Meat in front of mad dogs

This should be interesting. The "mad dog" (affectionately speaking) right wing is foaming about various NGOs and the first one up that I notice is the The Nature Conservancy.

Tyler Cowen at Volokh notes a WaPo story (seemingly with delight, characterizing the "details" as "gory" --- I found the on-line story rather sketchy):

Further scandal at The Nature Conservancy: The IRS is starting a large-scale audit of The Nature Conservancy, one of the largest non-profits in the nation.

I don't know what if anything TNC has done or not done. Let the chips fall where they may. If TNC has violated the law then the appropriate penalties should apply. But let's bear one thing in mind folks, TNC is the most corporate-like environmental group. It is a bastion of capitalism and uses free-market methods to preserve land, which is a good thing in my mind i.e. if the public really want to preseve land, buy it.

Nor do I do know anyone at TNC or much about its personnel but I suspect that the corporate culture is inspired more by the Fortune 500 than by the Earth Liberation Front. So when the foamers attack it, they are really atttacking themselves.

Moreover, and this does not excuse either errors of omission or commission, when you are managing $3 billion you will make mistakes. Read the story linked above carefully. Some of the procedures identified -- selling to board members without a public announcement etc --- seems indiscrete in this era if probably legal. But selling land at a price which reflects its decreased utility (due to self-imposed restrictions) well that's the whole idea. From the WaPo story here:

The stories also reported that the Conservancy had repeatedly bought land, added some development restrictions, then resold the properties at reduced prices to its trustees and other supporters. The buyers made cash gifts to the Conservancy roughly equal to the difference in price, thereby qualifying for substantial tax deductions.

Duh. That's what TNC is supposed to do. If this practice has been abused, flush it out. (I would like to see the TNC put these properties up for public bid -- might get even more money -- but that might not be workable if the buyer is also the current land-owner.) But on its face, I don't see the issue. If TNC has violated the law, bad.

But if TNC is simply using the tax laws to get results you don't like (i.e. preserving land), tough nuggies. You set up the game, you play by the rules.

But as I said, let the chips fall but I surmise that this is Republicans cannibalizing themselves and cleaning house internally to get rid of any vestige of decency in the Party.

Anyone know more? Let 'er rip. If this investigation is truly aimed at reforming a worthwhile organization and making it work better in the public interest, send me a nice hat to eat.

UPDATE: Well I don't know Tyler Cowen and so if anyone assumed that I meant to lump him in as a 'mad dog' Republican, I apologize. But I thought his characterization of the scanty details at the WaPo story as "gory" would allow such a humorous characterization in return. I see I was wrong and people are in a very serious mood today. Lighten up, folks. Describing the few details as the WaPo stories contained as "gory" was abolutely straight-up and unbiased. (Though in reality he may have meant it lightly, too.)

Nevertheless, there is such a thing as 'mad dog' Republicans. I assume that none of my readers are; but let me warn you -- they are out there.

Comments

[TM Lutas]

Sorry, I'm inclined to agree with Thomas. You started the intemperateness with the title. Was it really necessary to label these people "mad dogs"? Dehumanization of your political opponents over tax law is just not justified.

Furthermore, there is something of a history here dating back to the Clintons that people on the right need to watch out for. The Clinton administration was accused (and statistical analysis of nonprofit audits provides prima facie support to the accusation) of using the tax code to 'get' conservative nonprofits. The black joke at the time was made up of polite inquiries of whether a major anti-Clinton broadside had produced an audit inquiry yet. Too often, the response was either yes, or that an audit had just been completed.

The responsible right needs to keep a watch out that this doesn't descend into tit for tat misuse during the Bush administration. By using such incendiary terms, you are encouraging a 'closing of the ranks'. That's, at the very least, unfortunate and not helpful to maintaining a civil society. By giving political cover to those who would like to launch tit for tat strikes, it would be proper, in my opinion, to characterize it as deranged, if only mildly so.

The second article giving details seems to lay out a case where the Washington Post (that right wing bastion of conservativism? Hah!) investigated and uncovered wrongdoing by The Nature Conservatory. TNC fessed up and changed its practices, and now the IRS is seeing whether there's any tax liability to go along with that. This seems an easy slam dunk as the public admissions by TNC make the chances of hitting a dry hole much lower than a random audit.

The relevant question is whether this is tit for tat or legitimate business as usual for the IRS auditing team. Injecting dubious accusations that TNC is a Republican organization (as if there weren't Democrat oriented corporate boards, yeah right) and that Republicans are on a quest to eliminate any decency that might have crept into their party is insulting and offensive.

The fact is that both major political parties have their decent members and their scoundrels. Your act of dipping into the gutter to sling mud does not help the decent in their fight against the scoundrels in either party.

[David Sucher]

Sorry about that. I just simply don't see that the Republican party is controlled at the present time by men I can respect. Wish it were otherwise as i certainly find it hard to tolerate the Democrats. But when it comes to bs, I think the Republicans more than edge them out.

[TM Lutas]

This is the kind of mean spiritedness that makes crossing partisan boundaries hard, Thomas. Don't dive right after him into the gutter. Talking about his "last vestiges of sanity" just wasn't called for.

On the other hand, the idea is usually that at least some sort of evidence of wrongdoing before it is appropriate to accuse someone, even criminals. That TNC apparently has stepped in some financial dog poop does not automatically make their audit a Republican plot or any relevant statement on Republican leadership decency.

There is a delicate balance of instilling a higher level of decency, honor, and civic discourse in a free society's polity. It is largely one of omission, where each side avoids taking cheap shots at the other side while trying to policy your own side of the foamers who would drag everybody down into the gutter.

As far as I know, there are no calls for widespread audits of left-wing oriented NGOs because of the lack of decency, honor, or honesty in that part of the ideological spectrum and if there were, I would expect such intemperate talk to be put down hard from within the elite arbiters of opinion within the right itself.

There is something of a moral obligation to lever yourself out of the gutter if the other side is making visible efforts to do so. Those who ignore that moral obligation usually get hammered for it electorally so there's practical teeth to the custom.

You also may consider the reputation of new urbanism as something of a lefty cause. Do you really want to reinforce that perception? Do you really want to associate it with the sort of down-market leftism that is so unsupportedly conspiratorial?

[back40]

There's a longer history of problems at TNC and it didn't begin with tax/legal issues, it began with effectiveness issues related to lack of normal measuring, monitoring and reporting controls. This post discusses the problem and has links to published material.

[David Sucher]

Back40's comment and interesting post -- I urge all to read it --- suggest all the more that an IRS audit is odd.

Disagree with TNC's management decisions; but such disagreement is covered by the 'business judgment rule' which accepts a wide variety of reasonable managerial responses to specific situations i.e. one can disagree with the manner in which TNC has gotten into bed with corporate America.

But though one might disagree, its seem a reasonable way to fulfill the organization's mission of preserving key landscapes. Maybe not the best or even particularly lucid. But courts will not interfere with the decisions of a management group (either public or private) when the decisions are fairly debatable. And that's a pretty low standard.

So, unless there is something illegal (as opposed to simply which might look bad) about TNC making deals with insiders, then I don't think the audit will do anything except fire a shot across the bows of moderate Republicans.

[TM Lutas]

While TNC's board does trend somewhat Republican, it's not really all that accurate to call them a Republican organization. They have a fair share of people who don't donate to political causes as well as plenty of Democrats on the Board.

The question of effectiveness is a legal issue as well as a practical one. You have to actually contribute a certain amount to your charitable field otherwise you lose your tax status with the IRS. But back40's posts really don't address whether an audit is justified. He's merely bringing up the fact that TNC has other problems that have nothing to do with the audit.

Just because Al Capone was a gangster, murderer, extortioner, bootlegger, and ran illegal betting operations doesn't mean that it was fundamentally wrong to put him away on tax charges. The Nature Conservancy is no Al Capone, far from it. But their actions or lack thereof in terms of effectiveness of conservation, business controls, success metrics, or overhead expense ratios have little to do with whether or not they deserve auditing.

In due time, the audit report will come out and we'll have enough information to better judge the situation.

[back40]

"...I don't think the audit will do anything except fire a shot across the bows of moderate Republicans."

Won't it shiver the timbers of every NGO, especially those who really do have skeletons in their closets as well as nailed to the mast?

[David Sucher]

Oh of course it will do that, back40, but those folks are already hostile and even fearful of Bush. And if they have done something wrong --- and that may I emphasise is NOT a matter of policies with which one disagrees -- then that's fine with me. ALL NGOs have to be held accountable.

But I am trying to illuminate some subtle poiitical nuances. Look, all that the audit of TNC is going to do is make it easier for TNC's left-wing opponents to hold up TNC as mis-guided. Plus, it will put a dampener on rich people donating because they don't want to have a spotlight on their business dealings, no matter how clean.