“It’s OK…the King is sorry.”
- Scandal: Obama, Jay Carney, Susan Rice, Hillary and the State Department meticulously lying about the cause of the Benghazi attack during an election campaign
Media Response: “Bah! Old news [about something the press never treated as news at all]! Politics! A ‘conservative story’!”
- Scandal: Billions being paid out by the Obama administration in fraudulent claims by minority farmers
Media Response: “Oh, Please!—a typical conservative conspiracy theory…what? It really happened? Well, the public doesn’t care about it, and “Pigford” is a funny name, so no harm…”
Well, let’s try something really new. I wonder if the IRS admitting that it targeted and harassed conservative non-profit groups in an election year qualifies as a scandal that calls into legitimate question the ethics and competence of the Obama Administration, in the eyes of our fair and objective press, the guardian of our freedoms. Is there any depth to the media’s complicity with this government’s misconduct? I suppose we’ll find out.**
From the Associated Press:
“Organizations were singled out [in 2012] because they included the words “tea party” or “patriot” in their applications for tax-exempt status, said Lois Lerner, who heads the IRS division that oversees tax-exempt groups. In some cases, groups were asked for their list of donors, which violates IRS policy in most cases, she said.
“That was wrong. That was absolutely incorrect, it was insensitive and it was inappropriate. That’s not how we go about selecting cases for further review,” Lerner said at a conference sponsored by the American Bar Association. “The IRS would like to apologize for that,” she added.*
Apology not accepted!
Richard Nixon using the IRS to harass liberal groups in opposition to his policies was a cornerstone of the accusations that he was using government agencies to stifle dissent and abridge the Bill of Rights. Apologize! Why didn’t he think of that? That would have made it all better!
The official story is that low level IRS employees started this on their own, and it was only recently discovered by IRS management. Well, let’s investigate that. Let’s investigate that without toady Democrats, channeling Elijah Cummings at the Benghazi hearing, claiming that anything questioning the unimpeachable virtue of this government and this President is a political “witch hunt.” History, psychology, organizational theory and experience tell us that low level employees tend to pick up on cues and attitudes, not to mention desires, from those over them. “Will no one rid me of this troublesome priest?” Yes, those knights who killed Thomas Becket were “low level” too. But King Henry apologized, and that made it all better.
President Obama wants to give the IRS a greater and greater role in American lives, which requires a proportionate level of trust, and this is the supervisory competence the agency receives. And what is the official response? “We’re sorry.” We’re sorry that under our watch, Americans are treated differently by the law according to whether they support the President’s policies or not.
Yes, I’m sorry too. I’m sorry I can’t trust my government not to subject citizens to adverse government power because they describe themselves as “patriots.”
* I want to add, after posting this, that for this revelation to take place at a private organization’s closed convention on a Friday afternoon is a slimy, disgraceful tactic that further destroys any remaining shred of belief that this administration cares about transparency. This was a naked attempt to minimize and bury damning information, while getting out in front of story that was about to be released elsewhere. I didn’t think anything this group of ideologues, amateurs and incompetents could do would shock me any more, but this has. I am physically sick about it.
UPDATE: James Taranto’s response to this story is here. TaxProf Blog has a listing of media and web coverage here.
** Here’s an early and not very encouraging indication: Administration apologist David Weigel at Slate headlines his post “Tea Party Leaders Understandably Annoyed that the IRS Investigated Them.” But why should anyone else be upset, right David? It’s just the stupid Tea Party!
___________________________
Sources: AP, New York Times
Ethics Alarms 
Oh, I think the media knew, there’s no way to keep a lid this tight on something this wide without the media’s involvement. Unfortunately, I think this, and Benghazi, are just two small spurs of the iceberg of damaging doings the media hid until Obama was safely reelected. Further, I think they are letting it all dribble out, a piece at a time, now so that come 2016 Hilary will be able to say “oh come on, that was a LONG time ago, are you still harping on THAT?” The sad part is that it is likely to work, because the fact that conservatives and the Tea Party have been pretty successfully demonized means no one will get too bent out of shape over this, even though “they came for the conservatives” could easily be spliced into the spiel that ends with “finally they came for me, and there was no one left to speak for me.” I know that borders on violating Godwin’s Law, but the fact is that tactics used against one group can be turned on others.
Fear not, Godwin’s Law only applies if associations to Naziism are used as an ad hominem or false analogy.
And why shouldn’t they be turned on others? After all, they work.
I must tell you, this story upsets me, more for how I fear people will react to it than for the story itself. I fear I will lose all respect for many of my friends who consider themselves good progressives and Democrats, because they will twist themselves into pretzels trying to avoid the obvious implications of this story: incompetence, politicization, arrogance, and corruption deeply imbedded in this government, out of total contempt for fair government and dissent. This Administration is a massive ethics corrupter, because it forces good people to tolerate the intolerable.
It rightly should upset you if your friends behave like that, because it will just be proof positive that nothing matters more to them than whether the actor wears the red or the blue jersey. I walk past the desks of black co-workers every day who have pictures of the president next to pictures of the martyred MLK (who I submit would be aghast at a lot of what is going on now) and simply cannot talk politics with them, for they will hear no word against THEIR president and any criticism must be profoundly racist.
Perhaps you’re right, that the previous administrations were just as bad (although I imagine if anything like this had happened under Bush’s watch, we would have heard about it. We heard about every time he wiped his nose.) But that doesn’t change the fact that THIS – this crime, this administration – is doing it here and now. We can’t change the past, but we can hold the present players accountable for the crimes they are currently benefiting from. And every cry of ‘The other side is just as bad!” each sounding of “the entire system is corrupt!” echos back “what can we do about it?”
The answer is to start now. With THESE crimes. And when the next administration does similar things, respond in the same way. We must start holding our representatives accountable, and that doesn’t mean waiting for the scandal we can’t ignore or the administration that we disagree with. Now. Today. Is it fair to the ones who skated because we were sleeping? No. But to wait is to invite worse and more. And as we’ve all seen here, there’s ALWAYS worse and more available.
Zoebrain, you are so right.
I think this a lazy comment, zb. Degrees matter, specifics matter. Using the IRS for content-based harassment as a result of exercising rights is at the top of the dangerous list.
Wait … what? Aren’t you the one criticizing me re the same sort of analysis re presidential lies? I agree with you here. This appears to be blatant abuse of power. “Degrees matter. Specifics matter.”
They do matter, so you can just say, “everybody is bad.” The fact that others are worse, however doesn’t make the current example any better, which is why, “Yeah, but look what they did!” is a dodge, irrelevant, and unethical analysis.
What’s awful is that both sides have cried WOLF every day for years so when a genuine T-Rex like this comes along, everyone assumes it’s more of the same. One side is getting away with murder, because the other side is obviously not credible..
When the GOP gets into power, it will be just the same. They’ll get away with murder because the Dems will cry Wolf all the time too, as they’ve done in the past.
“This Administration is a massive ethics corrupter, because it forces good people to tolerate the intolerable.”
*********
Exactly!
” I fear I will lose all respect for many of my friends who consider themselves good progressives and Democrats, because they will twist themselves into pretzels trying to avoid the obvious implications of this story: incompetence, politicization, arrogance, and corruption deeply imbedded in this government, out of total contempt for fair government and dissent. ”
**************
Want to read something scary?
Go read the comments section of online stories about the latest Benghazi news.
Read what is said in defense of the present administration.
Or…perhaps I should say, read it and weep.
Okay then. I guess you would have supported every administration in the past 40 years being investigated at the time along with the majority of Congress. And if this would fix the inherent dishonesty in our political parties, I’d jump on the Jack Marshall wagon. But I don’t think we’d have gottten any real governing done. And I fear that it wouldn’t have any positive effect anyway because politicians will take the slap on the wrist after the fact if it means the accumulation of wealth/power in the interim.
Now just simmer down, I say simmer, simmer…
I suggest people read Ezra Klein’s examination of the IRS issue, appropriately titled Good Reasons for a Dumb Mistake.
“http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/05/13/wonkbook-the-good-reasons-for-the-irss-dumb-mistake/
Post-Citizens United we saw a major increase in applications by groups applying for 501(c)4 status – that is, tax-exempt status meant to be applied only to non-political groups. The IRS quite properly is charged with investigating violations of this guideline.
Now let’s say you’re looking for a quick rule of thumb to identify groups that might actually be political, but posing as non-political. You might flag, say, groups whose titles included “Save Roe v. Wade,” or “Tea Party.”
Now guess which side of the political aisle saw the greatest increase in suspicious-sounding applications? If you recall the times, it was the right side of the political spectrum that was most energized around identifying opportunities for financial contributions. Hence the dumb mistake.
Not that it was right, by any means. There’s a big difference between a sensible rule of thumb and a clearly discriminatory edict. A good parallel might be racial profiling by cops. The downside of discriminatory guidelines is very clear; but the downside of no shortcuts at all is evident every time you go through an airport security line and see Grandma from Des Moines getting the full treatment.
Is there a breach of ethics here? Yes, I’d say so. But it looks mainly like clumsy incompetence, which got noticed and corrected a little too late.
Jack, I agree w. your statement that “degrees matter, specifics matter.” I don’t think I agree with your statement that this constitutes “using the IRS for content-based harassment as a result of exercising rights.” You’d have to convince me there was intent on the part of someone in power to do precisely that, as opposed to the more obvious explanation of stupid shortcuts by people who lack a grasp of the importance of nuance in applying guidelines.
Charles, the fact that at least two officials of the IRS have given out misleading information (aka lies) about how long this went on, where it went on, who knew about and when they knew, I’d say the presumption of innocence is misplaced. Klein, meanwhile, is a Democratic apologist and activist progressive journalist. For a little balance, you should read George Will on the same topic this morning…here.
Come on. “Now let’s say you’re looking for a quick rule of thumb to identify groups that might actually be political, but posing as non-political. You might flag, say, groups whose titles included “Save Roe v. Wade,” or “Tea Party.”
Really? How about groups called “NAACP”? We are to believe that this is just a one-side of the spectrum phenomenon, and that just after the 2010 elections in which said Tea Party whipped the Democrats up and down, that it just happened to be the focus of the IRS’s unconstitutional scrutiny? And where do you see that “Save Roe v. Wade” term? I can’t find it in any of the major accounts. I can find the terms “tea party,” “patriot,” and “9/12,” however.
In Will’s excellent piece, he writes in part…”…It remains to be discovered whether the chief executive is guilty of more than an amazingly convenient failure to superintend the excesses of some executive-branch employees beyond the Allegheny Mountains. Meanwhile, file this under “What a tangled web we weave”:
“The IRS official in charge of the division that makes politically sensitive allocations of tax-exempt status said Friday that she learned from news reports of the targeting of conservatives. But a draft report by the IRS inspector general says this official was briefed on the matter two years ago.
“…Liberals, whose unvarying agenda is enlargement of government, suggest, with no sense of cognitive dissonance, that this IRS scandal is nothing more sinister than typical government incompetence. Five days before the IRS story broke, Obama, sermonizing 109 miles northeast of Cincinnati, warned Ohio State graduates about “creeping cynicism” and “voices” that “warn that tyranny is . . . around the corner.” Well. He stigmatizes as the vice of cynicism what actually is the virtue of skepticism about the myth that the tentacles of the regulatory state are administered by disinterested operatives. And the voices that annoy him are those of the Founders.
“…Episodes like this separate the meritorious liberals from the meretricious. The day after the IRS story broke, The Post led the paper with it, and, with an institutional memory of Watergate, published a blistering editorial demanding an Obama apology. The New York Times consigned the story to page 10 (its front-page lead was the umpteenth story about the end of the world being nigh because of global warming). Through Monday, the Times had expressed no editorial thoughts about the IRS. The Times’s Monday headline on the matter was: “IRS Focus on Conservatives Gives GOP an Issue to Seize On.” So that is the danger.
“If Republicans had controlled both houses of Congress in 1973, Nixon would have completed his term. If Democrats controlled both today, the Obama administration’s lawlessness would go uninvestigated. Not even divided government is safe government, but it beats the alternative.”
Amen to THAT!
Wow. This is more than clumsy incompetence. If I were tasked with investigating groups who might be taking unfair advantage of the tax code following Citizens United, I would have done a random sample — even if a quick glance showed that “tea party” showed up a lot. Because ANY political group might have been looking to violate the tax code — not just conservative ones. I think that is what any reasonable professional would have done — especially a tax professional who presumably knows a bit more about statistics than the average person. When you use a prepared word list, you are setting to prove a preexisting theory — much like advocacy in the legal world. But the IRS isn’t supposed to be an advocate — it is supposed to be neutral. Here, these employees were setting out to find fraud with conservative-minded groups. They should be fired if they haven’t already.
As all liberals ignored, all groups with ‘progressive’ or ‘progress’ in their names were approved quickly without undue scrutiny. Well, the liberals better beware. When an administration can be this corrupt and get away with it, it becomes the acceptable behavior of the next administration. The next administration will even top it. If we flip the statements and actions of this administration, we can see what will be permissible by the next. People need to get over being partisan or we can look forward to statements like this in the future:
“We did not join the Department of Justice to prosecute white people”
It was just a mistake that the NAACP, the ACLU, any group with “women”, “abortion”, “reproductive rights”, “progressive”, etc were denied nonprofit status. Also, they weren’t denied, they were just postponed until the paperwork was filled out properly and processed. For those who want a copy of the report on this incident, we have a easy, 500 part questionnaire you can fill out…
“We did have reports that white-robed and hooded men with gas cans and guns were outside polling places, but we find no evidence that they intimidated anyone or interfered with the election in any way. The investigation will proceed no further.”
“It is regrettable that the reports of vast corruption and incompetence by the administration was not widely reported by the media until after the election. It was not intentional, but things like that can’t be allowed to influence the election. It is also regrettable that the press focused on the college drug use and unsubstantiated date-rape allegations made against the Democratic front runner to the exclusion of almost everything else during the Democratic primary. The press can be so unpredictable.”
“It is unfortunate that a large percentage of the Democratic congressmen were detained by security before the vote to repeal Obamacare. This was merely a communication problem and it wasn’t ordered or endorsed by anyone else. Since quorum rules have routinely been ignored for years, criticism of this action is merely the result of partisan sniping.”
“We think any physician requesting to provide abortions should have to undergo a thorough criminal back ground check and mental health screening. Their name and home address should be published in local media outlets stating that they are requesting abortion permission so that members of the public may register any concerns with the local authorities. Once all such concerns are processed, the approval process can continue . I’m sure everyone can agree with this common-sense request.”
“The White House will no longer communicate with ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, The NYT, or any other so-called news agency that is merely a pawn for the Democratic Party. The FCC is reviewing their licenses as we speak and the FBI and CIA are wiretapping them for transgressions against national security. All official news will go exclusively through FOX.”
If we get this future, we know who to blame.