By Douglas V. Gibbs
When the IRS was caught red-handed targeting conservative groups, and it turns out that the designed assault upon The Right frightened republican donors from giving up much needed funding during the presidential election of 2012 and may have very well influenced the outcome of the election, for those allied with the Tea Party it confirmed what conservatives always believed. As the scandal deepened, and then IRS Chief Lois Lerner not only denied knowledge, but claimed that the IRS had not even considered targeting Obama's opposition, relegating the responsibility down to a few renegade employees in Ohio, the distrust of the IRS heightened. Then, while questioned by Congress, after denying any wrongdoing and knowledge, Lerner pleaded the Fifth, for fear of incriminating herself if she said anything more.
Something was being hidden, conservatives believed, and despite all liberal left cries to the contrary, the investigation moved forward.
Barack Obama, at this stage, as he has done with any scandal, to reduce questions regarding his involvement, distanced himself from the scandal, and even created other situations as distractions. The compliant media participated as well, though showing some disagreement with what had happened when the scandal first emerged.
As with other scandals, the Republicans recognized that the smoking gun probably existed in communications between various members of the Obama administration, be it by memo, or emails. Their investigation began to chase after these alleged communications, and conveniently, the communications turned out not only to be gone, but through a technical error described as the crash of a hard drive.
The common sense of the average individual in society, and the knowledge of those that have spent time on the inside, cried foul. Is the government so inept that it can't even keep record of important IRS emails, yet claims to be effective enough to handle everyone's medical records in line with Obamacare?
Reality dictates that the emails are not lost. Emails are not stored on a single hard drive. There are servers used, and multiple storage locations. The only key would be finding them as the government used a strategy of duck and dodge, while throwing up distraction after distraction to get the people to the point that they just didn't care anymore. Emails are the least of the Obama administration's concerns, when dreams of political domination and eliminating the existence of the GOP is on their plate.
Thankfully, the Republicans have not given up. As the Veterans Affairs scandal, Benghazi, and the Berdahl prisoner swap emerged to create a blitzkrieg that may derail the GOP's investigation into a scandal that Americans on both sides of the political spectrum were at one point angry about, the republicans have moved forward, demanding answers, and demanding the missing emails.
The latest decisive hammer to drop has fallen upon IRS Commissioner John Koskinen, as he thrashes in the waters of lies and deception by the democrats while the GOP uses hearings to find the emails tied to the agency's tea party targeting scandal that have allegedly disappeared.
The emails, covering the period January 2009 to April 2011, belonging to former IRS head Lois Lerner, are vital pieces of evidence that can reveal the liberal left Democrat Party's devious scheme to single out conservative groups for special scrutiny, and that the scheme was guided by members of Congress and Obama administration officials outside the IRS.
The request for the emails went out over a year ago, and the democrats shuffled their feet, refusing to answer subpoenas, until they had hatched their story about the destruction of the emails. According to House Oversight Committee Chairman Representative Darrell Issa, "...we subpoenaed the emails in August 2013 and again in February 2014." He accused those involved of covering up the fact they were missing, and only came forward to fess up after having been caught red-handed."
"You personally did not cause the targeting," he told current IRS chief Koskinen, "You personally did not destroy the emails. But by your actions and your deception, you now own this scandal."
In the world we the people live in that would be called "obstruction of justice," and is a very serious offense.
"We have a problem with you," Issa sniped, "and you have a problem maintaining your credibility."
IRS Commissioner John Koskinen maintains that there are no back-ups, and that the loss of Lerner's emails was due to an oddly timed glitch.
Other subpoenas have gone out, including White House lawyer Jennifer O'Connor, who, through her boss, told Congress she will not appear.
Refusing to appear is also a big deal in the real world, but these people seem to believe they are above the law. But with failure to provide information and records, Lerner's refusal to testify, and the refusal of others to testify, it leaves the investigators no choice but to believe that something is being hidden. How convenient that the smoking gun in the form of emails have suddenly disappeared, and not just any emails, but specifically the emails subpoena'd over a year ago. Sure, it is not unusual for computers to fail, as Koskinen has testified, but that is exactly why government has so many back up systems in place.
Koskinen claims just this year alone, partly due to budget cuts and the IRS using obsolete equipment as a result of limited funding, over 2,000 employees have suffered hard drive crashes.
Yet, these are the same people in charge of keeping our tax records straight. These are the people trusted to enforce the Obamacare fine. . . tax . . . penalty. . . unconstitutionally mandated payment for a federal intrusion into the private industry forced upon the people of the United States. And remember, this is just a small, failed part of a much bigger federal government that tells you that you need more government, that they can be trusted to run our lives, and force their policies upon us.
The obvious, however, is not that they are incompetent, or that their aged equipment has failed. The truth is much more sinister than that. The truth is that the democrats are hiding the truth, that they purposely targeted Obama's enemies with the goal of punishing his enemies, and politically annihilating them. All hands on deck were aware, and are participating. Lies, deception, and totalitarian dreams.
We are only seeing the tip of the iceberg regarding the corruption, lies, and lawlessness of the Obama regime and his democrat minions. The truth is being covered up. America is being lied to, including those that believe Obama to be the second coming of whatever savior they believe him to be. All Americans are being lied to, all Americans are being used as tools in a scheme to maneuver the democrats into a socialist scheme of power only used by tyrants and dictators.
As Issa hammered home, "So the American people should believe that if they don't have the resources to pay their taxes, they shouldn't pay their taxes, because if the IRS doesn't have the resources, it won't keep records?. . . resources are a question of whether or not you retain key documents."
Like Obama on every scandal that comes his way, Koskinen insists that he did not know what was going on, and he had only been told that there was an issue that no one knew the ramifications of.
"The first time I knew that emails had been lost from her account was in April."
So it is safe to say the federal government, who tells us they are the salvation of society, and that their ruling elitism is necessary for our country to run properly, don't know jack about anything.
"My time has expired," Issa interjected while Koskinen spoke. "And I've lost my patience with you."
I have a flash drive that can save eight gigs of information, but the government can't even keep track of a few emails. Are they that technology impaired? The answer is no. They are simply that bad at lying.
"They’re stored somewhere," Koskinen then said at one point. "They get taken off and stored in servers... we can find Lois Lerner’s emails."
The republicans howled over this, since Koskinen had previously testified that the emails were gone for good, and that the IRS had 'recycled' the hard drive.
Audible gasps echoed throughout the hearing room as he voiced that admission.
Government rules require IRS offices to back up email messages to 'a separate electronic record keeping system.'
During Friday's Ways and Means hearing, when Koskinen was indicating the emails were lost forever, Republican Representative Paul Ryan insisted, "Nobody believes you."
Lerner is already charged with Contempt of Congress for refusing to answer a subpoena from Issa by testifying about a years-long scheme to use the IRS to hamstring conservative groups.
"I believe Lois Lerner is hiding something," Issa said.
"I believe the Justice Department, the IRS, and the White House are interested in her succeeding in hiding what she’s hiding, which is targeting of conservative groups based on their ideology in support of the president’s war on Citizens United, a Supreme Court decision that he didn’t like."
"This is something he vehemently opposes," Issa said, "and Lois Lerner acted on his opposition."
He also suggested the Obama administration is aware that his committee's investigation into the IRS is getting perilously close to the White House itself.
"Could it lead to political operatives of the president?" he asked. "Yes."
Koskinen insisted that the IRS is working as fast as possible to give Congress all of Lerner's emails and won't apologize for the loss of countless documents because of a claimed computer crash.
Former Internal Revenue Service official Lois Lerner has invoked the Fifth Amendment twice while under subpoena to avoid testifying about her role in the tea party targeting scandal.
Congressman Issa said in response to all of this, "a year ago, when news broke that the IRS had targeted Americans because of their political beliefs, President Obama pledged, 'we will work with Congress as it performs its oversight role.'"
"I’m disappointed that one year later, the White House has attempted to block this Committee’s first request for voluntary cooperation from a White House official."
Obstruction of justice.
And they will not get cooperation from the White House, not because there was no wrong doing, but exactly for the opposite reason. . . and because the democrats believe they are above the law, they believe they do not have to answer for any wrong doing, because lying, cheating, corruption, and illegal activity is acceptable in their eyes when it is for the purpose of protecting, and promoting the liberal left agenda. It is the liberal left democrats from of the Muslim practice of taqiyya.
'We have a problem with you, and you have a problem maintaining your credibility': House Republicans slam IRS commissioner as they subpoena a White House lawyer in 'missing emails' case - U.K. Daily Mail
