Category Archives: Treasury
Lois Has no Mail
Lois has no mail. Lois Lerner is the former IRS employee who pled the fifth to avoid answering questions about IRS harassment of Obama political opponents. Now that her email has been subpoenaed she claims she lost it when her hard drive crashed.
Lois Has no Mail
Not only that, IRS canceled its contract with the backup company. Not only that, Lois’s dog ate the crashed hard drive, had to be put down, and was cremated.
Issa and Cummings Committee Chaos
The big story on Fox New Sunday was that IRS kingpin Lois Lerner would waive her 5th amendment rights and testify before Daryl Issa’s House Oversight committee. At least that’s what Issa told Chris Wallace on Sunday. On Wednesday Lerner pled the fifth again.
Issa Cummings Committee Chaos
Angered by Lerner’s continued silence, Issa ruled the the hearing adjourned. He then silenced the leading committee Democrat, Ellijah Cummings, by cutting off his mic. The room erupted in chaos with Cummings shouting “I’m a U.S. Congressman” and fellow Dems chanting “shame”. Let’s go rinkside to Dana Milbank:
Issa told Wallace on Sunday that Lerner’s “attorney indicates now that she will testify” after refusing to do so at a hearing last year. The lawyer denied this, and Lerner did not testify Wednesday — and that would have been the news, if not for Issa’s sound-system antics.
Indeed. Issa keeps stepping on his own punchline. The news might have been about why Lerner doesn’t want to talk about these emails:
“Tea Party Matter very dangerous… Counsel and Judy Kindell need to be in on this one… Cincy should probably NOT have these cases,” Lerner said in a February 2011 email.
“Cincinnati wasn’t publicly ‘thrown under the bus’ (but) instead was hit by a convoy of Mack trucks,” wrote Cindy Thomas, former director of the IRS exempt organizations office in Cincinnati, in a May 10, 2013 email to Lerner.
It looks like the IRS intimidated conservative groups and the Tea Party was relatively quiet in the 2012 election. Was there corruption? So far Republicans haven’t come up with a smidgen of proof.
Smidgen of Corruption
Usually when a politician is asked about a particular scandal he stonewalls and says he’d love to set the record straight but he just can’t because an investigation is ongoing. In a refreshing change of pace President Obama told Bill O’Reilly there’s “not a smidgen of corruption” at the IRS.
George Will has said the IRS scandal should be treated like Watergate.
Lois Lerner was the head of the IRS division that grants tax exemptions to non profit groups. During a speech to the American Bar Association she arranged for a planted question so that she could account for increased scrutiny the IRS was giving to conservative groups, compared to liberal groups, seeking tax exempt status.
When asked about this by Congress Lerner pleaded the fifth.
Well, Maybe a Smidgen of Corruption
Cleta Mitchell, a respected attorney representing grass roots conservative groups, says the IRS contuse to target them to this day.
Little Sisters of the Poor
The Little Sisters of the Poor won a skirmish against Big Gov. The Supreme Court issued an injunction that excused the nuns from filling out a form directing others to provide contraceptives to their employees.
Apple iOS 7 is Just Like ObamaCare
The president compared ObamaCare’s rocky rollout favorably to Apple’s launch of iOS 7.0.2. Really. Well, they both do take fingerprints, operate in a cloud, and spy on us.
“Consider that just a couple of weeks ago, Apple rolled out a new mobile operating system, and within days, they found a glitch, so they fixed it.”
A bug that allowed unauthorized users to get past the new iPhone’s fingerprint protected lock screen was fixed. President Obama promises the federal government, proven so nimble in the past, will do likewise.
Apple and ObamaCare the Same
Kathleen Sebelius got into the act saying, “…hopefully you’ll give us the same slack you give Apple”.
