The man who led the Internal Revenue Service when it was inappropriately scrutinizing conservative groups' applications for tax-exempt status said Tuesday that he intentionally kept himself in the dark about those kinds of decisions because he thought, as a political appointee, he should keep his distance.
An attorney for the high-ranking IRS official who ignited the agency's political targeting scandal with a public apology this month plans to invoke her right to remain silent instead of answering questions from top House investigators on Wednesday.
You know you are a serious societal pestilence when even politicians can kick you around. Which is why the Senate Finance Committee called Steven Miller, former acting IRS commissioner, to testify about the agency's scheme targeting conservatives for tax punishment.
Democratic lawmakers on the Senate Finance Committee said Tuesday the IRS, while engaging in "unacceptable" targeting of conservative groups, may have been set up for failure by campaign finance law ambiguities that allowed tax-exempt groups to engage in partisan politics without disclosing their donors.
Yes, President Obama's birth certificate was made public two years ago and even emblazoned upon a Democratic fundraiser coffee mug during the 2012 presidential campaign. But the "birther" issue which so intrigued Donald Trump has yet to disappear.
Every few years, at least from the time of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, there is a scandal involving abuse of power at the Internal Revenue Service.
The Republicans who can't wait to talk impeachment should sit down, shut up, and be patient. President Obama may yet deserve impeachment, but we're not there yet. Patience, as anyone old enough to remember Watergate knows, is how this game is played.
There is an old proverb that goes something like this: From the mouths of babes and drunks comes the truth. It is pretty dated. If you were to create that proverb today, you might have to include politicians and their advisers.
With each developing scandal, the picture of an arrogant administration abusing its power grows clearer.
