TAXPROF ROUNDUP: The IRS Scandal, Day 34.

THE PETTY CORRUPTION of the political class.

IT’S NOT JUST YOU, BUDDY: Clive Crook: “I’m a U.K. citizen hoping soon to become a U.S. citizen, a lifelong admirer of the American project and its founding principles. But after living here for eight years, I’ve started to wince when I hear the expression, ‘It’s a free country.'”

TRANSPARENCY: House members remain concerned after FBI/NSA briefing on PRISM. Plus, from Rep. Brad Sherman (D-CA): “I did not know a billion records a day were coming under control of the executive branch.”

ANN ALTHOUSE COMMENTS on my post about David Brooks, Barack Obama, and Edward Snowden from last night.

THE WORLD IS SWIMMING IN SHALE OIL.

Nearly a third of the world’s technically recoverable natural gas and 10 percent of its oil can be found in shale formations, according to a new report by the Energy Information Administration. Thanks to fracking and horizontal drilling, there’s a bounty of oil and gas available to countries around the world .

This report, which has a much larger scope than previous reports, bumped up the estimated global amount of technically recoverable shale gas by 9.3 percent. In its regional breakdown North America looks like a big winner. Of the 41 countries surveyed, Mexico had the seventh and Canada the ninth largest reserves of shale oil, while the US was second only to Russia. Meanwhile, the US, Canada, and Mexico were in fourth, fifth and sixth place, respectively in the EIA’s ranking of the largest technically recoverable shale gas reserves.

Quick, Vladimir, put money into the Sierra Club!

POLITICAL BIAS: The Problem Is Not Just IRS Lawyers; The Problem Is All Federal Government Lawyers.

The results for the IRS were striking. Of the IRS lawyers who made contributions in the 2012 election, 95% contributed to Obama rather than to Romney. So among IRS lawyers, the ratio of Obama contributors to Romney contributors was not merely 4-to-1 as previously reported, but more like 20-to-1. The ratio of funds to Obama was even more lopsided, with about 32 times as much money going to Obama as to Romney from IRS lawyers.

So has the IRS gone off the rails into hyper-partisanship, leaving behind other more balanced federal agencies? … The data show, however, that the partisanship of the lawyers in the IRS is not unusual or even particularly extreme among federal agencies. In fact, the lawyers in every single federal government agency–from the Department of Education [100%] to the Department of Defense [68%] — contributed overwhelmingly to Obama compared to Romney. The table below shows the results for all agencies with at least 20 employees who contributed to either Obama or Romney. . . . The root of the problem is the rule by a class of career government employee lawyers who lack the diversity of opinion that is found in the non-lawyer private sector. The IRS inquiry, rather than focusing narrowly on “who knew what” within the agency, should lead to a top-to-bottom rethinking of who’s doing the administration in the modern bureaucratic administrative state.

This makes the notion of a “nonpartisan” civil service ring rather hollow.

UPDATE: Reader Brenda Schoer writes: “Given the job market for lawyers, is it really possible that not a single Republican lawyer applied for a job at the Dept of Ed? Do these government agencies have to put ‘REPUBLICANS NEED NOT APPLY’ on job postings to warrant an EEOC or DOJ investigation?”

Well, J. Christian Adams has documented highly politicized hiring at the Justice Department, so don’t expect much from that quarter.

MORE: Here’s the original post on this, from Rob Anderson at Pepperdine.

THE ATLANTIC: The Obama Surveillance Revelations Are Pushing Liberals Over the Edge. “Progressives are mad as hell at the administration when it comes to civil liberties, and they’re not going to take it anymore.”

Plus: “If you go back and look at candidate Obama’s statements about whistleblowers and civil liberties, breaches of freedom and privacy under the past administration, you’d have a hard time saying Candidate Obama would agree with President Obama on this.”

AT AMAZON, Dockers Pants Under $40.

Also, up to 50% off on Dockers shorts.

And, today only: Save 59% or More on Little Giant Classic 300-Pound Duty-Rating Ladder Systems with Work Platform.

THE UNIVERSITY OF KANSAS TRIES TO shut down the popular @KUBoobs twitter feed.

KEVIN WILLIAMSON: “There has been an unfortunate outbreak of deficit naivety in the past few weeks.”

CHANGE: George W. Bush’s Favorability Reaches Post-Presidency High. “More Americans remember George W. Bush approvingly than negatively, according to a new survey released with Washington mired in scandals and President Obama under fire for expanding his predecessor’s surveillance of Americans. Forty-nine percent of Americans view Bush favorably while 46 percent view him negatively, Gallup reports. Democrats developing an appreciation for Bush at a faster rate than any other group, though his numbers are up among across the political spectrum.”

CULTURE OF CORRUPTION: Report: Nepotism is an ‘open and widely accepted’ practice at the Energy Department. “Despite the Department’s ethics program and information regarding prohibited personnel practices, advocating for the selection of relatives appears to have become an open and widely accepted Departmental practice.”

ROLL CALL: After NSA Leaks, Senators Question Snowden Vetting, Secret Court.

As lawmakers began to explore ways to respond to the public disclosure of a pair of top-secret National Security Agency operations, the question also arose as to why the leaker had a security clearance in the first place.

Edward Snowden was fired by the consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton as of Monday after revealing through The Guardian newspaper that he was the source of leaks that led to the disclosure of NSA surveillance programs that involved the bulk collection of phone records and Internet traffic.

“Snowden, who had a salary at the rate of $122,000, was terminated June 10, 2013, for violations of the firm’s code of ethics and firm policy,” the company said. “News reports that this individual has claimed to have leaked classified information are shocking, and if accurate, this action represents a grave violation of the code of conduct and core values of our firm.”

Senators seemed taken aback that the 29-year-old contractor had access to information about the NSA programs.

Yeah, the less you think of Snowden, the worse the NSA looks. . . .

JAMES TARANTO: The Alzheimer’s Ploy: Does the sequester really threaten vital research?

WELL, HE PROMISED CHANGE: FBI requests for records under Patriot Act have increased 1,000% in just four years.

THE HILL: Lawmakers say NSA briefing didn’t address privacy concerns. “Lawmakers concerns over the National Security Agency’s surveillance programs were not alleviated after the full House received a briefing on the programs Tuesday. Lawmakers skeptical of the NSA’s phone and Internet data collection programs said their questions largely were not answered by the briefing with senior Justice, NSA and FBI officials.”

PENCIL PUSHERS PACK HEAT: Gun Control? Not at the IRS!

CHANGE: Symposium: Law School In The New Legal Environment.

JONATHAN ADLER: Did James Clapper Lie To Congress? “Admittedly Clapper was in a difficult situation, but it’s nonetheless clear that he was not truthful to Congress.”

LETTERMAN: Obama Gave Sasha Justin Bieber’s Phone Records For Her Birthday.

YES. NEXT QUESTION? Are zero-tolerance policies at school targeting harmless kids?

WHEN WOMEN COMPLAIN ABOUT THE DISAPPEARANCE OF CHIVALRY, I’m prone to point out that chivalry was a system, one that imposed obligations of behavior on women and girls as well as on men. Likewise, when David Brooks complains that Edward Snowden is an unmediated man, I must note that in the civil society Brooks invokes, Presidents and other leaders were also mediated; they were not merely checked by Congress, courts, etc., but they were also checked by themselves, and a sense of what was proper that went beyond “how much can I get away with now?” Obama, too, is unmediated in that sense. That Brooks couldn’t see beyond his sharply-creased pants to notice that when it was apparent to keen observers even before the 2008 election is not to his credit. If the system of civil society has failed, it is in no small part because its guardians — notably including Brooks — have also failed.

RICHARD FERNANDEZ: The Destroyer of Words: “We always knew that technology could do this. What we had not suspected was that the Obama administration would do this.”

NEWS YOU CAN USE: Marriage Secrets Of America’s First Astronaut Wives.