Petrelis Files

SF Chron: Bob Woodward's Plame Source is Jeff Gannon!

Ready to have your funny bone tickled?

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This is from yesterday and needed to be moved up.

IRS Files: Bob Woodward's Foundation

Bob Woodward was interviewed in July 1996 for a PBS "Frontline" show on why America hates the press, and he was asked about "buckraking," which is described as a journalist becoming famous because of TV appearance, then hitting the lecture circuit for substantial fees.

Woodward replied: "I give lectures for money, but my wife and I have a foundation and all of the money goes into the foundation and all of the money from the foundation goes to charity. So, I make no money from it."

I didn't know he and his wife, Elsa Walsh, a writer for the New Yorker magazine, had a 501(c)3 foundation and to learn more about it, I checked out the IRS 990 forms for the Woodward Walsh Foundation.

The current tax filing, for 2004, shows the foundation had $143,170 in revenue, spent $1,228 for operating and administrative costs, and doled out only $20,000 to charities.

This is the breakdown of groups that received grants and the amounts:

Sidwell Friends School: $10,000

Uganda Children's Charity: $500

Ovarian Cancer National Alliance: $1,750

Little Folks School: $500

Intown Playgroup: $250

Martha's Table: $1,000

Literacy Partners: $1,000

Miller Center of Public Affairs, University of Virginia: $5,000

The Woodward Walsh Foundation claims no relationship with the Miller Center, which is not the case. Bob Woodward is a member of the governing council of the center.

I'll leave it media ethicists to determine if being an assistant managing editor of the Washington Post and serving as a top advisor to a major university is a conflict of interest or questionable.

The 2003 IRS 990 filing for Woodward's charity reveals $80,000 in revenue, $1,150 for operating costs, and $21,000 in grants.

Who received a grant that year?

College of Veterinary Medicine: $2,000

Center for the Study of Responsive Law: $2,000

Sidwell Friends School: $15,000

Washington Humane Society: $2,000

And for 2002, the Woodward Walsh Foundation reported $52,733 in revenue, $1,200 for administrative expenses, and a paltry $7,750 given to charities.

The contributions breakdown:

Little Folks School: $1,000

Central Asia Institute: $250

Ovarian Cancer National Alliance: $500

Washington Humane Society: $1,000

Sidwell Friends School: $5,000

You can verify these numbers by checking out the IRS 990 forms for the Woodward Walsh Foundation, as posted on GuideStar.org.