POLITICS, IT'S WHAT POLITICAL ORGANIZATIONS DO:

To get tax-exempt status, a 501(c)(4) has to be primarily a social welfare organization. But groups like the liberal Priorities USA and the conservative Crossroads GPS are social welfare organizations only in the sense that they were fighting for the welfare of Barack Obama and Mitt Romney, respectively.  None other than our friend Erick Erickson railed against the groups who shamelessly exploited campaign finance law. In fact, it seemed Tea Party groups were the worst. Erickson wrote just five weeks ago: 

My mother constantly gets mail at her house begging her for money to fight the good fight. More often than not, the groups begging her for help have "Tea Party" in their name and they are all scams.

He even alleged clear violation of elections law:

Give money to a conservative candidate and you too will see your mailbox explode. "But we cannot pull from FEC filings," they claim. That may be the law, but when has that stopped them? Try this -- give a handful of conservative candidates enough money to get printed in their FEC disclosures. "Mistype" your name. Watch as you suddenly see an avalanche of direct mail, all with your name mistyped.

And it was clear from Erickson's complaints that their primary focus was campaigning, however inefficiently, and not social welfare:

Like drug addicts wanting one more hit before going straight, they send out one last mail piece demanding money to help Allen West...

Never you mind that Allen West will never see one penny of the money. "We're building his name identification," the mailhouse tells you. Yes, in the days of Rush Limbaugh's 20 million listener audience, Fox News's domination of the news airwaves, and Allen West's own efforts, I'm sure he needs some crappy little group no one has ever heard of using his name so that they themselves get money.

The IRS was trying to screen out groups that were seeking non-profit status to illegally finance campaign activity, which is good, but they were using a politicized method -- screening for groups with "tea party" or "patriot" in the name, as well as those whose core issues were Tea Partyish themes like cutting spending -- which is very bad.

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