David Cay Johnston, ace tax reporter, has an excellent story in today's NYT on the norms at IRS concerning audits. To sum up, IRS auditors are more or less discouraged to do thorough audits, letting billions of dollars get away when it's right in front of them. Top officials at the Internal Revenue Service are pushing agents to prematurely close audits of big companies with agreements to have them pay only a fraction of the additional taxes that could be collected, according to dozens of I.R.S. employees who say that the policy is costing the government billions of dollars a year.

Representatives Meehan and Shays announced at a press conference yesterday their plans to introduce legislation that both reduces the influence of lobbyists and tightens campaign finance laws. According to BNA Money and Politics, these comprehensive measure include reintroducing a measure to regulate 527 groups under campaign finance restrictions, replace the Federal Election Commission with an independent agency, the Federal Election Administration, and reform the presidential campaign public financing system.

Senator Bennett (R-Utah), the ranking Republican on the Senate Rules Committee, introduced an amendment yesterday to remove the grassroots lobbying disclosure provision from S.1. Bennett is worried about the constitutionality of the provision, which is perplexing considering it would not restrict direct or grassroots lobbying by an organization. Numerous amendments to the Senate lobbying bill have been offered, and formal debate on grassroots lobbying has yet to occur.