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Readers! A November fund-raising drive!

 

It is unfortunately time for another November fund-raising campaign to support my work here at Behind the Black. I really dislike doing these, but 2025 is so far turning out to be a very poor year for donations and subscriptions, the worst since 2020. I very much need your support for this webpage to survive.

 

And I think I provide real value. Fifteen years ago I said SLS was garbage and should be cancelled. Almost a decade ago I said Orion was a lie and a bad idea. As early as 1998, long before almost anyone else, I predicted in my first book, Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8, that private enterprise and freedom would conquer the solar system, not government. Very early in the COVID panic and continuing throughout I noted that every policy put forth by the government (masks, social distancing, lockdowns, jab mandates) was wrong, misguided, and did more harm than good. In planetary science, while everyone else in the media still thinks Mars has no water, I have been reporting the real results from the orbiters now for more than five years, that Mars is in fact a planet largely covered with ice.

 

I could continue with numerous other examples. If you want to know what others will discover a decade hence, read what I write here at Behind the Black. And if you read my most recent book, Conscious Choice, you will find out what is going to happen in space in the next century.

 

 

This last claim might sound like hubris on my part, but I base it on my overall track record.

 

So please consider donating or subscribing to Behind the Black, either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. I could really use the support at this time. There are five ways of doing so:

 

1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.

 

2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation. Takes about a 10% cut.
 

3. A Paypal Donation or subscription, which takes about a 15% cut:

 

4. Donate by check. I get whatever you donate. Make the check payable to Robert Zimmerman and mail it to
 
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
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You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.


Why did the IRS wipe clean Lois Lerner’s Blackberry?

An excellent question. The answer? The IRS refuses to say.

Among the most pressing is the fact that a Blackberry belonging to Lois Lerner, a former official at the center of the scandal, was wiped clean shortly after investigators started asking questions about her alleged role in the targeting of conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.

Despite the fact that this revelation first came to light in August, the IRS has yet explain why this was done.

Considering her former role as chief of the IRS’ tax exempt division, and its proximity to the targeting scandal, the decision to wipe her phone after investigators started asking questions is both suspicious and troubling.

I have to admit I missed this minor detail. In previous examples where the IRS destroyed a hard drive, it was because the hard drive had had problems. The destruction was still illegal, but in at least in that case there was a somewhat reasonable if unlikely reason to do it. With Lerner’s Blackberry they haven’t given us any reason, other than it was done shortly after the investigation had begun.

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

5 comments

  • Cotour

    We will find out where this all goes after the November election if, as is hoped, the Republicans take control of both the Senate in addition to the Congress. What is going on right now is just the stretching of time. And in the end the Republicans may compromise on the issue for some other gain in another area. And we may have to wait until 2017 when Obama and Holder are no longer holding power anyway because no matter what he Congress comes up with related to the breaking of law, the president and Holder will certainly not agree with the findings.

  • She’s guilty as hell, that is the only reason for all of her electronics to be swept.

  • wodun

    People have been focusing a lot on emails but she could have had documents on her phone.

  • Edward

    That is what “spoliation of evidence” is all about:
    http://definitions.uslegal.com/s/spoliation-of-evidence/

    “it is inferred that a person who destroys such evidence does it with consciousness of guilt.”

    Meaning, of course, that not only is it correct to infer that Lerner is guilty, but that the IRS is, too, as it is doing the hiding or destroying of these items of evidence. We can even infer that the other IRS employees whose emails have been “lost” are also guilty.

    Although many compare this scandal to Watergate, in this case the cover-up is not worse than the original crime of denying people their constitutional rights, which the tax code had been painstakingly written to protect, but they also were obviously influencing a federal (presidential) election. There may also be targeting of people for tax-audit harassment based upon their political activity. As bad as it is (and it *is* bad, especially since the Justice Department is aiding and abetting rather than protecting the rights of We the People), the cover-up is minor in comparison. It is just that we have to get past the cover-up in order to find out how deeply this scandal is rooted within the IRS, Justice Department, and perhaps other agencies.

    The appalling nature and amount of corruption seen in this scandal is also found in other events that have occurred, such as (but hardly limited to) the “Fast and Furious” fiasco, and the Benghazi terrorist attack. Have we ever seen this much corruption in any other administration in US history?

  • Chris Kirkendall

    Yeah – good point ! ! Hadn’t considered that ! !

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