By Christie Thompson, ProPublica

In his State of the Union address, President Obama returned to a point he'd made on election night: The need to do something about long voting lines. Obama announced his plan for a commission to "improve the voting experience in America."

But often missing from discussions about how to make voting easier is the rapid expansion of absentee balloting. Letting people vote from home means fewer people queuing up at overburdened polling places. So why hasn't vote-by-mail been heralded as the solution?

When it comes to absentee and mail-in voting, researchers and voting rights advocates aren't sure the convenience is worth the potential for hundreds of thousands of rejected ballots.

Although Oregon and Washington are the only two states to conduct elections entirely by mail, absentee voting has expanded rapidly nationwide. Since 1980, the number of voters using absentee ballots has more than tripled. Roughly one in five votes is now absentee.

Twenty-seven states and the District of Columbia allow voters to request an absentee ballot for any reason, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. That's up from the six states that did so in 1988, according to the Pew Charitable Trusts.

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By Kim Barker, ProPublica

In a confidential 2010 filing, Crossroads GPS — the dark money group that spent more than $70 million from anonymous donors on the 2012 election — told the Internal Revenue Service that its efforts would focus on public education, research and shaping legislation and policy.

The group's application for recognition as a social welfare nonprofit acknowledged that it would spend money to influence elections, but said "any such activity will be limited in amount, and will not constitute the organization's primary purpose."

Political insiders and campaign-finance watchdogs have long questioned how Crossroads, the brainchild of GOP strategist Karl Rove, had characterized its intentions to the IRS.

Now, for the first time, ProPublica has obtained the group's application for recognition of tax-exempt status, filed in September 2010. The IRS has not yet recognized Crossroads GPS as exempt, causing some tax experts to speculate that the agency is giving the application extra scrutiny. If Crossroads GPS is ultimately not recognized, it could be forced to reveal the identities of its donors.

The tax code allows groups like Crossroads to spend money on political campaigns — and to keep their donors private — as long as their primary purpose is enhancing social welfare.

Crossroads' breakdown of planned activities said it would focus half its efforts on "public education," 30 percent on "activity to influence legislation and policymaking" and 20 percent on "research," including sponsoring "in-depth policy research on significant issues."

This seems at odds with much of what the group has done since filing the application, experts said. Within two months of filing its application, Crossroads spent about $15.5 million on ads telling people to vote against Democrats or for Republicans in the 2010 midterm elections.

"That statement of proposed activities does not seem to align with what they actually did, which was to raise and spend hundreds of millions to influence candidate elections," said Paul S. Ryan, senior counsel for the Campaign Legal Center, who reviewed the group's application at ProPublica's request.

Officials with Crossroads GPS would not answer specific questions about the material in the application or whether the IRS had sent a response to it.

"As far as we know, the Crossroads application is still pending, in which case it seems that either you obtained whatever document you have illegally, or that it has been approved," Jonathan Collegio, the group's spokesman, said in an email.

The IRS sent Crossroads' application to ProPublica in response to a public-records request. The document sent to ProPublica didn't include an official IRS recognition letter, which is typically attached to applications of nonprofits that have been recognized. The IRS is only required to give out applications of groups recognized as tax-exempt.

In an email Thursday, an IRS spokeswoman said the agency had no record of an approved application for Crossroads GPS, meaning that the group's application was still in limbo.

"It has come to our attention that you are in receipt of application materials of organizations that have not been recognized by the IRS as tax-exempt," wrote the spokeswoman, Michelle Eldridge. She cited a law saying that publishing unauthorized returns or return information was a felony punishable by a fine of up to $5,000 and imprisonment of up to five years, or both. The IRS would not comment further on the Crossroads application.

"ProPublica believes that the information we are publishing is not barred by the statute cited by the IRS, and it is clear to us that there is a strong First Amendment interest in its publication," said Richard Tofel, ProPublica's general manager.

ProPublica has redacted parts of the application to omit Crossroads' financial information.

With its sister group, the super PAC American Crossroads, Crossroads GPS has helped remake how modern political campaigns are financed.

American Crossroads, which does identify its donors, spent almost $105 million on election ads in the 2012 cycle. For its part, Crossroads GPS poured more than $70 million into ads and phone calls urging voters to pick Republicans — outlays that were reported to the Federal Election Commission. It also announced spending an additional $50 million on ads critical of President Barack Obama that ran outside the FEC's reporting window.

Based on the extent of Crossroads GPS' campaign activities, Obama's re-election campaign asked the FEC in June to force it to register as a political action committee and disclose its donors. The FEC has yet to rule on the request.

Politically active social welfare nonprofits like Crossroads have proliferated since the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision in January 2010 opened the door to unlimited political spending by corporations and unions.

Earlier this year, a ProPublica report showed that many of these groups exploit gaps in regulation between the IRS and the FEC, using their social welfare status as a way to shield donors' identities while spending millions on political campaigns. The IRS' definition of political activity is broader than the FEC's, yet our investigation showed many social welfare groups underreported political spending on their tax returns.

It's impossible to know precisely how Crossroads has directed its efforts, but the breakdown of expenses on its tax returns from June 2010 to December 2011 gives some indications.

During those 19 months, Crossroads spent a total of $64.7 million, of which $1.4 million — or just 2 percent — was identified as being spent on research. That compares with the 20 percent of effort Crossroads said it would devote to research in its application.

A tax return covering this year isn't due until November 2013.

The IRS rarely pursues criminal charges against nonprofits based on statements in their applications. It's more common for the agency to deny recognition or revoke a group's tax-exempt status.

In a letter to Congress in September, the IRS said it was engaged in "more than 70 ongoing examinations" of social welfare nonprofits. Earlier, in its work plan for the 2012 fiscal year, the agency said it was taking a hard look at social welfare nonprofits with "serious allegations of impermissible political intervention."

Campaign finance watchdog Fred Wertheimer, who runs Democracy 21 and has filed several complaints to the IRS about Crossroads, said the group's application for recognition showed why more aggressive enforcement is needed.

"When you read what they say on their application, there are a lot of words there. But I find them to be disingenuous and to have little to do with why Karl Rove founded this organization," Wertheimer said. "If you believe this is a social welfare organization, I have a rocket that can get you to the moon very quickly and at very little cost."

Video and transcript via BillMoyers.com.

The Nation editor Katrina vanden Heuvel and Jamie Raskin, constitutional law professor and Maryland state senator, join Bill to discuss how the uncontested power of the Supreme Court is changing our elections, our country, and our lives.

“We wanted to bring attention to how this court has empowered the 1% at the expense of the 99%,” says vanden Heuvel. “How it is now working for big business, for corporate power against the interests of ordinary citizens in this country.”

A full transcript of the discussion follows below the fold.

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"People are 3,615 times more likely to report a UFO sighting than they are to commit in-person voter impersonation, according to national data."

Ana Kasparian and Cenk Uygur recently discussed just how common voter fraud is as Republicans across the nation pass "Voter ID" laws.

Though 37 state legislatures, many of them Republican-led, have passed tighter voter-ID laws to toughen up on perceived instances of fraud, a new analysis shows that the feared offense almost never occurs. A review of 2,068 cases of alleged fraud over the past 12 years showed that despite there being 146 million registered voters in the U.S., there were only 10 cases of voter impersonation at the polls since 2000—a finding that undercuts the case made by those who say IDs must be more tightly regulated to ensure fair elections.

Narrated by former presidents Dwight Eisenhower and John F. Kennedy and activist Mario Savio, along others, "Revolution 2012: It's Time to Rise" explores our rigged system, from the military industrial complex to our bought-and-paid-for elections. But the most poignant sound bite may come from a representative of Iraq Veterans Against the War:

"We are resisting an occupation we once risked our lives for. We swore to support and defend the Constitution of the United States of America, but we found out the hard way that the greatest enemies of the Constitution are not to be found in the sands of some far-off land, but rather right here at home. When injustice becomes law, resistance becomes duty. It is time we started meeting oppression with resistance. They cannot stop us. Humanity marches on. The utmost manifestation of love and devotion to America is today, as it always has been, resistance of tyranny."

As clips from iconic past speeches prove, we were warned.

Bill opens this week’s show by explaining how last week’s Supreme Court decision not to reconsider Citizens United exposes the hoax that Citizens United was ever about “free” speech. In reality, Bill says, it’s about carpet bombing elections “with all the tonnage your rich paymasters want to buy.”

Full transcript after the jump...

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This is where you're supposed to talk amongst yourselves and share your thoughts. Yes, that means you.

The occupy movement isn't ready to pack it in and head for home just yet. They have a lot plans for the coming new year...

Via:

No more peaceful tent encampments in parks. No more Mahatma Gandhi nice-guy stuff. Not enough. Escalation time. Wall Street, the superrich and their Washington lobbyists are tone deaf, blinded by greed, trapped in their post-2008 business-as-usual bubble.

Warning; OWS tells us America's going to be shocked by not one but hundreds of wake-up calls in 2012.

How? In a recent Washington Post column, OWS leaders say they are accelerating their battle strategy in 2012. In what amounts to a new declaration of war that promises to electrify the 2012 elections, OWS will be using new asymmetrical warfare strategies, write two of the men who have been the driving force behind the movement since early this year: Kalle Lasn, the editor-in-chief of Adbusters magazine, and senior editor Micah White.

Listen to some of the specific guerrilla tactics they warn will be used in their 2012 "American Spring" assault: A "marked escalation of surprise, playful, precision disruptions, rush-hour flash mobs, bank occupations, 'occupy squads' and edgy theatrics." And in a New Yorker magazine interview shortly after New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg's "military-style operation," Lasn warned: "this means escalation, pushing us one step closer to a revolution."

Warning that "American democracy in endangered," Sen. Bernie Sanders on Thursday proposed a constitutional amendment to overturn a Supreme Court ruling that allowed unrestricted and secret campaign spending by corporations on U.S. elections. The first constitutional amendment ever proposed by Sanders during his two decades in Congress would reverse the narrow 5-to-4 ruling in Citizens United vs. the Federal Elections Commission.

"Make no mistake, the Citizens United ruling has radically changed the nature of our democracy, further tilting the balance of power toward the rich and the powerful at a time when already the wealthiest people in this country have never had it so good," Sanders said.

"In my view, history will record that the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision is one of the worst decisions ever made by a Supreme Court in the history of our country."

Sanders's amendment, S.J.Res. 33, would state that corporations do not have the same constitutional rights as persons, that corporations are subject to regulation, that corporations may not make campaign contributions and that Congress has the power to regulate campaign finance.

Sanders said he has never proposed an amendment to the Constitution before, but said he sees no other alternative to reversing the Citizens United decision.

"In my view, corporations should not be able to go into their treasuries and spend millions and millions of dollars on a campaign in order to buy elections," he said. "I do not believe that is what American democracy is supposed to be about."

Senator Sanders is circulating a petition to gain support for his amendment, and is available to view or sign online.

The Los Angeles City Council passed a resolution on Tuesday declaring that corporations are not people and not entitled to the same constitutional protections.

Via:

The council’s 11-0 vote drew a standing ovation from a packed chamber of Occupy L.A. members and other activists.

Pending the resolution’s approval by Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, the city would be on record in support of
federal legislation that would ensure corporations are not entitled to the same rights as people, especially when it comes to spending money to influence elections.

It also proposed language for a constitutional amendment declaring that money is not a form of speech and affirming the right of the federal government to regulate corporations.

The Council President Eric Garcetti, co-sponsor of the resolution along with Councilman Bill Rosendahl said that “Every American should have an equal voice in their government, but unless there are big changes, your voice is only as loud as your bank account. And its the big corporations that have the largest bank accounts of all.”

The resolution comes, in part, as a reaction to the recent Supreme Court ruling that that corporations and unions can spend unlimited amounts of money in elections. The resolution cites a 1938 opinion from Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black on the subject, that reads “I do not believe the word `person’ in the Fourteenth Amendment includes corporations”.