Audit Trails

“The odds of being selected for that audit in any given year are tiny — out of nearly 153 million individual returns filed for 2017, for example, the I.R.S. targeted about 5,000, or roughly one out of 30,600.” And yet, here’s a really interesting coincidence, James Comey was on the list. And in 2019, with similarly long odds, Andrew G. McCabe got audited. NYT: Comey and McCabe, Who Infuriated Trump, Both Faced Intensive I.R.S. Audits. (Editor’s note: I wasn’t exaggerating in today’s top story.)

+ “What would you do to stay relevant? That’s always been a definitional question for D.C.’s prime movers, especially the super-thirsty likes of McCarthy and Graham. If they’d never stooped this low before, maybe it’s just because no one ever asked them to.” The excellent Mark Leibovich in The Atlantic: The Most Pathetic Men in America. (Time for these chumps to do an internal audit.)