• This is a political forum that is non-biased/non-partisan and treats every person's position on topics equally. This debate forum is not aligned to any political party. In today's politics, many ideas are split between and even within all the political parties. Often we find ourselves agreeing on one platform but some topics break our mold. We are here to discuss them in a civil political debate. If this is your first visit to our political forums, be sure to check out the RULES. Registering for debate politics is necessary before posting. Register today to participate - it's free!

IRS scandal is unraveling

Wehrwolfen

Banned
Joined
May 11, 2013
Messages
2,329
Reaction score
402
Gender
Male
Political Leaning
Conservative
By Thomas Lifson
July 19, 2013

We can now officially say that the IRS harassment of conservative groups is a political scandal connected to the Obama political machine. Despite the best obfuscatory efforts of Obama henchmen like Rep. Elijah Cummings, yesterday the IRS scandal was tied to a political appointee of President Obama. Step-by-step the chain is being followed upward by the House Oversight Committee chaired by Rep. Darrell Issa.
Jay Carney's assurances that two rogue agents in a back office in the 27th most populous metropolis of America were the problem has been exposed as a blatant, outrageous lie. Now we know that Obama's hand-picked agent was leading the initiative, as far as the people below him in the federal apparatus knew.


Read more: Blog: IRS scandal is unraveling


As the honorable Mr. Elijah Cummings would say, Keep moving folks, nothing to see here. Don't bother with the lies from the White House. It's those lowly IRS employees. Only the uninformed and easily gullible can believe that this Obama regime has nothing to do with this scandal.
 
By Thomas Lifson
July 19, 2013

We can now officially say that the IRS harassment of conservative groups is a political scandal connected to the Obama political machine. Despite the best obfuscatory efforts of Obama henchmen like Rep. Elijah Cummings, yesterday the IRS scandal was tied to a political appointee of President Obama. Step-by-step the chain is being followed upward by the House Oversight Committee chaired by Rep. Darrell Issa.
Jay Carney's assurances that two rogue agents in a back office in the 27th most populous metropolis of America were the problem has been exposed as a blatant, outrageous lie. Now we know that Obama's hand-picked agent was leading the initiative, as far as the people below him in the federal apparatus knew.


Read more: Blog: IRS scandal is unraveling


As the honorable Mr. Elijah Cummings would say, Keep moving folks, nothing to see here. Don't bother with the lies from the White House. It's those lowly IRS employees. Only the uninformed and easily gullible can believe that this Obama regime has nothing to do with this scandal.

I watched most of the hearing yesterday and the behavior of the Democrats on that committee was absolutely horrible. They went from investigating to accusing and from asking questions to shrieking.

The only thing I can make out of that kind of behavior is that as the investigation keeps coming up with more and more evidence of political motivations they get more and more scared. Nothing is more dangerous than when you have a badger cornered and they are definitely acting like that.
 
I watched most of the hearing yesterday and the behavior of the Democrats on that committee was absolutely horrible. They went from investigating to accusing and from asking questions to shrieking.

The only thing I can make out of that kind of behavior is that as the investigation keeps coming up with more and more evidence of political motivations they get more and more scared. Nothing is more dangerous than when you have a badger cornered and they are definitely acting like that.

Yeah, you don't want anybody to question George's obstruction of justice and conspiracy with Issa in preparing a false report.

Too bad -- Issa opened up this can of worms, and now he's the worm in the can.
 
I love how Issa admonished everybody not to jump to conclusions.

BWHAHAHAHAHHH! From Issa!

God, I bet he wished he had never conspired with George to file a false report.
 
By Thomas Lifson
July 19, 2013

We can now officially say that the IRS harassment of conservative groups is a political scandal connected to the Obama political machine. Despite the best obfuscatory efforts of Obama henchmen like Rep. Elijah Cummings, yesterday the IRS scandal was tied to a political appointee of President Obama. Step-by-step the chain is being followed upward by the House Oversight Committee chaired by Rep. Darrell Issa.
Jay Carney's assurances that two rogue agents in a back office in the 27th most populous metropolis of America were the problem has been exposed as a blatant, outrageous lie. Now we know that Obama's hand-picked agent was leading the initiative, as far as the people below him in the federal apparatus knew.


Read more: Blog: IRS scandal is unraveling


As the honorable Mr. Elijah Cummings would say, Keep moving folks, nothing to see here. Don't bother with the lies from the White House. It's those lowly IRS employees. Only the uninformed and easily gullible can believe that this Obama regime has nothing to do with this scandal.

The Ameican Thinker is crap. They can't even get the title right. The scandal is unraveling, but that's not to their liking. Peggy Noonan's WSJ column. :lamo

Peggy Noonan Discovers IRS "Bombshell" She Wrote About Two Months Ago | Blog | Media Matters for America
 
By Thomas Lifson
July 19, 2013

We can now officially say that the IRS harassment of conservative groups is a political scandal connected to the Obama political machine. Despite the best obfuscatory efforts of Obama henchmen like Rep. Elijah Cummings, yesterday the IRS scandal was tied to a political appointee of President Obama. Step-by-step the chain is being followed upward by the House Oversight Committee chaired by Rep. Darrell Issa.
Jay Carney's assurances that two rogue agents in a back office in the 27th most populous metropolis of America were the problem has been exposed as a blatant, outrageous lie. Now we know that Obama's hand-picked agent was leading the initiative, as far as the people below him in the federal apparatus knew.


Read more: Blog: IRS scandal is unraveling


As the honorable Mr. Elijah Cummings would say, Keep moving folks, nothing to see here. Don't bother with the lies from the White House. It's those lowly IRS employees. Only the uninformed and easily gullible can believe that this Obama regime has nothing to do with this scandal.




Come back when the American Stinker has some actionable information.

Nothing at the link fits into that category.




"Better days are coming." ~ But not for today's out of touch, running out of time, GOP.
 
Come back when the American Stinker has some actionable information.

Nothing at the link fits into that category.




"Better days are coming." ~ But not for today's out of touch, running out of time, GOP.

Wehrwolf is in the rightwing echo chamber. Once you enter, you never exit, and you never see reality again.
 
Wehrwolf is in the rightwing echo chamber. Once you enter, you never exit, and you never see reality again.




He really believes that the incoherent drivel that he constantly posts will somehow change the results of last November's election.

I don't agree with him on that point.




"Better days are coming." ~ But not for today's out of touch, running out of time, GOP.
 
The Ameican Thinker is crap. They can't even get the title right. The scandal is unraveling, but that's not to their liking. Peggy Noonan's WSJ column. :lamo

Peggy Noonan Discovers IRS "Bombshell" She Wrote About Two Months Ago | Blog | Media Matters for America




I don't understand what it is you're trying to show. A couple months ago she said that the "rogue agent" ploy was not something that stood up to logic. Now she is saying that there is evidence to refute the "rogue agent" lie.

This does not seem like a repetition nor does it seem like a contradiction.

She is simply updating based on the most current information.
 
I don't understand what it is you're trying to show. A couple months ago she said that the "rogue agent" ploy was not something that stood up to logic. Now she is saying that there is evidence to refute the "rogue agent" lie.

This does not seem like a repetition nor does it seem like a contradiction.

She is simply updating based on the most current information.

Almost two months ago she wrote: "Reuters reported high-level IRS officials, including its chief counsel, knew in August 2011 about the targeting."

Today she wrote: "the chief counsel of the IRS is one of only two Obama political appointees in the entire agency."

There is no "Bombshell" as the title of today's column indicates.

Rogue agents is not a lie: IRS: Two 'Rogue' Agents Responsible For 'Overly Agressive' Reviews | TPM LiveWire

The 292 in your signature should be 96. Conservatives Struggle With IRS Scandal Numbers | TPMMuckraker
 
This will likely be a wasted attempt but I'll try to clarify this for you guys anyway -

At issue isn't simply the fact that Tea Party groups were noted on BOLO lists. That aspect of things was just the first of a long train of abuses.

What was happening is that as applications came in for (c)(4) status they were divvied up as they were supposed to be. Groups which appeared to have a political agenda, based on their name or described purpose, were sent to Cincinnati. At that point certain applications were selected for additional scrutiny. Those applications ALL referred to Tea Party or something to that effect. Some of those were rejected but ones that were not rejected were then sent to Washington for further review. It was at the Washington office, which was the ultimate authority for approving these applications, where the director of that office was told to forward them once again to the IRS General Counsel. When they got to that office - the office of an Obama appointee - they went into permanent hold status. No Progressive applications were subjected to this kind of treatment.

What the Democrat members of the Oversight Committee are squawking about is that Progressive groups were on the BOLO lists too. That makes a great headline but it completely ignores the rest of the process. In essence, they are pumping out a giant smoke screen over the whole issue and, as evidenced by their behavior at yesterdays hearing, doing so in an utterly juvenile and obnoxious way.
 
Almost two months ago she wrote: "Reuters reported high-level IRS officials, including its chief counsel, knew in August 2011 about the targeting."

Today she wrote: "the chief counsel of the IRS is one of only two Obama political appointees in the entire agency."

There is no "Bombshell" as the title of today's column indicates.

Rogue agents is not a lie: IRS: Two 'Rogue' Agents Responsible For 'Overly Agressive' Reviews | TPM LiveWire

The 292 in your signature should be 96. Conservatives Struggle With IRS Scandal Numbers | TPMMuckraker



Read the audit yourself.

Numbers culled from the audit are the result of the use of "statistical samples" of all of the applications.

It is very possible that a number was listed in the audit that is an accurate quote of the work of the auditors, but is not an accurate statement of the exact number of the universe of incidents. They are pretty clear in defining these methods as they go through this report of the audit.

I do recall seeing the number 96 in the audit, but that was not the whole number of affected applications. It was only the affected applications in the representative sample.

It's really too bad that obama is a Democrat. If he were a Republican, a whole generation of wanna be Watergate reporters would be cutting their teeth on this lawless Chicago Machine Politician's violations. As it is, they just have to hold to their party loyalties and watch the transgressions occur waiting for the next political campaign when they can once again wheel out their Reporting skills to cover the Republicans.

http://www.treasury.gov/tigta/auditreports/2013reports/201310053fr.pdf
 
Last edited:
Yeah, you don't want anybody to question George's obstruction of justice and conspiracy with Issa in preparing a false report.

Too bad -- Issa opened up this can of worms, and now he's the worm in the can.


You've made an allegation regarding "George's" obstruction of Justice and a conspiracy with Issa. Can you show facts. While we are at it, are you claiming that since G.W. Bush supposedly committed a felony, it gives Obama the right to do the same?
 
Read the audit yourself.

Numbers culled from the audit are the result of the use of "statistical samples" of all of the applications.

It is very possible that a number was listed in the audit that is an accurate quote of the work of the auditors, but is not an accurate statement of the exact number of the universe of incidents. They are pretty clear in defining these methods as they go through this report of the audit.

I do recall seeing the number 96 in the audit, but that was not the whole number of affected applications. It was only the affected applications in the representative sample.

It's really too bad that obama is a Democrat. If he were a Republican, a whole generation of wanna be Watergate reporters would be cutting their teeth on this lawless Chicago Machine Politician's violations. As it is, they just have to hold to their party loyalties and watch the transgressions occur waiting for the next political campaign when they can once again wheel out their Reporting skills to cover the Republicans.

http://www.treasury.gov/tigta/auditreports/2013reports/201310053fr.pdf

You're right, they'd be scrambling for that Pulitzer prize.
 
Almost two months ago she wrote: "Reuters reported high-level IRS officials, including its chief counsel, knew in August 2011 about the targeting."

Today she wrote: "the chief counsel of the IRS is one of only two Obama political appointees in the entire agency."

There is no "Bombshell" as the title of today's column indicates.

Rogue agents is not a lie: IRS: Two 'Rogue' Agents Responsible For 'Overly Agressive' Reviews | TPM LiveWire

The 292 in your signature should be 96. Conservatives Struggle With IRS Scandal Numbers | TPMMuckraker



You are either working with old news or believing the union news later. This is a cut and paste from the letter from the IG that contains those accurate numbers in my sig line.

Treasury: IRS targeted 292 Tea Party groups, just 6 progressive groups | WashingtonExaminer.com


<snip>
Democrats had noticed that the word "progressives" was on the so-called Be On The Lookout, or BOLO, list. But the Treasury IG suggested that the list wasn't used.

The operative paragraph from the IG letter:

"Based on the information you flagged regarding the existence of a 'Progressives' entry on BOLO lists, TIGTA performed additional research which determined that six tax-exempt applications filed between May 2010 and May 2012 having the words 'progress' or 'progressive' in their names were included in the 298 cases the IRS identified as potential political cases. We also determined that 14 tax-exempt applications filed between May 2010 and May 2012 using the words 'progress' or 'progressive' in their names were not referred for added scrutiny as potential political cases. In total, 30 percent of the organizations we identified with the words 'progress' or "progressive" in their names were processed as potential political cases. In comparison, our audit found that 100 percent of the tax-exempt applications with Tea Party, Patriots, or 9/12 in their names were processed as potential political cases during the timeframe of our audit."
<snip>
 
You are either working with old news or believing the union news later. This is a cut and paste from the letter from the IG that contains those accurate numbers in my sig line.

Treasury: IRS targeted 292 Tea Party groups, just 6 progressive groups | WashingtonExaminer.com


<snip>
Democrats had noticed that the word "progressives" was on the so-called Be On The Lookout, or BOLO, list. But the Treasury IG suggested that the list wasn't used.

The operative paragraph from the IG letter:

"Based on the information you flagged regarding the existence of a 'Progressives' entry on BOLO lists, TIGTA performed additional research which determined that six tax-exempt applications filed between May 2010 and May 2012 having the words 'progress' or 'progressive' in their names were included in the 298 cases the IRS identified as potential political cases. We also determined that 14 tax-exempt applications filed between May 2010 and May 2012 using the words 'progress' or 'progressive' in their names were not referred for added scrutiny as potential political cases. In total, 30 percent of the organizations we identified with the words 'progress' or "progressive" in their names were processed as potential political cases. In comparison, our audit found that 100 percent of the tax-exempt applications with Tea Party, Patriots, or 9/12 in their names were processed as potential political cases during the timeframe of our audit."
<snip>
That's wrong, look on page 3 of the following letter to Rep.Levin from TIGTA. The Washington Examine cherry picked from the report.

TIGTA Response to Levin

Your report states that TIGTA "reviewed all 298 applications that had been identifiedas potential political cases as of May 31, 2012." (See page 10 of your report.) Yourreport includes the following breakdown of the potential political cases byorganization name: (1) 96 were "Tea Party," "9/12," or "Patriots" organizations; and(2) 202 were "Other." Why did your report not identify that liberal organizations werealso included among the 298 applications you reviewed?TIGTA did not make any characterizations
of
any organizations
in
its audit report asconservative or liberal and believes it would be inappropriate for a nonpartisanInspector General to make such judgments. Instead, our audit focused
on
thetesting
of
296
of
the 298 potential political cases (two case files were incomplete) todetermine if they were selected using the actual criteria that should have been usedby the IRS from the beginning to screen potential political cases. Those criteriawere whether the specific applications had indications
of
significant amounts
of
political campaign intervention
(a
term used
in
Treasury's Regulations). For69 percent of the 296 cases, TIGTA found that there were indications of significantpolitical campaign intervention, while
31
percent
of
the cases did not have thatevidence.
We
also reviewed samples of
501
(c)(4) cases that were not identified aspotential political cases to determine if they should have been.
We
estimate thatmore than 175 applications were not appropriately identified as potential politicalcases.TIGTA's audit report determined that certain cases were referred for potentialpolitical review because their names used terms
in
the IRS selection criteria. Wecould not tell why other organizations were selected for additional scrutiny becausethe IRS did not document specifically why the cases were forwarded to a team ofspecialists. TIGTA recommended that the IRS do so
in
the future
 
By Thomas Lifson
July 19, 2013

We can now officially say that the IRS harassment of conservative groups is a political scandal connected to the Obama political machine. Despite the best obfuscatory efforts of Obama henchmen like Rep. Elijah Cummings, yesterday the IRS scandal was tied to a political appointee of President Obama. Step-by-step the chain is being followed upward by the House Oversight Committee chaired by Rep. Darrell Issa.
Jay Carney's assurances that two rogue agents in a back office in the 27th most populous metropolis of America were the problem has been exposed as a blatant, outrageous lie. Now we know that Obama's hand-picked agent was leading the initiative, as far as the people below him in the federal apparatus knew.


Read more: Blog: IRS scandal is unraveling


As the honorable Mr. Elijah Cummings would say, Keep moving folks, nothing to see here. Don't bother with the lies from the White House. It's those lowly IRS employees. Only the uninformed and easily gullible can believe that this Obama regime has nothing to do with this scandal.

You're very impressionable, aren't you? and if want to see uninformed and gullible, look in the mirror my friend ... the rest of us want to see concrete evidence, not this circus Issa is running ... he should be out stealing cars which is what he does best, instead of wasting our time with this ...
 
You're very impressionable, aren't you? and if want to see uninformed and gullible, look in the mirror my friend ... the rest of us want to see concrete evidence, not this circus Issa is running ... he should be out stealing cars which is what he does best, instead of wasting our time with this ...




Big News In The IRS Scandal
July 19, 2013


To quickly review why the new information, which came most succinctly in a nine-page congressional letter to IRS Commissioner Daniel Werfel, is big news:


IRS Tax Exempt and Government Entities Division revenue agent Elizabeth Hofacre, left, and retired IRS tax law specialist Carter Hull testify before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on Capitol Hill on Thursday.

When the scandal broke two months ago, in May, IRS leadership in Washington claimed the harassment of tea-party and other conservative groups requesting tax-exempt status was confined to the Cincinnati office, where a few rogue workers bungled the application process. Lois Lerner, then the head of the exempt organizations unit in Washington, said “line people in Cincinnati” did work that was “not so fine.” They asked questions that “weren’t really necessary,” she claimed, and operated without “the appropriate level of sensitivity.” But the targeting was “not intentional.” Ousted acting commissioner Steven Miller also put it off on “people in Cincinnati.” They provided “horrible customer service.”

House investigators soon talked to workers in the Cincinnati office, who said everything they did came from Washington. Elizabeth Hofacre, in charge of processing tea-party applications in Cincinnati, told investigators that her work was overseen and directed by a lawyer in the IRS Washington office named Carter Hull.

Now comes Mr. Hull’s testimony. And like Ms. Hofacre, he pointed his finger upward. Mr. Hull—a 48-year IRS veteran and an expert on tax exemption law—told investigators that tea-party applications under his review were sent upstairs within the Washington office, at the direction of Lois Lerner.​

[Excerpt]

Read more:
Big News In The IRS Scandal | Off The Ripp

So you claim that Ms. Hofacre and Mr. Hull perjured themselves before a Congressional investigative committee?
And certainly we all want to see concrete evidence. That's if Obama and his cronies will allow us to get it. It seems that those employees accused of the crime are claiming orders were issued directly by White House appointees. Perhaps Ms. Lerner will be able to shed more light on the subject.
 
The Ameican Thinker is crap. They can't even get the title right. The scandal is unraveling, but that's not to their liking. Peggy Noonan's WSJ column. :lamo

Peggy Noonan Discovers IRS "Bombshell" She Wrote About Two Months Ago | Blog | Media Matters for America

Counter American Thinker by mocking its credability and then posting Media Matters...

images
 
Counter American Thinker by mocking its credability and then posting Media Matters...

images


Okay, I shouldn't have called the American Thinker crap, I was wrong in doing so. However, their pieces are opinions and they rarely use external links to back up anything they say. Media Matters OTOH provides external links, video, audio and transcripts to back everything they assert.
 
You've made an allegation regarding "George's" obstruction of Justice and a conspiracy with Issa. Can you show facts. While we are at it, are you claiming that since G.W. Bush supposedly committed a felony, it gives Obama the right to do the same?

We know the facts: Issa contacted George, a republican operative in the IRS, who produced a false report that purposely held back information that showed the IRS was targeting progressive groups.

Now we need an investigation to see how Issa and George colluded. Suddenly you don't like investigations, I see. Tough luck. I hear Reid is contemplating one.
 
That's wrong, look on page 3 of the following letter to Rep.Levin from TIGTA. The Washington Examine cherry picked from the report.

TIGTA Response to Levin



What is your thesis then? That the agency is ultimately corrupt and the Obama administration froze the approvals for the TEA Party applications when they were referred to the White House guy, but the number of the criminal actions was not as high as originally counted?

The mass murderer killed far fewer than the 100's we originally thought so the 100 or so killed is okay.

Do you know that there is still not one single non-conservative group that complained to their representatives that it was being treated poorly by the IRS?
 
Corruption and illegal bull****? In our government? It can't be!

This administration is truly full of utter morons if they honestly thought none of their shenanigans would leak out.
 
I honestly think Obama could step out tomorrow and say " yea I did it, what of it" and there would still be left wing lunatics that woudl support him, including Democrat Congressmen who would refuse to impeach.
 
We know the facts: Issa contacted George, a republican operative in the IRS, who produced a false report that purposely held back information that showed the IRS was targeting progressive groups.

Now we need an investigation to see how Issa and George colluded. Suddenly you don't like investigations, I see. Tough luck. I hear Reid is contemplating one.

If what you claim is true, knowing what the Democratic Party was and is like, why didn't they take Bush and Issa to task over 5 years ago. This is like the Progressive plant in the Houston TEA Party Rally that you touted and were found out. If you can't prove what you're claiming send in the phonies like Renee Vaughn. Will you be submitting phony papers like Dan Rather to prove your point?
 
Back
Top Bottom