list didn't mean that somehow Democratic-leaning groups had been harrassed.
Still, the documents did give Democrats something to push back with, after weeks of a seemingly one-sided investigation that dealt mainly with Tea Party complaints.
As for the 83 page report from the new Acting IRS Chief, you can read that here.
Here are links to a series of IRS "BOLO" lists that were posted by Democrats from the last four years:
Aug. 12, 2010
Nov. 9, 2010
Nov. 16, 2010
Feb. 2, 2011
Feb. 8, 2012
March 23, 2011
June 15, 2012
June 16, 2012
June 25, 2012
Feb. 8, 2012
July 10, 2012
July 11, 2012
April 4, 2013
April 10, 2013
April 19, 2013
One more thing about the 83 page internal IRS review - here are the takeways as authored by the IRS on what they found:
Management and judgment failures contributed to inappropriate treatment of certain taxpayers applying for tax-exempt status.
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Current fact-gathering has found no evidence of intentional wrongdoing.
Current fact-gathering has found no evidence of involvement from anyone outside of the IRS.
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Current fact-gathering has found no evidence of inappropriate criteria in other IRS business unit operations.
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The nine TIGTA recommendations, along with additional actions, will help correct the problems identified in the TIGTA audit report.
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The IRS Commissioner's Office and other leaders across the IRS do not always have sufficient knowledge of emerging risks.
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Existing mechanisms to assist taxpayers, such as the Taxpayer Advocacy Service, are neither well understood nor sufficiently leveraged.
New leadership has been installed at all 5 levels of management responsible for tax-exempt applications, including top IRS leadership.
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A newly created Accountability Review Board will recommend within 60 days any additional personnel actions necessary to hold accountable those responsible for the findings in the TIGTA audit report.
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The use of BOLO lists has been suspended.
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To clear the current backlog, a voluntary, self-certification process is now available to expedite those tax-exemption applicants who have waited longer than 120 days for a decision.
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A new process will assess criteria and screening procedures across the IRS to identify emerging risks.
A new Enterprise Risk Management Program will design a framework for identifying risk areas across the IRS, so that IRS leadership and external stakeholders are aware of such issues.
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The IRS will initiate new education and outreach regarding the role of the National Taxpayer Advocate.
U.S. Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul leaves the Russian Foreign Ministry headquarters in Moscow, Russia, May 15 2013.
By Jim Maceda, Correspondent, NBC News
MOSCOW -- As fugitive National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden evaded capture in Hong Kong and fled to Moscow, disappearing in an airport transit lounge, U.S. Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul was on the front lines of efforts to arrest him.
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According to multiple accounts, McFaul tirelessly worked the phones and social media, focusing pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin to "do the right thing" and hand over the 29-year-old?former NSA-contractor. Putin ? typically defiant ? refused.
It was an odd, confrontational role for a diplomat ??but then again, McFaul isn't a typical one.
Ever since the former Stanford University academic and Russia expert arrived?? about a year and a half ago ??in the Spaso House, the traditional residence for U.S. ambassadors, McFaul has been a lightning rod for Russian anger against the West, and specifically, America.
McFaul, a laid-back, 49-year-old Californian as fluent in Los Angeles Lakers basketball as he is in strategic nuclear arms, likes to say he is "no Cold War soldier."
But he hadn't even unpacked his bags when Russia?s main, Kremlin-controlled TV station Channel One ran a lead story about a group of opposition leaders lining up outside Spaso to meet the man who wrote a book titled "Russia?s Unfinished Revolution."
The reporter suggested McFaul had been appointed by President Barack Obama to finish that business.
McFaul has taken it all in stride: the angry chants of "Down with the U.S. Embassy" at pro-Putin demonstrations; the growing anti-Americanism of Putin?s third term as president; his crackdown on U.S. institutions like USAID and Voice of America; the evisceration of the anti-Putin movement and the jailing of its key leaders.
Recently, there has also been a?tit-for-tat over human rights, with Russians accused of abuses being banned from travel to the United States and Americans prohibited by the Kremlin from adopting Russian children.
Above it all is Russia?s military and financial support for Syrian strongman President Bashar Assad.
But, while many in the Obama administration have been criticized for doing little in the face of Putin?s surge, McFaul has turned into a prodigious blogger and tweeter, slowly winning over the hearts and minds of young Russians with his jovial chatter ??he often tweets in Russian.
For example, the tweet below in Russian says: "President Putin on Snowden: 'the faster he chooses the final destination point, the better it will be for us and for him.'"
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At the same time, McFaul also knows how to pick his fights. When a group of so-called "private security" agents raided the offices of the non-governmental organization For Human Rights and forcibly evicted 71-year-old activist Lev Ponomaryov, leaving him covered in cuts and bruises, McFaul took to Twitter and called the move "another case of intimidation of civil society."
The Putin regime has responded in kind. In May, just as the U.S. ambassador had launched the#AskMcFaul hashtag, a question-and-answer session on Twitter, he was bombarded with questions -- too many to be unplanned -- about the news that Russian authorities had detained a U.S. Embassy employee named Ryan Christopher Fogle.
Fogle allegedly tried to recruit a Russian intelligence agent for the CIA. McFaul managed to ignore the online harassment and focus for a full hour on the positive: good cooperation in law enforcement; the "reset" in U.S.-Russia relations; and his love of the opera. Fogle was later released.
And, this week, even as his boss, Deputy Secretary of State Bill Burns, was named point man for U.S. efforts to arrest Snowden, McFaul has unleashed his rapid-fire tweeting during the latest stand-off over Snowden?s fate. ?
Reacting to Putin?s claim that he couldn't extradite the American because there was no such treaty between the United States and Russia, McFaul fired off this reminder: "Over last 5 yrs US has returned 1,700 Russian citizens to Russia w/ 500+ of them being criminal deportations" ??a?shrewd talking point followed by more chatter about basketball.
In the end, Snowden may well escape, finding asylum in Ecuador or elsewhere. But it won?t be for lack of effort from America?s unlikely man in Moscow, battling ??and taking the knocks ??from behind the scenes.
Jim Maceda is an NBC News correspondent based in London, currently on assignment in Moscow.?
The NSA leaker is traveling to Moscow en route to a third country. Russian President Vladimir Putin's spokesman told journalists Sunday that he knows nothing of Snowden's travel plans.
By Fred Weir,?Correspondent / June 23, 2013
A giant screen at a Hong Kong shopping mall shows Edward Snowden, the former contractor accused of leaking information about NSA surveillance programs. He left Hong Kong on Sunday.
Vincent Yu/AP
Enlarge
The fugitive National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden has sprung yet another surprise. He's on the move, and reportedly traveling to Cuba, and then perhaps on to Venezuela or Ecuador, via Moscow.
Skip to next paragraph Fred Weir
Correspondent
Fred Weir has been the Monitor's Moscow correspondent, covering Russia and the former Soviet Union, since 1998.?
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Mr. Snowden left his temporary refuge in Hong Kong?Sunday?morning, just one day after the US government charged him with espionage and launched an urgent effort to extradite him from the former British colony. He boarded an Aeroflot flight to Moscow, and news reports say he has an onward ticket with the Russian national airline to fly to Cuba?on Monday.
In addition to the clear suggestion of official Russian aid with the fleeing whistleblower's logistics, Snowden appears to have received help from a more kindred source. WikiLeaks tweeted?Sunday?that it had "assisted Mr. Snowden's political asylum in a democratic country, travel papers and safe exit from Hong Kong."
Kremlin authorities earlier hinted that Russia might be willing to grant asylum to Snowden. But President Vladimir Putin's spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, told journalists?Sunday?that he knows nothing about the NSA leaker's travel plans.
Authorities in Hong Kong announced Snowden's departure?Sunday?in an official statement?that noted he had left "on his own accord for a third country through a lawful and normal channel," and added that US authorities had already been informed.
The statement said the urgent US warrant to arrest Snowden could not be carried out "since the documents provided by the US Government did not fully comply with the legal requirements under Hong Kong law.... ?As the HKSAR [Hong Kong] Government has yet to have sufficient information to process the request for provisional warrant of arrest, there is no legal basis to restrict Mr Snowden from leaving Hong Kong."
The statement included an extraordinary passage that may go far toward explaining why Hong Kong, which does have an extradition treaty and good relations with the US, appears to have turned so uncooperative in Snowden's case: "Meanwhile, the HKSAR Government has formally written to the US Government requesting clarification on earlier reports about the hacking of computer systems in Hong Kong by US government agencies. The HKSAR Government will continue to follow up on the matter so as to protect the legal rights of the people of Hong Kong."
Wikileaks founder Julian Assange said in a statement?Sunday?that his organization was providing legal and logistical help to move Snowden to a safe haven in a "democratic country."
"Mr. Snowden is flying in an Aeroflot aircraft over Russian airspace, accompanied by WikiLeaks legal advisers," Mr. Assange said.
Upon arrival in Moscow he will be "met by diplomats from the country that will be his ultimate destination. Diplomats from that country will accompany him on a further flight to his destination," he added. The third country is still not named, but experts say it's most likely to be Venezuela or Ecuador.
"Owing to WikiLeaks' own circumstances, we have developed significant expertise in international asylum and extradition law, associated diplomacy and the practicalities in these matters," Assange said.?"I have great personal sympathy for Ed Snowden's position. WikiLeaks absolutely supports his decision to blow the whistle on the mass surveillance of the world's population by the US government."
Snowden's latest revelations, published in Hong Kong's South China Morning Post?on Sunday, indicate that US intelligence agencies have been hacking Chinese mobile phone companies to steal millions of text messages.
Russian security expert Andrei Soldatov, who edits Agentura.ru, an online journal that focuses on the secret services, says that in addition to granting Snowden safe passage to Cuba on an Aeroflot jetliner, Russia may have played a deeper role in helping to arrange his flight.
He suggests that the Kremlin's English-language satellite news network, RT, which enjoys very close relations with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, could have used its offices to help Wikileaks hook up with Snowden in Hong Kong,?
"There are reports that Assange's assistant, Sarah Harrison, is flying on the same plane with Snowden," says Mr. Soldatov.?"Involvement of RT would make sense, since RT has close cooperation with Assange, and he did a series of programs for them last year [Russia gives WikiLeaks' Julian Assange a TV platform]. The involvement of WikiLeaks requires no explanation. It wants to maintain itself as the key center for all disclosures of the kind that Snowden brought to the world," he adds.?
Soldatov says Russian assistance is also logical, for wider reasons than just an opportunity to stick it to Uncle Sam.
"Russia and China have been involved in a so-far unsuccessful struggle to change the rules of the Internet, by taking control of it away from the US-based Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) and giving its functions to a wider, non-US-based entity," he says.
"The Russians and Chinese have been posing, for these purposes, as big defenders of Internet freedom. This political context helps to explain RT's close relations with WikiLeaks as well.... So, it makes sense for them to help Snowden too. Russian authorities see an opportunity to present themselves as the new center of refuge for whistleblowers against US dominance in Cyberspace. It's a coup for them," he adds.??
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) ? As President Barack Obama prepares to visit East Africa, nearly 15 years after terrorists bombed two U.S. embassies here, a former U.S. ambassador to Kenya says he worries that security at the Nairobi embassy has become "complacent."
Obama is scheduled on Monday to visit Dar es Salaam, the commercial capital of Tanzania, which along with Nairobi was the site of near-simultaneous embassy attacks in August 1998. The bombings combined killed 224 people, mostly Kenyans. A dozen Americans died.
Scott Gration, the immediate past U.S. ambassador in Nairobi and a retired U.S. Air Force major general, said that during one period of his yearlong tenure as ambassador he didn't think that security was had the priority it should have been given. He said he thinks the problem has been rectified.
Danny Alexander: "We are putting long-term priorities before short-term political pressures"
Plans for a ?100bn modernisation of the UK's infrastructure, including new homes, road repairs and improved flood protection, have been announced.
The package, of which ?50bn will come in 2015-16, is also aimed at boosting new sources of energy like shale gas.
Treasury Minister Danny Alexander said the plans put "long-term priorities before short-term political pressures".
But Labour said projects must start now and capital investment in the engine of the economy was actually falling.
The announcement of the government's infrastructure plans came a day after Wednesday's Spending Review, in which ?11.5bn of cuts to Whitehall departments were spelt out.
While the first ?50bn is committed to infrastructure projects starting in 2015-16, the rest is for the period from 2016 to 2020.
The main funding commitments include:
?3bn to build 165,000 new affordable homes
?28bn for road improvements, including ?10bn for essential maintenance
?10bn to clear a "backlog" of school building repairs
850 miles of railway to be electrified as part of ?30bn rail investment
?250m for extended super-fast broadband to rural areas
?370m for flood defences. Agreement with industry to provide affordable insurance for flood-hit homes
?800m extra funding for Green Investment Bank
?150m for health research including into dementia
?100m for a new prison in Wales
"This is an ambitious plan to build an infrastructure that Britain can be proud of," Mr Alexander told MPs.
The road building programme was the largest for 40 years and the support for new homes the most substantial for more than two decades, he said.
As part of efforts to boost home building, government-owned land will be sold to the private sector and together with sales of other government assets, including the Student Loans book, would raise ?15bn.
There will be new support to help the building of new nuclear plants, including Hinkley Point in Somerset, a guaranteed price for offshore wind energy and tax incentives brought in for shale gas projects.
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Spending Review Documents
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His speech came as a report was being published showing that the UK's shale gas reserves were greater than previously thought.
The transport plans focused mainly on roads and railways.
'Road decay'
Mr Alexander said ?10bn would be spent on dealing with the UK's "decaying" road network, with 21,000 miles of roads to be resurfaced and new lanes to be added to the busiest stretches of motorways.
Among the most significant projects, the ?1.5bn upgrading of the A14 between Huntingdon and Cambridge will be brought forward by two years to 2016.
Mr Alexander said the spending on roads was equivalent to the cost of filling 19m potholes.
On rail, he restated plans to electrify large parts of the network and increased the budget for the proposed HS2 line connecting London and seven of the largest ten UK cities, to more than ?42bn.
Osborne: "We've got a long-term plan now as a country to up our national game"
He also confirmed that ?2m feasibility funding would be provided for London's proposed Crossrail 2 project, but said Mayor Boris Johnson's challenge was to work out how the private sector could meet at least half the cost of the scheme.
He also said the basis of an agreement had been reached with the insurance industry for it to pay for a new scheme to help 500,000 homeowners in areas prone to serious flooding to get cover at reasonable prices.
Earlier, Mr Osborne told BBC Breakfast that "you cannot just build a road in a week" but new homes, schools and roads were already finished and the coalition had a "long-term plan" rather than the "stop-start" approach of previous governments.
On energy, he said shale gas was "environmentally safe" and could provide "cheap energy" for many years to come - but that projects - criticised by environmental campaigners - would need to get the appropriate planning approvals.
'Act now'
But shadow chancellor Ed Balls said most of the projects would not begin for four years.
"They should do an immediate boost for housing and transport this year and next," he told ITV's Daybreak.
Ed Balls: "The international monetary fund says a ?10bn boost is needed now"
"George Osborne talks about capital spending but he's not actually acting.
"I don't think the public buy into this at all - I think people see their living standards falling, tax cuts for millionaires, the economy flatlining, unemployment high. The plan has completely failed."
The ?50bn for 2015-16 represents a real-terms fall of 1.7% from the infrastructure budget for 2014-15 but the coalition says the figure is still higher than the one Labour was planning when it lost power in 2010.
'Rarely delivered'
Green Party MP Caroline Lucas said spending was being directed towards "polluting high-carbon infrastructure" such as roads and shale gas instead of prioritising jobs in renewable energy and energy efficiency,
The British Chambers of Commerce welcomed the announcement but said it must quickly be translated into action.
"Infrastructure projects are too often promised and too rarely delivered in this country, and that cycle must be broken," director of policy Adam Marshall said.
"The Whitehall machine must be judged by the number of diggers on the ground, not strategies and press notices."
In Wednesday's Spending Review, the chancellor said the economy was "out of intensive care" and announced several measures aimed at saving money, including:
President Obama is heading to South Africa from Senegal as part of his African tour, where Nelson Mandela's daughter says he might visit Mandela if doctors approve. NBC's Keir Simmons reports.
By Stacey Klein and Ian Johnston, NBC News
Barack Obama said Friday that he did not need a ?photo op? with Nelson Mandela, saying the ?last thing? he wanted to do was be intrusive at a time when the anti-apartheid icon?s family are concerned about his health.
However, the president did not rule out a meeting with Mandela, whose ex-wife Winnie Madikizela-Mandela said Friday had made a ?great improvement? compared to a few days ago.
On Tuesday, Mandela's daughter Zindzi said that her father ?opened his eyes and gave me a smile? when she told him Obama was coming.
Speaking about her ex-husband Nelson Mandela, Winnie Mandela says, 'From what he was a few days ago, there is great improvement' in the former South African president's condition.
Speaking on Air Force One as he flew to South Africa from Senegal, Obama said that ?we?ll see what the situation is when we land.?
?I don't need photo op," he said. "The last thing I want to do is be intrusive at a time when the family is concerned? with Mandela?s condition.
He said the main message he wanted to deliver was ?profound gratitude? for Mandela?s leadership and to say that ?the thoughts and prayers of the American people are with him, his family and his country.?
This message could be delivered to his family and not directly to Mandela, the president said.
On Thursday, Obama said he had already had the "privilege of meeting Madiba [Mandela's clan name] and speaking to him."
"And he's a personal hero, but I don't think I'm unique in that regard," Obama added. "If and when he passes from this place, one thing I think we'll all know is that his legacy is one that will linger on throughout the ages."
Madikizela-Mandela, speaking outside Mandela's former home in the Johannesburg township of Soweto, said her ex-husband seemed to be getting better.
?I?m not a doctor but I can say that from what he was a few days ago there is great improvement," she said.
When asked by NBC News Special Correspondent Charlayne Hunter-Gault?whether the family would welcome a visit by Obama, Zindzi Mandela said Thursday she wasn't aware of any formal request. However, she added that decision would be left with doctors treating the Nobel Peace Prize laureate.
Ahead of his arrival in Johannesburg on Friday, an anti-Obama protest was held not far from the hospital where Mandela is being treated with one demonstrator claiming the U.S. president had been a ?disappointment.?
Siphiwe Sibeko / Reuters
Protesters protest the visit of President Barack Obama in Pretoria Friday. One said he viewed Obama as a "disappointment" and thought Nelson Mandela would too.
Reuters reported that nearly 1,000 trade unionists, Muslim activists, South African Communist Party members and others marched to the U.S. Embassy where they burned a U.S. flag, calling Obama's foreign policy ?arrogant and oppressive.?
"We had expectations of America's first black president. Knowing Africa's history, we expected more,? Khomotso Makola, a 19-year-old law student, told Reuters. He said Obama was a ?disappointment, I think Mandela too would be disappointed and feel let down.?
South African critics of Obama have focused in particular on his support for U.S. drone strikes overseas, which they say have killed hundreds of innocent civilians, and his failure to deliver on a pledge to close the U.S. military detention center at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba housing terrorism suspects.
However, Nigerian painter Sanusi Olatunji, 31, had brought portraits of both Mandela and Obama to add to a growing number of flowers, tribute notes and gifts outside the hospital.
?These are the two great men of my lifetime,? he told Reuters. ?To me, Mandela is a prophet who brought peace and opportunity. He made it possible for a black man like me to live in a country that was only for whites.?
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View images of civil rights leader Nelson Mandela, who went from anti-apartheid activist to prisoner to South Africa's first black president.
In the latest statement on Mandela?s condition, South African President Jacob Zuma said the 94-year-old was ?much better? on Thursday than he had been the previous night. "The medical team continues to do a sterling job," he added.
A statement issued by Zuma?s office said he and Obama would hold ?crucial bilateral talks that will take forward relations between the two countries? on Saturday.
?South Africa values its warm and mutually beneficial relationship with the United States immensely. This is a significant visit which will take political, economic and people to people relations between the two countries to a higher level, while also enhancing cooperation between U.S. and the African continent at large,? it said.
The statement noted Obama?s visit was being made as South Africa prepares to celebrate ?20 years of freedom? ? 1994 saw the first elections in the country in which all its citizens were eligible to vote. Mandela voted for the first time in his life in that year and was elected the country?s first black president, serving until 1999.
?South Africa greatly appreciates the solidarity provided by the Anti-Apartheid Movement in the United States during the struggle for liberation,? the statement said.
Reuters contributed to this report.
Related:
This story was originally published on Fri Jun 28, 2013 5:05 AM EDT
