By Tim Newton
It seemed fairly light, but still overreach at first, with a simple apology by the Chief IRS Director over non-profit organizations admitting that conservative groups had been targeted for extra scrutiny. As it has grown, we now know that this overreach was extremely overbearing and details show a great deal of harassment. It was not however just the overreach of targeting groups that has so many individuals upset, the scandal continues to grow in force and shines more light on the lack of transparency and accountability both in the IRS and in the Obama administration.
We now know that Lois Lerner had a planted questioner ask her about questions that had been asked in the media about the IRS and Tea Party Groups and she issued an apology, This came just days after her hearing before the Ways and Means Committee herself and right before the Inspector General's report on the IRS's mishandling on Tea Party and conservative groups requests for tax exemption. She has now stated that when she appears before the house she will plead the fifth. This of course comes from the most transparent administration in history. Her current position after being head of this besieged department? She is now the head of the division which has been charged with helping to implement Obamacare.
Some senators see the overreach of the IRS as too much, and that they must be held accountable. Senator Dean Heller (R-NV) has introduced a bill to cut funding to increase IRS agents as requested by Obamacare.
He stated:
"News that the IRS has been targeting conservative groups violated the trust that the American people place in their government. Nevadans are already concerned about ObamaCare, so the fact that Congress could hand over even more power to an agency under intense scrutiny to enforce the health care law is deeply concerning. The ‘IRS Accountability Act’ suspends funding for new ObamaCare IRS agents because right now we can’t trust the IRS to do its job"
Then we were told by the Obama administration that they had no knowledge of it . We now know that administration officials knew at least three weeks beforehand. Apparently his aids did not inform him of the scandal so he did not "interfere" with the ongoing investigation. Why does our president seem to not know about everything that is going on in his administration? But as we also learned last weekend Obama has had no hand in running government in the last four years to begin with ;).
Now it wouldn't be as bad if this was just a targeting issue, as we learned from the hearings last week before the House Committee on Ways and Means that it wasn't just targeting, but a great deal of harassment including asking for the content of possible prayers that members of the group may pray, voluminous amounts of records, financial details of members, along with audits of businesses and individuals involved with these organizations.
Details keep emerging in this case but the further it goes, the deeper it gets for the Obama administration, as scandals within the departments of Treasury, Justice, and State continue to be investigated. The Senate's Finance committee sent a bipartisan letter requesting large amounts of documents to be released to the public after hearing from large numbers of non profit groups.It has even extended to a further scandal of investigating and threatening prosecution against a Fox News reporter for an investigation he was conducting. The Justice Department hole keeps being dug deeper, and the time for restraint of the government by the people is need now more than ever.
