National: The recently fired head of the IRS was personally audited by an angry Congressional committee over the agency’s special attention to conservative political groups. But Steven Miller refused to say the audits of groups applying for non-profit status were political. Republicans and some Democrats are scurrying to take on the IRS. Unspoken in all the fury is exactly who and what are the 70,000 “non-profits” that applied for tax-free status. The so-called 501(c)4 groups (the law under which they exist) are supposed to be social welfare organizations, not political. But many of those complaining have “Tea Party”, “Patriot” and “9/12” in their titles. 

• On the Benghazi beat, it turns out that a secret source provided ABC News with doctored emails texts that purportedly showed the White House manipulating the message about the attack on the US consulate. One hundred pages of emails released later shows that ABC’s source gave them information altered to bolster Republican attacks on the Obama administration. What a wonderful town.
• At least 60 people were injured, five critically, in the collision of two commuter trains near Fairfield, Ct. The first train derailed, hitting the other. Damage to the tracks is likely to cause travel delays.

World: Improvised bombs in Iraq killed at least 66 people in two incidents yesterday. One blew up near a Sunni mosque, killing 40, and the other was placed near a funeral tent in a town south of Baghdad. In Pakistan, 13 were killed and 30 injured in two separate bombings.

North of the Beaver Dam: The mayor of Toronto denies accusations that he was recorded in a cell phone video smoking crack cocaine. Two reporters and an editor for the Toronto Star say they’ve seen the video that was offered to them at a price of over $100,000. The three say the video clearly shows Mayor Rob Ford in a well-lit room smoking from a glass crack pipe. Ford is a colorful character who was once tossed out of a professional hockey game for being drunk and belligerent.

Cannes Caper: More than $1 million in jewelry was stolen from a hotel room in Cannes. The Swiss jewelry company Chopard brought the jewels to the annual film festival for loaning to stars for their red carpet walks. The theft happened just hours after a showing of “The Bling Ring”, a true story about teenagers stealing from the homes of Hollywood stars.

Shore Leave: King Juan Carlos of Spain has decided it’s unseemly to keep the monarchy’s 137-foot yacht during bad economic times and he’s putting it up for sale. The $27 million yacht is called “Fortuna” and that’s about what it costs to fill the gas tanks: $26,000.

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