Darrell Issa's IRS Investigation Is Falling Apart

[marmar]

(Bloomberg Businessweek) When Republicans won control of the House of Representatives in 2010, Representative Darrell Issa of California was supposed to become a star. Issa, who made no secret of his ambition, took over the Oversight and Government Reform Committee, vowing to use the power of his chairmanship to stage hundreds of hearings and hold the Obama administration to account. Anticipating what he promised would be “constant battle,” the White House hired extra lawyers and braced for the onslaught.

But Issa wasn’t the force people expected him to be. His biggest investigation, into the botched anti-gun smuggling operation that left a Border Patrol agent dead, incited right-wing talk radio listeners. Beyond that, though, it barely registered. After two years in power, Issa seemed more bark than bite.

Then came last month’s revelation that IRS agents had singled out Tea Party groups for special scrutiny. Here was an issue that seized public attention and posed a legitimate threat to Obama. Since then, nobody in Congress has pushed harder than Issa to pin the scandal on the White House.

But after a burst of attention, Issa’s investigation appears to have stalled. Although he turned up embarrassing material—has any government official been humiliated quite like the IRS commissioner in the dorky video dressed up as Spock?—Issa hasn’t made the all-important connection to the White House. And he may not be able to. The news this week that he won’t release the full transcripts of his interviews with IRS officials—interviews he selectively quoted from to imply White House complicity—suggests that what they contain may in fact exonerate the administration of the very charge Issa is laboring so hard to prosecute. .....................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-06-13/darrell-issas-irs-investigation-is-falling-apart#r=rss

[liberal N proud]

1. Which is why we are suddenly talking about a 2006 news story as if it happened today.

[TheMadMonk]

23. It's not quite the same story. It's confirmation from horse's mouth.

It's both and neither. It needed exposure to light of day.

It damned well needs to be debated, and in a fair world, amendments to control the entire Alphabet Soup would be swiftly amended to the Bill of Rights.

[KharmaTrain]

2. He'll Find Another Goose To Chase...

...Issa's the reincarnation of Disco Danny Burton who kept trying to find shit to throw and stick on President Clinton. Issa's struck out with Fast & Furious & Benghazi and now this one but he's surely got yet another "scandal" that he'll be "investigating". While he looks the fool to the majority of Americans and represents the absolute dysfunction the House has become, the great unhinged love the dude. He's their hero and if he fails it's only cause its some kind of conspiracy. They're throwing lots of money at him and his star rises with every shitstorm he creates.

The game here is to create so many faux scandals as to distract the corporate media and try to paint this administration as corrupt and/or inept. Issa's showtrial hearings have been red meat for a media bored in reporting about the economy or gun control and gets the food flying. Issa knows it and the rushpublicans know that when the news is loaded with these "scandals" it prevents the administration from getting their message out...

[Atman]

11. Excellent post. They really don't care what sticks.

To their constituents (read: fools), these "scandals" never go away. They just tack them onto the previous non-event, blame the "MSM" for covering up for Obama, and chant the litany of scandals whenever anyone tries to say something positive about the President. The larger goal is to make sure the base ties all these scandals to "the Democrats" in the run-up to 2016. It works.

The other day I posted the Hannity video on FB, the one which shows him praising the NSA under Bush, but excoriating Obama for it. I made no comment, just posted the video. One of my friends (a Floridian, another Repub who claims he's not) replied, saying "I knew it! As soon as I heard this NSA scandal, I wondered how long before someone blamed Bush!" Even though I blamed no one, I just posted Hannity talking.

The Obama derangement syndrome is real. There's even a lot of it right here on DU.

[Iggo]

19. ASSOCIATIONS!

[xchrom]

3. du rec.

[graham4anything]

4. every single smear has failed and in fact backfired. In 2014, the dems will win the house and send

and send Isaa packing his bags and giving up the gavel.

[edhopper]

7. The GOP

has gerrymandered too many safe districts for that to happen.
Add to that the traditional low Dem turnout in midterms and it won't happen.

[graham4anything]

9. Martin Luther King Jr was told he couldn't. Obama was told he couldn't. THEY DID

Why can't it happen?

Register new voters, get out all the voters

Have from say May 2014 til Nov. 2014, every single day, have President Obama, Biden, Kerry, Senator Cory Booker,
have President Bill Clinton and next President Hillary Clinton out there 24/7/365 imploring the voters to vote

SO why can't it happen?

The 18 can come from blue states

They don't need to come from the red states at all.

ALL of the house is up for election.

Just say yes, and not that it can't.

[Voice for Peace]

16. +++

never say never

[edhopper]

27. Howard Dean had a plan for this

but the Dems have abandoned his 50 State strategy.
Truthfully, I don't know what the Dems message is.
"Stop the GOP from screwing things up more" will not get the people to come out in force.
If the Dems had acted like Dems from the beginning and not Republican lite, maybe then.
But I don't think it is realistic right now. Maybe in 8 - 10 years.

[graham4anything]

29. the 18 can come from a few states, not necessarily all states. We don't need all. Just 18.

and Howard Dean is a good member of Team Obama.
as for the other, any vote not for the democratic vote in the congress, is a vote against the democratic vote.

It's not like Rand Paul will ever once side with anything I want, so we don't need his vote, we need to defeat his vote and render
him poltically obsolete in the voting booth in 2016. Surely there is one person in Kentucky that could beat him, being that if
he wasn't given 35% more money than his opponent, he never would have squeaked through a victory in the first place.
He can be defeated in 2016 in his senate race, if he actually goes for reelection.

[Mr. David]

12. Gerrymandering or not. Voter education is still KEY.

There may be some *sane* Republicans who may not like what they are seeing in Congress.

So need to do a lot of knocking and introducing themselves...

When they aim a gun at you, they've gone too far and you move on.

It's that simple.

[Half-Century Man]

17. If you want to change that, be active

Think of it a political jogging.

[NewJeffCT]

20. I hope you're right

I'd be ecstatic if Dems picked up seats in the House and held onto the Senate. If Dems can pick up seats and Hillary runs against a radical rightie, Dems could win the House in 2016.

[edhopper]

32. That is more realistic.

Mid terms are usually bad for the party with a Pres. in power.

[NewJeffCT]

33. Usually, they are

but, Republicans overreached with Clinton and lost seats in 1998... they're overreaching now as well, but will Dems capitalize on it?

[edhopper]

34. If they actually addressed things

like jobs, infrastructure, gun control and really going after Wall Street, maybe. But the seem to want to be Rockefeller Republicans these days.

[kentuck]

5. Because the truth will totally demoralize his followers.

and create a backlash within the Republican Party by the tea Party faithful.

[Downwinder]

6. Wasn't a good car thief either.

[malaise]

8. You mean ReTHUG Grand Theft Auto Issa?

[niyad]

10. except the irs did not "single out" tea party groups. as I recall, there were some progressive

groups on that list, as well. but that part is okay, I guess.

[Atman]

13. Even split 3 ways.

Progressive groups, Tea Bag groups, non-partisan groups. But that fact is rarely mentioned in the media supposedly "covering" for the administration. It doesn't fit the GOP scandal narrative.

[Thinkingabout]

14. There is a scandal, a scandal created by Darrel Issa, he has targeted Democrats with lies he

is not able to prove and still lying to carry his pursuit of a lie which lies in his own mind. Thank to Cummings for revealing the truth.

[CanonRay]

15. That's generally happens to a house of cards

Issa is such an opportunistic asshole

[Iliyah]

18. Issa do have another "scandal"

State Department prostitution and child rape which is a valid investigation in my opinion. Of course they will tie it to Pres O and their main focus Hillary Clinton.

NSA will never go away. Like the GOPs, they will and has lied in your face for decades. Unfortunately we are living in paranoid times. Y'think the 21th century would be the beginning of peace, love, and justice for the whole world, but nad, its the usual "its them against us".

IRS and Benghazi was a no go. Yes investigate them and find ways to better the security for embassies and by all means fix the IRS and that should have been the purpose, but noooooooo, Issa and the GOPers had to tie them to Pres O with two and Clinton with the one. Instead of trying to help Americans recover, the GOPers are busily trying to take away female rights concerning their body, voter rights, worker rights, jam their form of Christianity on us, cutting SNAP, and on and on.

[SCVDem]

21. Today is supposed to be the day

Show us the transcripts!

YOUR PAPERS PLEASE!

[Skip Intro]

22. The IRS didn't apologize for nothing. Lerner didn't take the 5th for nothing.

What is the truth?

[DuckBurp]

25. The IRS apologized because they were told to so do.

Lerner took the fifth because she had nothing to gain by testifying.

[Cali_Democrat]

28. Angry another faux scandal is biting the dust?

[geek tragedy]

31. I don't know who's more upset that the IRS story is fizzling, Skip or Issa.

Last edited Fri Jun 14, 2013, 05:51 PM - Edit history (1)

What power given the government (given, because the power of the government is bestowed upon it by the people) allows it to take money from the person who earned, and give it to someone else?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=1387643

[geek tragedy]

30. LMAO. Let's do the Time Warp

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x5071884

I have to ask, is it legal for a pastor to endorse a political candidate, in a church?
Many here were concerned about rw "preachers" pushing bush, because that was, as I recall, somehow illegal.

Anyone who has seen the particular youtube video of Wright praising Obama and slamming Hillary, for being white it seemed to me, would have to be blind to not see that as a campaign event for Obama.

Would we stand for a pastor praising in direct language g w bush, while slamming Kerry? Many here were upset about that. But if it was wrong, or even in violation of campaign laws, then, wouldn't that also be the case with Wright?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=5071884&mesg_id=5072093

However, I did read the rest of your post. They will go after Wright, you're right about that. But no, I don't think this has anything to do with repukes going after Dem pastors, preachers, etc. Wright opened himself up to this controversy.

[DuckBurp]

24. There never was any "there" there.

TIGTA's characterization that the IRS was "targeting" conservative organizations was wrong from the get-go.

[clarice]

26. I heard that Mr. Issa suffers from Eurotophobia . Just a rumor ? nt

[reusrename]

35. I didn't know that.

Had to look that one up.